Stories of Inspiring Joy

Philip Shepherd

Philip Shepherd is recognized as an international authority on embodiment. His unique techniques have been developed to transform our disconnected experience of self and world, and are based on the vision articulated in his celebrated books, New Self, New World (2010) and Radical Wholeness (Nov 2017). Philip developed the practices of TEPP to help people reunite the thinking of the head with the deep, present and calm intelligence of the body. Unlike the prevailing view of embodiment – which involves sitting in the head and ‘listening to your body’ – Philip’s approach helps you listen to the world through the body. What the body most deeply understands is that it belongs to the world. Ultimately, TEPP is about coming home to yourself.

In today’s new episode, Philip shares his personal journey to understanding his path, purpose, and embodiment - and it all started with a bicycle. This journey allowed him to be wide open to the world, to nature, to people, to connection, and adventure. It allowed him to connect with himself in a new and profound way, too. On that bike he went through so many waves of understanding what it means to be human, and each one of them was luminous. As Philip shares, if you get on the bike and keep peddling, and you're headed in the right direction, and you don't stop peddling, you'll get there - and that’s exactly what he’s done.

To connect with Philip and learn more visit his website www.reconnecttoself.life and on Instagram @philipshepherd and @tepp.life and on Facebook @tepp.life

Stories of Inspiring Joy is a production of Seek The Joy Media and created by Sydney Weiss. To learn more and submit your story, visit www.storiesofinspiringjoy.com

*Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this episode are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of Stories of Inspiring Joy.

Nicole Spindler

Nicole Spindler is a human resources professional, graduate of John Carroll University, and author of Beyond Life's Moments: An Empowering Outlook on Transcending Unexpected Setbacks. She has always had a burning passion for writing and, learning from past hurdles, to bring a message of vulnerability, self-acceptance, and perseverance. It is her aspiration to inspire others to embrace their often life-derailing situations so that they may emerge not only victorious, but empowered to face whatever may come next.

In today’s episode Nicole shares the moment her life turned upside down and the light, love, and life that came from walking into the unknown. When she was 15 years-old, Nicole found out that her dad was diagnosed with an extremely rare form of care. It was so rare that there was only one doctor in the entire world who could help treat her dad. Early on, Nicole knew that somehow this was meant to happen to her family. She knew this challenge was going to teach her something, and if they could just get through this moment and beyond, this was going to lead to greater and better things ahead. Nicole took this mindset and walked into the unknown with her dad and his diagnosis, her mom’s eventual cancer diagnosis, and her diagnosis of anxiety and PTSD, and it’s been one of the greatest experiences of her life. Nicoles’s reflections and ability to see her challenges as transformative rather than traumatic will remind you that there is so much growth and learning that comes from life’s difficult moments, and that the light at the end of the tunnel is possible for all of us.

To learn more and connect with Nicole check out her Linktree https://linktr.ee/nicolespindler on Facebook here Instagram @beyond_lifes_moments sign up for her author community monthly newsletter for all the latest updates here and you can find her new book Beyond Life’s Moments, is available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble and where most books are sold.

Stories of Inspiring Joy is a production of Seek The Joy Media and created by Sydney Weiss. To learn more and submit your story, click here.

*Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this episode are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of Stories of Inspiring Joy.

Carly Wright

Carly Wright is new mom, Postpartum Mental Health Coach, full spectrum doula and master energy healer. She helps moms release resentment, guilt and expectations so that they can feel like themselves again. By blending spirituality and tangible therapeutic tools, she’s created the V.I.B.R.A.N.T. Mama Method, a revolutionary approach to postparum mental health and healing beyond the fourth trimester.

In today’s episode Carly shares her story of suffering from anxiety and depression from a really young age, and feeling misunderstood and unworthy for most of her life. After entering a safe and expected career, her life felt more out of alignment than ever. Lost, hopeless and at rock bottom, she decided to heal her energy and get out of the cycle of anxiety and depression once and for all. Through her journey she's released shame, healed childhood wounds, and blossomed. Now, she uses her journey to help women feel free from the shame and shackles of mental health challenges. 

Carly's story and journey of finding her inner strength, sharing her voice, and healing from the inside is relatable, inspiring, and full of so much courage.

To learn more about Carly, her story, and her work visit her website https://carlyjeanwright.podia.com and you can connect with her on Instagram @thevibrantmamamethod and check out the Vibrant Mama Method here

Stories of Inspiring Joy is a production of Seek The Joy Media and created by Sydney Weiss. To learn more and submit your story, click here.

*Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this episode are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of Stories of Inspiring Joy.

Tina McDermott

Tina McDermott transforms people's lives through her inspiration, wisdom, knowledge and love of living well. Tina is an Inspirational Chef, Speaker, and Weight loss coach for nearly 20 years and is passionate about helping people release unwanted weight naturally and keep it off forever without yo-yo dieting. For the past 20 years she has had the joy and pleasure to help her clients pursue healthier lifestyles through her weight release and fitness programs that she personally designs. Tina gives guidance, love and support to her clients so they too can be strong, fit, healthy and be free from the emotional chains that keep them inside the walls of limiting beliefs, food addictions, weight gain, and belly challenges. Her slogan is Be Healthy, Vibrant and Free. Tina teaches nutrition courses, cooking classes, fitness and various webinars within corporations as well as delivers keynote corporate speeches.

In today’s episode Tina shares her story learning to love her body. Growing up as the third female child in an Italian family, Tina never felt the love she craved from both her parents. The only way for her to get the love and attention she craved was to refuse food. It wasn’t long until this behavior developed into Anorexia. She used to refuse to eat as a form of control over her crazy Italian parents and her chaotic life, and then when she was twelve years old everything she changed. She traveled to Italy with her Nona and fell in love with food for the first time. Tina realized she had an emotional relationship with food, and after her sister passed away from cancer it was the wake-up call she needed to take care of herself. She realized she had a deep love of wellness, and it became her mission to teach as many people as she could about natural health and wellness. Over the years she’s come to peace with the self-sabotaging behaviors, and Tina knows if she can heal you can too. Now Tina teaches professional menopausal women to lose weight naturally and keep it off forever without yo-yo dieting. The key to her success is coming to peace with those emotions that drive you to eat and keep you stuck.

To learn more and connect with Tina visit her website www.tinamcdermott.com on Facebook here and you can find her Facebook Support Group Reboot Your Gut, Lose Weight and Yes, You Get to Eat here Twitter @TinasBodyBiz you can fin her free ebook here and her YouTube channel here

Stories of Inspiring Joy is a production of Seek The Joy Media and created by Sydney Weiss. To learn more and submit your story, click here.

*Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this episode are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of Stories of Inspiring Joy.

 

Serena James

Serena James is a certified holistic healer tasked with the exciting life mission of raising the vibration of Mother Earth. She provides energy healing services and workshops to help people overcome energetic barriers to experience more joy, wellness, and prosperity in their lives. James is the founder of Just Be and makes her home in the beautiful state of Montana with her family.

Serena didn’t always identify herself as a holistic healer, and as she shares in today’s episode sometimes we’re led to our calling, even through difficulty. Serena shares her journey with her son, from displaying symptoms of depression as a toddler to behavioral problems as he got older, Serena and her family searched for answers while complying with her son’s schools wishes for an intervention. Serena’s friend put her in touch with a holistic healer, and the healer was able to release the blocked energy in her son’s stomach and reroute that energy to his liver. After that first appointment, they saw major improvement with her son and his anger had subsided. Serena realized that for years his energetic crisis was mislabeled as behavioral issues, and after just a couple of months her happy healthy son was back. From this moment Serena knew she had to explore the world of energy work herself, and her journey to becoming a holistic healer began. Today, she helps people overcome obstacles in their lives by helping them shift their energy. As Serena shares, it’s through sharing our stories that we can learn, connect and grow.

To learn more and connect with Serena visit her website www.thejustbelifestyle.com and on Instagram @authorserenajames and @thejustbelifestyle and Facebook @authorserenajames you can find Vibe Higher at Balboa Press, Amazon Prime, or Barnes and Noble and connect with her via email authorserenajames@gmail.com

Stories of Inspiring Joy is a production of Seek The Joy Media and created by Sydney Weiss. To learn more and submit your story, click here.

*Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this episode are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of Stories of Inspiring Joy.

Stephanie Roman

Stephanie Roman is a weight-neutral Food & Body Acceptance Coach. She offers her clients a weight-neutral approach to health and wellness using the principles of Intuitive Eating and Health at Every Size. Stephanie brings to her coaching method both her personal experience with dieting and body shame as well as a compassionate, judgment-free space, oodles of support and laser-sharp intuition.

