As we move through the winter solstice and toward a new year, many people feel a quiet weight—pressure to change, pressure to decide, pressure to be ready.

In this episode of Rise To Her, Emily explores a different way of approaching 2026. One rooted in collective energy, shared experience, and opportunity rather than force or urgency.

This conversation reflects on ancient seasonal wisdom, the power of shared rhythm, and how manifestation shifts when we stop carrying everything alone. Instead of goal-setting or pushing for clarity, this episode invites you to stay available to what’s already forming.

Why winter has always been a season of gathering, rest, and shared survival

How collective energy can support your vision instead of creating pressure

The felt difference between obligation and opportunity

Why manifestation becomes easier when support is allowed

A softer way to approach 2026 without forcing answers

Take these prompts slowly. There’s no rush to answer them.

1.
When I remove urgency, expectations, and timelines from 2026, what do I start dreaming about instead?
What wants my attention when I let myself want something without needing to justify it?

2.
What am I currently carrying as if it’s mine to manage alone?
Where could shared energy, collaboration, or support make this feel lighter?

3.
When I imagine being supported—by timing, community, or something steady beyond my own effort—what direction feels easiest to lean toward right now?
What feels interesting without asking me to decide anything yet?

→ Join ROOTED (Seasonal Living Membership): use code SOLSTICE for almost 50% off an entire year!

→ Winter Solstice Episode (Listen First or Pair With This One)

→ Connect on Instagram

→ Explore More at Rise To Her (and get my free 7-day mini course: Burnout to Balance)

If this episode resonated, share it with someone who’s been feeling the weight of the season. You don’t have to carry it alone.

The Winter Solstice has been honored for thousands of years as a turning point in the human relationship with time, energy, and survival. In this episode of Rise To Her, Emily explores what the solstice really represents, why our ancestors oriented their lives around it, and how these ancient teachings still apply to modern life.

We move through ancestral roots, Celtic and earth-based traditions, and the psychology of seasonal living—connecting ritual, rhythm, and soul-aligned values to the way we care for our energy today. This conversation invites you to slow down, tend what matters, and re-orient your life around intention rather than pressure.

You’ll also learn simple, practical solstice rituals you can do right now to release what no longer belongs, nourish your body, and anchor into the next cycle with clarity and steadiness.

• What the Winter Solstice is and why it has been honored across cultures
• Ancestral lineage, earth-based traditions, and seasonal rhythms
• The difference between core needs and soul-aligned values
• Why modern exhaustion comes from ignoring natural pauses
• The symbolism of fire, food, and the hearth in ancient solstice rituals
• The myth of the Holly King and Oak King and what it teaches about timing
• Three practical Winter Solstice rituals you can do at home
• How intentional slowing helps protect your energy for the next cycle

Fire as Release — safely burning what no longer belongs in this next season
Seasonal Nourishment — eating slowly, intentionally, and in season
Orientation Ritual — choosing a word to embody in the coming year

🌿 Join ROOTED at special Winter Solstice pricing
→ Join for less than $1/day or get full year access at 50% off
CODE: SOLSTICE FOR $20 off PER MONTH FOR AN ENTIRE YEAR

CODE: SOLSTICEYEAR for 50% off FOR AN ENTIRE YEAR OF ROOTED ACCESS

📍 Portland, OR – Live Winter Solstice Workshop (limited tickets)
👉 GRAB YOUR SPOT HERE

📸 Connect with Emily on Instagram
👉 @risetoher

🎧 Love the show?
Share this episode with someone in your community and leave a review on Spotify or Apple Podcasts. Your support helps this work reach those who are ready for it.

with Jo Giese

Healing doesn’t always feel hopeful.
Sometimes it comes with grief, frustration, and the quiet realization that life will never look the way it once did.

In this episode of Rise To Her, Emily sits down with award-winning journalist and author Jo Giese to talk about what happens when your body forces you to slow down—and the version of life you loved is no longer accessible.

After a sudden injury left Jo unable to walk, she found herself navigating far more than physical recovery. This conversation explores identity loss, learning to accept help, redefining strength, and how to keep choosing joy without bypassing grief.

This episode is for anyone who is “doing better” on the outside, but still quietly mourning who they used to be.

What it means to heal while still grieving your old life

How injury and loss can change your sense of identity

Why healing isn’t linear—and why comparison can make it harder

Learning to live at a different pace without giving up meaning

The role of community when independence is taken away

How Jo refused to accept a diminished version of her life

Why walking, water, and nature became part of her recovery

How to stay open to joy without denying pain

Jo Giese is an award-winning journalist, longtime radio host, and bestselling author whose work explores movement, meaning, and resilience. Her upcoming memoir, You’ll Never Walk Alone (releasing February 8, 2026), tells the story of a sudden Achilles injury that left her unable to walk—and the unexpected transformation that followed.

