Is emotional regulation always a good thing? with Julie Bowen and Aliza Pressman episode artwork

EPISODE · Aug 25, 2026 · 55 MIN

Is emotional regulation always a good thing? with Julie Bowen and Aliza Pressman

from ReThinking

 Julie Bowen is an Emmy Award-winning actress best known from her roles as Claire on Modern Family and Virginia in Happy Gilmore. She’s also a former host of the podcast Quitters, which she eventually quit. In this episode, Adam and Julie are joined by developmental psychologist Aliza Pressman for a delightful conversation about authenticity, emotional intelligence, and parenting. Julie makes the case for why sometimes quitting is the most mature thing to do, and shares what she’s learned from coaching her sons through commitments they no longer wanted to uphold. She interrogates Adam about his inability to get angry, and he and Aliza speculate on what would happen if everyone was perfectly emotionally regulated. The three also reflect on the difficult truth that you cannot change how others act, and explore strategies for teaching kids (and yourself) how to handle conflict between the values you hold and the way you actually behave.Featured guestsFollow Julie Bowen on Instagram and TikTokFollow Aliza Pressman on Instagram, LinkedIn, Substack, and at draliza.com/Connect with the teamFollow Adam on Instagram, LinkedIn, and at adamgrant.net/Subscribe to Adam’s Substack GrantedWatch ReThinking videos on YouTube at TEDPodsFollow TED on X, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, and TikTokReThinking is produced by Cosmic Standard. Our Senior Producer is Jessica Glazer, our Engineer is Aja Simpson, our Technical Director is Jacob Winik, and our Executive Producer is Eliza Smith.For the full text transcript, visit ted.com/podcasts/rethinking-with-adam-grant-transcripts Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Episode metadata supplied by the publisher feed · Published Aug 25, 2026

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Is emotional regulation always a good thing? with Julie Bowen and Aliza Pressman

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