In today's episode Stephanie shares just one of her stories - the belief that the most important thing she could offer the world was her looks, and how “pretty” she was. This “gift” had nothing to do with her, and it said nothing about her as a person. She knew it was entirely wrapped up in how other’s viewed her - all these other people got to decide her worth. Here’s the thing, as Stephanie so beautifully shares, whomever you allow the power to make you feel worthy, also yields the power to make you feel worthless. For Stephanie, it was no surprise that she spent years, decades, chasing her own worthiness. Today, Stephanie has learned how to tune into her body’s innate wisdom, appreciate her body for the miracle that it is, and she’s using her experiences and wisdom to help others do the same.

To connect with Stephanie and to learn more you can find her on Instagram @sromancoaching and on her website www.stephanie-roman.com

Stories of Inspiring Joy is a production of Seek The Joy Media and created by Sydney Weiss. To learn more and submit your story, visit www.storiesofinspiringjoy.com

*Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this episode are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of Stories of Inspiring Joy.

Manjari Gopika

Manjari Gopika is a passionate teacher and practitioner of yoga asanas and Bhakti Yoga. After twenty-something years of feeling unconfident in her body, Manjari Gopika found herself in a yoga class, and very shortly thereafter experienced a shift in her mind and body. Ten years of practice, four trips to India,  countless Bhagavad Gita classes, alignment lessons, and one 200 hour teacher training later, Manjari is more in love with yoga and more in touch with her true self than she ever thought possible. Manjari's mission is to help others be their strongest, boldest, authentic selves through the tools of yoga practice.

After 11 years in New York City, Manjari moved to Dallas with her husband and four year old daughter in May 2020, where she continues to teach yoga group classes and courses on zoom. She is the founder of Real Yoga, a facebook community where she offerspose tutorials, classes, short meditations and philosophy talks that help people incorporate yoga into their everyday lives. Her students are curious individuals of all ages, sizes, and professions, who appreciate that yoga is something that enhances their relationships--with themselves and others--and their experiences in the world, and who enjoy learning the profound alignment of classical poses, while understanding that “perfection” is not “one size fits all”.

In today’s episode, Manjari shares her personal journey with yoga and how it got her to unlimited joy. Her mission is to show you that yoga is right for every body, gender and age, and provide you with the tools to live in rhythm of life and grow into your boldest most authentic self. Manjari’s story begins in 2011 where she was an actress working by day in a hip New York City hotel. She had recently gone through a breakup and her confidence was at an all time low. Growing up she didn’t enjoy moving her body, she avoided athletics at all costs, and safe to say growing up she was picked last for every sport. She knew it was time for a change, and she decided to sign up for a yoga class. It was hard work, but she enjoyed it. She slowly realized that she was much more capable than what her mind would let her believe. It got her thinking, if she had no idea that she could do this one thing, what else could she do that she wasn’t aware of? Yoga has transformed her life, given her the tools to be her most authentic self, and opened her up to a world of possibilities.

To learn more and connect with Manjari visit her website www.manjarigopika.com/shop and use the FREE4ME discount code to experience one free group yoga class as her gift to you and you can find her classes here plus you can find her Facebook group called Real Yoga here and on Instagram @manjari.gopika.yoga

Stories of Inspiring Joy is a production of Seek The Joy Media and created by Sydney Weiss. To learn more and submit your story, visit www.storiesofinspiringjoy.com

*Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this episode are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of Stories of Inspiring Joy.

Sherra Aguirre

Sherra Aguirre is the author of Joyful, Delicious, Vegan: Life Without Heart Disease. She founded and led a successful business for three decades, winning national awards for entrepreneurship, innovation, and service excellence. She sold the company in 2016 to focus on her passion for healthy diet and lifestyle. Now in her seventies, Aguirre describes herself as high energy, in better overall health, and in many ways more fit than in her thirties or forties. She has practiced meditation and yoga daily for more than twenty-five years, and for many years has researched and read extensively about diet and lifestyle as the most important factors for achieving and maintaining good health. By adopting a whole plant-based diet, she improved overall heart health and eliminated symptoms of hypertension despite a significant family history of heart attack, stroke, and high blood pressure. She is passionate about empowering others to maintain vibrancy and good health throughout their lifetimes.

In today’s episode, Sherra shares the inspiration behind her new book, and how her personal struggle with Heart Disease and Hypertension, also known as the silent killer, and how through adopting a whole plant-based diet, she improved her overall health. Her family experienced tremendous loss, and Sherra knew she couldn’t live in denial of her own symptoms any longer. Sherra mourned the day she first filled the prescription, but after taking the medication for a week she started to feel lightheaded. She realized she needed to work with her body to make improvements to her health and wellness, and she turned to a plant-based diet. Listening to her body has guided Sherra along her journey, and it’s allowed her to step into greater gratitude, joy, and wellness. Her joy is magnified by the knowledge that something so loving for her body is also healing for all plant and animal life on Earth.

