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Our Next Guru: Oprah Winfrey (Patreon)

Published:
2023-03-22 12:57:13
Imported:
2026-06
Tags:

Content

That's right! The next decoding episode will be on Oprah Winfrey.

She's been long requested and we agree it is overdue even if she is something a bit closer to the traditional alternative health guru archetype.

In any case, she was a guru figure long before the new crop appeared and she remains something of a king/queen-maker and still influential.

Finding content that isn't primarily focused on other people is hard but this interview despite being from 8 years seems to give some good insights into her worldviews that are echoed in her newer content.

If people have alternative suggestions or comments, please let us know below!

Files

Oprah Winfrey on Career, Life, and Leadership

During a student-led interview at Stanford Graduate School of Business, Oprah Winfrey shares seminal moments of her career journey and the importance of listening to your instincts. Winfrey also offers advice to students on how to find their calling: "Align your personality with your purpose, and no one can touch you." Listen to Oprah on "View From The Top: The Podcast." https://www.gsb.stanford.edu/insights/view-top-podcast

Comments

Podcast Phanatic

I am very hyped for this. I think she has a lot of interesting rhetorical techniques. In a similar vein I would really love a gurometer reading of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh/Osho. Obviously he’s really skirting the line of “secular”, but most of his talks aren’t particularly religious. I think he is interesting beyond the stuff in the Netflix documentary, he went in all sorts of directions and has a very captivating style. Same for Sadhguru. He is a strong rhetorician but probably too traditionally religious to be appropriate for this show. However he was interviewed by Joe Rogan, so there’s some true guru on new guru action there.

Michael

Oprah is old news and there is likely zero overlap between fans of DtG and Oprah. Do Red Scare. It’ll be timely, there’s a new season of Succession starting soon.

Cesare

This sounds awesome. I never thought about her but it really seems to make sense. Obviously not too similar to the others, but she's definitely a force to be reckoned with. And has a ton of sway in the wider culture. I mean she practically made Deepak, JD Vance, Oz, and countless others into who they are today.

MaxPlan

The Joe Rogan for women!

Ali B

Excited for this. I’ve heard some critiques of Oprah but they’ve mostly focused on certain topics that she’s spread misinformation about, mostly about health products as you note, but I don’t think I’ve heard a breakdown of her rhetorical strategies specifically. I get the sense there may be a lot of Paltrow overlap, though they may have slightly different styles so I’ll be interested to see that impression is correct or not.

Jenny

I’m looking forward to this. I used to watch her but stopped when she pivoted to totally woo topics. She started a dedicated segment called “About the Spirit” or something. I think it was around the same time as her turn towards anti-vax (platforming Jenny McCarthy). I think the very last show I watched of hers was when she covered The Secret. I thought, OK I’m done here

Max

Looking forward to this, also have you ever considered Tim Ferris?

Leslie

Oprah should be interesting. Another female guru suggestion: Rhonda Patrick.

Emma

Ohh excited for this! I think inspite of her being a bit dated she is still a figure with a huge amount of cultural influence. Maybe almost another one of your sigma gurus like Elon because she's so successful? I feel a bit torn about her because on one hand you have to admire a black woman becoming so successful in an era and industry that was and still is incredibly sexist and racist! And I feel that her heart is mostly in the right place and she's done some good stuff. But then at the same time I think she has also done a lot of harm. Mostly by pushing some really bad weight loss ideas and toxic wellness influencers. Plus she also has almost a secularish prosperity gospel take on money where she talks about 'concious capitalism'.

Jason Trock

I have not listened to the interview yet. The things I like about Oprah - her back story - the work, it’s was good and it’s a good story. Creating the studio in the west loop of Chicago. It was huge. It made an investment where the city was falling apart (although there is ample criticism of that too) but now the west loop is absolutely thriving. The things I think are questionable - the way she hand selects people to be the next celebrity guru. dr Phil, Dr oz, that interior design guy.. the lance armstrong episode - as if confessing on Oprah makes things “okay” it was as if Oprah had suddenly lost her bullshit filter and blindly platform these crockpots. The favorite things episodes… The book club! The Oprah lifestyle isn’t “bad” but it definitely introduced a lot of people to what turned out to be questionably bad people and ideas. And UGGs.

Peter

Ooooh this will be fun!

Kai

Oprah is an ok choice, but you known that you will have tot do Balaji, right?

Emma

I just heard on your latest episode that your also looking for females to interview as well as female gurus. Me and my friends love Aubrey Gordon. I think she's been on Conspirituality pod recently. Anyway she could be a good co-decoder for a wellness guru. She's smart and hilarious! https://www.maintenancephase.com/ ohh and what would be really fun would be hearing Aubrey on Mikhaila Peterson!

Mandy

Just wanted to let you know that Oprah does still make content and it's all quite intimate conversations with people, so there's sure to be a lot of her personal thoughts in these too. She has a few series on Apple TV: - The Conversation: https://tv.apple.com/us/show/the-oprah-conversation/umc.cmc.49yt85r7ow6904u0177r694qy - The Me You Can't See: https://tv.apple.com/us/episode/a-path-forward/umc.cmc.3lfqcjl4zcrqpfksaftvzrhv8 She also has a more recent series called Super Soul Sundays: https://www.oprah.com/app/supersoul-sunday-full-episodes.html I really think you should pull content from any of these, as 8 years is such a long time ago, and I'd prefer to hear your thoughts on what she's actually like *now*

ketracel-white 🧁

I'm still angry with her for giving Dr. Phil a career in media lol

JC Larke

Ah! Full disclosure, I'm an Oprah apologist. I love her so much but I'm fully open to your analysis. I actually paid $147 to see her when she came to Vancouver. I know she's stepped into some bad material over the years. And she promoted workaholism to all of her employees and she's had narcissistic gurus on her show over the years. But I can't stop thinking or get away from her beginnings. She pulled herself out of a life of basically being a maid to a white family, met her biological mother late in life, went through sexual abuse as a child, and of course was a descendant of slaves. I know that she's done some questionable things. She has promoted the idea of "manifestation" which I got caught up in, and have now recovered from. I'm looking forward to hearing your breakdown.

Peter

Didn't Louise Hay ultimately become famous from her Oprah appearance which brought us the entire Hay House empire of spiritual gurus? Without Oprah none of the people she has elevated would have seen the light of day and the New Age Movement may have just remained a background movement. The whole spiritual realm we have now full of wellness influencers might have had to find real jobs had we not had The Secret & the cast like James A Ray on her show, Gabby Bernstein, Tony Robbins even.