This episode might surprise you. I had no idea until I spoke with my guest Bruce Fertman that the way we’ve unconsciously learned to walk is actually doing us a disservice. In fact, most of us are making it harder than it needs to be. In this episode we discuss Bruce and his coauthor Michael J. Gelb’s new book Walking Well: A New Approach for Experiencing Comfort and Vitality in Every Step; a helpful guide that’s chock full of secrets, advice, and guidance on walking with pleasure, power, poise, and peace.

Bruce Fertman brings sixty years of study as a movement artist and educator to his work, having trained in gymnastics, modern dance, ballet, contact improvisation, the Alexander Technique, tai chi chuan, aikido, chanoyu (Japanese tea ceremony), Argentine tango, and kyudo (Zen archery). For the past thirty years Fertman has taught in Europe, Asia, and the Americas helping people experience the interconnectedness of physical and spiritual life.

In this episode Bruce discusses:

• How walking can be more than exercise
• Walking as a metaphor
• “Sleep walking” your way through life
• How walking can help you increase your awareness of your body
• Developing a new relationship with your body
• Walking and breathing
• Walking for inspiration
• Myths about walking
• Walking for vitality
• Tips on how to walk well
• Walking with “bear” feet
• Walking shoulder to shoulder
• Walking for transformation
• The connection between sitting, standing and walking

Bruce and Michael’s website: Walking Well

________

BECOME YOUR OWN SHAMAN Introductory Online Course: Learn More

Visit Wendy’s website to learn more about the Harmonic Egg® / Ellipse®

“Gifts and Tools to Explore and Celebrate the Unseen Worlds” - The Lucid Path Boutique

Lucid Cafe episodes by topic

Listen to Lucid Cafe on YouTube

Cacao is more than just a drink that many are sharing in their ceremonies; it is a Master Plant Medicine that, although not psychedelic, carries the power to open hearts, facilitate deep inner work, and foster a profound connection with the essence of life. My guest Judy Machado, founder of Goddess Temple Cacao, is following her passion to introduce people to the healing magic of Ceremonial Cacao.

Judy spent a year and half Consulting for a bean-to-bar chocolate company. She became infatuated with the spiritual story and significance of Cacao and whole-heartedly connected to the power of this heart-opening, Consciousness-raising plant medicine.

She worked intimately with a Shipibo-Canibo trained Shaman to deepen her connection with the plant, journeying through many of the ancient and sacred Cacao Dietas to receive teachings and wisdom. She began to experience a deepening relationship to this benevolent Spirit Guide, receiving messages to share with the world.

In this episode, Judy discusses:

• How Cacao is a Master Teacher Plant
• The difference between medicinal and teacher plants
• Creating a Cacao ritual
• How the Cacao Spirit invites a heart-opening journey inward
• The Cacao Dieta ceremony
• Developing a relationship with the Spirit of Cacao
• Transforming beliefs
• How the Spirit of Cacao can help us remember and broaden our perspectives
• Creating the Cacao ritual that’s right for you
• The transformative nature of Cacao
• Free introductory gifts she offers people (links below)
• 5-Day Cacao Drinking Challenge for beginners (link below)
• Cacao retreats

Visit Judy’s website

Free offerings for Lucid Café listeners from Judy:

• FREE Metamorphosis Journey-To-Self Meditation
• 5-Day Cacao Drinking Challenge: Breakup with coffee & Awaken with Cacao
• FREE live training How to Transform Your Passion for Cacao into a Profitable, Impactful Business
• FREE live training Meet your Cacao & Mushroom Spirit Guides through the sacred Master Plant Medicine Dieta

________

More Info/Enroll: BECOME YOUR OWN SHAMAN Introductory Online Course

Visit Wendy’s website to learn more about the Harmonic Egg® Sound and Light Energy Therapy Pod

“Gifts and Tools to Explore and Celebrate the Unseen Worlds” - The Lucid Path Boutique

Lucid Cafe episodes by topic

Listen to Lucid Cafe on YouTube

Are you emotionally potty trained? My guest Rachel Kaplan is a licensed psychotherapist who created an accessible framework for self-care and personal transformation that she calls Emotional Potty Training™ (EPT). In this episode and in her new book Feel, Heal & Let That Sh*t Go, she shares her revolutionary call to action that will teach you precisely how to feel your emotions by moving them through your body as nature intended.

