Feeding Fatty

Choose You! Pick Your Non-Negotiables and Set Your Intensions For Growth with Sarafina Arthur-Williams

What a great message and very timely, Choose You! It's been a difficult year and most everyone has been effective in some manner. Now as the world is opening up, it's a great time to look inward and think about our own mental health. Its important for our growth. Self-care is important to being happy, healthy, and the best you you can be.

About Sarafina

Sarafina Arthur-Williams is the CEO and founder of Intentional Simplicity LLC, a wellness-based mental health private practice. As a wellness and creative consultant, she educates her clients and mental health practitioners about positive psychology, art therapy, and the value of wellness and mindfulness. She is ranked on Feedspot's top psychology bloggers of 2020 and features as a guest speaker on a variety of mental health platforms. To encourage sustainability, Sarafina documents how she practices wellness in her daily life through her online presence.

www.liveintentionallysimplistic.com

www.feedingfatty.com

Full Transcript Below

Choose You! Pick Your Non-Negotiables and Set Your Intensions For Growth with Sarafina Arthur-Williams

00:00:22 Roy Hello, everybody. Welcome to another episode of Feeding Fatty. This is your host Roy. We are chronicling our journey through, becoming more healthy on, trying to lose some weight, get back in the gym. We're talking about us, as individuals and we also, we have professionals and different disciplines that come on as guests from time to time. Today's no different Terry I'll let you introduce Sarafina.

00:00:48 Terry Sarafina Arthur-Williams is the CEO and founder of Intentional Simplicity, LLC, a wealth wellness based mental health, private practice as a wellness and creative consultant. She educates her clients and mint and mental health practitioners about positive psychology, art therapy and the value of wellness and mindfulness. She has ranked on feed spots, top Psychology Bloggers of 2020, and features as a guest speaker on a variety of mental health platforms to encourage sustainability Sarafina documents, how she practices wellness in her daily life, through her online presence. Welcome to the show, Sarafina, we're happy to have you thank you so much for having me.

00:01:37 Roy Yeah. Thanks for being here. There's so much to unpack with this. I'm going to just, first off, let you tell us, kind of how you found yourself in this events led up UT and where you are today.

00:01:52 Sarafina Sure. I opened intentional simplicity in 2020, truly because of my lack of support around my mental health, my culture, my intersectionality, and my education. I was definitely struggling through my PhD program while also trying to find my niche within my field. There are lots of things that get in the way of me getting the resources to my clients, for example, insurance access, sustainability, things like that. I really was trying to implement something that I could help my clients create a sustainable well-based life. In that I teach people how to learn more about themselves, implement their authenticity and creativity within their practice business life or like their personal lives. From there I also support people in understanding their identity exploration is a huge part of, intentional simplicity. We're really here to help us honor what we've been through and how our journey is going to manifest.

00:03:02 Roy And you are a master's level practitioner. What does, what does that mean? Exactly. Yeah, so.

00:03:07 Sarafina I got my master's in psychology as well, as far as fine arts and art therapy and counseling. It was a whole semester of learning. It kind of just like ended up building the right, sustainable, I guess, practice for me to help my clients with. From there I decided I wanted to know more about clinical psychology and that's what made me pursue for the education. Currently I wanted to know how can I use my credentials and my degrees and my education to really create a sustainable practice for other people. I've been shifting my view of mental health and have been looking a lot more into industrial psychology and workplace environments and self care and wellness within the spaces, because I recognize the value of it. I'm really excited to be in this space and to use my gifts, to serve others.

00:04:07 Roy Wow. Like all those different disciplines, because they're all very important in our self-care. I think we can just get back to the basics for just a minute that, like us trying to improve our eating and eat better exercise and all that. Well, it is part of self-care, but also self care makes all those things easier. I mean, it's circular in respect that, we have to really take care of ourselves because, for a lot of us, it's that emotional. If it's the eating, it's the emotional eating, excuse me. Or maybe even, the emotional drain of stress from the day, instead of going to the gym in the evening, it's like, let's just get the popcorn chocolate and, put on a good movie and say, what's that?

00:05:02 Sarafina Yeah, it's very comforting. And, it's, it gets us out of the discomfort of what we've been going throughout the day. It takes a lot of energy for us as humans to move through our days. You get a chance to just decompress, I bet we jumped on top of that.

00:05:20 Terry There's so much energy suck and going on. It's just crazy. Absolutely. Some of it's self-imposed, I mean, it's like, okay, this is this really happening. I mean, what's going on here.

00:05:36 Roy Yeah. I like the message of the company it's and tell me if I get it exactly right. It's intentional simplicity, is that correct? Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, yeah. I mean that is such a, it's such a strong term because I think also as humans, we try to over-complicate things and life and really, most things that are good and good for should not be that difficult. I don't know if that's something that you found in your studies or as you talk to different people that you work with is that, we tend to over complicated ourselves, but then we also get ourselves in these complex situations that even start heaping more on us.

00:06:23 Sarafina Absolutely. I find that intentional simplicity was created to help myself, sustain a wellness practice as a wellness space therapist. It's so important for me to Abe to be able to balance and ground myself prior to seeing someone else. How was I going to do this? And with my schedule, I was so jam packed with classes, with work, with family, with just like personal needs. I was really concerned as to why this couldn't be much more simpler. Why did I have to work so hard just to get the things that I needed? And in there, I was like, I'm going to try to intentionally simply be me and do these things as best as I can. Listening to my body, do I need to have a meal right now? Do I need to have water? Do I need to go to sleep? Do I need to take a shower? Do we need to go for a walk? Your body in itself was a huge indicator of your wellness.

00:07:21 Sarafina The first thing that's most important is understanding how to connect with you. That is where the identity focus stems from, and learning about what your body is asking for versus what your Mo your soul may need, versus what your mind may need versus what the environment's doing to you. There are a lot of things that we must consider when we're creating our self-care, but it has to be with you in mind or at work,

00:07:47 Roy Which is also another, I think, I don't know if it's another way to say or another step in the process is they, self-realization I mean, we really have to consider, where we are, what we're doing, and self-realization is not the word that I'm looking for. I'm trying to think, but just being able to be true to ourselves, but also to be, honest about what is going on around us and where are these, where's that pressure, that stress where's that uncomfortableness? Where does it come from? Because a lot of the times we actually, self-aware, that was the word I'm looking for. Self-aware, sorry, but we, a lot of times we have the power to change these things. It may be uncomfortable. We talk about that, with me and Terry, there's some things that, we talk about doing that. It's like, E I know it would help, but it's just an uncomfortable step.

00:08:50 Sarafina Yeah. That discomfort is a huge indicator of, preference, ? and for humans, we don't really get the space to decide what's best for us because we're always around other things, other influences. In that we lose the ability to decide what really is best for us. We're constantly second guessing or using other means to address issues that aren't really here. For example, substance abuse, emotional abuse, all of these different things that we're putting onto ourselves, that don't really serve us anymore. I create the self care into our wellness based approaches to our healing, mainly because how can you be sustainable with you? You are who you're with the entire time you're here on her. In that, how can you use the sane being with you, knowing how to nourish your basic needs is the first step. Knowing that it doesn't have to be hard is okay, too, ing that you don't have to be uncomfortable to grow no matter what, whether it's uncomfortable or comfortable, we are growing.

00:10:06 Sarafina When we set our intention, it helps us determine in what direction we're going in. That's where the support of a therapist or coach, family, friends, whatever helps you keep, what is the word accountable for your intentions and your goals? So it's truly a whole wellness based approach.

00:10:28 Roy Yeah. And, we talk about, our, we talk about the self-awareness and, self-realization and all that, but also how much of this is put on us by society, our need for, justification or our need of others to, acceptance or their, whatever that is, because I think about that a lot with, and I recounted this the other day, but there was a story in, on our local news station that they did about a guy that he used to be an options trader. It was, you know, probably very stressful. He probably made a lot of money, but he had a health event. Now he is a muralist painting, stuff on walls and doing all this work. They interviewed him and he was like, so happy. He's like, I can't believe I did that for so long, but what it made me think about was that, sometimes it's that inner self that we want to achieve more.

00:11:36 Roy We want to do this. We think that we thrive in this environment. Conversely, I think that sometimes it's the thought about what others think about us? what, yeah. What's, society's measure of success for me, the house I live in or the salary or the job title that I have, and I don't know part of this is getting old. It's easy, at my age, because I've been through all this and now I can look back and say, none of that stuff is worth it. It's what is on our inside. What makes us truly happy? That's what we have to pursue.

00:12:16 Sarafina Absolutely. Yeah. A lot of the transitioning occurs within, like the best work occurs in those transitional moments when you're really faced with who you are, what the world needs of you and what you really want.

00:12:35 Roy Yeah. Do you find that working with the people that you work with is the struggle, I mean, I know it's up to us to change, but is this a pressure that we put on ourself or is it, do you think it's more that it's this societal view that we need to kind of let go of that?

00:12:54 Sarafina Absolutely. I think we can't negate the value of culture. Knowing that we are in a space that culture permeates everything that we do to say that it's just our environment or just us or, them, it takes away from all the things that make you who you are. And that is an intersectional person. That's a person that has many parts that creates one whole. By throwing away our environment and saying like, I'm going to focus all on me, you lose the connection of what it's like to have people around. We speak in circles, we grow in circles and we're all connected. By saying, okay, well, I'm going to focus mainly on the environment. They lose what you bring to the table. It's a constant battle of whether or not, and I hate to say the word battle, but what works best for you and what is your environment bringing to the table and what are you like holding on to?

00:13:54 Sarafina A lot of the things that we explore when we're doing that inner work is what emotions are yours and which ones aren't, what has someone brought into your space that has landed on you? And now you're taking on that energy. For example, you go to work and your boss has an awful morning and they come talk to you and they have an attitude, and they're giving you all this extra work to do. In that you immediately become angry and you're now taking on the boss's energy and then your energy and the next person you see, and then you're moving on and moving on, and this is your workspace. This is where you guys want to profit. This is where you want things to be moving. Now your emotions have become the focus rather than the task at hand. We think about these intentions and these goals and these, things that we want for ourselves, make sure you're really exploring what's coming.

00:14:48 Sarafina Who is it coming from? If you were the person that's going through, whatever you may be going through, it's much easier to access that information rather than to get the information as someone else that has landed onto you. That's why therapy is awesome because you sit there and you talk to one person about the things that are going inside of you without the clutter of the world in that space, but your therapist or the person who's helping you guys progress, should be aware of the culture that you, in the experiences of the environment, that you've been a part of your family, how they impacted your job, how that impacts your finances, all of these different things. It is a holistic approach when you're doing internal work. We often negate, we negate all the other parts that make us strong.

00:15:42 Roy That's true, but that's a hard thing. I don't know if it's, it may not be simplistic enough just to Blaine some ideas out there, but, that's something that, I don't know why we've, it's not that there's anything really bad going on in our life, but for some reason over the last few weeks, that conversation has had, we've had more and more about not letting other people's problems be put upon us, but I'm telling you it's hard because, if buddy, somebody in the outside world roughs me up then, unfortunately Terry is the closest one to me. She probably gets some of that runoff, but, are there any, I guess coping mechanisms or, like, I'm your boss and I come at you and like, okay, I had a bad drive in this morning and now I'm in the office and I'm like, Hey, why don't you have this done?

00:16:38 Roy Or you didn't do it just like, exactly. Like I wanted in blah, just like piling on and on until you feel small. It's like, how do we protect ourselves from that? Or how can we distance to be able, because it's easy to verbally say, oh, what, that's that guy's problem. He had a bad day, this or that, but it's, well, I'll speak for me. It's harder to release that. I can, I guess intuitively or, intellectually. I know that's, what's going on. That's like, man, I didn't do anything. I'm just sitting here minding my own business, but still, I would tend to carry that with me through the rest of the day instead of being able to release it. I guess, I don't know if you've got any words for that.

00:17:29 Sarafina Yeah, absolutely. You, you just made me get a brain blast. I was speaking with one of my clients and they were talking about how, their work environment makes them very reactive rather than responsive. In those spaces, you have to be responsive rather than reactive because you must let it sink in and then respond to your environment. This person is a medical professional, so they're constantly moving and they have been in the swing of COVID. And that pressure that's there. What you just said to me was released. I just, it sounds like we have these three options that we can do in these moments when we're confronted with another experience, which is we can react, respond, or release, and to do these things is to first recognize what's really showing up. That first step is identifying what sparks or triggers what brings up, what comes up for you when you're having this conversation with someone else, do you feel sense of ease?

00:18:32 Sarafina Do you feel calm? Do you feel frustrated, angry, sad, apprehensive, worried all of these things. We often don't have the language to these emotions, which makes it difficult for us to address what's really going on, which makes it even more difficult for the person responding to you to respond appropriately. Because if you're really sad and you're expressing anger and you get kicked out of work, that's different than do you need time off? And can we talk about what's going on later? That's a much easier response to like take into yourself and then experience what happens next rather than now, my boss is mad at me. Now this is happening. Now this is happening. Now I have to go and all started about you, just feeling sad. That was what was showing up for you. We must consider the language you're using. Within workspace spaces, our leaders must also be aware of how to respond to our employees and to one another.

00:19:31 Sarafina If I'm going to continue, if you guys are all right with that, but then we go from there and then we say, so where is it showing up? Is it showing up within your mental wellness? Is it showing up within your spiritual and your professional, your physical, your health overall, where are these things or emotions coming up in your bonus? And when we talk about all the different parts of our wellness, truly think about you, what makes you, who you are in all dimensions, and help you recognize, do I have a hardship within my interpersonal relationships? Is it hard for me to have relationships with other people? Is that where I get my, a lot of, distress or discomfort from, or is it my physical health? That something that I really can't reach because I'm seeing the environment impacting so much more than seeing my progress internally.

