The BigTalk Podcast

Hosted by Amanda Davies

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119

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Aug 2026

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About the show

Amanda Davies is an award-winning business leader, a Registered Psychologist with the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (AHPRA) for over 20+ years, and a Certified Somatic Practitioner & Educator. As a Fellow of the Association for Coaching (AC), Amanda has made significant contributions to the industry and pioneered the world's first Psychodynamic Coaching methodology - a depth-oriented approach that translates psychodynamic and Jungian principles into rigorous, ethical coaching practice. She is committed to supporting current and future leaders in the personal development industry, helping them deepen their craft and create a ripple effect of positive change. In 2015, Amanda transitioned from a successful corporate career to pursue her passion for empowering others. With over 25 years of diverse experience, she passionately believes that, regardless of your circumstances or the obstacles you face, you can achieve your full potential in this lifetime. Amanda has been featured in The Times, The Guardian, Yahoo Finance, The Telegraph, and Huffington Post. She was shortlisted as a finalist in the UK's National Business Awards (2017) and named as the UK's leading Business Mentor (2019). Her dedication to bringing depth, embodiment, and psychodynamic insight into the coaching field has established her as a transformative force in the evolution of modern coaching.

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September 8, 202645 min

Episode 120 - Why Coaching Has a Depth Problem

We’re living through a moment of extraordinary acceleration in technology, work, culture, identity and everyday life. But as the outer world becomes faster and more complex, something else is happening: people are turning inward. They’re asking deeper questions about who they are, what is truly theirs, their purpose, and who they are becoming. In this episode, we explore why coaching is entering an important new phase and the shifts coaches and practitioners need to make to ensure they're ready to meet what's coming. You'll learn: :: Why conventional coaching can reach a strange ceiling when clients already *know* what they need to do :: Why the person we’re coaching isn't always the person they believe themselves to be :: How unconscious adaptations, persona and disowned parts of the self shape our lives :: Why Jung's concept of individuation changes the purpose of coaching :: Why people are increasingly seeking answers to questions of identity, meaning and purpose :: Why developing a specialised depth skillset can transform both your coaching practice and professional value Ultimately, this episode asks a bigger question: What becomes possible when we stop coaching only the person in front of us, and start learning to see the whole person? ... Explore the Psychodynamic Coach Academy - Waitlist Open If you're ready to develop the psychological depth to work with clients at this level, explore the Psychodynamic Coach Academy, our internationally accredited professional training in psychodynamic coaching. The next cohort begins 9 November 2026. Get on the Waitlist to hear about our exclusives savings available for a limited time. https://www.psychodynamiccoachinginstitute.com/certification

August 25, 202636 min

Episode 119 - When Your Authority Lives in the Shadow, It Comes Out Sideways

When your authority sits in the shadow, it comes out sideways... You may know your stuff. You have experience. You have the results and the expertise. Yet why do so many women still feel strangely uncomfortable claiming authority? Why does it still feel a little taboo? In this episode, we explore what happens when authority, power, certainty, and influence haven't been fully integrated into your conscious identity. Specifically, we shine a light on how unclaimed authority sometimes slips out sideways through control, resentment, over-functioning, covert competition, difficulty selling, a fear of visibility, or constantly second-guessing yourself. We’ll look at why claiming authority can feel psychologically charged, particularly when you've learned that being powerful, ambitious or highly visible comes with a cost. The most exciting part? When you consciously inhabit your authority, your visibility, voice and leadership become more powerful, and your business has room to grow around the full weight of what you bring. ... If this conversation is stirring something for you, Shadow Medicine is where we’ll take the work deeper into the hidden dynamics shaping your visibility, voice, authority and self-expression. And next week, I’ll be dropping a free "Shadow of Visibility Masterclass", where we’ll explore what’s really happening beneath the surface when being seen in your business feels harder than it should. Keep an eye on my socials for the announcement 👀 --> https://www.instagram.com/amandadavies.co/

