The Catherine Plano Podcast

EP 459: The Invisible Reason You Can’t Stick to Your Habits with Monica Packer

What if the reason you can’t stick to your habits has nothing to do with willpower, motivation, or discipline? What if the methods you’ve been handed were never designed for the life you’re actually living? For so many of us, habit advice arrives in the same shape: wake at five, follow the routine, repeat daily, never miss. And when it inevitably falls apart, we blame ourselves rather than the model. In this powerful episode, habits and identity coach Monica Packer reveals what’s actually getting in the way: the invisible labour you carry, the perfectionism dressed up as ambition, and the shame voice quietly running the show. THE RECOVERING PERFECTIONIST Monica didn’t arrive at her work through theory. She lived it. At 20, she was the stereotypical overachiever: scholarship kid, full-ride tuition, straight As, every honour society. From the outside, her life looked perfectly assembled. From the inside, she was quietly breaking down through suicidal ideation, multiple eating disorders, panic attacks, and silent nervous breakdowns. Nobody around her knew. “Because I had so long held on to that shame voice inside me,” she shares. A decade later, on the brink of turning 30, she realised she’d spent the previous ten years on the sidelines of her own life, paralysed by the same shame that once drove her achievements. That moment changed everything. WHY HABIT ADVICE WAS NEVER BUILT FOR YOU “A lot of the books and the bestsellers written out there are by men,” Monica points out. “Very few of the examples use women, and very little of the research is done on women.” The issue isn’t that those methods are bad. It’s that they ignore the invisible load so many people carry: the mental gymnastics of running households, anticipating everyone’s needs, remembering everything for everyone. That load steals the time, energy, and headspace required to follow rigid habit prescriptions. Trying to fit your habits into a model designed for someone with none of that weight is, in Monica’s words, like trying to fit a square peg in a round hole. THE THREE SHIFTS THAT CHANGE EVERYTHING Monica’s framework rests on three powerful reframes. Habits are not requirements; they’re supportive. Their only job is to serve you, not to score you. That gives you permission to choose how a habit fits your season, not the other way around. Habits are not routines; they’re small and simple. Most “habits” people set are actually eight habits stacked together. Instead, start with a baseline: the smallest, simplest version of the habit you could do on your worst day. One paragraph of journaling. Five minutes of movement. Baselines build toward the ideal, and sometimes the baseline is all you need. Habits are not rigid; they’re flexible. Redefine consistency as doing your best most of the time over time. Flexibility isn’t the enemy of consistency. It’s what makes consistency possible. MEET SHARON: THE VOICE IN YOUR HEAD For one of Monica’s clients, the inner shame voice had become so loud that they decided to name it. They called her Sharon, a blend of “shame” and “Karen.” The act of naming created separation. Suddenly, there was the client, and there was Sharon, and they were not the same person. “Shame does not lead to sustainable change,” Monica says. “It simply does not work.” Compassion does. The work begins with awareness, then labelling, then learning to speak back to that voice as your wisest, most compassionate self. It feels foreign at first. It changes everything. THE DO SOMETHING LIST Six months before turning 30, Monica wrote a list of 30 things she wanted to do before her birthday. Not a bucket list. Not goals. Just things she’d long wanted to try, with one rule: do them poorly. “I want to do 30 things really poorly,” she remembers. That permission to be mediocre is what cracked her life open. Writing, painting, reading and even the podcast that didn’t make the original list. It all began with one small, badly done thing. ABOUT MONICA PACKER Monica Packer is a writer, podcaster, and certified habits and identity coach. She hosts the top-rated About Progress podcast and has guided thousands of women toward sustainable growth through her progress-over-perfection philosophy. She’s a mum of five, a former middle school teacher, and a sourdough obsessor. KEY TAKEAWAY The reason your habits keep falling apart isn’t a character flaw. It’s a system mismatch. When you stop forcing yourself into rigid prescriptions and start designing habits that flex around your real life, consistency becomes possible. When you name the shame voice instead of obeying it, you reclaim the driver’s seat. And when you give yourself permission to do things poorly, you finally start doing them at all. Watch the full conversation on YouTube [https://youtu.be/r3Vx10PlAww] FIND OUT MORE ABOUT MONICA PACKER Website: aboutprogress.com [https://aboutprogress.com] Follow on Instagram: @aboutprogress [https://instagram.com/aboutprogress] YouTube Channel @aboutprogress [https://www.youtube.com/@aboutprogress]