00:20:23 Sarafina There's a lot of things that we can focus on, which helps you narrow down. Instead of thinking, I have to do all of these things, while also managing my emotions. I'll also managing the world around me while also figuring out how to get to the next thing in the day. Take it one step at a time and ask yourself these questions. What is showing up for me? Where is it showing up? how can our, myself in this moment. From here, I'd like to do these things with clients who have like really speedy schedules, which is five minute emergency self-care plans. For example, you have five minutes to say, I'm going to go use the rest, do it in that time, you do your affirmations. You maybe do some deep breathing. You maybe go for a light walk or get a drink of water. These things in itself, slow your brain down and tell you to bring it back to a grounding.

00:21:17 Sarafina When the, when were getting heightened in these emotional spaces, it's likely that our body is responding to, survival rather than, just living, ? and that's because we're humans, that's what we do. Our mind is ready to keep us safe. However, when we are going through these times, the best thing that we can do for ourselves is to talk to yourself, bring yourself into a place where you can change your mind, because your mind is needing to be changed. You're not in a fear based space. You're not hurting, you're not in need of survival. You're okay, what do you need? And how can you move forward? Other things you can do journaling, you can have peer groups, maybe a work buddy, or a accountability buddy, block your time out. I'm going to disclose as a person who has ADHD, but has to be very, on schedule as an entrepreneur and a boss and a CEO and a therapist.

00:22:18 Sarafina And all of these things. I pack my day with self care before I schedule anything else. For the morning, I don't start working or seeing anyone until 12 because I need that time to get up. I don't like mornings. I need to make sure I've got a coffee. I could take a shower if I wanted to it go sit outside. By noon, hopefully Sarafina has herself together to start the day. From there, if I have a client after, so I take maybe 30 minutes to journal or talk to a friend who just encouraging me. It really is about what do I need to make it through my day? That's sustainable. These things are all within myself. This is me saying, I'm going to reach out to someone. I like, I'm going to make a meal. I'm going to go for a walk. It's just picking you in the times when you need to be chosen, ? and we often negate that.

00:23:14 Roy Imagine in your job that more, oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Go ahead. The last.

00:23:19 Sarafina Part is to celebrate your growth. That is because recognize that you are growing and you're progressing in a positive direction, even though it is uncomfortable, have little celebration kits, that have like maybe notes that a friend has said to you about your progression or, the things that you've done, maybe have like gratitude circles, where you connect with people once a month and talk about all the great things. You've because you've probably done a million things that are awesome within a month that we don't really tap into and they can be very small or very large, no matter what addressing it, acknowledging that you are doing well is a wonderful thing to do for your self care.

00:23:59 Roy I like that gratitude circle. That's awesome. Yeah. We talk about that a lot, celebrating the small things because, and I have a business podcast and something I talk about over there a lot is, we have 10 things on our to-do list today. We get seven done and we'll spend the rest of our day beating ourselves up about the three week done. It's like, well, we got 70%. If we, I use the baseball analogy. If you could hit 700 in baseball, you'd be a gazillionaire. Why shouldn't we celebrate ourselves that we did 70%? I mean, it's, and I'm not telling you I've mastered that yet. I'm still working, but it's like, we try and not the other thing I have to give a lot of, props for is your job, because I'm telling you if somebody came in and plopped on my accounts right now and started telling me their problems, I'd be like, you don't know that I have love it.

00:24:55 Roy It must be a huge emotional drain, for you to help people. So, you know, thank you for that. Thank you for why you do know that the individuals you help, probably thank you tremendously as well, but it's such a, cause we're talking about this self care and what other people put on us, but you're a little different, you invite people to come in and put this stuff on you on that. I know it's a little different because it's not directed at you, but still, you develop caring and, other, feelings for people that you help. I'm sure that's like, Ugh, so yeah,

00:25:34 Sarafina For sure. Within my training, I also understand what it's like for me to be, someone who holds emotions and hold space for other people. That is why I get to decide what my self care is going to be the most important thing for me. You've brought up something really wonderful, which is like, based off of your role in society, your career, your plan, your goals, that's the kind of self care that you need to be implementing. ? So, what is the strengths required for my emotionally intensive job? how much self care do I need rather than someone who doesn't have an emotionally intensive job, but they need to get out and exercise a lot more because they're sitting in front of the rest of the whole time. There's a lot of different things that we can question to help us explore, which one's best for us.

00:26:26 Sarafina Another good one is like sometimes people think self care is selfish and you're negating the things that are important when in truth to not choose you in times when you have to, disappoint is the service to who you are, because you are the most important part of your wellness. Every time that you don't choose you, when you needed to choose you teach yourself that's okay and that's not okay. That's not what you want. So the language is very important. How you talk about these issues that you're going through. Also how you talk about, the strengths that you have because of who you are. There's a lot of things that we can do together to implement wellness in a way that, myself and my client are thriving out of the space that we've created rather than, hurting or like counter transferring or transferring emotions onto one another.

00:27:28 Sarafina It's really important that therapist will the practitioner have that mindset prepared. Yeah.

00:27:35 Terry Yeah. And that's true. I mean, self-care is unselfish and it's the best thing that you can do so many people. Don't realize that until you're like deep into all my, it ended a fog, ?

00:27:52 Roy Yeah, yeah. It's just like too, I don't feel like, I can be the best partner to Terry if I'm, got health issues. That's one thing that, is really become, not that I have any, but we, it's just become more of a realization that we don't want it to get that way. This, the self care getting healthy, that journey is more important because of those things that you say, I can't be my best for others if I am not at my best. I think it gets back to sometimes our jobs too, that we self-sacrifice because of a job. I think we have to be careful. We need our income and we need that. Also, the reciprocation, because believe me, a company will cut you in a heartbeat when they need to. Yet we put up with all of this stuff where, we don't take care of ourselves.

00:28:50 Roy We don't exercise, we don't eat, we don't have that time. Then, the stresses that go with that. So, it's difficult, but there's an old song that says, I love the line. It says something about, surrender, but don't give yourself away. And that's so very important. It's a fine line to develop where that is, but we have to always keep ourselves in mind. Mm.

00:29:17 Sarafina Yes, that's beautiful. I, I hear that. We, I see us as being in like on a tether within our wellness and we're always being pulled away, but then always tries to come back to ourselves, always being pulled away and trying to come back to ourselves. It'd be much easier if you just could be with yourself while also going. You're not always having to track back into you are. But that takes work. That takes a lot of grounding work. Also recognizing where you fit and where you don't recognizing where you are wanted and where you're not wanted, recognize where you're seen and when you're not seen. I say these things because people within my community, I'm African-American queer woman, probably are experiencing the same things and don't feel seen, don't feel heard, but like you said, this is my livelihood. I have to get money to work.

00:30:11 Sarafina That creates a huge discourse between what comes first, the money or the person. We've been in a society for some time now where, we don't really invest in humanity before we sorta invest in our economy and the services that we can give. And there's such totally fine. We live in a capitalistic world. However, when the person who is creating these jobs and these things for us can no longer function, what happens next, who was there. That is a problem for us because we are humans at the core and us as we are worthy and valuable, but our society does not allow us to recognize that. So then you start to do that. Good work for yourself, asking yourself these questions. Does this environment serve me? Do I feel seen here? What is the culture like? Does it align with my values and morals? Does it hurt me or help me? do I see a future here? What patterns and themes have been consistent thus far? and how can I shift and believe that if you leave one thing, there's going to be another there's endless possibilities.

00:31:24 Sarafina There really is. We often get pigeonholed into this one idea, like I have this good thing and it's going to be gone. I have nothing else, but what happens if it goes away? Like you gave me a story earlier about someone who ended up being a muralist after leaving a job that was difficult for them. That has been so fulfilling I'm sure. The difference is even more rewarding than making X amount of dollars. It really depends on when you're ready to make these decisions. Will you choose you? Where will the courage come from?

00:31:53 Roy Yeah, the, in business and in finance, we talk about, we are the sum of the five people that surround us. Let's extrapolate that to self care for a minute. I don't know that you've studied it or there's an nodal evidence on that, but it just made me, it just was curious, thought that if we have to be careful with who we surround ourselves, do they take care of themselves? Are they the kind of people that we want to be with? Because as leaders, supposedly we are, the leader that we are, the kind of leader of the people that we surround ourselves with, I guess is the easiest way to say that we are the, of the, well, I apologize. I fell off for just a minute surfing. I don't know if you can still hear me or not, but, I guess the question that, the, what I had asked and if you answered it, I'm sorry, you may have to tell us one more time, but, it seemed like we got a bad, zoom connection going on here.

00:33:26 Roy I know I've fallen off a couple of times, but, so are we the, some like in our self care world, are we the sum of those five people that we are closest to? Mm.

00:33:38 Sarafina Mm. I think that's a really good question. I, I would have to say, it depends on who you are surrounded by. To be in a cohort of people who do not align with your morals and values is very easy to become swayed, but that does not necessarily mean that you are also like them. That's what makes our brain really cool is that it's so malleable. We can start to change and adapt different patterns of thinking based off of who we're with, what we start to do, how was our shift? And so by surrounding yourself with people that make you feel stronger, or that inspire you to help you feel seen or give you a voice when you didn't have one, those are things that become concrete elements, which is very similar to being in relationships that are abusive, that bring you down, that hurt you, which become concrete experiences.

00:34:37 Sarafina Yeah, maybe we are a part of these things, but does that mean it is who we are? I don't want to say it is. I just think it is. Going back to that culture aspect, how has your culture really impacted you? And is it benefiting you or is it harming you, how does it serve you? That was a great question. I would definitely, I think that would make people consider who was around and who helps you keep you grounded and aligned with who you'd want to be. If you don't have people like that in your life that's, so to me, we explore, we examine how will we can get these people in your life?

00:35:18 Roy Yeah, yeah. Because I know that there are people that everybody knows that are, negative and their interview suckers. It's like, cause the other thing I was thinking about is that not so much in our age, but, especially if you're younger instead of, Hey, I need to go and I need to be eating right. I need to go to the gym and I need to get in bed early, sleep all of these components of self-care. But, maybe hang out with people that, way we want to go out to the beer joint and hang out and, stay up till late, not get any sleep, anyway, earlier it just kinda hit me that, we, I think in all aspects of our life, we just really have to be careful of, who we give our time to, because whether we do it consciously or not that energy that they have really transfers to us.

00:36:13 Sarafina Absolutely. Absolutely. That's such a good thing to say, and I can even translate into what is it like to be impacted by a therapist, right. That energy is transferring in that room and it's creating something different. It's just because I'm a human that it works that way, and the person in front of me as well, so we can create that energy exchange. What happens when you don't have the strength to get out of these spaces that are, I would say, vampire sucking or energy suckers. That, it's very sad because now your environment is trumping you rather than you and your environment, working harmoniously to create a good balance of who you want to be in your future, who you are now, things like that. A lot of people are in this situation right now because of COVID, being stuck in a home or in a job where environment, because of the situation we're in.

00:37:09 Sarafina And that is awful. Knowing how to at least keep yourself grounded as going back to those nourishing things. Are you breathing? Are you drinking water? Are you eating? Are you getting sleep? PQ pick you.

00:37:23 Roy Yeah. The other thing too, this came up in another discussion, but I think we have to give ourselves permission that it's number one. Okay. To take care of us, but number two, that it's okay to make these kinds of changes because sometimes it's hard, for all the reasons we've talked about, but you have to, eventually you've got to say, it's okay to choose me to renegotiate. Yeah.

00:37:49 Sarafina Yeah. I like that. I often tell my friends and my clients about what are your non-negotiables right. What things are you willing to negotiate on? And so maybe you have been going to the gym for a week straight now, and a friend that who loves to party and invite you to come out. You're like, what, I'm celebrating my growth, you going and doing something that encourages where you've been in the past, but helps you grow. I say, but that is like, when you're put in a situation that you have to decide something different than you have normally decided, that is where the transitioning and the growth will occur. So yeah, you'll go out. You get back to the next day and you're going back to the gym. You're going, you're still eating the things you wanted to be eating, just because you have done something different.

00:38:36 Sarafina Doesn't mean it's now the trajectory from now on. Often people who were going through weight changes and health, and emotionally abusive relationships, struggle with this idea of like, if this one time I change, I'm falling off. Or if this one time they have done this, they're now miraculous. They're better. And though that's not true. It's okay to hold both truths in a space I am growing while I also am suffering. I am doing better while I also acknowledging that I've been through a hard time. And that's perfectly fine.

00:39:13 Roy I like how you just put that. I really am paying attention. I am taking notes because I think that, and that's one thing we've talked about too, is that, for me, that one time and change, and then man, I am off the path, and somewhere else. Really having that self realization that it's okay for this one thing to happen. It doesn't derail us from our future path that we're on. Yeah. Yes,

00:39:47 Sarafina Yes. In that mind process, believing that whether or not you work out or don't work out, you are worthy as a human being, as being who you are. Right. So we've crossed that off, working out. Does it make you greater or less than of a person, but working out could make you a healthier individual, ? And so it's like changing the language around what are we actually doing these things for? are we really doing it to seem like we are fitting in? And we have a community that aligns with who we are? Is it something that we're doing because we want to grow? Or is it something for someone else, ? And when within partnerships we make the sacrifices, and it's knowing whether or not a sacrifice is hurting you or it's bettering the space that you guys have created together. It's being kind and considerate to each other's experiences of the world as well.

