The Vital Goddess

Dianne Shepherd
  • 4.9 (14)
  • SEXUALITY
  • UPDATED WEEKLY

The Vital Goddess Podcast is a sensual, soulful space for midlife women who feel the call to come home to their bodies. Through embodiment practices, sacred feminine wisdom, Taoist and Tantric teachings, and intimate reflections, each episode invites you out of the thinking mind and into the living intelligence of your body.  This is a place to soften, remember your pleasure, reclaim your power, and explore what it truly means to live from embodied love, radiance, and desire—on your own terms.

  1. 6D AGO

    Sacred Sensual Movement: Returning to the Wisdom of Your Body

    Let Your Body Lead In a world that moves at relentless speed, many of us find ourselves living almost entirely in our heads—rushing, pushing, managing time, and overriding the quiet wisdom of the body. In this episode, I invite you to slow down and explore sensual, non-linear movement as a gentle yet powerful pathway back into presence, healing, and inner rhythm. We explore the difference between Kronos time—clock time, productivity, and pressure—and Kairos time, or soul time: the spacious, cyclical rhythm where the body naturally heals, digests, and integrates life. Through reflection, teaching, and a guided embodied practice, you’ll be invited to release story and let sensation lead you home. This episode is especially supportive if you’ve been feeling: overwhelmed or overstimulateddisconnected from your bodyemotionally stuck or looping in your mindtense, numb, or out of synccurious about movement as medicine rather than exercise In this episode, we explore: Why the body heals in Kairos time, not Kronos timeHow digestion, repair, and emotional processing require safety and slownessWhat “sensation over story” really means—and why it mattersHow sensual, wave-like movement supports nervous system regulationWhy pleasure, breath, and rhythm are essential for modern womenA gentle 5-minute sensual movement practice to help you drop into soul time This is an invitation to let your body lead, to listen inwardly, and to reconnect with the wisdom that’s already alive within you. Let's dive in!

    29 min

  2. JAN 30

    Radiant Self-Love: When Love Is Liberation/ Full Moon in Leo & Venus in Aquarius

    Under this luminous Full Moon in Leo on February 1st, we’re invited to return to a deeper, truer experience of self-love — not as something we earn or perform, but as something we emanate. This episode explores love as a living, embodied frequency rather than an act of self-sacrifice. With Venus traveling through Aquarius, a powerful reframe comes online: My love is liberation. Together, Leo and Aquarius remind us that joy is not the reward for giving — it is the source from which authentic love flows. In this episode, we explore: How so many women were conditioned to equate love with depletionWhy midlife often marks a sacred turning point where over-giving no longer worksThe heart and breasts as powerful, energetic centers of embodied loveWhy eros and pleasure are essential nutrients for a radiant, spacious heartHow ancient priestess wisdom honored sensuality as sacred powerA gentle, fully PG Tantric breast and heart meditation to reconnect you to your inner sourceWhen eros, heart, and pleasure are integrated, love becomes expansive rather than draining — a natural offering rather than a sacrifice. This Full Moon is not asking you to shine harder.  It’s asking you to shine freer. 🌹 Embodiment Practice Included This episode features a short, gentle PG Tantric Breast & Heart Meditation designed to: Nourish the heartRestore a sense of safety and warmth in the bodyReconnect love with pleasure rather than obligationThis practice can be done fully clothed, seated or lying down, and is always invitational. 🐍 Ancient Lineage Remembered We also touch on ancient goddess cultures, including the wisdom embodied by priestess traditions, where exposed breasts symbolized life force, nourishment, and sacred power — not performance, but presence. This is not something new we are learning.  It is ancient wisdom we are remembering through the body. So many of us were taught that love requires depletion.  This lunation offers a different truth. Happy Full Moon, love. Let's dive in. Dive deeper: Join us in the Vital Goddess Mastery program, a living temple to reclaim the sacredness of your body and the power of your pleasure. Learn more  here.