EP 458: What Your Dreams Are Really Trying to Tell You (The Science Behind It)

Have you ever woken from a vivid dream and thought, what on earth was that about? Maybe you were flying, falling, or running through places you’ve never been that somehow felt strangely familiar. What if those wild dreamscapes aren’t random nonsense at all, but your brain speaking its most honest language? In this Moment of Awe, we step into the mysterious space where neuroscience meets psychology, where the science of sleep collides with the poetry of the soul. While most of us dismiss our dreams the moment we reach for our morning coffee, something far more extraordinary is happening beneath the surface. Your dreams aren’t noise. They’re sacred conversations between your brain, your heart, and your soul. This episode reveals three transformative insights about the science and meaning behind your dreams, and how to start working with them. YOUR BRAIN’S NIGHT SHIFT: THE SCIENCE OF DREAMING When you fall asleep, your brain doesn’t shut down. It lights up. During REM sleep, the stage where most vivid dreams occur, your brain becomes almost as active as when you’re awake. Neural imaging shows surges of activity in areas tied to emotion, memory, and imagination, while logic and self-control take a back seat. That’s why dreams feel so real and so irrational at the same time. Neuroscientists now understand that dreaming serves a powerful purpose: it’s your brain’s way of processing emotions, problem-solving, and storing memories. Think of it as an overnight therapy session, sorting through what you didn’t have time to feel during the day. Your mind is filing emotional data, connecting dots, and sometimes rewriting stories that were too heavy to carry while you were awake. So the next time you wake from a dream that makes no sense, remember: your brain was just doing deep maintenance on your soul. THE FEAR FACTOR: MESSAGES FROM THE SUBCONSCIOUS Freud called dreams the “royal road to the unconscious.” Jung believed they were messages from the deeper self, symbols trying to guide us toward wholeness. In modern psychology, dreams are seen as the bridge between your conscious desires and your unconscious truths. That nightmare where you’re being chased? It’s not about danger. It’s about avoidance. That recurring dream about missing a flight? It’s your mind saying, “You’re afraid of missing out on something bigger.” And those dreams about people from your past? They’re not about them. They’re reflections of the parts of yourself still seeking closure. Dreams are the theatre of the psyche, where unspoken fears and forgotten hopes take the spotlight. The key is not to decode them like riddles, but to feel into them. Ask yourself: what emotion was I carrying in that dream? What part of me was trying to be seen? Because the language of dreams is not logic. It’s symbolism. TURNING NIGHT INTO INSIGHT: WORKING WITH YOUR DREAMS Here’s where the magic meets the practical. You can train yourself to remember and even work with your dreams. Keep a journal by your bed. The moment you wake, write down whatever you can recall, even fragments. Colours, feelings, symbols. Over time, you’ll start to see patterns, emotional fingerprints of your inner world. Before sleep, set an intention: “Show me what I need to understand.” Your subconscious listens. Dream researchers say this simple practice can enhance creativity, emotional regulation, and even decision-making, because you’re learning to dialogue with the deeper parts of yourself. And for the truly adventurous, lucid dreaming allows you to become aware inside the dream. Imagine exploring your own consciousness while you sleep. The truth is, your dream world isn’t separate from your waking life. It’s the same mind, just speaking in symbols instead of sentences. This isn’t just an episode. It’s an invitation to stop dismissing your dreams and start listening to what they’re trying to show you. Your dreams are your mind saying something here needs attention, something here is seeking resolution, something here wants to be understood. When you listen with curiosity, the mystery dissolves, and meaning begins to emerge. The goal isn’t to decode every dream. It’s to honour the conversation. And once you start listening, you’ll never sleep the same way again. You can watch the video of this episode on YouTube [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nzQC3meIeis]. Newsletter: https://catherineplano.com [https://catherineplano.com] for transformation. Instagram: @catherineplano [https://www.instagram.com/catherineplano] for inspiration.

