The Mindful Journey
Join us on "The Mindful Journey," a transformative podcast guiding you through the landscape of mindfulness, self-awareness, and personal growth. Each episode, our host and thought-provoking guests share insightful stories, practical techniques, and inspiring wisdom to help you cultivate a deeper connection with yourself and the world around you.
Psychic Medium and Attorney: Jason Zuk on Intuition, Evidence and Grief
How do you trust what you cannot prove, when your training says to prove everything? If you carry both a need for evidence and a quiet inner knowing, this conversation is for you.
Sana speaks with Jason Zuk, an attorney and psychic medium, about holding both worlds, dreams, grief, and why intuition may be one tool among many.
About the Guest:
Jason Zuk is a licensed attorney and a psychic medium who has worked professionally since 2017. He hosts The Social Psychic Radio Show and shares his own personal beliefs and experiences in this...
Positive Attitude About Aging: Dr. James Beckwith on Positively Not Old
Growing older can feel like a countdown, or like a long road walked one season at a time. If birthdays bring a quiet dread, this conversation offers another way to look at the years.
Sana and Dr. James Beckwith, an optometrist for nearly 40 years, explore reframing, purpose, connection and pausing, without pretending the hard parts away.
About the Guest:
Dr. James Beckwith is a doctor of optometry, practice owner and Wild Health Precision Medicine fellow, in practice since 1988. He is the author of Positively Not Old. This is a reflective conversation, not medical...
Navigating Inner Transformation: Finding Peace in Who You Are with Xenia Ioannidis
What does it actually mean to go through an inner transformation, without pressuring yourself to have it all figured out? On The Mindful Journey, host Swati and author and healer Xenia Ioannidis explore that quiet, unfolding process.
Xenia shares how a career change, a move across the world and a deeply humbling season reshaped her, why patterns repeat until we learn from them, and a simple five-line practice for setting intention each morning and night.
About the Guest:
Xenia Ioannidis is a healer, teacher and author based in Miami. A former creative director...
Frequency Healing Explained: Science, Risks & Real-World Experiences | Michael Upstone
What does it really mean to heal? Can energy-based technologies support the body's natural processes, and how do we distinguish scientific evidence from exaggerated claims?
In this episode of The Mindful Journey, host Sana welcomes Michael Upstone, president of Keep Health Research and author of the Frequency Healing book series, to explore his 18-year journey investigating frequency healing, energy medicine, and emerging health technologies.
Michael shares how his interest began with a device he associates with the Russian space medicine program. He explains his early experiences with SCENAR technology, the training he undertook, and the...
Endometriosis and Chronic Pain: When Surgery Doesn't Help | Heather Yoshimura
This is my strongest choice because it addresses a specific concern that listeners with endometriosis may be searching for, while accurately reflecting Heather's experience.
Other compelling options are “Why Endometriosis Pain Can Persist After Surgery,” “The Hidden Nervous System Connection to Chronic Pain,” “Living With Endometriosis: Finding Hope Beyond Surgery,” and “How Heather Yoshimura Reclaimed Her Life After Chronic Pain.”
About the Episode:
What happens when you've tried every recommended treatment for endometriosis, undergone multiple surgeries, and still wake up in pain every day?
For years, Heather Yoshimura lived with debilitating chronic pain. De...
The Placebo and Nocebo Effect: How Belief Shapes Health with Dr. Janey Little
What we expect about our health may matter more than we realise. This episode is for anyone curious about the mind and body connection and the quiet power of expectation.
Dr. Janey Little explains the placebo and nocebo effects through a hospital story and her own practice, and shares her views on belief, hope and prognosis. It is a perspective to reflect on, not medical advice.
About the Guest:
Dr. Janey Little spent 22 years as a veterinary surgeon before becoming a natural medicine practitioner who supports clients on their healing journeys. She is...
Handling Pressure and Mistakes: Clearer Decision Making with Grand Prix Rider Silvia Rizzo
Have you ever frozen before a big decision, or replayed a mistake long after it was over? On The Mindful Journey, host Sana sits with Silvia Rizzo to explore how we respond to pressure, uncertainty and error.
Silvia shares why fear fills the empty spaces of uncertainty, how to decide from reality rather than imagined outcomes, and why every mistake is simply new information.
About the Guest:
Silvia Rizzo is an international Grand Prix dressage rider, entrepreneur and certified life coach. Her experience in elite sport and business shapes how she thinks about...
Only Go Straight, Don’t Know: Returning Mindfulness to Its Zen Source with Dr. David Lee Fish
Mindfulness now arrives as apps, courses and checklists. What did it look like before all that? This episode is for anyone who practises mindfulness and wonders what the techniques grew from.
