What if the version of you that you’ve been trying to fix was already whole this entire time? What if the endless journaling, the shadow work, the inner child workshops, the breathwork retreats, and the constant quest to “do the work” have actually become the very thing keeping you from stepping into your true power? What if the real breakthrough isn’t another modality, but a remembrance of what was always there?

In this deeply activating episode, intuitive energy worker and quantum philosopher Gabi Kovalenko reveals why so many intelligent, self-aware people remain stuck in the same loops no matter how much work they do on themselves. She explains why coherence across every dimension of your being matters more than raising your vibration, why the feminine energy rising on the planet right now cannot be ignored, and why wholeness was never something you had to earn. It was your birthright all along.

This is a conversation for anyone who has been on a spiritual path for years and still feels like something is missing, for anyone who senses they are meant for more but cannot seem to break through. Because the answer was never outside of you. It lives in the space between the notes, in the stillness between breaths, and in the quiet knowing you have been trying to think your way back to.

Gabi Kovalenko didn’t choose this path. It chose her. From a young age, she found herself writing about themes of intuition, self-awareness, and the deeper questions of existence, channelling wisdom that seemed to flow through her rather than from her. She never uses a teleprompter. She never scripts a video. When people ask whether she is using AI or reading from notes, the answer is always the same: the wisdom comes from embodiment, not preparation.

“It more flowed from a place of not getting in the way of this energy and consciousness that’s trying to come through me,” Gabi explains. Originally drawn to traditional medicine, she quickly grew disillusioned with the limitations of conventional approaches and discovered that true transformation operates through subtle energy and the deeper root causes that mainstream systems often overlook.

Gabi names a pattern that millions of people are caught in without realising it: the glamourisation of the healing journey. Shadow work, she says, is necessary. Looking into the eyes of the pain body and understanding your roots is part of the process. But staying lodged in those layers is where people stagnate.

“It’s kind of like an obsession with going through the healing or relating to the pain body and sometimes even glamourising that part of the spiritual journey, which can keep somebody in victim consciousness and slow down the ignition of their true purpose.”

Her alternative is coherence: aligning not just mentally, not just physically, not just spiritually, but across every dimension of your conscious experience simultaneously. When even one layer is excluded, the subconscious manifests circumstances to bring attention to whatever remains unresolved.

The conversation turns to the collective shift taking place right now, particularly for women. With Saturn and Neptune moving into Aries and the energy of the fire horse year igniting action, Gabi believes this is a juncture point where women who have been dwelling, stagnating, and feeling suppressed are being called to reclaim their power.

“You can’t wait for permission anymore from anybody else. You can’t wait for people to apologise that inflicted the pain. You can’t hope for partners to change. And you can’t wait for anybody to do this work for you.”

She also offers essential guidance for empaths, introducing the concept of a semi-permeable field. Rather than being energetically wide open and vulnerable to depletion, empaths can learn to maintain deep compassion while preserving their own energetic sovereignty through radical self-empathy and intentional boundary setting.

Gabi Kovalenko is a transformational thought leader, modern philosopher, and author of Falling Up. She integrates principles of noetic science, quantum physics, and positive psychology to reveal the power of consciousness and potentiality within all of life. Trained as a holistic healthcare practitioner and currently pursuing a Ph.D. in natural medicine, Gabi’s passion lies in inspiring a fresh awareness of life by disarming limiting beliefs and igniting a paradigm shift towards joy, abundance, and freedom.

You were never broken. The healing journey was never meant to become your identity. When you stop treating yourself as a project to fix and start generating coherence across every layer of your being, something extraordinary happens. The pendulum stops swinging. Peace sets in. And the version of you that was always whole begins to remember itself. Not through another course, another book, or another retreat, but through the radical act of trusting what already lives inside you.

Watch the full conversation on YouTube

Find Out More About Gabi Kovalenko

Website: https://www.gabikovalenko.com/

Book: Falling Up

Follow on Instagram: @gabikovalenko

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Your Children Aren’t Here to Be Fixed, They’re Here to Wake You Up

What if every argument with your child, every slammed door, every moment of frustration has nothing to do with them and everything to do with a wound you never healed?

It’s a confronting question. And for most parents, the instinct is to reject it immediately. But in this powerful conversation with Dr. Shefali, the founder of the Conscious Parenting movement, she reveals a truth that could transform not just the way you parent, but the way you understand every relationship in your life: your children are not the problem. They are the mirror.

“Most people are so-called zombie-like, moving through life in reactivity,” Dr. Shefali explains. “Not aware that they can get into the driver’s seat and begin to mandate their reactions.”

As a clinical psychologist with a doctorate from Columbia University and three New York Times bestselling books, Dr. Shefali has spent decades studying a pattern that plays out in homes across the world. Parents unconsciously project their unresolved pain, unmet needs, and unfulfilled dreams onto their children without ever realising it. And that unchecked authority goes completely unsupervised.

The result? We cast our children into roles they never chose. We write the movie, direct the scenes, and expect everyone to follow the script. Then when our children resist, we label them as difficult. When they defy us, we feel rejected. But they’re not rejecting us. They’re rejecting the role we assigned them.

Dr. Shefali offers a framework that flips everything on its head. Rather than assuming your reaction to your child’s behaviour is justified, start with the presumption that you have projected your own wounds onto the situation. Then prove to yourself that you haven’t.

She uses the example of a child hiding a C grade from their parent. The instinct is anger, disappointment, even betrayal. But when you pause and trace that reaction to its root, you often discover an old wound around shame, unworthiness, or fear of failure that was planted decades ago during your own childhood.

“The triggers are the gifts that help you turn around and look within,” she says. “They show you where you’re not yet free.”

This is the essential inner work. And it doesn’t just transform parenting. It breaks the cycle of generational trauma that quietly passes from one family to the next.

The conversation takes an urgent turn when Dr. Shefali addresses social media’s impact on young people. She doesn’t soften her words, comparing unrestricted access for children to handing them drugs or alcohol.

She highlights the alarming rise in anxiety, self-harm, eating disorders, and isolation among teenagers, driven by a digital world built on comparison, perfectionism, and curated reality. She applauds Australia’s legislation restricting social media for children under 16, and urges parents to treat screen time as a red flag behaviour that demands firm, non-negotiable boundaries.

