Lucid Cafe

In this very special episode of Lucid Cafe, I celebrate the long-awaited release of my new book, Raven’s Daughter: The Story Keeper. After years of dreaming, writing, and behind-the-scenes work, publication day is finally here.

Joining me is my brilliant and hilarious friend Claire Wheeler, who helps me unpack the story, themes, and inspiration behind the book. This is the first time I’m speaking about Raven’s Daughter out loud in any real depth, so it’s part book talk, part soul share — with a few meandering moments along the way.

We explore some of the book’s deeper currents, including our complicated relationship with deception, the influence of artificial intelligence, and our growing disconnection from the natural world. Though it’s a work of fiction, Raven’s Daughter offers an imaginative lens for reflecting on the challenges of our time.

In this conversation, Claire and Wendy discuss:

• The inspiration for Raven's Daughter
• Deception
• How do you know what's true?
• Terror management theory
• The three realities described in the book
• The story's shamanic influence

For more information about Raven's Daughter or to purchase a copy, visit Three Worlds Press

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In this episode, I sit down with the passionate Alanna Kaivalya to explore the lost — yet ever-present — power of the feminine. While modern women have more freedom than ever to shape our lives and careers, many of us still measure success through a masculine lens, chasing goals and strategies that don’t reflect our deepest desires.

This conversation is not about rejecting the masculine, but about reclaiming the feminine — the intuitive, connective, and compassionate energy that too often gets sidelined. Alanna, a bestselling author and spiritual teacher, shares insights from her new book The Way of the Satisfied Woman, a powerful guide for anyone seeking an alternative path to fulfillment.

Together, we discuss how embracing the feminine can liberate us from burnout, invite greater ease, and reconnect us with what matters most: meaningful relationships, inner peace, and authentic expression.

Alanna Kaivalya, PhD is a bestselling author, educator, thought leader, and expert on mythology, spirituality, psychology, and women’s empowerment. The author of Sacred Sound and Myths of the Asanas, she earned a doctorate in mythological studies with an emphasis in depth psychology from Pacifica Graduate Institute and is the host of The Satisfied Woman podcast.

In this conversation, Alanna discusses:

• What defines femininity 
• Why connecting with the feminine is more important than ever
• What models of satisfaction look like for the modern woman
• How women don't realize how minimized and oppressed they are
• The definition of "satisfaction"
• Her run-in with facebook
• Masculinity and femininity
• Curating your life
• Four keys to a satisfied life
• Relearning how to interact
• Trust
• The habit of apologizing

Visit Alanna's website
Listen to The Satisfied Woman podcast
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In this episode we explore the magic of writing and the power of telling your story. My guest Nancy Slonim Aronie wants you to know that writing is not an exclusive club, that everyone has a really good story to tell. And usually not just one. In her new book Seven Secrets to the Perfect Personal Essay she writes “Essay writing is personal. Sharing what you think about a certain topic is risky. Especially if what you think is not what everyone else thinks.”

Nancy Slonim Aronie is the founder of the Chilmark Writing Workshop on Martha’s Vineyard and the author of Memoir as Medicine and Writing from the Heart. A regular commentator for NPR’s All Things Considered, Aronie has taught at Harvard University and conducted writing workshops and lectures at Kripalu, Omega, Esalen, Rowe Conference Center, Wainwright House, and the Open Center in New York City.

In this episode, Nancy discusses:

• Creativity is its many forms
• The healing power of the personal essay
• The mystery and magic of writing
• How everyone is a writer
• Being vulnerable
• The importance of feeling safe when writing and sharing your writing
• Writing workshops

To learn more about Nancy and her workshops, please visit https://chilmarkwritingworkshop.com/

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Does what goes around, really come back around? Do you reap what you sow? My guest Mordy Levine, who along with his coauthor, Lama Lhanang Rinpoche, recently released the book The Beginner’s Guide to Karma: How to Live with Less Negativity and More Peace. In this episode Mordy explains the role that the universal law of cause and effect, or karma, plays in our lives and how to use this understanding to create a positive path forward.

“Learning about karma will help us understand why we are experiencing this contentiousness so broadly and deeply,” write Rinpoche and Levine. “But more important, understanding karma will allow us reduce anger and division among ourselves, our community, our country, and the world.”

Lama Lhanang Rinpoche and Mordy Levine are the authors of The Beginner’s Guide to Karma. Lama Lhanang Rinpoche was born in the Amdo region of historic Tibet and received a traditional monastic education and later studied under several respected Tibetan lamas. Today, he teaches Vajrayana Buddhism at the Jigme Lingpa Center in San Diego, California. Mordy Levine is an entrepreneur, meditation teacher, and the president of the Jigme Lingpa Center. He also created the Meditation Pro Series, a meditation program designed to alleviate chronic health issues. 

