Living Inspired - A Functional Approach to Women’s Health, Energy, and Resilience

What if time isn’t actually the problem?

In this episode of Living Inspired, Rachel sits down with Michelle Niemeyer, a former attorney turned coach, to explore a powerful reframe she calls time bending.

Instead of managing time more efficiently or cramming more into already-full days, this conversation looks at how our relationship with time changes when we reconnect with what energizes us.

Michelle shares how chronic stress and burnout quietly shrink our world, draining joy, creativity, and focus, and how her own autoimmune diagnosis became a turning point that forced her to slow down and listen. From there, she explains how rediscovering what truly lights us up can expand our capacity, improve focus, and help us get more done without pushing harder.

This episode is especially meaningful for women navigating midlife, chronic stress, or ongoing symptoms, where the nervous system has been “on” for far too long. Rachel and Michelle explore how joy, creativity, movement, and alignment are not luxuries, but essential ingredients for healing, clarity, and sustainable energy.

Rather than offering another productivity system, this conversation invites you to pause, reflect, and take back agency over how you spend your time, energy, and attention.

• Why burnout isn’t just about working too much, but losing pieces of yourself

• How doing what energizes you can actually expand your experience of time

• The connection between nervous system regulation, joy, and productivity

• Why energy, not hours, is the real currency

• Simple ways to regain clarity without quitting your job or overhauling your life

• How small shifts in awareness can create big changes in how life feels

  
  

Michelle also shares a free resource for listeners, including a guided meditation and journaling prompts to help you identify what truly lights you up, along with a goal-setting framework designed to support intentional living.

As we stand on the edge of a new year, it’s easy to feel the pressure to set big goals, fix what feels broken, or reinvent ourselves entirely.

In this episode of Living Inspired, Rachel invites you into a very different way of approaching 2026. One that is gentler, more sustainable, and deeply rooted in who you are already becoming.

Instead of resolutions, we explore the idea of tiny experiments. Small, low-pressure shifts that help you listen to your body, rebuild trust with yourself, and create real change without burning out your nervous system.

This episode is especially for you if:

• You feel tired of starting over every January

• You’ve tried diets, supplements, or protocols that didn’t stick

• You’re navigating midlife changes, chronic symptoms, or emotional overwhelm

• You want to feel calm, confident, and more like yourself again

Inside the episode, we talk about:

• Why resolutions often fail and what works better

• How identity, not willpower, drives lasting change

• What “tiny experiments” are and why they’re so powerful

• Reflecting on who you became in 2025 (not just what you did)

• How curiosity can replace pressure and self-criticism

• Why symptoms are signals, not failures

• How this approach supports healing, especially in midlife

Rachel also shares how this framework has shaped her own life and work, and why rebuilding trust with your body is at the heart of true healing.

Resources mentioned in the episode:

• Free Consultation: Find Clarity and Relief with Rachel.
  

• Mood Swings SOS (Free Audio Resource):
  A calming nervous system reset you can use in the moment

  
  

• Instagram: Follow Rachel at @PeaceInPerimenopause

I’m joined by Nina Manolson, a body peace coach and therapist with over 30 years of experience helping women end the war with food and their bodies.

Together, we explore the growing cultural pressure to shrink, especially in the era of GLP-1 medications, and the quieter question so many women are asking themselves: Should I be shrinking too?

This episode is not about judging GLP-1s or telling anyone what they should or shouldn’t do. Instead, it’s about understanding the emotional and relational impact of living in constant body comparison and management. Nina introduces the idea of body autonomy, reminding us that while every woman gets to choose what she does with her body, we also deserve a compassionate, connected relationship with it.

We talk about food noise and why simply shutting it off may mean losing important body communication. Nina reframes cravings and hunger as messages rather than problems, and shares what it actually looks like to build a respectful, sustainable relationship with food and body, especially if you were never taught how.

One of the most powerful moments of the episode is when Nina reads her poem, I Don’t Want to Die Hating My Body, a moving reminder of what’s at stake when we spend our lives at war with ourselves.

If you’ve ever felt pressure to shrink, struggled with food noise, or wondered if there’s a calmer, kinder way to live in your body, this conversation will meet you right where you are.

You can learn more about Nina and access her free journals, masterclasses, and Body Peace Deck at ninamanelson.com or bodypeacewithnina.com.

Contact Rachel: [email protected]

Learn more about her work: RachelCartaRN.com

Find relief from Mood Swings ASAP here: rachelcartarn.com/sos

In this bonus episode, we take a gentle pause from regular programming to honor something many people carry this time of year: grief. Whether your loss is recent or years in the past, the holidays often bring memories and emotions to the surface.

