The Marcella Principle Podcast

In my work as a food and forgiveness mentor, my heart gets cracked open almost daily by women who courageously mine the depths of their pain to discover within it the hidden jewels of dignity and wisdom. My guest on today’s episode, Dr. Rani Thanacoody, is one such woman. After sustaining a terrible loss at just four years old, Rani spent much of her early adult life trying to understand a pain sh...

While Mother’s Day is conventionally wrapped in flowers and brunches, there are many women who spend this high holy day of motherhood in the shadows of a story that’s seldom brought into the open. That is the story of the mothers whose babies never took a breath or opened their eyes to the light of day. Today’s guest is Katy Cook, an alumna of my Women, Food & Forgiveness Academy who suffered a se...

You know what you want to eat… and yet in the moments that matter, you reach for something else. If you’ve ever felt stuck in that gap between knowing and doing, this episode is for you. This is a live EFT tapping session from the 7th anniversary of Tap, Taste, Heal , where I guide you through a simple process to uncover—and begin shifting—the deeper beliefs driving food struggles. ✨ In this epis...

Next week I turn 64. Which means, like all of us, I’m the oldest I’ve ever been. When I recorded the masterclass you’re about to hear, at the spritely age of 62, I thought I had a handle on the terrain of “aging gracefully”: Stay fit. Eat well. Tend to your spiritual life. Nurture your close relationships. And indeed I do feel I’m fulfilling those directives. Even so, something undeniably shifts a...

When perimenopause dawns for women over 40, it can bring a baffling cognitive haze for which most doctors have only one answer: “This is just how it is now.” But is that true? Functional nutritionist Sarah Wayne refused to accept that verdict. Sidelined by severe brain fog in her early forties, she chose to listen more closely to her body rather than resign herself to decline. In today’s episode,...

Now that the wave of New Year’s resolutions is on the wane, let’s talk about what really creates sustainable positive change, one day at a time. According to one of his devotees, the late sage Maharishi Mahesh Yogi reportedly said, “Well begun is half-done.” In today’s Marcella Principle podcast I break down for you why the first hour of your day determines the direction of your entire life and wh...

Today I share with you the opening meditation and teaching from my Winter Virtual Retreat, which took place this past Saturday, December 6. The theme of the retreat was “Let There Be Light,” and in the talk I invite you to slow down and unpack that statement as perhaps the most powerful intention of healing that you can invoke for yourself. Because just as light can’t exist without darkness, so it...

If you are a human walking on this Earth, you have known grief. Maybe grief arrived unbidden after your beloved disappeared … your dream shattered … your body changed … or some part of your identity just … slipped away. In Traditional Chinese Medicine, the dry, descending energy of autumn mirrors the falling leaves and correlates to the lungs, where grief and sorrow often hide as breathlessness, f...

What happens when an ER doc realizes—as many now do—that the system meant to heal us is profoundly broken? In this episode of The Marcella Principle Podcast , I talk with Amy Walsh—an MD turned wild woman and self-proclaimed nettle witch —as she chronicles her heroine’s exodus from the Western medical paradigm to the deeper forests of holistic healing and plant spirit medicine. Amy shares how her...

You stare in the mirror and think, disgusting. You tug at your clothes, avoid the camera, dread the dressing room. You carry a shame so old it feels, in Carl Jung’s words, like the “swampland of your soul.” But what if that deeply personal shame is actually your tender heart of compassion, waiting to be born? In this first episode of a four-part series on body image and feminine power, let the wil...

It’s easy to “love yourself” when, say, your wallet is full, or you’re having a great hair day, or life just generally feels like it’s on your side. But what about when the sorrows of personal and collective trauma feel like more than you can handle? Today in The Marcella Principle I share with you why the life-saving practice of self-love might be the most important choice you can make to find a...

For all the pain that’s proliferated 24/7 these days, there’s a parallel universe of deep somatic healing flourishing right alongside it. Sometimes that medicine arrives in the form of one practice, one moment, or one question that unlocks a door we didn’t even know was closed. And it often comes just as we’re ready to receive it. In this episode of The Marcella Principle podcast I’m joined by Lul...

In this first episode of The Marcella Principle, I explore how you can free yourself from the extremes of acting anger in or acting it out and instead honor the wildfire within by coming into wise relationship with this life-giving energy. It feels fitting that anger is my inaugural topic for this podcast. Because anger, just like this episode, is by its nature rough around the edges. After alliga...

Last fall at my “Becoming Ageless As We Age” retreat, I discovered an unexpected truth: A dozen women, in one powerful moment, confessed that they longed to rekindle their sexuality—whether by igniting passion with their husbands, venturing into solo exploration, or rediscovering intimacy after divorce. If this small gathering was any indication of our collective predicament, then the jury is in:...

In this talk from a winter virtual retreat I led with my Women, Food & Forgiveness Academy community, we explored a timely question: How do we un-conform ourselves to the swirling world of illusory appearances and instead transform ourselves by the renewing of our minds? Who do we seek to become in this aeon of collective degeneration prophesied in Hindu cosmology as the Kali Yuga, the darkest hou...

“Shock has value,” says wise woman Josephine Spilka upon contemplating the outer and inner wreckage that mighty Hurricane Helene visited upon her life. After what she thought was a night of heavy rain, Josephine awoke in the early morning of September 27 to what sounded a freight train ripping through her house. When the stately rooted trees on her property began twirling like parasols through the...

Election tension is running high and is likely to run higher in the coming days. I can’t say this to you strongly enough: Stop squandering your precious life force on people, places, and circumstances you cannot control. Remember: worry is praying for what you don’t want. Instead, turn off the shrieking media … find a quiet spot … put in your earbuds … and let this centuries-old Buddhist meditatio...

If you’re biting your nails and grinding your teeth with election anxiety, step with me out of the madness and into a parallel universe where love comes alive in the specter of death. I initially intended to interview midlife renewal coach Anasuya Basil about the caregiving journey she’d undertaken to support Gary, her ex-partner, through his ordeal with stage 4 cancer. I was curious to hear how A...

Last month I had the privilege of talking with Erin Reese, host of Truth and Consciousness —one of my favorite podcasts here on Substack—about how planetary movements can give us insight and courage when our personal and collective lives feel overwhelming. Erin describes her work as “straddling the worlds using astrology as a portal for guidance and expression in day-to-day living alongside my tru...

After endlessly telling yourself, “someday I’m gonna …,” you finally gain traction in building those atomic self-care habits. Saying farewell to gluten and dairy, your belly feels calmer, your joints feel looser, and your clothes fit more comfortably. Getting out of bed and onto your yoga mat first thing in the morning, you step into your day feeling invigorated. But just as real progress appears...

Anxiety, wrinkles, and stiffness: How can the elemental science of Ayurveda help us heal these symptoms of aging using everyday ingredients from our own kitchen? Today I meander through these questions and more with Ayurveda educator Mary Sheila Gonnella of Occidental Nutrition . Listen as Mary Sheila walks us through simple self-loving practices you can begin immediately to calm your soul and hyd...

Today I continue my soft tiptoe into podcast land with belly-health and body-love expert Allison Post. Allison is author of The Gut Wellness Guide: The Power of Breath, Touch, and Awareness to Reduce Stress, Aid Digestion, and Reclaim Whole-Body Health . In 2019 our mutual publisher, North Atlantic Books, arranged an author conversation between Allison and me to celebrate the publication of my boo...