The Courage Coalition

Corree Roofener
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Solocasts and Guest Interviews for inspiring, educating and empowering listeners to embrace courage in all aspects of their lives. Fostering a coalition of individuals who are committed to living authentically and fearlessly in their dreams! This is not a polished highlight reel it’s real stories, raw truth, and the kind of courage that changes lives. Each week, host Corree Roofener brings you unfiltered conversations and heartfelt solocasts that remind you you’re not alone in the climb. From navigating money and mental health to breaking cycles in foster care and redefining success, every episode is about choosing faith over fear and taking your next brave step. The Courage Coalition is more than a podcast it’s a community of dreamers and doers who are ready to live authentically, even when it’s hard.

  1. 1D AGO

    We Were Never Taught to Feel Safe With Money

    Money has never been just numbers. It’s never been black and white. From the moment we are old enough to notice it, money becomes tangled with safety, love, belonging, approval, fear, and shame. We learn often without words that what we earn, spend, or have somehow determines our worth or our place in the world. Emotional Money was created to gently but powerfully disrupt that story. Not by telling you what you “should” do, but by asking the questions most of us have never been invited to explore: Why do I spend the way I do? Why do I save, or not save the way I do? What belief is driving my behavior? This book is not about fixing you. It’s about understanding you. I chose to put this work into a book one you can write in, pause with, return to because growth shouldn’t only be available to those who can afford one-on-one coaching or expensive rooms. This is about accessibility. This is about meeting you where you are, without shame, without comparison, without the pressure to overhaul your entire life. Every chapter asks one simple but courageous thing: What is one small shift you can make here? Because real change doesn’t happen through massive leaps it happens through honest awareness and baby steps taken with intention. And what’s powerful is that this framework doesn’t just apply to money. It shows up in your health, your relationships, your faith, your leadership, and the legacy you are building whether you realize it yet or not. On February 24, I’m inviting you into the launch of Emotional Money. Not just to celebrate a book but to step into a different way of relating to money, to yourself, and to what’s possible. Join the mailing list, come to the live launch, and be part of a conversation that is changing how we talk about money from shame to curiosity, from scarcity to alignment, from silence to truth. If this stirred something in you, it’s not by accident. Your story matters. And when you take even one brave step toward rewriting it, you don’t just change your life you help change the world.  Contact Corree about a podcast question or conversation here: correeroofener@gmail.com To be a part of Emotional Money Launch, join our email list here: https://crfinancialfoundations.com/resources available to purchase on Amazon 2/24/26 To find out more about Corree and learn about all the ways she does not choose to stay in one lane go here: https://correeroofener.com/ Are you ready to walk with us for https:/https://fosteringthesummit.org Join us as we change the statistics for children aging out of foster care. Also, follow me on https://www.instagram.com/correeroofenercoach/ for more inspiration and practical wisdom for your business and life. Until next time, keep shining bright! - Corree

    30 min

  2. 3D AGO

    The PG-13 Conversations We Need to Have with Erika Rothenberger

    There are some conversations we don’t avoid because they aren’t important—we avoid them because they’re too important. Too personal. Too revealing. Too likely to crack the “I’m fine” mask right off our face. In this episode of The Courage Coalition, I brought back repeat guest Erika Rothenberger a woman who doesn’t just walk into rooms with energy, but with truth. When I asked her what we need to start talking about more in 2026, her answer wasn’t polished. It was a hell yes. Because the conversations that change people aren’t always “safe.” They’re the ones we’ve labeled PG-13: hormones, perimenopause, midlife awakening, money without shame, divorce, addiction, miscarriage, assault real life punches that so many carry quietly, thinking they’re the only one. What made this conversation hit deeper wasn’t just the topics it was the thread running through all of them: control, belonging, and the cost of silence. Erika shares what it was like growing up with alcoholism inside a home that looked “successful” from the outside, and how those early beliefs wire us to walk on eggshells, perform for safety, and achieve as a coping mechanism. We also talk about eating disorders through a lens that most people miss: not vanity, but nervous-system survival. When life feels out of control, the body will reach for one thing it can manage food, movement, restriction, numbing. And as someone who fostered for 15 years, I’ve seen that same survival strategy in children who had nothing else they could control. This is the part the world doesn’t understand: behavior is often a language of unmet needs. Most of the time, it’s not about the surface issue at all it’s about longing to feel safe, seen, and accepted. And then the conversation takes a turn into something that reshapes you: Erika’s brutal assault and what she did with her pain afterward. She didn’t just “get through it.” She used it to fight for change, working to shift legislation in Pennsylvania around strangulation laws. That is the definition of audacity: not letting trauma define your legacy, but letting it refine your purpose. If you’re listening and you feel that quiet knowing—there’s more for me—I want you to hear this clearly: you are not behind, you are not too late, and you are not alone. Start where you are. Make your own “audacious badass list.” Collect your evidence. Because courage isn’t the absence of fear—it’s the decision to move anyway… and to stop pretending you’re fine when you were made for more. To get Erika's new book Audacious Expansion click here: https://a.co/d/eQi2JNr To find out more about Erika and her Audacious movement click here: https://www.instagram.com/stories/erikalearothenberger/ Contact Corree about a podcast question or conversation here: correeroofener@gmail.com To be a part of Emotional Money Launch, join our email list here: https://crfinancialfoundations.com/resources available to purchase on Amazon 2/24/26 To find out more about Corree and learn about all the ways she does not choose to stay in one lane go here: https://correeroofener.com/ Are you ready to walk with us for https:/https://fosteringthesummit.org Join us as we change the statistics for children aging out of foster care. Also, follow me on https://www.instagram.com/correeroofenercoach/ for more inspiration and practical wisdom for your business and life. Until next time, keep shining bright! - Corree

