A Quest for Well-Being

— Women are ever-changing as you go through your cycle each month and as your hormones fluctuate. Heather Wolcott teaches us what is happening hormonally in the body each week of our menstrual cycle, as well as how to eat, exercise, and leverage our emotions to create balance and a deeper connection to our female body. You will know the optimal weeks to fast vs feast, lift heavier weights vs. HIIT, write a book vs. give a TED-Talk, and much more based on how different your body is each week of your cycle.

Valeria interviews Heather Wolcott — She is a National Board-Certified Health and Wellness Coach, an ADAPT-Certified Functional Health Coach through the Kresser Institute and has over 20yrs of experience as a Holistic Nutritionist working 1-on-1 with clients to help them achieve their health and wellness goals.

She was also a Johnny G Certified Spinning Instructor and worked in the fitness industry for 20 years.

Her expertise is in using functional medicine’s approach to finding the root-cause of her clients’ issues and helping them optimize the 4 Pillars of Health which include: Sleep, Stress (Mindset), Movement, and Nutrition, in their lives. She also has deep passion and knowledge on longevity and anti-aging protocols in attempt to help people avoid cognitive decline, neurodegeneration, and improve their healthspan.

Heather partners with people who desire change and want more out of the life they are living so they can grow into newer versions of themselves and reach their wellness goals.

She lives in Franklin, TN with her husband and 2 kids, and works with people across the country

To learn more about Heather Wolcott and her work, please visit: https://heatherwolcott.com/

IG: @heatherjohnsonwolcott

FB: Heather Johnson Wolcott

— This podcast is a quest for well-being, a quest for a meaningful life through the exploration of fundamental truths, enlightening ideas, insights on physical, mental, and spiritual health. The inspiration is Love. The aspiration is to awaken new ways of thinking that can lead us to a new way of being, being well.

— Our stories are our identity. They’re borne from a never-ending cycle of repetitive thoughts that lead to deeply held beliefs, ingrained behaviors, and ultimately, who we believe our- selves to be. When we embody a fixed mindset, we view our qualities and abilities as unchangeable traits set in stone. Conversely, the growth mindset empowers us to believe that our qualities can evolve through dedication, effort, and continuous learning. It’s not easy to change our story, but it is possible.

Valeria interviews Deanna Moffitt — She is the author of “The Rewrite: Change Your Life One Story at a Time.”

Deanna Moffitt is an accomplished speaker, coach, and author. The word people use most to describe her is energizing. With an eclectic background in project management, leadership development, qi gong, improv comedy, and storytelling, Deanna isn't just a coach; she's a dynamic podcast guest you won't forget.

To learn more about Deanna Moffitt and her work, please visit: https://deannamoffitt.com/

— This podcast is a quest for well-being, a quest for a meaningful life through the exploration of fundamental truths, enlightening ideas, insights on physical, mental, and spiritual health. The inspiration is Love. The aspiration is to awaken new ways of thinking that can lead us to a new way of being, being well.

— Much like the body, the mind is capable of healing itself naturally. Psychologist and creator of Brainspotting Dr. David Grand believes the way people look and gaze can affect their feelings. The goal of Brainspotting is to enable people to target negative emotions by positioning their eyes in a certain way. Through trained brainspotting therapists, one's eyes are slowly guided across the field of vision until a brainspot becomes apparent, a location that evokes traumatic memories or painful emotions. There is increasing evidence that trauma is “stored” in the body and that it can alter the way the brain works. Trauma can, for example, have an effect on emotions, memory, and physical health. Brainspotting seems to activate the body’s innate ability to heal itself from trauma. Disturbing memories can be replaced in the brain, resulting in painful feelings being exchanged for more resolved, peaceful things. Brainspotting makes use of this natural phenomenon through its use of relevant eye positions. This helps the brainspotting therapist locate, focus, process and release a wide range of emotionally and bodily-based conditions. It is also a brain-based tool to support the therapy relationship, as it taps into and harnesses the body’s natural self-scanning, self-healing ability.

