Awaken your power.

(with Dr. Elizabeth Willis)

In this episode of Awaken Your Power, host Keri Mangis is joined by Dr. Elizabeth Willis, visionary educator, author, and Director of the Institute of New Paradigm Intimacy, for a rich and expansive conversation about embodiment, power, and what it truly means to return to wholeness.

Elizabeth introduces a deeply integrative framework—Sexuality, Soma, Soul, and Service—and invites us to reconsider where power actually lives. Not as dominance or control, but as presence, sensation, and the capacity to feel.

At the heart of the conversation is Eros, which Elizabeth reframes not as sex alone, but as life force itself: the vitality that awakens the cells, animates the body, and reconnects us to our aliveness. Sexuality, she explains, is one doorway to Eros—but not the only one. When approached somatically and consciously, it becomes a portal for healing, creativity, and spiritual intelligence.

Keri and Elizabeth explore how modern culture has fractured our experience—separating body from soul, spirituality from sexuality, and service from self—often beginning in childhood. Drawing on her 25+ years in Montessori education, Elizabeth describes how children arrive deeply connected to soul and sensation, only to slowly crystallize into identities built for performance and compliance. What we often call a “midlife crisis,” she suggests, is more accurately an initiatory return to the soul—one our culture rarely names or supports.

The conversation moves fluidly between personal healing and collective transformation, addressing shame, trauma, religious conditioning, and porn-based scripts that shape our relationship to sexuality. Elizabeth speaks candidly about how sexuality has been used as a tool for power-over—and how slowing down, attuning to the nervous system, and listening to sensation opens the door to entirely new choices.

Eros as life force, not performance or pathology

The soma as the sensate body—and sensation as a language beneath thought and emotion

Why sacred sexuality is more about nervous system attunement than sexual technique

Sexuality as a healing portal and a catalyst for psychological and spiritual growth

The difference between self-pleasure and masturbation, and why new pleasure pathways matter

How embodied boundaries arise from sensation rather than mental rules

Questioning libido myths—especially around menopause

Teaching and caregiving as spiritual service rather than burnout

How individual healing ripples outward into families, institutions, and culture

Elizabeth also shares how her work in sacred sexuality unexpectedly converged with her life as an educator, leading to her forthcoming book, The Initiated Teacher: Reawakening the Soul of the Montessori Educator in the New Paradigm. The book offers a next-level vision of teacher wellness—one that frames teaching as a path of initiation, transformation, and service, rather than endurance.

The episode closes with a clear throughline: what we exile into the shadows—especially sexuality—will continue to distort power until it is met with awareness, education, and compassion. Integration is not optional; it is the work of our time.

Dr. Elizabeth Willis is a visionary educator, author and director of the Institute of New Paradigm Intimacy, a global school devoted to embodied leadership, sacred sexuality, and the reclamation of Aeros as life force with over 25 years in Montessori education and a doctorate in curriculum and instruction.

Elizabeth Bridges the worlds of spirituality, somatics, and education to help people return to wholeness through the body. 

Through her work. Elizabeth invites others to remember that power is not dominance, but presence.

Her forthcoming book, The Initiated Teacher: Reawakening the Soul of the Montessori Educator in the New Paradigm, explores the integration of Sexuality, Soma, Soul, and Service as a pathway to wholeness—for educators and for anyone called to meaningful service.

newparadigmintimacy.com

Signature offering: 9-month Somatic Sex Coaching Certification (now enrolling; next cohort begins in January)

In this episode of Awaken Your Power, host Keri Mangis sits down with Mellara Gold, a longtime meditation and mindful yoga teacher whose work centers on awareness, self-compassion, and embodied presence in a complex and often overwhelming world.

Their conversation opens with a question many spiritual practitioners quietly wrestle with: how do we remain rooted in love and light without turning away from real suffering, injustice, and cultural upheaval? Keri and Mellara explore the delicate balance between spiritual practice and honest engagement with the world—without bypassing, numbing, or pretending.

