In this soulful solo episode of Aligned Expressions, Sherry Steine, RYT 500, Certified Yoga Therapist, Certified Aromatherapist, and holistic wellness educator, explores the deeply personal and transformative connection between aroma, color, breath, and emotional well-being in an episode titled “Exploring the Emotional Language of Aroma and Hue.”

Drawing from years of research, intuitive practice, and therapeutic experience, Sherry shares the inspiration behind her new journal, In Color and Scent: A Journal of Aromatherapy & Color Breathing Rituals for Inner Peace. The journal emerged from her growing fascination with the subtle “color signatures” of essential oils and how these energetic qualities may influence emotional states, nervous system regulation, and inner harmony.

Throughout the episode, Sherry reflects on the fascinating intersections of aromatherapy, color psychology, mindful breathing practices, and sensory wellness. She discusses how specific colors and essential oils can evoke emotional responses, support energetic balance, and create a deeper sense of grounding, creativity, calm, renewal, and spiritual connection.

Listeners are also invited behind the scenes of Sherry’s experimental workshop experience, where participants explored guided color breathing rituals paired with intentional aromatherapy practices. Sherry shares the powerful feedback and surprising results gathered from the workshop, including emotional shifts, sensory awareness, enhanced relaxation, and deeper self-reflection experienced by attendees.

This episode offers gentle insight, practical inspiration, and thoughtful conversation for anyone interested in holistic wellness, emotional healing, sensory rituals, and creating intentional moments of peace in daily life. Whether you are a caregiver, wellness professional, or simply seeking new ways to reconnect with yourself, this conversation encourages you to begin seeing — and sensing — wellness beyond the surface.

Episode Themes Include:

• The emotional influence and psychology of color
• Essential oils and their energetic or “color” signatures
• Pairing aroma with breath and visualization practices
• Creating restorative rituals for home and self-care
• Reflections from Sherry’s experimental aroma and color workshop
• The inspiration behind In Color and Scent

In this heartfelt return to Aligned Expressions, host Sherry Steine opens Season 6 by sharing a deeply personal and professional evolution. After taking intentional time away from the podcast, Sherry reflects on becoming a Certified Yoga Therapist, recalibrating her wellness business, and publishing two new books: In Color & Scent I Settle and Aligned by the Stars. Both works highlight her integrative approach to healing through aromatherapy, color, and Vedic astrology.

This episode centers on the theme “Feed Your Spirit, Focus Your Mind, and Train Your Body,” setting the tone for a more holistic and embodied direction for the season ahead.

Joining the conversation is Dr. Gayl Crump Swaby, mental health consultant, associate professor of counseling, and author of Unlocking Legacies and Realising Burdens. Together, they explore the impact of generational trauma, the importance of addressing inherited emotional patterns, and pathways toward healing and wholeness.

This episode invites listeners into a grounded, multidimensional approach to wellness—one that honors the connection between mind, body, and spirit while offering compassionate insight into breaking free from the past and stepping into a more aligned future.

In this episode of Aligned Expressions, I’m joined by Debra Reis, MSN, RN, CNS, clinical nurse specialist, author, and international speaker known as the Empowered Nurse Advocate. With over 25 years of experience using integrative therapies in clinical settings — including cancer care — Deb brings powerful, practical tools for navigating stress and overwhelm in real life.

Our conversation focuses on three simple ways to overcome stress and overwhelm, especially for those living with chaotic schedules and high emotional demands. Deb shares her evidence-based pproach, which supports the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual dimensions of well-being through relaxation techniques, aromatherapy, and gentle movement.

One of the highlights of our interview is a guided breath practice Deb leads us through that helps balance the nervous system and mitigate stress in just minutes. It’s a technique you can use anytime you feel anxious, overstimulated, or emotionally overloaded.

If you’re looking for practical tools to feel calmer, more grounded, and more resilient, this episode offers both inspiration and immediate relief.

Tune in to learn how to find calm in the chaos — one breath at a time.

Website: https://debrareis.com

Free Guide: https://debrareis.com/3-ways-to-overcome-stress-and-overwhelm

In this episode, I’m joined by Ar. Surabhi Kumari, an Architect, Wellness Space Strategist, and the founder of Sucupirah Designs—a healing-centered design studio devoted to helping women transform their homes into sanctuaries of nourishment and nervous system support.

As a professional with over a decade of experience in architecture and green building—including years designing for a leading eco-luxury hotel chain—Surabhi brings a unique and refreshing lens to how we inhabit space. Her approach weaves together sustainability, ancestral wisdom, sensory psychology, and mindful spatial practices, forming the heart of her Sucupirah Wellness Design Framework.

