Rooted in Wellness with Mona Sharma

A normal cholesterol result can feel like permission to stop worrying about your heart. You exercise, try to eat well, get your yearly blood work, and leave believing everything is fine. That is what makes heart disease so frightening. It can continue developing for years while the tests you have been taught to trust give you no reason to look any further.
In this episode of Rooted in Wellness, I sat down with Dr. Abid Husain to find out what can be missed when we rely on cholesterol and an EKG alone. We talk about the testing that can catch heart disease earlier, why women can have real heart problems even when traditional scans look clear, and how hormones, stress, blood sugar, sleep, and movement can change the picture. Most importantly, Dr. Husain shares what to ask for if you want a more complete view of your heart health before symptoms appear.
Dr. Husain is a triple board-certified cardiologist and integrative medicine physician who has worked across inpatient and outpatient cardiology. After years of treating heart failure and atherosclerosis, he stepped away from conventional practice and spent the next decade expanding his training in functional and cellular medicine. Today, he brings these disciplines together in his practice and teaches a systems-based approach to atherosclerosis through his Next Generation Medicine course.
What We Discuss:
05:55 Why cholesterol is the last number Dr. Husain wants to hear when assessing heart risk.
09:02 What can be going wrong years before the heart produces a single warning sign.
19:39 The overlooked blood markers that can reveal what a basic cholesterol panel misses.
33:25 How declining estradiol may quietly change a woman’s cardiac risk in midlife.
41:11 The real cardiovascular problem women were told was “just anxiety” because their scans looked clear.
48:37 What statins do beyond lowering cholesterol and why higher doses may come with a tradeoff.
1:01:04 Why the artery known as the “widowmaker” can turn someone’s first symptom into a cardiac emergency.
Learn more about Mona Sharma:
Download Your FREE Guide - 12 Wellness Tips to Unlock Your Best Health Now: Ready to reclaim your vitality? Download Mona’s 12 Wellness Tips and take actionable steps to transform your health, energy, and mindset. Get started now at monasharma.com/12tips 
Visit Mona's website: monasharma.com – Unlock powerful tools and wisdom rooted in wellness to elevate your health, energy, and clarity. Mona blends ancient healing practices with modern science to help you achieve lasting transformation.
Follow Mona on Instagram: Stay connected with Mona for daily inspiration, holistic health tips, and personal growth. Join the conversation on Instagram at @monasharma
Learn more about Dr. Abid Husain: 
Website: interlinkedmd.com
Instagram: @dr_abidhusain
YouTube: @DoctorAbidHusain 
Go deeper with Dr. Husain’s Next Generation Medicine course, a systems-based guide to understanding atherosclerosis: nextgenerationmedicine.co

Have you ever caught yourself repeating a pattern you were sure you had already healed? The person or situation may change, but somehow you end up in the same kind of relationship, carrying the same fear, or reacting in the same way. You understand the pattern, so why does it still have so much power over you?
In this episode of Rooted in Wellness, I sit down with Manex Ibar to explore why certain patterns can feel impossible to break, how the subconscious may influence the way we see ourselves, and what those recurring struggles may be trying to reveal. We also talk about the Sphinx Code, destiny versus free will, spiritual bypassing, modern distraction, and what nature can show us when we finally become quiet enough to listen.
Manex Ibar is a modern mystic, spiritual innovator, and creator of the Sphinx Code. Described by the Financial Times as “The Extreme Spiritual Guide” and known as the Doctor’s Shaman and the Billionaire’s Mystic, he has spent more than two decades blending ancient shamanic traditions, depth psychology, human energetics, and nature-based practices to guide people through profound inner transformation.
What’s Discussed
(10:05) Why so many people feel disconnected from themselves.
(12:18) Destiny, free will, and whether our patterns can change.
(17:23) What the Sphinx Code reveals about the subconscious.
(23:41) What happens when a wound becomes part of your identity.
(42:14) Why the wound may also contain the way forward.
(53:12) How modern distraction keeps us from seeing ourselves clearly.
(1:22:13) The questions that can reveal what a recurring pattern is protecting.
Listen to this episode to understand why recognizing a pattern is not always enough to break it, and what may be hiding underneath the part of your life that keeps repeating. 🎧
Thank You to Our Sponsors: 
Timeline: Timeline’s clinically proven formula is now available at a new, lower price. Mitopure now starts at $79, when you go to timeline.com/MONA 
Learn more about Mona Sharma:
Download Your FREE Guide - 12 Wellness Tips to Unlock Your Best Health Now: Ready to reclaim your vitality? Download Mona’s 12 Wellness Tips and take actionable steps to transform your health, energy, and mindset. Get started now at monasharma.com/12tips 
Visit Mona's website: monasharma.com – Unlock powerful tools and wisdom rooted in wellness to elevate your health, energy, and clarity. Mona blends ancient healing practices with modern science to help you achieve lasting transformation.
Follow Mona on Instagram: Stay connected with Mona for daily inspiration, holistic health tips, and personal growth. Join the conversation on Instagram at @monasharma
Learn more about Manex Ibar & Sphinx Code: 
Sphinx Code: sphinxcode.com
Manex Ibar: manexibar.com
Wisdom Quest: wisdom-quest.com
Download Sphinx Code on Apple: apps.apple.com/us/app/sphinx-code/
Download Sphinx Code on Google Play: play.google.com/store/apps/sphinxcode

