Grief 2 Growth

Today's offering is on the 22nd birthday of my daughter Shayna who passed away in 2015. This is the seventh birthday without Shayna here with us.  The birthdays of someone who has passed are bittersweet. Birthdays are not only a time to celebrate someone coming into our lives, we celebrate the fact they have made another trip around the sun. The birthday of someone who has passed from this re...

This mindful Monday moment was inspired by a comment on Penny Wittbrodt's NDE. A viewer wrote that she was tracking right along with Penny until Penny said we choose to have tragedies in our lives. This makes no sense. Why would anyone choose to be less than 100% happy all the time, if given the choice? Natalie Sudman's NDE has also prompted a lot of discussion about Natalie choosing to...

In this short episode, I share tips for content creators and content consumers. So much content is available for free. But, it takes time and effort to create it. What do content consumers owe to content creators? How can content creators make it easy for consumers to support them? In this episode, I give simple tips for both and it doesn't always involve an exchange of money. You've bee...

I spoke with Crystal about life after the suicide of her sister Gina, in 2019. Crystal was raised Mormon and the suicide of her sister tested her faith and caused her to wrestle with guilt. It ultimately led to Crystal forming two businesses to help others deal with these same things. Crystal Partney is an author, speaker, suicide grief coach, and founder of Scattering Hope and Owl & Thistle....

Not everyone has a Lifetime Television biopic starring Heather Locklear. But, my guest for this episode does. Kristine Carlson is a New York Times bestselling author and renowned speaker recognized worldwide for the global success of The Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff book series she co-authored with her late husband Dr. Richard Carlson. Her latest book, Heartbroken Open, a life-changing memoir, has...

As the parent of a child who survived the passing of her sister, I know one of the biggest concerns, when a child dies early, is, "How do I help my other child?" Michele Benyo is a mom of two, a Certified Grief Recovery Specialist®, an early childhood parent coach, and the founder of Good Grief Parenting. After her 6-year-old son died of cancer, her 3-year-old daughter said, “Mommy, half...

You are going to love this guy! I enjoyed this frank conversation with Jerry about what it is to be a man, the ultimate nature of reality, the role of drugs in spiritual development, and much more.  Jerry is a self-described:  MENTOR, BESTSELLING AUTHOR, FILMMAKER, PODCASTER, PSYCHEDELIC INTEGRATOR, DENIM FREAK, COFFEE FIEND, and PROVOCATEUR. Jerry is the author of: BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF BLADESVIL...

Shelley F. Knight is a positive changes expert who can help you through her written and spoken words. Shelley has been intuitive for her entire life and comes from a family that encouraged her spirituality. She has worked as a nurse for decades and uses that experience along with her intuition to help others make positive changes, even around the subject of grief and death. Shelley passionately sh...

In Part 3 of our conversation, I ask Alba questions to fill in some of the details of her experience. We learn what the accident is that caused Aurelia's passing. We learn more details about her dreams that predicted the event. And, we learn where Alba is today, after having had the experience.  Alba Monn is an author and a mother who had a fascinating experience with the birth of one of her...

In Part 2 of our conversation, Alba continues the story of her experience with Aurelia. Alba Monn is an author and a mother who had a fascinating experience with the birth of one of her children, Aurelia. Alba had a near-death experience that changed her life. It was, in actuality, a shared death experience, as you will learn when you hear her story. I’ve broken this very special episode into thre...

Alba Monn is a mother who had a fascinating experience with the birth of one of her children, Orelia. Alba had a near-death experience that changed her life. It was, in actuality, a shared death experience, as you will learn when you hear her story. This is one of the most profound NDEs I have heard. I’ve broken this very special episode into three parts. In parts 1 and 2, I get out of the way and...

Adam has dedicated himself to a lifetime of service, prompted by the early passing of his toddler sister when Adam himself was a young boy. Today, Adam Rabinovitch is Executive Director of COPE - a nonprofit grief and healing organization dedicated to helping parents and families living with the loss of a child. I have worked with COPE to provide support to grieving families. They are a valuable r...

