Mind Games

1. Introducing: Mind Games Trailer

   Show notes

   Mind Games tells the story of NLP and its crazy cast of disciples, including the fake doctor who invented it at a New Age commune, took it to Fortune 500 boardrooms, and whose gruesome murder trial did little to stop its rise. The biggest mind game of all? NLP may actually work.

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   Jan 12, 2026 3 min

Season 1

1. The Guru’s Guru

   Episode 1

   Show notes

   What if someone told you that you could skip years of therapy with a few mental tricks? It sounded impossible… until we found Neuro-Linguistic Programming. NLP is a form of hypnosis beloved by everyone from sex cults to the U.S. military to fortune 500 companies–yet almost no one knows it exists.

   Long before she co-founded NXIVM, hypnotist Nancy Salzman encountered NLP as a radical method for reprogramming the mind. Her story leads us to its inventor, Richard Bandler, a volatile, self-made guru. As we dig into how it took hold in so many places, we face an unsettling possibility: NLP might actually work.

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   Jan 20, 2026 43 min

2. The Drummer with the Knives

   Episode 2

   Show notes

   1970s Santa Cruz, California–a world of barefoot psychology students, mountain communes, and underground therapy sessions led by a charismatic but troubled young man: Richard Bandler. We go back to the moment Neuro-Linguistic Programming was born, and meet a teenage misfit rocker whose talent for persuasion came with a dangerous edge. We hear from the Bandler’s early followers, including one woman who ended up tied to a burning cross in a therapy game gone wrong. As the origins of NLP come into focus, another question emerges: how did a fringe experiment in an alternative college town grow into a global force for both transformation and manipulation?

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   Jan 27, 2026 40 min

3. All In Your Head

   Episode 3

   Show notes

   Could a few words really change your mind–or your memories? Zoë tests hypnosis on herself, trying to unlock memories of her late father. Alice experiments with NLP to calm her anxiety around giving birth. Meanwhile, they chart the spread of NLP from therapy groups into corporate America, where it made its founders rich. But does NLP really work, or is this just the placebo effect?

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   Feb 3, 2026 42 min

4. The Self-Help Empire

   Episode 4

   Show notes

   How do you turn mind games into hundreds of millions of dollars? We ask Tony Robbins, who discovered Neuro-Linguistic Programming, adapted its techniques, and built an empire of infomercials and firewalking, all while spawning a self-optimization craze he’s ambivalent about today. Meanwhile, Alice tests NLP on Zoë’s mom to see if they can use Bandler’s techniques to conquer an unusual fear.

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   Feb 10, 2026 38 min

5. A Human Technology

   Episode 5

   Show notes

   In the 1980s, the U.S. Army was in a weird place. So weird, it was willing to hire Richard Bandler and Tony Robbins to try to turn ordinary soldiers into expert marksmen in just a few days with NLP. Zoë hits the shooting range with an NLP expert to see if she can become a sharpshooter. Plus, the little-known NLP backstory behind another psychological technique the military still actively uses: EMDR.

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   Feb 17, 2026 27 min

6. Murder in Santa Cruz

   Episode 6

   Show notes

   Three people walked into a room…only two came out alive. In 1986, Richard Bandler was charged with murdering a woman in his inner circle. We dig into the trial that nearly sank Neuro-Linguistic Programming, the unsolved mystery of what really happened that night, and how Bandler walked away acquitted while the technique he fathered only grew more infamous.

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   Feb 24, 2026 38 min

7. The Pickup Artist Playbook

   Episode 7

   Show notes

   A new group of fans flocked to NLP in the 90s: pickup artists. At the center of the movement was Ross Jeffries, a hypnotist and purported expert in getting women into bed. Jeffries lets Zoë in on the secret to his success, as she and Alice grapple with the realization that maybe they, as journalists, have more in common with pickup artists than they’d like to admit.