Dr. Shefali closes with three uncomfortable truths. First, your children are here to show you where you haven’t healed. Second, every moment of reactivity towards your child is a wake-up call to unresolved pain within you. And third, your child is not here to fulfil your expectations. They are here to live their own life and their own destiny.

Dr. Shefali is bringing her transformative teachings to Australia for two powerful live events. Hailed by Oprah as “revolutionary” and the “best child expert,” she is a 3-time New York Times bestselling author, clinical psychologist, and pioneer of the Conscious Parenting movement who has trained over 1,200 coaches worldwide.

This event is for everyone, not just parents. Whether you’re a mother, father, leader, teacher, or simply someone seeking healing and direction, this experience will help you reconnect with your true self and break free from outdated patterns, expectations, and emotional pain.

Melbourne | Palais Theatre | Wednesday, 11 March 2026

Tickets are limited. Book now at events.drshefali.com/australia

Watch the full conversation on YouTube.

Find Out More About Dr. Shefali

Website: drshefali.com

When Your Identity Shatters: A Therapist’s Journey Through Suffering

What if the moment your entire identity falls apart isn’t a breakdown but a sacred initiation? What if the culture that taught you to pathologise your pain has stolen your capacity to transform through it?

For over 28,000 hours, Dr. John W. Price has sat knee to knee with people in their most debilitating shatterings. As a Jungian psychotherapist with a doctorate in depth psychology, he doesn’t just understand suffering intellectually. He has walked through the fire himself, and it’s that lived experience that makes him one of the most compelling guides for anyone navigating identity crisis, spiritual awakening, or the terrifying process of becoming who you actually are.

In this profound conversation, Dr Price reveals why tying your self-worth to your net worth creates a dangerous trap, how “sacred refusal” becomes an act of devotion, and why the moments when everything crumbles are actually the gateways to transformation our modern world has forgotten how to honour.

Dr. Price’s path to the therapist’s chair began on stage. From age six, music was his calling. He was self-motivated, wild, rebellious, smoking in the boys’ room while dreaming of guitars and record deals. By his mid-twenties, he had signed that deal and was touring nationally, living the dream he had fantasised about since childhood.

Then everything came crashing down.

The birth of his son, the collapse of an unhealthy relationship, and the sudden weight of single fatherhood shattered every identity he had built. He weighed 35 pounds less from stress, found himself in court battles, and sat in a therapist’s office feeling completely lost. “I had a shattering of an identity,” he recalls. “My whole life dream was disrupted.”

But in that therapist’s chair, working with a brilliant woman named Charlene who introduced him to Buddhist meditation, something shifted. Dr. Price realised he didn’t just want healing. He wanted to offer it. That moment of recognition sent him back to school, this time as a ravenous student pursuing a master’s in clinical psychology and eventually a doctorate in Jungian depth psychology.

One of Dr. Price’s most powerful insights centres on how our culture has lost the capacity to recognise transformation for what it is. “Because our culture doesn’t really have an orientation to initiate us into this kind of process, we pathologise it, and we think that something is wrong,” he explains.

When your identity crumbles, when the life that looked good on paper suddenly feels unbearable, when you can no longer perform the role everyone expects of you, our society tells you something is broken. But Dr. Price sees these moments differently. They are sacred shatterings, initiations that ancient cultures would have honoured with ritual and community support.

The problem for so many high achievers is that they have tied their sense of self-worth entirely to their net worth, their title, their role. When that foundation shifts, they don’t just lose a job or a relationship. They lose themselves. “How do you actually trust the fall rather than resist it?” becomes the central question.

Drawing on wisdom from his mentor Richard Rohr and Jungian analyst James Hollis, Dr. Price introduces the concept of “sacred refusal.” This is the practice of stopping performance, of refusing to comply with systems that don’t serve your soul. “Any win for the self, or the soul, is experienced as a death by the socialised ego,” he teaches, quoting Hollis.

This is why leaving family systems feels so terrifying. Why creating your own journey requires walking into the wilderness of the unknown. Why individuation always costs something.

But the alternative is living according to control-based systems, whether religious, political, economic, or corporate, that keep you performing and compliant rather than transforming and free.

Dr. Price’s vision is one of resurrection. Not just personal healing, but remembering that life is a sacred text, not a self-improvement plan. We are stories within a story, and transformation isn’t about getting better. It’s about experiencing life more completely and fully.

Every Emotion Is a Teacher – Stay with what hurts long enough to hear its wisdom.

Refusal Is Devotion – What you stop performing becomes sacred space.

Live Mythically – See life as a sacred text, not a self-improvement plan.

Dr. John W. Price is a licensed psychotherapist, Jungian scholar, and host of The Sacred Speaks podcast. He holds a Master’s in Clinical Psychology and a Doctorate in Jungian Psychology, and serves as President of the Board at the Jung Center of Houston. With over 28,000 clinical hours and 800,000 podcast downloads, he guides people through grief, identity collapse, and spiritual awakening.

You can watch the video of the conversation on YouTube

Find Out More About Dr. John W. Price

Website: www.drjohnwprice.com

What if the reason you’re exhausted, frustrated, and stuck isn’t because you’re not working hard enough, but because you’re forcing your life instead of flowing with it? In this transformative episode, nationally recognised executive coach Brett Baughman shares 25 years of wisdom about discovering the critical difference between forcing and flowing, and why most people are unknowingly hiring the wrong version of themselves for the life they’re trying to build.

Brett Baughman didn’t stumble into peak performance coaching. From a young age, he possessed an innate ability to see people for who they truly are, helping them feel seen, heard, and understood. This gift evolved into his life’s work: helping others discover their passion so they can live with purpose and make a meaningful impact.

“I have so much abundance in my life that not only is it a calling, but it pours out of me,” Brett shares. “I have to, right? It’s kind of like my responsibility for giving back for the blessings I’ve had in my life.”

One of Brett’s most powerful frameworks is recognising when you’re flowing versus when you’re forcing. When you’re in flow, doors open effortlessly. You wake up inspired. Good ideas come naturally. You meet the right people at the right time. Gratitude becomes your default state.

