Diet rules don’t just live on your plate—they live in your head and your history. We invited food freedom coach and holistic wellness expert Sloane Elizabeth to unpack how fear-based nutrition, viral trends, and moralized labels push smart people into smaller, more anxious lives—and how to step out of that loop with clarity and calm.

We start by taking a hard look at diet culture’s favorite tactics: intermittent fasting as identity, carb and bread panic, and the halo of words like natural and healthy. Wendy shares a personal story about hidden allergens in a “simple” bar, reminding us why label literacy matters without spiraling into obsession. From there, we redefine healthy as personal and flexible—where taste, allergies, and sensitivities count, and where forcing “perfect” foods undermines trust. Sloane maps out a model that fuses evidence-based nutrition with spirituality, so choices are guided by both facts and felt safety.

The conversation digs into family scripts like the clean plate club and using food as reward, showing how scarcity and people-pleasing shape overeating and urgency. Sloane shares her own journey from perfectionism and control to intuitive eating, explaining why the real first step isn’t macros—it’s the subconscious. By addressing root beliefs around worth, scarcity, and trust, you create change that sticks and watch it ripple into work, relationships, and self-care. We also flag red signs for entrepreneurs: constant food thoughts, purity-driven label checks, skipped events due to body worry, and rules that sound like can’t or must.

If you’re ready to stop outsourcing your choices to trends and start listening to your body with compassion and skill, this one’s for you. Tune in, take what serves you, and test it gently in your next meal. Subscribe, share this with a friend who needs food freedom today, and leave a review to help others find the show.

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Connect with Wendy Manganaro:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/wendymanganaro1/

Support the show

Connect with Wendy Manganaro:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/wendymanganaro1/

We explore how mindful self-compassion helps women founders trade hustle and grind for gentle, sustainable motivation. A counselor shares practical tools, early warning signs of overload, and simple grounding skills to build a business with real boundaries.

• definition of mindful self-compassion for female entrepreneurs
• compassionate motivation versus hustle culture
• using mindfulness to return to the present
• therapist-backed skills before other interventions
• Melissa’s journey from burnout to better boundaries
• designing business hours and email expectations
• three pillars: mindfulness, self-kindness, common humanity
• warning signs of overload and isolation
• grounding methods: 5-4-3-2-1, nature, “where are your feet”
• self-kindness tactics: comfort, soothe, validate, provide, protect, motivate

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Connect with Wendy Manganaro:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/wendymanganaro1/

Burnout isn’t just exhaustion; it’s a slow shift in your identity, boundaries, and belief system that many women entrepreneurs don’t recognize until they hit a breaking point. In this powerful conversation, behavior scientist and burnout survivor Dr. Jacqueline Kerr joins Wendy to unpack the early warning signs of burnout, the difference between passion and self-sacrifice, and why women leaders are especially vulnerable.

Dr. Kerr, one of the top 1% most-cited scientists worldwide, shares the behavior-change strategies she used to rebuild her own leadership after leaving academia, along with practical tools you can apply today—whether you’re leading a team, a company, or your own home office.

You’ll learn how to:
• Identify burnout before it becomes a crisis
• Set boundaries that support creativity, not guilt
• Break perfectionism, people-pleasing, and the “always on” habit
• Lead yourself (and others) through times of change with more compassion

This conversation remains deeply relevant in 2025, as women continue to navigate hybrid work, entrepreneurship, caregiving, and the pressure to be everything to everyone. If you’ve been feeling overwhelmed, resentful, or stretched too thin—this episode is your reset point.

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Connect with Wendy Manganaro:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/wendymanganaro1/

We explore disease as the loss of ease across the physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual layers, tracing roots through ancestral trauma, environmental toxins, and learned suppression. We share practical tools to notice subtle body cues, rebuild worth, and restore ease in life and business.

• redefining disease as loss of ease across systems
• ancestral load, industrial toxins, intergenerational stress
• childhood suppression of feelings and body signals
• body dashboard metaphor and subtle symptom tracking
• medical gaslighting and turning to holistic care
• moving from supplements to quantum‑level integration
• surrender, perspective, and releasing fear narratives
• entrepreneurial dis‑ease in pricing, clients, and messaging
• observation, mirrors, coaching, and foundation repair
• self‑worth, identity shifts, and emotional maturity
• letting go of anger and drama to regain energy

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Please subscribe if you love hearing all of these conversations about self-care. And if you love Lori, please leave us a review

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Connect with Wendy Manganaro:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/wendymanganaro1/

Stress doesn’t just live in your head—it shapes your breath, your hormones, and the choices you make when you’re tired and tense. We sit down with intimacy coach and educator Stacie Steinbock of The Golden Thread to explore how pleasure can be a reliable, ethical, and practical medicine for bodies carrying burnout, shame, and even post-cancer changes. Stacie brings a rare blend of expertise: two decades in sexuality education, including medical curriculum work with the UofL School of Medicine, and a rigorous Tibetan Five Element Tantra certification that roots her methods in lineage-based somatic practice.