August 12, 202650 min

Episode 118 - The Roles We Play, and the Shadows Beneath Them

What if the woman you've become is only part of the psychological story? After more than two decades of working with women, I've become increasingly interested in how the roles we learn early in life can become deeply embedded in our adult identities. The capable one. The strong one. The responsible one. The good one. The independent one. Eventually, we can become so good at playing these roles that we stop recognising them as adaptations at all. We simply call them "personality". But there's a deeper question sincere Shadow Works asks of us: What had to be left out in order for you to become this woman? In this episode, I explore the relationship between identity, adaptation and Shadow, including why we can become psychologically invested in the very roles that exhaust us, why our strengths can sometimes become defences, and how the parts we've learned to suppress may contain qualities we now need to reclaim. I'll also bring this into the realities of adult life: relationships, leadership, business, visibility, creativity and the strange moments when the identity that once served us begins to feel increasingly constraining. Sincere Shadow work is about seeing what's been left out. ... and sometimes, that's where the most interesting parts of you begin to emerge. ... Shadow Medicine is my 6-week live experience for women who are ready to go beneath the surface of identity, visibility and self-expression and begin working with the parts of themselves they've learned to keep out of view. Learn more about Shadow Medicine → https://www.amandadavies.co/shadow-medicine Correction: We start September 14 (not 7th as mentioned in the episode).

July 29, 202655 min

Episode 117 - The World Wants Your Voice. Your Family Taught You Silence.

We are living through one of the greatest shifts in human communication in history. Think back to the "good old days" where very few people were required to become public voices. There was a time when your work could speak for itself, and your expertise could largely remain within your community or workplace. Frankly, you could live a meaningful life without ever having to build an audience! Today, that’s no longer the case. Therapists have podcasts and audiences. Coaches have newsletters. Professionals have personal brands. Entrepreneurs are expected to become thought leaders. We are living in a new visibility economy, but there is a hidden tension we rarely talk about... The technological world has changed way faster than our psychology has. We are being asked to become more visible, more expressive and more public than ever before... yet many of us are still carrying old internal rules about what it means to be seen. Rules we learned in childhood: Don’t be too much. Don’t make a fuss. Don’t expose what happens here. Don’t outshine others. Don’t challenge the system. So here we are, expected to move at the pace of the modern world inside of a culture that demands full visibility... with nervous systems (and shadow systems) built for compliance and the smallness of our family conditioning. ... and your business is the place where these two worlds collide. This this episode, I investigate why so many accomplished women still struggle with visibility, and how stepping forward can activate old patterns around belonging and safety. We explore: - The six cultural shifts that have transformed visibility from an optional choice, into the defining psychological challenge of our time (and why our nervous systems are still catching up)! - How the old rules we inherited around belonging, safety and self-expression continue to shape the way we show up publicly. - Why brilliant women can spend years doing inner work and still struggle to be fully seen. - How the parts of ourselves we learned to suppress may actually hold our greatest creativity, authority, power, and impact. If you have ever wondered why being seen feels both exciting and exposing... Why you can be highly skilled yet struggle to fully step forward... This conversation is for you. See you inside!

June 9, 202651 min

Episode 116 - The Crisis Beneath the Mental Health Crisis

We live in a time of unprecedented psychological understanding. We know about trauma, attachment, nervous systems, emotional regulation, and mental health more than any generation before us. ... and yet, something curious is happening. Despite all of this insight, many people are quietly struggling with a deep sense of disconnection from themselves, their relationships and from life itself. Of course, the world around us feels chaotic... Traditional meaning-structures are crumbling... Anxiety is rising... Loneliness is on the increase. But beneath the surface of outwardly-functioning lives, there's a question on the lips of many that's becoming harder to ignore: "Is this really it?" In this episode, we explore a different way of understanding what is happening beneath the surface of modern life. Because while we have become incredibly fluent in understanding what is "wrong" with us and the world at large, we have lost fluency in a more ancient question: :: "What is trying to emerge through us?" This conversation explores the idea that many of the experiences we label as burnout, confusion, emotional intensity, or dissatisfaction may in fact be signals. Signals that a life is beginning to outgrow the identity that has been carrying it. We also explore why so many people are unconsciously searching for meaning through new pathways such as spirituality, astrology, depth psychology, shadow work, and altered states of consciousness, and what this reveals about the deeper hunger of our time. At the heart of this episode is a simple but confronting possibility: What is often experienced as emotional or psychological disturbance may also reflect an underlying process of soul-emergence. When viewed through that lens, the focus subtly shifts from "healing what's wrong" to questions of "who am I becoming"? ... Final Places Remain: Become a Psychodynamic Coach - Class starts 22nd June. - $1500 in savings through our Early Bird promotion Discover more here: https://www.psychodynamiccoachinginstitute.com/certification

