The Daring Well Podcast - Holistic Health & Wellness, Mindset, and Personal Growth

In this powerful and reflective episode of The Daring Well Podcast, host Rita Mercer invites you into a compassionate conversation about the roles many of us unconsciously take on—and why it may be time to lovingly resign from them.

These roles often begin as survival strategies rooted in love, responsibility, or the desire for connection. But over time, they can lead to burnout, resentment, emotional exhaustion, and disconnection from our true selves and from the people we want to connect with. 

This episode is an invitation to pause, reflect, and begin choosing healthier ways of showing up in your relationships, work, faith spaces, and everyday life.

You’ll be encouraged to release shame, practice grace, and remember that you are allowed to start again—right now. Awareness always comes before change, and this episode offers gentle insight to help you recognize patterns that may no longer be serving you.

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Mindfully You Wellness Workshop
A virtual wellness experience focused on resetting habits, releasing negativity, reflecting intentionally, and goal setting.

Learn more and register at: www.DaringWell.com/workshop

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💛 Final Encouragement

“At some point, these roles helped us survive. But survival roles don’t always belong in healthy, mutual relationships.”

If this episode resonated with you, consider sharing it with someone you love—and remember, you are allowed to show up differently.

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In today’s episode of The Daring Well Podcast, Rita Mercer invites you to slow down, pause, and reconnect with the healing power of sacred rest. In a world that glorifies hustle, productivity, and constant movement, this conversation is a gentle yet powerful reminder that rest is not a reward—it’s a necessity.

If you’ve been feeling overwhelmed, mentally exhausted, or stuck in a cycle of pushing through fatigue, this episode offers a compassionate permission slip to do less and be more. Rita explores how intentional rest supports the nervous system, boosts creativity, and helps prevent burnout. She also challenges cultural labels and productivity myths that make us feel like we need permission to pause.

Through mindful reflections, relatable examples, and grounded encouragement, you’ll learn how sacred rest helps you reconnect with the present moment, cultivate gratitude, and restore balance in your mind, body, and spirit.

This episode is for anyone longing for peace, clarity, and sustainable energy—without guilt.

✨ You are worthy of rest. Right now.

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Episode Segment Chapters

1. What Is Sacred Rest & Why It Matters

Rita reframes rest as the foundation of productivity, strength, and creativity—not something to earn after exhaustion.

2. Hustle Culture, Labels, & Permission to Be

A powerful conversation about hustle culture, the “soft girl era,” and why we don’t need labels to give ourselves permission to rest or be authentic.

3. Mindfulness, Gratitude, & The Power of the Present

How mindfulness and daily gratitude help us slow down, stay grounded, and reclaim the only moment we truly have—now.

4. Burnout, the Nervous System, & Ignored Body Signals

Rita explains how burnout happens when we ignore early signs of fatigue and why micro-breaks are essential for mental clarity and nervous system regulation.

5. Letting Go of Guilt & Honoring Your Worth

A closing encouragement to release guilt, challenge the hustle mindset, and embrace rest as a form of self-respect and self-care.

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Sleep is essential to our physical, emotional, and spiritual well-being—yet for so many people, bedtime is filled with restlessness, anxiety, and frustration. In this episode of The Daring Well Podcast, Rita Mercer is joined by Dr. Benjamin Long, sleep medicine physician, seminary student, and creator of the Sleep Habits Journal, for a powerful conversation on why insomnia happens and how we can respond with compassion instead of self-blame.

Dr. Long explains the science behind insomnia, including how stress, burnout, and unhelpful sleep habits keep the nervous system stuck in fight-or-flight mode. Together, Rita and Dr. Long explore why forcing sleep often backfires, how anxiety becomes conditioned to the bedroom, and what it means to “cease” before bed in a culture that glorifies productivity.

This episode also weaves in faith-based practices, including prayer, reflection, and the Prayer of Examen, showing how spiritual rhythms can calm the nervous system and restore a sense of safety at night. Listeners will walk away with practical tools, deeper understanding, and renewed permission to rest well—without guilt or striving.

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1. Why We Can’t Sleep: Understanding Insomnia Without Shame

Dr. Long breaks down what insomnia really is, including predisposing, precipitating, and perpetuating factors. This segment helps listeners reframe sleep struggles with compassion and clarity instead of frustration.

2. Anxiety, Burnout, & the Nervous System at Night

This section explores how stress and overthinking activate the nervous system and interfere with sleep. Rita and Dr. Long discuss why high achievers and caregivers are especially vulnerable to restless nights.