Mellara shares her personal origin story: a debilitating spinal injury at seventeen that led her, reluctantly, into yoga. What began as physical rehabilitation became a profound awakening. Through breath and movement, she discovered not just relief from pain, but a way of being with herself—perhaps for the first time. Awareness, she explains, is not something she chose; it was something life demanded.

From there, the conversation unfolds into a rich exploration of:

Awareness as a daily, embodied practice rather than a spiritual concept

Self-compassion as the gateway to dignity and sovereignty

The ways women are conditioned to abandon themselves in order to belong

Belonging to oneself as a prerequisite for healthy community

Rejection as redirection, not failure

The cultural addiction to external validation and how mindfulness interrupts it

Ritual as presence rather than performance

Solitude, hermiting, and silence as essential—not indulgent

The generational ripple effects of inner work and healing

Mellara speaks candidly about the necessity of solitude and learning to say no—not as withdrawal, but as responsibility to one’s own consciousness. She reframes ordinary tasks like washing dishes or folding laundry as devotional acts when done with presence, reminding us that transformation does not stay contained; it moves outward through families, relationships, and communities.

The episode closes with a simple but powerful reminder: presence is power. To offer yourself even a moment of undivided attention is to come home to your wholeness.

This episode is especially resonant for anyone navigating midlife, burnout, identity shifts, spiritual fatigue, or the quiet realization that pushing through no longer works.

About Mellara Gold
Mellara Gold has taught meditation and mindful yoga for over two decades. She is the author of A Life Worth Living: A Journey of Self-Discovery Through Mindfulness Yoga and Living in Awareness: Deepening Our Daily Lives Through Prayer, Ritual, and Meditation. A former actress trained at the Lee Strasberg Theatre Institute, Mellara is also a regular contributor to OM Yoga & Lifestyle Magazine, Elephant Journal, and other spiritual publications.

You can find Mellara at mellara.com and on Instagram @mellaragold

Email here at [email protected]

In this powerful and paradigm-shifting episode of Awaken Your Power, Keri speaks with Sean Blackwell, author of Bipolar Awakenings and creator of the Bipolar Awakenings project. Sean’s work courageously challenges the dominant psychiatric narrative, offering a radically different lens on bipolar disorder, psychosis, and what many might call “mental illness.”

Drawing from his own dramatic hospitalization in 1996, nearly 20 years of research, and extensive work with clients around the world, Sean explores the intersection of spiritual awakening, trauma, and non-ordinary states of consciousness. He argues that what is often labeled as pathology may in fact be a spiritual emergency—a potent, disorienting, but potentially transformative process arising from the body’s own intelligence.

Together, Keri and Sean dive into the risks of over-pathologizing, the cultural discomfort with breakdowns, the somatic nature of Kundalini energy, and how integrating these states requires nuance, courage, and a complete overhaul of how we hold human experience.

This episode is a must-listen for anyone interested in mental health, trauma healing, spirituality, or challenging the status quo around what it means to “wake up.”

Sean’s unexpected hospitalization following a powerful Kundalini awakening

Why he believes his episode was a breakthrough, not a breakdown

How the psychiatric system oversimplifies complex spiritual processes

Why the “chemical imbalance” narrative lacks scientific support

The difference between spiritual emergency and mental illness

How trauma, intergenerational wounds, and somatic blockages fuel bipolar symptoms

The role of Kundalini as a force for psychological reorganization

Dangers and benefits of meditation retreats and intense spiritual practices

Why our culture silences truth-telling during non-ordinary states

Sean’s innovative use of surrogate breathwork in healing sessions

The evolutionary potential in embracing—not suppressing—these experiences

Why the world doesn’t need “normal” people, but natural people

What real healing demands: courage, expression, and deep self-inquiry

“What psychiatry calls mania or psychosis may actually be a spiritual emergency—a powerful awakening that’s too much to integrate all at once.”

“The chemical imbalance story simply isn’t supported by science.”

“Breakdowns are breakthroughs trying to happen.”

“Normalcy is what got us into this cultural mess. The world needs more natural people.”

“In non-ordinary states, people often speak truths their families have avoided for decades.”