00:40:39 Roy Right? Right. Well, you have something, Terry. No, you had a smile. Okay. Well, Sarah feena, we appreciate you being with us. I mean, this is so much good stuff. Because we talked about mindset, we have to get in the right mindset. We have to do these things for us before we can get healthy. We, it's, it seems like everybody would know this, but if we really want to change, we have to make a change and we can't continue to do the same thing and hope that everything is going to get better. I think, hopefully the messages that we need to choose us, it's not selfish to do that. We can still choose us, but yet still be, kind and engaged with other people. We will be a better person to other people will be a better person to ourself as well.

00:41:38 Sarafina Absolutely. I would like to leave you guys with, something that you can set your attention with whenever you were having to engage, in the world or within yourself, may I have a tender heart and a soft mind? May I gain an understanding of my inner and outer connectedness?

00:41:59 Speaker 4 Oh, I love that about the tender heart. That's great.

00:42:03 Roy Yeah, because I don't think we had, I don't want to get off on this, but it too much, but I don't think we have enough empathy for, instead of, somebody comes at you instead of coming right back at them is like, maybe we just have that empathy that, what it's just something else is going on in their world. We don't know about, we have to, I like that you said earlier, take a step back, take a deep breath. And, how did you say it was, be responsive, not reactive. I mean, I love that. I love that so much because when we get stressed and when we're pushed to the limit, it's that reaction. Unfortunately that stuff lives for a long time. It's not, come out of your mouth, you can't waste, take them back. Really let it sink in and have some empathy for the other person and maybe where they are at what they're going through before we, do respond.

00:43:02 Roy Yeah.

00:43:03 Sarafina When you need to release, knowing what activity.

00:43:07 Speaker 0 Yeah.

00:43:09 Sarafina Recognized where I, it words, that's what I was going to say. Yeah. That's really awesome. I wanted to share that you added the release and it can be the release that's best for you after you have responded. Maybe it is hanging out with someone and maybe it is going to the gym. Maybe it's creating artwork. The release should be rooted in how you love on you, because you're trying to get this energy out. I love to dance. I love to take showers when I'm angry. Those are the two things that I do when I get something out of my body, love to dance it out. If it's in the nighttime or it's in the morning, I'll just take a shower and genuinely release and let the things fall off my body. It's just a good practice to get in the mind you setting that intention.

00:43:58 Sarafina You're not ever questioning why you're doing what you're doing.

00:44:05 Roy Yeah. That's good. That's good advice for sure. All right. Well, we're going to wrap up if you wouldn't mind tell everybody of course, how they can reach out and get ahold of who that you help, how you can help them touch.

00:44:20 Sarafina Sure. My name is Sarafina Arthur-Williams. If you would like to contact our business line, feel free to reach us at 4 1 2. 2 9. 4 8 7 0. You're also able to text this line as well. My email address is [email protected]. My favorite place is our website and you can check it out at intentionallysimplistic.com and then on Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn, we're an Intentional Simplicity, LLC.

00:44:52 Roy Okay, awesome. Well, y'all reach out. See how Sarafina can help y'all and thank you so much for your time. I know we ran longer, but it's a great conversation. So we appreciate that. And her website is awesome. I've been on it all morning. I need this. No, I need that. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you both. It's been all right. Well, that's going to do it for another episode of feeding Patty. Of course not amyloid. You can find us feedingfatty.com. We're also on all the major social media platforms. A video of this interview will go up on YouTube when it goes live. We are also on all the major podcast platforms, iTunes, Stitcher, Google, Spotify. We're not a one that you listened to please reach out. Until next time, take care of yourself and take care of those around you.

www.liveintentionallysimplistic.com

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Small Steps Make Big Changes, the Triathlete's Approach to Success with Kyla Lupo

Have you dreamed of being a triathlete? Competing in triathlons? Its never to early or too late to start. It is a big step and a big commitment, but if can be done. Just taking small steps to lead toward the eventual goal of completing some form of triathlon completion. Get health and get fit while training to compete in a very difficult arena.

About Kayla

Kyla Lupo is a USA Triathlon certified coach with a Masters in Education from George Washington University. She brings years of experience in coaching people in a variety of situations, including triathlon. Want to know about her athlete stuff?

She represented Team USA at the 2019 ITU Multisport Championships in Pontevedra, Spain as an age-group Long Course Aquabiker. Kyla is a nationally ranked Age Group short course triathlete and finished second in the Athena division at the Illinois 2018 Triathlon Championships. In 2019 Kyla qualified for the USAT Short Course Age Group National Championships that will be held in August 2021.

Want to know about her coaching stuff? She believes that anyone can tri in the body they have right now and works with athletes on a personal level to overcome their fear and doubts while getting fit and ready for the start line. Actively advocating for a radical level of body acceptance in sport and society, Kyla leads a team of people of all shapes and sizes that can be found at www.teamgobig.life

www.feedingfatty.com

Full Transcript Below

Small Steps Make Big Changes, the Triathlete's Approach to Success 00:00:15 Roy Hello, and welcome to another episode of feeding fatty. This is Roy Terry. We are the podcasts that is chronicling my journey, our journey through, wellness, trying to obtain wellness, maybe lose some weight, lose a lot of weight, get in better shape. And, we talk a lot about some things that are going on in our life, how we're progressing and what we're up to, but we also have professionals, as guest on from time to time. And today's no different. Terry.

00:00:45 Terry Kyla Lupo is a USA triathlon ser triathlon certified coach with a master's in education from George Washington university. She brings years of experience in coaching people in a variety of situations, including triathlon. She represented team USA at the nut at the 2019 ITU multi-sport championships in Ponte ferta Spain as an age group, long course, Aqua biker Kyla is a nationally ranked age group, short course, triathlete and finished second in the Athena division at the Illinois 2018 triathalon championships in 2019, Kyla qualified for the USA T short course age group national championships that will be held in August of 2021. She believes that anyone can try in the body. They have right now and works with athletes on a personal level to overcome their fear and doubts while getting fit and ready for the start line, actively advocating for a radical level of body acceptance and sports sport and society.

00:01:58 Terry Kyla leads a team of people of all shapes and sizes that can be found at team go big life. Kayla, welcome to the show. We're happy to have you.

00:02:10 Kyla Hi Terry, thanks for a great introduction. I know there's all these big words in there that unless you're a Chaplet you have no idea what it means and I'm like, I'm just going to go rewrite that.

00:02:28 Roy Well, thanks so much for taking time out of your day to be with us. Part of, this journey is for me anyway, it's not only, wanting to lose weight, but also to stay in shape. I think, I set a lot during the day and the whole thing, nowadays it's, what setting is the new smoking and all of this stuff that's going on? we've become so seditary and in our diets have become so loaded with other stuff. Anyway, it's just, it's a bad convergence of stuff. It's funny, we read a, an article yesterday that was just saying that from 1950 to 19 to 2015, somewhere in that range, we've extended our lifespan by about 10 years by medicine medications, and by just modern medicine. They said that we have kind of bumped up into the, where it's not cost-prohibitive and they say extending our life the next 10 years will be due to lifestyle changes.

00:03:34 Roy Anyway, I think that's interesting that, and I, I like what you say that you can do it in anybody, we could go out and train to do whatever we put our mind to that there is a path. Even if we're, I think my opinion, even if we're overweight, if we still move around, it's better than being overweight and sitting on the couch and, eating another bag of Doritos. Absolutely. What are you seeing with, people that are coming to you? Are they, well, first off, let's start with, how did you find yourself here? I mean, it's a very impressive background and a lot of, doing a triathlon, my dad used to do them and, yeah, they're brutal. I mean, it's not something that you just wake up one day and say, well, I think we may just do a little poppet triathlon in this afternoon or something like that.

00:04:29 Roy How did you find yourself in this space?

00:04:33 Kyla Oh, it's right. It's a really great story. I, like a lot of people out there, I made a commitment. I wanted to feel fit and healthy and better in my body. Part of that was losing weight, but that wasn't my driving factor. I really just on, I wasn't moving as much as I used to when I was younger. I was like, all right, well, I'm going to do that. I'm going to do a 5k. I said, I'm going to do a race every month for 12 months. The year of 2015, I did a race every month. And, I got up to a 10 K, which is 6.2 miles. At some point I realized that I, or I remembered, I used to be a swimmer. I swam all through high school and college and thought I should get back in the pool. Like that will really help me be a better runner because lung efficiency, all that other stuff.

00:05:26 Kyla I remembered, but I also really liked bicycling. I got a bicycle and I was really enjoying it. And I thought, wow. I wonder if there's a way that I could be like a cycling racer for whatever reason. Like I just kept single sporting. In that someone said, well, it depends on what kind of cycling you want to do. Cause if you want to do a triathlon, that's one kind. If you want to do cyclocross, that's different. If you want to be time trials, all these fancy cycling words, it was like triathlon, you say. Yeah. And, that was the end of the beginning, I guess. And, I sat myself out to finish, a triathlon. I found a team. I trained with them. It was really great. I finished my first sprint triathlon in June of 2016. As I crossed that finish line, I knew I had found what I was meant to do in this world.

00:06:22 Kyla And, then I realized, started looking around at the people around me that weren't just the ones on my team. All I saw were skinny, super fit, really muscular looking people. There was the people on my team that I trained with, not my team, but the team I was training with. I mean, there were all sorts of bodies, right? Were what a lot of people would call overweight. We were, super short, super tall, like, didn't look like athletes. Some of us did admittedly right there. Of course, some of those. I realized if I wanted to see more people that looked like me finishing triathlons, I needed to be the person that could show them. They could do it. Awesome. Right. I went and got my coaching certification, like my actual Travelon coaching certification. I've been working with people in a variety of different situations, coaching them, whether it's been women or men or grandmas.

00:07:29 Kyla I spent some time on my life teaching, some of our lovely grim grandparents in this world. How do you use technology? so lots of different places where I've had to meet people where they are and help them get them where they want to be. The team just sort of formed it. Self people started realizing what I was doing and what, and then I got this and then Matt, and then the team grew into what it is today. And, it's an incredible group of people who are just so welcoming and supportive of each other. Boarding of each other. Some of us are what I would call like serious athletes. Some of us, have even ever done a triathlon Bernard can't.

00:08:27 Speaker 3 Sleep.

00:08:29 Kyla On my team, I have the Athena, not the Athena I have, well, she's the Athena long course national champion of 2019. In 2020 we had, like no races. The couple that we did have down here in Florida, she won her age group for an ultra distance triathlon, which is what a lot of people would call an iron man. There's, I just call it ultra like iron man. And I have a really interesting,

00:08:58 Speaker 3 But that's beside the point.

00:08:59 Kyla Ultra distance. We have someone who, in 2019 had both hips replaced and is looking forward to doing their first triathlon. Well, it should have been in may, but it got rescheduled to August. We have the whole spectrum of everyone on the team. I think that what pulls us all together is this idea that we, everyone has a place and you don't have to look a certain way. You can do anything right now in this body kind of thing. Yeah, so that's where I come from the long and short of it and all of that stuff in the bio about like all the things, all it means is that, I know how to work. The number system such that, by finishing, I qualify to go and do bigger things. I have athletes that come to me that say, I want to go represent team USA. How do I do this? And it's like, let's find your strengths and we're going to play into your strengths.

00:10:06 Kyla I went to Spain, I'm not a fast runner. I can not compete with people when I run good, but I'm not fast. I went to Spain, I did Aqua bike, which is swimming bike, and I'm a fast swimmer and I'm a good cyclist. So, you figure out how to get to the goals that you want to do with the skills that you have and amplifying what you're good. So, so, if you don't.

00:10:33 Roy Remind everybody what is, the distances for the triathlon and then the difference between that and the iron man, just give us ,

00:10:41 Kyla Yeah, that's a great question. Generally there's four distances, right? Sprint, Olympic half and full, and then people like to invent their own. They're super sprints, which are very short. When you get to the international level, there's actually, a distance between a half and a full that it's just, it's all gonna be. So sprint is generally, it's the shortest. It's, anywhere from 500 to a thousand meter swim, which is, a quarter to a half inch of a mile, and then a 12 to 15 mile bike ride, and then a 3.1 run a mile run, and then it just scales up from there, right? We have an international or an Olympic or an international depends on how you call it, which is longer swim, 20 to 25 on the bike. And then 6.2 miles. When you get to the half, that's what we call a 70.3. That was when it gets a little serious.

00:11:42 Kyla It's a one and a quarter mile swim and a 56 mile bike ride and then easy peasy, a half marathon. So 13.1 miles. Wow. At ultra distance, or the Ironman distance is one 40.6. You may see car stickers and say one 40.6. What you can know about that is that person is legitimately committed because it takes over your life, the train from one of those. That's a two and a half mile swim, 112 miles on the bike. Then, cause you're not done a marathon 26 points.

00:12:16 Speaker 3 Gosh. So how do.

00:12:18 Kyla An athlete go that distance last year? And I have one doing it this year too. It's from a coach so much fun to train them because you really get to help them push beyond these mental boundaries that they have in there. So,

00:12:33 Terry How much training? I mean, how, I know it's a lot, but like a typical week or month, how much training is.

00:12:42 Kyla So great. That's a really great question. Let's use the example of going and ultra distance because everything scales down from there. Right. I, I plan my trainings in two weeks of build. You have two weeks where you're working pretty hard and then one week of, what we call recovery, where you're just taking easier, right? So you'll have three runs in a week, an easy run, a track workout or a speed workout, and then a long run on the weekend. If you're going on ultra that long run is anywhere from 13 to 20 miles. You pull in the cycling as well. Oh my goodness, stop, come here. Let me go. Oh my gosh, it's so professional where it's like, you really just get to see what it's like to work from home. For me, the magic number is three there's, three, one run workouts, three cycling workouts and two or three swimming workouts.

