The Awakened Heart: A Podcast for Healing Women
The Awakened Heart: A Podcast for Healing Women is a safe space for trauma survivors and neurodivergent women ready to claim their voice, soften into their truth and feel at home with themselves.
I’m Autumn Moran, a Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC), certified Life Coach, and 500-hour trained yoga instructor who understands this journey intimately as a neurodivergent woman, trauma survivor and as a therapist and life coach.
Each week, I offer soulful episodes where I intertwine my lived experiences with insights from my therapy practice all with the goal to help women unmask and find peace in their lives by healing trauma and learning how to accommodate their neurodivergence.
Through real talk, mindfulness practices, and gentle healing approaches rooted in trauma-informed wisdom and nervous system care, you’ll find practical tools to help you feel safe in your body, seen in your story and supported in your journey.
This is your sanctuary to soften, heal, and remember that you were and are never too much.
Work with me: Click the link to schedule a free 15 minute consultation.
The Awakened Heart: A Podcast for Healing Women
BONUS EPI: The Good-Girl Recovery: Healing from the Rules That Keep You Small
The quiet moment when pretending stops can feel like an earthquake: your body tenses at rest, your mind bargains for worth through productivity, and the smallest no sets off alarms. We explore that turning point with honesty and care, tracing how women learn to equate safety with compliance and why the old rulebook was never written for our full humanity. Anxiety takes on a new role here; not as a flaw to fix, but as intuition speaking, especially for those of us who’ve been told to mute our instincts to keep the peace.
We walk through what it looks like to reclaim your inner authority one small act at a time: a clean no without justification, choosing rest without guilt, and refusing to defend your needs to people committed to misunderstanding you. Expect resistance both internally from a vigilant nervous system and externally from folks who benefited from your obedience. I offer a grounded path for nervous system regulation and reparenting, with body-first practices that teach safety while you build new rules: rest is a birthright, truth may disappoint others and still be right, and worth lives in presence, not output.
You’ll hear clear language for spotting red flags, practical examples for setting boundaries, and a set of journal prompts to anchor your next steps. This conversation is legacy work: each time you reject smallness, you heal more than your own story.
Connect with Me:
I offer private sessions for therapy if you’re in Texas, and life coaching if you’re outside the state or abroad. Whether you’re healing trauma, navigating a big life shift, or just ready to come home to yourself, I hold space for women just like you everyday.
Fill out a consultation requests via my linktree (http://linktr.ee/EmpoweringWellnessHub) for a free 15 min chat to see if we are a good fit!
Also you can find my link and follow me on instagram & there’s also a badass **Spotify playlist** made for women healing through softness and strength called Divine Woman!!!
Welcome to the Awaken Heart, a podcast for healing women. This is a space where your voice matters, your body is sacred, and your journey home to yourself is always and forever honored, no matter how winding the road. I'm Autumn, licensed professional counselor, life coach, yoga instructor. And if you're interested, I offer virtual sessions for life coaching and therapy. If you're in the state of Texas, click on the link tree in the show notes to schedule a 15-minute consultation to have a free chat with me to see if we're a good fit. But ultimately, my dear, I am your companion on this divine path of healing. And I hope this episode is the validation you've been needing to help you make the right choices for yourself. Because there comes a time, I don't know when, I don't know how or why, I know how or why, but I know there comes a point in time in a woman's life, maybe quietly, maybe in flames, where we look around and realize we've been living inside someone else's rulebook. We've done everything right. We followed all the steps, tried to meet all the expectations, tried to check all the boxes, and still it feels maybe hollow, maybe like it's not yours, maybe it's like something you really don't like or it doesn't feel right, still feels off. That whisper that says this cannot be all there is gets louder. It grows from a murmur to a roar. And one day, pretending doesn't work anymore. You feel it in your bones, that mismatch between who you are and the client, the life you're currently living. I want this episode to be for the woman who has done contorting herself to fit systems, families, or cultures that never made space for her full humanity. Because this is not about just mindset, this is about survival patterns. Your brain has learned safety to be safe means self-abandonment. You've learned to read the room before you read yourself. You learned how to shape shift before you learned that you needed rest and that it was a requirement. You seek approval before you even know your own truth. Not because you're lazy or because you're broken, but because you've been living out of alignment with who you are for years, months, decades, lifetime. Because the rules I'm talking about, they were not written for women who feel deeply. They weren't written for women who sense everything, who question, who move to their own rhythm, who want and use their intuition for the greater good. They were written by systems that profit off of our disconnection, disconnection from our body, our needs, and our truth. When you think about how anxious women are and also how taboo it is to be intuitive and witchy, these are one and the same, yet we're told to fix the anxiety so we can perform and stop the intuition because it shines light on all the fucked up shit in this world and it makes other people feel uncomfortable. What I'm trying to say is that anxiety is your intuition. Now, I'm not ignoring generalized anxiety, panic disorder, or social anxiety. I'm simply saying that anxiety, when listened to, most of the time, is