To learn more and connect with Sherra visit her website https://sherraaguirre.com and on Facebook @AuthorSherraAguirre Twitter @SherraAguirre Instagram @SherraAguirre and you can find her new book here

Stories of Inspiring Joy is a production of Seek The Joy Media and created by Sydney Weiss. To learn more and submit your story, visit www.storiesofinspiringjoy.com

*Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this episode are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of Stories of Inspiring Joy.

Karla Salinari

Karla Salinari is a Holistic Health Coach based in Brooklyn NY. Her experience with pregnancy opened her eyes to the importance of nutrition. After gaining 82 pounds while carrying her daughter, she began to explore new avenues to better nourish herself and her family. Karla began by replacing the unhealthy aspects of her diet with whole foods and higher-quality ingredients. The results were healthier body weight, a better relationship with food, and a happier outlook on life.

Karla’s story starts when she was pregnant with her daughter. There was never a balance between herself and food, and she knew she needed to cultivate a healthy relationship with food. It was during that time that she decided she wanted to enroll in nutrition school, and learn how to be better at healing her relationship with food and setting a good example for her daughter. It was during this time that she had so many “aha!” moments. She learned the importance of understanding we make food choices based on unhealed traumas and emotional impulses, and she knew she needed to share this message with her community. As Karla shares, in her culture there’s a disconnect between health and nutrition, and it’s been her mission to share her insights and guidance to help as many people as she could to learn to love their bodies. As Karla shares, food is medicine and it has the power to heal us from the inside out.

To learn more and connect with Karla visit her website www.KarlaSalinari.com and on Instagram @TheLatinaHealthCoach Facebook @TheLatinaHealthCoach and Twitter @TheLatinaHealthCoach

Stories of Inspiring Joy is a production of Seek The Joy Media and created by Sydney Weiss. To learn more and submit your story, visit www.storiesofinspiringjoy.com

*Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this episode are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of Stories of Inspiring Joy.

Dawn Taylor

*Disclaimer: Today’s episode does discuss suicidal ideation and abuse. If you or someone you know is struggling with mental health, The Suicide Prevention Lifeline has 24/7, free & confidential support for people in distress, prevention, & crisis resources: their number is 1-800-273-8255.

Dawn Taylor is the professional ass-kicker, hope giver. International trauma specialist, life coach strategist, and all-around badass, Dawn’s journey into helping others heal began when she took her personal recovery from the trauma she experienced in her life into her own hands. 

While at times unconventional, Dawn’s strategic methods have helped hundreds heal from everything related to PTSD from sexual, emotional, and physical abuse, to issues from infidelity, to overcoming addiction, as well as helping cult survivors thrive. Dawn’s work has empowered entrepreneurs, stay-at-home moms, and CEOs alike to be the superheroes in their own lives. Having completed thousands of hours of training from many professional programs, including the Robbins Madanes Training Institute, and certified as a Subconscious Imprinting Techniques professional, Dawn’s blunt honesty will challenge your thinking, broaden your awareness, and help you achieve the outstanding results you are worthy of.

In today’s episode, Dawn is interviewed by Sarah Snyder, and Dawn shares her journey coming to her work as a trauma specialist. For most of her life Dawn felt like she was just too much, and she was so scared of hurting other people with her story. She felt too broken to get help, and too damaged to ever be healed herself. She had no intention of becoming a trauma specialist, but this work healed her and she realized she couldn’t be the only one. At the core of her work is her why, to help other people become their superhero in their own rescue so that they can inspire people to do the same. Dawn shares how she works with client and throughout the episode Dawn and Sarah reflect on their work together, Sarah’s journey to trusting Dawn, and why sending emails was a huge part of Sarah’s healing. From overcoming her own trauma and trusting her gut, Dawn has stepped into her own healing and vulnerability to help her clients in a meaningful way. It’s given her clients the permission they’ve needed to step into their healing and vulnerability too. As Dawn shares, it’s never too late to work through your trauma. You’re worth fighting for.

To learn more and connect with Dawn on her website https://www.thetaylorway.ca and on Facebook @thetaylorway on Instagram @thetaylorwaynow and on LinkedIn here

Stories of Inspiring Joy is a production of Seek The Joy Media and created by Sydney Weiss. To learn more and submit your story, visit www.storiesofinspiringjoy.com

*Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this episode are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of Stories of Inspiring Joy.