The Contentment Creator
Welcome to The Contentment Creator Podcast – the ultimate podcast for conscious creators, mindful parents, and visionary entrepreneurs who are ready to embrace courage, clarity, and contentment in every facet of life. I’m your host, Ellen Broen – a certified life coach, professional singer, mom, and unapologetic fan of clever wordplay, cozy books, and adorable dogs. This podcast is your daily dose of inspiration to help you: ✨ Find clarity in your life vision and decisions. ✨ Ignite creativity and unlock your entrepreneurial potential. ✨ Cultivate contentment and balance in your personal and professional journey. ✨ Build thriving communities that feel like home. Each short, impactful epis...
AI helped me follow through on couples therapy doing THIS.
What if the most important part of communication isn’t saying the perfect thing… but helping each other feel understood before trying to respond?
My AI chatbot and I explore how validation can become a powerful relationship practice, especially in the moments when both partners are tired, emotionally drained, or running on very little bandwidth. What begins as a question about how to remember to validate each other becomes a deeper conversation about nervous system capacity, repair, shared language, and how couples can stay connected when communication starts to slip into defensiveness or disconnection.
We also...
The problem with investing in your business… (AI business coaching session)
What if hiring support in your business isn’t about doing more… but about finally building a business that protects the source of your best work?
I put an AI life coach chatbot to the test with a real-life coaching conversation about hiring business support, protecting creative energy, and navigating a season of limited capacity without abandoning your values. What begins as a practical question about hiring a video editor, virtual assistant, and content producer becomes a deeper exploration of energy, sustainability, decision load, and what it means to invest forward without forcing yourself into burnout first.
Values-Aligned Hiring (with my AI life coach)
What if the “right” decision isn’t about finding the perfect person… but learning how to trust yourself inside an imperfect process?
I put an AI life coach chatbot to the test with a real-life coaching conversation about hiring a nanny, decision-making, nervous system activation, and learning how to choose support without getting lost in fear, perfectionism, or over-analysis. What begins as a practical question — “Can ChatGPT help me hire a nanny?” — quickly becomes a deeper exploration of trust, compatibility, communication, family rhythms, and what it means to invite someone into the emotional ecosystem of your home.
Through thi...
Transforming my marriage, business, & parenting in 2 hours (thanks ChatGPT?)
I am putting an AI life coach chatbot to the test with real-life coaching conversations around hiring, motherhood, business support, marriage communication, and parenting triggers. Rather than treating decision-making as a purely logical process, this conversation explores what happens when our choices are shaped by nervous system activation, emotional history, capacity limits, and the desire to create something more sustainable.
Through the lens of hiring a nanny, we unpack why choosing support inside the home can feel so deeply intimate and activating. This isn’t just about checking references or reviewing qualifications, it’s about inviting someone into...
Emotional Inquiry: A Meditation for Meeting Your Feelings Instead of Managing Them (STOP AVOIDING THIS)
What if healing doesn’t begin by controlling your emotions… but by finally learning how to meet them?
In this guided emotional processing practice, we explore emotional inquiry as a way to build self-trust, nervous system safety, and emotional resilience. Because many of us don’t actually allow ourselves to fully feel emotions but instead we analyze them, avoid them, distract from them, or try to “fix” them before they’ve even had a chance to communicate.
This episode walks through a gentle somatic practice designed to help you turn toward emotions with curiosity instead of fear. Rat...
What Your Emotions Are Actually Trying to Tell You (11 Core Feelings Explained)
What if our emotions aren’t problems to fix… but signals we’ve forgotten how to understand?
In this episode, we explore the deeper meaning behind emotions like fear, anger, guilt, sadness, shame, jealousy, anxiety, and joy but as forms of communication from the body, mind, and nervous system. Because many of us were never taught how to truly feel our emotions. We learned how to suppress them, avoid them, perform through them, or push past them instead.
We unpack how every emotion carries information. Fear can point toward what needs care or courage. Anger can re...
The Emotions You Run From are Running Your Life (what you resist persists)
What if the emotions you keep avoiding are quietly shaping your entire life?
In this episode, we explore how emotional avoidance influences our decisions, relationships, behaviors, and identity often without us even realizing it. Because what we call procrastination, perfectionism, overworking, people-pleasing, control, or “just being practical” is sometimes a nervous system trying to avoid difficult feelings like shame, rejection, fear, grief, disappointment, or inadequacy.