our superpower, is our intuition, is our gut instinct speaking to us, our higher good, our higher power, if you will. But more often than not, we're taught to ignore the intuition, ignore the anxiety because it's silly and we need to instead give people the benefit of the doubt or to see the good in someone, even though when they are actively acting immoral or downright awful. We have fucking rules like be nice, don't make a scene, just smile, work harder, fucking be productive, don't rest until it's done. You got this, push through. Be the helper, not the one who needs help. Or he means well, or they mean well. And and the fucked up part about this is for so many of us, these rules get internalized until they sound like our own thoughts. Because when you have a neurodivergent lens, one, you take things fucking literally. So the rules that didn't benefit you that you still had to live by, you took them literally. And then, being a neurodivergent, you have a strong sense of justice. So you are innately wanting to do what is quote unquote right based on the rules you were given, even though they're fucked up rules to begin with. This these rules, this comes becomes our echo chamber in our minds, that constant hum of should, must, and not enough. But the beauty of all this is that we can write these rules any way we want. We can rewrite this shit. And that rewriting starts with awareness, with catching yourself in the moment when you shrink, when you're over-apologizing, when you silence your truth. It starts when you start asking, who told me I had to do it this way? Whose voice is this in my head? Do I even believe this anymore? So I'm not here to be like, let's find out who did this and let's call them out and let's make them feel bad and tell them they fucked up. I don't give a shit who said it. I just want you to be aware that it's not you, your inner voice, your truth speaking. It was someone else. And that doesn't align with your beliefs anymore. It no longer serves you. And that's the important part because that's where the awakening begins. Acknowledging that you no longer believe it and giving yourself permission to no longer believe it. And this awakening is not in grand gestures or perfect plans, but in these small radical acts of noticing. The first time you say no without justification, the first time you don't spiral or guilt yourself for not doing a chore, or when you choose to rest without guilting yourself. And one that I think is so deep and so beneficial is when you realize you can no longer go back to pretending. Boy, I remember when I realized I couldn't go back to pretending. There were several moments in my life. There's not just one thing and then I was just better. It has been a long, steady stream of realizing where I was pretending, where I was following when it no longer served me. When I was going through the motions of things that kept me feeling drained and not wanted or less than or different from. Because when you stop pretending, you start to see how deeply the old rules ran, how your nervous system flinches when you take up space, how your body tenses when you rest, and how your mind tries to negotiate your worth through productivity. But what if the goal isn't to be good anymore? What if the goal is to be whole? When you've lived your life following someone else's blueprint, waking up feels disorienting. It can feel dangerous, like because your body learned that compliance was safety. So when you start saying no, when you start asking questions, your nervous system might very well sound the alarm. You're not doing it wrong. It's just, I would encourage you to see it as tremors of liberation. Because the truth is you don't owe anyone your silence, your obedience, or your self-assurance, or your not self-assurance, self-erasure, right? Abandoning yourself, your self-abandonment. Because you're not put on this earth to perform. You're here to become fully yourself. And sometimes that looks like burning down the rule book. Not because you're reckless, not because you're a horrible person, not because you don't love anyone, not because you're a bad person, but because you are ready to live in your truth, in your truth, because your truth is yours and it belongs to no one else's. No one else. We all have our own truth. So when you stop asking for for stop asking for permission to exist as you are, when you realize that all those rules, all those fucking rules that have kept you small, quiet, obedient, not seen, not heard, those rules were never holy. They were never sacred. Sorry about the dog. They were never yours. If you feel something, if you resonate with what I'm saying, if you have that ache that says, I want more than this, I want you to trust that it's not rebellion for rebellion's sake. It's your soul remembering freedom. And I you don't have to burn your life down overnight. You can start by questioning one rule at a time. You can start by making one choice that honors you instead of the fucking expectation. Because this is how liberation begins. It's quiet, it's tender, it's one moment at a time. So what happens now that you've seen it, now that you don't want to pretend, you've woken up, you've seen the rules for what they are, and you're in this space between who you were taught to be and who you're becoming, it's fucking uncomfortable. It can be confusing and also very liberating. Because what's happening here is that you're deconstructing, you're conditioning, and when that happens, we face resistance. Because when you stop following the rules, the people who benefited from your obedience might start to take notice, might start to have a problem. They might say you've changed. And I want to say this with a whole heart. Whether they're friend, family, foe, co-workers, high school besties, knowing you since you were in diapers, I don't care. This is a hard truth. If you start to become your true self, you're a good person, you mean well, and you're cleaning up your life to follow the life that you want. And if anyone starts to get defensive, angry, derogatory, rude, name-calling, trying to make you change your mind, trying to convince you that you're you're seeing it a different way. That's not how it is. Those are red flags. Those people are scared that they're not