Valeria interviews Susan Martin — She is a Board-Certified Marriage and Family Therapist practicing psychotherapy in a thriving private practice in Boise, Idaho.

She is the founder of Susan Martin Therapy and Wellness working with adults struggling with the lasting effects of trauma, including developmental trauma experiences. Susan is certified in Brainspotting, a progressive and cutting-edge approach to treating the central nervous system’s adverse responses to current life stressors.

Susan helps clients who feel their past is keeping them from living their best futures, those whose bodies are tired of existing in survival mode, and those who are struggling with their relationships because of the somatic stress living with an always-activated central nervous system. Susan also specializes in depression, anxiety, the effects of shame, attachment wounds, and life and family changes and transition. Emotional health, nervous system health, neurobiology, and overall physical wellness are her passions. Her approach to her work is to treat the “whole” person and reach root causes of symptoms. Also, a certified life coach, Susan is currently developing a program to help heal and empower today’s high-achieving, busy, must-do-it-all women who are lost in people-pleasing, drowning in expectations, and don’t feel they have control of their lives to be authentically present, have deeper human connections, and have lasting healing from their pasts.

As an adopted adult continually growing and rejuvenating from her own preverbal trauma, Susan feels deeply and is sensitive to the world around her. Susan’s work represents a second career earning her Master of Arts in marriage and family therapy from Northcentral’s School of Behavioral Sciences in her forties as a busy wife and mother of two teenaged girls. Always an integral focus in her work with clients are resilience, purpose, gratitude, and, of course, joy. Her favorite quote is from the great Viktor Frankl, famed psychiatrist, holocaust survivor, and author of Man’s Search for Meaning, “Between stimulus and response, there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”

To learn more about Susan Martin and her work, please visit: https://susanmartintherapy.com/

— This podcast is a quest for well-being, a quest for a meaningful life through the exploration of fundamental truths, enlightening ideas, insights on physical, mental, and spiritual health. The inspiration is Love. The aspiration is to awaken new ways of thinking that can lead us to a new way of being, being well.

— Beautifully broken, soul stripped bare,

fragmented heart, pain and despair.

Tears will cleanse from deep inside,

wounded by love, tormented by mind.

Beautifully broken, seems so unfair,

spirit is strengthened, through love and care.

Life and it's meaning is yours to decide,

emotional scars that will forever bind.

Beautifully broken, so now you know,

journey on, may you reap what you sow.

Sword is strengthened by the heat of flame.

Beautifully broken, there's no one to blame.

~ by Ray Sinclair

Valeria interviews Dr. Lisa Billings — She received her Ph.D. in clinical psychology from the University of Virginia.

While there, her research focused on how traumatic childhood experiences affect individuals' developmental trajectories. Specifically, Lisa focused on the long-term and insidious effects of inter-parental conflict, divorce, and family violence on well-being, as well as how divorce mediation can enhance post-divorce family functioning. Dr. Billings has published several journal articles in these areas, and did a post-doctoral fellowship, thinking she would go into academia like everyone else in her family. Her father was a professor for over 50 years at University of Chicago, her stepmother was in academic medicine at Northwestern, one of her brothers is a physics professor at Boston University and the other brother is a neuroscience professor at Washington University in St Louis.

Once Lisa began having children, however, she understood a few things more deeply: 1) Being a good mom to her children was one of her primary reasons for being on this earth; and 2) Being a guide and a healer to others was her other primary purpose. Lisa strongly believes that the loss and trauma she experienced in childhood has given her special powers of empathy and insight.

After spending eight more years at Children’s Hospital and having four children, Lisa started her private practice in Central Denver just over 15 years ago. In her private practice, she specializes in the transition to adulthood, anxiety, depression, complex childhood trauma, divorce, and other difficult life transitions. In addition to traditional talk therapy, she has also been trained in psychedelic assisted psychotherapy and currently provides ketamine-assisted psychotherapy (KAP) in her office. There is now a strong body of peer-reviewed literature that demonstrate both the neuro-scientific benefits of ketamine on the brain (decreases depression/suicidality and increases neuroplasticity), as well as the enhanced benefits of using ketamine as a catalyst to therapy, especially with individuals struggling with anxiety, depression and trauma (e.g, the rigid thinking disorders). Lisa has seen the incredible benefits of KAP with her own eyes with clients in her practice.