Rachel opens the episode by sharing her own experience of losing her dad and a simple analogy that reframes how grief lives within us over time. She offers compassion, permission, and understanding for anyone moving through a tender season.

This episode includes a special conversation from Rachel’s other podcast, Hospice Redefined, featuring three hospice professionals who have also experienced significant personal loss. Their stories offer comfort, validation, and practical tools for navigating the holidays with more ease.

• Why grief often intensifies during the holidays

• A simple way to understand how grief changes over time

• How honoring a loved one can create connection and relief

• Real stories of adapting traditions and creating new ones

• Practical strategies for lowering expectations and protecting your emotional energy

• Gentle reminders that you don’t have to navigate this season alone

This episode is for anyone grieving a loved one, anyone supporting someone in grief, and anyone who feels heaviness or emotional overwhelm during the holiday season.

May this episode bring comfort, connection, and a little more breath to your season.

Reach out to Rachel: [email protected].

Find out more about her work: RachelCartaRN.com

Learn more about her passion project: HospiceRedefined.com

If you have been feeling irritable, overstimulated, or like your nervous system is stuck on high this holiday season, this episode is for you.

In this coaching call I am sharing with you, we talk about what actually makes this time of year feel so intense and how to gently bring your system back down without clearing your schedule or disappearing for a week. You will learn simple, realistic ways to create tiny pockets of space that calm your body, soften your mind, and help you feel more like yourself again.

These strategies work during the holidays and in any busy or transitional season of life.

• Why the holidays and other busy seasons hit your nervous system harder in midlife

• How sensory overload, hormones, blood sugar, grief, and expectations all play a role

• What “dysregulated” really looks like in everyday life

• Simple ways to create space without canceling everything on your calendar

• “Space snacks” you can use anywhere: mini regulation tools in between tasks or conversations

• How to use breath, silence, and small pauses as powerful nervous system medicine

• Gentle questions to help you prioritize what actually matters and let go of what drains you

• Permission to choose presence over perfection and cut out things that steal your peace

  
  

  Mentioned in this episode:

• Free 5-minute Mood Swings SOS audio
  A short guided reset you can use when irritability, rage, or emotional overload hit.
  

• Connect on Instagram: @peaceinperimenopause

In this episode, I am inviting you into something that feels very close to my heart.

On Black Friday morning, instead of running a sale, I felt led to simply open my Zoom room for 30 minutes and offer a live breath and meditation practice. No slides. No pitch. Just community, connection, and a space to allow whatever was present.

If you are in midlife, or in any season where your hormones, emotions, and energy feel like they are all over the place, you might recognize yourself in this conversation. Mood swings, irritability, oversensitivity, grief, and feeling “not like yourself” can bring so much shame. In this episode I walk you through a gentle body scan, a simple journaling practice, and a way of relating to your inner world that is rooted in curiosity instead of judgment.

Allowing what you feel is not weakness. It is one of the most powerful ways to get unstuck.

In this episode you’ll hear about:

• Why allowing your feelings can open the door to healing

• How trauma and “shoulds” can create patterns that leave you feeling stuck

• What it looks like to create space in your day for your nervous system to soften

• A guided body scan you can do lying down, sitting, walking, or even driving (eyes open)

• Simple journaling prompts to help you hear from your inner wisdom

• Why practices like this are no longer “nice to do,” but essential when you are in a season of flux

Mentioned in this episode:

• The Mood Shift Method (one of my core frameworks for stabilizing mood swings)

• Mood Swings SOS free audio (short audio you can use in the moment when your mood spikes)

• Blog + podcast archive: rachelcartaRN.com (click “Blog / Podcast” in the menu)

  
  

If this episode supports you, it would mean so much if you shared it with a friend or left a review. It helps these conversations reach more women who need to know they are not alone.

Find and follow Rachel on instagram: @peaceinperimenopause

I’m sharing Chapter 3 of my book, Secrets to Authentic Happiness, as today’s episode.

This chapter is all about the power of gratitude, how it rewires your brain through neuroplasticity, and why a simple five-minute daily practice can begin to shift your entire inner world.

You’ll hear stories from my clients, the science behind gratitude, and a guided invitation into a 90-day practice I call Living in Extreme Gratitude—a gentle, doable way to retrain your brain to look for small moments of joy, even on the hardest days.

If you’ve ever rolled your eyes at “just be grateful” advice or felt like gratitude practices were too fluffy or forced, this chapter is for you.

And if you love what you hear, you can grab the full audiobook here:
👉 SecretsToAuthenticHappiness.com/audiobook

Share your gratitude journey with me:

Email: [email protected]

Instagram: @peaceinperimenopause

What happens to marriage when hormones shift?

