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You can feel “fine” on the outside and still be white-knuckling your way through life. That’s the quiet tension Elena Box is unpacking as Ode to Joy shifts into a new season on the art of letting go, a practice she also calls “practicing death while fully alive.”

We talk about why resilience isn’t only about staying strong. Sometimes strength is releasing what was never yours to control in the first place. From Elena’s work as a shamanic practitioner and death doula, a pattern keeps repeating: the things we struggle to let go of at the end of life are often the same things we cling to every day in relationships, motherhood, identity, and the stories we tell about who we’re supposed to be. That’s where the real work begins, not with willpower, but with honesty.

Then we get practical. Control isn’t the problem, it’s the strategy. So what are you protecting yourself from feeling? Elena names the emotional roots beneath avoidance grief, uncertainty, powerlessness, rejection, shame, loneliness and not being chosen and shares a vulnerable story about returning to acting through a community theater audition. The twist is the takeaway: the goal isn’t to be chosen, it’s to choose joy. You’ll also learn a simple 30-second nervous system friendly practice to help you pause, name what you feel, and stay with it long enough for your life to open back up.

If this resonates, subscribe, share the episode with a friend who’s been holding it all together, and leave a review so more people can find the show. What feeling are you most resistant to experiencing right now?

• You are not avoiding your life—you are avoiding a feeling within it
• Control is not your problem—it is your protection
• The way you practice feeling now is the way you will meet life later

• What feeling am I most resistant to experiencing right now?
• When that feeling starts to arise, what do I do instead?
• What am I afraid would happen if I fully felt it?
• Where in my body do I notice this feeling?
• What would it look like to stay with it for just 30 seconds longer?

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You can be disciplined, capable, and doing “all the right things” and still feel wrung out. That’s the tell. I’m pulling apart the illusion of control and the sneaky way it turns love into pressure, ambition into tension, and responsibility into burnout. I’m coming to you raw: a sick week, a house full of termites, financial stress, and a long hospital day supporting my mom through heart surgery. Life is not neatly packaged, and neither is resilience.

We talk about the belief that keeps so many of us stuck: if I just do it better, market it better, plan it better, then the outcome will finally be safe. I share what it’s like to realize people still don’t know about work you’ve poured your soul into and how that can trigger the urge to control the narrative. From there, we move into humility, not as making yourself small, but as releasing the need to orchestrate everything and letting your life be lived through you. We ground it in simple, embodied practices, from noticing tension in the body to practicing letting go in everyday choices.

Because death is always the sharpest teacher, we also go there. As a death doula, I explain why control doesn’t just exhaust us in life, it can make death harder too. I offer three core truths, plus journaling prompts to help you loosen your grip, build trust, and find your way back to joy even when you can’t know what happens next. If this lands, subscribe, share it with someone who’s carrying too much, and leave a review with a few stars so more people can find the show.

THREE ELENA TRUTHS

• You are not exhausted from doing too much—you are exhausted from trying to control too much
• The work is not to master life, but to meet it as it unfolds
• The way you practice letting go now is the way you will meet death later

JOURNALING PROMPTS

• Where in my life am I trying to control an outcome instead of meeting what is actually here?
• What am I afraid would happen if I truly let go in one area of my life?
• Where is life asking me to trust instead of force?
• What does “support” actually look like for me right now—am I allowing it?
• If I knew I could not control the outcome, how would I choose to show up differently this week?

A Two-Day Immersion into Death, Devotion & Conscious Living

July 25–26

Beyond the Veil Festival is not a typical gathering—it is a guided passage into that space.

A two-day immersive experience devoted to exploring death not as something to fear, but as a powerful teacher for how to live.

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Resilience isn’t a personality trait. It’s a return path, and you can practice it in the middle of real life.

I’m Elena Box, shamanic practitioner and death doula, and I’m pulling the thread that runs through everything I teach about joy: preparing to meet death well. That may sound heavy, but it’s strangely freeing. When I stop treating resilience like “pushing through” and start treating it like coming back to center, I get more choice in the moments that used to hijack my body and my mind. I share the quotes and wisdom that guide me, from Carl Jung to Marcus Aurelius, and why studying the Bible for the first time has surprised me with themes I see across so many spiritual traditions: forgiveness, devotion, and surrender.

We also talk about the spiral nature of healing using the river metaphor: you never step into the same river twice, because you are not the same person when you return. I bring this down to ground level with a personal story of running into an estranged family member and what it looks like to pause, notice capacity, and stay present without needing the perfect response. This is mindfulness with teeth, nervous system awareness, and spiritual practice that actually works when the stakes are high.

