Peace and harmony looked like an empty apartment and a recliner. That's when he knew something was wrong.

Dave Shotgun Shell spent decades chasing adrenaline … football, MMA fighting, even karaoke when his body couldn't take the hits anymore. 

After multiple concussions and near-death experiences starting at age two, he subconsciously became addicted to intensity. 

But when the crashes started outweighing the highs, he swung hard in the opposite direction: two hours of meditation daily, seeking peace and harmony. 

What he got instead was an empty apartment, a divorce, kids who lived elsewhere, and an isolated existence with nothing but four white walls and a recliner. 

He had achieved perfect peace. And zero impact on the world.

This conversation with Genea digs into the cost of extremes, and what happens when you finally stop escaping into either adrenaline or spirituality, and start living from the middle.

Dave and Genea explore:

🔹 The childhood trauma of a cinder block dropped on his head at age two, and how it set the trajectory for a lifetime of seeking near-death experiences

🔹 Why meditating two hours a day gave him exactly what he focused on … nothing … no wife, no connection, no impact

🔹 His friend who told him to join a monastery … the moment he realized he'd escaped too far

🔹 The mantra that changed everything: "I do. Either things will or they won't. But that doesn't change who I am."

If you've been swinging between grit and escape, intensity and isolation, or giving until you're empty … this episode will show you there's another way.

About Dave:

As the founder of BlueVantage—a company forged in the ashes of 9/11, now thriving under his daughter Adrienne's leadership—and DCPacket, revolutionizing power distribution through Digital Electricity, Dave has built a legacy of value creation. His ventures also include partnerships like R.B. Akins, enabling mission-critical infrastructure. Yet, beyond business success, Dave's story is one of personal renewal,anchored by his wife Gretchen's discovery of neurofeedback therapy, which silenced the ghosts of his past Traumas.

Connect with Dave:

Website:  https://shotgunschell.com/

Free Gift Link: https://shotgunschell.com/about

Connect with Genea

Weekly Clarity Call - Wednesdays 7a PST/10a EST - Join the call here:  https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/regis... 

Inquire about Events, Firewalking, Coaching, being a guest on Be the Wolf LIVE or Be the Wolf Podcast https://bethewolfnow.com/connect/

Website: http://bethewolfnow.com/

Instagram:   / geneabarnes   

Facebook:   / bethewolfnow   

TikTok:   / geneabarnes 

“I really want to… but I can’t.”

That sentence sounds harmless. But it’s quietly shaping your entire life.

In this episode, Genea Barnes tells the truth about why so many high-functioning people struggle to say what they actually want … and how fear, childhood conditioning, and survival patterns turn honesty into excuses. 

This isn’t about time management or boundaries. It’s about authenticity… and the cost of losing it.

This episode moves through moments you’ll recognize in your body:

🔹 The fear that hits when you imagine saying no without an explanation

If you’re tired of feeling trapped by obligations, guilt, or other people’s expectations, this conversation opens a different way. 

Listen when you’re ready to come back to yourself.

Connect with Genea

Weekly Clarity Call - Wednesdays 7a PST/10a EST - Join the call here:  https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/regis... 

Inquire about Events, Firewalking, Coaching, being a guest on Be the Wolf LIVE or Be the Wolf Podcast https://bethewolfnow.com/connect/

Website: http://bethewolfnow.com/

Instagram:   / geneabarnes   

Facebook:   / bethewolfnow   

TikTok:   / geneabarnes   

About Genea

Genea Barnes is a mentor, coach, and speaker whose early life was rooted in deep trauma and neglect. To stay safe, she learned to make everyone else feel good and put their needs first.

It worked to survive, but it came with a cost. She lost her ability to discern what was truly right for her. And getting what she wanted came with the anxiety that it would be lost or taken away. 

She was great at making other people’s dreams come true, but when it came to what she truly wanted, she self-sabotaged and procrastinated … always putting something else first. 

She spent decades exploring and studying every modality under the sun to break free from those patterns and create a life that felt like joy, ease, and freedom. 

Today, she empowers people to move away from and resolve conflict rooted in trauma, generational trauma, and sacrifice of self … so they can create the life they crave and access greater peace and freedom in all areas of their life. 

This gives them access to loving, authentic relationships, consistent healthy habits, and success in business, finance, and career that feels like fulfilment and freedom.

You can't ride the middle between joy and bitterness.

Rachel Martin thought she could. She thought if she just held it together, stayed grateful, did everything right, the chaos would fix itself.