Jo has built a community of over 25,000 hikers, readers, and seekers who connect deeply with her grounded storytelling and lived wisdom.

You’ll Never Walk Alone by Jo Giese

→ stay up to date + check out her other books, too!!

Jo Giese’s Website
→ check it out here

Follow Jo on Instagram
→ follow her IG here

Winter Solstice Workshop — Portland, OR (Dec 20)
→ JOIN HERE 

Journey to Joy Retreat — Bacalar, Mexico (Nov 5–10, 2026)
→  RETREAT INTEREST LIST

ROOTED: Seasonal Living Membership (7-Day Free Trial)
→ Join Here

You can be healing and grieving at the same time.
You can move forward without pretending you’re the same person.
And you don’t have to do it alone.

If this episode resonated, share it with someone who’s quietly navigating their own in-between season—and take a walk today, even if it’s a slow one.

On Ep 47: Why Rest Can Feel Unsafe — And What Your System Is Trying to Tell You, Emily breaks down why rest can feel so unsafe for some folks and how to begin undoing the "go go go mentality" that many of us are chained to. This episode came out of a week in Bacalar that humbled Emily in a way she didn’t expect. Emily went to visit a healer she's known for over a decade, and the moment she arrived, her body stopped. Hard.
Not in a burnout collapse kind of way — in a you’re-not-listening-so-I’m-taking-over kind of way.

What unfolded over the next five days became a lesson in slowing down, listening to her body, and remembering the rhythms we belong to — not the ones we perform for.

Inside this episode, we explore:

why your body speaks long before your mind does

why rest, stillness, and emotional presence feel unsafe for so many high-capacity humans

the medicine tradition of listening to sensation rather than symptom

how cyclical living makes overwhelm easier to hold

how to sit with discomfort without collapsing into it

what my time with a local medicine woman unlocked in my own healing

how shadow work fits into all of this (and why it’s not about digging for pain)

You’ll also hear the prompts we're working with this week — the same ones that are being offered to you.

Here are the prompts for you to explore: 

If you need a moment to breathe, to hear yourself again, or to let your body’s truth catch up with you… this is that moment.

ROOTED Membership (7-day free trial)
👉 JOIN HERE FOR FREE

Shadow Work Portal (inside ROOTED)
👉 JOIN HERE 

Join the 2026 LGBTQIA+ Wellness Bacalar Retreat Interest List
Email: [email protected] 

Follow on Instagram
👉 https://www.instagram.com/risetoher

A grounding episode for leaders, helpers, caregivers, and anyone who turns into the “responsible one” the moment they walk back into their childhood home.

The holidays have a way of waking up the parts of you that worked overtime to keep you safe when you were younger — the fixer, the peacekeeper, the emotional caretaker, the one who anticipates every mood in the room.

You may have done so much work on boundaries, self-responsibility, and reclaiming your energy…
and yet the moment you’re around old patterns, your system slips into familiar roles without asking.

This isn’t regression. It’s your body remembering what once kept you safe.

In this episode, we explore:

Why protector parts get louder around family

What “over-responsibility” actually is and why so many leaders carry it

Six common roles people fall back into during the holidays

How to recognize when you’re slipping into an old identity

A real-time practice to soften your body, update your protectors, and choose micro-boundaries that protect your energy

How to use the Shadow Work Portal inside ROOTED to stay steady through the holidays and winter season

If you’re already feeling your energy leak, or if you’re bracing for familiar dynamics — this episode will help you understand what’s happening and give you a way to stay in your own body, not your old role.

ROOTED is where high-capacity humans come to recover from carrying the world.
You’ll get access to:

The Shadow Work Portal for real-time support

Seasonal workshops for grounded, aligned growth

Meditations, rituals, and earth-based practices

Two live calls each month

A private community of deep-feeling leaders who want a more meaningful world

Start your free trial

Instagram: @risetoher
Website: Rise To Her

Many people who care about changing the world are running on fumes. They’re carrying responsibility that was never meant to be carried alone, and they’re trying to repair systems while ignoring the parts of themselves that are asking for attention. When we push past our limits long enough, the same patterns we want to dismantle in the world show up in our bodies, our choices, and our relationships.

This episode is about the connection between the work you do inside yourself and the work you do in the world. Shadow work isn’t about digging through every painful memory or “fixing” yourself. It’s about noticing the parts of you that learned to survive through urgency, overgiving, control, rescuing, or holding everything together — and bringing those parts back into relationship with who you are now.

When those patterns run the show, reactivity gets mistaken for purpose, and exhaustion feels like devotion. That’s how burnout repeats the very systems we’re trying to change. But when you’re resourced, rested, and grounded, your presence carries clarity instead of chaos. The way you communicate shifts. The way you advocate shifts. And the impact you make becomes steady instead of frantic.