    29 min

  3. JAN 23

    Breathe Like a Goddess; The Ancient Art of Sensual Breathwork

    What if breathwork wasn’t something you did but a journey you entered? In this episode, Dianne invites you into the ancient, feminine art of sensual breathwork — a gentle yet powerful way to shift states, soften the nervous system, and come home to the body. We explore conscious connected breathing (CCB), where the inhale flows seamlessly into the exhale like a wave, guiding you out of the thinking mind and into deeper, more intuitive states of awareness. Not through force or catharsis, but through presence, rhythm, and safety. You’ll learn why nasal breathing is so supportive for the nervous system, encouraging diaphragmatic breath, coherence, and the cultivation of nitric oxide, sometimes called the “miracle molecule” , which helps signal relaxation, circulation, vitality and ease in the body. We also explore sensuality as sacred technology, with a special focus on scent. Aromatherapy has been used for thousands of years in women’s spiritual practices, including in Goddess cultures like ancient Crete, where aromatic oils were ritual allies for devotion, embodiment, and altered states. Scent bypasses the thinking mind and speaks directly to pleasure, memory, and intuition. When paired with breath, it becomes a powerful portal into the sacred feminine. ✨ In this episode, you’ll experience: Why conscious connected breath gently shifts states of awarenessThe power of nasal breathing for nervous system regulationHow scent activates sensuality, intuition, and pleasureA 5 minute guided Sensual Breath practice to help you soften, descend, and journey inwardAn invitation to explore what brings you into a swoon Altered states don’t require effort, force or even plant medicine.  They require permission & presence. Choose a scent you love, press play and let your breath lead you home. Let's dive in! Dive deeper: Join us in the Vital Goddess Mastery program Spring 2026 here Explore the Taste of the Temple offer here

    28 min

  4. JAN 16

    Building a Legacy of Love/ New Moon in Capricorn, Yin/Yang Power & Embodied Love

    What if legacy wasn’t about striving…  but about how you love? In this episode of The Vital Goddess Podcast, I’m sharing a New Moon reflection inspired by the upcoming New Moon in Capricorn — a lunation that invites us to root into what we’re building long-term, not just in our work or goals, but in our bodies, our relationships, and the way we move through life. You don’t need to follow astrology for this episode to land.  I share how tuning into the rhythm of the New Moon and Full Moon became especially grounding for me during midlife and menopause, when our hormonal cycles shift and the body is longing for a new, steady pulse. Inside this episode, we explore: A feminine reframe of legacy as what lives on because of how you loveWorking with a yin word and a yang word for the year — and the alchemy created when they meetHow the New Moon’s connection with Pluto invites embodied power and deep truthHealing our relationship with action, effort, and over-doingSoftening an over-yanged mind and welcoming intuition, imagination, and feminine intelligenceA guided breathwork ritual to integrate yin and yang, left and right brain, structure and magicThis episode is an invitation to pause, breathe, and consciously choose what you’re building from the inside out.  An invitation to let love be your architect. Let's dive in. Dive deeper... Learn more about the Vital Goddess Mastery program and join us here. Learn more about the Taste of the Temple offer here.

    23 min

  5. JAN 9

    Jade Egg as Movement Medicine/ Restoring Pelvic Health Through Breath, Flow, Deep Listening & Self Love

    This week on the pod I dive into a topic I’m super passionate about: The Taoist Jade Egg practice. In this episode, I share the heart of my approach to working with the Jade Egg through breath, flow, subtle movement, deep listening & self love. Rather than training the body to perform, this work is about restoring relationship with your inner landscape so safety, trust, sensation and vitality can return naturally.  I introduce Jade Rebirth, my embodied approach to teaching the Taoist Jade Egg practice.  We explore why flow is foundational to healing, how fascia responds to gentle rhythm and time, and what it means to cultivate true strength without armoring. This episode is an invitation to soften, listen, and let the body lead. ✨ We explore: Why flow matters How gentle movement supports circulation, sensation, and releaseThe role of fascia in softening and integrationHow the body releases without reliving storiesWhy true strength doesn’t require tensionCan’t wait to share this one with you! 🌊 Explore Jade Rebirth More Deeply If you’d like to explore the foundations of Jade Rebirth, I’ve created a short Jade Rebirth Companion PDF you can download right here.  Jade Rebirth is also woven into the container of the Vital Goddess Mastery program, where we explore this work slowly and experientially through guided practice and live Temple Sessions. Learn more about Vital Goddess Mastery and join us here. Learn more about Taste of the Temple and join us here.