But the truck got repossessed. The finances were abysmal. And she kept saying "it is what it is" like it was protection, when really, it was surrender.

The wake-up call came on a winter road in Minnesota when she heard: You have to choose. Not someday. Not when things get better. Now.

This conversation is about the moment you stop tolerating and start owning your life. Rachel opens up about the messy middle, the emotional stages of taking responsibility, and what it really means to choose truth over comfort.

Here's what unfolds in this episode:

🔹 The phrase that signals you're choosing bitterness without realizing it

If you've been waiting for life to fix itself before you step into who you really are, this episode will shake something loose.

Listen now and stop riding the middle.

Connect with Genea

Weekly Clarity Call - Wednesdays 7a PST/10a EST - Join the call here:  https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/Mr9xoteOSj-pYabKDTNBRA 

Inquire about Events, Firewalking, Coaching, being a guest on Be the Wolf LIVE or Be the Wolf Podcast https://bethewolfnow.com/connect/ 

Website: http://bethewolfnow.com/

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

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bethewolfnow 

TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@geneabarnes 

Connect with Rachel

Website: https://findingjoy.net

Facebook link: https://facebook.com/findingjoyblog 

Email: [email protected] 

About Rachel

Rachel Marie Martin believes in the quiet, unshakable strength of the human spirit and its ability to rise again, to rebuild, and to rediscover joy.

She is the author of Get Your Spark Back, Mom Enough, and The Brave Art of Motherhood, and the voice behind FindingJoy.net, an online community reaching millions of readers each month.

Her words have been translated into more than 25 languages and featured on The Today Show, Good Morning America, NPR, The Huffington Post, Tiny Buddha, Parents, PopSugar, and more. A founding partner of Audience Industries, Rachel also equips entrepreneurs around the world to build message-driven, sustainable businesses that make a difference.

with over 50 million pageviews, 1.1 million+ Facebook followers, and a deeply engaged community across social media, Rachel’s work reminds people that their stories matter, they can create an impact,  and that joy can be found. 

She held his hand while he died.

Genea was four years old. He was a Vietnam vet. A junkie. And the only person around who made her feel loved.

Her mom was emotionally unavailable, physically abusive, and gaslighting her constantly. So this man up the street became her best friend. He gave her what her mom couldn't. Belonging. Encouragement. Safety.

And then he overdosed. And she watched him die.

That was just the beginning. Trauma stacked on trauma until Genea's entire nervous system was wired for one thing: survival.

She never wanted her trauma to define her. But it did. It defined every job she took. Every relationship she stayed in. Every dollar she made. She couldn't make more money than her mom. She couldn't step into what she wanted. She couldn't hold joy when she found it.

In this raw solo episode, Genea opens up about:

🔹 Why she used her trauma story to push people away (and how that kept her trapped in freeze)

If you've been running from your past while it quietly runs your life, this episode will meet you there.

Listen now and stop letting survival mode make your decisions.

Connect with Genea

Weekly Clarity Call - Wednesdays 7a PST/10a EST - Join the call here:  https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/Mr9xoteOSj-pYabKDTNBRA 

Inquire about Events, Firewalking, Coaching, being a guest on Be the Wolf LIVE or Be the Wolf Podcast https://bethewolfnow.com/connect/ 

Website: http://bethewolfnow.com/

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

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bethewolfnow 

TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@geneabarnes 

About Genea

Genea Barnes is a mentor, coach, and speaker whose early life was rooted in deep trauma and neglect. To stay safe, she learned to make everyone else feel good and put their needs first.

It worked to survive, but it came with a cost. She lost her ability to discern what was truly right for her. And getting what she wanted came with the anxiety that it would be lost or taken away. 

She was great at making other people’s dreams come true, but when it came to what she truly wanted, she self-sabotaged and procrastinated … always putting something else first. 

She spent decades exploring and studying every modality under the sun to break free from those patterns and create a life that felt like joy, ease, and freedom. 

Today, she empowers people to move away from and resolve conflict rooted in trauma, generational trauma, and sacrifice of self … so they can create the life they crave and access greater peace and freedom in all areas of their life. 

This gives them access to loving, authentic relationships, consistent healthy habits, and success in business, finance, and career that feels like fulfilment and freedom. 

She believes that when you operate from the TRUTH of who you are, humanity evolves. 

The system was designed to create destruction, and she was part of it.

For nine years, Jen Mitchell Love worked as a litigation attorney. She watched families get torn apart in courtrooms. She saw kids become collateral damage. She felt the heaviness of a broken system that treated people's real lives like billable hours. And she knew something had to change.