Sean Blackwell is the author of Bipolar Awakenings: The Quest to Heal Bipolar Disorder and creator of the Bipolar Awakenings YouTube channel. For nearly two decades, he has studied the somatic, energetic, and spiritual dimensions of bipolar disorder and psychosis. Through private retreats and breathwork-based healing processes, Sean supports individuals navigating extreme states and spiritual crises. His work blends transpersonal psychology, trauma healing, and a deep respect for the body’s innate intelligence.

Learn more at: bipolarawakenings.com

Sean’s books, training programs, and videos: bipolarawakenings.com

Sean’s YouTube channel: “Bipolar Awakenings”

Holotropic Breathwork (Stanislav Grof)

Keri’s website: kerimangis.com

For more conversations that challenge the status quo and awaken deeper self-authority, subscribe to Awaken Your Power on your favorite podcast platform.
Find more writing, courses, and resources at kerimangis.com.

In this episode of Awaken Your Power, Keri is joined by Karen Laos—speaker, coach, confidence cultivator, and host of the Ignite Your Confidence podcast. Karen has spent 25 years as a trusted C-suite advisor and keynote speaker for companies like Google, Starbucks, and NASA, and is the author of Trust Your Own Voice.

Keri and Karen dive into what it really takes for women to speak up, negotiate clearly, and take up space—at work, in relationships, and on the stage. Karen shares candid stories from her upbringing in a frugal, traditional home and how mixed messages about “being seen” shaped her early relationship with her voice and self-worth.

They explore cultural myths around negotiation, scarcity, gender roles, and “imposter syndrome,” while offering practical tools to help women ask for what they want without apology and step into a deeper, more grounded confidence.

Karen’s origin story: flea markets with her dad, learning to “never pay full price,” and the early messages she absorbed about speaking up

The painful gap between being valued for what you produce vs. being loved simply for who you are

How cultural myths (like “a good negotiation means everyone’s a little unhappy”) keep us in scarcity and zero-sum thinking

Why women tend to over-qualify themselves before applying or asking—and what we can learn from how men apply “underqualified”

The power of clear, direct asks vs. passive, softened language

“If you’re interested…” vs. “Would you like to…”

How to negotiate in a way that creates win–win outcomes, not winners and losers

The subtle ways women still police other women who take up more space, speak boldly, or break traditional norms

Gender conditioning and invisible early messages (like “girl sandwiches” vs. “boy sandwiches”)

Why discomfort is necessary for growth—and how to get curious instead of judgmental when we feel triggered by another woman’s boldness

Imposter syndrome as a sign of growth, not proof you don’t belong

Why we need both warmth and assertiveness, and how women are held to a different standard than men

The idea of a “celebration portfolio” to collect evidence of your strengths and accomplishments

Karen’s mission to reach 10 million women and help them turn self-doubt into self-confidence

1. Celebration Portfolio
Create two lists:

Your accomplishments (things you’ve done, created, achieved)

Your character strengths (who you are—your attitude, presence, and values)

Return to this when doubt creeps in to remind yourself you do belong where you are.

2. 5 & 5 Exercise
Ask five people you trust to share five positive qualities they see in you. Look for themes and strengths you may take for granted because they feel “just like you.”

3. Clear, Direct Asking
Replace:

“If you’re interested…”

“If you’d like to…”

With:

“Would you like to…”

“Are you available to…”

“Here’s a time that works for me—does it work for you?”

4. Borrowing Your Future Self
When you’re scared to ask or step forward, ask:

“What would the woman I’m becoming do here?”

Then make the decision she would make.

Karen Laos is a speaker, confidence cultivator, and communication expert who helps women speak up, negotiate clearly, and own their power in every conversation—from the boardroom to the kitchen table. With 25 years as a trusted advisor and keynote speaker for companies like Google, Starbucks, and NASA, she has coached countless leaders to become more influential and effective.

Karen is the author of Trust Your Own Voice, host of the Ignite Your Confidence Podcast, and is on a mission to help 10 million women transform self-doubt into self-confidence.