EP 457: A Chiropractor Told Her “Your Body Wants to Be Stuck.” It Changed Everything with Inna Segal

Most of us grow up believing that when something hurts, you go to a professional, they tell you what’s wrong, and you get on with your life. But what happens when the pain keeps coming back? When no practitioner, no pill, and no treatment can make it stick? What if the body isn’t broken at all, but desperately trying to communicate something you haven’t been willing to hear? In this deeply revealing episode, bestselling author and energy medicine pioneer Inna Segal shares how she discovered that every symptom, every tension, and every chronic condition carries an emotional and energetic truth. After 25 years of working with thousands of people around the world, her message is both confronting and liberating: your body has its own language, and learning to read it is the key to transformation that actually lasts. The Chiropractor Who Changed Everything At 20 years old, Inna Segal was seeing health practitioners between three and five times a week. Debilitating back pain, psoriasis covering her skin, chronic anxiety, digestive issues. Nothing was working, and she was approaching every appointment with the same passive mindset: fix me. Then one day, her chiropractor did something unexpected. He stood in front of her and said, “Your body wants to be stuck. Go home. There’s nothing I can do for you.” She was furious. But on the drive home, something shifted. Drawing on her background in linguistics, Inna began asking a question no one had ever posed to her: does the body have its own language? She went home, placed her hands on her back, and for the first time, tried to listen. What followed was a flood of golden light, an unwinding of tension, and a series of visions connecting her physical pain to childhood bullying, family conflict, and intergenerational trauma stretching back to her grandmother’s survival during the war. Within weeks, her psoriasis disappeared completely and never returned. Her back pain dissolved. Her anxiety dropped dramatically. And a gift she never expected began to emerge: the ability to see into other people’s bodies and help them understand what their pain was truly about. Your Body as a Roadmap What makes Inna’s approach so compelling is how logical it is. She breaks the body down by function and asks the simplest of questions. Eyes are for seeing, so what are you refusing to see? The throat is for communication, so what are you not saying? The digestive system processes what comes in, so what experiences in your life are you unable to digest? She explains that the left ear reflects your relationship with yourself and the feminine, while the right connects to achievement and the masculine. The shoulders carry burdens. The hips hold family dynamics. The spine is your deepest foundation. And all of it is already embedded in the language we use every day: “he’s a pain in the neck,” “my heart is broken,” “I carry the weight on my shoulders.” Why Spiritual Bypassing Is Dangerous Inna is refreshingly direct about what she calls the most dangerous trend in the wellness space: spiritual bypassing. She challenges the culture of “love and light” that avoids the real, specific, detailed inner work that lasting transformation demands. As she puts it, band-aids don’t work. No one can do the deep inner work for you. Practitioners can support you, but the journey of truly knowing yourself requires your own willingness to slow down, get curious, and stop skipping steps. Three Golden Nuggets Inna leaves listeners with three practical steps to begin. First, make the decision to befriend your body. Second, start asking it questions and listen for the answers. Third, journal every insight that arises. And above all, work on one issue at a time, because one genuine breakthrough builds the self-belief needed to tackle the next. About Inna Segal Inna Segal is a pioneer in energy medicine and human consciousness, and the bestselling author of The Secret Language of Your Body [https://www.amazon.com.au/Secret-Language-your-Body-Segal/dp/0980286557/], translated into 27 languages with over a million copies sold worldwide. For over 25 years, she has helped thousands of people transform pain into freedom through the wisdom of the body and soul. Watch the full conversation on YouTube [https://youtu.be/rs6E0wfm4eU] Find Out More About Inna Segal Website: innasegal.com [https://www.innasegal.com/] Follow on Instagram: @innasegalauthor [https://www.instagram.com/innasegalauthor/] Follow on Facebook: Inna Segal Author [https://www.facebook.com/InnaSegalAuthor] YouTube: @InnaSegalAuthor [https://www.youtube.com/@InnaSegalauthor/channels]