Most of us know when we are drifting away from ourselves. We feel it in the sleep that stops restoring us, the anxiety that starts to feel familiar, the energy that never fully comes back, the cravings that get louder, the workouts that drain us instead of building us, and the quiet sense that our body is asking for something we keep trying to override.
The problem is that modern life has trained so many of us to normalize that state. We wake up and reach for our phones. We move through constant stimulation, blue light, low-grade stress, ultra-processed food, world events, long to-do lists, and the pressure to keep optimizing. Then we wonder why the body feels like it is always bracing, even when nothing is technically wrong.
In this episode, I sit down with my dear friend and mentor Dr. Scott Sherr to talk about the cellular side of that stress loop. Dr. Sherr is a Board Certified Internal Medicine Physician specializing in Health Optimization Medicine and Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy, and his work sits at the intersection of mitochondrial biology, the autonomic nervous system, and advanced tools for recovery. We talk about what he calls the Sympathetic Spiral, why the nervous system is not broken, how mitochondria shift when the body feels unsafe, and why burnout, hormonal chaos, broken sleep, inflammation, and low energy may keep coming back when the body never fully gets the signal that it is safe to recover.
What’s Discussed:
15:03 Why excitement, anxiety, and hypervigilance can feel so similar in the body.
20:29 The metabolic side of burnout and what creates the “wired but tired” state.
30:55 How high performers become accustomed to living in hypervigilance.
39:04 Why calming the nervous system can backfire when cellular energy is already depleted.
01:01:23 Why burnout is affecting people earlier and how to find the right entry point.
01:11:56 How methylene blue interacts with mitochondrial energy and oxidative stress.
01:24:57 The connection between estrogen shifts, mitochondrial stress, GABA, and sleep during perimenopause.
My hope is that this conversation helps you stop blaming yourself for exhaustion that has a physiological root. 
Learn more about Mona Sharma:
Download Your FREE Guide - 12 Wellness Tips to Unlock Your Best Health Now: Ready to reclaim your vitality? Download Mona’s 12 Wellness Tips and take actionable steps to transform your health, energy, and mindset. Get started now at monasharma.com/12tips 
Visit Mona's website: monasharma.com – Unlock powerful tools and wisdom rooted in wellness to elevate your health, energy, and clarity. Mona blends ancient healing practices with modern science to help you achieve lasting transformation.
Follow Mona on Instagram: Stay connected with Mona for daily inspiration, holistic health tips, and personal growth. Join the conversation on Instagram at @monasharma
Learn more about Dr. Scott Sherr:
Website: Troscriptions.com
Instagram: @troscriptions
OneBase: onebasehealth.com
For Practitioners
Explore the seven-module HOMeHOPe certification, cohort-based learning, clinical case discussions, and practitioner education Dr. Scott mentioned in the episode.
Explore HOMeHOPe practitioner education
Dr. Scott also invites you to the 2026 HOMeHOPe Conference, happening October 2–3, 2026, at the Drake Hotel in Chicago. The two-day event is open to practitioners and anyone interested in exploring the latest in health optimization, hormones, longevity, metabolic health, and more.
Learn more and reserve your seat at https://homehope.org/homehope-conference-2026. Use code MONA for 10% off your ticket!