Karen Laos 

Keynote Speaker 

Communication Expert & Confidence Cultivator

Website: https://www.karenlaos.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/karenlaosofficial 

Facebook: Ignite Your Confidence with Karen Laos: https://www.facebook.com/groups/karenlaosconsulting

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/karenlaos/

Episodes also available on YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCEwQoTGdJX5eME0ccBKiKng/videos

My book “Trust Your Own Voice”: 

https://karenlaos.com/book/

For more conversations that challenge the status quo and invite deeper personal power, subscribe to Awaken Your Power on your favorite podcast platform.

Find more of Keri’s writing, talks, and offerings at kerimangis.com.

In this episode of Awaken Your Power, Keri talks with Maureen Spielman—spiritual psychology coach and host of the Mystical Sisterhood podcast—about what it really means to live from unity consciousness in a world that feels more divided than ever.

They explore how our inner work ripples out into the collective, why women and the reclaimed feminine are so central to this time on the planet, and how creativity, community, and liminal “in-between” spaces become initiations into a more awake life.

Maureen also shares candidly about her own cancer journey as a turning point that stripped away old personas and unprocessed resentment, inviting a deeper level of honesty, self-compassion, and spiritual growth. Together, she and Keri challenge the shiny, “love and light” version of awakening and talk about the real cost—and real gifts—of saying yes to a path of consciousness.

What unity consciousness actually is and how it contrasts with dualistic “right/wrong, winner/loser” thinking

Why we can see both deep cultural division and an unprecedented rising of light and collaboration at the same time

How our inner work on shame, guilt, anger, and self-judgment creates harmony in our relationships and the wider collective

The idea of the microcosm and macrocosm: how each of us is a small version of what’s happening in the whole

Why women and the reclaimed feminine are so central right now—sisterhood, mentoring, eldership, and cyclical wisdom

Moving from competition and scarcity to collaboration and “there’s room for all of us”

Creativity as a feminine, mystical force—how everything from cooking to conversation can become alchemy

Liminal spaces: the uncomfortable “in-between” times when one life is over and the next hasn’t formed yet

Learning to stay with discomfort (the “mosquito on the nose” in yin yoga, the bugs on the yoga mat) instead of constantly seeking comfort

The real cost of awakening: illness, loss, breakdown, and the crumbling of identities we thought we needed

Why Maureen wouldn’t go back to who she was before cancer and deep inner work

Sovereignty and power: how we’ve been conditioned to give our power away—and how to start calling it back

The difference between being “normal” and being truly natural, in your own voice and rhythm

Awakening isn’t tidy or glamorous. It’s more often about being stripped down, cracked open, and invited to unlearn who you thought you had to be.

Inner and outer are mirrors. As we heal our inner critic, judgment, or resentment, our relationships and communities shift, too.

The feminine is rising. Not as domination over the masculine, but as a rebalancing: community over hierarchy, cycles over straight lines, mentorship over lone-wolf heroics.

Creativity is everyday magic. True magic is changing how we see the world—and helping others see differently, too.

Your power is yours to reclaim. Notice where you hand your authority to experts, influencers, or systems, and gently call that power back to your own inner knowing.

Maureen Spielman is a spiritual psychology coach and the founder/host of the Mystical Sisterhood podcast. Her work centers on unity consciousness, sisterhood, and helping women cultivate a more harmonious relationship with self so they can show up more fully in all areas of life. Drawing on her background in conscious parenting and her own initiatory experiences with illness and loss, Maureen supports women in reclaiming their inner mystic, their creative power, and their place in community.

https://www.threads.com/@maureenspielman

For more conversations that challenge the status quo and invite deep, soul-level transformation, subscribe to Awaken Your Power wherever you listen to podcasts.

Find more of Keri’s work at www.kerimangis.com

In this conversation, Keri sits down with yoga teacher and clinical social worker Karen DeBaun, owner of Yoga Moodra, to explore yoga as a practice for living—not just another form of exercise. They talk about midlife beginnings, healing from trauma, and how yoga can become a framework for pausing, reflecting, and living more consciously in chaotic times.