In addition to her private practice, Dr. Billings recently joined Noma Therapy, a start-up KAP company, which will provide a specially curated 14-week KAP program to those diagnosed with depression, anxiety, or trauma-related disorders. Noma Therapy is already contracted with Colorado Medicaid as well as most major insurance companies, so the benefits of KAP will be more accessible to a broader range of clientele.

To learn more about Dr. Lisa Billings and her work, please visit: https://drlisabillings.com/

— “People in therapy or on a spiritual path are often under the mistaken notion that getting Enlightened means no longer having to deal with a full range of emotions. They hope that Enlightenment will mean living in a permanent state of “bliss” which they translate as “feeling high all the time, like on the best combination of drugs.” In fact, they often begin using meditation and its special states of consciousness to “hide out” from any emotional experience. You can’t stifle, suppress, or repress your own emotions; instead, you must learn how to feel your feelings and interpret their purpose skillfully.”

Valeria interviews Jonathan Labman — He is the author of “A Therapist's Guide to Being Human and Waking Up."

In 1992, Jonathan received his License as a Massage Therapist in New York State. He worked as a Licensed Massage Therapist full-time, while studying and getting certified in Energy Healing (from 1995-1998) and taking two graduate courses in counseling at NYU. In 1998, Jonathan returned to graduate school for a Master of Art with a Concentration on Counseling Psychology. Following that, in 2000 he took a 500-hour Yoga-Alliance Certification as a Yoga Teacher.

Jonathan was in private practice as a Counseling Psychologist from 2000-2008, and then returned to corporate life for supervision hours towards a license. He began that process as an Employee Assistance Program Specialist at United Behavioral Health in Philadelphia in 2008 and completed it as an Outpatient Counselor at the Penn Foundation Recovery Center.

Upon licensure in late 2010, Jonathan became the Director, The Trauma Treatment Project at the Penn Foundation from 2011-2013. There he worked with a team to implement changes in policies, procedures ,and clinical skills to make Penn Foundation a Trauma-Informed Care Center of Excellence. He was and still is a supervisor for clinician licensure, ran the Adult Trauma Treatment Supervision group, created lectures and trainings on trauma-informed and trauma-specific care, and specialized in individual and group work for people with a history of trauma.

Jonathan served on the Montgomery County Trauma-Informed Services Committee and Training Subcommittee and served on the Bucks County Trauma Steering Committee. Jonathan also completed the ASIST (Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training) Workshop and then the ASIST T4T (Training for Trainers) in Denver, CO.

In 2013, Jonathan returned to private practice work as a Licensed Professional Counselor and Spiritual Mentor in his private practice Simply Awake LLC. He has run small groups in spiritual awakening since 2001, taught meditation to hundreds of people (including Bucks County administrative staff, and at the Doylestown Hospital Community Health series) and worked with people using the principles of Transpersonal Psychology.

Jonathan says, “I have studied human development in its many dimensions for 50 years. I have an entire album of credentials and academic degrees that you may review in my consulting office in Holicong (Buckingham Township), and I’ll be happy to answer any professional questions you have. I have been in the human service fields for over 31 years. I have worked with everyone from wealthy heirs of family fortunes, to successful businesspeople wanting to find meaning in their lives, to famous artists and writers, to people on welfare because their jobs were shipped overseas.

To learn more about Jonathan Labman and his work, please visit: simplyawake.com

— This podcast is a quest for well-being, a quest for a meaningful life through the exploration of fundamental truths, enlightening ideas, insights on physical, mental, and spiritual health. The inspiration is Love. The aspiration is to awaken new ways of thinking that can lead us to a new way of being, being well.