We unpack how avoidance is not weakness, laziness, or failure. It’s protection. The nervous system is designed to move us away from pain and toward safety, especially if certain emotio...
3 Steps to Feel Your Emotions (Effective Emotional Processing)
Why does it feel so difficult to know what we’re actually feeling in real time? And why do emotions sometimes feel either completely inaccessible… or overwhelmingly intense?
We unpack how emotions are not abstract experiences happening only in the mind, but physical sensations that live throughout the body. Tight jaws, racing hearts, sinking stomachs, constricted throats, tense shoulders, shallow breathing, and chronic muscle tension are often emotional signals happening beneath conscious awareness. What many people call “being disconnected from themselves” is often a nervous system that learned early on that feeling emotions was unsafe.
When we...
The Emotional Skillset That Will Change Your Life (THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING)
What if our emotions aren’t problems to fix… but signals we’ve simply forgotten how to understand?
We unpack how emotional avoidance quietly shapes our lives beneath the surface. What looks like procrastination, perfectionism, people-pleasing, overworking, emotional numbness, or chronic anxiety is often a nervous system attempting to avoid feelings that once felt unsafe to experience. The emotions we resist don’t disappear — they begin to organize our decisions, behaviors, relationships, and identity beneath our awareness.
Through this conversation, we explore the hidden wisdom within emotions such as fear, anger, guilt, sadness, shame, jealousy, anxiety, d...
Creating a new normal when you’re exiting survival mode
Is it possible to be mindful while you’re in survival mode? And what if survival mode isn’t actually something to escape as quickly as possible… but something to tend to with greater awareness and care?
In this first part of the survival mode series, we explore what it means to move through overwhelming seasons of life mindfully without pretending things are okay, forcing positivity, or pressuring ourselves to “bounce back” before we’re ready.
Because when life changes in profound ways—through grief, postpartum, burnout, health crises, divorce, or major transitions—it’s not just the exter...
Essential self-care for survival mode seasons (when your old routine doesn’t work anymore)
How do you take care of yourself when the version of you that created your old routines… no longer exists in the same way?
In this third part of the survival mode series, we explore what essential self-care actually looks like during seasons of overwhelm, nervous system exhaustion, and emotional depletion—when your old habits and routines no longer feel accessible.
Because one of the most painful parts of survival mode is realizing that the systems that used to work for you suddenly don’t anymore. And instead of recognizing that your internal capacity has change...
What Survival Mode Is Doing to Your Body (and How to Support It)
What is survival mode actually doing to your body… and why does it feel so hard to think clearly, rest deeply, or function the way you normally would?
In this second part of the survival mode series, we explore what chronic stress does not just emotionally, but neurologically and physiologically. Because so often, what we label as laziness, inconsistency, or lack of discipline is actually a nervous system operating beyond capacity.
We unpack how cognitive overload impacts working memory, decision-making, and mental clarity, and why your brain begins reallocating energy away from long-term thinking in or...
How to Be in Survival Mode Mindfully
Is it possible to be mindful while you’re in survival mode? And what if survival mode isn’t actually something to escape as quickly as possible… but something to tend to with greater awareness and care?
In this first part of the survival mode series, we explore what it means to move through overwhelming seasons of life mindfully—without pretending things are okay, forcing positivity, or pressuring ourselves to “bounce back” before we’re ready.
Because when life changes in profound ways—through grief, postpartum, burnout, health crises, divorce, or major transitions—it’s not just the externa...
How to Get Out of Survival Mode and Feel Safe Again
What if survival mode isn’t something to escape… but something to tend to?
In this deeply reflective series, we explore what’s actually happening inside the body and nervous system during seasons of chronic stress, burnout, grief, postpartum healing, overwhelm, and emotional exhaustion.
Because survival mode is rarely just “in your head.”
It’s physiological. Neurological. Emotional.
And often, what we label as laziness, inconsistency, lack of discipline, or emotional instability is actually a nervous system adapting to prolonged stress and overload.
Throughout this conversation, we unpack how chronic stre...
When am I ready to raise my prices? (Live Life Coaching Session)
Should you raise your price even when long-term clients already trust and love your program?
In this live coaching conversation, we explore the tension between staying in integrity with your work and the fear of changing something that people already feel comfortable with.
On the surface, it looks like a pricing question. But underneath, it reveals something deeper: fear of being perceived as greedy, fear of losing clients, and fear of disrupting something that already feels safe.