This conversation captures Jen in the middle of her most honest evolution yet. She's merging the spiritual practice she kept private for years with her legal work. She's speaking the truth about what divorce actually is: a sacred transition that can heal generational patterns instead of destroying families.

Jen gets raw about:

🔹 Why she became a lawyer to get around the rules (and ended up trapped by them)

This is for anyone who's built something impressive but hollow and stressful. Anyone who knows they're meant for something different but hasn't fully claimed it yet.

Watch to see what real evolution looks like when you're still in it.

Connect with Genea: 

Website: http://bethewolfnow.com/ 

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

Connect with Jen:

Website https://solacedivorce.com 

Appointment Link: https://app.acuityscheduling.com/schedule.php?owner=20935226 

Instagram handle: https://www.instagram.com/solacejenmitchell/ 

Jen’s Bio:

Jen Mitchell Love is a family law attorney, mediator, and holistic coach who founded Solace Divorce Mediation to change the way people experience divorce. After years in the courtroom, she created a heart-centered, spiritually grounded approach that honors the soul contract of marriage while guiding couples through the legal process with mindfulness, intention, and love. 

Through Solace, her “Divorce with Love” Master Class, Solace University, and her book “Shine, Soul, SHINE!” Jen helps people release what no longer serves them, protect their children, and step into a new chapter as empowered co-creators of their Dream Life.

Your no doesn't land because there’s something deeper at play.

Genea spent years behind a bar, unable to say no to doing shots with customers. Come on, just one drink. Just one more. She'd start every shift saying she wasn't drinking, and end it five shots deep. Not because she wanted to drink. Because her no was laced with guilt, fear, uncertainty.

Fear that they'd be upset. Guilt that their experience wouldn't be good. All stemming from being a child who made her mom's (and everyone else’s) feelings her responsibility.

This episode breaks down why saying no feels impossible and what's actually happening underneath. Genea shares stories that cracked the pattern open. The structures she built just to protect herself from having to choose. The anxiety that came up when she finally started putting her experience first.

She reveals:

🔹 Why taking a month off drinking was the only time people respected her no (and what that taught her about clean boundaries)

🔹 The workaholic structure that let her say no, but also kept her from saying yes to things she actually wanted

🔹 How putting other people's experience first since age two created nos that never stuck

🔹 The joy practice that trains you to choose yourself even when you're running late If you struggle to say no without an excuse, this episode will show you what's actually in the way. Listen to learn how to say no cleanly, without fear, and have it actually stick.

Connect with Genea:

Website: http://bethewolfnow.com/

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

About Genea Genea Barnes is a mentor, coach, and speaker whose early life was rooted in deep trauma, abuse, and neglect. To stay safe, she learned to ‘prove’ her worth and take responsibility for others’ needs and feelings.

It worked to survive, but it came with a cost. She lost her ability to discern what was truly right for her. And getting what she wanted came with anxiety that punishment would follow, or be taken away. This led to self-sabotage and limits on how much peace, love, joy, and freedom she was able to feel and maintain in her life.

She spent decades exploring every modality under the sun to create a life that felt like ease and freedom, and finally achieved it.

Today, she empowers people to move away from and resolve conflict rooted in trauma, generational trauma, and loss of self … so they can access greater peace and freedom in all areas of their life (in way less time than it took her).

This gives them access to success that feels like fulfillment and freedom in business, finance, and career, loving, authentic relationships, and healthy habits that feel like a ‘want to’.

She believes that when you operate from the TRUTH of who you are, humanity evolves.

She had everything she was told would make her happy. So why did it feel like a cage?

Ashley Jordan built a life that looked perfect on paper. The dream house. The marriage. The career as an activist. A life that looked enviable from the outside. The result … feeling absolutely caged on the inside.

She walked away from it all. The marriage to a good man. The activist career. The friendships that couldn't handle her evolution. And she rebuilt everything from the inside out based on who she actually is, not who she was told to be.

This isn't a story about dramatic betrayal or abuse. It's about the quiet 

suffocation of living a life that isn't yours. The terror of leaving safety for the unknown. The death of your ego when you stop performing goodness and start embodying truth.

This conversation captures the messy, beautiful journey of unbecoming. Of stripping away every mask to find the truest self underneath. Of walking away from a good man and a good career because good wasn't enough. Of losing friendships that couldn't survive her transformation. Of discovering that grief is actually love calling you home.