    1 hr

  3. FEB 2

    Emotional Money: Why Your “Why” Matters More Than the Number

    Every January we make promises to ourselves about money, habits, change and by February many of us are already sitting in the quiet shame of why didn’t I keep it this time? What I’ve learned, both personally and through years of financial coaching, is that shame is one of the loudest drivers of our money behavior. Not income. Not intelligence. Shame rooted in old beliefs, inherited values, and definitions of success that were never ours to begin with. The most damaging belief I see is I don’t make enough, so this will never work for me. That belief doesn’t protect you it keeps you stuck. Here’s the truth: Chad and I have never made what culture would call “a lot” of money. We’ve never hit the numbers people casually throw around online. And yet, we’ve built a life that feels aligned, intentional, and deeply ours. Money doesn’t change when the number changes it changes when the why becomes clear. That’s why I created Emotional Money. Not as another plan or set of rules, but as a framework to help you understand the beliefs and values shaping your decisions. Most of our money stories were written long before we ever earned a paycheck, and until we understand them, no budget or strategy will stick. If 2026 is the year something truly has to change, the question isn’t what plan should I follow? It’s what behavior am I willing to change? Money is rarely just about money it touches our health, relationships, worth, and freedom. When you understand your why, everything begins to shift. You are not behind. You are not broken. You are uniquely created, and your story deserves understanding, not shame. If any part of this resonated, stay in the conversation—share the episode, download it, leave a review. And be brave enough to ask yourself the questions you’ve been avoiding. Love you. Mean it. Contact Corree about a podcast question or conversation here: correeroofener@gmail.com To be a part of Emotional Money Launch, join our email list here: https://crfinancialfoundations.com/resources available to purchase on Amazon 2/24/26 To find out more about Corree and learn about all the ways she does not choose to stay in one lane go here: https://correeroofener.com/ Are you ready to walk with us for https:/https://fosteringthesummit.org Join us as we change the statistics for children aging out of foster care. Also, follow me on https://www.instagram.com/correeroofenercoach/ for more inspiration and practical wisdom for your business and life. Until next time, keep shining bright! - Corree

