Shells and Shadows

The Body Remembers — Until You Teach It Otherwise (with Tricia Sexton)

In this episode of Shells & Shadows, Yehuda sits down with Tricia Sexton — breathwork facilitator and founder of Rooted Journey Retreats.Tricia shares what it was like growing up inside bullying that escalated into sexual assault, rumor, and shame — and how that kind of betrayal can live in the body for decades, showing up as distrust, low self-worth, and painful patterns in relationships.What changed her life wasn’t a single breakthrough — it was leaving. A study abroad in Ireland became years of living abroad in places like Tanzania, Thailand, Nepal, Guatemala, and Costa Rica — and through that travel, she found a different kind of confidence, resilience, and self-trust.Today she brings those lessons into her work: holotropic-style breathwork, integration, and adventure-based retreats designed to regulate the nervous system under real conditions — not just in theory.In this conversation:• The long tail of shame, distrust, and low self-worth• EMDR and reclaiming the “higher self” as your real self• Travel, reverse culture shock, and why integration is the whole point• Breathwork umbrellas: pranayama vs holotropic, circular breathing, breath holds• A practical daily tool: longer exhales + nose breathingConnect with Tricia:Instagram: @breathe_withtriciaWebsite: rootedjourneyretreats.com [rootedjourneyretreats.com]If this conversation sparked something in you and you’re ready to go deeper, work with Yehuda.Visit https://shellsandshadows.com/ [https://shellsandshadows.com/ ]to book a free guided breathwork + cold plunge session — a lived initiation into the work of meeting your body, your shadow, and your spark.

Come As You Are: Building the Space I Never Had (with Ashley Rupe)

In this episode of Shells & Shadows, Yehuda sits down with Ashley Rupe in the new Salt Lake City studio for a conversation about loneliness, survival, and building the support system you never had. Ashley shares why she started a local healing collective — a non-clinical space rooted in breathwork, nervous system regulation, and real human connection. Not a place to be diagnosed. A place to show up exactly as you are. After hosting her first in-person event, one thing stood out: Every single person said they were lonely. She talks about growing up as the oldest sibling between two completely different households — one strict and religious, the other unstable and shaped by addiction. She didn’t graduate high school. She learned adulthood by watching and adapting because there were no clear answers when she asked for help. Emotions weren’t talked about. Support wasn’t consistent. And even in a large family, she often felt alone. She reflects on what it means to reach out and not be met — and how choosing your mental health can sometimes mean creating distance from people you wish could show up differently. After maintaining stability for six years, she recently made the decision to check herself into inpatient care voluntarily. Not because someone forced her. Because she recognized she needed support before things escalated. She speaks candidly about that choice — and why asking for help isn’t weakness. In this episode, you’ll hear: - Why Ashley created “Come As You Are” and what people are actually hungry for - The difference between being alone and being lonely - Growing up without emotional safety — and figuring life out in real time - Boundaries, family rupture, and why unconditional love doesn’t mean unconditional tolerance - Coping skills, breathwork, and nervous system regulation - Parenting with emotional awareness and natural consequences - The line she leaves listeners with: “You can do hard things. You’ve done it before. What’s one more?” If this conversation moved something in you, share it with someone who needs to hear it. And if you’re ready to go deeper, work with Yehuda. Visit https://shellsandshadows.com/ [https://shellsandshadows.com/ ]to book a free guided breathwork + cold plunge session. Change one life. Start with your own. Connect with Ashley:Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/sunflowerbabbbe?igsh=MXdwN2cycjhzYm94cw==]Tiktok [https://www.tiktok.com/@sunflowerbabbbbe]Podcast [https://open.spotify.com/show/4beswL6mkFbr039wwQf7ts?si=9ece11c0951e4c1c]

Time at the Edge: The Man Who Had to Die to Truly Live (with James Miragliotta)