Forcing looks completely different. Frustration replaces gratitude. Time feels scarce. You’re pushing against closed doors repeatedly. Your mental, physical, and spiritual wellness starts declining.

“When something’s not going the way you want, stop and say, am I forcing things?” Brett advises. “You’re going to be putting too much energy into something and realise like, this is not what I should do. And you have to let go and flow. And as soon as you let go, you’ll start to get clarity and things will start to line up.”

Brett’s signature practice is “Take Five and Come Back Better.” Whether you’re arguing with your partner or spiralling in negative self-talk, this technique will change your life within days.

When you notice you’re not being the person you want to be, stop and excuse yourself. Take two to three minutes and do breathwork using the 4-2-6 technique: inhale through your nose for 4 seconds, hold for 2 seconds, slowly exhale for 6 seconds. Repeat for two minutes.

“If you really breathe and just slow the breathing down, you turn off that emotional thinking,” Brett explains. “The anger, the sadness, the fear, the guilt goes away. You become objective.”

Once calm, ask yourself two critical questions: “How is that emotion helping me?” and “What am I supposed to learn from this experience?” These questions transform emotional reactions into growth opportunities.

Every morning, Brett wants you to ask: Am I the right person for this job I’ve assigned myself today?

If you wake up in a terrible mood, lacking confidence, feeling defeated, then you’re not the person to do the job. That version of you will never produce the results you want.

“It doesn’t mean don’t do the job,” Brett clarifies. “It means go get aligned first.” Because as Brett powerfully states: “As you build it, so shall it live.”

Brett calls this philosophy “failing forward.” When something doesn’t work, ask what you learned and what you’ll do differently next time. This removes the fear of mistakes and replaces it with curiosity about growth.

Brett Baughman is a nationally recognised executive coach, voted Top Business Coach to Work With by Apple News. With over 25 years of experience guiding high-performing executives, CEOs, and leadership teams, Brett is a trusted expert in helping people break through to their next level of success. As the creator of The Ideal You framework, Action Mastery Retreats, and the immersive Breath House Experience, Brett has helped clients launch new ventures, scale companies, and achieve outstanding financial success while becoming healthier, happier, and more fulfilled humans.

You are designed for flow, not force. Real transformation happens when you recognise the difference between pushing against closed doors and riding the river of your calling. Stop fighting against your own nature and start aligning with it. Coming home to yourself means releasing the belief that success requires suffering and claiming your right to live in grateful, inspired flow.

Watch the Full Conversation on YouTube

Find Out More About Brett Baughman

Website: https://www.brettbaughman.com/

Have you ever stared at your to-do list, felt that familiar dread, and suddenly decided that reorganising your sock drawer was the most important task in the world? What if that delay you keep shaming yourself for isn’t laziness at all—but your mind trying to protect you from something it perceives as threatening?

In this powerful episode, we shatter the myth that procrastination is a character flaw or lack of discipline. The truth is far more revealing: procrastination isn’t the enemy—it’s a messenger. It’s a mirror reflecting how we manage emotion, fear, and self-worth. While the world tells you to push harder and discipline yourself into action, something far more transformative happens when you stop fighting the delay and start understanding it.

This episode reveals three transformative insights about the psychology behind procrastination and how to turn delay into self-awareness.

The Comfort of Future Self-Deception: Every time you tell yourself “I’ll do it tomorrow,” your brain is playing its favourite trick. We imagine a future version of ourselves who is infinitely capable—a superhero who will have more energy, more focus, more time. Psychologists call this temporal discounting: we prioritise immediate comfort over future benefit. And here’s the trap—every time we delay, we get a tiny hit of relief. Dopamine whispers that we escaped discomfort, and that relief reinforces the habit. We don’t procrastinate to waste time. We procrastinate to avoid pain. The next time you catch yourself scrolling instead of starting, pause and ask: what am I trying not to feel? It’s rarely laziness. It’s emotional protection.

The Fear Factor—Perfectionism in Disguise: Behind every chronic procrastinator, there’s usually a perfectionist hiding. We delay not because we don’t care, but because we care too much. The thought of doing something imperfectly triggers fear of judgment, rejection, and even success itself. So we wait. We polish. We overthink. Because as long as the task isn’t done, it can’t be wrong. “If I never finish, I never fail”—that’s the quiet logic of procrastination. Safety disguised as strategy. But here’s the paradox: by avoiding the discomfort of imperfection, we create the pain of paralysis. Progress doesn’t come from perfection. It comes from movement.

Rewriting Your Procrastination Story: Once you understand procrastination, you can begin to rewire it. The key is not to fight it, but to get curious about it. Start small—break overwhelming goals into tiny doable steps. The brain loves completion, and even micro-successes release dopamine that fuels momentum. Reframe the task: instead of “I have to finish,” try “I’ll just begin.” Beginning is often the hardest part, and once you start, inertia works for you instead of against you. Most importantly, replace self-criticism with self-compassion. Research shows that people who forgive themselves for procrastinating are far less likely to repeat the pattern. When you remove the shame, you remove the resistance.

This isn’t just an episode—it’s permission to stop shaming yourself and start listening to what your delays are trying to tell you. Procrastination is your mind saying something here feels too heavy, too uncertain, or too much. When you listen with compassion, the delay dissolves and action feels natural again. The goal isn’t to conquer procrastination. It’s to understand it. And once you understand it, you are free.

You can watch the video of this episode on YouTube.

Newsletter: https://catherineplano.com for transformation.

Instagram: @catherineplano for inspiration.

What if the reason you feel like a stranger to yourself isn’t that you’re lost, but because you’ve been performing for so long, you forgot what authenticity looks like? From childhood, so many of us learned that success meant following the script: get the degree, climb the ladder, earn the title, achieve the milestones. But somewhere along the way, that external validation became internal disconnection.

In this powerful episode, bestselling author and mindfulness expert Case Kenny reveals the truth about modern identity: it’s not about finding yourself once and being done. It’s about constant reinvention through reflection. He explains why “just being yourself” might be the worst advice you’ve ever received, and how the traits you think make you too much are actually what attract the right people to you.

This is a conversation for anyone who’s tired of feeling like one person at work and a stranger at home, for anyone questioning whether the life that looks good on paper actually feels good in reality. Because real fulfilment doesn’t come from collecting achievements. It begins the moment you become the same person inside the conference room and outside.

