If You’re Feeling Uncertain & Anxious, You Need to Hear This
Episode of The Mel Robbins Podcast · March 13, 2025 · 1 h 21 min
Mel Robbins talks with clinical psychologist Dr. Julie Smith about her book Open When and practical tools for handling emotions, anxiety, self-criticism, uncertainty and avoidance.
Summary
Mel Robbins hosted clinical psychologist Dr. Julie Smith in her Boston studio to discuss Smith's book Open When, a follow-up to her bestseller Why Has Nobody Told Me This Before?. Smith explained that the new book was written for moments of crisis rather than long-term practice, and described her mission of moving therapy skills out of the clinic because she regards them as life skills. She used a rice demonstration to illustrate that one in four people experience a mental health problem in a given year.
Smith described an emotional toolkit built on emotion regulation, viewing emotions as information, and treating attention as a spotlight that can be directed among competing thoughts. She recounted discovering a breast lump weeks before her manuscript deadline, urged listeners not to delay health concerns, and described rewriting her chapter on fear around the idea of becoming the predator rather than the prey. She also offered metaphors for overwhelm, such as bracing against ocean waves and treating one's inner world like a sauna.
The conversation covered resentment and comparison, which Smith argued should be directed toward specific, constructive targets rather than friends; social anxiety, for which she recommended graded exposure and shifting attention outward; and self-criticism, where she advocated speaking to oneself like an elite athlete's coach. On uncertainty, she stressed narrowing focus to the next steps and living as if one has a future.
Later segments addressed relationships, where Smith rejected the idea that people must be fully healed before partnering, and anxiety, where she recommended curiosity over judgment and a values exercise to guide decisions. Using a wooden rainbow, she showed how avoidance gradually shrinks a person's life and how gradual steps can restore it. Robbins shared her own experience of loneliness after relocating in her fifties.
Chapters
- 0:00
Introduction and the idea behind Open When
Robbins introduces Dr. Julie Smith, who explains that Open When was written as a guide for moments of crisis, and describes her mission of sharing therapy skills as life skills.
- 13:28
The emotional toolkit: emotions and thoughts
Smith explains emotion regulation, viewing emotions as information, and the spotlight metaphor for choosing which thoughts to attend to.
- 16:38
Cancer diagnosis: predator versus prey
Smith recounts her breast cancer diagnosis, urges people not to delay health checks, and describes reframing fear by becoming the predator rather than the prey.
- 24:58
Handling overwhelm and grief
Smith describes allowing big emotions to pass using the sauna and ocean-wave metaphors.
- 28:05
Resentment and comparison
Smith argues resentment signals unmet boundaries or a lack of gratitude and that comparison should be specific and constructive rather than directed at friends.
- 33:10
Shyness and social anxiety
Smith shares her own shyness and recommends graded exposure, self-support, and directing attention outward in social situations.
- 40:39
Self-criticism and regret
Smith uses the locked-room thought experiment and the idea of an inner coach to promote self-compassion, and links attention to past, future and present to mood.
- 48:05
Coping with uncertainty
Smith recommends tolerating uncertainty, narrowing focus to next steps, and living as though one has a future.
- 52:28
Relationships
Smith rejects the idea that people must be healed before a relationship and describes how she and her husband use humor to repair conflict.
- 57:35
Anxiety and the values exercise
Smith recommends approaching anxiety with curiosity and describes a values-rating exercise to guide what to do even when it is uncomfortable.
- 1:04:19
Avoidance and the shrinking rainbow
Using a wooden rainbow, Smith shows how avoidance shrinks life, and she and Robbins discuss gradually rebuilding it through small steps.
- 1:16:49
Key takeaway and parting words
Smith says the key lesson is that people need not be at the mercy of their emotions and that they are not alone.
Key points
What was said, by whom, with the exact words. Timestamps jump to the moment.
- Julie Smith
Smith says she wrote Open When because people in crisis need immediate direction rather than advice about practices they should have started earlier.
“If you're in the thick of it and you're in a crisis, the last thing you need to hear is, well, you probably should have started practicing mindfulness six months ago”
Linked moment · 10:45Skip to 10:45 using a listen link in the info box.
Julie SmithSmith cites the statistic that one in four people will experience a mental health problem within a given year.
“one in four people will experience a mental health problem at some point this year”
- Julie Smith
Smith argues that people cannot control which thoughts arise but can choose which ones receive their attention, likening attention to a spotlight on a stage.
“So it's this idea that your attention is like a spotlight. And if all your kind of thoughts were actors on the stage, you've got control of the spotlight”
- Julie Smith
Drawing on her own diagnosis, Smith urges people not to delay getting health concerns checked.