Surabhi believes that the spaces where women live, work, and rest carry profound influence on emotional wellbeing, stress recovery, and life transitions. In her work, she explores how intentionally curated environments can:

• calm the sympathetic nervous system

• nourish emotional resilience

• support women through cycles of change

• create a sense of rootedness, safety, and expansion

As a LinkedIn News–Featured Thought Leader, she writes about space as a tool for wellness, identity, and conscious living—inviting women to reclaim their environments as reflections of who they are and who they are becoming.

Her mission is beautifully clear:
to guide women in creating homes that heal, comfort, and empower them at every stage of life.

LinkedIn:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/architect-surabhikumari

Newsletter — EcoWellDesign Digest:
https://www.linkedin.com/build-relation/newsletter-follow?entityUrn=7330968371829624837

Website:
sucupirahdesigns.com (Website currently being updated)

Connect with Surabhi

This very special episode of Aligned Expressions marks a first in the podcast’s history—three incredible guests at once for a powerful, heart-centered conversation. In October, host Sherry Steine joined eight co-authors to launch the transformative new book Resonate Healing Voices Anthology: A Collective Project of Professional Wellness Steward Practitioners, created by Dr. Michelle Boulden-Hammond and Radiance Carrying Friends. Today, three of these radiant voices are here to share their wisdom, their journeys, and the sacred intention behind this collaborative project.

I’m honored to welcome:

• Dr. Michelle Boulden-Hammond — Editor, co-author, and visionary behind the anthology. A trailblazing advocate for holistic wellness, Dr. Michelle blends transpersonal counseling, sound healing, and women's wellness practices to empower women to align mind, body, and soul.

• Dr. Karen Raye Haymore — A nationally recognized holistic health practitioner, author, and speaker who is dedicated to preserving ancestral healing traditions. With a doctorate in Metaphysical Science and Natural Medicine, she bridges ancient practices with modern holistic approaches. She is also the founder of the Holistic Professionals of Color Association.

• Mekeva Miller — An Ayurvedic Body Therapist rooted in a maternal lineage of intuitive and holistic healing. Mekeva integrates traditional Ayurvedic wisdom with mystical insight to guide clients through transformative journeys of wellness, embodiment, and intuitive growth.

Together, we explore the inspiration behind the anthology, the power of collaborative healing work, and the deeply personal practices each author brings to the world. This episode is filled with reflections on legacy, intuition, ancestral wellness, and the many ways we as healing practitioners support others on their journey toward balance and renewal.

Whether you are a wellness professional, a seeker, or simply someone who loves stories of healing and empowerment, this episode offers wisdom, connection, and profound insight.

Tune in and join us as we celebrate this beautiful publication—and the collective voices rising to help others reclaim their wholeness.

In this nourishing episode of Aligned Expressions, host Sherry Steine sits down with the radiant and deeply knowledgeable Kim Richardson, MS, C-IAYT, E-RYT 500 — owner of Yes You Yoga and Wellness in Birmingham, Alabama — to explore sound as an ancient and modern form of vibrational medicine.

Together, Sherry and Kim dive into:

✨ The history and roots of sound therapy across ancient cultures
✨ Sound as an alternative vibrational healing modality
✨ How instrumental sound trends are shaping today’s wellness experiences
✨ The neuroscience behind sound and the nervous system
✨ Practical ways sound supports meditation, anxiety reduction, and deep relaxation
✨ How trauma-informed sound practices help create safe, inclusive healing spaces
✨ Sound therapy’s role in community healing and reducing health disparities

Kim brings a wealth of experience as a certified yoga therapist, sound practitioner, and wellness leader. Her work spans hospitals, cancer centers, VA programs, and youth behavioral health units through the University of Alabama at Birmingham’s Arts in Medicine program. In 2024, she received the International Association of Yoga Therapists' prestigious John Kepner Seva Award for her service with veterans and under-resourced communities.

This conversation is filled with wisdom, practical guidance, and profound heart — inspiring us to listen more deeply, breathe more fully, and welcome sound as a gentle companion in our healing journeys.

🎧 Tune in and experience how sound can soothe the spirit, settle the mind, and help us reconnect to our inner harmony.

In this nourishing episode of Aligned Expressions, host Sherry Steine sits down with the radiant and deeply knowledgeable Kim Richardson, MS, C-IAYT, E-RYT 500 — owner of Yes You Yoga and Wellness in Birmingham, Alabama — to explore sound as an ancient and modern form of vibrational medicine.