    22 min

  6. JAN 2

    Sacred Integration: Strength, Softness & the Super Full Moon in Cancer

    Happy New Year! 🎉  And Happy Full Moon in Cancer! 🌕♋ In this episode, we meet beneath the first Full Moon of the year (on January 3rd) , a luminous Super Full Moon in Cancer, to set a nourishing and sustainable tone for 2026. Cancer invites us home — into the body, into feeling, into emotional intelligence that soothes us back into our rhythm.  With the Sun closely framed by Venus and Mars, this lunation offers rare support for weaving tenderness and strength, Yin and Yang, love and action into a more integrated way of living. In this episode, I share a guiding philosophy for the year ahead that I call Sacred Integration — the devotion to honoring both structure and sensation, discipline and pleasure, fitness and sensuality as essential wellness allies rather than opposites. I also offer a personal reflection on returning to a consistent fitness routine through the barre method while deepening my devotion to my Jade Egg practice, and how this balance has brought greater harmony to my body and nervous system in midlife. You’ll be guided through a 10-minute ish embodiment ritual, designed to help you feel this integration in your body — grounding strength without force, softness without collapse — and to begin the year rooted in rhythm rather than extremes. This episode is a reset.  A place to soften, breathe, and come home to your core and design the year ahead in aligment. 🌊 In This Episode Why the Cancer Super Full Moon is a powerful moment for homecomingHow Venus and Mars working together support lasting wellness and intimacyWhy wellness practices can become unwell when taken to extremesSacred Integration as a new paradigm for midlife vitalityA gentle Lunar Love embodiment ritual to anchor strength and softnessIf this episode resonates and you’re longing for ongoing rhythm, embodiment, and support, the $99 Taste of the Temple offers a gentle initiation into the Vital Goddess Mastery — a space to explore Sacred Integration through breath, sensual self-care, and sisterhood.  Learn more and join us here With deep gratitude, I honor my barre teachers Fred DeVito and Elisabeth Halfpapp, creators of Core Barre Fit.  Their pioneering work and devotion to intelligent strength, integrity, and longevity in the body have profoundly shaped how I relate to fitness and embodied wellness in midlife. Learn more about their work here

    22 min

  7. 12/19/2025

    Pleasure Is the Portal: Bringing Your 2026 Mantra to Life

    As we close out 2025 and stand at the threshold of the Winter Solstice, this episode offers a gentle, embodied way to meet the year ahead. If you’ve chosen a word or mantra for 2026 but it hasn’t quite landed in your body yet, this one's for you. In this final episode of the year, Dianne explores why pleasure is the missing link in manifestation and how intentions come alive when the body is included. Inspired by the idea that affirmations are most powerful when we’re “in the vortex,” this episode translates manifestation into the language of the nervous system, breath, presence, and sensual embodiment. Inside this episode: Why your body must believe your mantra before it can unfoldHow pleasure creates the internal safety needed for creationWhat it truly means to be “in the vortex” from a somatic perspectiveA gentle embodied practice to help your 2026 word come aliveThis is a threshold episode. A moment to slow down, soften, and allow your next season to emerge from within. ✨  If you’re feeling the pull to be supported in this work, the Solstice portal into the Vital Goddess Mastery is open for a few more days.  Join us in the VGM Temple at 50% off our normal tuition. You can learn more and join us here.

    36 min

  8. 12/12/2025

    Slow Down and Rejuvenate: A Solstice Breathwork Ritual for You

    In this episode, we slow down together for a deeply nourishing end-of-year ritual designed for women in midlife. As the Solstice approaches and the year begins to close, your body often wants softness, warmth and replenishment more than pressure or resolutions.  This episode honors that need with a sensual Taoist practice called Kidney Breathing. It is one of the most restorative feminine practices for rebuilding vitality, sensuality, and emotional resilience. We begin by acknowledging what this year has asked of you and inviting your nervous system into a state of rest.  Then we move into a slow, guided breathwork ritual that helps you release exhaustion and refill your inner well.  This practice supports your hormonal balance, your sensual energy, your mood, and your sense of inner rootedness as you prepare for the new year. Kidney Breathing is especially powerful for women in midlife.  It nourishes your yin essence, awakens your second spring energy, and helps you enter the new year grounded and deeply centered instead of force and burnout. This episode is meant to feel like a warm bath for your entire system. By the end, you will feel fuller, softer, more centered, and more ready to step into the new year from a place of grounded feminine power. Inside this episode: • Why the end of the year can feel heavy for women in midlife • Why your kidneys are key to your vitality and sensuality • How to release the emotional residue of the year • A guided short, sweet and sensual Kidney Breathing ritual • How to prepare your body for a new year with softness and intention If you loved this episode, share it with a friend who needs a moment of deep nourishment.  And if you want to go deeper, come join me inside my mystery school where we practice these arts all year long. The Solstice presale portal is open at 50% off our normal tuition. Learn more and join us here.

    29 min
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4.9
out of 5
14 Ratings

About

The Vital Goddess Podcast is a sensual, soulful space for midlife women who feel the call to come home to their bodies. Through embodiment practices, sacred feminine wisdom, Taoist and Tantric teachings, and intimate reflections, each episode invites you out of the thinking mind and into the living intelligence of your body.  This is a place to soften, remember your pleasure, reclaim your power, and explore what it truly means to live from embodied love, radiance, and desire—on your own terms.

Information

  • Creator
    Dianne Shepherd
  • Years Active
    2021 - 2026
  • Episodes
    231
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © 2026 The Vital Goddess
  • Show Website
    The Vital Goddess

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