Mushrooms are suddenly everywhere, and honestly, I love seeing this ancient medicine finally getting the attention it deserves. But between lion’s mane lattes, mushroom gummies, fruiting bodies, mycelium, and microdosing, how do you know what is actually supportive and what is simply great marketing?
In this episode of Rooted in Wellness, I sit down with my sweet friend Alli Schaper to take you into the incredible world of fungi. We talk about the mushrooms that may support your brain and body, what to look for before buying a supplement, and how microdosing is changing conversations around our habits, grief, joy, and even our fear of death.
Alli Schaper is the CEO and cofounder of SuperMush, host of Into the Multiverse, and cofounder and board member of Microdosing Collective, the first U.S. nonprofit dedicated to legal microdosing advocacy. She has been featured in Forbes 30 Under 30, National Geographic, Rolling Stone, Goop, Bloomberg, and Summit Series.
What’s Discussed:
(08:16) Why functional mushrooms may be difficult to feel when your body is already running on overdrive.
(19:06) Alli’s journey from chronic gut issues and multiple prescriptions to taking her health back into her own hands.
(29:56) The difference between culinary, functional, and psychedelic mushrooms.
(36:02) Fruiting body, mycelium, extract ratios, and what actually matters on the label.
(54:52) Why mushrooms have remained part of human healing for thousands of years.
(01:05:16) How mushrooms became what one of Alli’s teachers calls “instruments of joy.”
(01:09:47) What to understand about microdosing, protocols, sourcing, and responsible exploration.
Thank You to Our Sponsors:
Timeline: Timeline’s clinically proven formula is now available at a new, lower price. Mitopure now starts at $79, when you go to timeline.com/MONA 
Learn more about Mona Sharma:
Download Your FREE Guide - 12 Wellness Tips to Unlock Your Best Health Now: Ready to reclaim your vitality? Download Mona’s 12 Wellness Tips and take actionable steps to transform your health, energy, and mindset. Get started now at monasharma.com/12tips 
Visit Mona's website: monasharma.com – Unlock powerful tools and wisdom rooted in wellness to elevate your health, energy, and clarity. Mona blends ancient healing practices with modern science to help you achieve lasting transformation.
Follow Mona on Instagram: Stay connected with Mona for daily inspiration, holistic health tips, and personal growth. Join the conversation on Instagram at @monasharma
Learn More About Alli Schaper & SuperMush:
Website: allischaper.com
Instagram: @allischaper   
Website: supermush.com 
Instagram: @supermush

Most of us were taught to treat the body like something to fix. Pain shows up, so we chase the pain. Stress builds, so we try to calm the mind. Tension gets louder, so we stretch harder. But what if the body is not working against you? What if it has been communicating through the very signals we keep overriding?
In this episode, I sit down with Jason van Blerk of Human Garage to talk about fascia as one of the most misunderstood organs in the body, and why it may be a missing piece in how we understand chronic pain, stored emotion, tension, trauma, pressure, movement, and healing. We explore why pain may not always begin where it shows up, why the body is not just biomechanical, and how fascia may change the way we think about what the body holds, repeats, and struggles to release. 
Human Garage,  co-founded by Jason van Blerk and Aisha Rodrigue, is a wellness platform that teaches self-guided fascial movement, breathwork, and body awareness techniques designed to relieve tension, improve mobility, and promote self-healing.
What’s Discussed:
10:38 Why the body’s signals get overridden from a young age.
14:05 Why quick fixes may quiet pain without addressing why it was there.
20:32 What fascia actually is, and why it is more than most people realize.
22:31 How fascia may change the way we understand memory, emotion, and the body.
23:49 Why pain may show up in one area when the pattern begins somewhere else.
26:30 Why the body is pressurized, not just biomechanical.
35:17 Why trauma is not only psychological.
40:53 What can happen when the body finally begins to release.
46:50 How jaw tension may connect to what remains unexpressed.
01:00:24 Why breath and counter-rotation matter in Fascial Maneuvers.
01:05:08 A simple practice to help shift the body out of stress.
Listen to this episode if you have been trying to think your way through something your body may still be carrying.
Thank You to Our Sponsors:
Carol Bike: Visit carolbike.com/mona and use code MONA for a special discount.
Learn more about Mona Sharma:
Download Your FREE Guide - 12 Wellness Tips to Unlock Your Best Health Now: Ready to reclaim your vitality? Download Mona’s 12 Wellness Tips and take actionable steps to transform your health, energy, and mindset. Get started now at monasharma.com/12tips 
Visit Mona's website: monasharma.com – Unlock powerful tools and wisdom rooted in wellness to elevate your health, energy, and clarity. Mona blends ancient healing practices with modern science to help you achieve lasting transformation.
Follow Mona on Instagram: Stay connected with Mona for daily inspiration, holistic health tips, and personal growth. Join the conversation on Instagram at @monasharma
Learn More About Jason van Blerk, Aisha Rodrigue  & Human Garage: 
Website: humangarage.net 
Instagram: @jasonvanblerk 
Instagram: @aishahumangarage 
Human Garage Instagram: @humangarage