Desire As Medicine Podcast

Want a new year with resolutions that doesn’t fall apart by February? Go straight to sustainable change by making peace with right now so your goals have solid ground. Instead of forcing quick wins that fade, we explore how acceptance turns desire into a steady practice. True growth feels like a spiral, where you revisit old patterns with new wisdom, not the same you. Together we unpack the differ...

The moments that change our lives rarely shout; they whisper through breath, pulse, tightness, and ease. We designed this guided mini toolbox to help you hear those whispers and turn them into choices you trust. Across a calm, grounded practice, we slow down your nervous system, contrast the felt sense of yes versus no, and translate sensation into a clean, honest response you can act on today. Th...

Ever feel that automatic yes come out of your mouth, before you've really had the chance to think about it? We’ve been there, and we built a simple, reliable toolkit to help you answer with clarity instead of obligation or auto-response. We walk through five practical tools you can use today. The pause that interrupts people-pleasing, a body check that reads expansion or contraction, a desire...

Ever notice how fast “YES” leaves your mouth while your body whispers No!?  We go deep into the real mechanics of yes and no. Some reasons why we say them. How they land in the body, and what it costs when we ignore the truth to keep the peace. From the short-term comfort of people-pleasing to the slow creep of resentment and burnout, we map the terrain so you can feel the difference between a cle...

The calendar fills. Group chats buzz. The season starts to feel like a performance instead of a celebration. In this episode, we pause to name what drains our joy this time of year: Obligation. We explore how obligation shows up as invisible labor, full of emotional management, and conditioned yes responses. A tight chest. Shallow breath. Subtle self abandonment. We talk about how resentment build...

What if rest wasn’t a prize you earn after burning out, but the source of your creativity, clarity and kindness? We pull apart the tangled beliefs that keep us sprinting from the fear of losing momentum, the scarcity around time, and the nagging worry that energy might never return and offer a grounded way to choose rest before the crash. Together, we map the difference between sick rest and resto...

What if you stopped waiting for an invitation and started treating life like it matters today?  Catherine and Brenda explore the power of ritual, the medicine of desire, and the steady courage it takes to create meaning in your own life.  From the circle of the Grand Ole Opry to a candlelit bill paying session at a kitchen table, they look at how a small shift in attention changes everything. They...

The holidays can really speed up your life. Catherine and Brenda invite listeners to treat Thanksgiving as a time for gratitude. They explore gratitude as a perception practice. They bring in the Chinese parable of maybe, maybe not and the mantra if I am not winning, I am learning to show how progress grows through honest reflection. They examine the fine line between positivity and bypass. They f...

A tour through GraceLand in Nashville was created to be a fun excursion. But became something much bigger: a clear view of how much has changed; and how much we take for granted when it comes to voice, rights, and real creative freedom.  Standing where Elvis needed producers, radio slots, and physical pressings to be heard, we realized we can open a laptop, hit record, and publish without permissi...

Ever feel like your calendar runs your life and your heart gets whatever scraps are left? This week, we dig into what it truly takes to stay connected to yourself while navigating love, work, and the relentless pull of everyday demands. From body-based practices to smart scheduling, we map out how to reclaim attention, set honest boundaries, and make choices you can stand behind. We start with the...

Catherine & Brenda guide a Body Scan that turns stress into clear signals and shows how somatic awareness supports desire-led choices. Breathwork, curiosity, and small resourcing moves help you feel safer, softer, and more honest with yourself. Episode Highlights: • why a five-minute body scan builds self-trust • naming sensations to separate signals from stories • lengthening breath to calm t...

When the mind gets loud and the body goes into alert, thinking harder does not calm anything. Brenda and Catherine guide listeners to slow down. They introduce a gentle body scan practice to shift awareness into regulation. One breath. One sensation. One small shift. These small shifts build trust in the body’s signals. They share how to use a body scan daily. Before checking a bank balance, durin...