EP 456: The Emmy Award Winner Who Left It All to Follow Consciousness with Frank Elaridi

What if the career you worked so hard to build, the identity you constructed piece by piece, was never really yours to begin with? What if the version of you that shows up every day, doing the job, earning the title, ticking the boxes, is simply the most convincing role you have ever played? For most of us, the idea of walking away from success feels reckless. We are taught to chase it, protect it, and measure our worth by it. But what happens when success starts to feel like a costume? And what happens when something deeper, quieter, and far more real begins to call you away from it all? That is exactly the question at the heart of this conversation with Frank Elaridi: four-time Emmy Award-winning journalist, former producer at Good Morning America, energy healer, and one of the most quietly radical thinkers you will encounter in this space. The Moment the Career Ended Frank spent 12 years covering the biggest stories in the world. Hurricanes. Mass shootings. The Oscars. Interviews with popes, presidents, kings, and queens. By any measure, it was the career most people spend a lifetime chasing. Then one afternoon in Austin, Texas, he was pulled off a romantic holiday to produce a last-minute interview. Standing in the middle of a frantic, frustrating production, a single thought arrived with complete clarity: This is not my life. It was the last thing he ever did for ABC. What followed was not a crisis. It was, in Frank’s words, simply the next unfolding. His Vedic astrology chart had predicted the transition. Multiple healers across different countries had been telling him for years that he was a healer. A Curandera in Mexico had pointed to his heart and laughed when he insisted he was a journalist. None of it had landed until it was meant to. You Are Not the Body. You Are Not the Mind. Frank’s work as a claircognizant energy healer is built on a single, radical idea that sits beneath everything he teaches. You are not the body. You are not the mind. And the moment you truly understand that, not as a concept but as a lived experience, everything changes. This is not a philosophy to admire from a distance. It is a daily practice of turning attention back to the one who is watching, asking the question that collapses all others: Who is it that is seeking? Frank describes three distinct paths people take toward liberation. The left-hand path moves through darkness and shadow. The right-hand path is the way of love, sainthood, and service. And then there is the direct path: self-inquiry. Not processing trauma layer by layer. Not accumulating spiritual practices. Simply finding out who you are from the source of where all of this arose. Three Practices to Carry With You Today Frank closes the conversation with three grounded, accessible practices drawn directly from his teaching: 1. The A Course in Miracles Affirmation. Anytime you feel wronged, dismissed, or hurt today, try this: It is not this I would look upon. I trust my brothers who are one with me. This is forgiveness at its deepest level. Not grace. Not tolerance. Complete detachment from the idea that anything real was ever done to you. 2. The Self-Love Body Practice. Place your left hand palm-up in your lap. Move your right hand to your heart and say: My heart, I love you. Then your eyes. Then your head. Repeat the cycle. Frank shares that people in his community regularly begin to cry during this practice. Consciousness, he says, is self-love. This is how you worship that. 3. The Pre-Sleep Self-Inquiry. Before you fall asleep tonight, ask yourself: Who was I before birth? Who will I be a hundred years from now? Meditate on death as though sleep itself were dying. Little by little, the grip of fear and false identity begins to loosen. Frank Elaridi is the co-author of the Modern Nirvana Oracle Deck, published by Chronicle Books, a TEDx speaker, and the founder of Awaken The Healer Within, his online course and community helping holistic practitioners build thriving healing businesses. You can watch the video of the full conversation on YouTube [https://youtu.be/S7gu_bqXlcA] Find Out More About Frank Elaridi Work with Frank one-on-one: frankelaridi.com/energy-healing [https://frankelaridi.com/energy-healing/] Join Awaken The Healer Within on Skool: skool.com/awakenedhealers [https://www.skool.com/awakenedhealers/about] YouTube: youtube.com/frankelaridi [https://www.youtube.com/frankelaridi] Instagram: @felaridi [https://www.instagram.com/felaridi/?hl=en]