In this episode, we explore how anger, grief, exhaustion, and urgency can be honored without letting them take the wheel. We look at how to return to your body, interrupt reactive cycles, and rebuild the capacity to lead, create, and connect in a way that lasts. You’ll hear three simple rituals used inside the Shadow Work Portal that support you when you’re stretched thin or losing sight of why your work matters.

This conversation is for anyone who feels the weight of the world and wants to keep showing up without losing themselves in the process.

• Grounding Pause
Hand on the body. Three slow breaths. A moment to come back to yourself before stepping into conversations or decisions.

• Sacred Stop
A short pause when urgency takes over. Sixty seconds to step away and return to your values instead of fear or pressure.

• Circle of Resourcing
Weekly connection with someone who can witness you without performance. Community regulation shifts patterns faster than isolation ever could.

Join ROOTED (Shadow Work Portal access + 7-day free trial):
https://www.risetoher.com/rooted 

Instagram (@risetoher):
https://www.instagram.com/risetoher 

Shadow Work Portal inside ROOTED:
https://www.risetoher.com/rooted (recieve immediate access when you join ROOTED)!

What if the life you’ve been given isn’t the one you have to accept?

In this episode, Emily talks with author and coach Martine Cohen about how conscious choices can rewrite your story—even when it feels like your brain, your identity, or your roles have you stuck. Martine shares how a traumatic car accident and concussion shifted her from “I am my brain” to “I am awareness,” and how you can step out of patterns, people-pleasing, and unconscious survival modes to lead yourself from alignment and freedom.

You’ll learn how to:

Recognize the difference between reacting and choosing

Let go of the layers that hold you back (beliefs, identities, fears)

Shift your nervous system from survival to thriving

Integrate your intelligence and intuition for authentic leadership

Make small, powerful choices today that change your tomorrow

This episode is a must-listen for high-achieving professionals, leaders, and anyone done sacrificing their peace, power, and purpose for someone else’s version of success.

Resources + Links:

Martine Cohen — Website 

Book No More Layers: Discover Your Inner Power and Reclaim True Freedom from the Inside Out — Amazon 

Free gift + Connect page — [Gift link / Connect Page]

ROOTED Membership (7-day free trial) — https://www.risetoher.com/rooted 

Rise To Her Instagram — @risetoher 

Join ROOTED for seasonal, earth-based practices + The Shadow Portal: https://www.risetoher.com/rooted 

✨ Grab Martine’s free gift for quieting the mind and reclaiming choice: [Gift link]

Keywords: inner freedom, rewrite your story, conscious choices, Martine Cohen, No More Layers book, people-pleasing recovery, nervous system regulation, self-leadership, high-achiever burnout, spiritual growth

What if healing isn’t just about medicine—but place, community, and feeling truly cared for?
In this soulful conversation, Emily sits down with Barry, founder of Carmel Retreats  and steward of the historic Cuddle Dune Cottage (“the Lost Cottage of Carmel”).

After an advanced cancer diagnosis, Barry transformed his family’s seaside cottage into a sanctuary for rest, renewal, and remembrance—rooted in nature, spiritual practice, and community support.

You’ll hear how to curate your own environment for healing (even at home), the surprising power of micro-rituals, and Barry’s heart-led Postcards for Healing  initiative that gifts free stays to those in need.

Barry — Founder, Carmel Retreats & Steward of Cuddle Dune Cottage
🌐 Website: Carmel Retreats 
📸 Instagram: @carmel.retreats 
💌 Postcards for Healing Nomination: Nominate Someone Here 

00:00 Welcome + Why healing is also “where” we are
03:10 Barry’s diagnosis → nature, ritual, and community as lifelines
06:20 Daily practices: meditation/prayer, ocean grounding, and simple joy
09:00 Try everything: finding your modalities (what worked, what didn’t)
12:10 Community care: letting people help (and why that heals both ways)
15:05 Reframing the mundane → everyday miracles during recovery
16:30 The Lost Cottage of Carmel & Eliza Yoakum’s legacy
19:10 Being “open”: removing blocks to receive light and guidance
22:10 Mind–body focus, OCD share, and the power of choosing attention
28:00 ROOTED membership invite (seasonal, nature-based support)
30:10 Myth & meaning: descent, shadow work, and renewal
33:10 Sensory rewiring after radiation: neuroplasticity & persistence
36:00 Postcards for Healing: how to nominate someone for a free stay
39:00 5 ways to curate a healing environment at home
47:00 Visualization + action: pairing “magic with motion”
49:00 Rapid-fire: grounding sound, healing color, ocean medicine
50:15 Gratitude as an antidote to spirals
51:00 Partners & resources in Carmel + where to find Barry

Sanctuary Objects: Place 1–3 items that spark joy where your eyes land first.

