Best Of The Week: Root To Resilience Welcomes Grief And Light Host

 Two GOATS of life-affirming independent podcasts talked in Late January on the Root to Resilience podcast with creator/host Anupa Devi. On that hour-long episode on January 28th, Anupa welcomed Nina Rodriguez, creator/host of the Grief and Light podcast. 

 Nina has already been recognized with the 2025 award from Women Who Podcast Magazine. 

Anupa has just been nominated for the Woman Who Achieves Awards 2026 by Woman Who in recognition of her brand and business she built from scratch. 

Anupa is also a Women’s Podcasters Award 2025 Winner - Personal Development Category. 

With two women of such distinction, their conversation promised to sparkle, and it didn't disappoint. This is our Best Of The Week pick

Grief is something every one of us will face in life — yet so many of us are never taught how to navigate it.

In this deeply honest and compassionate episode of Root to Resilience, Anupa Devi and Nina Rodriguez discuss grief, loss, and resilience. Together, they explore how we can build emotional strength while honoring the very real pain that comes with losing someone we love.

Both Anupa and Nina share the unique bond of having lost a sibling at the age of 32 — a connection that brings depth, understanding, and tenderness to this discussion.

This conversation is a reminder that grief is not something to fix — it’s something to honor, tend to, and gently integrate into our lives.

Whether your loss is recent or many years ago, this episode offers reassurance, understanding, and hope.

The Root to Resilience podcast dives into practical tips, insightful conversations, and personal stories designed to empower you to find balance and resilience in today’s fast-paced world.

Anupa Devi continues: "Together, we’ll explore the mind, body, and soul connection, giving you the tools to face life’s challenges and thrive. Because resilience isn’t just a skill—it’s your superpower." 

 Root to Resilience is not a theoretical exercise, but more of an exploration of the mind, body, and soul connection, giving listeners the tools to face life’s challenges and thrive. Throughout the show, there's a strong focus on actionable steps, instead of the celebrity-driven, new-age advice that is more fiction than fact. 

Anupa Devi knows what she's talking about. She is a UK-based resilience coach, speaker, and podcaster helping people overcome limiting beliefs, build self-trust, and find purpose using storytelling, science, and spiritual wisdom for personal growth. She hosts workshops, offers 1:1 coaching, and speaks at events, empowering individuals to thrive through life's challenges by connecting mind, body, and soul.

  Root to Resilience isn't the only podcast focused on a growth mindset, but it’s one of the best, and its independence demonstrates once again that anything in audio that large networks and celebrities can do, indie podcasters can do better. So many of these podcasts project the message, "I did it, so can you." By contrast, Anupa Devi communicates in a supportive tone, conveying the message,"Let me help you." 

Anupa's guest on this episode, Nina Rodriguez, is the creator/host of The Grief and Light podcast, which explores grief, loss, and life in the "after" openly, authentically. Nina explains: "Our mission is to foster a grief-informed world, give a voice to the nuanced human experience of grief, and light the way for other grievers to feel hope as they navigate this reality." 

As creator, host, and producer, she has built the show into a platform that amplifies griever voices, fosters compassionate understanding, and illuminates pathways forward, showing that grief is not something to “fix,” but something to tend, honor, and live with. 

Nina is an excellent host, relying on honesty, sincerity, and a respect for her audience to attract listeners. There are plenty of podcasters from network-supported shows that offer therapy on their podcasts. While they may be professional, they lack the earnestness, honesty, attentiveness, and kindhearted approach that Nina Rodriguez seems to employ instinctively. 

On celebrity podcasts, one celebrity interviews the other, and often the most discussed topic is not surprisingly, themselves. When Anupa and Nina got together on Root to Resilience, both guest and host did talk about their personal experiences with grief, but always in the context of how their encounters with suffering can be instructional to listeners and lead them to actionable steps.

During the conversation, Nina explains, "Grief is an invitation to slow down and turn inward. Take the smallest, tiniest, most accessible forward. Shorten your timeline and stay in the present." 

At the end of the episode, Anupa asks Nina for advice for listeners, and Nina obliges with, "Grief needs expression. It needs an outlet." 

"Check in with yourself," Nina advises. "Ask yourself what you need at this moment?"

This episode is emblematic of how independent podcasters care deeply about their listeners/viewers and put everything into helping them with their life challenges, whether those challenges be grieving or searching for resilience and balance in life. 

If I needed help (I always do, by the way), would I ask Dr. Phil or Anupa Devi and Nina Rodriguez for guidance? Not even close. It would be Anupa and Nina every time!