Ashley shares the raw truth about:

🔹 The moment she had to leave the activist group she founded because she no longer fit her own mission

 🔹 Why 24 years of repressed grief cracked her open when her childhood sweetheart died

 🔹 How closing her heart at 13 to avoid pain kept her caged for decades

 🔹 The loneliness of not fitting anywhere while you're becoming who you really are

If you've ever felt like your life looks good on paper but still doesn’t “feel right,” this episode will shake something loose.

Listen to understand what’s possible when you choose yourself.

Connect with Genea: 

Website: http://bethewolfnow.com/

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

Connect with Ashley: 

Website: ashjordan.com

Instagram: @msashjordan

Promotional Link: unhappy achiever.com

Ashley's Bio:

Ashley Jordan is the author of Unhappy Achiever: Rejecting the Good Girl Image and Reclaiming the Joy of

Inner Fulfillment. She writes and speaks for women who are done with the masks, the striving, and the

silence—and who are ready to reclaim their voices and rebuild their lives with truth, freedom, and love.

You might not like this one.

If you're someone who does a lot for other people, buckle in. Because Genea is about to challenge the story you've been telling yourself about why you give so much.

You think it's because you care. And yes, you do care. But the capital T truth? There's something deeper. Something you're avoiding by making everyone else feel better.

Genea shares her own pattern of over-giving. 

Hours researching to help an ex-boyfriend’s health issues. Lying awake trying to solve clients' problems. Never taking time off because she "cared" so much about the company. 

But all of it (yes all of it) was running from unresolved pain inside herself.

Here's what this episode reveals:

🔹 The invisible conflict that drives people-pleasing and over-giving

Warning: This episode asks you to look at uncomfortable truths. But on the other side is peace. 

Connect with Genea: 

Website: http://bethewolfnow.com/

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

What if the image you're projecting is “perfect,” but the identity underneath is even better?

Celeste Moore teaches people how to align their external presentation with their authentic self. 

But she only learned how to do this after decades of performing identities that weren't hers. 

From childhood trauma to toxic relationships to living a double life, Celeste survived by becoming whoever she thought she needed to be.

This episode is about the journey from performance to presence:

🔹 How sexual trauma at four years old created a lifelong pattern of pleasing and performing

Listen if you're ready to stop hiding behind the version of you that you created to stay safe and be accepted.

Connect with Genea: 

Website: http://bethewolfnow.com/

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

Connect with Celeste:

YouTube:  https://www.youtube.com/@CelesteMooreImage

Appointment Link:  https://celestemooreimage.hbportal.co/public/67d0b12f7010

Instagram handle:  https://www.instagram.com/celestemooreimage/ 

Celeste’s Bio

For a long time, I thought power came from looking the part.

So I styled myself to be accepted to earn money, to gain respect, to get a seat at tables where I was often

the only woman.

It worked... until it didn’t.

Because dressing for validation is still just survival.

It’s image without embodiment. And it leaves even the most accomplished women wondering why they

still feel invisible.

That was me until I stopped performing and started claiming.

I got radically honest about who I was becoming and built a presence that matched her.

Not who the world said I should be but the woman I actually am.

That transformation changed my life. And now it changes my clients’.

Today, I work with high-achieving entrepreneurs, public figures, and industry leaders ready to command

presence at their next level.

They’re not just after polish, they want precision. Alignment. Influence.

And that’s what I deliver.

I've styled TEDx speakers, luxury founders, celebrities and award-winning CEOs.

My work has been featured in Forbes, Fox News, The Wall Street Times, and on red carpets and stages

where every detail matters.

When New York Fashion Week calls, I’m there not to watch, but to lead.

And when clients are preparing for national press, high-stakes keynotes, or brand reinventions, I’m the one

they trust to make sure they’re seen for who they truly are.

Because when your image is in full alignment with your identity, you don’t just look the part.

You become undeniable.

The to-do list isn't the enemy. Your relationship with it is.

You know the pattern. Spin it in your brain. It feels like 500 things. But when  you write it down. It’s only five things. And even when you finish, there's no relief. Just more tasks. More pressure. More proof that you'll never catch up.

Genea shares a story about being trapped in a closet as a child at night. Literally tied up. Waiting for light under the door. And what she discovered about freedom in that moment changes everything about how you approach your overwhelm today.

Here's what opens up in this episode:

🔹 The invisible conflict that makes your to-do list feel endless

🔹 What actually happens when you access freedom first, then work

🔹 Why your nervous system keeps you in perpetual doing mode

🔹 The practice that breaks the overwhelm cycle for good

Doing more will never set you free. But this episode will show you what actually does. Listen or watch now.

Connect with Genea: