Check Out Marcella Friel’s Story

Today we’d like to introduce you to Marcella Friel.

Hi Marcella, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
My name is Marcella Friel, and I help health-conscious women heal the spiritual roots of their struggles with food and body.

Given that I’ve never dieted a day in my life, how did I come into this rather unlikely livelihood?

In 1994 I discovered an escape clause in the rat-race contract and left corporate America to cook for cloistered meditators at Gampo Abbey Buddhist monastery on a blustery cliff in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, under the guidance of Pema Chödrön.

When a monk remarked that I had found my “right livelihood” in cooking, I pursued a culinary-arts path that led me to certify as a natural foods chef at the Natural Gourmet Institute in New York City, under the direction of the late Annemarie Colbin.

I cooked and taught at meditation retreat centers across North America, including Drala Mountain Center (north of Fort Collins), Spirit Rock Meditation Center in California, and elsewhere.

I also taught healing culinary arts at Bauman College in Northern California from 2005 to 2013.

Even though I was absolutely in love with working as a chef and culinary arts instructor, something was calling me to go deeper.

I had been working with an EFT Tapping practitioner for a few years by this time and thought, “Okay, I’m going to become a practitioner myself and help people figure out what to eat.”

So I certified as an EFT practitioner in 2014, and–fortunately–I had no idea what I was getting myself into.

When one of my early clients said to me, “Some women use razor blades; I use food,” I was completely stopped in my tracks.

On the one hand, as one of those rare women who’s never dieted a day in my life, I had no idea what she was talking about.

On the other hand, as a woman who has survived multiple complex trauma, I knew exactly what she was talking about.

I began to draw fearlessly on my deepest knowing—from my decades of 12-step recovery and Buddhist meditation practice, along with my Tapping training—to dive headlong into the root traumas that were causing my clients to use food to soothe themselves.

At some point the words “Women, Food & Forgiveness” floates across my mind like a banner trailing an airplane.

So in 2018, after the crazy success of my online course “Lose Emotional & Physical Weight with Tapping,” and while I was under contract for my first book, “Tap, Taste, Heal,” I founded a program called The Women, Food & Forgiveness Academy that I run to this day.

It’s a 12-month initiation into unconditional self-love for women who struggle with yo-yo dieting, binge eating, sugar addiction, and body shaming. It’s an extremely un Weight-Watcher type of program, and the results have been truly miraculous.

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
I would say, if it’s a smooth road, it’s not your road!

Actually, one of the biggest challenges was handling the sudden surge of success I experienced in early 2018, when my first online course for DailyOM, “Lose Emotional & Physical Weight With Tapping,” became their #1 best-selling course and stayed in the top 10 for most of that year.

Women started pouring into my work, and I had no idea what to do with them. I had been working almost exclusively 1-on-1 at that time, and there was no way I could have worked with all those women at once.

So in June 2018 I launched my Women, Food & Forgiveness Academy, completely from the hip.

It was a lot of improvisation, just making things up as I went along. But my biggest learning and my biggest joy has been the power of the community that has grown up around the Academy. The women who come through these virtual doors often make friends for life.

The other part that still brings me enormous joy is watching how women heal inside this community.

I mean, I’m at the helm, and sometimes I still do 1:1 work if a woman really needs that support, but to see a woman just learn to love and forgive herself, no matter the number on the scale, is something that I–and they–never imagined could be possible, and I get to witness and midwife that all the time. It’s truly a privilege.

Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
What sets me apart from others is that I have this crazy-quilt eclectic mix of tools and themes that I use in my work. I’ve been a student of Tibetan Buddhism since 1997 and a teacher since 1996, and I’m always referencing Dharma teachings, along with wisdom I’ve garnered along the way from being in 12-step recovery for nearly 30 years.

And then there’s teachings on The Heroine’s Journey that I’ve cribbed from Joseph Campbell that form the curriculum basis of my Women, Food & Forgiveness Academy. I like to say that all acts of healing are acts of heroism, because to truly heal–rather than just feel better–it takes courage–to face the shadow, to be supported, to let go of the familiar, even if it’s painful.

So many coaches who try to help women heal their relationship with food are themselves recovering from disordered eating, and I notice that often there’s still that subtle message of food being the enemy.

Well, I’ve never dieted a day in my life, I’ve never had a gripe about my body weight–and on top of that, I was a chef for over 20 years, and I love food.

So when women finally get that message that there’s nothing wrong with wanting food, and that everything they’ve ever done has come from a place of love, and that their lives are a Heroine’s Journey, it’s incredibly liberating.

Before we go, is there anything else you can share with us?
I’m not a big social media girl. The best places to find me online are at Insight Timer (https://insighttimer.com/womenfoodandforgiveness), where you can find me live most Saturday mornings at 8:00 a.m. mountain time.

The other great place to find me is at “The Marcella Principle” on Substack (https://themarcellaprinciple.substack.com/), which includes “The Marcella Principle” podcast, along with a weekly EFT Tapping audio sent right to your inbox if you subscribe.

Pricing:

• You can pick up my free PDF, “Tapping for Self-Forgiveness,” here: https://www.womenfoodandforgiveness.com/tapping-for-self-forgiveness
• I offer a 90-minute intensive for $495: https://www.womenfoodandforgiveness.com/calling-your-soul-home
• My Women, Food & Forgiveness Academy opens January 2026, at $285 per month: https://www.womenfoodandforgiveness.com/women-food-and-forgiveness-the-heroines-journey
• Join me live and in person at Joyful Journey Hot Springs in June 2026: https://insighttimer.com/retreat/the-marcella-principle-spiritual-regeneration-for-a-world-in-decline-retreat-for-women
• Get your copy of my book, “Tap, Taste, Heal”: https://www.northatlanticbooks.com/shop/tap-taste-heal/

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.womenfoodandforgiveness.com/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/womenfoodandforgiveness
• Youtube: http://youtube.com/channel/UCKspMoUfj0_2rvM7RzvBtoA
• Other: https://insighttimer.com/womenfoodandforgiveness

Image Credits
Photos available courtesy of Heidi and Tara, the wild and wacky goddesses at In Her Image Photography in Petaluma, California.