00:13:46 Kyla We also put in, yoga, Pilates and a strength or to work out in there. Right. We're really trying to hit all the things. The Swim workouts are just like swim team. A lot of people did swim team when they were kids. You're out there and you're doing drills and things, and sometimes you're just swimming a whole long thing if you're in the pool two or three times a week. The cycling is a lot like the running you have just, ending on the course that you're doing. You might have a lot of Hills, so you'd have a workout. That's just where you're going to go climb Hills for an hour and a half. You'll have a speed workout like you do when you're running, because the fast stuff where your heart is really beating really hard, really fast. That's what helps you go with the long and steady 20 miles, right.

00:14:33 Kyla So, we slowly build up over time. When you have, it's funny, you ha you'll have a peak weekend, right. Because you never do a full ultra and you never do a full half until the day you do. Yeah. Because it takes so much time recover from that a sakes like two or three months for your body to recover from an ultra distance. At least a month for a 70.3 now, like professional athletes do it differently, but they get massages every day. They get exactly the nutrition that they need. They get the hot bath, cold bath, like all that kind of stuff. On a weekend, when you're peaking, you're going to go out for like 120, 130 mile bike ride. You can get up the next morning and go for a 20 or a 22 mile run. That's, that's pretty much your weekend. People decide to go into ultra distance, I'm the first person to say, yes.

00:15:30 Kyla I never say no to anyone. Like we know is not in my coach vocabulary. Yeah. And it's a serious commitment. It's can be 20 to 30 hours of training a week. Everyone else in your life has to be on board with that. Like, if you have a partner and kids, everyone's got to understand what's going on. Yeah. Right. It is a like, so my athlete that went into ultra, it was like an 18 to 24 month process. When you really look back to where she started. It was, but that last year, that last 12 months, hilarious how it all came up at that last 12 months is where it's just, you really have to commit to it. Yeah. And, and she did, and my other one, that's going, you are the cat and ultra this year. She has a very different life than the other one.

00:16:28 Kyla My other athlete and so different, it's always the same kind of training. I think what sets me apart as a quote is slanting around the rest of their life. They get what they need to be able to go to work, be there for their kids, have time with our partner, and sit around and watch TV if that's what they really want to do. Of course, for a sprint, you just scale it all down. I still want you to do in each discipline three times a week. Right. But your bike rides are shorter. Your runs are shorter. You're like, everything is just shorter. So, yeah. So it's the same kind of thing. Three sports three times a week.

00:17:09 Roy Yeah. I think it's good to mention too, that, when we talk about the actual race itself, the marathon, no matter what, the distance, this all happens back to back, it's not like stretched out over a week.

00:17:21 Speaker 3 It's like, you run,

00:17:24 Roy You run you,

00:17:26 Kyla It's in the water at 6:00 AM and you do your swim. You come out of the water and you're all wet and you go and you get your bike. Some people change clothes and some people don't and you go out and you ride your bike, and then you come back in and you put on your sneakers and you go out and do your run. And you're done. Yeah. Super easy. It is it's all in one day. My athlete that went in ultra this past year, it was really big deal. She finished in 16 hours and 45 minutes. That's huge because it's like, under the time cut off, she did not do an Ironman branded race, but, it's under the time cutoff, but she was moving her body for 16 hours and 45 minutes. I'm like,

00:18:04 Terry That's crazy. I'm just tired of hearing about it. I need a nap. I.

00:18:08 Speaker 3 Need to, well, I just I'm like.

00:18:13 Roy When we talk about that, the physical part, I mean, you've got to get in shape and you have to start somewhere with the workouts, but the other part of this is I'm sure you really have to dial in your diet as well.

00:18:26 Kyla Yeah. It's, nutrition is a huge part of it. One of the things I find more often than not with my athletes is they're not eating enough. And, they just, or they're not getting the right balance of things, right. We're really anti diet on the team. We're very much into, eating what we want when we feel like what we want. Right. The thing is that rarely means eating a bag of Doritos usually means having a nice well-rounded meal, full of proteins and carbs and fats that really helps nourish your body so that you can get up the next morning and go run 20 miles. Right. Right. We, there are definitely some athletes where we have to count calories. When we're looking at ultra distance athletes, you go out on a seven mile bike ride, or seven hour bike ride. That's like 3000 calories. You have to eat that back, girls, your body's going to start eating itself.

00:19:30 Kyla It becomes this, how do we get in 3000 calories? So we really do start to count a little, but it's always from a perspective of we are doing what is right for our bodies and what they need at that time. It's really tough as an athlete to not listen to the enormous amount of supplements and diet culture, and pushing things and doing all this stuff because it's in our faces all the time. We have a nutritionist that works with our team who that's her specialty. The two things is how do you feel to be an athlete? And then also, how do you honor your body and eat in a healthy, real way that isn't, denying yourself? The things that you want. Yeah,

00:20:19 Roy Yeah, yeah. We talk about very well-rounded, we don't want to do anything to the extremes, but, part of that includes, and I'm sure even more is, water hydration, and then sleep. I know that, sleep is a definite downfall of mine. I've talked about that a lot because, you get up draggy, this morning it's like, I really need to go to the gym and I'm not pushing myself to even do anything for a moly, right. Close to a triathlon, or even not even close to one segment of, the, either the swim and running or that. So, get that straight, but it's still, it's like, I'm tired. I don't feel like it. So, I talk about it a lot. That sleep seems to be the trigger to begin my downfall, to spiral back into, well, I'd rather just sit here and I'll watch some TV and rest and maybe eat a nice snack or something like that.

00:21:21 Roy And then we crave that also. I think I see it makes me crave the carbs and the sugar, because I want to, it's like, I'm dragging, I need to, feel that little quick pickup. Again, that cycle you eat it and then you crave more and then you eat more, then you feel worse anyway, it's just,

00:21:40 Kyla Yeah, absolutely. It's it is that tired, that's one of the first things you have to fight, wrestle bit. Am I tired or am I exhausted? Yeah. Should I really skip this run? Because if I go out, it's actually going to be detrimental or do I just need to push myself so that thing. Right, right. So, yeah, that is a real thing that happens to the best of us to the best athletes. Am I tired or am I exhausted? How do you tell the difference? It's tough. You'll learn. You'll learn that when you're tired and you go out for that eight mile run and halfway through, you hit the wall hard and you have to call your partner to come pick you up. Wow. Yeah. That was exhausted. I shouldn't have gone out on this run. That was exhausted. Yeah. Like it is, you just learn over time and it's one of the things that when people are brand new, they, it's one of the ways we realized we're not hydrating that like you talked about, we're not eating enough.

00:22:53 Kyla Cause we're super tired all the time. Yeah. Those, I remember that first year or so of doing triathlons, my nutrition was so out of whack and I was exhausted for six months. It was exhausted all the time called nutritionist. She's like, what are you doing? Where's all your protein. Where are your carbs? Why aren't you eating any carbs? Like where like what's. I was, it was a whole new awakening. She was like, how many hours do you sleep at night? I'm like, I don't know, five or six. Yeah, no, you're at the height of your training. And you'd like eight or nine. That's where everything settles in to your body is when you're sleeping. It's really important to get that rest. That's where that recovery week, every two weeks we have, an easier week.

00:23:40 Roy Yeah. I think that difference too, for me, is, once you get to the gym and just kind of start walking and start the blood pumping, he, you can tell either you really start to feel better. You're like, okay, I'm glad I did it. Are you just really start to wilt more and be like, I just need to really regroup here and start over again.

00:23:59 Terry Yeah. Just getting there, just getting there. I mean, making yourself go and get that's key.

00:24:07 Speaker 4 Yeah.

00:24:08 Roy When, this takes a big mindset and I think that we can, what I'm trying to relate this to is, not necessarily that I want to do the triathlon or anything strenuous right. This moment. I think it's that the benefit is the mindset that you have to work with people to get their mind, right. That this is going to be, it's going to be work. It's going to be a struggle and it's going to be worth it. I look at it that way as like, with trying to dial in everything that it's, it takes a lot, but it will be worth it. What do you, how do you help? I don't know. Maybe somebody has come to you and they've gone two weeks and they're like, I can't go on, I just can't do this anymore. I know there's a lot more to it, like time constraints and this and that, but I mean, how would somebody, that's just kinda like, fatigued, kind of how do you talk them down off that and get them back on track?

00:25:09 Kyla Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Well, the first thing I'll say is none of my athletes would go two weeks without telling me that was going on. Right. We, we check in the training software or use, I, I can see whether or not they're doing what I've prescribed. We comment back and forth when they skip a workout. Like we have this, we have team meetings every week where everyone checks in with everyone. I, I literally had this almost exact situation happened, where an athlete came to me and said, I hated this workout. And it was a track workout. And I was like, oh my gosh. Okay, well, what's going on? And she's like, I feel like a failure when I do it. I am exhausted the rest of the day. I just don't that, like, I don't want to do it. You can see I skipped it last week.

00:25:58 Kyla Cause I don't want to do it. That's right in that moment when it's not fun anymore. That's when we changed sales, we changed the course of the ship. We change up, what's going. So, I said, okay, we're not doing those workouts anymore. No more of those. I just want you to go out, it's so funny. I just want you to go out and do an easy seven or eight miles.

00:26:17 Speaker 3 Yeah. She is.

00:26:23 Kyla We talked about what else was going on in life. Right. It turns out that they were way behind on work for work. They felt like they were drowning in that they missed an event with kids. Because tired because training because other work stuff. Right. We really tried to suss out the root of what was going on, and figure that out. You put things back in order, right? You figure out where your priorities are and you make sure that the most important things get done and the most important thing for you might not be training. Yeah. You have, you gotta have a coach who meets you where you are. Right. Some people are super serious and they want a coach tells them, you got to go out and do it and got to get it done. I don't want to excuses, but those aren't the people I work with.

00:27:31 Kyla People I work with have real jobs and real lives and real kids. And they do this for fun. Yeah. Really getting to the core of why are you doing what you're doing? Right. If it's, for whatever reason it is, if it's not a reason that sparks you, that excites you, then you're doing it for the wrong reason. Yeah. That is definitely something we spent a lot of time doing in 2020. Why do we race? Why do we do triathlons? and if it's because you want the finish line and the metal and the t-shirt, well, there weren't any in 2020, so now we've got to figure out how else we're going to get you motivated. It was a really, it was really interesting year, but so do you, how.

00:28:21 Terry Did you, how did you cope with the COVID situation as far as your coaching goes? I mean, I know that's a loaded question because there are so many different things that you had to do, but I mean, did you go virtual? Had you been virtual before? huh. It's a really.

00:28:44 Kyla Great question. We like to say now that we have this great phrase, COVID safe, we've been, COVID safe since 2017. When we started the team, it's always been virtual. We have, our team meetings are all zoom. I have athletes in Iowa and Oakland and Los Angeles and Washington DC, Fort Lauderdale, I've got athletes everywhere. Wow. We talk about, we started tossing around, we hated zoom before everyone else hated.

00:29:16 Speaker 3 First hate us.

00:29:19 Kyla It's interesting, right? Because I saw other coaches who couldn't pivot or who refused to pivot and I saw them go out of business. Yeah. My team actually flourished because people, realize they wanted a coach who focused on the finish line for them. Right. I had a lot of athletes who adjusted their sales to be less about racing and more about staying fit or getting strong. Because I already had all this stuff in place to be virtual and to support and to coach and to create community, the only thing, and it's a really big thing though. The only thing that really changed is we didn't get to see each other racist. Yeah. Yeah. So, and I saw a lot of my athletes lean into the community. Like I had not seen before, because of missing everything.

00:30:22 Roy Did most people hang with it or were there some that were like, Hey, if we can't race, I just don't want to do this. Or did most, I guess, probably athletes at that level, they wanted to maintain some form of being in shape just for the return of it.

00:30:36 Kyla Absolutely. So, I did, I had two or three athletes who were like, Hey, if there's not a race, then here's what I want to do. Right. I want to be able to do 10 pushups or I'm going to, I really am going to train so that I can do rag bra, which is, a bike ride across Iowa over a week. Right. That in itself, of course is its own start line, but that's something you train for like two years. Some of them did pivot and I did have to get clever with the coaching cause it was like, how do I maintain my athlete that, when and ultra, how do we maintain that fitness? if there isn't going to be a race. Yeah. We did, I have got, I've got four different levels of membership on my team. Some, some athletes stepped down to where there wasn't a training plan and we said like here's what you should do every three weeks kind of thing.

00:31:33 Kyla I had new athletes come in as well, who were like, I've got time. I don't have to commute to work anymore. So I've got three hours every day. Let's get serious about this. Like let's have something positive to focus on and that's getting fit, getting healthy, getting strong and getting ready for 2021. Wow.

00:31:54 Roy Yeah, that's good. It just, it, I think it, like I said, I want to take that same mindset that this is like a, it's not a one-time, we go back to the gym and then it's just over that, we have to continue even for myself, just to be in some form of normal shape because, like I said, becoming seditary, man, I'll tell you what, my bones, my joints, everything is just tight. I feel tight. That's another thing is the stretching. W how do you have a good stretching program? Because,

00:32:29 Terry You know, you mentioned yoga earlier.

00:32:34 Kyla So funny. Yeah, I, I've, I don't have a stretching program, but, I always recommend to people it's so funny, I should call her and tell her, or email. There's a great woman who does yoga with Adrian, and she's a real person and it's real yoga, and it's not, she does it. If she messes up in the recording, she just keeps going. She hasn't go back and edit in the right thing or whatever. So, a lot of my athletes really love her. She's got a whole YouTube channel. That's where I send my athletes. Now. She doesn't resonate with everyone, right. So, there are on my I'm one of them, but people who are so averse to wasting time on yoga or stretching, but it's the single greatest thing you can do. I found a YouTube of yoga to do first thing in the morning in your bed.

00:33:35 Speaker 3 Yoga to do last night, where you go.

00:33:38 Kyla To sleep well, I'm already laying down, I'm already in bed. Like, I just, I put that on and I do a little strategy before we go to sleep. I do a little stretching first thing in the morning, and that's made a really big difference for me personally. It's finding what works for you, because like you said, before going to the gym once and then never go on again, that's not going to do it. Right. We want some consistency with that. And, start small steps, make big changes, right. Finding the thing that works for you and then following through on it. Yeah.

00:34:17 Terry Yeah. That's been that the small steps, that's been a theme for everything we've been talking about. It's just finding the small step.

00:34:24 Roy Yeah. There's also been some evidence lately about, trying to make too many changes. Again, everybody has to find their own way, but this, I'd read, I don't know if it was a book or an article, but a guy wrote a great piece about this. He's like, you know, okay. You wake up today and you're fed up with being overweight. You're fed up with, not exercising. You're fed up with the types of foods that you eat. It's like you try to change, five things, not drastically, you make all these drastic changes and then you just can't keep up with everything. So, I'll and I'll get your opinion because it's kind of leads into, training for something big. But, I think probably better to add little components, little steps of each thing that you want to change instead of just, everything all at once cold Turkey.

00:35:17 Kyla Oh yeah. It's, it's really tough to just be like, so you've been in the same rut for five years and all of a sudden you're just going to have everything and do a new thing. Like, no, that's not actually going to work. It's not going to be sustainable. Right. Right. So it's small. We'll get personal. Right. For me, I'm training for a big race this year, to qualify, to go and do another ITU world championship and Australia in 2022. And I was really struggling. It was, it was really struggling with showing up on the days I needed to show up. I realized, I can't just, boom, all right, here we go. Four days in the pool, four days on the bike, two days of strength, two days a yoga, let's go when I hadn't been doing anything but morning and evening yoga sometimes. Right. I took one thing I said, I'm going to swim and I'm going to swim three days a week, Monday, Wednesday, Friday.

00:36:25 Kyla I'm going to get that locked in place. That that is just the expectation that's, what's going to happen. Right. Cause it means getting up early, which means going to bed a little earlier, it means, a lot of different things. I've done that consistently for four weeks. It probably helps that I hired a coach. Now I feel like if I don't go to the pool, I'm wasting money. Yeah. That's probably what's helping, but I've got that locked in Monday, Wednesday, Friday, go to the pool Saturday morning and go to the ocean and swim with a group of people. I really like, so this week coming up, this is where I'm going to start putting in the cycling because the swimming is on autopilot. So now we're putting in the cycling. Right. It's tough finding the right days for it, with scheduling and all that stuff. Like when you work for yourself, you think, oh yeah, you can do whatever you want.

00:37:19 Kyla Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's not a myth. Getting one thing in place and establishing that takes 21 days to make a habit. Right. You put one more thing in and chances are that second thing you put in, it's going to pick up a little faster because you've already established a rhythm. Right. Right. Then it just sort of snowballs, right. Small steps, big changes. Yeah. Yeah. So one thing at a time. Yeah.

00:37:54 Terry We're at, and we're in the process of changing over and trying a plant-based diet. I think what, which week are we on? Okay. You're on.

00:38:02 Roy About the third week. Yeah. Yeah. We've made it through our three weeks and we're not being crazy if we want a piece of fish or a piece of meat, and we'd go out and get it. That's not, it, we're just trying to eliminate as much that and dairy as we possibly can and see, it's been a blessing for me on my blood. Sugar has been not as low as where I need it to be, but it's been stable. I don't see the huge spikes and anyway, some stuff moderating, but like I, I, hadn't been to the gym in about two months and went last night and I just, I am, like enthusiastic, let me put it that way. Enthusiastic, maybe an overachiever. I don't know. It's like I made it there. I want to do everything I possibly can and do as much as I can.

00:38:52 Roy Last night I just had to dial it back and of course Terry said, dinner's going to be ready and you gotta be home by this time. I had, she gave me a deadline, so I didn't hang out there.

00:39:02 Terry I knew you'd want to be there for four or five hours. I'm like, okay. You wouldn't be, it would take all that recovery time before he could go back.

00:39:10 Roy Like I just, I walked for about, 20 minutes, easy light walk. Then, I just feel very tight. What I did, I went over and did a couple of, upper body machines, just very lightweight, just did one rep of each one. And then the legs, the same thing. I did a couple of them just to, kind of start loosening up. I've I will tell you that for as little as I did, I'm very sore this morning. Then, yeah, well, and I didn't, we didn't get a lot of sleep. There was a little episode somewhere, we live out in the country. I guess after the bars closed last night, somebody was driving down the main road, not far from us. And they were, setting off some firearms. Like, not just once,

00:39:55 Terry But there was like 20, 25 shots.

00:39:58 Roy Two this morning, two 30 this morning, we're up.

00:40:00 Terry Like four or five bursts, a shots about 2 15, 2 30 am.

00:40:05 Roy Yeah. We're up seeing if we're under attack.

00:40:08 Speaker 3 Woke Roy up. I'm like, right. I think.

00:40:10 Terry That was gunshot. I think that was gunshots.

00:40:14 Speaker 3 Oh. So anyway,

00:40:15 Roy That, so I've been dragging today and I think that's maybe another reason why I'm a little sore, but it felt so good when I got home last night, I just told Terry, I said, I've got to fight and find a way to get in there every day just to do something. Just that movement is so good for me. And,

00:40:34 Terry Or every other day, so you can build up to it every couple of days and we can walk around here. Yeah.

00:40:42 Roy It's a good time for me to clear my head. When we go for a walk, it's just, that's my meditation as well, I think is just gives me time to think and where we live in such an awesome place that we're surrounded by nature. We go out for a walk, we're just out in the middle of the woods and, it's, it is such an experience. It really is watch for snakes.

00:41:07 Speaker 3 On like that. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Well we.

00:41:11 Kyla Thank you for the key to that soreness. Yes. Oh yes. Little bit more hydration than usual, right? And more protein than usual. You usually the day of, or the day after I hit the gym, I'll hide. That's when I break down and I'll have a protein smoothie. Right. Okay. Which is hard because I also try to eat a lot of not processed. Right. We call it a low to the earth and what is it? Something, a load of the earth, meaning, plant-based stuff. Right. But, I have a really great protein powder that I like that's made out of pea protein. So, a scooper to have that little bit of milk, some spinach, that extra protein is what's going to help your muscles feel better. As soon as you can get that in, that's why all of like what I call the lung kids at the gym, they've always got that like protein.

00:42:10 Speaker 3 Flash, chugging. Yeah.

00:42:13 Kyla There's, there's stuff behind that. Right. Of course they're checking the whey protein, which is not as great for you, but, if you're going, plant-based, there's pea protein, there's soy protein, which is all right for a dude. There's lots of different choices, but just upping that protein intake by just like an extra 20, 30 grams, which is just discomfort to, that'll really help with that soreness. If you can, and don't knock it till you try it, an Epsom salt bath with of baking soda in it will do wonders. Yeah. No, don't knock it. No, I'm not.

00:42:54 Roy I am so not against the hot bath at all. Oh my gosh. It makes, it just makes my whole body feel. And.

00:43:02 Kyla If you want to go every day, look at me. I can't not be a coach go to the gym every day. There's nothing wrong with that. Right. Do your arms one day and do your legs the next day. You always do of a core workout because that benefits everything, but arms one day legs, one day. That way when you're sore and a little tired the next day, you're like, well, that's all right. That's all right. I'm going to work my arms and my chest and my back today. So that'll be fine. Yeah. Yeah. That's when you go, but you can also look up online. There's something called, three-day splits. That's it's like actual, here's what you do on these three days. You maximize your time at the gym. Like one day we'll be, these muscle sets and that muscle set and that thing. I only, I asked my athletes to do strength like twice a week, and then yoga as well.

00:43:53 Kyla We, but triathletes do different kinds of strength training because we never isolate one muscle. Yeah. We're always going to work two muscles at the same time, because that's what we do when we're out racing. Right. So we're doing any of our sports. So, but I'm a, three-day a three-day split might actually be really great for you because then it's like, you lock in those three days a week and this is what you go and do. On the odd days, you and Terry can go out for a nice walk and not get bit by snakes.

00:44:18 Speaker 3 Yeah. Yeah. All right. Well, any other, no, that's great.

00:44:26 Roy Any other tips and tricks before we wrap this up, that you'd give anybody, that's either just wanting to start, getting in shape or maybe even wants to take that next step. Right? Small.

00:44:37 Kyla Steps make big changes. Okay. Oh. If you just wanted to get started, the best thing you can do. Absolutely. Honestly, the best thing you can do is find a coach or a team that knows how to work with beginners, right? Comradery is one of the greatest things about triathlon. When you find a coach who really knows how to work with beginners there, they're going to give you plans and training and all that other stuff that's going to meet you right. Where you are. Right. In theory, that coach shouldn't cost a lot of money. In theory, some coaches do, at the very least finding a community or a team like Facebook works with that. There are only a few coaches out there that have a level of membership on their team. That's just community. I have that level. If you want to come and check out that's good.

00:45:32 Kyla Small steps make big changes, right. Little things start with two workouts a week, and then there's more than enough time to get up to the six or seven a week that triathletes usually do so most half, I don't know some triathletes, but small steps make big changes, and find yourself a community that will support you and tell you what mistakes to not make. Yeah.

00:46:00 Roy That's great advice. So, what is something that you do every day that you feel like adds a lot of value in? It can be professional or personal, but just a habit, an app, computer program, anything like that?

00:46:14 Kyla I don't think I do every day. Every day I do the New York times crossword puzzle. I'm probably that's the old and I drink water. Those are probably the two things I do every single day. What I try to do every single day is spend 15 or 20 minutes in the morning or in the evening. It depends on where I am figuring out how I'm going to spend my time that day or the next day. Right. A lot of times. Like today, when we're done, I'm going to spend about 20 minutes planning out Monday and Tuesday. Right. Cause I'm trying to get that bike locked in, but spending time, planning your time. That way when I come into the office in the morning, I'm like, Nope, I know what I need to be working on right now. It's dotted out of that. Right. Yep. Then, find something fun that engages your brain, whether it's a Sudoku or a crossword puzzle, or like some, puzzle game on your phone or your computer and do that every day, because that's going to keep your mind sharp and it's something that you can look forward to every day.

00:47:24 Kyla So, yeah. Yeah.

00:47:26 Roy Yeah. I think that's important about the, we always say plan your work and work your plan because you come in and sat down in the morning with the text and the phone and emails and just so much stuff to get distracted that if you've got a plan, you can come in and sit down and get on it. I'm much more productive when.

00:47:44 Terry I do that too much noise everywhere. Yeah, exactly.

00:47:49 Roy Well, right. Well tell everybody how they can tell them who you'd like to work with, how you can help them. Of course, how can they reach out and get ahold of you?

00:47:59 Kyla Awesome. The, I really like to work with beginner, triathletes and triathletes who, want to take on a big challenge, but don't know where to start. Right. I, I really come at it from what I call a holistic heart centered approach, which is you are an entire human being with an entire life. I know that triathlon is not the center of that. I'm going to figure out how you can get everything in there. Right. Okay. We are committed to a radical level of body acceptance. It doesn't matter where you are on whatever scale, whether it's your bathroom scale, your gender scale, your race schedule, scale, whatever it is. You're going to be welcomed on my team with open arms. If you've not experienced that in other places, come on over and let us know. You can find me at, www.teamgobig.life. So www.teamgobig.life.

00:49:08 Kyla From there, you can navigate to all the other places on the website. And, you can schedule a 30 minute discovery session with me where I get to learn all about you and what's going on in your life and figure out, whether or not you're a good fit for our team. If you're not, I know so many coaches and I know the good ones, and I'm going to point you in that right direction. Because the last thing I want is for you to be in the wrong place.

00:49:36 Roy Great. We will put all that in the show notes, but I think that a couple things that you, I think to a couple of things you touched on that need to probably be emphasized are that the acceptance part is that, it's so important to find a group that you feel comfortable because if you don't feel comfortable with the group, no matter what the level or how big, how great their plan is, you're not gonna take part and do that. The acceptance part, but also, the discovery to find out where people are, because, unfortunately the internet, sometimes it's a one pill fixes all. So it's like, Hey, I'm a coach. I got, this plan worked for Joe. It's gonna work for you. It's like, well, me and Joe May be totally different or have different goals or whatever. That, meeting people where they're at, that's an awesome thing.

00:50:27 Roy That's something to keep in mind when you're selecting business coaches, athletic, sporting coaches, health coaches, whatever, just make sure that somebody is going to take the time to really talk to you, find out what your goals are, find out where you are, find out your hurdles. I mean, just like me, if I came to you and said, I wanna, be run a triathlon, in two weeks, at least you can talk me down from that, say, that may not be the best thing. Look at the schedule too, because when whatever we do in life, work family, all that stuff has to come first and has to be worked in there somewhere. And then, so finding that good match. You can't just say, look, you got to give me, two hours a day at this time. Anyway, I think those are just important points to emphasize to the audience that, make sure you find somebody that can, really take an interest in you.

00:51:23 Kyla Absolutely. Roy, if you wanted to do a triathlon in two weeks, I wouldn't say no to you,

00:51:29 Kyla Right. You said at the beginning, why.

00:51:34 Kyla We would have a serious discussion about what kind of race you wanted to have and what your goals for that were. We would, we would get, if you said, do you want to do an iron man? I, I, I, we would,

00:51:49 Speaker 3 We would figure it out. And you would.

00:51:52 Kyla Go in with the, with a realistic set of expectations. Cause I'm never going to say no, it's just, I can't say no to anyone. That's why my kittens keep walking. Maybe,

00:52:03 Roy Maybe Terry, let me roll the window down while she drove me through the course, at least I could smell the fresh air.