Case Kenny didn’t just study personal development; he lived the crisis that demanded it. At 28, he was the Regional Vice President of Sales at an advertising agency, crushing quotas and living what looked like the professional dream. He knew exactly who he was supposed to be in the office: confident, successful, the man with all the answers.

Then he’d go home.

“I would go to my job and feel like one person, and then I leave and I don’t know who I am,” Case recalls. “I’m like, I don’t know who I am on a human level, or a boyfriend level, or a partner level, or a son level, or a brother level. And I was like, that’s problematic for me.”

This acute disconnect sparked a radical experiment. In 2018, he launched a podcast not to build an audience, but to force himself into self-reflection. Each episode became a laboratory where he’d unpack an emotion, desire, or expectation and “beat it up with mindfulness and logic.” Eight years later, he’s left corporate life entirely and built a career around what he jokingly calls “sharing my feelings for a living.”

“I’m really not a big fan of advice that’s like, just be yourself,” Case explains, “because if you decide that when you’re 20, you should not be the same person at 25, 30, 35, 40.”

The popular wisdom tells us to discover ourselves and commit to that identity. But Case argues this is a dangerous fallacy. Real wisdom doesn’t come from experience alone; it comes from reflecting on experience. Without constant reflection, we risk living according to outdated beliefs and values that no longer serve us.

“We don’t get wisdom from life experience. We get wisdom from reflecting on life experience,” he says, paraphrasing John Dewey. The things that happen to you shape who you are, but it’s reflecting on those experiences that should have the final say in who you become.

His background in languages (he double majored in Chinese and Arabic at Notre Dame) resurfaces in his work. Case views personal development through a linguistic lens, believing that the words we use to describe our experiences fundamentally shape our reality.

One of Case’s most powerful concepts is “out-of-town confidence,” a mental model that reframes how we approach relationships and life goals.

Imagine you’re visiting Miami for the first time. You’d probably be more extroverted, more confident, more open to new experiences. Why? Because you’re not fixated on any single person or outcome. The focus is on the experience itself, and if you happen to meet someone amazing along the way, that’s a bonus.

“Get the most out of life as possible, not in a crazy, selfish, narcissistic way, but just as the human endeavour,” Case explains. “And then you use that as the lens to say, is this person right for me?”

This philosophy challenges the traditional narrative that finding “the one” is life’s ultimate mission. Instead, he argues we should extract maximum value from being human rather than outsourcing our happiness to external validators.

Research proves something counterintuitive: you’re more likable than you think you are. It’s called the “liking gap,” and it operates across cultures and languages. After interactions, we consistently underestimate how much the other person enjoyed our company.

“You and I interact. I leave the conversation thinking, I don’t think she really liked me that much,” Case describes. “Overwhelmingly so, you are more likely to say, no, I liked Case. He seemed like a cool guy.”

Even more powerful: the traits you consider “too much,” weird, or outside normal are actually nonconforming traits that research shows are more attractive than conventional ones.

“Double down on the things that you think make you weird,” Case advises. “Your passion is a magnet for the right people and a filter for the wrong people.”

When asked about “having it all together,” Case reframes the entire concept. We imagine perfection as possessing everything simultaneously: the career, partner, body, happiness, and friendships all at once. That’s fantasy.

“I’ve had the career but not the partner, the partner but not the career, the career but not the money,” he explains. Reality is transitional, and the binary thinking of “everything or nothing” sets us up for perpetual disappointment.

His alternative is simple: ask yourself one question as often as possible. “In this moment, with what I’m doing, with my habits, with my partner, with my diet, with my friends, with my city, do I feel like my most honest self?” Then adjust, pivot, and move accordingly.

Case Kenny is a bestselling author, podcast host, and creator who left his role as Regional VP of Sales in advertising to pursue full-time work in mindfulness, language, and personal development. With a background in Chinese and Arabic from the University of Notre Dame, he brings a unique linguistic lens to self-discovery. He’s been podcasting twice a week for eight years, helping people find clarity, kindness, and optimism in their lives.

You are not destined to remain the person you were at 20, 25, or even last year. The identity crisis you experience isn’t a problem to solve but an invitation to evolve. When you stop performing and start reflecting, when you bring out-of-town confidence to everyday life, and when you embrace the transitional nature of having it all, you become the same person inside the conference room and outside. Coming home to yourself means releasing the belief that there’s one right way to live and claiming your right to constant reinvention.

Watch the full conversation on YouTube

Find Out More About Case Kenny

Website: https://casekenny.com

What if everything you’ve been told about aging is a lie? What if your 50s and 60s aren’t about fading into irrelevance, but about finally becoming who you were always meant to be?

In this transformative episode, bestselling author and spiritual teacher Marianne Williamson dismantles the cultural narrative that treats midlife as a slow decline. Instead, she reveals it as the most powerful awakening of your life—a time when the wisdom you’ve accumulated can no longer stay silent, when you stop caring what others think, and when you finally have the courage to say what needs to be said. This is a conversation for anyone who’s been conditioned to fear aging, who’s carrying shadow figures from their past into their present, or who’s ready to claim the grandeur that only comes with lived experience.

Marianne Williamson didn’t set out to become one of the most influential spiritual teachers of our time. In her 20s, she discovered A Course in Miracles and was captivated by its psychological mind training on forgiveness—dismantling a thought system based on fear and accepting one based on love instead. “At first it was just what it was doing for me,” she explains. “The career niche that I inhabit today didn’t even exist at that point.”

She started with a small study group in a bookstore. Then she moved to Los Angeles, and the AIDS crisis burst onto the scene. Gay men flocked to her lectures because “in the middle of this horror, there was this then young woman talking about a God who loves you no matter what and about miracles.” One thing led to another. She published a book. Oprah Winfrey loved it. A Return to Love became a mega-bestseller, and a quote from it—”Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure”—became an anthem for seekers worldwide.

But Marianne’s journey wasn’t always smooth. She ventured into politics, running for the Democratic nomination for President in both 2020 and 2024, and encountered a level of public scrutiny and mean-spiritedness she’d never faced in the spiritual world. “We all made mistakes in our 20s, but they weren’t written into the ethers of the internet to be with us forever,” she reflects, lamenting how young people today are denied the freedom to grow without permanent records of their missteps.