May 26, 202645 min

Episode 115 - Why So Many Coaches Secretly Don't Want To Be "Coaches"

There’s a strange tension happening inside the coaching industry right now. On one hand, more people than ever are entering the space because they genuinely want to help others transform. But on the other hand… many practitioners secretly feel disconnected from the very identity they’ve stepped into. Because somewhere along the way, coaching became associated with performance. Scripts. Personal branding. High-energy motivation. Surface-level empowerment. Formulaic transformation. And for many people - especially those drawn to psychology, spirituality, shadow work, Jungian thought, emotional depth and human complexity - something about that feels profoundly incomplete. In this episode, we explore: * Why so many coaches feel disillusioned with modern coaching culture * The hidden embarrassment some practitioners feel around the word “coach” * The difference between real transformation and motivational performance * Why depth-oriented practitioners crave psychological grounding * How the industry often bypasses the unconscious entirely * The growing hunger for work that feels intellectually serious, emotionally honest and soul-deep This conversation is for the people who know they were never meant to do surface-level work. The people who have always been fascinated by the psyche, by patterns, by shadow, by meaning, by what lives underneath behaviour. And perhaps most importantly: the people who have always wondered if there’s another way to practice transformational work altogether. ... EXPLORE DEPTH-COACHING: Early Bird Enrollment for the June cohort of the Psychodynamic Coach Academy is now open with $1500 in savings on offer for a limited time. Discover more here: https://www.psychodynamiccoachinginstitute.com/certification

May 12, 202639 min

Episode 114 - Self Improvement and the Missing Map of the Psyche

Are you healing… or just polishing the personality? Much of modern self-improvement focuses on behaviour change, mindset, habits, emotional regulation, or becoming a “better version” of your socially-conditioned self. But what happens when transformation work never moves beyond the surface of the psyche? In this episode, we explore the deeper unconscious dynamics that shape behaviour, resistance, identity, visibility, self-sabotage, and transformation itself, and why many coaches and practitioners are working with an incomplete map of the psyche. We explore: - why self-improvement often plateaus - the unconscious meaning behind “self-sabotage” - why awareness alone doesn’t necessarily create change - spiritual and somatic bypassing - the difference between adaptation and integration ... and why so much transformation work unintentionally becomes "personality polishing" rather than deep psychological change .... Explore the Psychodynamic Coach Academy: Early Bird Enrolment is now open for our upcoming cohort starting on 22 June. - Save $1500 - Secure over $3000 in bonuses - Limited spots available Discover more here: https://www.psychodynamiccoachinginstitute.com/certification

April 28, 20261 hr 8 min

Episode 113 - Waking Up to Your Soul's Calling: The Nudges, Niggles & Signs You’re Meant for a Different Path

Today’s episode is for those of you at the very beginning of something… even if you can’t quite name it yet. Most people who find their way into this work haven’t lived linear lives. You’ve changed, outgrown things, and been through many cycles of death and rebirth. You’ve never quite fit the mould and if you're honest, life itself has felt like a kind of training ground. Almost as if you've been prepared for something. Then there comes a moment (or a series of moments), usually around mid-life, where something starts to get your attention. A quiet pull. A persistent niggle. Patterns you can’t ignore anymore. A dissatisfaction some would flippantly call a "midlife crisis". It might show up through synchronicities, dreams, conversations… or just a growing sense that the life you’ve built no longer fully fits. Many people feel this. But just as many rationalise it away. Minimise it. Talk themselves out of it. Tell themselves it’s just a phase, or something external that needs fixing. In this episode, we’re going to slow that down. I’ll walk you through how to recognise when you’re being called, in real, practical terms, sharing some of my own story as I go - and the grounded steps you can take if you choose to follow it.