00:52:12 Kyla Oh, I love it. The honking the horn.

00:52:16 Roy All right, well, that's going to do it for another episode of feeding fatty. Of course, I'm a hope your host, Roy, and we appreciate you listening very much. You can always find us at www.feedingfatty.com. We're on all the major social media networks platforms, as well as all the major podcast platforms, iTunes, Stitcher, Google, Spotify. If we're not a one that you listen to regularly, please check us out. Please let us know and we'll be glad to get that added for you. Until next time, take care of yourself and take care of your family. Thanks. Thank you.

www.teamgobig.life

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Diabetics Need To Pay Careful Attention To Sleep Habits and Sleep Issues with Terry and Roy

There was a sleep study released last week that found if you have diabetes and don't sleep well are at an 87% greater risk of dying within the nine-year study period than those that didn't have diabetes. There was a question of correlation, does poor sleep lead to diabetes or does diabetes lead to poor sleep. Either way, sleep is an important factor in our all-around health.

About Terry and Roy

After years of weight, health and fitness challenges, Roy Barker and Terry Mallozzi made a commitment to changing their eating habits. And implementing realistic fitness goals for them. They chronicle their journey for health on the Feeding Fatty Podcast speaking to experts about related aspects of health challenges (type 2 diabetes, hyperthyroidism, hypothyroidism), losing weight (need to) and staying positive (easier said than done). Little did they know it's not just counting calories and cutting out sweets

www.feedingfatty.com

Full Transcript Below

Diabetics Need To Pay Careful Attention To Sleep Habits and Sleep Issues with Terry and Roy

00:00:13 Roy Hello and welcome to another episode of feeding fatty. I'm your host, Roy tearing. This, program we want to, what we try to do is talk about our journey through our wellness. That includes, how we eat, what we eat, not necessarily being on a diet, but our diet in general, we talk about exercise mindset, just a lot of things that are related to, our health and wellness and just living a better life for us. So, w w we usually have guests on as well, it's about our journey. We talk about some personal issues, but we also have guests that are professionals in the space. Typically we have them on Tuesdays on our Thursday release. We usually do our, something more personal what's going on in our life. Also we've kind of made a decision to, be more, be a little more candid about diabetes and be, do a lot more focus on, current issues or things that are going on with the diabetes, or just delivering information on our Thursday.

00:01:19 Roy That'll kind of be our focus for some time anyway, we may change to, something else later on, but we want to go for this because, I know it's been no secret that I suffer from type two diabetes. Most of that's because of the weight I carry around my belly and then also, just poor eating habits. Something that definitely needs to be discussed, not only for my health, but I'm sure there are a lot of people out there that struggle just the same as I do, because I love to eat. I love food. I love all kinds of food. Unfortunately, some of the food that I love most garlic bread, all the sweets.

00:02:00 Terry And things like that. Those are.

00:02:02 Roy All the worst things for. Anyway, we're going to kind of come on. I think another thing, we'd been talking about this the last few weeks, but then, we've had some poor eating habits that, we've been eating out a lot. It seems like, and on the run and celebrations, coming out of COVID, everybody wants to go out to eat or, get together and eat. Anyway, there's just been a lot of things going on and, my dad, my diabetic readings the last week, or so were terrible. I mean, they were extreme and something I've never seen before. Anyway, it just sparked us to say, look, we need to probably talk about this more, not only to help ourselves, but maybe we can help somebody else out there.

00:02:48 Terry Oh yeah, for sure. I mean the more information we can help put out there just for discussion, because we are not the professionals, we're not medical, we're not professionals. We're just talking about.

00:03:03 Roy Yeah. That's something we need to always get out of the way. When we talk about this, as we are not medical professionals, we're not researchers, we're delivering our personal opinions and things that we read. We always tell you to seek out your own medical, your own physician or your own medical advisors to find out what's best with you. Also, the, your dietician people like seek out your professional because every individual situation is different. It's not, we're not all the same, but we just hear our own research.

00:03:34 Terry I mean, google yourself. Don't get way too involved with Dr. Google, but, just do your own research. However you do that, do it.

00:03:45 Roy Well in that way, too, because we still think, even with your own research, you need to seek out a medical professional, but at least you walk in armed with things that you could talk about. I mean, there's, and they may say, nah, that's not for you, or that's not a good thing. Or there's the side effects. There could be a lot of issues, but at least it's dialogue, which that's how we solve problems is talking about it. Our medical professionals are very smart, but they don't necessarily keep up on every new and different thing that's coming out as much as they would love to try to. There's just so many things that are coming at them all the time. So anyway, it's a good conversation starter.

00:04:25 Terry Yeah. We, do, we want to get started with this?

00:04:29 Terry Go ahead. Okay. So,

00:04:31 Terry There was a study released this past week that said people with diabetes who have trouble falling or staying asleep, or 87% more likely to die of any case what? Yeah. Yeah. I'm sorry to die prematurely.

00:04:51 Terry If they have both diabetes had diabetes and sleep disruption, correct. Yeah. Yeah. Sorry.

00:04:58 Terry Yeah, so that is, I just want to go to sleep. Yeah. I don't have diabetes that I know of, but I'm good.

00:05:09 Roy Yeah. What, it's kinda like a triangle is the best way we talked about this earlier is that kind of at the top of that triangle is being overweight. The, if you go down the, to the left side, that bottom part would be, diabetes. If you kind of go over to that right part corner of the triangle, that would be, sleep disruption in this part. What they're saying is, and they don't really know. I think some, another researcher not involved in the study actually asked the question. Do we have poor sleep because we have diabetes or do we have diabetes because we have poor sleep. I don't think they make that distinction. I think they're just saying that, if you're overweight and you go down that, then now all of a sudden your sleep and your diabetes are connected in some way. We have to be careful about that.

00:06:04 Roy And, I've, our pillars of what we want to do for our health, drink water, exercise, and sleep is important. We talk about this, I talk about my downfall is my sleep and where we've been the last month or so, for those listening, that we've had internet issues to the extreme, we finally got those worked out, we think. Then, we haven't, luckily we had some recordings that were backlogs, so were able to keep releasing, but the reality is it's been a real struggle and we haven't recorded or even scheduled anybody for probably a month now a month or more. So anyway, we're getting back into that. We're fixing to send out some taping invites, but, I meant.

00:06:54 Terry To, I'm sorry, I'm going to interrupt you. I meant to sh to forward you, this meme that I saw, it said, kids, families without internet service, and it was a photo of little house on the Prairie and all of them, it was hilarious. And I was thinking about it. It was like, okay, yeah, not a pioneer woman. I just want it when I want it. And when you don't have it. Oh my gosh. Yes. Yes. That's.

00:07:19 Roy Kind of been the way we've been little house on the Prairie for awhile, but the, I guess how that relates to the diabetes and sleep is that we've had to go to eating establishments that didn't serve the best quality of food for, our, what we way that we want to eat. Then, actually having to stay up later because of the travel or coming home and having difficulty in upload. I mean, the, my sleep pattern has just been way out of whack the last few weeks. Of course that is always to me, what starts the eating, because if I'm staying up late, that means that I want to eat late. I need, I feel, tired and depleted. I feel like if I can eat, I'll get a boost of energy and what works best for that is of course, sugary substances or, carbs, things like that.

00:08:10 Roy Bumps me up to, it's bad for the diabetes. It's bad for the weight, bad for diabetes, way bad for sleep. I mean, if you're eating right before you go to sleep, it's just, yeah. So, yeah. Then, even just getting four or five hours of sleep and trying to do that for weeks or days or weeks on end, it just, it is a negative for me. It, it starts a lot of things. Anyway, kind of figuring out this link between diabetes and sleep, it's very important and, there's so many reasons why we need to get our sleep. Also, we can relate our diabetes back to, the, I guess the instance of, Alzheimer's not going to say everybody that's got diabetes is going to get all timers, but I think there's a lot of research that's going on out there now saying that, Alzheimer's is kind of a type three diabetes.

00:09:06 Roy Typically, if you go into older age with the diabetic issue, you may have a higher chance of, having Alzheimer's. So all of this stuff is interrelated. It's interrelated with our wellness. We want to make sure that, we kind of get this information out, but personally that we do all we can do to get that good sleep cycle, get the exercise in, and then along with eating, right. We'll be able to, reduce the, that body weight. Also I feel like I sleep better when we've had exercise, the days that we're active and we're moving and trying to work it in, I feel like my sleep cycle is much better than just, if I'm sitting here at my desk all day, cause again, I've got me a new Fitbit. So I'm excited about that. I've had a, I had an iWatch for a long time and the thing just quit working.

00:10:06 Roy It quit updating and I couldn't get it connected, but I really I'm really like the Fitbit. I was disappointed in the iWatch, when I got it. Anyway, back to the Fitbit, it's got the reminder about taking the 2,250 steps every hour and then, I've just felt better. Those days when, we're out pushing in and getting our stuff done, I tend to come in and go right to sleep and sleep, on the, I've always been a fairly good sleep. Oh my.

00:10:35 Terry Gosh, you do sleep well. I am so jealous. You just like hit the pillow and within five minutes, you're done here. I am. I watched a movie after you went to sleep last night. So I didn't go to bed. I was in bed at 10 30, but I didn't go to bed sleep until 2:00 AM. Yeah.

00:10:53 Terry You just hit the pillow and you're done well, the.

00:10:55 Roy Show were watching, we actually had to turn it off because I think I made it through like five minutes, but I was exhausted. The problem is with that is, over the last three or four weeks, been averaging, five or six hours a night. And, and they're saying,

00:11:11 Terry They're saying, good sleep, they're referring to good sleep as seven hours, seven to nine hours, but seven hours for sure.

00:11:22 Roy It's where I try to be. That's the other thing, I'm not sure about the iWatch. I don't want to talk it down in this, but I will say that is one thing I'm liking about the Fitbit. It shows your sleep, and I'm not sure how accurate all this is, but, I was trying to find it. I keep meaning to wear.

00:11:44 Terry Mine. My apple watch when we sleep by forget, I'm too tired. And then I don't sleep.

00:11:53 Roy Yeah. Because my sleep scores, I think last Sunday, I guess we must've gone to bed early. I had like an 85.

00:11:59 Terry Oh yeah. I remember sleep score, but yeah. I was late to celebrate. And so then we, you know, my.

00:12:06 Roy Sleep score since then have all been in the sixties. And, so anyway, it's important. I think it's, for me personally, I will say it's important for a lot of factors, just my overall, doing analytical stuff. Being able to think critically being able to be in a decent mood, not letting some of the struggles, that we've had, compound and, be more upset about things that typically shouldn't be, but because you're so extremely tired and you're pressed for time and that this, technical issue we've run into is going to cost you more time. It just compounds to a point of craziness. So, but anyway, let's get back to the sleep study. I just wanted to reiterate that, how important I feel that sleep is for me personally.

00:12:54 Terry Oh yeah. They, it's just, it's a vicious cycle. I mean, it's you, so like type two diabetes, people who have type two diabetes tend to be overweight and may suffer from obstructive sleep apnea. They're predisposed to like kidney, issues and, neuropathy, just, everything is a vicious cycle. Everything just builds on to another thing. To where you can't even identify where it comes from. Right?

00:13:28 Roy Yeah. This is a part of this study, they, this wasn't just with diabetics. I think that what came out of it started as a sleep study as a secondary group, they kind of looked at the diabetic part, but this is just saying that for people, even without diabetes, they are 11% more likely to die within nine year followup than people without who slept well. The, if you're, even if you're not a diabetic and don't sleep well, you've gotten 11%, more likeliness to die within this. They did a nine year followup and that's what they found. So, it's important for everybody no matter who we are. And, again, I will say, I think that they've even started linking the sleeping issue to a prevalence of Alzheimer's as well. So, if we go into our older age, some of these things that we do in our younger age will catch up with us in our older age.

00:14:26 Roy And, there's the old saying that if I known I was going to live this long, I would take a lot better care of myself. That's another thing is that, we need to get this message out to start early because whatever you're doing in your younger adulthood, you will carry that into your older adulthood. And, there's just a cause.

00:14:45 Terry Effect, there's a cause and effect to everything. When you're younger, you are blazing new trails, you're reinventing wheels. You want to do it for yourself. That's the main thing you want to blaze your own path, ? Right. You know that we have a few years on us, some experience helps, but, you know, we're still learning, but now I'm more open to inviting in research from all different areas, friends, family, online, all of it. I would have been if I were younger, cause I was such a rebel anyway, I wanted to do it all myself. Right.

00:15:31 Roy Yeah. We just need to, just really take note that, a lot, there's a lot of scientific, there's a lot more good scientific information out there. So, and current,

00:15:41 Terry It's not like you have to reach for the insight encyclopedia, Britannica, however you say, I don't know we had all of those, but it wasn't Cray was as current as it was. We thought it was cool. We didn't have to go to the library cause we had it at home. Yeah. Right.

00:15:57 Roy Yeah. This just, again, kind of reiterating the point that I just found a caption in here and this information that we are talking to you about, it's we found this on CNN health, a lot of great places to go. And the,

00:16:11 Terry And the study and the study.

00:16:13 Terry Came out, on June, in June a journal of sleep in the journalist sleeper.

00:16:21 Roy Okay. It was actually, I'm just trying to find, oh, the, Christie, Kristin,

00:16:28 Terry Ken Knutson and E van Cotter. They did a study that was released just, well, that was released at the, in the us national library of medicine, the NIH.