One of the most powerful teachings Marianne shares is about forgiveness—not as a platitude, but as a practice of liberation. “A Course in Miracles says that if you bring the shadow figures of your past into the present, then you are programming the future to be just like the past,” she explains.

Many of us replay painful memories, trying to forgive by reliving them. But this approach backfires. “Every time I brought it in and thought about it, it was almost like visceral, like it was reenacting what took place,” Catherine shares. Marianne’s response? Accept that it happened. Know that the love was real, the love you gave and received was eternal, and “the rest was literally a kind of shared illusion or nightmare, a kind of hallucination of consciousness, and you don’t have to carry it with you.”

The ego, however, wants to keep bludgeoning you with it. What they did, what you did, what you didn’t do. But healing doesn’t come from endlessly analyzing where the wounds came from. “Knowing where you got this has done me no good,” Marianne admits. “Knowing you are this way, Marianne, and be willing not to be, and ask God’s help. That’s the miracle.”

Spiritual practice isn’t theoretical. It’s what you do when you wake up at 3 a.m. with your thoughts spiralling. It’s choosing whether to grab your phone and scroll through chaos or to ground yourself in meditation and prayer.

“If you wake up in the morning and you go directly to the news, you go directly to social media, it’s like you’re saying to the chaos, come on, eat me alive, I’m open and available for that,” Marianne warns. But if you ground yourself in spiritual practice first, “it makes all the difference because it’s kind of like the yoga of consciousness. You get yourself in the correct position of alignment with the ever-unfolding thoughts of love.”

The Course in Miracles teaches that there is no such thing as a neutral thought. Every thought either takes you toward greater oneness and peace or into anxiety, depression, and separation. “Every single moment is a moment of choice,” Marianne emphasises. “We either make that choice consciously or we make it unconsciously to either open the heart or to constrict.”

When you constrict, you deflect the miracle. But here’s the beautiful part: “It’ll come back around again. It’ll be held in trust for you until you’re ready to receive it.”

Midlife grief is real. You have to move through the loss of what you no longer have to receive what is only yours now. “I have found myself saying to younger women, you have things I don’t have anymore, but I have some things you don’t have yet,” Marianne shares. “And that’s what we’re awakening to.”

At 50, she stopped caring what other people thought. But at 60? “I felt this level of power that is almost like not only do you not care what other people say, you have to. It’s like when a woman is breastfeeding, the milk has to express itself. The wisdom you have in you can’t not say it.”

This isn’t about arrogance. It’s about recognising that we live in a culture where the undertow constantly whispers: you’re over the hill, you’re invisible, you’re all used up. “So we have to counter that undertow,” Marianne insists, “because it’s a new dawn for us. And the new dawn for us, we know can be of help in bringing a new dawn to the world.”

When Catherine mentions people asking about retirement, Marianne’s response is instant: “I’m just getting started, honey.”

Marianne sees humanity at a critical crossroads. “We’re living at this moment of parallel phenomenon, one world crumbling, another world struggling to be born. And we are called on to be death doulas and birth doulas.”

This is not a time for the wounded bird, the ditzy female, or woundology. “It’s a time to really call ourselves and each other into the highest place.” The human race has reached a point where our collective behavioural patterns are no longer sustainable. We either take an evolutionary leap forward or face extinction.

That leap begins with individual transformation. “Wake up every morning and ask, where would you have me go? What would you have me do? What would you have me say and to whom?” Marianne teaches. “Love, use me. Use my hands, use my feet.”

You might be assigned to talk about personal transformation through a podcast. You might work on the environment, peace, food systems, or healing. But whatever your assignment, “everything else is ultimately meaningless.”

Golden Nugget #1: Ask Who You’re Not Forgiving

Identify who you haven’t forgiven and be willing to realise that the love they gave you was real, the love you gave them was real, and everything else was just a shared illusion. Put it in the hands of God and refuse to bring those shadow figures into your present.

Golden Nugget #2: Be a Spiritual Athlete

This is not a moment to indulge in moderate drinking, moderate drug use, or junk food. This is a moment to truly be in shape—physically, mentally, and spiritually. Your spiritual discipline and practice matter now more than ever.

Golden Nugget #3: Reach Out to Someone Who Needs Help

Think of someone in your life who could use support. Reach out. That simple act of extending love creates the field in which miracles occur naturally.

For more than four decades, Marianne Williamson has been a leader of spiritually progressive circles. She is the author of 16 books, four of which have been #1 New York Times bestsellers. A quote from the mega-bestseller A Return to Love, “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure…” is considered an anthem for a contemporary generation of seekers.

Her other bestsellers include A Woman’s Worth, The Law of Divine Compensation, Tears to Triumph, The Gift of Change, Everyday Grace, and The Mystic Jesus: The Mind of Love. With her books and online classes, she has taught millions of people universal spiritual themes at the heart of all the great religions of the world.

Williamson founded Project Angel Food, a non-profit organisation that has delivered more than 19 million meals to ill and dying homebound patients in the Los Angeles area since 1989. She has also worked throughout her career on poverty, anti-hunger, and racial reconciliation issues. In 2004, she co-founded The Peace Alliance and supported the creation of a U.S. Department of Peace.

She ran for the Democratic nomination for President in both 2020 and 2024.

Midlife is not an ending. It’s the moment you finally have enough experience, enough failures, enough humility, and enough fire to become who you were always meant to be. The grief you move through unlocks access to a power you’ve never known. The wisdom inside you can no longer stay silent. And when you stop abandoning yourself to avoid being abandoned by others, you discover that real peace comes from alignment with love, moment by moment, choice by choice. You’re not over the hill. You’re just getting started.

Watch the Full Conversation on YouTube

SEE MARIANNE LIVE IN AUSTRALIA:

Brisbane – February 22, 2025

Melbourne – February 25, 2025

Sydney – February 26, 2025

Website: Marianne.com

Have you ever felt like everything in your life was quietly unravelling, and you couldn’t tell if you were transforming or falling apart? What if that restlessness you felt all through 2025 wasn’t you breaking—it was you shedding what no longer fit?