In this episode of Shells & Shadows, Yehuda sits down with James Miragliotta, author of Time at the Edge — a former attorney and entrepreneur whose life changed after a near-fatal stabbing and near-death experience.James built a high-achieving life: a growing law practice, public office, business ventures, and international work. But a series of losses — including the death of his father, his wife’s cancer, and the kidnapping and murder of a business partner — forced him to rethink everything.Years later, while caring for his second wife during a long struggle with paranoid schizophrenia, James woke up one night to a 16-inch chef’s knife plunged into his torso. After calling 911 and being airlifted to a trauma center, he bled out on arrival and was revived, spending days in a coma and undergoing multiple emergency surgeries. Doctors told his family he would likely never walk or function normally again — but within weeks he was out of the hospital in what they described as a medical miracle.Coming back changed the way he lives day to day. He talks about losing the constant pressure to prove himself, letting go of the need to control everything, and learning to pay attention to the people and opportunities that were always around him but easy to miss before.James reflects on the near-death experience that became Time at the Edge, describing a state where he felt connected to everything around him — beyond language or physical senses — and how returning from that experience reshaped his understanding of success, relationships, and being alive.In this episode:• Building a life around achievement — from law and public office to international business • The losses that forced him to confront mortality and change direction • Spending 12 years caring for a spouse with severe schizophrenia • The night he was stabbed, the emergency flight, and the narrow moments that saved his life • His near-death experience and the perspective he returned with • Letting go of ego, control, and constant striving • Grace, presence, and redefining what success really meansIf this conversation sparked something in you and you’re ready to go deeper, work with Yehuda.Visit https://shellsandshadows.com/ [https://shellsandshadows.com/] to book a free guided breathwork + cold plunge session — a lived initiation into the work of meeting your body, your shadow, and your spark.Change one life. Start with your own.Connect with James: Coaching: https://mentorecoaching.com/ [https://mentorecoaching.com/]Website: https://KaizenMasteryGroup.com/ Read James' Book, "Time at the Edge": https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0F22XVXF1 [https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0F22XVXF1]

The Search for Meaning in the Modern Youth Treatment Industry: A Dialogue with My Former Therapist

What happens when your life is decided for you? In this deeply personal episode of Shells & Shadows, Yehuda sits down with Phil Wintch—one of the therapists from the residential treatment center where Yehuda was sent at sixteen. What unfolds is not a takedown of the youth treatment industry, nor a blind defense of it—but an honest reckoning with the light and the shadow that live inside transformative experiences. Together, they explore what it means to be forced into change… and what it takes to choose it. They discuss the reality that youth treatment can be both healing and harmful. That programs can create brotherhood, resilience, and life-altering growth—and still contain dysfunction, power imbalances, and painful mistakes. Both can be true. And maturity requires holding both. AT THE HEART OF THE CONVERSATION IS A DEEPER QUESTION: How do you help someone who doesn’t want to be helped? Or perhaps more honestly— How do you help someone who doesn’t believe they deserve a better life? Yehuda shares the grief of leaving his old life behind, the anger and bargaining that came with it, and the moment he glimpsed a vision of something more. Phil reflects on two decades working in youth treatment—what works, what fails, and the heartbreaking pattern of young men who refuse inspiration when it’s offered. They dive into: • The hero’s journey as a lens for understanding treatment and transformation• Why some young people rise—and others remain bitter• The importance of checking your motive as a parent before making life-altering decisions• The reality of flawed programs—and the danger of reducing an entire industry to its worst examples• Reactive attachment, trauma, and the belief: “I don’t deserve better.”• Viktor Frankl’s idea of the last human freedom—the ability to choose one’s attitude in any circumstance• Why “deserve” may be the wrong question—and how divine worth reframes everything THIS EPISODE IS ESPECIALLY FOR: • Parents facing impossible decisions• Young men wrestling with resentment, identity, or direction• Anyone who has been forced into an unwanted season of growth• Those who are trying to make meaning out of suffering If you’ve ever had your life disrupted—by circumstance, by family, by God, or by your own decisions—this conversation asks: Will you refuse the call? Or will you answer it? Because whether we choose it or not, the adventure eventually chooses us. And even when everything else is stripped away, one freedom remains: The freedom to decide who you will become. If you’re a parent weighing a heavy decision, or someone still carrying the weight of your own treatment journey, please share this. It was recorded for the one person who needs to know they aren't alone in the shadow. If this conversation sparked something in you and you’re ready to go deeper, work with Yehuda. Visit https://shellsandshadows.com/ [https://shellsandshadows.com/] to book a free guided breathwork + cold plunge session — a lived initiation into the work of meeting your body, your shadow, and your spark.