    20 min

  4. JAN 26

    When It Doesn’t Work: The Foster Care Conversation We Avoid

    There’s a conversation we don’t have enough in foster care and adoption because it’s loaded with fear, judgment, and that quiet ache of “What will people think?” Today on The Courage Coalition, Trisha Collins (Director of Missional Impact at Child Bridge Montana) and James Newell (adoptive dad, husband, builder, and a man willing to speak honestly about the hard) helped open the door on the topic: what happens when it doesn’t work. Because our culture loves a tidy ending. “They’re adopted now, so it’s all good.” “You’ve had them since they were tiny, so of course it’s a perfect fit.” But real life doesn’t follow a script and children aren’t a fairytale plotline. Sometimes the most loving decision isn’t forcing a forever that doesn’t fit. Sometimes the bravest thing you can do is admit, this isn’t in this child’s best interest, even when your heart is breaking and your worth is trying to tie itself to the outcome. I shared a piece of my own story when we had a medically fragile little one from infancy, and adoption came onto the table. From the outside, it looked like it should have been automatic. But inside our home, the reality was complicated. Her sensory needs were so intense that the outdoors wind, smells, the very life our family lived made her physically sick. And because only my mom and I could care for her, it became clear: keeping her would have been about my grip, not her healing. The shame was real. The feeling of failure was loud. But then the gift came later the part you don’t see in the moment. We helped with the search for her forever family. We met them. And now, years later, I’ve watched her thrive exactly where she belongs loved, understood, and supported in a life that fits her nervous system and her joy. Trisha said something that hit me right in the chest: foster care isn’t always a marathon; sometimes it’s a relay race. Batons get passed. That doesn’t mean someone failed. It means the child is still moving toward what’s right. And maybe that’s the reframe we all need: success isn’t “I did it all.” Success is love with wisdom. Love that stays honest. Love that gets curious instead of condemning. James brought a powerful perspective from the male side how shame shows up when you feel responsible to protect your home, your kids, your marriage, and you’re still wondering, What’s wrong with me? Trisha offered a line I won’t forget: if the car is in the ditch, we don’t have to obsess over how it got there we have to focus on getting it out. So if you’re in the thick of it right now fostering, adopting, supporting reunification, or grieving a placement that didn’t work here’s what I want you to hear: perfect love casts out fear… and love does. It shows up. It tells the truth. It apologizes when it misses. It stays open-handed. And it refuses to measure worth by whether the story turned out the way you thought it “should." Contact Corree about a podcast question or conversation here: correeroofener@gmail.com To be a part of Emotional Money Launch, join our email list here: https://crfinancialfoundations.com/resources available to purchase on Amazon 2/24/26 To find out more about Corree and learn about all the ways she does not choose to stay in one lane go here: https://correeroofener.com/ Are you ready to walk with us for https:/https://fosteringthesummit.org Join us as we change the statistics for children aging out of foster care. Also, follow me on https://www.instagram.com/correeroofenercoach/ for more inspiration and practical wisdom for your business and life. Until next time, keep shining bright! - Corree

    51 min

  5. JAN 19

    When Fear Holds Your Hand

    Fear is one of the most misunderstood forces we live with. We’re taught that fear is the signal to stop, to turn around, to stay safe. But what if fear isn’t the enemy at all? What if it’s simply a messenger an ancient survival system that was never updated for the life you’re living now? In this solo episode, I reflect on how fear has shown up in my own story, not as the thing that stopped me, but as the very thing that invited me forward. Fear is what surfaces when we’re standing at the edge of something honest, something true, something that asks us to be seen. And in a culture that prioritizes belonging over authenticity, being seen can feel terrifying. So many of us are walking a tightrope in the fog unable to see what’s ahead, unable to see what’s below, only aware of the pounding of our own hearts and the pull to retreat back into what’s familiar. We stay because it’s accepted. We stay because it’s safe. We stay because belonging feels like love. But the cost of belonging to what has always been may be the very thing costing us our dreams, our purpose, and the impact we were born to make. Growth isn’t about leaping off a cliff; it’s about small, quiet steps taken in courage steps that often feel scarier precisely because they ask us to release identities we’ve never known life without. As this new year unfolds, my invitation is simple but not easy: notice where fear is leading you. Is it guiding you forward by asking you to listen more deeply, get quieter, and trust what your heart already knows? Or is it keeping you bound to old stories, old roles, old expectations that no longer fit? Fear works both ways. It can handcuff you or it can hold your hand. And the legacy you leave isn’t built only by what you do, but also by what you choose not to do. Someone is always watching. The question is: will you let fear silence you, or will you let it be the companion that walks you into the life you were always meant to live? Contact Corree about a podcast question or conversation here: correeroofener@gmail.com To be a part of Emotional Money Launch, join our email list here: https://crfinancialfoundations.com/resources available to purchase on Amazon 2/24/26 To find out more about Corree and learn about all the ways she does not choose to stay in one lane go here: https://correeroofener.com/ Are you ready to walk with us for https:/https://fosteringthesummit.org Join us as we change the statistics for children aging out of foster care. Also, follow me on https://www.instagram.com/correeroofenercoach/ for more inspiration and practical wisdom for your business and life. Until next time, keep shining bright! - Corree