April 14, 202646 min

Episode 112 - The Sovereign-Coded Woman: Power, Projection & Self Authority

In this episode, we go beyond surface-level ideas of confidence and independence to explore what it actually means to be sovereign-coded and why so many women struggle to fully stand in it... ... even after years of inner work, and even though they *intuitively know* they're here to be noticed, make waves and stand tall. The truth is, you were born sovereign, but you also activated it through descent, through experience, and through doing the work most people avoid. ... and yet despite all of the healing and inner work, there’s often still a part of you that questions whether you’ve earned the right to fully own it. In this episode I cover: - How Tall Poppy Syndrome and Internalised Misogyny have teamed up to keep you small - The conditioning that taught you to fear your own power - The instinct to shrink, soften, and stay acceptable - Why being fully expressed often disrupts belonging - How to hold projection, envy, and misunderstanding - The Good Girl pattern and how it undermines your authority Not everyone will understand you because they’re not meant to. But if you want a bigger, more expressed life, you’ll need the capacity to hold that. This is where sincere Shadow Work comes in... Tune-in for a heart-felt, firey discussion on power, projection and being a self-led woman. .... YOUR INVITATION: If you're ready to go deeper, explore my self-study program, Electric Woman. Electric Woman is a Shadow Medicine Journey for recovering People Pleasers, Super Survivors, and Good Girls ready to get Next-Level Visible and reclaim their Vital Spark. Electric Woman offers a reactivation of the brilliance and creative voltage that was never truly lost - only hidden. Join now for immediate access: https://www.lightpurposelivingtraining.com/electricwoman

March 16, 202643 min

Episode 111 - The Moment Most Coach Trainings Never Prepare You For

At some point in their practice, many coaches encounter a moment that their training never quite prepared them for: - A client understands their challenges. - They are motivated to change. - They genuinely want something different. ... and yet, despite some progress, the old patterns of self-sabotage reappear. The coaching conversation begins to circle. The same themes repeat. ... and quietly, the coach may start wondering: "Am I missing something here"? In this episode, we explore a reality many coaches experience but rarely discuss openly - the moment where traditional coaching tools such as strategy, motivation, mindset reframing, and goal setting stop being enough. Because when insight and motivation are already present, and the pattern still persists, it quickly becomes obvious the issue is pushing on something deeper within the psyche. Drawing on principles from depth psychology and the work of Carl Jung, this episode explores how unconscious dynamics (including the shadow, competing parts of the self, and identity protections) can shape client behaviour in ways many coaching models simply don’t explain. We’ll also look at the four pressures many coaches quietly experience in their practice: • The Competence Doubt - Am I actually helping my clients? • The Looping Session Problem - Why do we keep coming back to the same issue? • The Business Pressure - If clients don’t change, will my business succeed long term? • The Integrity Tension - How do I go deeper without crossing into therapy? Understanding shadow dynamics gives coaches a completely different way of seeing what is happening inside a session. Patterns that once felt frustrating or confusing begin to reveal something meaningful about the deeper forces shaping a client’s behaviour. .... *** NEW: What Every Coach Needs to Understand About the Shadow If this episode resonated with you, you may enjoy our new professional briefing for coaches. This 2.5-hour recorded training explores the deeper psychological dynamics that frequently appear in coaching conversations - including shadow patterns, relational dynamics, and the hidden forces that shape behaviour. It’s designed for new, aspiring, and experienced coaches who want a clearer framework for recognising what is happening beneath the surface in their sessions. Access the full briefing for just $27 here: https://www.psychodynamiccoachinginstitute.com/shadow-briefing ... *** FINAL PLACES: The Psychodynamic Coach Academy For coaches who want to explore this work at a much deeper level, the Psychodynamic Coach Academy is our internationally accredited certification in psychodynamic coaching. Rooted in the insights of Carl Jung and depth psychology, the program trains coaches to recognise and work with shadow, the personal unconscious, and identity-level transformation within an ethical coaching framework. The next cohort begins on March 30 and final places are currently available. Learn more about the program here: https://www.psychodynamiccoachinginstitute.com/certification