We trace the real gaps in sex education—silence around desire, relationships, and body image—and how that silence becomes a generational pattern. Stacy shares her ovarian cancer story, surgical menopause, and the intimate process of relearning pleasure when familiar pathways no longer work. From there, we get specific: what somatic healing means, how cellular memory keeps trauma in the tissues, and why talk therapy alone can’t always resolve what the nervous system still flags as threat. You’ll hear how the chemistry of pleasure—dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin, endorphins—protects against chronic cortisol, restoring focus, motivation, and calm. We also explore an Eastern perspective that frames orgasm as a momentary taste of freedom from suffering, while reminding us that everyday joys—like a quiet walk or a warm bath—can return the body to safety.

Stacie offers a grounded framework: movement, meditation, connection practices, and pleasure practices clients take home—no touch, clear ethics, collaborative care with medical providers when needed. We include a short guided exercise to feel the difference between recalling pain and invoking a nourishing sensory memory, illustrating how quickly the body can shift states. The takeaway is simple and powerful: pleasure isn’t an indulgence that steals from productivity; it’s the fuel that sustains creativity, resilience, and a clear connection to your why.

If this resonates, subscribe, share with a friend who needs relief, and leave a review to help more listeners find this conversation. To explore Stacie’s work, reach out for her free 30-minute consultation and ask for the complimentary ebook on pleasure as medicine.

Offer: 1:1 private intimacy coaching with Stacie for individuals, couples, and partnership systems

Offer Link: https://www.goldenthreadtantra.com/services

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Connect with Wendy Manganaro:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/wendymanganaro1/

Kumiko Sanayama, Shiatsu grandmaster and founder of Five Lives Center of Shiatsu, shares her expertise on managing stress and anxiety through self-shiatsu techniques. Drawing from her family's tradition and years of practice with clients like Giselle Bundchen and Nicole Kidman, Kumiko explains how this powerful healing art can transform wellbeing through mindful touch.

• Shiatsu follows the same pressure points as acupuncture but uses hands, elbows, and knees instead of needles
• Kumiko developed "intuitive Shiatsu" by adapting traditional techniques to individual needs
• The Japanese characters for Shiatsu represent connecting people through hands, sun, moon, and earth
• Each session is customized as practitioners assess clients through stretches and careful observation
• Entrepreneurs commonly experience stress in the back, shoulders, neck and wrists from computer work
• The pandemic increased interest in touch-based therapies as people sought alternative wellness approaches
• Digital communication creates "metal energy" that needs to be melted with "fire energy" through touch
• Self-care techniques are available on Kumiko's YouTube channel for those unable to visit practitioners

If you love what you heard today, please subscribe for more self-care tips as the weeks go forward. And if you love what Kumiko said today, please leave a review and have a blessed and abundant week.

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Connect with Wendy Manganaro:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/wendymanganaro1/

Dive into the world of LENS (Low Energy Neurofeedback System) with Nicole Bankhead, founder of Serenity Wellness Counseling, as she explains this gentle, tech-assisted approach to supporting your nervous system. Learn how this innovative therapy can help entrepreneurs struggling with sleep issues, anxiety, and burnout through a process that takes just minutes per session.

• LENS Neurofeedback provides a mirror for the brain, allowing it to see and correct its own patterns
• The therapy maps 21 points on the brain that correlate to specific functions
• Most clients experience improved sleep and decreased irritability after just a few sessions
• Treatment typically begins weekly then decreases in frequency as improvement occurs
• Sessions take only about 20 minutes with the actual feedback lasting just seconds
• Results tend to be permanent, unlike medication that requires ongoing use
• LENS works exceptionally well alongside traditional talk therapy
• The therapy can help entrepreneurs who notice increased anxiety, irritability, or sleep problems

If you're interested in trying LENS Neurofeedback, you can call Nicole's office for a free first session. Even if you're not in her area, her team can help connect you with providers near you. Please subscribe for more self-care tips and leave a review if you enjoyed this episode.

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Connect with Wendy Manganaro:

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/wendymanganaro1/