00:16:42 Roy Yeah. They are neurology and preventive medicine at Northwestern university Feinberg school of medicine. We just want to give credit to, all these great professionals that are out there looking, but, they just said that, sleep is, it's important to, I was just looking here. It said that even regardless of the diabetes, that sleep is important. So anyway, yeah. So, what are things we can do? I think they talk about people that fall asleep and, there's the falling asleep issue. There's the waking up in the middle of the night and, really need to talk to a physician to try to get a handle on that. They have a lot of sleep studies that are going on that you can be involved with again, to find out what your individual situation is. Is it sleep apnea? Is it yeah. Your root cause. And then if.

00:17:42 Terry You, and if you have diabetes, treat your diabetes, for sure. I treat your diabetes. Right. You also need to take into effect that you're not sleeping well.

00:17:56 Roy Yeah. And we'll talk about this more. I'm sure. The only way you can treat your diabetes is to monitor it. I, I will say that I'm not the best that when I know I'm eating bad, I don't want to look at it cause I know what's going to be in bed, but the only way to really be able to manage it is to see, where are you at when you wake up? What does different types of foods do to you? So you can know, cause there, every people are affected differently by different types of foods. Some people may be, some diabetics may be able to eat something and it not have an effect. Some others, it blows them out of the water. That's why it's important, two hours after every meal to test to see, Hey, what did that do to me? Keep a record of it that way, Hey, I can eat this.

00:18:45 Roy One thing I can't do is, eat, even though, I try to stay under about 40 carbs a day. I can't eat all 40 at one meal. So, you have to spread those out, through the day, I try to be more carb heavy in the morning when I know I'm gonna, work off an exercise and then, or just, living through the day, I know I'll burn them off a little better, but then also the way that you pair different foods. Again, we'll talk about all this stuff more in future episodes, but also want to get this, the two people that we watched on YouTube that time about the eating. No, it was about the way that your, the, something about was being captured in your muscles. That was, I don't remember the whole deal, but it was about the insulin and the sugar. Yeah. We need to really get that information out because I thought those were two, respective individuals in the field and they were very good.

00:19:51 Roy They had some good, a good, both of them had good YouTube videos where they actually laid it out and showed you some good. Yeah,

00:19:58 Terry That'd be good to talk about. And, what I was also gonna mention is you in the past and correct me if I'm wrong in the past, you have taken your medication, your diabetes medication, like in the morning and at night, and now what are we doing? We doing it meal time. Yeah. Trying.

00:20:20 Roy To do it at meals. Yeah. I'll just see if there's a difference. I just don't think I've ever had much luck with the medication that I'm on. What we've tried to do is, what I've tried to do, look at some different research and, there's some people that say take it in the morning and at night. There's some that say, take it with a meal. So we I've moved to taking it. We haven't done that long enough to really see any, see what the effect, but trying to do it with that last meal of the day, especially to see since we don't, a lot of times we fast in the morning until lunch. So, I'll may take one just when we get up, just because, but, yeah, but the, yeah, I just have I've always felt like it really hasn't helped me that much. So, trying to move some things around and again, I just, I carry so much weight that is the biggest issue with me, even if, even when I eat clean, I can still test bad just because I carry so much.

00:21:27 Roy So working on that simple, yeah. It's way important. I need you around honey. I'm like, I don't like those high readings. All right. Anything else you want to talk about before we get out of here? No, just.

00:21:42 Terry How important sleep is to everybody, but I'm, just if you have diabetes, treat for sure, treat your diabetes, take your meds, get your readings, even though you don't want to know what they are, get them. Maybe something will click in to make you take measures to get to a better place. Right. You know, it's yeah. Sometimes we have to be scared.

00:22:10 Roy Into I'm scared into doing something. When you see some of those extremely high readings, and of course that can be a catalyst.

00:22:19 Terry Reality is just the reality setting in it just.

00:22:23 Roy Yeah. And all the damage. That's the thing is I, we need to really lay out the damage of diabetes because, somebody like myself, I've never been hampered by it much. I don't think I give it as much thought or as much consideration or revered as much as I should. Again, I think it's cumulative that, in the beginning stages, you probably don't have a lot, but as you'd let it progress. As you age, there are going to be ramifications for not dealing with it in a timely manner. Again, those are, those would be some good topics for some future episodes to say, what are some of the different, not only the people that the professionals, that we want them to see, but also some of the, what are the, yeah. What are the ramifications of not dealing with it?

00:23:16 Terry Yeah, because I mean, pre-planning is important in all aspects of your life, ? And if you just reality of taking the readings and not acting like you're Bulletproof, because we are aging, I'm aging. I'm not throwing.

00:23:35 Terry You under the bus,

00:23:37 Terry We don't need to wait until something drastic happens. We don't need to re we need to respond and react.

00:23:45 Terry Because it's too late. Then that's.

00:23:47 Roy The reality with this. Don't want to get too graphic, but if you have to lose a toe or a limb, you can't go back and say, okay, I'm going to get my mind right now, do it. Or if you damage your kidneys and then of course the Alzheimer's connection, all of that stuff, you just can't turn it back. It's not a do over it's. This is, this is life. Yeah. And it's done. So, all right, we look forward to bringing you more information on that, but for today, that's going to do it for me. Yeah.

00:24:16 Terry If you, if there's anything that you want to talk about specifically about diabetes, aging, whatever, please go to our Facebook group, go to our Instagram, please reach out. We'd love it. Yep. Yep. We're.

00:24:29 Roy On all the major platforms, social media platforms. We probably hang out, I would say on, probably Instagram more than any place is our preferred place. You can reach out there. We're on all the major podcast platforms, Google, iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify. We're not a one that she listened to reach out. We'd love to get on it and make it easier for you to listen to us. Our website, www.feedingfatty.com. Also, there's a fairly new logo that we just put up. We'd love to hear your comments. Terry designed that one herself. I think she did an awesome job. It looks great. Check us out, see what you think. And, yeah. We'd love to hear any comments about professionals in this industry that you would like to hear from your story. If you have a transformation story, we would love to hear that, just reach out.

00:25:26 Roy We'll see if we can, book a date to the table and if you're struggling,

00:25:29 Terry Come on. Let's, you know, it takes a village.

00:25:32 Roy Let's talk about it. Yeah. Cause we can, sometimes being there to support each other is what it's about or, being able to find the correct help. Always. We can see what we can do, but yeah, starting a discussion. That is the that's the first. Yep. That's the first point. With your medical professionals, not just us, but talk to a medical professional, registered dietician nutritionist. There's a lot of great professionals out there that can help. And, we have, if you haven't checked us out, go back and look at some of our past episodes. We have had some amazing guests and we've got some amazing ones lined up for the future that we can't wait to get out here. We'll try to be a little more regular on these Thursday releases, about what's going on with us. Not only that, but trying to focus on the diabetes for a while and see if we can get that going.

00:26:24 Roy Anyway, until next time I'm Roy Terry,

www.feedingfatty.com

Are You Substituting the Pleasures of a Good Relationship with Food? with Roman Mironov

Our relationships are such an important part of our life. Especially the intimate relationship, the one that we have with our romantic partner because when we feel good in the relationship, everything else basically falls into place. When we don't, let's say our relationship gets toxic. We tend to go to food and other addictions as a coping mechanism.

About Roman

I'm a relationship coach trained by Robbins Madanes, the official training center of Tony Robbins.

I help clients create those beautiful moments in a relationship that you wish you could relive over and over.

I teach you how to be grateful for your partner, respect them, and communicate effectively.

www.romanmironov.com

www.feedingfatty.com

Full Transcript Below

Are You Substituting the Pleasures of a Good Relationship with Food? with Roman Mironov

00:00:15 Roy Hello everybody. Welcome to another episode of feeding fatty. This is Roy. This is Terry. So we are the podcast. We are chronically in my journey through getting healthy, again, diet, exercise, change in mindset. So, we talk from time to time about the struggles and things that we do and Terry support for that. We also have, professionals as guests from time to come on and help us out. Give us some different viewpoints on things that we can do better to help us in this journey. Today is no different. Terry I'll let you introduce Roman.

00:00:50 Terry Yeah. Roman Marinov is a relationship coach trained by Robbins. Madanes the official training center of Tony Robbins. He helps clients create beautiful moments in a relationship that you wish you could relive over and over. He teaches you how to be grateful for your partner, respect them and communicate effectively likes to help people realize there's a potential and to live a happy lifestyle. Roman, thank you for being on the show. Welcome.

00:01:20 Roman Well, Ryan Garrett, thank you so much. It's an honor. I'm very happy to be with you today. Thank you.

00:01:28 Roy Yeah. Because we explore, relationships, with our food, with exercise, with life, and then also, with each other, Terry is such a big part of, me getting her well, she's a big part of life, no, either way, but we worked together and she is very instrumental in helping me on this path to wellness. So, let's just talk about that. What, how do relationships, affect things like are eating motivation, things like that.

00:02:05 Roman Oh, they actually affect them a lot because our relationships is such an important part of our life. Especially the intimate relationship, the one that we have with our romantic partner, because when we feel good in the relationship, everything else basically falls into place. When we don't, let's say our relationship gets toxic. We tend to go to food and other addictions as a coping mechanism.

00:02:38 Roy Okay. Yeah. I think it's two fold because for me, sometimes I can be driven just the other ways that, we're excited, things are going good and it's always like, Hey, let's go out and celebrate and have something good to eat. That's all it's like to celebrate. One thing that we're trying to, work hard on or, the, I guess, relating to different things as, food triggers, not only in our relationship, but work in life. It's just that, instead of having everything as a celebration point to run out and, eat some really good food, we're trying to change that to like maybe go do five pushups or do an exercise, do something physical instead of going for that food.

00:03:28 Roman Yeah, exactly. That's why when I celebrate, I made sure not to celebrate for food because it really only adds to the addiction. We're talking about addictions makes us stronger. It makes the neural pathways between food and pleasure is stronger in your mind. Right.

00:03:49 Roy Yeah. I think, we had a guest on this last week and were talking about some things that, and we try to look back in our past that relationships that we've had and things that have happened. And, I've been very fortunate that I have, I had an awesome childhood adulthood, life has just been very good for me. I'm blessed and couldn't ask for more, but the one thing that we kind of uncovered this last week was, ice cream. And, my relationship with that, as far as it being that celebratory mechanism that, as growing up, I had two grandpas that whenever anything, if were working, it'd be like, let's go down. You know, you worked really hard today. Let's go celebrate with some ice cream. Of course, taking a break, like my dad, when I'd go to work with them, we'd be like, oh, let's take a break and run over to dairy queen and get this.

00:04:47 Roy It's interesting that, while I never really thought about it until this week that I've carried that around in life with me, not necessarily as a negative, that something went bad and that's what triggers, but actually mainly that may be just the opposite. It was such a positive experience that, as cream is my thing that I've gotta be very careful with.

00:05:18 Roman Yes, yes. I know it makes a lot of sense. You associated again associated tons of pleasure with ice cream. Right. And that's when, right. When you want to feel great, now we just go to ice cream. Right.

00:05:33 Terry Also with your relationship with your grandparents, just anybody that you're thinking about that you had that celebratory mode with, it's like, it brings up good feelings, loving feelings with that. Yeah.

00:05:48 Roy It, and it carries over to, our spouse, our partner, because it's like, it, and it's not her not Terry's fault more me. I'm the one, I'm the trigger. It'd be like, oh, we had such a good day today. Let's rush out and get something to eat. Anyway, definitely something that we've been working on is to try to find, and maybe it's just as simple as let's go take a walk instead of, making food that focal point.

00:06:14 Terry To make a nachos at one o'clock in the morning, like we did a few months ago. Right.

00:06:21 Roy What are some other things that we can do to strengthen those relationships? And I, I, I'm assuming that this applies not only to our loved ones, but the relationships that we build with our families and coworkers and just, pretty much relationships in general.

00:06:41 Roman Yeah. That's a great question. I think you guys are a couple that's a great role model for me. I've been talking to you before and today, and I think that there was great energy between you and that's something that I definitely want to write and to be more specific, we need more communication. If you want to improve your relationship with the other person, remember that communication is the blood of the relationship. So, one thing to do is to make sure that you engage your partner in very deep conversations, not just shallow things about day to day stuff early into deeper emotions and feelings asked and how they feel and being asking very specific questions that also helps not just how are you, right? Yeah. How did you feel about that person saying that? Or how did you feel when you were in pain today? Those kinds of high quality questions? Another tip is to always be 100% present in the conversation.

00:07:54 Roman Make sure that you're not distracted by anything right. Gave that presence, that gift of your presence to your part. I will come in the eye be 100% there, especially if you are a man because women feminine women, they are very susceptible to this. Let's say the third tip is to make sure that you make your partner feel significant. You remind them that they are important to you. You praise them for every little thing. You make sure that they feel that they're appreciated because this is important. Yeah. Oftentimes we just take our partners for granted and we never gave them that praise or the feeling of significance. Yeah.

00:08:42 Terry Roy's really, Roy is really good at that. I mean, he D he tells me how grateful he is for me. I, I can't even tell countless times a day. I'm just like, oh me, I, I can't take a compliment. It's really hard for me to do. Yeah,

00:08:59 Roy Yeah. She is, I think it's an effort between both of us because she takes such good care of me in so many ways that it's like, Ooh, I've got to keep telling her not only because she is really awesome, but also because I don't want her to think I take it for granted or, those little bitty things that she does. I don't want her to think that they're unnoticed or overlooked. They're all just to me, the little things are as important as the big things. Probably more important day to day.

00:09:31 Roman Wow. That's some beautiful level of consciousness. Yeah. That's Tourette. Yeah. I can appreciate it.

00:09:40 Terry He's really good about it. He's also really good about trying to talk things out, trying to get to the root of causes, which I'm not like, I'll take care of him the way that I know how, and that's cooking and doing what I need to help make sure that he's being healthy and that I'm being healthy and all of that. I need to learn to verbalize that better. You have any tips on that? I mean, it's just hard. I don't know why it's so hard.