Sandra Champlain is the host of We Don't Die, a popular podcast; the author of We Don't Die, a bestselling book; and the single biggest reason I started podcasting. Sandra was a lifelong skeptic about the afterlife. But, she also feared death. Her investigative and skeptical mind led her to delve deeply into afterlife studies to know for herself what is true and what is not. Sandra not o...

In this scintillating conversation, Dr. Kovacs and I discuss the nature of consciousness and who we are as human beings. We talk about the deep truths behind ancient myths. Dr. Kovacs has been exploring the nature of consciousness her whole life. This was greatly accelerated when, within a three-year period, her mother, her son, and then her husband were killed in three separate automobile acciden...

I am happy and hopeful to share this special episode with you. All of my episodes are special. But, in this one, I discuss a particular type of pain that some of us suffered at the hands of toxic theology. I hope it helps someone who listens. If you know someone it could help, please share. In this episode, Dr. Purcell and I discuss how similar our childhoods were due to the teaching that God made...

Barby Ingle is a best-selling author, reality personality, and lives with multiple rare and chronic diseases; reflex sympathetic dystrophy(RSD), migralepsy, PALB2-var, endometriosis, and other pain disorders. Barby is a chronic pain educator, patient advocate, and president of the International Pain Foundation. She is also a motivational speaker and best-selling author on pain topics. Barby knows...

Leslie Lindsey Davis is the author of the book "You Can't Eat Love" where she shares the lessons she learned on a journey to learn to love herself. Part of the work was finally dealing with the ungrieved loss of her mother decades before. Leslie learned how to name and honor the emotions that she had kept shoving down. It was not until she began to confront the emotions, especially...

Reid Peterson is the Creator of Grief Refuge, a mobile app that is a daily companion to people in grief. Reid has years of experience working with grief and creating online learning. He has combined the two into a unique app for your smartphone. Reid's biological father died in 2006 and his stepfather died in 2016. After losing both father figures in his life, he sought support through commun...

Frances Key is the scribe of a four-book series called The Team: A Mother's Wisdom from the Other Side. She began writing the books 19 days after her mother died when she sensed her mother communicating important spiritual insights to her. She considers the true authors of the books to be her mother, Teddy Key, and the spiritual team she rejoined after she died. If you've listened to me...

This is Dr. Valla's second appearance on Grief 2 Growth. In May 2020, Dr. Valla and I spoke about healing our inner child within. In this episode, we focus on difficult life situations. Are they planned? If so, why would we do that?! The topic of this episode was inspired by the origin of Dr. Valla's work, which is working with disabled children. Why would a person choose to have a disab...

Some people believe Near-Death Experiences are hallucinations, hoaxes, or even tricks of the Devil. But, Near Death Experiences line up with what the Bible tells us awaits us and who we truly are. Near-Death Experiences are evidence of the Bible's veracity. Pastor John Burke is an author and the founding pastor of Gateway Church in Austin Texas. He's written six books including "No...

Krista St-Germain is a Master Certified Life Coach, grief expert, widow, mom, and host of The Widowed Mom Podcast. When her husband was killed by a drunk driver in 2016, Krista’s life was completely and unexpectedly flipped upside down. After therapy helped her unfurl from the fetal position, Krista discovered Life Coaching, Post Traumatic Growth and learned the tools she needed to move forward an...

Bridget Finklaire is an author and spiritual teacher. We had a wide-ranging discussion as she has a wealth of knowledge to share that comes from years of experience. She's a wealth of knowledge. I started with six pages of notes and we only got to about half of what I wanted to talk to her about in our hour together. Bridget is originally from the UK and lived in London for many years before...

Anthony Chene attended business school and began a career in finance before realizing that was not his life’s passion. After graduating in media journalism and audiovisual production, Anthony worked as a video reporter within companies, media agencies, and TV channels.  Now, Anthony works as a freelancer (DOP, director, or video reporter) for various clients, and develops his own projects (documen...

Dr. Lozano reached out to me to tell me about her work with using hypnosis for past life and life between life regressions. It's something I've always been curious about. So, we agreed that I would give it a try before having her on the program. Vondie is a Life Between Lives hypnotherapist. She’s also a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist and former Psychology Professor who’s been fe...