    18 min

  6. JAN 12

    Single Parenthood Isn’t a Choice Most of the Time with Cindy Witteman

    There are conversations we avoid because they hit too close to home money, domestic violence, poverty, and the quiet realities of single parenthood. In our first guest episode of 2026, I sat down with Cindy Wittemann, and let me just say it: this woman is a powerhouse with a story that carries both pain and proof. She grew up in deep poverty with a single mom sometimes without electricity, water, food, or transportation and as a child she attached “success” to the simplest things: a fridge with food, lights that turned on, a roof that didn’t feel uncertain. So she did what so many of us were taught to do she believed marriage would be her escape hatch. Her happily-ever-after. Until it wasn’t. Ten years into a domestic violence marriage, raising three little girls, she heard one sentence that cracked the illusion wide open: “It’s better to come from a broken home than grow up in one.” And that day, Cindy picked up a basket of clothes, a bag of diapers, her babies three, two, and five months and she left. What hit me hardest wasn’t just her courage to walk out. It was the clarity around why she stayed so long: the stigma. The story she carried from childhood that single parenthood meant failure, poverty, shame, and “ending up like her mom.” And like so many abusive dynamics, her spouse used that fear as a weapon If you leave, you’ll be broke. You’ll be on welfare. You’ll be exactly like her. This is why we have to talk about money. This is why we have to talk about single parenthood. Because the belief systems we inherit as children don’t just shape our choices they can trap us inside lives we were never meant to survive. Cindy’s nonprofit grew from that exact reality: the “messy middle” families who don’t qualify for enough help to get ahead, yet can’t access the next level because the system penalizes growth. She gives single parents cars—not as charity, but as a tool for forward motion. A way to reach school, work, childcare, and opportunity. Because poverty isn’t always laziness it’s often logistics, red tape, and a system that makes “one dollar more” cost twelve hundred dollars in lost support. Cindy said it so simply it took my breath away: “I see you.” I see how hard you’re working. I see the sacrifice. I see the bravery it takes to keep showing up when you’re carrying everything alone. Because leaving isn’t the easy way out staying is often the familiar cage. And if you’re in that place today unsafe, unhappy, trapped by fear Cindy offered a truth that lands like a dare: Whether you think you can or you think you can’t… you’re right. Sometimes courage looks like therapy and a plan. Sometimes it looks like selling plasma and working two jobs. Sometimes it looks like one shaky step with no map at all. But there is another side. And one day your kids will look at you and say, “How did you do that?” And you’ll realize: you didn’t do it perfectly. You did it honestly. You did it anyway. Contact Corree about a podcast question or conversation here: correeroofener@gmail.com To be a part of Emotional Money Launch, join our email list here: https://crfinancialfoundations.com/resources available to purchase on Amazon 2/24/26 To find out more about Corree and learn about all the ways she does not choose to stay in one lane go here: https://correeroofener.com/ Are you ready to walk with us for https:/https://fosteringthesummit.org Join us as we change the statistics for children aging out of foster care. Also, follow me on https://www.instagram.com/correeroofenercoach/ for more inspiration and practical wisdom for your business and life. Until next time, keep shining bright! - Corree

    40 min

  7. JAN 5

    Beyond the Surface: Why 2026 Is About Deeper Conversations

    As we open Season Three of The Courage Coalition, I found myself reflecting deeply on what this podcast was always meant to be and what it’s now being called to become. From the beginning, the heart of this space has been real people living courageous lives: choosing growth over safety, stepping forward in fear, and doing the hard things even when the noise around them said, stay comfortable. That intention has never changed. But as 2025 came to a close, there was a stirring in me a quiet but persistent knowing that something needed to shift. We’ve shared brave stories, yes. But we haven’t always asked the hardest questions. And courage, real courage, doesn’t stop at what’s inspiring it goes straight into what’s uncomfortable, messy, and deeply human. Season Three is about going there. It’s about creating space for conversations we’ve avoided for too long because they feel risky or taboo conversations around sex, money, mental health, menopause, fatherhood, motherhood, foster care, education, faith, politics, body image, trauma, and intuition. Not from a place of argument or division, but from shared humanity. From curiosity. From a willingness to listen and to sit with perspectives that may differ from our own. Growth doesn’t happen when we stay safe; it happens when we ask ourselves why something makes us uncomfortable, angry, or afraid. As a culture, we say we want change, but we resist being the ones who change. And until that shifts, nothing actually moves forward. This season is an invitation and a challenge. I’ll be bringing back familiar voices and welcoming new ones, asking different questions, and holding deeper space. But this isn’t just about me or my guests. It’s about you. If there’s a conversation you know needs to happen, a question you’ve been afraid to ask, or a topic you wish someone would finally address reach out. Every episode includes my contact information because this is meant to be a living, breathing community. Change begins with connection, and connection begins with courage. Season Three is about strengthening the heart of this coalition anchored in safety, love, and acceptance so we can challenge the status quo and create a ripple that actually leads somewhere. If it resonates, share it. If it challenges you, stay curious. Either way, this is where the real work begins. Contact Corree about a podcast question or conversation here: correeroofener@gmail.com To be a part of Emotional Money Launch, join our email list here: https://crfinancialfoundations.com/resources available to purchase on Amazon 2/24/26 To find out more about Corree and learn about all the ways she does not choose to stay in one lane go here: https://correeroofener.com/ Are you ready to walk with us for https:/https://fosteringthesummit.org Join us as we change the statistics for children aging out of foster care. Also, follow me on https://www.instagram.com/correeroofenercoach/ for more inspiration and practical wisdom for your business and life. Until next time, keep shining bright! - Corree