Karen shares why discomfort and anxiety are often the doorway to real change, how curiosity keeps us from hardening into certainty as we age, and why she sees herself as an “ambassador of love and peace” in a culture that rewards speed, productivity, and numbness. This is an invitation to step off autopilot and into a more deliberate, awake way of being.

Yoga in midlife and beyond

How starting yoga in her 40s shaped Karen’s teaching

Why so many of her students have stayed with her long-term

What it’s like to come to yoga without being a “bendy 25-year-old”

Yoga as a practice for the mind, not just the body

The line that hooked her: gaining flexibility in the mind

How yoga supported her emotional and physical recovery after a serious motorcycle accident

Why she believes yoga is “a practice for living,” not just fitness

Capitalism co-opting yoga

Hot yoga, power yoga, and speed as the dominant narrative

What we lose when yoga becomes just another workout

Reclaiming yoga as “a sacred practice of remembering who you are”

Pause as quiet rebellion

How yoga classes are built around intentional pause and integration

Why rest, reflection, and stillness are almost nonexistent in our culture

Why even one hour a week of true pause can begin to change a life

Habits, autopilot, and conscious living

The difference between helpful routines and unconscious habits

Why Karen and Carrie are more interested in undoing habits than just trading old ones for new

How habits can become “brain shortcuts” that keep us from actually being present

From reactivity to response

How yoga has helped Karen become less reactive and more deliberate

The ripple effects of one person becoming calmer, clearer, and more rooted in their values

How this inner work quietly shapes our culture and communities

Yoga, activism, and being an “ambassador of love and peace”

Different roles people can play: activists, supporters, question-askers, rabble-rousers

Karen’s personal mantra: “Ambassador of love and peace”

Expanding the idea of activism beyond protests and picket signs to how we move through the world every day

Discomfort as a catalyst for transformation

Why anxiety and discomfort are often what finally move us to change

Karen’s own leap into yoga teacher training in her 40s (and imposter syndrome all along the way)

How to reframe discomfort as information and invitation, not failure

Why it’s so hard to try new things
From Karen’s article “5 Reasons Why It’s Hard to Try New Things”:

Our built-in negativity bias and brain’s obsession with safety

Our love of the comfortable and predictable

Social fears: not wanting to look awkward or out of place

Misinformation and assumptions about what something (like yoga) will be

A deep lack of faith in ourselves and our ability to handle the unknown

Curiosity and unlearning

Curiosity as a spiritual practice and a way to soften certainty

How assumptions flatten other people into two dimensions

The courage it takes to unlearn beliefs and patterns that “got us this far”

Beginner’s mind on and off the mat

Tiny glimmers of enlightenment

Rethinking enlightenment as fleeting moments of connection, wonder, and alignment

Why Karen doesn’t chase permanent bliss states but treasures brief openings

How pausing long enough to notice “little moments of magic” may be the most accessible form of awakening for modern life

Creativity as spiritual practice

Karen’s ongoing relationship with The Artist’s Way (Julia Cameron)

How creativity is less about making “art” and more about how you live your life

Carrie’s love for Big Magic (Elizabeth Gilbert) as a companion text

Vulnerability, imperfection, and why our human “clumsiness” is often what connects us most

A gentle invitation to try yoga

For those curious but hesitant: why you’re allowed to dabble

The value of trying something simply to expand your experience, even if you decide it’s not for you

How online gentle yoga can be a low-pressure, accessible starting point—no fancy clothes or commute required

Karen DeBaun is the owner of Yoga Moodra, where she teaches online gentle yoga to adults in midlife and beyond. With 18 years of experience as a yoga instructor and 30 years as a clinical social worker, Karen blends yoga, mental health, and holistic wellness to help students reduce stress, build strength, and cultivate a deeper connection between mind and body.

Her classes emphasize accessibility, compassion, and curiosity, making yoga feel like a practice for real life rather than performance. Karen is also a speaker on anxiety, stress, burnout, and finding calm in uncertain times, and is the author of an upcoming daily reflections book, See You on the Mat: Reflections for Presence and Peace.