Dr. David Lee Fish traces mindfulness back to the Zen teaching “only go straight, don’t know” and shows how it speaks to performance anxiety. You leave with a quieter question to sit with, not another method to add.
About the Guest:
Dr. David Lee Fish is a saxophonist, music professor and performance coach. He teaches online courses on speaking, performing and compet...
What If You’re Not Too Sensitive—Just in the Wrong Environment? | Kathryn Riordan
Have you ever been told you're too sensitive, take things too personally, need too much rest, or should simply toughen up?
What if sensitivity isn't something you need to eliminate?
In this episode of The Mindful Journey, Swati speaks with Kathryn Riordan, a National Board Certified Health & Wellness Coach who works primarily with neurodivergent women experiencing burnout.
Kathryn explores what it can mean to live as a highly sensitive person in a culture that often celebrates constant productivity, long hours, pushing through exhaustion, and emotional restraint.
For someone who needs more...
Reconnecting With Your Purpose, with Baiba Wisse | Mindful Journey
In this episode of Mindful Journey, host Yusuf talks with manifestation expert and career coach Baiba Wisse about what it really means to find purpose. Baiba unpacks the common misconception that purpose equals a job title, and shares how her own path started with a simple longing to feel enthusiastic about each new day instead of just getting through it. The conversation moves through childhood soul fracturing and disconnection, the physical and emotional warning signs of living out of alignment, and why gentleness, not force, is what actually helps people reconnect with their own voice. Baiba closes with a...
Scott Ambrose on Finding Presence Through Meditation and Inner Growth
Moving so fast you forget to simply be where you are? On The Mindful Journey, host Swati and Scott Ambrose explore navigating inner growth through presence, from everyday mindfulness to a simple meditation practice.
You will learn why a wandering mind is part of meditation and how to shift from fight or flight into rest and digest.
About the Guest:
Scott Ambrose is an attorney in Scottsdale, Arizona, who has meditated since age twelve and teaches meditation. He studies mystic traditions and wrote Demystified Mystic.
Key Takeaways:
Presence spans your...Navigating Change With Presence: Mindful Awareness with Steve Barton
Always preparing for the next thing while life slips by? On The Mindful Journey, host Niharika and coach Steve Barton explore navigating change with presence rather than prediction.
You will learn why mindfulness is exciting, not boring, how to clear the weeds of overthinking, and a playful way to let go of the past.
About the Guest:
Steve Barton is a coach who helps clients build awareness and release old thinking. He co-wrote The Father, The Son, The Aha Moment with his son in 2021.
Key Takeaways:
Feeling stuck? Start with...Trusting Your Inner Knowing Through Life Transitions with Steven Golden
What do you do when you stand at the edge of a big decision and part of you hesitates? On The Mindful Journey, Rev. Steven Golden explores how our thoughts shape our experience of life transitions.
You will hear simple daily practices for releasing fear and doubt, building self-gratitude and self-love, and meeting setbacks with patience.
About the Guest:
Rev. Steven Golden is an ordained minister with a Doctor of Divinity and the author of Your True Human Power. His turning point came after hearing Wayne Dyer and Marianne Williamson speak.
...
Understanding Resistance: Why We Hold Back and How to Listen with Sam Brooks
Why does part of us keep pulling back, even when we want to change? This episode of The Mindful Journey is for anyone who procrastinates, avoids, or keeps finding reasons to wait, and feels stuck without knowing why.
Sam Brooks shares how rethinking his news habits helped him move forward, why resistance is data rather than an enemy, and how to decide when to listen to it and when to gently set it aside.
About the Guest:
Sam Brooks is the founder of Rally News, a positive news aggregator. He began his career...
Finding Presence in Daily Life: The Power of the Pause with Kirana Sidin
Are you actually present in your life, or just getting through it? This episode of The Mindful Journey is for anyone moving through busy days on autopilot who wants to feel more awake without adding another self-improvement project.
Author and strategic life coach Kirana Sidin explains why mindfulness is about returning rather than never drifting, how small pauses change the way we respond, and where presence quietly lives in ordinary moments.
About the Guest:
Kirana Sidin is an author and strategic life coach based in Jakarta, Indonesia, and a mother of five. Her...
Navigating Inner Transformation Through Mindfulness and Faith with Michael Muccio
Why does real inner change feel so slow, even when you're doing the work? This episode of The Mindful Journey is for anyone who has tried mindfulness, felt their mind get louder, and wondered if they were doing it wrong.