In this episode, Mordy discusses:

• The definition of karma
• What karma is and what it isn’t
• The three consequences
• Looking at motivation
• The connection between action and thought
• Meditation as a tool for awareness
• Escaping our own prisons
• What led him to practice Buddhism
• Managing frustration
• Heavy and light karma
• Sociopathy and psychopathy
• Buddha nature
• What care about karma? 

The Jigme Lingpa Center website 

Mordy’s website 

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This seems like one of the more important episodes I’ve released since the podcast started back in 2018. My guest Dr Janine Oliver is a clinical psychologist who has expertise in social media, reality TV, and critical thinking. In this episode we discuss her research, its implications and practical ways to take care of your amazingly resilient brain. 

Janine is a Cognitive Psychologist and Licensed Clinical Social Worker who, in addition to working with clients in her Philadelphia area practice, offers professional presentations and specialized consulting regarding her research. She is also the author of the book The Anxiety Cure: Practical DRUG-FREE Ways to RE-WIRE Your Brain.

In this episode, Janine discusses:

• Her background and what inspired her research
• What critical thinking is
• Mirror neurons
• The impact of regular social media and reality TV exposure
• Neuroplasticity
• Cultural impact
• Real world examples of the impact
• Ages effected 
• Stages of brain development
• Practical solutions
• Dopamine and human connection
• Boredom
• (And then wendy pretends she knows what she’s talking about re: consciousness!)

Janine’s website

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Have you ever wanted to create change? Or unapologetically chase your dreams? Yet for some reason you stop before you ever get started? Do you ever feel stretched in so many different directions that it feels like you’ve lost your creative spark? My guest Becca Powers wants to empower you to unleash your potential and become everything you were meant to be. In this episode we discuss her new book A Return to Radiance: The POWER Method to Ignite Your Soul and Unleash Your Potential and the creative ways she helps people to get unstuck.

Becca has been referred to as the female Tony Robbins, is a renowned keynote speaker and the visionary Founder of Powers Peak Potential, a leading keynote and training company specializing in mindset mastery for high performers. From her humble beginnings as a minimum-wage Dollar Store employee to an award-winning, 20-year career as a Fortune 500 sales executive, Becca has perfected her expertise in empowering senior leaders and high-performance teams to unlock their full potential through her proprietary methodology, The POWER Method.

In this episode Becca discusses:

• What the word radiance means to her
• Un-potential
• Her early exposure to living a radiant life
• How she lost her radiance
• The five pillars of The Power Method
• Finding ways to both survive and live your radiance
• Looking to your early life for clues
• Selfishness
• Meaning making
• How finding meaning can deepen your connections with others
• Finding your purpose
• The importance of values
• Activating your personal power

 Becca’s website: https://www.beccapowers.com/

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With all the external noise vying for our attention these days, it’s easy to forget that we have access to a wealth of wisdom within each of us and beyond. My guest Happy Ali shares easy  techniques that work on every level of intuition starting with hunches, precognition, and dream analysis and building to direct communication with a multidimensional level of intelligence that is always available. Happy’s clear explanations and insightful guidance, combined with inspiring true stories from his own and others’ direct experiences, demystifies the intuitive process and makes it accessible to all. 

Happy Ali is the author of The Intuition Bible: How and Why to Tap Into Your Inner Wisdom. With a BA degree in psychology from UCLA, he is a prophetic dreamer, certified master NLP practitioner, certified master clinical hypnotherapist, and host of the Happy Insights podcast. Happy’s spiritual journey began in 1995 when he dedicated his life to the exploration of metaphysical disciplines after a near-death experience inspired a dramatic awakening. 

In this episode, Happy discusses:

• What intuition is
• Differentiating between true intuitive guidance and wishful thinking
• The benefits of not always getting it right
• Acceptance
• His prophetic dream experiences
• The evolutionary challenge of accessing intuition 
• The “yes” or “no” technique
• How your agenda can get in the way
• Inner world
• Group coaching and online courses he offers

Happy’s website 

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This episode might surprise you. I had no idea until I spoke with my guest Bruce Fertman that the way we’ve unconsciously learned to walk is actually doing us a disservice. In fact, most of us are making it harder than it needs to be. In this episode we discuss Bruce and his coauthor Michael J. Gelb’s new book Walking Well: A New Approach for Experiencing Comfort and Vitality in Every Step; a helpful guide that’s chock full of secrets, advice, and guidance on walking with pleasure, power, poise, and peace.