Nature Dose: Step outside daily—porch sun salutes, cloud-watching, tree-touching.

Receive Support: Let people help. Receiving is healing (for both of you).

Sacred Corner: Create a meditation/visualization nook (10–20 min daily).

Intentional Food: Choose one “healing meal” ritual a day (tea, greens, or broth).

Carmel Retreats: Website  | Instagram 
Postcards for Healing (mail-in nomination): Details + Address 
Refuge Spa (thermal cycles/mineral soaks): Website 
Earthbound Farm (organic foods nearby): Website 
Earth Cura Apothecary (custom herbal teas): Website 
Salty Soul Sanctuary (yoga/meditation): Website 
MOJA Yoga: Website 
Mad Dogs & Englishmen E-Bike Tours: Website 
Monterey Touring Vehicles (’55 Thunderbird, Hwy 1): Website 
Caraccioli Cellars: Website 
Scheid Vineyards — Wines: Website 
Aubergine (Restaurant): Website 
Casanova (Restaurant): Website 
California State Parks (Point Lobos): Website 
Emily’s ROOTED Membership (7-day free trial): Join Here 
Rise To Her on Instagram: @risetoher 

✨ Nominate someone for a free healing retreat via Postcards for Healing → Nominate Here 
🌿 Join ROOTED for seasonal, earth-based support → Start Free Trial 
💫 Share this episode with someone navigating illness, burnout, or grief → Share Link 

If this episode supported you, please rate & review on Apple Podcasts — your words help Rise To Her reach more people who need this message. ❤️

In this episode:
Emily sits down with Christina L. Woods—Clinical Hypnotherapist, Rapid Transformational Therapist®, coach, Reiki Master, and author—to explore the real reason high-achievers stay stuck in patterns of overthinking, anxiety, and exhaustion, even when they “know better.”

You’ll learn how hypnotherapy bridges the gap between what we consciously want and what our subconscious believes to be safe. Together, they dive into how creating safety in the body unlocks sustainable transformation—without more pushing, forcing, or striving.

YOU’LL HEAR ABOUT:
• Why mindset and motivation aren’t enough for lasting change
• The link between your nervous system and subconscious patterns
• How hypnosis rewires beliefs for calm, confidence, and clarity
• Why rest and safety are the foundation of true productivity
• Simple ways to anchor new beliefs in your day-to-day life

TIMESTAMPS
00:00 – Why awareness isn’t enough to change
03:00 – What’s bringing Christina joy right now
07:00 – Her journey from corporate success to healing work
11:00 – Why high-achievers struggle to slow down
18:00 – What actually happens in hypnosis
24:00 – How your brain resists change even when you want it
29:00 – Creating safety as the foundation for transformation
34:00 – Integrating subconscious shifts into daily life
38:00 – Rest as a gateway to clarity and creativity
40:00 – Where to find Christina and connect

CONNECT WITH CHRISTINA
Website: christinalwoods.com 

Next Level You: https://christinalwoods.com/nextlevelyou/
Instagram: @christina.lwoods 

CONNECT WITH EMILY
Instagram: @risetoher 
More resources: risetoher.com 

Join ROOTED (7 day free trial)

In this conversation, Emily sits down with licensed counselor Alyssa S. Scarano, LPC, NCC, founder of Collective Therapy & Wellness, to unpack what happens when healing gets political. Together they explore how language shapes healing, how self-compassion becomes an act of resistance, and why the practice of rupture and repair deepens both personal and collective trust.

They discuss what it means to hold boundaries and neutrality without bypassing reality, how to balance activism with nervous system care, and how compassion can be a radical choice in a world that rewards punishment and perfectionism.

“Compassion doesn’t enable. Punishment isn’t discipline. Language is how we return to ourselves.”

This episode will leave you feeling grounded, reflective, and ready to embody the version of healing that doesn’t turn away from the world—but participates in changing it.

00:00 – Setting the tone for a grounded, curious conversation

03:00 – Alyssa’s story: connection, language, and becoming a “connector”

07:00 – The power of language in shaping our inner and outer world

10:30 – Regulated vs. reactive: what it looks like in real life

14:00 – The “rice on the stove” moment: finding compassion mid-overwhelm

17:00 – Expectation → Neutrality: letting go of moralizing our choices

20:00 – Is self-compassion enabling? (and what the research says)

23:00 – Why high achievers self-punish and what that pattern gives us

28:00 – The intersection of politics and wellness

33:00 – Rupture and repair: how trust is built through repair, not perfection

38:00 – Language as a tool for nervous system regulation

43:00 – Closing reflections on compassion, activism, and community care

Alyssa’s Website — Collective Therapy & Wellness 

Follow Alyssa on Instagram 

Follow Rise To Her on Instagram 

Book a Private Mentorship or Speaking Engagement > email [email protected]