dr. matthew goodman

Matthew Goodman, Ph.D. is Founder/CEO of The Middle Way. He is a Licensed Clinical Psychologist (PSY32423) with expertise in mindfulness-based interventions and behavior change. Dr. Goodman has taught mindfulness and stress-reduction skills for 10+ years to healthcare providers, teachers, students, athletes, and lay audiences. He is currently Clinical Assistant Professor of Psychiatry and the Behavioral Sciences at the Keck School of Medicine of USC, where he provides supervision and teaching to psychiatry residents and sits on the Steering Committee for the USC Center for Mindfulness Science.

Dr. Goodman received his Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from the California School of Professional Psychology (San Diego) with an emphasis in Health Psychology. Throughout his training, he worked primarily at the intersection of mental and physical health. He has provided clinical care and teaching at a number of hospitals and clinics including UCSD, Scripps, Providence St. John’s, and USC. Dr. Goodman is Board Certified in Biofeedback with a specialty in heart rate variability.

Dr. Goodman has found it vital weave creativity into his professional work. At age 22 he lived and practiced in a Zen Buddhist monastery. After coming up against his own “dark night of the soul” in the context of meditation, he spent four years writing, directing, and editing a documentary film on the “dark night” phenomenon in contemplative practice. He has studied improv comedy for a number of years (including at the world-famous Groundlings) and believes this practice can be a powerful antidote to anxiety (rest assured, he’s had lots of it! Also… check out our one-of-a-kind class combining improv with mindfulness and other life skills). Dr. Goodman is the author of Simple Stress-Reduction: Easy and Effective Practices for Kids, Teens, and Adults, a step-by-step guide to practicing mindfulness, self-compassion, breathing techniques, sleep skills, and more.

Dr. Goodman hosts “The Middle Way” podcast, which uses the principles of Interconnectedness, Compassionate Awareness, and Pragmatic Action to examine social and political issues. The Middle Way perspective maintains that the biological, behavioral, and spiritual operating principles of the individual also apply to the collective. In this way, we can better “diagnose” and “ treat” collective symptoms (i.e., social, political, economic, ecological) by viewing the world through the same lens as the individual—as an interconnected, interdependent organism. From the micro to macro, symptoms are seen as purposeful opportunities, or divine “gifts,” pleading for our compassionate attention such that we can take wise, pragmatic actions that lead us closer to our higher potential.