What emerges is a more honest reflection of what’s actually happeningyour program has evolved, your va...
How do I get more stuff done? (Live Life Coaching Session)
What if the real issue isn’t productivity but your relationship with your own brain?
In this live coaching conversation, we explore what it actually means to feel “stuck,” especially when life is full but still feels mentally cluttered, emotionally heavy, or directionless.
On the surface, it looks like a time management or routine problem. But underneath, it’s something deeper: how you relate to your thoughts, your responsibilities, and your sense of self.
We unpack the desire to “move faster through life” to get past guilt, resentment, and mental friction so there’s more space f...
Why am I unhappy when I have a good life? (Live Life Coaching Session)
What if the problem isn’t that you lack clarity… but that you don’t trust yourself?
In this live coaching session, we explore the experience of feeling stuck in the “messy middle”—busy, doing a lot, but somehow feeling like nothing truly matters or moves forward.
On the surface, it sounds like a lack of vision. But as the conversation unfolds, something deeper emerges: a persistent inner voice filled with doubt, judgment, and shame that questions every decision and overrides self-trust.
We look at how this “boardroom voice” develops, why it becomes so loud, and how...
Why won’t people hire me? (Live Life Coaching Session)
Why do clients say they’re a “yes”… but still don’t move forward?
In this live coaching conversation, we unpack a frustrating pattern many coaches experience like getting verbal yeses, only for clients to delay, cancel follow-ups, or ultimately say “not right now.”
At first glance, it looks like a sales or pricing issue. But underneath, it reveals something deeper: a shift in confidence, discomfort around money conversations, and an internal hesitation to fully lead.
As the conversation unfolds, it becomes clear that this isn’t just about clients—it’s about the coach’s own rela...
What’s it *really* like to work with a life coach? (LIVE LIFE COACHING SESSIONS)
I am pulling back the curtain on my own coaching with clients. This conversation was a great example of something an AI chat bot would never spot — when a client is operating mostly from their head and not connecting to their heart, or their deeper motivations behind their decisions. A bot could have asked her why does she want to raise her rates, but a coach could see that this client was trying to think her way into worthiness rather than lead from her inner belief and heart — and you could really see her drop in when she spoke abou...
Guided Somatic Healing Session (feel safe in your body again)
What if healing didn’t have to be forced…
but instead, gently allowed?
This guided somatic healing + EFT tapping session is a space to slow down, soften, and reconnect with a sense of safety in your body again.
You don’t need to perform this perfectly.
You don’t need to rush your healing.
Just arrive as you are—and let your nervous system be supported.
In this session, you’ll be guided through:
— Grounding breathwork to help you arrive in the present moment
— Intention...
Get Out of Your Head and Into Your Body (Guided Grounding Practice)
What if the way out of overwhelm isn’t more thinking… but coming back into your body?
This guided vagus nerve reset is a somatic healing experience designed to help you shift out of overthinking, anxiety, and mental overload—into a grounded sense of safety within yourself.
You don’t need to understand anything perfectly here.
You don’t need to perform it right.
Just follow along and let your body receive.
Through gentle breathwork, sound, movement, and self-touch, you’ll be guided into a state of regulation and calm.
...
Release Stress Stored in the Body (Body-based Healing for Overthinkers)
How much stress are you carrying… that your body hasn’t had a chance to release?
This guided somatic session is designed to help you gently move stored tension, anxiety, and emotional buildup out of the body without forcing, overthinking, or pushing yourself.
Instead of trying to “fix” how you feel, this practice invites you to feel, move, and release in real time.
Inside this 12-minute reset, you’ll be guided through:
— Gentle awareness of where stress lives in your body
— Simple tension-and-release exercises (hands, shoulders, face)
— Light shaking an...
10 Minute 4-7-8 Breathing Guided Session (Deep Relaxation)
What if calm was just one breath pattern away?
In this guided somatic session, we move beyond talking about regulation—and into experiencing it in real time.
Using the 4-7-8 breathing technique, you’ll be led through a rhythmic practice designed to slow the nervous system, release tension, and bring the body back into a state of safety and relaxation.
All you need to do is follow the sound:
Inhale as the higher tones play
Hold in stillness
Exhale with the lower tones
No over...
Regulate in Real Time: Guided Nervous System Reset (Somatic Exercises)
What if regulation wasn’t something you had to figure out…but something your body already knows how to return to?