Author Michael Muccio shares why he left a high-flying corporate career, what faith taught him about presence, and why returning without judgment matters more than never drifting.
About the Guest:
Michael Muccio is a Sarasota, Florida-based author who left a successful hospitality career to work alongside motivational speaker Zig Ziglar. He writes from...
Navigating Change Through Awareness: Marcia Ruben on The Mindful Journey
What if our brains simply aren't wired for how fast change happens today? Host Swati talks with executive coach Dr. Marcia Ruben about why our nervous system craves certainty, and why staying present during change is a learnable skill.
Marcia shares simple grounding techniques, like rubbing your fingers together or imagining roots into the ground, a stop-sign visualization for interrupting a spiraling thought, and why she recommends learning to live in the question instead of rushing toward an answer.
About the Guest:
Dr. Marcia Ruben is an executive coach and organizational consultant, and...
Making Friends With Your Ego: David Fiala on The Mindful Journey
What if fighting your ego is exactly what keeps it in charge? Host Shridha talks with David Fiala about why making friends with the ego, rather than battling it, is the fastest way to quiet it down.
David shares a self-forgiveness visualization for easing self-criticism, the idea of the observer, the part of you that watches your thoughts and isn't the thoughts themselves, and why kindness and gratitude are what actually calm the ego down.
About the Guest:
David Fiala is a licensed clinical social worker and author of The Courageous Seeker. He...
Breaking the Addiction to Achievement: Anu Verma on The Mindful Journey
What if the drive to achieve more is its own kind of addiction? Host Sana talks with trauma specialist Anu Verma about redefining success away from external validation and toward how you actually feel inside.
Anu shares how childhood trauma can leave the nervous system stuck in fight, flight, or freeze, why running from problems rarely solves them, and why forgiving those who hurt her was about releasing weight she no longer wanted to carry.
About the Guest:
Anu Verma is a trauma specialist, author, and speaker, and the founder of Victim to...
Trusting Intuition Every Day: Katharine Giovanni on The Mindful Journey
There's a voice inside you that speaks before your thoughts fully form, a pull toward certain choices logic can't explain. Most of us have felt it, and most of us second-guess it.
On this episode of The Mindful Journey, intuitive and author Katharine Giovanni shares how she learned to trust that quiet inner voice, including one decision that may have saved her life.
About the Guest:
Katharine Giovanni spent decades in customer service and concierge training before intuition became her full focus. She is the author of The Little Bird on Your Shoulder...
Why Serving Others Only Works When You Serve Yourself Too | Cindy Rand on The Mindful Journey
Nearly thirty years as a certified accountant and business finance coach doesn't sound like the origin story for someone called the Busy Woman's Cheerleader. But for Cindy Rand, the two chapters of her life, finance and faith-driven service, were never actually separate.
In this episode of The Mindful Journey, host Sana talks with Cindy Rand about surviving domestic abuse and homelessness, why busyness and productivity aren't the same thing, and why serving others sustainably means refusing to run yourself into the ground to do it.
About the Guest:
Cindy Rand, known as the...
Spiritual Regression Hypnotherapy: Releasing Trauma Without Reliving It, with Taras Machula
Most mindfulness practices, whether it's breathwork, journaling, or meditation, are trying to do one thing: bring you back to your heart. But what happens when the mind you're trying to quiet keeps pulling you toward every unresolved thread in your life?
In this episode of The Mindful Journey, Sana sits with Taras Machula, a certified hypnotherapist and spiritual regression practitioner from Manitoba, Canada, whose own healing journey began with a visitation from his late father and years spent searching more than forty places of worship for what unconditional love actually feels like. The conversation moves through spiritual...
How to Listen to Your Body: Andrew Scheim on Body Work and Detox
Most of us learn to override our bodies instead of listening to them. Andrew Scheim, an integrative wellness practitioner and advanced body worker, has spent decades helping people do the opposite.
From his years as a blues musician to acupuncture, detox, and PEMF therapy, Andrew walks through how the body holds what the mind hasn't processed, and why real healing needs both the right input and real movement.
About the Guest:
Andrew Scheim is an integrative wellness practitioner, educator, and advanced body worker with decades of experience working with chronic and complex health...
Health on Planet Earth: The HOPE Framework with David Gottfried
There's a kind of hope that doesn't just wait for things to get better. It builds plans, creates, and moves through the world with purpose. When it comes to the health of a planet, that kind of hope isn't optional, it's the whole point.