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   Mar 3, 2026 36 min

8. NXIVM

   Episode 8

   Show notes

   How did Neuro-Linguistic Programming become an indoctrination tool for one of the most notorious sex cults of the 21st century? Co-founder Nancy Salzman reveals how she brought NLP to NXIVM, and how leader Keith Raniere—now serving a 120-year sentence for sex trafficking and other crimes—turned the methods against her.

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   Mar 10, 2026 39 min

9. Meeting Bandler

   Episode 9

   Show notes

   After following Neuro-Linguistic Programming from a groovy West Coast commune to the inner circles of NXIVM, we track down its elusive creator, Richard Bandler. Our search leads us to a London seminar, where Alice experiences his techniques firsthand. Finally, we hear from the man himself and decide once and for all if NLP is a tool worth using, or a pseudoscientific hustle best left alone.

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   Mar 17, 2026 47 min

1. From How to Life Forever: The Longevinauts

   Show notes

   When an astrologer tells Mangesh that he’ll (probably) die early, he takes it in stride. But his family and friends (not to mention all the Don’t Die longevity influencers on his FYP) feel differently… and besides, if science can keep his brain sharp and his tennis game strong for longer, why not take advantage? So he visits Dr. Nir Barzelai, the world’s leading aging researcher, and Dr. Ron Primas, an elite longevity doctor, to figure out what he should do. Plus: A chat with Ken Reid from TV Guidance Counselor about age in pop culture, from the Golden Girls to “I’ve fallen and I can’t get up.”

   Disclosure: The experts we spoke with want to be clear that although they have some minor quibbles with Bryan Johnson, they’re grateful for the fact that he’s started the conversation on longevity. Any insinuation that he’s got weird vibes is ours.

   • Listen to Ken Reid’s podcast, TV Guidance Counselor
   • Learn more about Nir Barzelai’s Longevity Genes Project and his book, Age Later
   • Learn more about Ron Primas’s longevity and concierge medicine practice
   • Read Cynthia Kenyon’s groundbreaking 1993 study of worm longevity
   • Check out the Ray Kurzweil Library

   Special thanks to Azadi Records and Bliss Samsa for their beautiful tracks, and Botany for the score.

   Episode collage art by Vahini Shori.

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   Aug 4, 2026 51 min

2. NEW FROM THE BUILDERS: Elon Musk: "Humans Won't Be in Control" When AI Becomes Smarter Than Us

   Show notes

   Elon Musk has spent his career turning improbable ideas into companies that reshape the world. To some, the entrepreneur behind Tesla and SpaceX is an engineering genius whose ambitions have transformed electric cars and space travel. To others, his politics and extraordinary influence raise serious questions about the future he is building. Either way, the world’s first trillionaire is betting Tesla’s future on AI and humanoid robots, and SpaceX’s on life beyond Earth.

   In this season’s debut episode, Walter asks Musk about DOGE regrets, why he believes robots will solve America’s national debt, and the dark politics that have consumed his own platform, X. Along the way, Musk shares why living in a simulation demands that we all be less boring. A candid conversation about the imagination, drive and contradictions of a man determined to turn his vision into our future.

   Interview taped August 6, 2026.

   And be sure to pick up Walter Isaacson’s The Innovators: How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses, and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution, wherever fine books are sold.

   ABOUT THE HOST
   Walter Isaacson is the bestselling author of biographies of Elon Musk, Jennifer Doudna, Leonardo da Vinci, Steve Jobs, Benjamin Franklin, and Albert Einstein. He is a professor of history at Tulane University and previously served as CEO of the Aspen Institute, chair and CEO of CNN, and editor of Time. He was awarded the National Humanities Medal in 2023.

   IN THIS SEASON
   Elon Musk (Tesla, SpaceX, xAI)
   Peter Thiel (Founders Fund, PayPal, Palantir)
   Mustafa Suleyman (Microsoft AI, DeepMind)
   Dario Amodei and Daniela Amodei (Anthropic)
   and more!

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   Oct 29, 2026 40 min