Rachel Kaplan, MA, MFT, is a licensed psychotherapist with a thriving practice in the San Francisco Bay Area. Creator and host of the acclaimed podcast Healing Feeling Sh*t Show, she is active on a variety of social media channels and has published multiple features in Common Ground. Kaplan has studied yoga, meditation, and hands-on healing practices in India and Nepal, earned a master’s degree in counseling psychology from the California Institute of Integral Studies, and trained in cutting-edge trauma modalities such as EMDR. She divides her time between Oakland and Joshua Tree, California.

In this episode, Rachel discusses:

• Her creative perspective regarding processing emotions
• The trend of thinking about your feelings
• The tragic event that heavily influenced her life
• The limits of traditional psychotherapy
• The importance of feeling your feelings
• How she teaches people how to get in touch with their wounds in order to release their pain
• The importance of taking charge of your healing process
• Her spiritual journey
• What being emotionally resilient looks like
• The benefits of allowing yourself to feel all your feelings
• Why people experience stuck-ness
• Reactive and proactive emotional release
• The fear of allowing yourself to feel
• The importance of feeling a sense of agency in your emotional life
• The various ways she works with clients
• Her podcast Healing Feeling Sh*t Show

Rachel’s website

________

BECOME YOUR OWN SHAMAN Introductory Online Course

Visit Wendy’s website to learn more about the Harmonic Egg® energy therapy pod

“Gifts and Tools to Explore and Celebrate the Unseen Worlds” - The Lucid Path Boutique

Lucid Cafe episodes by topic

Listen to Lucid Cafe on YouTube

To kick off Season 7, I asked my friend Linda River Valente if - given the nature of these “interesting” times - she’d be willing to come back on the show and give us a taste of what we can expect in the coming months through the lens of astrology, as well as how to best navigate the challenges that she sees coming.

Linda offers her clients a lifetime of collected, eclectic wisdom through her work as a seasoned astrologer, witch, holistic sexuality educator, tarot visionary, magic maker, and Burlesque producer and performer.

In this episode Linda and Wendy discuss:

• The astrological forecast for the end of 2024 and the first half of 2025
• How we can reframe this time in a more relational, collaborative way
• The significance of the outer planets
• Different ways to interpret the astrology
• Wendy’s 2008 visionary experience
• Pluto’s impact on culture
• What these transitions are inviting us to examine, return to, evolve into
• The experience and qualities of time
• The impact of Mars retrograde (12/6/24-2/23/25)
• Suggestions regarding how to take advantage of this period of time and take care of your nervous system

Learn more about Linda

Want a regular dose of Linda's magic? check out her patreon

________

BECOME YOUR OWN SHAMAN Introductory Online Course

Visit Wendy’s website to learn more about the the Harmonic Egg®

“Gifts and Tools to Explore and Celebrate the Unseen Worlds” - The Lucid Path Boutique

Lucid Cafe episodes by topic

Listen to Lucid Cafe on YouTube

In this episode I speak with the very fun and engaging Samantha Bennett about how to tap into and explore the things that bring you joy in a way that’s reasonable and not at all intimidating. We discuss her latest book The 15-Minute Method: The Surprisingly Simple Art of Getting It Done, which isn’t just about productivity hacks or working more efficiently. Instead, it asks us to adjust our outlook and realize an important truth: we don’t achieve more simply by doing more — we achieve more by doing more of the things that matter.

Sam is a writer, speaker, actor, teacher, and creativity-productivity specialist and author of the bestselling, Get It Done: From Procrastination to Creative Genius in 15 Minutes a Day, which Seth Godin described as “An instant classic, essential reading for anyone who wants to make a ruckus.”

This bestseller was followed by, Start Right Where You Are: How Little Changes Can Make a Big Difference for Overwhelmed Procrastinators, Frustrated Overachievers and Recovering Perfectionists. She is the founder of TheRealSamBennett.com, a company committed to helping overwhelmed creatives and frustrated over-achievers get unstuck, so you can prioritize, focus and move forward on the goals that matter to you.

She is also a wildly popular course instructor on LinkedIn Learning with over a half-million participants and an average of 4.8 stars in a range of courses including, Time Management for Busy People, How to Stop Wasting Time in Meetings, Embracing Times of Uncertainty, and How to Write Emails People Will Actually Read.

In this episode Sam discusses:

• Our unhealthy relationships with time and money
• Value-driven motivations
• Where are you focusing your energy?
• What matters to you and are you prioritizing it?
• The 15-minute a day pledge
• Her idea of incorporating the pledge into the corporate world
• Business before pleasure?
• Zone of genius
• Regret
• Where does confidence come from?
• Discipline
• How to manage when you're experiencing difficult life circumstances

Sam’s website

________

Sign up for Wendy’s newsletter (scroll to the bottom) to find out when the "Become Your Own Shaman" Intro online course will launch

“Gifts and Tools to Explore and Celebrate the Unseen Worlds” - The Lucid Path Boutique

Lucid Cafe episodes by topic

Listen to Lucid Cafe on YouTube

What exactly is a Druid and what do they do? In this episode and in her new book Celtic Druidry: Rituals, Techniques, and Magical Practices, my guest Ellen Evert Hopman unravels some of the mysterious lore surrounding Druidism and shares how our contemporary understanding of this ancient practice is not really complete.