gonna get what they've been getting from you anymore, and then they're gonna have to do it themselves. Let them do it themselves. Because they might call you selfish, difficult, dramatic, and you're none of these things. You're done performing calm to keep the peace. You are claiming your life, maybe for the first time ever. And that will always make those who are still asleep very uncomfortable. You don't need to explain your healing to people who are committed to misunderstanding it or you. So, how do you rewrite the rules? Because when I say create new rules, I don't mean new cages or perfectionistic structures. I mean guiding full-body truths, the kind that keep you rooted when the world tries to pull you back into smallness. These are the rules that come from your nervous system, not from societal pressure. So if you have an old rule of that you need to earn rest, I want your new truth to be rest is my birthright, and my body deserves safety. If your old rule was I can't upset anyone, your new truth may be my truth might disappoint others, but that doesn't make it wrong. Old rule. If I'm not productive, I'm falling behind. Or even I'm behind. New rule, new truth. My worth isn't measured in output, it's revealed in presence. Old rule. If I don't do it, no one will. Expanding only deepens my connection. And if expanding doesn't deepen the connection, if it is just met with resistance, boundaries need to be made with that person because they're not there for your greater good. That's a hard truth because some people are really close blood or friend. And it's sad to have that realization. Because creating new rules is a process of deep reparenting, reparenting. You are saying to yourself, I get to decide what safety feels like. I get to choose how I show up. I get to build a life that doesn't drain me just to be acceptable. And this often means unlearning learning survival patterns that were never that were once life-saving. Because people will tell you just to let it go. But you can't just let go of a rule that once protected you, not without giving your body a new map of safety. So that's where nervous system work, compassion, and slow, consistent self-trust come in. Every time you question an old rule, pause. Notice what comes up. Does your body tense? Do you feel guilt? Do you feel fear? Because that's your nervous system trying to protect you from the danger that no longer exists, that's no longer serving you. So instead of pushing through it, put one hand over your heart and whisper to yourself, I'm safe to choose differently now. I'm safe to choose differently now. This is the rewiring. This is what self-liberation actually looks like. Not just saying affirmations, but teaching your body that it's okay to live in your new truth. If and when the old rules echo in your mind, remember that that echo doesn't mean you failed. It means you're healing something ancient. And your nervous system's just trying to make sense of the new and get rid of the old. You are interrupting generations of conditioning, patriarchal systems, neurotypical standards, and trauma responses that said, be smaller, quieter, and easier to love. And every time you say no to that, you're not just healing you. You're healing the line of women who couldn't do it. And let's honor that for a moment because this is legacy work. This is reclamation work. The courage to live by your own rules, that's fucking revolution. That's what the world needs. No longer staying quiet, no longer letting people just push you around and be shitty and just do whatever they want while you just serve, while you just show up and pretend. So before we wrap it up, transitioning into thought prompts, journal prompts. Get your notebook out, get your brain out. Got some questions for you. What rules have I been living by that I never actually agreed to? Which of those rules feel heavy in my body? What would safety look like if I defined it for myself? What's one small way I can honor my truth today, even if it feels uncomfortable? What's one new rule I want to live by? Let this rule be one that reflects who you are becoming, not who you are taught to be. Because that's how you meet yourself, beneath the rules and the noise and the conditioning. It'll come out. Give yourself some space because you are allowed to rewrite your life. You are allowed to stop living for survival and start living your truth. Your truth. Keep questioning, keep softening with yourself and your needs and your accommodations. Come home to yourself. Feel at home with yourself in your mind, in your body, in your heart, in your spirit. And if you're not, start setting some boundaries. Start looking at the rules. And I guarantee you, guarantee you that you will start feeling better within, without, with who you are day to day. If this episode helped you feel a little more understood, a little less alone, please share it with another who might need it. I'd love to hear from you. Message me, comment, follow. I love feedback. Tell me what you'd like to hear more of. Tell me what you enjoy hearing about. I love feedback. I offer private sessions, like I said in the beginning, for virtual therapy if you're in Texas, and virtual life coaching if you're outside the state or abroad. Whether you're healing from trauma, navigating a big life shift like we've talked about today, are just ready to come home to yourself. It is my honor, my life's gift, my pleasure, just my heart's song to help women every day like you find their footing in life, to get on their path, to feel good about their choices, to listen to that voice inside, to shake off all the shackles that we've been given along the way. Fill out a consultation form at the link tree if you're curious about working together. Also, there's a good Spotify playlist. Apple playlist will be coming soon. Bum bum bum. But right now, it's at Spotify. It's called the Divine Woman. It is made for women healing through softness and strength, and it is a bomb diggity playlist. Remember, my dears, you are never too much, you're never too late, and you do not have to figure this out all alone. Until next time, may you be happy and free. May mine and your healing ripple outwards to bless the world with happiness and freedom. Take care of you, and I'll see you soon.