Then I widen the lens to caregiving, supporting aging parents, and the practical heart of death doula work: dignity for the dying, reducing fear through understanding, and creating more space for closure, legacy, and peace. I close with three core truths and journaling prompts you can use all week to treat daily life as sacred practice.

If it resonates, subscribe, share it with a fellow caregiver or sensitive soul, and leave a review so more people can find the show.

• You will meet the same moment again—but you will not be the same person
• Your life is the ceremony; the practice is happening in the ordinary
• The more you turn toward death, the more fully you learn how to live

• Where in my life am I being asked to return—not avoid?
• What am I afraid to feel right now, and what might be waiting on the other side of that feeling?
• How have I changed since the last time I faced a similar challenge?
• What would it look like to treat my daily life as sacred practice?
• If I were preparing for death—not in fear, but in devotion—how would I live this week differently?

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Resilience doesn’t always look like powering through. Sometimes it looks like turning the lights down, telling the truth about what your body is doing, and letting yourself be held long enough to finally let go.

We sit down with Andonia Fthenakis, a multidisciplinary artist and integrative healing arts practitioner specializing in sound and vibrational therapy. Together, we unpack how ritual and sound healing can help women rebuild inner authority, especially when life feels like it’s collapsing from the inside out. We talk about why authentic release matters, what it takes to create nervous system safety, and how community practices like moon circles give us a way back to ourselves through movement, breath, voice, and vibration.

We also get practical about how to begin if you’re new to this world. What should you look for in a sound bath or spiritual practitioner? How do you use discernment when you’re in crisis and just need help? And how do you reconcile earth-based tools like crystals, incense, and ceremony with a religious background without turning any path into dogma? We share grounded ways to listen for “true north,” care for your energetic hygiene, and step into spring with real cleansing, including a simple but powerful burning ritual for releasing what you’re done carrying.

Andonia also shares a defining resilience story: choosing a home birth without family approval, holding steady in her choice, and reclaiming “my body, my choice” as a lived spiritual practice. If you’re craving more trust in yourself, deeper community, and a more embodied relationship with healing, this conversation will meet you there. Subscribe, share this with a friend who needs it, and leave a review so more listeners can find these stories and tools.

Resources:

Join Andonia's Whattsapp Group Ecstatic Healing Long Island

Follow her on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/akouie.alchemy/

Visit Andonia's Website: https://www.akouie.com/

Upcoming Offerings from Andonia:

Sun, Mar 22

Akouie Healing Arts Space

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We explore resilience as private devotion, how to stay loyal to art and truth without external validation, and why choosing expression over silence protects aliveness. Death work, theater, motherhood, and the athlete-of-joy mindset shape a practical path back to self-trust and creative fire.

• resilience as the unseen training for joy
• death, annihilation and the cost of silence
• the regret portal as a signal that you still care
• theater as temple and a call back to art
• motherhood, identity and making space to create
• Elena Truths: art vs self-abandonment, embarrassment vs silence, resilience as devotion
• practical tools: 15-minute creative devotion, one boundary weekly, one uncomfortable truth, move your body, ask what you’d regret not attempting

1. Where have I abandoned myself in order to maintain harmony?
2. If I knew embarrassment wouldn’t kill me, what would I create?
3. What version of me am I grieving right now?
4. What am I afraid will happen if I succeed?
5. What is one non-negotiable creative act I can commit to weekly — even if no one responds?
6. Am I measuring my value by revenue, validation, or devotion?
7. What would “training as an athlete of joy” look like this month?
8. If I look back five years from now, what would I regret not attempting?

If you feel called, it would mean so much if you could go ahead and, you know, drop us a review, maybe throw us a couple of stars. If there are five of them, even better.

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We map a path from overwhelm to ethical action by treating joy as a trainable practice and the nervous system as our guide. We name the moment, metabolize rage into clarity, choose one sustainable lane, and pace for the marathon with somatic tools and information hygiene.

• grounding in the ethos of moving through difficulty to reach durable joy
• regulation, recovery, and return as athletic training for the nervous system
• naming collective grief, fear, and rage without collapsing into it
• capacity, integrity, and the courage to act imperfectly
• reframing rage as boundary data and directing it into action
• sustainable civic steps and choosing one focused lane
• information hygiene and media boundaries to protect health
• somatic practices for discharge and repair: walking, shaking, crying, breath
• support for caregivers to pace for the long road
• three truths on regulation, imperfect action, and values-aligned joy
• journaling prompts to turn feelings into clarity and steps

If you feel called, it would mean so much if you could go ahead and drop us a review, maybe throw us a couple of stars. If there are five of them, even better.