Ever feel like your desire tank is running on empty? After a season of deep conversations, Brenda and Catherine shift gears to explore the often-overlooked wisdom of coasting. Growth is not meant to be nonstop. Just as nature moves through seasons, desire ebbs and flows. Sometimes the healthiest choice is to step back, pause the practices, and let yourself float for a while. In this conversation,...

What happens when two desire coaches pause to reflect on their own relationship with desire? After three years and 111 episodes of the Desire as Medicine podcast, Brenda and Catherine open up about where desire feels alive, where it feels challenging, and how their relationship with it has evolved. Brenda shares about her journey of building physical strength at 57 through pole dancing, inspired b...

Have you ever noticed how easily we focus on the difficult patterns inherited from our families while overlooking the beautiful gifts passed down through generations? In this heartfelt mini-episode, Brenda and Catherine expand the conversation about lineage beyond trauma to celebrate the treasures our ancestors have given us. Brenda shares the story of her family’s chicken soup recipe, passed from...

The threads of ancestry shape daily life in both subtle and profound ways. From stress responses to emotional habits to worldview, Catherine and Brenda reflect on how they are living expressions of those who came before them. In this episode, they explore the Indigenous wisdom concept of Seven Generations Forward and Back, which teaches that present choices affect seven generations ahead while als...

Personal transformation does not fit neatly into a 90-day program. In this conversation, Catherine and Brenda explore why meaningful growth often takes years or decades, and why that timeline is both natural and necessary. They reflect on what sustains the process when change feels slow: forgiving who we were, showing compassion for how long it takes, and facing reality without judgment. Many of t...

The space between knowing something and embodying it is where transformation happens. In this conversation, Catherine and Brenda explore what it takes to move from intellectual understanding to living change as second nature. Catherine shares her 20-year journey of opening her heart and building healthy boundaries. What began as a desire for deeper relationships required years of therapy, confront...

The gap between knowing and doing is often the hardest part of personal growth. In this episode, Brenda and Catherine explore what embodiment truly means and how to bridge the distance between intellectual understanding and lived experience. What happens when advice like "love yourself more" feels impossible? Why do we scroll until 1 AM even though we know better? Through personal storie...

When health challenges arise, whether caring for an aging parent, supporting a partner, or facing personal illness—desire often shifts in profound ways. Priorities change almost overnight, reshaping how we experience and relate to desire itself. In this episode, Brenda and Catherine share personal stories and reflections on caregiving, illness, and the transformation of desire during these seasons...

Responsibility might seem like the buzzkill of desire, but what if it’s actually the key to deep fulfillment? Brenda and Catherine challenge the fantasy that our wants should simply appear without effort. Instead, they explore how taking ownership of our desires creates the fertile ground for them to flourish—both within ourselves and in our relationships. They discuss the natural seasons of desir...

What happens to our sex lives when we actively practice desire? Everything changes. When we approach desire as a spiritual practice, our relationship with sex shifts from reactive and conditional to conscious and self-responsible. Brenda and Catherine explore how this transformation unfolds, moving beyond old patterns, like withholding sex during conflicts or expecting partners to manage our arous...

Have you ever found yourself in that strange, disorienting space where you used to feel your desires clearly, but now, all you hear is silence? In this episode, Brenda and Catherine explore what happens when desire goes quiet. After spending so much time learning to follow the whispers of longing, what do you do when those whispers disappear? Rather than rushing to fix it, they invite you to pause...

Have you ever caught yourself mindlessly eating chocolate or clicking “next episode” on Netflix into the early hours, even when you’re no longer enjoying it? Brenda and Catherine talk about the “hungry ghost” state: a craving that seems bottomless, never fully satisfied. In this episode, they explore the Buddhist concept of the hungry ghost (Preta in Sanskrit), beings with enormous bellies and tin...

What if desire shows up before we even have the words for it? In this episode, we explore how desire first emerges - not as a clear thought, but as a whisper, a spark, a sensation in the body. Long before we can name it, it’s already speaking to us. We share personal stories (including Brenda’s not-actually-about-the-beach vacation dilemma) to show how subtle desires, when ignored, often morph int...