    20 min

  8. 12/10/2025

    2025 Reflections

    As this year comes to a close, I’m reminded once again that I don’t do resolutions I do reflections. Not the kind that measure accomplishments or accolades, but the kind that ask, Who did I become this year? What did I learn? What quiet truths rose to the surface when I allowed myself to slow down enough to hear them? This year, my practice was simple: gather the evidence of my becoming. Not the big moments, but the shifts. The whispered yes. The dream spoken out loud. The moments of choosing courage over comfort… again and again. And it surprised me how much clarity arrives when we stop trying to rush into the next thing and instead honor what has already unfolded. 2025 was a year of unraveling and remembering. I walked into it with five words connection, clarity, purpose, light, authenticity words that didn’t just guide me, but taught me. They asked me to stop performing and start listening. To stop shrinking and start rising. To connect deeper, not wider. To return to the truth of who I’ve always been: a mother, a creator, a vessel, a visionary, a woman who was born on purpose for a purpose. This year clarified who I am beneath the expectations, the noise, and the pressure to do things the “right” way. And what I discovered was that living aligned financially, spiritually, creatively wasn’t just possible, it was the exact path where everything finally clicked into place. And maybe the biggest lesson was this: becoming is rarely loud. It’s not the roar on the mountaintop it’s the whisper inside your chest. It’s choosing the uncomfortable next step, the thing that doesn’t make sense on paper but makes perfect sense to your soul. It’s saying yes to the vision even when you’re scared. It’s trusting that every shift, every surrender, every tear, every brave conversation, every mile walked, every boundary set, every moment of faith was preparing you to be seen. Not for attention. But for impact. For legacy. For the generations watching. For the woman you were always meant to rise into. As we step into a new year, I hope you take a moment to gather the evidence of your own becoming. Not the outcomes your evolution. The quiet defiance. The whispered yes. The courage you didn’t even realize you were practicing. Because sometimes the most profound transformation isn’t what you plan—it's what you finally allow. Contact Corree about a podcast question or conversation here: correeroofener@gmail.com To be a part of Emotional Money Launch, join our email list here: https://crfinancialfoundations.com/resources available to purchase on Amazon 2/24/26 To find out more about Corree and learn about all the ways she does not choose to stay in one lane go here: https://correeroofener.com/ Are you ready to walk with us for https:/https://fosteringthesummit.org Join us as we change the statistics for children aging out of foster care. Also, follow me on https://www.instagram.com/correeroofenercoach/ for more inspiration and practical wisdom for your business and life. Until next time, keep shining bright! - Corree

    26 min
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About

Solocasts and Guest Interviews for inspiring, educating and empowering listeners to embrace courage in all aspects of their lives. Fostering a coalition of individuals who are committed to living authentically and fearlessly in their dreams! This is not a polished highlight reel it’s real stories, raw truth, and the kind of courage that changes lives. Each week, host Corree Roofener brings you unfiltered conversations and heartfelt solocasts that remind you you’re not alone in the climb. From navigating money and mental health to breaking cycles in foster care and redefining success, every episode is about choosing faith over fear and taking your next brave step. The Courage Coalition is more than a podcast it’s a community of dreamers and doers who are ready to live authentically, even when it’s hard.

Information

  • Creator
    Corree Roofener
  • Years Active
    2024 - 2026
  • Episodes
    149
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © 2026 The Courage Coalition
  • Show Website
    The Courage Coalition