3. Sleepless Night Rules: What Helps (And What Hurts)

Dr. Long shares practical sleep strategies inspired by CBT-I, explaining why forcing sleep, clock-watching, and long naps can worsen insomnia. Listeners learn how to gently retrain their brains for rest.

4. Breaking the Cycle: Worry Time, Doomscrolling, & Boundaries

This segment addresses common sleep disruptors like racing thoughts and nighttime scrolling. Dr. Long offers simple tools such as worry time, journaling, and technology boundaries to support calmer nights.

5. The Call to Rest Well: Faith, Trust, & Sacred Sleep

The episode closes with a reflective conversation on faith, prayer, and rest as acts of trust. Dr. Long shares how spiritual practices can transform sleepless nights into moments of connection and peace.

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Connect 

Sleep Habits Journal & Sleep Resources by Dr. Benjamin Long

https://thewholeheartedmd.com/sleep-habits-journal/

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What if peak performance wasn’t about doing more—but about living more intentionally?

In this powerful episode of The Daring Well Podcast, Rita Mercer sits down with Alan Lazaros to explore peak performance through purpose, and why true success requires alignment across health, wealth, and love. 

Alan shares his deeply personal journey through early loss, relentless achievement, and a near-fatal car accident that forced him to redefine what success really means.

This conversation invites listeners to rethink hustle culture, design meaningful goals, and build sustainable habits that support fulfillment—not burnout.

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Connect with Alan Lazaros

CEO & Co-Host of Next Level University Podcast

Learn more about Alan’s work, coaching programs, and free personal growth resources at:
www.nextleveluniverse.com

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In this powerful episode of The Daring Well Podcast, Rita sits down with AJ Schneider, founder of Beyond the Green Coaching, to explore the emotional roots of our money habits, the shame many people carry around finances, and the healing required to build a healthier relationship with money.

This conversation goes far beyond budgeting and dollars — it’s about emotional wellness, nervous system patterns, self-trust, and rewriting long-held money stories.

AJ breaks down why people continue living paycheck to paycheck, how money mirrors our unprocessed emotions, and why survival mode feels familiar even when it’s exhausting. She also offers practical mindset tools and emotional antidotes to shame, fear, and guilt around finances.

Whether you're healing from money trauma, trying to break generational patterns, or learning how to manage your emotions around spending, this episode will help you build financial confidence with compassion and clarity.

1. Money Is Emotional — Not Mathematical

AJ explains why most people don’t have money issues because of math — they have emotional patterns rooted in stress, loneliness, burnout, or coping. This reframes financial struggles through a therapeutic lens and invites listeners into self-compassion.

2. The Paycheck-to-Paycheck Comfort Zone

AJ shares why survival mode feels familiar and why people unconsciously stay in financial chaos. This segment expands awareness around nervous system conditioning and scarcity mindsets.

3. Meeting Your 80-Year-Old Self

A powerful visualization where AJ encourages listeners to imagine their future self sitting at the decision-making table. This moment helps listeners shift into long-term thinking, purpose, and intentional financial behavior.

4. Shame, Fear & Guilt — The Three Barriers to Financial Wellness

AJ breaks down emotional blocks and their antidotes:

• Shame → Acknowledgment
• Fear → Trust & Surrender
• Guilt → Acceptance & Forgiveness

5. A Simple Daily Step: Track Your Emotions When You Spend

AJ offers a practical starter exercise to understand your spending habits by noticing the emotion behind each purchase. High-impact, simple, and transformational.

Explore coaching, programs, and resources at:
https://www.beyondthegreencoaching.com

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Follow us on YouTube & TikTok:
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For free wellness resources. Click the link to tap into new ways to reset with mindfulness, holistic wellness tips, and coping skills.
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Guest: Kat Anselmo – Health Coach, Yoga Teacher, Wellness Guide

In this week's episode of The Daring Well Podcast, Rita Mercer sits down with wellness coach and yoga teacher Kat Anselmo to explore how small daily practices—like movement, mindfulness, intention setting, and self-reflection—can completely transform your mental and emotional wellbeing.

Kat shares her deeply personal healing journey, the moment she realized that life can shift in an instant, and how she rebuilt herself through consistent movement, meditation, and radical self-honesty. You’ll learn mindset tools, wellness habits, and practical strategies you can start today to build confidence, reduce stress, and reconnect with your true self.

Kat’s Story: Healing, Heartbreak & the Turning Point

Kat shares how her wellness journey began when her boyfriend became ill and yoga unexpectedly became a lifeline. Years later, during her own season of heartbreak, she turned back to those tools and rebuilt her life.