Choose 1–3. Keep it simple. Keep it honest. Do it imperfectly.

Regulation

1. Where do I feel the current political moment in my body?
2. What signals tell me I’ve consumed enough information today?
3. What reliably brings me back to center?

Rage & Boundaries

1. What am I most angry about right now?
2. What boundary does that anger reveal?
3. If my rage had a wise job, what would it be?

Voice & Integrity

1. Where have I been silent out of fear of getting it wrong?
2. What value feels non-negotiable for me right now?
3. What does integrity (not perfection) look like in my life?

Action & Capacity

1. What is one action I can take sustainably this week?
2. What is one action I can release without guilt?
3. How do I want to pace myself for the long road ahead?

(Remember: This is a marathon, not a sprint.)

Joy as Practice

1. What brings me back to joy after engaging with heavy topics?
2. How do I train my nervous system to recover?
3. What does being an athlete of joy look like this week?

Choose one lane. Bookmark the rest.

Civic Engagement

Find Your Elected Officials

🔗 https://www.usa.gov/elected-officials

U.S. Capitol Switchboard

📞 202-224-3121

(Call and ask one clear question. You don’t need the perfect script — just your voice.)

Immigration Support

Immigration Advocates Network

🔗 https://www.immigrationadvocates.org

ACLU – Immigrants’ Rights

🔗 https://www.aclu.org/issues/immigrants-rights

Survivor-Centered Support

RAINN (Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network)

🔗 https://www.rainn.org

National Women’s Law Center

🔗 https://nwlc.org

Investigative Journalism & Court Records

ProPublica

🔗 https://www.propublica.org

CourtListener

🔗 https://www.courtlistener.com

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Buy your copy of Elena's book "Grieve Outside the Box"
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Feeling spun out by the headlines and the heat online? We name the collective dysregulation many of us are sensing and offer a humane path back to steadiness: grief literacy, nervous system care, and joyful integrity that doesn’t require disengaging from what matters. I share why doomscrolling is a trauma response, how the body interprets constant input as threat, and what conscious, bounded engagement looks like when staying informed starts to cost your aliveness.

Together, we unpack a practical compass for hard times: think globally, act locally, regulate personally. That means honoring limits, then turning attention to small, consistent acts of care in your neighborhood—checking on an elder after a storm, sharing groceries, making eye contact, or supporting a local pantry. We also challenge binary thinking and dehumanization, choosing to see the person across from us while refusing to use hatred as a coping strategy. Joyful presence becomes a form of resistance, a way to stay human without collapsing into apathy or burning out.

You’ll also get tactile tools to metabolize grief and release charge safely: submerged screams in a bath, rage rooms, angry walks in the woods, long exhales that reset the vagus nerve, cold-water resets, and a simple news boundary ritual followed by a hand-wash to signal completion. We close with a joy ledger practice and focused journaling prompts to clarify what’s truly in your control—your attention, your relationships, and your care for vulnerable people nearby. Subscribe, share this with a friend who needs steadiness today, and leave a quick review so more listeners can find a humane way back to joy.

Journaling Prompts

• “What am I actually grieving beneath my political feelings?”
• “Where has my nervous system been asking for rest?”
• “What does joyful integrity look like for me right now?”
• “What is one small place I can show up locally this week?”
• “What happens in my body when I step away from the noise?”

Support the show

Buy your copy of Elena's book "Grieve Outside the Box"
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Send us Fan Mail

We unpack the lie that joy is a feeling you earn and reclaim it as a daily practice that builds resilience. We explore how joy coexists with grief, why breakthroughs without integration burn us out, and how small rituals train the nervous system to return to center.

• dismantling myths of joy as reward, feeling, or circumstance
• the spiral nature of healing and identity
• practicing joy before the result through repetition
• consistency over motivation and gentle returns
• joy and grief coexisting without canceling each other
• ordinary rituals that regulate the nervous system
• three core truths to carry through the week
• journaling prompts for practical integration
• noticing returns, softening, and steadiness

Three Elena Truths: Pick one to carry you through the week

1. Joy is not a mood. It’s a practice.
2. Resilience isn’t pushing through. It’s returning to yourself.
3. You don’t wait for the life you want—you practice it in small, livable ways.

Journaling Prompts:

• Where am I waiting for joy instead of practicing it?
• What is one small way I already know how to return to myself?
• If joy were a practice, not a feeling, what would it look like this week?
• What feels kind and doable right now?

Once a month I send out the Calliope’s Quill newsletter with journaling prompts and notes, sign up at www.elenabox.com

Support the show

Buy your copy of Elena's book "Grieve Outside the Box"
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