Swati sits down with David Gottfried, founder of the U.S. Green Building Council and the World Green Building Council, for a conversation that moves from backpacking in Yosemite as a young naturalist to designing a net-zero home in 1980, to the framework he now calls HOPE: Health on Planet Earth. This is a...
Boundaries and Internal Safety: Barb Nangle on How to Stop Abandoning Yourself
Most of us think boundaries fail because our words aren't firm enough. Boundaries coach Barb Nangle returns to The Mindful Journey to explain why boundaries actually collapse when we don't feel safe enough inside ourselves to hold them.
Barb walks through the moment at 52 that led her into twelve-step recovery, how codependency and victim mentality show up in subtle everyday ways, and how learning to build internal safety helped her heal her relationship with food and with other people.
About the Guest:
Barb Nangle is a boundaries coach, speaker, author, and podcast host...
There Is No Destination, Only Presence: Terry Bean on The Mindful Journey
We spend so much time thinking about where we're going, our careers, our goals, the things we want to achieve, and far less time noticing what's happening inside us while we do it all. Swati sits down with Terry Bean, author, executive life coach, and speaker, to talk about mindfulness as something far more accessible than most people assume, and growth as a practice rather than a place you eventually arrive.
Terry shares her own decades-long personal development journey, the patterns that quietly disconnect people from themselves, and simple practices, from a family mantra to a single...
Surviving Your Own Dark Night of the Soul: Frances Fayden on The Mindful Journey
The phrase "dark night of the soul" gets used often enough that it can lose its weight, but it's not a bad week, it's a complete disconnection from everything that used to hold meaning. Sana sits down with Reverend Frances Fayden, spiritual mentor, author, and host of the Magnify Your Miracles podcast, to talk about what happened on the other side of hers.
Frances walks through the six years she spent inside a spiritual community, the grief and self-doubt that followed leaving it, and the 2012 encounter she says changed the direction of her life and work.
<...Building a Relationship on Purpose: The Monument Method with Gaylen Wilson
Most couples build their relationship on chemistry alone, and that's exactly why so many struggle once the early romance phase fades. This episode is for anyone who wants their relationship to be intentional rather than left to instinct.
Gaylen Wilson joins Sreemedha to share the Monument Method, a practice he and his wife Heather built to stop fights before they start, repair connection quickly, and protect their relationship as something worth defending together instead of a battleground for who's right.
About the Guest:
Gaylen Wilson is a certified thriving relationship coach and co-creator...
Releasing Fear After the Storm: Fadi Sarieddine on The Mindful Journey
When something hard happens, the storm usually passes, but it tends to leave something behind, a quiet wiring that says stay small, stay guarded, don't hope too much. Sana sits down with Fadi Sarieddine, a spiritual healer and author, to talk about the fear that keeps steering decisions long after the hard thing is actually over.
Fadi shares the story behind his upcoming book, At the End of a Storm, what it felt like to carry an invisible armor for years, and a practical way to start noticing where fear, rather than genuine caution, might be running...
From Self-Forgetting to Self-Remembering: Theresa Gale on The Mindful Journey
Most people don't lose themselves in a single dramatic moment, they lose themselves one ordinary day at a time, and often nobody tells them until years have passed. Sana sits down with executive coach and certified Enneagram trainer Theresa Gale to talk about self-forgetting, self-remembering, and what it actually takes to come back to yourself.
Theresa shares how a difficult early childhood experience shaped lifelong patterns she didn't fully understand until she discovered the Enneagram at 37, and offers a simple practice for catching those patterns in the moment they're happening.
About the Guest:
...
Coping With Uncertain Times and Self-Esteem: Kate Heartsong on The Mindful Journey
There's a particular kind of tired going around right now, a sense that the old ways of coping aren't quite working and nobody's sure what the new ones look like. Sana sits down with Kate Heartsong, known as the Confidence and Career Coach, to talk about self-esteem, uncertainty, and what she calls humanity's current evolutionary shift.
Kate shares the childhood accident that led to undiagnosed hearing loss and years of shame, how long real personal change actually took for her, and why she believes reconnecting with your own inner authority matters more than ever right now.
<...A Lifelong Search for Truth and Healing: Daniel Winrose on The Mindful Journey
Imagine being a child who feels things other people cannot explain away, not fear exactly, more like a knowing, with nobody around you having a word for it. Sana sits down with Daniel Winrose, author of Along Trails of Truth, to talk about growing up in a dysfunctional family, a childhood spiritual encounter that stayed with him for decades, and the long, patient road back to his own heart.
Daniel shares the early experiences that shaped his inner world, how a meditation practice begun to quit smoking led him somewhere far deeper, and why it eventually felt...