This somatic integration series is designed to help you step out of overthinking and into real-time regulation using simple, body-based practices you can actually feel.
Instead of just learning about healing, you’ll experience it moment by moment, breath by breath.
Inside this experience:
Guided 4-7-8 breathing to calm the nervous system and support deep relaxationGentle body-based movements to release stored stress and tensionVagus nerve activation through breath, sound, and ground...Using ChatGPT as my AI Business Coach
I decided to put my AI coaching chatbot to the test in a deeply personal way: navigating the crossroads of my business while freshly postpartum. Running a business in this season feels like juggling a dozen moving pieces of energy, clients, content, and community and I found myself asking the question that keeps me awake at night: what direction should I take now?
I’ve set up coaching masterclasses, harvested content clips, and begun to grow my audience, but I still feel a bit aimless. Is it Circle, YouTube memberships, new programs, or something else en...
I used ChatGPT as my AI life coach – Here’s what happened
I decided to explore boundaries in marriage through a deeply personal lens. Setting limits can feel both protective and uncomfortable, especially when they touch on deeply held values or differences. My husband and I are generally good at creating boundaries, but some like “no-go zones” around politics still stir subtle tension for me. I tend to be an open book, while he’s more private, and “agreeing to disagree” has sometimes felt like a barrier to connection. In this episode, I reflect on what it means to hold boundaries as healthy and loving, without shrinking my sense of safety or closene...
I asked AI life coach for parenting advice (I didn’t expect this)
I decided to turn my attention inward and notice a pattern in how I share updates about my kids. My husband’s updates tend to skew positive, while mine include both joys and struggles but the struggles often take center stage. This isn’t about fake positivity; it’s about the ways our brains naturally prioritize challenges over beauty. In this episode, I explore why I focus on the “negative,” how that shapes my story as a parent, and what shifts when I pause to truly linger in joy.
In our conversation, we unpacked:
✔ How ne...
ChatGPT Helped Me Regulate in 5 Minutes (simple somatic exercises)
I decided to put my custom AI coaching chatbot to the test in a deeply personal way: regulating my own nervous system in real time. As a certified life coach, I know how hard it is to pause, tune in, and truly meet yourself where you are but what happens when a tool you built meets you exactly where you are, without judgment or expectation? This episode isn’t about technology; it’s about what surfaces when you stop performing, stop fixing, and actually go inward.
In this session, my AI guided me through five simp...
Life Coach REACTS to AI Life Coach (Can it coach ME?)
Can AI actually coach you? I put my own chatbot to the test and the results surprised me.
What happens when a certified life coach sits down with a custom-programmed AI chatbot coach? I trained that AI chat-bot life coach in my own coaching style and core competencies, and let it coach me in real time across four areas of my life: my personal life, my parenting, my marriage, and my business.
This isn't a tech review. It's a raw, honest look at what happens when you let yourself be coached by something you built...
The Nervous System Reason You ‘Fall Off Track’
It’s not a discipline problem, it’s your nervous system.
This episode breaks down overthinking, nervous system regulation, somatic healing, nervous system healing, and why you can’t stop overthinking to explain why consistency feels so hard.
If you’ve ever said:
Why can’t I stay consistent?Why do I fall off track?Why do I burn out after doing well?This will reframe everything.
You’ll learn:
✔ Why inconsistency is a nervous system cycle
✔ How activation leads to burnout
✔ How to stay connected ins...
What it Actually Feels Like to Be Regulated (It’s not what you think)
Being regulated doesn’t mean calm all the time—and that changes everything.
In this episode, we explore nervous system regulation, somatic healing, overthinking, nervous system healing, and why you can’t stop overthinking in a way that actually feels realistic.
You’ll learn:
✔ Why calm isn’t the goal
✔ What regulation actually feels like
✔ How to build capacity instead of control
✔ How to return to yourself faster
Because nervous system regulation, somatic healing, overthinking, nervous system healing, and why you can’t stop overthinking are about capacity—n...
The Missing Piece in Nervous System Healing (It’s not mindset.)
If you feel “on” one day and completely drained the next—this is why.
We’re diving into nervous system healing, overthinking, somatic healing, nervous system regulation, and why you can’t stop overthinking—and the real reason you keep crashing.