In this powerful episode, we explore why 2025 left so many of us feeling raw, done, and ready to walk away from versions of ourselves we’d outgrown. This wasn’t random discomfort—this was a Number 9 year combined with Snake energy, and it arrived to make you honest, not comfortable. While everyone around you was forcing momentum, you were doing something far more powerful: listening to truth you’d been avoiding. Now 2026 has begun as a Number 10 year—new identity with infinite potential—and it’s demanding something completely different from you.

This episode reveals three transformative insights about what 2025 revealed and what 2026 actually demands from you now.

Honour What the Shedding Revealed: The most important growth of 2025 was completely invisible. It didn’t come with applause or external validation. It came in the middle of the night when you finally admitted the truth you’d been avoiding. It came when you stopped explaining yourself to people who were never going to understand. It came when you let the friendship fade without forcing a dramatic ending. The Snake doesn’t shed loudly—it sheds in private, quietly, completely. You released jobs that drained you, beliefs that limited you, versions of yourself you’d outgrown. And you did it without fanfare, without needing validation, without turning your healing into performance. That wasn’t weakness—that was mastery. Internal work feels like nothing is happening, but it’s everything, because you cannot build a new life on a foundation you’ve outgrown.

You Are Standing in Infinite Potential Right Now: Here’s what changes everything about 2026: most people see it as a Number 1 year and think “fresh starts,” but they’re missing the zero. And the zero is where the power lives. Zero represents Source, the unseen, the infinite field of possibility. This isn’t a year where you grind your way to success through willpower alone. This is a year of co-creation. The 1 is you—your vision, your clarity, your choice. The 0 is Source—the universe, the mysterious force that opens doors you didn’t even know existed. Together, they create something neither could accomplish alone. You’re not starting from scratch. You’re starting from clarity, from truth, from the solid ground of knowing who you are and what you will no longer tolerate. Stop carrying the weight of outcomes. Your job is to move, to choose, to act. The rest? That’s where the zero does its work.

The Horse Demands You Run: Starting in February, everything shifts again. Horse energy arrives, and the Horse doesn’t tiptoe—the Horse runs. Where the Snake revealed truth, the Horse demands movement, courage, forward motion. Here’s the uncomfortable truth: clarity without action is just comfortable confusion. You know what you know now. 2025 gave you that gift. You see the patterns, understand the lies you believed about yourself, know what needs to change. But knowledge without embodiment is just intellectual entertainment. This year is asking you a different question—not “What do you know?” but “What will you do?” The Horse doesn’t wait for perfect conditions. It runs because running is its nature. And courage isn’t the absence of fear. Courage is moving while afraid, choosing freedom over familiarity every single day. Your assignment: identify one truth that 2025 revealed and take one action toward embodying it this week. Not next month. Not when you feel ready. This week.

This isn’t just an episode—it’s an invitation to stop rehearsing your life and start living it. The shedding is done. 2025 cleared the way. 2026 is where you run. If you’re standing at the edge of your own expansion, afraid to jump, this one’s for you.

You can watch the video of this episode on YouTube.

Newsletter: https://catherineplano.com for transformation.

Instagram: @catherineplano for inspiration.

What if the reason you can’t say no isn’t weakness, but conditioning? From childhood, so many of us were taught that love had to be earned, that being good meant staying quiet, agreeable, and available. But somewhere along the way, that survival strategy became self-betrayal.

In this powerful episode, bestselling author and trauma recovery coach Lisa A. Romano reveals the truth about codependency: it’s not about needing others too much, but about forgetting who you are. She explains why guilt floods your body when you set a boundary and how healing begins the moment you realise your inner critic isn’t actually your voice—it’s an echo from your past.

This is a conversation for anyone who’s tired of people-pleasing, over-giving, or shrinking themselves to keep the peace. Because real love doesn’t require you to abandon yourself. It begins the moment you come home to you.

Lisa A. Romano didn’t just study codependency—she lived it. Growing up with parents who were adult children of alcoholics, one highly narcissistic and the other deeply codependent, Lisa carried shame throughout her entire childhood. She believed something about her made it impossible for her parents to love her.

This pattern followed her into adulthood. She married a man similar to her mother, repeating the cycle of seeking approval and subjugating herself. After a severe breakdown and six therapists, she finally received the diagnosis that changed everything: codependency.

The tragedy that catalysed her mission came when her brother-in-law, also an adult child of alcoholics, took his own life. In that devastating moment, Lisa realised that if he had understood codependency and childhood trauma the way she now did, he might still be alive. She pushed past her fears of what her family would think and published her first book, “The Road Back to Me,” which became an Amazon bestseller overnight.

Today, as a certified life coach and leading expert in codependency and childhood trauma recovery, Lisa has helped over 5,000 students heal through her signature 12-week Breakthrough Method, blending neuroscience, trauma-informed coaching, mindfulness, and spiritual wisdom.

“When you’re codependent, you don’t know that you’re codependent until your life becomes unmanageable,” Lisa explains. It operates completely below conscious awareness, a loop of childhood trauma disguised as personality.

Codependency isn’t just people-pleasing. It’s people-pleasing from a loss of selfhood. It’s cleaning the house but needing your husband to walk in and pat you on the back. Making his favorite meal but requiring him to make a big deal about it. Watching your sister’s kids but expecting her to watch yours in return without having to ask.

“With codependency, it’s an emotional enmeshment,” Lisa reveals. “I lose my sense of self and I’m emotionally reliant on someone in a very unhealthy way, and I don’t even realize it.”

The dangerous part? Codependents often think they’re “the good one.” They’re the fixers, the caretakers, the ones always willing to listen. But beneath that giving is resentment, unmet expectations, and the victim mentality that comes from abandoning yourself while trying to avoid being abandoned by others.

The guilt you feel when setting boundaries isn’t random. It’s precisely programmed survival wiring from your first three years of life.

“Your needs aren’t being served, your ego-based needs from zero to three,” Lisa explains. “You’re in a theta brainwave state, which is a hypnotic brainwave state.” During this critical period, if your narcissistic needs—the healthy developmental need to matter, to be seen, to have your feelings validated—go unmet, you don’t develop a solid ego boundary.