The Power of 10 Minutes: Why Tiny Habits Create Big Change

Kat explains why movement is the foundation of wellness and how her simple “10 minutes a day” rule helped her shift from feeling lost to feeling empowered.

Self-Love & Identity: The Root of Real Success

A powerful conversation on how loving yourself influences relationships, decision-making, purpose, and emotional clarity. Kat explains why most people know others better than they know themselves.

The Book of Life: Creating a Personal Guide to Inner Success

Kat describes how she built her “Book of Life,” which includes goals, values, affirmations, rituals, and her vision board — a living document she updates each year to stay aligned and focused.

Mindset Strategies: Meditation, Affirmations, Nature & Everyday Wellness

Practical, accessible tools for reducing stress, building confidence, and creating a sustainable wellness lifestyle. Kat shares tips for meditation, journaling, nature healing, self-care, and more.

This episode is a heartfelt guide for anyone feeling stuck, overwhelmed, or unsure where to start on their wellness journey. Kat brings a grounded, compassionate perspective on how movement, mindfulness, and intention can slowly reshape your life from the inside out.

You’ll walk away with tools you can start practicing immediately — 10-minute movements, affirmations, 3-minute meditations, wellness rituals, and journaling prompts — along with the encouragement that healing doesn’t require perfection, only small, consistent steps.

Website:  www.katsyoga.com
Instagram: www.instagram.com/kat.anselmo/

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In this powerful episode of The Daring Well Podcast, I had the honor of sitting down with Nikki Allen, award-winning author, filmmaker, R&B artist, and spiritual disruptor.  Nikki is candid and opens up about her healing journey from heartbreak and abuse to radical self-awareness, self love, and personal empowerment. Through storytelling and soul work, Nikki shows us that healing isn’t always about going back to who we were — sometimes, it’s about meeting the version of ourselves we've never met before.

From emotional trauma to identity loss, self-worth, and boundary-setting, Nikki takes us behind the scenes of her book Loved You, Hated You and the inner work she calls “soul surgery.” We talk about why women stay, how trauma impacts identity, and how to rebuild life on your own terms.

This episode is full of truth-telling, inspiration, and actionable insight for anyone who has ever felt stuck, silenced, or disconnected from themselves.

• Abuse isn’t always loud — sometimes it hides in kindness and charm.
• Healing requires going deeper than coping skills — we must uncover the root.
• Your frequency attracts your relationships — when you elevate, your circle shifts.
• Boundaries are not selfish — they are sacred acts of self-protection.
• Self-discovery isn’t going back — it’s choosing who you’ll become next.

1. Why Women Stay – Understanding the Patterns
2. Breaking the Charm–Harm–Harm Cycle
3. Soul Surgery – Healing the Root vs. Band-Aid Fixes
4. Boundaries & People Pleasing
5. Identity After Healing – Meeting Your True Self 

Website : https://officialnikkiallen.com

Order the Book, https://www.amazon.com/Loved-You-Hated-Nikki-Allen/dp/B0FF2BHB21

(Books, music, filmmaking projects, philanthropy, and more)

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In this episode of The Daring Well Podcast, I sit down with Jeff Patterson, founder of the Northwest Fighting Arts Academy and creator of The Yielding Warrior Method. With over 36 years in meditative and martial arts, Jeff shares how his journey began in an unexpected place — a boxing gym — and ultimately led to a lifelong mission to help others cultivate clarity, presence, and performance through the meditative arts.

We explore the three pillars of yielding — physical, mental, and emotional — and how they help us navigate stress, conversations, relationships, burnout, and even high-performance environments. Whether you're an athlete, entrepreneur, leader, or someone seeking deeper peace, this episode offers practical tools to reconnect with your body, regulate your energy, and build a sustainable inner practice.

From the seven-link system to the five paths of meditation, Jeff breaks down big concepts into accessible wisdom that anyone can apply. We end with the unforgettable Stonecutter Story — a powerful lesson in consistency and transformation beneath the surface.