Ellen Evert Hopman is the author of a number of books and has been a teacher of Herbalism since 1983 and of Druidism since 1990. She is a professional member of the American Herbalists Guild and has presented on Druidism, herbal lore, tree lore, Paganism and magic at conferences, festivals, and events in Northern Ireland, Ireland, Scotland, Canada, and in the United States.

In this episode, Ellen discusses:

• What a Druid is and what it’s not
• Her practice as a Celtic Reconstructionist Druid
• Druidism throughout history
• The Druid’s role in ancient society
• The striking similarities between East Indian and Celtic cultures and religious practices
• Celtic ritual and ceremony
• The importance of magic
• Druids and shamanism
• What it means to truly be a Druid
• The Tribe of the Oak Druid training program
• How ancient Druids used restorative justice

Ellen Evert Hopman’s website

The Tribe of the Oak Druid training program

________

Sign up for Wendy’s newsletter (scroll to the bottom)

Visit Wendy’s website to learn more about the the Harmonic Egg® / Ellipse®

“Gifts and Tools to Explore and Celebrate the Unseen Worlds” - The Lucid Path Boutique

Lucid Cafe episodes by topic

Listen to Lucid Cafe on YouTube

Can working with Sacred Geometry help you unlock the secrets to your spiritual evolution? Gail and Gregory Hoag have been studying and working with Sacred Geometry for decades and in this episode highlight what they’ve learned and the tools they’ve created to help your personal evolutionary journey. We also discuss their new book Sacred Geometry: The Universal Language of Divine Alignment.

The Hoags, revered leaders, speakers and teachers, are revealing how the universal patterns displayed in sacred geometry play a foundational role in the evolution of consciousness. There is magic in how they met, in how they brought their individual gifts and wisdom to a marriage that advanced this knowledge into the world. They have dedicated their lives to making Sacred Geometry accessible to all. And to using their knowledge to inspire a more peaceful, harmonic world.

In this episode, Gail and Gregory discuss:

• What Sacred Geometry is
• How Sacred Geometry can expand your sense of self and connection
• Resonance and relationship within the universe
• Consciousness and geometry
• Ways Sacred Geometry can enhance your life
• Sacred Geometric tools
• The Hoags offerings

Gail and Gregory’s website

Access the first chapter of their book

________

Sign up for Wendy’s newsletter (scroll to the bottom)

“Gifts and Tools to Explore and Celebrate the Unseen Worlds” - The Lucid Path Boutique

Lucid Cafe episodes by topic

Listen to Lucid Cafe on YouTube

In 2016 Gail Lynn invented the Harmonic Egg®, a large wooden sacred geometric chamber that uses sound and light therapy with a resonant frequency to move and/or re-route blocked energy. In this episode we discuss the Harmonic Egg® - its design, how it works and the experience, as well as Gail’s book Unlocking the Ancient Secrets to Healing: Why science is looking to the past for the future of medicine.

Gail is a renowned visionary, inventor and pioneer in the realm of frequency healing, celebrated for her ground-breaking creation, the Harmonic Egg®. Since then she went on to also create the Ellipse® and the LiFTTM. These innovative sound and light frequency chambers, designed with the aim of fostering holistic healing and wellness, stands as a testament to Gail’s visionary approach to promoting mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual well-being.

In this episode, Gail discusses:

• How challenges in her life led her to take her power back
• Her journey from energy therapy practitioner to inventor
• The design of the Harmonic Egg® / Ellipse®
• How different musical instruments impact different organs and systems in the body
• The mysterious intelligence of sacred geometry
• The uptick in frequency-based healing modalities
• How Harmonic Egg® / Ellipse® sessions work
• Our culture’s desire for quick fixes
• How sessions can help you better manifest your reality
• The frequency of emotions
• Upcoming documentary

Learn more about Gail and Harmonic Egg® products/locations

________

Visit Wendy’s website to learn more about the Harmonic Egg® / Ellipse®

“Gifts and Tools to Explore and Celebrate the Unseen Worlds” - The Lucid Path Boutique

Lucid Cafe episodes by topic

Listen to Lucid Cafe on YouTube