Bruce Fertman brings sixty years of study as a movement artist and educator to his work, having trained in gymnastics, modern dance, ballet, contact improvisation, the Alexander Technique, tai chi chuan, aikido, chanoyu (Japanese tea ceremony), Argentine tango, and kyudo (Zen archery). For the past thirty years Fertman has taught in Europe, Asia, and the Americas helping people experience the interconnectedness of physical and spiritual life.

In this episode Bruce discusses:

• How walking can be more than exercise
• Walking as a metaphor
• “Sleep walking” your way through life
• How walking can help you increase your awareness of your body
• Developing a new relationship with your body
• Walking and breathing
• Walking for inspiration
• Myths about walking
• Walking for vitality
• Tips on how to walk well
• Walking with “bear” feet
• Walking shoulder to shoulder
• Walking for transformation
• The connection between sitting, standing and walking

Bruce and Michael’s website: Walking Well 

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Cacao is more than just a drink that many are sharing in their ceremonies; it is a Master Plant Medicine that, although not psychedelic, carries the power to open hearts, facilitate deep inner work, and foster a profound connection with the essence of life. My guest Judy Machado, founder of Goddess Temple Cacao, is following her passion to introduce people to the healing magic of Ceremonial Cacao. 

Judy spent a year and half Consulting for a bean-to-bar chocolate company. She became infatuated with the spiritual story and significance of Cacao and whole-heartedly connected to the power of this heart-opening, Consciousness-raising plant medicine. 

She worked intimately with a Shipibo-Canibo trained Shaman to deepen her connection with the plant, journeying through many of the ancient and sacred Cacao Dietas to receive teachings and wisdom. She began to experience a deepening relationship to this benevolent Spirit Guide, receiving messages to share with the world. 

In this episode, Judy discusses:

• How Cacao is a Master Teacher Plant
• The difference between medicinal and teacher plants
• Creating a Cacao ritual
• How the Cacao Spirit invites a heart-opening journey inward
• The Cacao Dieta ceremony
• Developing a relationship with the Spirit of Cacao
• Transforming beliefs
• How the Spirit of Cacao can help us remember and broaden our perspectives
• Creating the Cacao ritual that’s right for you
• The transformative nature of Cacao
• Free introductory gifts she offers people (links below)
• 5-Day Cacao Drinking Challenge for beginners (link below) 
• Cacao retreats

Visit Judy’s website

Free offerings for Lucid Café listeners from Judy:

• FREE Metamorphosis Journey-To-Self Meditation
• 5-Day Cacao Drinking Challenge: Breakup with coffee & Awaken with Cacao
• FREE live training How to Transform Your Passion for Cacao into a Profitable, Impactful Business
• FREE live training Meet your Cacao & Mushroom Spirit Guides through the sacred Master Plant Medicine Dieta

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Are you emotionally potty trained? My guest Rachel Kaplan is a licensed psychotherapist who created an accessible framework for self-care and personal transformation that she calls Emotional Potty Training™ (EPT). In this episode and in her new book Feel, Heal & Let That Sh*t Go, she shares her revolutionary call to action that will teach you precisely how to feel your emotions by moving them through your body as nature intended.

Rachel Kaplan, MA, MFT, is a licensed psychotherapist with a thriving practice in the San Francisco Bay Area. Creator and host of the acclaimed podcast Healing Feeling Sh*t Show, she is active on a variety of social media channels and has published multiple features in Common Ground. Kaplan has studied yoga, meditation, and hands-on healing practices in India and Nepal, earned a master’s degree in counseling psychology from the California Institute of Integral Studies, and trained in cutting-edge trauma modalities such as EMDR. She divides her time between Oakland and Joshua Tree, California.

In this episode, Rachel discusses:

• Her creative perspective regarding processing emotions
• The trend of thinking about your feelings
• The tragic event that heavily influenced her life
• The limits of traditional psychotherapy
• The importance of feeling your feelings
• How she teaches people how to get in touch with their wounds in order to release their pain
• The importance of taking charge of your healing process
• Her spiritual journey
• What being emotionally resilient looks like
• The benefits of allowing yourself to feel all your feelings
• Why people experience stuck-ness
• Reactive and proactive emotional release
• The fear of allowing yourself to feel 
• The importance of feeling a sense of agency in your emotional life
• The various ways she works with clients
• Her podcast Healing Feeling Sh*t Show

Rachel’s website

________

BECOME YOUR OWN SHAMAN Introductory Online Course 

Visit Wendy’s website to learn more about the Harmonic Egg® energy therapy pod

“Gifts and Tools to Explore and Celebrate the Unseen Worlds” - The Lucid Path Boutique

Lucid Cafe episodes by topic 

Listen to Lucid Cafe on YouTube