Karen’s website & classes:
Yoga Moodra – gentle online yoga for midlife and beyond
 https://www.yoga-moodra.com/contact.html

Free class for podcast listeners
Karen offers one free gentle yoga class for Awaken Your Power listeners.
(Check her site or contact page for the “First Yoga Class Free” link.)

Article:
5 Reasons Why It’s Hard to Try New Things – downloadable/free resource from Karen (via her website).

Books mentioned:

Julia Cameron, The Artist’s Way

Elizabeth Gilbert, Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear

Teacher referenced:

Andrew Harvey – writer and teacher on sacred activism

Caroline Myss – for the “skyscraper of awareness” metaphor

Karen DeBaun is the owner of Yoga Moodra, teaching online gentle yoga to adults in mid-life and beyond. Karen helps adult yoga students reduce stress, build strength, and enhance their overall wellbeing by offering a compassionate space where students can explore and deepen their connection to mind and body. With 18 years of experience as a yoga instructor and 30 years as a clinical social worker, Karen blends yoga practice and holistic wellness to provide a supportive online yoga environment where all students feel welcome and successful. In addition to teaching yoga, Karen is a speaker and presents on topics such as anxiety, stress and burnout, and finding calm in times of uncertainty. Karen is also the author of a soon-to-be published daily reflections book titled: See You On The Mat: Reflections for Presence and Peace.

In this episode of Awaken Your Power, Keri talks with Maree Lipschitz—speaker, facilitator, writer, and lifelong spiritual seeker—about the radical cultural power of female rites of passage. Drawing from decades of work with girls and women at puberty, motherhood, and menopause, Marie shares how ceremony and ritual can transform these transitions from private struggles into publicly honored initiations.

Together, Keri and Maree explore how reclaiming these rites of passage doesn’t just support individual women—it quietly undermines patriarchal, capitalist norms and invites an entirely different model of wisdom, leadership, and community.

How Marie went from industrial chemist studying oxytocin to a facilitator of deeply embodied female rites of passage.

Why menarche, motherhood, and menopause are spiritual rites—not just biological events.

What Maree learned when no one honored her own transition into motherhood, and how that sparked her work designing ceremonies for new mothers.

Examples of rites of passage from Indigenous and traditional cultures (from four-day dances to 40 days of post-birth seclusion) and what our modern world has lost by abandoning them.

Why post-menopausal women have historically been the wisdom-keepers—and how longer lifespans are creating an unprecedented wave of potential elder leadership.

How patriarchy harms both women and men, by over-valuing masculine forms of power and shutting down emotion, intuition, and vulnerability.

The quiet but radical difference between “helping women succeed in the current system” vs. using ritual to question and reshape the system itself.

The idea that all rites of passage are embodied and why public witnessing, truth-telling, and blessing are essential parts of any initiation.

Practical, everyday ways to reclaim ceremony:

Marking first periods, first heartbreaks, significant birthdays, and other turning points.

Simple rituals you can create at home for yourself or loved ones.

How denying rites of passage pushes teens (and adults) to self-initiate through risk-taking, numbing, or self-destructive choices.

What it means to move from “midlife crisis” to midlife transformation, with ritual as a container.

Maree's reframing of the Triple Goddess:

Maiden → Menarche and emerging sexuality

Mother → Nurturer (whether or not you have biological children)

Menopause → The Alchemist, with Crone/Elder emerging more fully around 70+

The deep stigma and falsehoods we must unlearn about menopause, including the belief that women lose their value once fertility ends.

Why Maree encourages women to track their cycles (and perimenopausal symptoms) as an act of power and a practical tool when seeking support.

A simple, beautiful story of how she honored her last period with candles, a bath, and a love letter to her body.

If culture doesn’t provide initiation, we will seek it anyway—often through risky, unconscious, or harmful paths.

Ceremony doesn’t have to be elaborate. Simple + sincere + witnessed can be life-changing.

We are living in a rare moment in history where large numbers of post-menopausal women have the health, resources, and desire to lead.

Bringing sacredness to the mundane—a birthday, a breakup, a final period—can reshape how we see ourselves and each other.