A Healthier Home Without the Overwhelm: Risa Suzuki on The Mindful Journey
You walk into your kitchen and start wondering about the air you're breathing, the water you're drinking, the surfaces your children touch, and suddenly the whole house feels like a problem to solve. Navya sits down with Risa Suzuki, a certified Building Biology Environmental Consultant, to talk about creating a healthier home without turning it into another source of stress.
Risa shares two client stories, one involving a security camera and one involving mold meters, to illustrate why chasing every possible risk at once tends to backfire, and why looking at just one or two things at...
Reclaiming Your Health After 40: Brian Parana on The Mindful Journey
Have you ever caught your own reflection and needed a half second to recognize the person looking back? Sana sits down with Brian Parana, who has spent more than two decades coaching real people, not Instagram people, on fitness, nutrition, and lifestyle, to talk about the slow drift that happens between who we were and who we've quietly become.
Brian shares why health struggles are so often misread as a discipline problem when something deeper is actually going on, and what two decades of coaching both Olympians and exhausted forty-something dads has taught him about what it...
You Are Not Broken: Zachariah Rehder on Breathwork and What Blocks Healing
Many of us spend years searching for healing as though we are broken, and the searching itself can become the obstacle. Zachariah Rehder spent fifteen years accumulating spiritual knowledge before realizing understanding was never the point.
An international breathwork facilitator and healer, Zach talks with Sana about why the conscious mind can't grasp the infinite, how breath helps completed feelings move through the body, and the question he asks everyone: what if this doesn't mean what you think it means?
About the Guest:
Zachariah Rehder is an international teacher, speaker, and healer with...
From "You're a Mistake" to Changing Lives: Thomas Wilson on Neurodiversity, Storytelling, and Belonging
What if neurodiversity isn't something to be fixed, but something to be understood?
In this moving episode of The Mindful Journey, neurodiversity advocate and storyteller Thomas R. Wilson shares his remarkable journey from being labeled a "problem" in childhood to becoming a mentor, educator, and champion for people whose minds work differently.
Growing up, Thomas faced bullying, misunderstanding, and a school system that often viewed his neurodivergence as a flaw rather than a strength. Instead of letting those labels define him, he transformed his lived experience into a mission to help others find belonging through...
You Already Know: Jennifer Halls on Trusting Your Intuition
Most of us override our own knowing dozens of times a day without noticing, that tight feeling in the stomach, that pull in one direction we reason ourselves right out of.
Jennifer Halls left a career as a museum curator with no roadmap to become an intuition consultant. Nearly 25,000 consultations later, she joins Sana to talk about dread as a messenger and how to build a relationship with your own knowing.
About the Guest:
Jennifer Halls is an intuition consultant, author, artist, and educator who left a career as a museum curator to...
Survival Mode: What Becomes Possible When You Stop Just Surviving, with Paul Padgett
You can be functioning, even impressively, and still not be living. Survival mode is quiet like that. It stops feeling like a crisis and starts feeling normal.
Paul Padgett has spent four decades rebuilding lives after disasters, and his own more than once. He sits with Sana to name the loop and explore what shifts when clarity replaces confusion and action replaces reaction.
ABOUT THE GUEST:
Paul Padgett is the founder and chief executive of Blueprints to Success, a transformational speaker and coach. He started his first company at eighteen in disaster reconstruction...
When the Body Feels Uncertain: Finding Steadiness Through Illness, with Jihane Laraichi
Meet Jihane Laraichi, energy coach and certified therapist, who joins Mindful Journey to talk about staying grounded through serious illness, including cancer diagnosis and recovery.
Listeners will hear gentle grounding practices to sit alongside medical care, not replace it, for moments fear feels loudest.
About the Guest:
Jihane Laraichi is an energy coach and certified therapist in Barcelona, with 11 years helping people navigate illness and conflict with steadiness.
Key Takeaways:
Trying to force positivity early in a diagnosis often works against what the body needs.Allowing fear, grief, and anger...Befriending Your Emotions: Elisa Neven-Pugh on Faith, Disability, and Being Real
This episode is for anyone who learned early to keep their emotions tidy and useful instead of honest. Author and disability advocate Elisa Neven-Pugh joins The Mindful Journey to talk about what it actually means to be real with what you feel, especially in the middle of something hard.
Elisa shares how her faith reshaped her relationship with strength and vulnerability, why she calls anger and grief untapped power rather than weakness, and how small, consistent practices, not one grand breakthrough, are what actually make honesty with yourself stick.
About the Guest:
Elisa...
