The Luella Jonk Show

In this solo episode, I'm doing something a little different—and a little vulnerable. I'm pausing the podcast for the summer. And I wanted to come on here, just the two of us, and tell you why. It wasn't an easy decision. Since 2021, I've shown up weekly without fail—guests, solo episodes, newsletters, content. And I don't regret a single one. But summer in Manitoba is short, s...

In this conversation with Stephanie Moore—clinical nutritionist, health coach, and author with over 35 years of integrative practice—we're going deep into the gut microbiome, and why what's happening in your digestive system is quietly running the show in your brain, your mood, your resilience, and your ability to handle stress. Stephanie doesn't do simple. After careers in performing...

In this conversation with Jillian Mariani—founder of Niyama Wellness and 20+ year veteran of Canada's vitamin and supplement industry—we're talking about something most women don't connect until it's already cost them: the relationship between burnout, perimenopause, and the supplements we actually need versus the chemistry experiment most of us are doing in our kitchens every morn...

In this conversation with Esther Munt-Brooks—Catholic speaker, sacred scripture scholar, and wife of happiness researcher Arthur Brooks—we're doing something a little different. No formal topic, no structured agenda. Just two women catching up on life, faith, marriage, and what it actually looks like to love well in the later seasons of life. And somehow, in that relaxed space, we covered ever...

In this conversation with Dr. Richard Dixey—Oxford-educated scientist, Buddhist scholar, and founder of a London Stock Exchange-listed biotechnology company—we're diving into something that quietly underlies every conflict, every resentment, and every misunderstanding in marriage: the fact that we are never actually experiencing reality. We're experiencing a map of it. And that map is colo...

In this solo episode, I'm tackling one of the most quietly asked questions I hear in my therapy room—one that couples rarely say out loud, but almost always think: Is this marriage asking me to grow, or are we genuinely incompatible? It's a question that deserves far more honesty and far less rushing than our culture allows. And before you jump to conclusions about your marriage, I want to...

In this conversation with Fr. Branden Gordon—a newly ordained Salesian priest serving at Saint Benedict Parish in Toronto—we're exploring something I rarely discuss on this show: what daily life looks like for a young priest navigating youth ministry, personal holiness, and the weight of representing Christ to everyone who walks through his door. Fr. Branden doesn't romanticize the priesth...

In this conversation with Joseph Pearce—internationally acclaimed author, Shakespeare scholar, and visiting professor of literature—we're exploring something I don't often discuss on the show: the depth of wisdom found in literature, philosophy, and the contemplative life, and what it teaches us about marriage, suffering, and formation. Joseph doesn't just write about great converts li...

In this solo episode, I'm challenging the way we've been taught to approach life—and it all started when I saw someone ask for the macros on a recipe online. Not how it tasted. Not if it was satisfying. Just the numbers. And it hit me: this is how we're being pushed to view everything now. Life has become about measuring, optimizing, tracking, and controlling. We analyze everything dow...

In this solo episode, I’m following up on last week’s conversation because many women reached out with the same exhausted question: Why is it always me who has to change? Why am I the one being asked to slow down, soften my tone, regulate my emotions, or communicate better when I already feel like I’m carrying everything? This week, I want to bring much more clarity to what I meant — because this...

In this solo episode, I'm walking you through something I see every single week in my therapy room — and something I've lived myself: the moment a small, ordinary trigger sends your entire nervous system into protection mode, and why the real problem is almost never what you think it is. I'll walk you through: ✅ The four-step pattern playing out in your marriage on repeat — trigger, p...

In this solo episode, I'm being honest about something I don't think we talk about enough: what happens after the spiritual highs. It's the Friday after Easter, and instead of feeling joyful and victorious, I've been waking up with this low-level heaviness—not depression, not anything my family would notice, but something quietly off. I'll walk you through: ✅ Why intensity—whe...

In this second conversation with Norwegian psychiatrist Hannah Spier, we're diving into territory that most clinicians won't touch: the rise of personality disorders among women, the feminization of therapy that's made gatekeeping impossible, and why credentials alone won't fix what's broken in mental health care. Hannah doesn't hold back. After years treating patients in o...