What 30 Strangers' Shadows Taught One Man About His Own – Light Stone & Yehuda HaLevi

Yehuda HaLevi, host of Shells and Shadows, joins Light Stone on The Stone Protocol after recording 30 episodes in 14 days in Salt Lake City — more than his entire first year of podcasting combined. Shells and Shadows is a podcast about people who have turned their darkest experiences into their greatest gifts. After two weeks of holding space for strangers' stories of addiction, homelessness, sexual abuse, suicide and homicide, Yehuda found the same thread running through every single one of them. The darkness was never the end. It was the seed. The fruit was always coming. In this conversation, Light draws out what really happened out there — and the two go deep on healing, boundaries, shadow work, spirituality, and what it means to be a human being connected to something much larger than yourself. In this conversation, Light uncovers what really happened out there. They get into: • Recording 30 episodes in 14 days — what that kind of immersion does to you as a host and as a healer • Guiding a complete stranger through IFS parts work live on air, watching her find peace in real time, and what it felt like to successfully hold that space • The moment a guest exploited an open-hearted vulnerable moment on mic — and the hard lesson about energetic boundaries that followed • Reuniting with a therapist from Yehuda's time in a residential treatment center and wrestling with the hardest question in healing: how do you help someone who doesn't believe they deserve to feel better? • Yehuda opens up about his own history — self-harm, over-medication, isolation in Israel, and what it felt like to see the light in the world and still feel completely unable to reach it • The ecstatic dance experience in Salt Lake that forced him to stop running from his shadow — and what happened when he finally turned around and danced with it • The common thread found across every single story: darkness as seed, light as fruit • Light on the warrior archetype, the “Swiss Army knife heart,” and why real love sometimes needs sharp edges • A genuine theological conversation about God, oneness, and what it means to be a fingernail connected to the heart of the divine • Guardian Ethics, conflict resolution with kids in the room, and the simple protocol that changes everything • Why saying yes to the stranger might be the most spiritually significant thing you can do The darkness is the door. But this episode is about what's on the other side. If this conversation moved something in you, don’t just let it pass. Share it with one person who needs to hear it — because changing one life changes the world. 🔗 Connect with Yehuda Halevi Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/shelllsandshadows/ Website: https://www.shellsandshadows.com/ Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2rcl5H8JgFAw9KGLur4Fi2?si=76fec2aa5d224b83 Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLL-FNTzHktjanfr4aFvbgq3KqqBs98-dL Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/shells-and-shadows/id1791640834 🔗 Connect with Light Stone Coaching: https://stoneprotocol.com/ IG: https://www.instagram.com/lightstone.media YouTube: https://youtube.com/@lightstonemedia TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lightstone.media Guest/referrals: DM “STONE” to @LightStone.Media Affiliate Links Peak Peptides: https://peak.you/r/light The One Device: https://theonedevice.com/lightstone Ion Layer: https://ionlayer.com/LIGHT Bison Tallow Protein Bar: https://geneseenutrition.com/home?am_id=light Mode Method, HRV+: https://modemethod.com/?rfsn=8991468.416e977 Astralis Blue Lotus: DM me for details Premium Mushroom Blend: DM me for details