Between ages three and five, children are supposed to be “little narcissists.” The adults around them should be managing what shows up inside them, helping them emotionally regulate, and teaching them that their feelings matter. When this doesn’t happen, children learn that they don’t have the right to feel, and therefore don’t have the right to set boundaries.

“If I say no, I might get abandoned or criticised or judged or shamed or banished from the kingdom,” Lisa describes. “That’s all stored.” The brain creates a predictive model: saying no produces guilt as a way to prevent abandonment. You’re abandoning yourself to avoid outer abandonment.

“Below the veil of consciousness, we’re just operating on a loop,” Lisa says. “We’re operating on childhood trauma. These are belief systems. They’ve become habitual thoughts. It becomes part of our persona.”

The subconscious mind is 500,000 to a million times stronger than the conscious mind. Most of your daily interactions are products of subconscious beliefs you’ve never questioned. You’re not living authentically—you’re recycling thoughts and patterns downloaded in childhood.

“It’s hard to be yourself when you were taught that yourself was not worthy of love,” Lisa reflects. “How do you love a self that your childhood conditioned you to believe was not worthy of love?”

The terror of being authentic becomes greater than the pain of being inauthentic. So you stay small, you people-please, you anticipate everyone else’s needs, and you resent them for not reading your mind.

Lisa believes the gateway to transformation is uncomfortable self-inquiry: “How happy am I? How excited am I to get up in the morning? Do I really like my partner or do I resent them?”

These are the questions we avoid by going to yoga and drinking Starbucks, she says with a laugh. We go through the motions in our relationships without examining how we’re showing up.

“Do I say yes when I mean no? Do I race to solve other people’s problems with the intention for them to see me and find worthiness in me? Am I taking care of everybody else at the expense of myself? Am I secretly resentful?”

These self-inquiring questions activate metacognition—the ability to observe your own thoughts and patterns from a higher state of consciousness. “There is no healing without metacognition,” Lisa emphasises. Without engaging your prefrontal lobe and neocortex, you’re stuck operating from the amygdala, hippocampus, and brainstem—pure thinking, feeling, and reacting with no space between stimulus and response.

Lisa’s breakthrough came when she stopped identifying with her ego and recognised it as a product of her five senses and childhood downloads. “That’s my ego’s language, but that’s not my true identity,” she explains.

She uses a powerful metaphor: “If I was in the middle of the ocean hanging onto a log, and the ego was that log, I’m not letting go until I see a raft. And I’m not jumping off the raft until I see a cruise ship.”

Her life raft was this realisation: “These are all false beliefs. I am enough. If I had been born to a healthy mother, I wouldn’t think these thoughts.” The “I’m not enough” narrative was contingent on what happened to her, not who she actually was.

“My divine essence is I’m an extension of source,” Lisa says. “Whoever and whatever created this entire cosmos created me. My inner child was always worthy, always worthy. I was just born to unhealthy dynamics.”

Every flower leans toward the sun. Why should you stay in the shade?

When Lisa realised her negative self-talk was just reverberations of her mother’s constant criticism—not her actual thoughts—it terrified her. “Who the hell’s steering the ship?” she wondered.

Her solution was meditation, sometimes for four to five hours a day. “I knew I had to empty my mind of this crazy self-talk that was so self-sabotaging and focused on what’s going to happen next.”

The results were almost immediate. After 40 minutes to an hour, she could sit up and observe. If the monkey mind returned, she’d lie back down and do another session. Each time, the chatter slowed further.

“Once I emptied the mind, it was like the observer within me was born. That’s metacognition. Now suddenly I’m outside of my mind observing. Now I can catch a negative thought. Now I can catch a codependent thought.”

One of the most common questions Lisa receives: “How do I heal without cutting people out of my life?”

Her answer: surrender.

“Surrender to this idea that I’m doing this deep healing work. Surrender that just because I’m doing this work doesn’t mean my partner is going to be doing this work. I surrender to their confusion about who I’m becoming.”

The reality is nuanced. Some people shouldn’t stay in your life—those who are aggressive, manipulative, or actively exploiting your abandonment fears. When you try to assert yourself and they bash you for daring, that’s a sign.

But other relationships can evolve. Lisa’s been with her second husband for 15 years. “He doesn’t believe in everything that I believe, and I freaking love that as a recovering codependent because I can tolerate that. I don’t need his approval. I don’t need him to agree with me.”

He supports her completely even though he doesn’t fully understand her work. “That’s unconditional love,” Lisa says. “Why does that person have to change to make me happy if that person has goodwill towards me?”

Expecting your partner to think exactly like you? That’s still codependency.

“Nature has no other recourse but to create by default unless the human being awakens,” Lisa explains. The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. You’re 75% more likely to become an alcoholic if your father was an alcoholic. It’s biology, environment, emotion, vibration—everything you were around.

“Nature will create through default patterns until you awaken, until there’s a cycle breaker in a generation.”

Lisa sees her clients as unsung superheroes. “What you have done is you’ve halted this trauma into future generations. You have changed the collective matrix in which we all bathe in. The natural thing is to remain unconscious and do what was done to you. Not the healthiest, not the most fulfilling, but the most natural and innocent.”

Her 12-week program moves through three phases: understanding what happened to you (the inner child’s wounds), moving into gentle accountability (it’s still your subconscious mind now), and ascension (how do we manage and emotionally regulate from a higher state).

“You can’t fix a hole in the wall that you don’t see,” she says. Once you develop compassion for yourself, that trumps shame. Only then can you offer your parents compassion—but not before you develop self-empathy.

Golden Nugget #1: Find the Space Between Your Thoughts

“One of the most powerful things you can do on your journey is to find the space between your thoughts,” Lisa emphasises. The mind runs on a loop, a consistent stream of what we assume is consciousness, but it’s mostly from the subconscious mind.

“If you could practice finding the space between your thoughts, you could activate metacognition. It slows everything down.”

Golden Nugget #2: Feelings Aren’t Facts

“A big reality check, narcissism check, self-righteous check, arrogance check is: wait a minute, my feelings aren’t facts. They’re just opinions.”

Your beliefs have probably changed over the past 25 years. But when you believed something 25 years ago, you thought it was a fact. This awareness creates humility and openness to growth.

Golden Nugget #3: Emotional Neglect IS Trauma

“Brain scans prove that children who grow up feeling ignored and invisible, their brain on a brain scan is similar to a child that has experienced domestic violence and physical abuse. It’s the same.”