🔑 In This Episode, You’ll Learn:

• How boxing unexpectedly led Jeff into meditation and Tai Chi
• The real definition of yielding — and why it’s a strategy, not surrender
• The 3 pillars of yielding: physical, mental, & emotional awareness
• Why high performers burn out — and how meditation helps regulate energy
• The five paths of a meditation journey (performance, therapeutic, medical, philosophical, spiritual)
• What it means to tap into flow state — and how to access it
• Why morning rituals are more powerful than routines
• The Stonecutter Story — a metaphor for consistency and unseen transformation
• How meditation helps you reconnect with who you truly are
• Ways to begin your own meditation practice — with purpose & structure

🧘‍♂️ The Three Pillars of Yielding - What It Teaches

Physical Yielding | Body awareness, breath, balance, responsiveness
Mental Yielding | Communication, negotiation, emotional intelligence
Emotional Yielding | Inner regulation, response > reaction, clarity

📌 Quote Worth Remembering

— The Stonecutter Story (Jeff Patterson)

🔗 Connect with Jeff Patterson

Visit: https://theyieldingwarrior.com/
📚 Free book :https://book.theyieldingwarrior.com/new-free-plus-shipping
🎥 Online programs + two-week free trial
📍 In-person academy located in Portland, Oregon

💭 Reflective Question for Listeners

What might change in your life if you started each day with presence instead of pressure?

🧭 Episode Timestamps

Time          Topic

00:10:58 | Jeff’s boxing story & surprising advice
00:13:30 | What is a Yielding Warrior?
00:19:10 | Burnout & high performers
00:22:15 | The five paths of meditation
00:24:05 | Flow state explained
00:27:00 | Morning ritual benefits
00:34:47 | The Stonecutter Story
00:39:01 | Final wisdom & encouragement

🎧 Listen, Share & Subscribe

If this episode inspired you, please share it with a friend — and don’t forget to subscribe so you never miss the next powerful conversation. Keep living, keep loving, and keep daring well!

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In this soul-nourishing episode of The Daring Well Podcast, host Rita Mercer, licensed counselor and holistic wellness & mindset coach, invites you to embrace the sacred practice of “wintering” — a season of rest, renewal, and deep self-connection.

Through the lens of nature’s wisdom, Rita explores how every season of life — joy, loss, abundance, and stillness — holds purpose and meaning. Just as trees shed their leaves to prepare for spring, we too must honor our seasons of slowing down to restore our minds, bodies, and spirits.

Rita shares her own journey through perimenopause, learning to listen to her body, honor her energy, and set healthy boundaries with compassion and courage. You’ll discover how pausing isn’t weakness, but a powerful act of healing and preparation for new growth.

✨ In this episode, you’ll learn:

• What it truly means to “winter” and why rest is essential for growth
• How to recognize signs that your body and mind need to pause
• Ways to cultivate inner peace through reflection, boundaries, and self-care
• Gentle reminders to redefine productivity and self-worth
• How to trust life’s seasons and flow with grace

🌸 Whether you’re navigating transition, burnout, or emotional fatigue — this episode is your invitation to slow down, tune in, and find the sacred beauty in stillness.

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For free wellness resources. Click the link to tap into new ways to reset with mindfulness, holistic wellness tips, and coping skills.
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In this week's episode, host Rita Mercer reminds listeners that hope is never lost, even when life feels heavy, uncertain, or overwhelming. Through grounded wisdom and gentle encouragement, she explores how our focus shapes our reality—what we focus on grows—and how to shift from anxiety and worry toward peace and inner strength.

Rita also shares practical tools to reframe hopelessness, regulate your nervous system, and rediscover your anchor of faith, gratitude, and purpose. This is a compassionate reminder that you are not alone, you are not defined by your struggles, and there is still light ahead.

Key Takeaways

• What You Focus On Grows: Learn how to redirect your attention from fear and anxiety toward gratitude, faith, and possibility.
• Understanding Anxiety: Explore how our nervous system reacts to stress and how to bring it back into balance.
• Hope as a Healing Practice: Discover small yet powerful ways to cultivate hope—even when you can’t see the full path ahead.
• Practical Grounding Technique: Use the heart-centered breath practice shared in this episode to calm your mind and body.
• Faith & Connection: Remember that peace is not the absence of problems, but the belief in something bigger—hope, love, and spiritual connection.

🌸 Affirmations from This Episode

• I choose to focus on what I can control and let go of what I cannot.
• I trust that better days are coming.
• Even when I don’t have all the answers, I can find moments of peace.
• My heart is steady. My spirit is strong.

Resources

• 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline (US): Call or text 988 for immediate support.
• For international crisis resources, visit: https://blog.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlines/, or check your local listings.
• Connect with Rita: www.DaringWell.com
  
  
• Follow Rita on YouTube: @DaringWell
  
  

🎧 Listen & Share

If this episode spoke to your heart, please share it with a friend who might need a reminder to keep going. Leave a review to help others find hope and encouragement through The Daring Well Podcast.

Send us Fan Mail

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@DaringWell

For free wellness resources. Click the link to tap into new ways to reset with mindfulness, holistic wellness tips, and coping skills.
https://www.daringwell.com/freebies