552: The Hidden Psychology That’s Sabotaging Your Health Decisions | Amanda Montell
The Genius Life
Max Lugavere
4.7 • 5K Ratings
🗓️ 18 February 2026
⏱️ 66 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Amanda Montell—linguist, bestselling author of Wordslut, Cultish, and The Age of Magical Overthinking, and host of the podcasts Sounds Like a Cult and Magical Overthinkers—joins Max to unpack the cognitive biases, culty language, and hidden psychological traps that distort our thinking and fuel anxiety in the age of information.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | What up everybody? It's episode 552 of the genius life. Let's go. |
| 0:23.8 | What's going on everybody? I'm your host, Max Lugamere. What is the genius life? The genius life. What's going on everybody? |
| 0:28.2 | I'm your host, Max Lugavir, and welcome back to The Genius Life, a show where we get a little healthier, a little sharper, and a little less emotionally hijacked by the internet. |
| 0:32.7 | Today I'm joined by Amanda Montel. |
| 0:34.7 | She's a fellow podcaster, fellow L.A.ish neighbor, and the rare person who can make |
| 0:39.2 | linguistics, cult behavior, and cognitive biases feel like a page turner. You know her from |
| 0:44.7 | Wardsla, cultish, and the Age of Magical O overthinking, her hit books, plus her podcast sounds |
| 0:49.9 | like a cult and magical overthinkers. In this conversation, Amanda breaks down why, even with |
| 0:55.7 | unlimited information at our fingertips, so many of us feel more confused, anxious, and burnt out |
| 1:00.8 | than ever, especially around health. We dig into the brain's magic tricks like confirmation bias, |
| 1:05.5 | the halo effect, negativity bias, and the illusory truth effect. We also talk about how wellness culture can get kind of culty at times, the language patterns that should set off your internal alarm, and how to tune out the noise and focus on the big levers that actually move the needle. Listen all the way through to the end, you're not going to want to miss a beat. And as always, please consider sharing this episode with friends and loved ones who may benefit from it. And if you're enjoying the show, please leave a regular review, subscribe on your podcast app, and follow along on YouTube. |
| 1:33.9 | And separately, if you want my free weekly newsletter where I break down research, share practical health tools, and send out occasional discounts, join 120,000 plus readers at maxelugavir.com slash newsletter. |
| 1:45.3 | And now with all that out of the way, here's episode 552 with Amanda Montel. |
| 1:51.1 | Let's rock. |
| 1:52.0 | Amanda Montel, what's going on? |
| 1:53.0 | Welcome. |
| 1:53.5 | Oh, hey, thanks. |
| 1:54.5 | How you doing? |
| 1:55.3 | Doing good. |
| 1:56.7 | Neighbor fellow podcaster. |
| 1:58.9 | Yeah, neighbor-ish. |
| 2:06.0 | Neighbor-ish. Neighbor-ish a different zip code but a similar similar similar climate you do have an arrow on so I mean technically we're not that our |
... |
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