This episode explains:
✔ The activation → crash cycle
✔ Why productivity can actually be dysregulation
✔ Why mindset alone isn’t enough
✔ How to regulate before burnout hits
Because nervous system healing, overthinking, somatic healing, nervous system regulation, and why you can’t stop overthinking all point to one thing: your body is...
Overthinking is a Nervous System Response (Not a personality trait)
Overthinking isn’t who you are, it’s your body trying to protect you.
In this episode, we unpack overthinking, why you can’t stop overthinking, nervous system regulation, somatic healing, and nervous system healing so you can stop blaming yourself and start understanding your body.
If you’ve ever thought:
Why can’t I turn my brain off?Why am I always overthinking?Why doesn’t mindset work for me?This is the answer.
You’ll learn:
✔ Why overthinking is a nervous system response
✔ How your body creates...
You Can’t Think Your Way to Healing (Here’s what ACTUALLY works)
Overthinking isn’t a mindset problem, it’s a nervous system response. In this episode, we break down overthinking, nervous system regulation, why you can’t stop overthinking, somatic healing, and nervous system healing so you can finally understand what’s really going on.
If you’ve been stuck in your head wondering:
Why you can’t stop overthinkingWhy awareness alone isn’t workingHow to regulate your nervous systemWhy healing feels harder than it shouldThis episode will shift everything.
You’ll learn:
✔ Why overthinking is NOT your personality
✔ The real reaso...
Before You Quit Your Dream, Listen to This
Before you make a big decision, listen to this.
We explore giving up on a dream, how to know when to quit, perfectionism, people pleasing, and how to stop people pleasing and why quitting isn’t your only option.
This episode will help you:
✔ Redefine your path without burning it down
✔ Understand when giving up on a dream is right
✔ Shift perfectionism into alignment
✔ Stop people pleasing and reclaim your voice
Join the Contentment Creator email list for exclusive, early-bird updates at https://tinyurl.co...
The Complicated Emotions of Moving On
Why does it hurt to leave something you chose to walk away from?
This episode explores giving up on a dream, how to know when to quit, perfectionism, people pleasing, and how to stop people pleasing—through the lens of grief and relief.
Inspired by themes from I'm Glad My Mom Died.
We talk about:
✔ Grieving the dream you outgrew
✔ Why giving up on a dream still hurts
✔ How to know when to quit without shame
✔ Letting go of people pleasing
Join the Contentmen...
When Perfectionism Kills Your Passion (& what Alysa Liu taught us)
When does mastery turn into pressure?
This episode dives into perfectionism, giving up on a dream, how to know when to quit, people pleasing, and how to stop people pleasing and how perfectionism slowly disconnects you from what you love.
If you’ve ever:
Felt like you’re doing everything right… but feel worseWondered how to know when to quit something you loveStruggled with people pleasing in your workThis is your wake-up call.
We also reflect on Alysa Liu and what her story reveals about passion and pressure.
Join...
Why I’m glad I gave up on my dream (and what I found instead)
I’m glad I gave up on my dream and I never thought I’d say that.
In this episode, we unpack giving up on a dream, how to know when to quit, perfectionism, people pleasing, and how to stop people pleasing through a deeply personal story.
If you’ve ever questioned:
Is it ok to give up on your dreams?How to know when to quit without regretWhether perfectionism is costing you joyThis is for you.
Giving up on a dream didn’t mean failure. It meant choosing myself.<...
When Your Dream Stops Feeling Right: What to Do Next
Giving up on a dream isn’t failure. In this episode, we explore giving up on a dream, how to know when to quit, perfectionism, people pleasing, and how to stop people pleasing and what happens when your dream stops feeling like yours.
If you’ve ever wondered:
Is it ok to give up on your dreams?How to know when to quit something you once lovedWhether perfectionism is killing your passionHow people pleasing shapes your pathHow to stop people pleasing and choose yourselfThis episode will change how you see success.
I sh...
Trust Your Intuition: The Decision-Making Skill No One Teaches
What is intuition… and how can we actually use it to make better decisions?
In this episode, we explore intuition through science, lived experience, and philosophy and how these perspectives come together to guide the choices you make every day.
You’ll discover:
The science of intuition: how your brain uses fast, unconscious pattern recognition (System 1 thinking) to process millions of signals and deliver a “knowing” without explanationThe role of the brain’s default mode network—why your best insights often come when you’re walking, driving, or not actively trying to solve the problemWhy int...