EP 455: Your Mood Isn’t Random: How Colour Quietly Shapes Your Emotions, Decisions and Happiness

Have you ever walked into a room and instantly felt calmer, more energised, or strangely unsettled, without being able to explain why? What if the colours surrounding you right now aren’t just decoration, but a silent language speaking directly to your nervous system, shaping how you feel, what you choose, and even how you behave? In this eye-opening episode, we decode the hidden world of colour psychology and reveal something most people never consider: colour isn’t just something you see. It’s something you feel. While we spend hours choosing what to wear, what to paint our walls, and what brands to trust, we rarely stop to ask why certain shades pull us in and others push us away. The answer lies in your brain, and once you understand it, you’ll never look at colour the same way again. This episode reveals four transformative insights about how colour quietly architects your emotional world and how to use that knowledge to your advantage. The Hidden Language of Hues: Every colour you encounter is whispering directly to your nervous system. Neuroscience shows that when light hits your eyes, it sends signals straight to the hypothalamus, the part of your brain that governs emotion, energy, and even hormones. Bright yellows and oranges activate dopamine and serotonin, your brain’s happiness chemicals. Soft blues and greens lower cortisol, helping you relax and focus. That calm you feel in your doctor’s waiting room? That’s blue doing its job. The hunger that hits you in a fast-food restaurant? That’s red and yellow working in tandem. Your environment is constantly priming your mood, and colour is the quiet architect of your entire emotional landscape. The question is: are you choosing your palette, or is it choosing you? Red, the Power and the Passion: Red is primal. It’s the colour of fire, blood, and survival, and it grabs your focus faster than any other hue. That’s why it dominates stop signs, sale banners, and even lipstick. It signals energy, urgency, and desire. In marketing, red is known to increase heart rate and stimulate action. Think of fast-food logos with their bold reds paired with yellow, designed to make you hungry and decisive. But red isn’t just a tool for advertisers. In your personal world, it can be a powerful ally when used intentionally. A touch of red in your workspace can fuel motivation. Red in your wardrobe can help you exude confidence and passion. The key is remembering that red is powerful, and a little goes a long way. Blue and Green, Calm, Trust, and Growth: If red is fire, blue is water. Blue evokes trust, stability, and calm, which is exactly why it dominates the corporate world. From tech companies to healthcare brands, blue says “you can trust me.” It slows the heart rate, clears the mind, and invites focus. Then there’s green, the colour of life itself. It represents balance, renewal, and growth. Studies show that even brief exposure to green, like plants or nature scenes, can lower stress and enhance creativity. If you want peace in your bedroom, think ocean. If you want productivity in your office, think forest. These aren’t just aesthetic choices. They’re neurological ones. The Surprising Influence on Your Decisions: Colour doesn’t just influence how you feel. It shapes what you choose. Marketers have known this for decades. The colour of a “Buy Now” button can increase clicks by 30%. Restaurants use warm tones to make you order faster, while luxury brands use black, gold, and deep navy to evoke sophistication and control. Even social media platforms deploy colour psychology, with blue encouraging trust and engagement, red grabbing attention, and green signalling success. But here’s the empowering part: you can use this same psychology consciously. Want to feel confident during a presentation? Wear navy or emerald. Need focus while studying? Surround yourself with cool tones that calm the nervous system. When you understand colour, you stop being influenced by it unconsciously and start using it to design your emotional reality. This isn’t just an episode about colour. It’s an invitation to stop reacting to your environment and start creating it. What if your mood wasn’t random? What if the colours in your life were shaping your energy, your focus, and your happiness every single day? Science tells us they are. And the beauty is that you can choose your palette. Start small. Add a plant to your desk. Paint one wall a colour that lifts your mood. Wear a shade that makes you feel unstoppable. Then notice what shifts. Because every hue has a heartbeat, and once you start listening, your world begins to change from the inside out. You can watch the video of this episode on YouTube [https://youtu.be/godexPmTpeE]. Newsletter: https://catherineplano.com [https://catherineplano.com] for transformation. Instagram: @catherineplano [https://www.instagram.com/catherineplano] for inspiration.