Together, Sherry and Kim dive into:

✨ The history and roots of sound therapy across ancient cultures
✨ Sound as an alternative vibrational healing modality
✨ How instrumental sound trends are shaping today’s wellness experiences
✨ The neuroscience behind sound and the nervous system
✨ Practical ways sound supports meditation, anxiety reduction, and deep relaxation
✨ How trauma-informed sound practices help create safe, inclusive healing spaces
✨ Sound therapy’s role in community healing and reducing health disparities

Kim brings a wealth of experience as a certified yoga therapist, sound practitioner, and wellness leader. Her work spans hospitals, cancer centers, VA programs, and youth behavioral health units through the University of Alabama at Birmingham’s Arts in Medicine program. In 2024, she received the International Association of Yoga Therapists' prestigious John Kepner Seva Award for her service with veterans and under-resourced communities.

This conversation is filled with wisdom, practical guidance, and profound heart — inspiring us to listen more deeply, breathe more fully, and welcome sound as a gentle companion in our healing journeys.

🎧 Tune in and experience how sound can soothe the spirit, settle the mind, and help us reconnect to our inner harmony.

In this episode of Aligned Expressions, I sit down with Stephanie Wigenton, Co-Founder and Owner of Wigenton Candle Co., to explore the powerful connection between clean living, wellness, and breast cancer advocacy. Wigenton Candle Co. was founded on a simple yet profound belief: what we breathe in matters.

Stephanie shares how her love for candles collided with the hidden truth about toxins in mainstream products—and how that realization led her to create beautifully scented, clean-burning candles made with natural soy wax and non-toxic ingredients. Together, we discuss her journey of transforming personal wellness needs into a mission-driven business, the healing role of scent and ritual in everyday life, and her advocacy for breast cancer awareness and prevention.

About Stephanie Wigenton:
Stephanie Wigenton is the Co-Founder and Owner of Wigenton Candle Co., a wellness-driven candle and home fragrance brand rooted in scent psychology and the art of creating scented memories. With an undergraduate degree in Organizational Leadership, she built a robust career in the corporate sector—spanning operations, human resources, sales, and client management—before stepping into entrepreneurship. Her journey began during the COVID-19 pandemic, when her search for candles that wouldn’t trigger asthma or allergies inspired her to create her own non-toxic alternatives. Today, Stephanie combines her leadership experience with a passion for wellness, guiding Wigenton Candle Co. as a platform for clean living, education, and advocacy, particularly around breast cancer awareness.

Whether you’re a candle lover, a wellness seeker, or someone curious about toxin-free living, this conversation will inspire you to rethink the air you breathe, the light you invite into your space, and the ways small daily rituals can support long-term health.

In this heartfelt conversation, Sherry Steine welcomes Dr. Gail Parker—renowned psychologist, yoga therapist, and author—to explore the profound ways restorative yoga can support recovery from deep-seated wounds and generational stress. Dr. Parker shares her insights on integrating restorative yoga into a personal or professional healing practice, the role of rest as a radical act of self-care, and how this work nurtures the mind, body, and spirit. Whether you are a wellness professional, a yoga practitioner, or someone seeking tools for personal transformation, this episode offers compassionate wisdom and practical guidance for cultivating wholeness and renewal.

Gail Parker, Ph.D., C-IAYT, E-RYT 500, is an author, psychologist, and a yoga therapist educator.

She is the author of Restorative Yoga for Ethnic and Race-Based Stress and Trauma and Transforming Ethnic and Race-Based Traumatic Stress with Yoga.

Dr. Parker is a lifelong practitioner of yoga and is well known for her pioneering efforts to blend psychology, yoga, and meditation as effective self-care strategies that can enhance emotional balance, and contribute to the overall health and wellbeing of practitioners. She teaches yoga therapists, yoga teachers, and behavioral health professionals how to utilize Restorative Yoga to support stress reduction and recovery from ethnic and race-based traumatic stress.

On this episode, How to Radically Pour into Your Own Cup, we welcome the inspiring Tara-Whitney Rison, known professionally as Tara-Whitney. Tara-Whitney is a certified health and wellness coach, consultant, actress, speaker, and the visionary Founder & CEO of RADICAL REFILL, LLC — an artistic-wholistic wellness company devoted to liberating high-achieving women from chronic burnout and guiding them into whole-person centered work and lifestyles.

Currently pursuing her Master of Science in Clinical Nutrition + Integrative Health at Maryland University of Integrative Health, Tara-Whitney brings both academic rigor and creative soul to her work. Her radical wellbeing framework empowers women to refill their cup without guilt and place their health at the forefront.

In this conversation, Tara-Whitney will share powerful, practical, and artistic approaches to self-renewal, and preview the transformational retreats and offerings emerging through RADICAL REFILL. Get ready for a deeply honest and uplifting dialogue on why putting yourself first is not only radical — it’s essential.

Stay tuned and let Tara-Whitney inspire you to redefine how you nourish your mind, body, and spirit.