The hippocampal volume is smaller. The amygdala is lit up. Because feeling ignored is akin to death for a child. The same trauma responses, cortisol responses, and nervous system wiring are activated.

Understanding what happened in your first three years of life is crucial. If you struggle with codependency, low self-worth, or boundaries, your nervous system was wired for survival during that period. You developed an aversion to abandonment and became sensitised to it, which fuels codependency and unhealthy emotional dependence.

“Being emotionally neglected is trauma. Understand why. If you relate to anything we’ve shared today, you might be able to trace it back to those early developmental years.”

Lisa A. Romano is a bestselling author, certified life coach, and leading expert in codependency and childhood trauma recovery. With over 5,000 students healed through her signature 12-week Breakthrough Method, she blends neuroscience, trauma-informed coaching, mindfulness, and spiritual wisdom to help adult children restructure their subconscious programs, build emotional resilience, and manifest intentional lives.

She is the author of multiple books including “The Road Back to Me” and has built a global community through her online programs, YouTube channel, podcast, and social media presence.

You are not destined to repeat the patterns programmed into you as a child. The guilt, resentment, and self-abandonment you experience aren’t character flaws—they’re survival strategies from a nervous system that learned love was conditional. When you activate metacognition through meditation and self-inquiry, you can observe these patterns from outside the loop. When you step out of ego and claim your inherent worthiness, you become the cycle breaker your lineage has been waiting for. Coming home to yourself means releasing the belief that you must earn love by abandoning who you are.

Watch the full conversation on YouTube

Website: https://www.lisaaromano.com

What if the mental health diagnosis you’ve been told limits you is actually the beginning of your most extraordinary life? What if stability isn’t the ceiling, but just the foundation? What if the system telling you to “just be stable” has been setting the bar far too low?

Award-winning speaker and mental health advocate Gabe Howard reveals a truth the mental health system doesn’t want you to hear: people with serious mental illness can do more than survive. They can thrive, build careers, speak at Oxford University, and lead badass lives.

Gabe Howard grew up dreaming of becoming a tech mogul, the next Bill Gates or Steve Jobs. It was the mid-90s, the early days of the internet, and he wanted to be an entrepreneur in the public eye. He even considered stand-up comedy. Then bipolar disorder happened. Psychosis happened. Suicidality happened. He was committed to a psychiatric hospital, and everything came crashing down.

When he finally reached recovery, Gabe was angry and traumatised. He searched desperately for resources to help himself and his parents, but the harder he looked, the less he found. That’s when he realised something powerful: he wanted somebody to do something, and then he realised he was somebody.

He never thought advocacy would become his career. He thought he’d volunteer for his local mental health charity and maybe make a small impact. Now, he’s a Webby Award winner, hosts the Inside Bipolar and Inside Mental Health podcasts, has spoken at Oxford University and the National Press Club in Washington, DC, and wrote a book called Mental Illness is an Asshole and Other Observations.

One of Gabe’s most powerful insights: mental health isn’t like physical health. It’s identical to physical health. Everyone has mental health, just like everyone has physical health. Most people, most of the time, have good mental health. But just like you can catch a cold or break a bone, you can experience mental health challenges.

The day after losing a loved one, no one expects you to be at your best mentally. That’s normal. Yet society treats mental health as binary: you’re either “crazy” or “perfectly fine,” with no room for the grey areas where real life actually happens.

Gabe challenges the mental health establishment’s tendency to set expectations dangerously low. Too often, people with schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, or major depression are told that getting a part-time job and living in a group home means “you’re doing great.” While stability matters, it shouldn’t be the only goal.

He’s witnessed people in group homes being told they can’t work full-time or pursue their passions when the real issue is that the system is too scared of relapse to let them try. He shares the inspiring story of Rachel Starr Withers, who lives with schizophrenia yet has hiked volcanoes, appeared in Marvel films, and hosts the Inside Schizophrenia podcast. Her philosophy: “I want to lead a badass life.”

Using boxing as a metaphor, Gabe explains that recovery isn’t about one knockout punch. Everyone loves the idea of that one breakthrough moment, but most fights aren’t won that way. What wins is dozens of small jabs: maintaining sleep hygiene, taking medication as prescribed, keeping mood journals, attending therapy, exercising, eating well, and practicing radical honesty.

These seemingly small things add up to sustainable wellness. The key is consistency, not perfection.

Gabe makes a compelling business case for reducing mental health stigma in the workplace. Companies that create cultures where employees can be honest about their struggles gain productivity. When people feel safe saying they need a mental health hour, they’re more likely to come in later that day rather than calling in sick entirely. This transparency transforms a full day lost into just an hour or two, making it not only ethically right but also more profitable.

Everyone Has Mental Health. Mental health is NOT just negative. It’s a spectrum everyone exists on, just like physical health.

The Basics Really Matter. Recovery isn’t one big breakthrough. It’s many small pieces fitting together: sleep, diet, movement, medication, therapy, and honest communication.

The Goal Is to THRIVE. Don’t just “live with” mental illness. Believe that people with mental illness can lead GREAT lives, not just get by.

Gabe Howard is the host of Healthline Media’s Inside Bipolar and Inside Mental Health podcasts and author of Mental Illness is an Asshole and Other Observations. Diagnosed with bipolar disorder in 2003 after being committed to a psychiatric hospital, he received a resolution from the Governor of Ohio naming him an “Everyday Hero” and spoke at Oxford University in England. He makes his home in Central Ohio with his wife, Kendall, and a Miniature Schnauzer he never wanted but now can’t imagine life without.

You are not limited by your diagnosis. The system may tell you to aim for stable, but you were meant for so much more. When you challenge low expectations, build consistent habits, and surround yourself with people who believe in your potential, thriving becomes possible. Your best life isn’t about just getting by. It’s about going as far as you can, and if you stumble, taking a step back and trying again.

Watch the full conversation on YouTube

Inside Bipolar Podcast: https://www.healthline.com/health/podcast/ibp

Website: gabehoward.com

Facebook: facebook.com/gabehowardspeaker

Instagram: @askabipolar

YouTube: youtube.com/gabehoward29

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/gabehoward29