For many women, midlife brings not only physical changes — but emotional distance, shorter tempers, and a quiet wondering: What happened to us?

In this deeply personal episode, I sit down with Brooke Davis, creator of Marriage in Perimenopause, to talk honestly about what’s really happening inside relationships during this season of life — and how to find your way back to connection, compassion, and understanding.

This conversation came straight from my own experience.
When my perimenopause symptoms began, after working in a high-stress hospital environment, I didn’t recognize myself anymore. I felt irritable, foggy, exhausted, and disconnected. My husband once said, “I just wish you were like you used to be,” and it broke me. Because I wanted that too.

Learning how much my hormones and nervous system were affecting my mood, my energy, and my relationships changed everything. And Brooke helped me see that clearly.

Together, we talk about:
✨ Why midlife can make relationships feel strained — and what biology has to do with it
✨ The “Estrogen Veil” and why little things suddenly feel so big
✨ How to communicate with your partner when brain fog and irritability take over
✨ The real reason libido changes — and how to rebuild intimacy naturally
✨ The emotional and practical tools that help couples reconnect
✨ Why this season can actually become a turning point toward deeper love and understanding

Brooke’s perspective combines relationship wisdom and hormone science in a way that brings instant relief — and hope.

Whether you’re married, dating, or simply trying to understand yourself better, this episode will help you see that you’re not broken. You’re just changing. And there’s a way through.

Connect with Brooke:

Instagram: @marriageinperimenopause
Check out her course The Hormone-Informed Midlife Marriage — a powerful resource for couples navigating this season together.

Connect with Rachel:

Website: RachelCartaRN.com
Instagram: @peaceinperimenopause
Grab the Partner Communication Guide mentioned in this episode — it’s a free resource to help you start these conversations with more clarity and compassion.

Get The Mood Shift Method to finally know what to do to navigate mood swings during perimenopause.

More articles to check out regarding relationships and lower perimenopause symptoms:

➡️ Cacioppo & Cacioppo, Psychoneuroendocrinology, 2014

➡️ Idiana HI et al., Menopause Research Journal, 2022;

➡️ Tadayon et al., Journal of Midwifery & Reproductive Health, 2024

Does it ever feel like the smallest thing can send your whole day spiraling?
You spill the coffee, your kid melts down, a meeting runs late—and suddenly, your emotional stability feels like it’s gone.

In this week’s episode, Rachel opens up about what real resilience looks like in perimenopause—and why it’s not about pushing harder or doing more. Through her personal story of burnout as a nurse during the COVID pandemic, she shares how resilience isn’t a mindset—it’s a physiological state.

You’ll learn:

• Why resilience feels so out of reach in midlife (and why that’s not your fault)

• What “allostatic load” means and how it explains your symptoms

• The 3 foundations for rebuilding resilience: rest, mindset, and nervous system regulation

• Simple daily practices to help you feel calm, grounded, and steady again

  
  

If you’ve been feeling like one small thing could send you over the edge, this episode will remind you that you’re not broken—you’re just overloaded. And there’s a way back to calm and strength.

👉 Grab Rachel’s free guide to uncover the root causes of your symptoms and start your path to relief: rachelcartaRN.com/lastinghealth

👉 Need a Mood Swing SOS? Grab one for free here: rachelcartarn.com/sos

This week’s episode is a little different. Rather than talking about hormones or health habits, I’m sharing something deeply personal, something that reminds us of the sacredness of life and how grief can be one of our greatest teachers.

Six years ago, I lost one of my dearest friends, Maria. Her life, and her passing, changed me forever. In this episode, I reflect on what she taught me about living with purpose, love, and courage.

Whether you’ve lost someone close or simply need a reminder to slow down and be present, this conversation will invite you to pause, breathe, and reconnect with what truly matters.

Because living inspired isn’t about perfection; it’s about presence. It’s about honoring the gift of being alive.

• Why grief can be one of life’s most powerful teachers

• How loss can inspire you to live more fully

• The connection between life, death, and healing

• How serving in hospice care reminds me of what truly matters

• A reflection on finding stillness in the busyness of life

• Take a moment to honor someone who has shaped your life. Light a candle, take a walk, or simply say their name out loud.

• Share this episode with a friend who might need comfort or encouragement today.

• Please leave a review. It helps more women discover Living Inspired.

  
  

• 🌿 Instagram: @peaceinperimenopause

• 💻 Website: RachelCartaRN.com

• 🎧 Listen to more episodes: Living Inspired Podcast