Tracking your cycle and symptoms is not just “data”; it’s a way of claiming your authority over your own body and story.

Maree Lipschitz is a speaker, facilitator, and writer specializing in female rites of passage. A former industrial chemist, she spent a decade working in corporate and tertiary education before becoming a mother in 1995—an experience that radically altered her path.

For the past 20+ years, Maree has facilitated:

Puberty workshops for pre-teen girls and their mothers

Rites-of-passage programs for teenage girls

Menopause and perimenopause workshops for women

Her work centers on menarche, motherhood, and menopause as profound spiritual initiations. Marie is currently writing her book, Menarche, Motherhood and Menopause: A Woman’s Journey Through Life, weaving memoir, archetypal psychology, and decades of facilitation experience.

Website & newsletter: https://www.mareelipschitz.com/

Sign up for updates on her upcoming book and offerings via her website.

with Aaron Scott

In this episode, Keri Mangis is joined by author and systems-thinker Aaron Scott for a far-reaching conversation about what it means to awaken inside a world built on inherited myths, conditioning, and collective illusions.

Drawing from his background in philosophy and nearly two decades on Wall Street, Aaron offers a rare lens into how our identities are shaped—and misshaped—by the structures we grow up within. Together, they explore the process of shedding those layers and reclaiming a deeper, more grounded truth.

This episode moves through:

The “synthetic construct” we mistake for reality

How childhood conditioning forms identity and disconnects us from our core

Disillusionment as a doorway, not a failure

The illusion of separation and why it fuels division

Conspiracy thinking as a ready-made story that replaces imagination

Interconnection as both comfort and responsibility

The myth of scarcity—not just of resources, but of time, meaning, and belonging

What it means to live from authenticity instead of external validation

Sovereignty as a daily practice of truth, agency, and conscious choice

Aaron also shares the personal breaking point that pushed him to question the life he had built—and the moment he chose inner truth over external expectations.

The conversation closes with a grounded, accessible definition of sovereignty:
A return to the truth within, a reclamation of selfhood, and a shift in how we move through the world.

If you’ve been sensing that the old stories no longer fit—or that something deeper is calling you back to yourself—this episode meets you right where you are.

https://www.theaaronscott.com

https://www.amazon.com/BEFORE-WE-FORGET-Collective-Awakening/dp/1969372230

In this deeply insightful conversation, Cheryl Stelte

  joins Keri to explore what it means to move from block to powerful. A spiritual coach, master healer, and author of From Block to Powerful: The Spiritual Guide to Unlocking Inner Clarity and Authentic Power, Cheryl helps women uncover how trauma, conditioning, and subconscious beliefs shape our lives—and how true transformation requires healing beneath the surface.

Together, Keri and Cheryl dive into the energetic connection between personal healing and collective evolution, why midlife “success but misalignment” is a spiritual initiation, and how shadow work helps us reclaim authentic power. This conversation is for anyone ready to stop fixing themselves and start listening to what their “blocks” are trying to reveal.

Cheryl Stelte — Spiritual coach, master healer, and author of From Block to Powerful: The Spiritual Guide to Unlocking Inner Clarity and Authentic Power. For over 30 years, she has guided women through trauma, reinvention, and spiritual awakening with a unique approach that views blocks as sacred signals rather than flaws.

🌐 Website: starofdivinelight.com 
📷 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/steltecheryl/
💼 LinkedIn: Cheryl Stelte 

Blocks are sacred signals. Every emotional or energetic “stuck point” is an invitation to deeper awareness, not a flaw to fix.

Healing ripples outward. Personal transformation (microcosm) influences collective evolution (macrocosm); when one person heals, the field shifts for everyone.

We are all connected. Separation is an illusion—each act of compassion, forgiveness, or courage uplifts the collective vibration.

Shadow work is essential. Real transformation means feeling repressed emotions, not bypassing them with mindset tricks or quick fixes.

Success without fulfillment = misalignment. When achievements stop bringing joy, it’s a call to realign with your soul’s deeper truth.

Discernment over judgment. Spiritual maturity means holding compassion for others’ paths while clearly choosing what aligns with your own.

You are far more powerful than you realize. Everything you need to awaken authentic power is already within your subconscious and your soul’s design.

“Blaming will never get you to who you truly are.”

“Our wounds are not problems to solve; they are portals to higher truth.”

“The extreme codependent will always attract the extreme narcissist—until healing occurs.”

“Separation is an illusion. When you judge another, you are judging yourself.”

“You can’t mindset your way out of trauma. You must feel your way through it.”

The origin of feeling “unwanted” and how early wounding shapes adult patterns

The cultural programming that keeps us small—and how spirituality reclaims power

Understanding the microcosm and macrocosm of healing: how personal work heals the world

The illusion of separation and why compassion is revolutionary

Shadow work explained: what it is, why it matters, and how it transforms at the energetic level

Moving beyond “mindset” into the subconscious and emotional body

The meaning of “midlife success but misalignment” and why it’s a sacred initiation

Why discernment—not judgment—is the foundation of authentic power

Practical steps for uncovering subconscious beliefs and repressed emotion

From Block to Powerful — Cheryl’s latest book

The Prayer of St. Francis (referenced as a model of spiritual action)

Quotes from Thích Nhất Hạnh, Sufi mysticism, and Buddhist teachings on compassion and attachment

Discussion of trauma imprinting in the subconscious and nervous system

🌐 Website: starofdivinelight.com 
🎧 Free Resources: Three Meditations for Subconscious Healing  — learn how to access the subconscious and create safety in the root chakra
💫 Offerings:

Personal Chakra Readings

Business Chakra Readings (for women in leadership and healing professions)

9-Month Deep Healing Program

🌐 Website: kerimangis.com 
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In this conversation, writing coach and author Amy Hallberg joins Keri to explore how we awaken power by claiming our gifts—especially in times of upheaval. They trace Amy’s journey from “upholder” to norm-breaker, the humbling wisdom of being an exchange student in West Germany, and why language is only an approximation of lived experience. Together they unpack ritual, grief, and everyday action in the wake of community tragedy, and reframe “purpose” from a rigid noun to a living verb. If you’re navigating liminal spaces—midlife shifts, identity transitions, creative blocks—this episode offers practical ways to honor what’s breaking down while making something truer take root.

Amy Hallberg — author, writing coach, and founder of Courageous Wordsmith, guiding real-life writers from inklings to finished work through 1:1 and group programs.
Website: amyhallberg.com • Programs: Courageous Wordsmith

Your gifts are your power. Start naming—out loud—the thing you do with ease (the thing others notice). Claim it, then practice it.

Purpose is a verb. Who you are being (quality + action) matters more than a tidy title or identity.

Language ≠ life. Words are translations of experience; let stories emerge before you edit them into shape.

Allow → Compose → Revise. Amy’s creative flow favors permissive drafting over “shitty first draft” self-talk or premature perfection.

Ritual holds crisis. In collective grief, pair prayer/meaning with movement/action (“pray—and move your feet”).

Small things, great love. Capacity builds through tiny, repeated acts (in writing, caregiving, citizenship).

You won’t “go back.” After liminal thresholds, the task is integration—not returning to who you were.

“Your gifts are your power.”

“Words are signifiers—approximations of what we live.”

“Purpose works better as a verb than a title.”

Meeting the rebel-upholder: growing up gifted, sensitive, and not quite fitting

Germany at 17: unlearning perfection & finding value beyond grades

Language, symbols, and telling the truth on the page

Drafting without armor: the Allow → Compose → Revise method

Ritual, grief, and community response after tragedy

Purpose vs. meaning: claim the verb, not the label

Closing practice: say it in the mirror—“I am a writer / creator / healer”—until your nervous system believes you

Prayer of St. Francis (“Lord, make me an instrument of your peace…”)

Quote often attributed to Mother Teresa: “We can do no great things; only small things with great love.”

Write down one gift you’ve been minimizing. Say it out loud three times today. Then take one tiny action that expresses it.

Website: amyhallberg.com

Coaching & community: Courageous Wordsmith

Site: kerimangis.com

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