In this episode, I share my reflections after listening to a recent Chatelaine podcast on weight, identity, and responsibility. This is an important and, at times, uncomfortable conversation. As a therapist, I work with women every day who feel exhausted, disconnected from their bodies, and unsure of what is actually within their control. While modern culture often emphasizes external factors such...

In this episode, I'm sitting down with Kate Christie—Australia's top time management expert and the woman who bought a palazzo in Sicily as her midlife manifesto. After losing her ex-husband to pancreatic cancer while raising three teenagers solo, Kate discovered that waiting for "someday" is the biggest trap we fall into. She created what she calls a Life List—not a bucket list fo...

There's a version of conviction that looks a lot like control. And most of us have been living there without realizing it. This week I'm coming to you solo — and honestly, a little vulnerably — because something came up in my own Faith Formation group that I wasn't expecting. I got defensive. I got reactive. And somewhere in the middle of trying to defend the faith I love, I stopped ac...

In this episode, Catholic educator Ester Munt-Brooks returns for a deeply honest conversation about what it really means to love — not as a feeling, but as a decision. From her years as a free-spirited musician in Spain who wanted nothing to do with commitment, to becoming a daily communicant, devoted wife, and mother of three, Ester unpacks what shifted — and why it took so long to look in the ri...

In this eye-opening episode, Norwegian psychiatrist Hannah Spier joins us from Zurich to share what she discovered after years of treating anxious, depressed women in outpatient clinics — and why she ultimately walked away from a high-flying career to become a stay-at-home mother of three. Hannah is the voice behind Psychobabble with Spier , where she analyzes the psychological patterns in our cul...

In this episode, I sit down with Father Joseph de Viveiros, a priest of the Congregation of the Resurrection and chaplain for the Nipissing-Parry Sound Catholic District School Board. Father brings decades of pastoral experience—from directing liturgy for World Youth Day 2002 with John Paul II to now caring for his 94-year-old mother with dementia—and his insights on Lent cut straight through the...

Today it's just me. And I'm angry. I wasn't supposed to record a solo episode today. I had two guest interviews scheduled. But ten minutes before we were supposed to go live, one of them canceled. "Not feeling well." At 2 p.m. their time. And here's the thing—I have empathy. Life happens. But this isn't just about today. This is about what I see everywhere: a catastroph...

In this episode, I sit down with Father John Henry Hanson, a Norbertine priest, formator, and spiritual writer from St. Michael's Abbey whose work lives at the crossroads of psychology and spirituality. Father holds a degree in psychology from Divine Mercy University, and his upcoming book The Fire and the Silence explores what it truly means to align the mind with God in a world that never st...

In this episode, Dr. James Kinross, consultant surgeon and microbiome scientist at Imperial College London, reveals why the trillions of microbes living inside us hold the key to our physical and mental health—and why we're facing an "internal climate crisis" that's changing everything. From IBS to obesity to mental health struggles, Dr. Kinross explains how our relationship with t...

I'm recording this one without makeup—not because I forgot, but because I need to practice what I'm about to preach: authentic vulnerability over comfortable validation. And what I'm seeing in my therapy practice lately has me genuinely concerned. Couples are now bringing printed transcripts of their spouse's ChatGPT conversations to sessions. People are outsourcing their moral com...

In this second conversation with Licensed Professional Counselor Eric Zeitler, we tackle one of the most frustrating dynamics in modern Catholic marriages: leadership. Or more accurately, the lack of it. Women tell me constantly that their husbands won't step up. Men tell Eric they don't know how—or worse, that they've tried and been shut down. Eric doesn't sugarcoat it: leadership...

In this first part of a two-part conversation, Licensed Professional Counselor Eric Zeitler opens up about his innovative approach to therapy that honors both psychological science and Catholic faith. As founder of the Imago Dei Healing Institute, Eric has dedicated his practice to helping clients heal deep wounds while respecting their deeply held values—a balance many Catholics struggle to find...