“anyone out there who has a kind of health concern and is tempted to put it off, don't, just do it”
- Julie Smith
Smith describes reframing her cancer diagnosis by adopting the mindset of a predator rather than prey.
“this cancer isn't coming after me. I'm coming after it. You better watch out”
- Julie Smith
Smith compares engaging with one's inner emotional world to a sauna: beneficial, but harmful if one stays too long.
“your inner world is a bit like a sauna. There are benefits to being there, but only if you don't stay too long”
- Julie Smith
Smith argues that unaddressed resentment destroys relationships and usually signals unheld boundaries or a lack of gratitude.
“resentment will just destroy a relationship if you allow it to continue”
- Julie Smith
Smith contends that stopping comparison is impossible and that the real problem is comparing oneself with the wrong people.
“Often the problem is not that you're comparing, it's that you're making the wrong comparisons that's going to lead you down the wrong path”
- Julie Smith
Smith recommends tackling fears via a graded hierarchy, beginning with the least frightening manageable challenge and repeating it.
“you don't start at the top, you start at the bottom. So you start with a thing that feels kind of manageable, but a challenge, and you repeat it as much as you possibly can”
- Julie Smith
Smith explains that socially anxious people focus inward on how they are perceived, and advises redirecting attention to others.
“when you're socially anxious, your focus will be inward. It will be on how are other people perceiving me?”
- Julie Smith
Smith argues that confidence is a byproduct of repeated action because the brain learns from evidence.
“And that's what you need is your brain learns through evidence of action. So you've got to kind of build up as many of those experiences as you can”
- Julie Smith
Smith links excessive focus on the past to depression and on the future to anxiety, recommending present-moment attention.
“If your attention is focused on the past, too much, you will get depressed and you will get miserable”
- Julie Smith
Smith rejects the social-media idea that people must be fully healed before entering a relationship.
“you've got to be healed before you get into a relationship. Oh my God. Like, when are you healed?”
- Mel Robbins
Robbins expresses concern that mental health discourse can make it easy to opt out of necessary but difficult tasks.
“I do worry about how it's easy to opt out of the things that you need to do because it's, quote, bad for your mental health”
- Julie Smith
Smith argues that decisions based on comfort shrink one's life, while decisions based on values lead somewhere meaningful.
“if you make decisions based on comfort and discomfort, it's not going to lead you anywhere meaningful. Your life's just going to shrink”
- Julie Smith
Smith says avoiding feared things feels like relief but worsens fear over time.
“avoidance of the thing that you fear, it lies to us. So it tells us that we are making everything better, but it makes fear worse over time”
- Mel Robbins
Robbins recounts overcoming loneliness after moving by starting with the small step of leaving the house daily.
“the very first step I took was I told myself I had to leave the house once a day, even just to go to the grocery store or to get a cup of coffee”
People
In the conversation
- Mel RobbinsAmerican author, podcast host and former lawyer who hosts The Mel Robbins Podcast
- Julie SmithBritish clinical psychologist, social media educator and author of Why Has Nobody Told Me This Before? and Open When
Topics
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From the publisher
Life is hard. Struggles are inevitable for you and for the people you love. But even when things feel overwhelming, there’s always something you can do. And in today’s episode, you’re getting a toolkit – a companion guide to all of life’s twists and turns. When life feels chaotic, you deserve clarity. When emotions feel overwhelming, you deserve tools that work. And when you feel stuck, you deserve a way forward. That’s all in today’s conversation with world-renowned clinical psychologist Dr. Julie Smith. Dr. Julie is here to share the essential strategies that will help you navigate stress, anxiety, and life’s toughest moments with confidence. This episode will change the way you approach your emotions and mental strength forever. You’ll learn: -How to handle difficult emotions in the moment -The biggest mistakes you make when dealing with stress & anxiety -How to stop overthinking and regain control of your mind -Practical tools to build resilience and mental strength -Why you are so much stronger than you realize—and how to tap into your strength This is one of those conversations you’re not only going to love, you’re going to want to share it with everyone you care about. For more resources, click here for the podcast episode page. If you enjoyed this eye-opening episode, listen to this one next: How to Control Your Mind & Redirect Your Energy to Self Transformation Connect with Mel: Get Mel’s #1 bestselling book, The Let Them Theory Watch the episodes on YouTube Follow Mel on Instagram The Mel Robbins Podcast Instagram Mel's TikTok Sign up for Mel’s personal letter Subscribe to SiriusXM Podcasts+ to listen to new episodes ad-free Disclaimer
Summary, chapters and key points were generated from the episode transcript on September 28, 2026. Quotes are checked word for word against the transcript.