00:10:12 Roman Oh, that is such a huge shower for many women. And that, thank you. Thank you so much for sharing it. And let me tell you a bookstore. It, that is a great representation on this thing, that there is this marathon runner, a very popular athletes, rich role. He tells a story in his book. What basically happened is that he was going to get married to their girl and they have been dating for quite a long time. At one point they were living in different seats, let's say about two or three hours long away. At one point they were supposed to meet. She was supposed to come to him, but she said that she could, and that was about one month before their wedding. They were supposed to get married and well, he got upset and he said, okay, well, let me come to you. Let me drive.

00:11:16 Roman And she said, no, don't okay. So that was her first hand. Then they were doing the wedding rehearsal. She actually, she didn't want to do it. There was a lot of tension and basically what she was doing. She was showing him that she didn't want the marriage. The rehearsal went its way, but he actually was very anxious. He thought that she might not even show up during the way, but she did. She did. And they got married. And then they went to this honeymoon. I think it wasn't Hawaii or something like that. In that honeymoon, they were not talking to each other. They like, she was so angry that she had told him not to talk to her at all. So they were basically spanning it apart. At the end of the honeymoon, on the field day, he was fed up with it. He said, okay, so I can't take this anymore.

00:12:29 Roman We should just break up. And she said, okay. So he was very angry. They went home and they basically did not leave a day together as a couple, as a married couple. He went to talk to her friends. That's when he found out that she actually had someone else who was dating someone else at this point. The point of this story is that she was dropping hands to him all along the way, many hints, but she was not saying this directly. And he was not getting those hands. That's the point where the men, they don't like cans. They want direct information, direct commands, direct orders. They're basically a very simple in the sense. Yeah.

00:13:24 Terry Yeah. That's, that has been a big issue, huge issue between men and women, because we want men to get it. We want them to get it and you figure it out, but here's a couple of hints along the way. You just figure it out. I don't need to have to tell you, I don't know why that is.

00:13:42 Roy Well, and that's, and I'm that way, sometimes I have to tell Terry I'm getting something here, but let's just be very clear about it. Cause you know, yeah. Cause I mean, sometimes that receptors not always dialed in and most of the time, I mean, we've been together long enough and I think we care enough about each other that, a lot of that stuff comes through and maybe she says, oh, don't worry about it, but I know better. I need to, I need to be worrying about that. But, but it's like we're making a transition in our diet. I have been very quizzical quizzical about this to her to, because I want to know where, we talked about it, but I need to make sure that this is good for her as well as good for me. Trying to just set her down and ask her, how do you feel about this? Let's talk about it.

00:14:40 Roy Because I don't want, if it's not good for both of us, I don't want this to go on for a long time and in her be resentful because that's, what I see is what happens is one per one partner does something for the other and they have to keep doing it or it last over a period of time until they become very resentful of that.

00:15:05 Roman Yes, yes. That happens. I mean, you need to be careful about that before, so think or discuss before to take on such a commitment. Yeah. And any, no. What if you don't feel comfortable doing it anymore? It's okay to renegotiate. Exactly.

00:15:22 Roy Yeah. That's what I keep telling her, is this in, because I think it's, I think a lot of this can be generational just like with myself. When I was growing up, you went to work for a company and you stayed there for 30 years, you did this and you bought a house and you stayed there for your whole lifetime and, younger in life in my thirties that, I decided that, what, it's all right to change your mind as we grow. And as we develop things change. We have to be able to accept it, understand it, but we have to communicate. I mean, there's things that have changed in our relationship that I don't know what it is. I can't tell, but it's just, maybe a little thing that was like, Hey, I don't really like that too much. Right. This moment, not anymore. And, but instead of just either letting her continue to do it or, her doing it and me just, festering about it, that I don't like this that much anymore, just have a community, just talk about it.

00:16:30 Terry I like how you said, I like how you said you, how you give permission to renegotiate because we are so set and we just think we need to follow through, ,

00:16:44 Roman That's right. That's right. That's the best example of how we need to keep communication lines open and the relationship. Even if something is bothering us, it's okay to say this. Just make sure that you say it in a loving way. Yeah. You find the right moment, that's it?

00:17:06 Roy Yeah. And it's easy to lash out. This is something that I have to be careful about because, do we work a lot? And so, we enjoy our work. We work a lot and sometimes things get tense, not necessarily between us, but more me like a process is breaking down. Something's not clicking. It's like when you have very limited time and you have a lot of things to do, if things tick off just perfect, you can get it done. And life is good. If there's one little glitch, then it throws everything out of balance. Unfortunately, Terry is the closest person and I don't ever want to lash out her. I had to be very careful about, Hey, what? I I'm having this problem. It's has nothing to do with you. I don't want it to run off on you. I, you know, I'm not that great.

00:18:01 Roy Not as good as I need to be about, well, number one, not letting it fester to get that way, but also, just making sure that she doesn't get the runoff from things, other things that are going on in life.

00:18:14 Roman Exactly. That's the correct word runoff. That's why they want to, you want to share what's on your mind very quickly. Not wait until it festers. Sure.

00:18:27 Terry Yeah. I mean, you do a good job at that. You you're very cognizant and I don't mean this to be the Roy and Terry show, but honestly you really, they really are very cognizant. I mean, hopefully at this juncture in our life, we've learned something along the way. I think we're really applying blind those lessons.

00:18:48 Roy Yeah. That's something else that, I feel fortunate enough about that. I just told her earlier that how, I was lucky to find her and we got together and, life has been good, but what, how difficult is this now at older ages or, I guess people coming together at an older age when they're very set in their ways they're set in their routines, I guess that makes it harder to mesh, to become a couple.

00:19:22 Roman Sometimes yes. Sometimes now, and no, because as people get mature, more mature, they actually become more patient. They become less selfish and they are more open to having a relationship that actually sustainable and not just about them, but they are ready to give more, even though it means that it might mean that they're not getting the same amount of love back. Yeah. That this transition, basically that happens over our lifetime from selfishness to selflessness, it helps relationships in older age.

00:20:08 Terry They know, I think we know more about ourselves, so we know what we want or what we like and can talk about that, can you express that? Not so well, like I'm doing now, but, we just know what to look for and know what that attraction is.

00:20:34 Roman Exactly. Exactly. Just, just like Roy was saying about his, wanting everything to be perfect. And if something doesn't go right. Even little thing, you might not be happy about it and this might show, so he knows himself very well. He's very cognizant then that's one good thing that comes from the fact that he's a mature masculine man.

00:21:02 Terry He is very masculine, honey.

00:21:06 Roy I think I'll say, I don't know if he just told me the other day that she's like, are you 14? And I'm like, yeah, mostly most of the time. Yeah. I haven't dwelled. I'm still the little boy I see the shiny object and have to chase it or have to stand on the rail that you're not supposed to stand on or whatever it is like that. So.

00:21:26 Terry I don't want the frozen pond in the back. That's not all the way frozen. That was scary. Yeah.

00:21:31 Roy We had this winter, we had a Creek behind the house as Stover. I mean, like really bad. It got so cold. And, so were down there. I don't even know why were back there, but I was like, Ooh, let me just test that. She's like, first he tried to talk me out of it and then she could see she wasn't going to do that. She took her camera out and started. She's like, I just want to get a picture of you when you fall through, that's another, important part I think for us is, the laughing and having fun together. Even though we work together, we're together, a lot of time, we still take time to try to laugh and have fun and, not be serious all the time.

00:22:23 Roman Wow. This is, this is impressive because give me given the fact that you guys work together. You already spent quite a lot of time together. You have the time and the energy to also laugh together. I mean, wow. I'm impressed. I'm impressed.

00:22:43 Terry You humor is very important. Yeah. Yeah. Even if it doesn't seem like it's the right time to laugh, ?

00:22:51 Roy Yeah. Humor and, we have a lot of other things in common. Like, we like music, so we're able to bond over, we both have a pretty intense appreciation of music from our childhood and generation. So, we're able to bond over that. But, I was just going to ask though, in, as you help people with relationships, what are, 2, 3, 4, 5 of the largest, contributors to a discord in a relationship?

00:23:25 Roman Well, we actually touched upon some of them, first of all, is communication. Basically a lot of people lay like to stop communication when things go wrong. Yeah. And basically doing it as a punishment. Yeah. Right. Let's say their partner does something that they don't like and punish them with what I call silent treatment.

00:23:50 Terry Women do that a lot. And another mistake,

00:23:55 Roman Another mistake is not praising your partner, just taking them for granted too much. Yeah. Another mistake is taking your relationship for granted and thinking that your partner is not going anywhere, they will stay there for life. This is not true because you always need to be looking for looking to introduce new units and to be a relationship because newness is important for keeping passion. You might have loved, we might have downs of love between each other, but if you don't have passion, your relationship might be due. Right. Another mistake is let's say, I'm sorry. Yeah. Okay. Another mistake is not being emotional enough, not being too touchy and feely because you need that. You need that a romantic connection in addition to your like regular conversational connection. For example, be sure to give hugs, be sure to kiss your partner, be sure to smile at them all the time.

00:25:16 Roman This is also important.

00:25:19 Roy Yeah. I definitely think that one is two and it's funny cause we still hold hands a lot, this like teenagers and that's, and like even at night when we go to sleep, sometimes that's just, my hand over on her just where I can touch her, feel her there. It's just, I don't know. It's kind of weird, but it's important just to have that connection.

00:25:43 Roman And it's not weird. No, that's absolutely normal. And it's actually beautiful. I like that again, you guys rock. Thank you. Well, yeah, just.

00:25:55 Terry Trying to take a compliment.

00:25:58 Roy Yeah. It's, I think the funny part about taking things for granted is that, maybe if you haven't had it, you appreciate it more. But I think it's just the opposite. The better things are between us. The more appreciative I am for her and all of those things, because it's so rare to find, two people that really mesh, I think, as good as we do on so many things. No, I'm not saying we don't have our differences or things that, I was trying to think what that was it's, she doesn't like all lives and I like all lose. We're able to, segregate that and it doesn't have to be a big thing, but for the big things in life, I feel like that we're pretty much on track, but there's always, some little differences that we may not always be together on, but talking about it.

00:26:54 Roy I think the other thing, is respect is that, we have to really respect our partner and their thoughts and their feelings. I don't have to agree with her, but I just have to respect that her life, circumstances have gone, have got her to this belief. And so you have to respect it.

00:27:17 Roman Yeah, that's right. What else can you do? Other, you also have a perspective, your own perception, right. And who knows who's right. Yeah. It's better to be happy to be right. Exactly. Or something,

00:27:31 Terry Something in the middle there, and that's what you just kind of mesh it together.

00:27:36 Roy I think that's a, I hate to get off on the social media tangent, but I will for just a minute that's a problem with that is that, we try to spend so much time to, convince or to talk people into having our point of view that we really don't take the time to listen to them, to see what their point of view is. The other part is that we can harmonize. We don't, I mean, it'd be a boring world if were all carbon copies and all felt the exact same way about everything. I mean, that's what that kind of adds to the spice of life. Just a little bit. And, the other part I get off on this tangent too, but trying new things is that we, Terry's a lot more conservative in that respect and that, especially as we talk about cooking and trying some new things that we're doing is I just tell her, look, do whatever you feel, throw it out there.

00:28:39 Roy Especially, it's like, if it messes up or comes out bad, we can start over or we can go up to the restaurant and get something we're not going to starve to death, but you hear people that is like the wife makes something bad and then it turns into a fuss and, I don't really get that, but I encourage her, do something different. It's it's okay.

00:29:05 Roman Yeah, yeah, definitely. That's one reason you guys have each other present as a masculine man, your, and having her as a feminine woman yeah. In air life. One of your goals is to challenge her in a positive way and that does how you do it. She is a little bit more conservative. As you say, you are there to give her new challenges. Right. And that's one of them. He does.

00:29:39 Terry He really does. I mean, staying in the food genre, I, I fry fried up, I guess it was fried up. Some TemPay never had done that before. We didn't know what it was going to turn out to be, but I don't know. It was, it was lots of prepping and everything. You fry it up and put all your stuff on. It turned out to be pretty good. I just hate doing all that. Tend to know that it's not going to turn out bad in that terrible. I should, I need to try new things.

00:30:07 Roy Yeah. And it's yeah. It's even like, we've been kind of locked down and haven't been out of the house much, but it's like the other thing is the spontaneity. I'm not sure which one of us is more spontaneity. I think we are at different times on different subjects, but, it's like, it was like, were just sitting on the couch one night and I got an email from a, a place that has music. It just said, the first 50 people get free tickets for, it was a cover band, a couple of cover bands. We liked the bands that they were covering. So, what I, I just sent an email in not expecting to win. I got a message back like, oh, you're the winner. So, it was like the next night or two, we just loaded up, went to this place and we had an amazing time.

00:30:58 Roy The music was good. We found a couple bands, but the place was good. And, it was just kind of fun to do something on a whim.

00:31:08 Roman Oh yeah, this is so important. This is important again, because it introduces newness and their relationship. It also see when we become too conservative, we start feeling older. And this is not conducive to love. This is not conducive to passion. When we go back to that younger mindset, we could slip in when we had less responsibilities and so on and so forth, we feel younger. Let's say you go out and you spend a wild night and you come home at 4:00 AM. This is something that makes you feel young. That reenergizes your passion in the relationship. Yeah.

00:31:59 Terry Yeah. I'm just thinking, I'm just thinking about how much older I'm going to feel the next day.

00:32:05 Roy That's me holding back. Yeah. I'm like, what? You can sleep all day. It doesn't matter. We don't have anywhere to be. So, we can go do that kind of stuff. And, I, I think it's fun, it's just new adventures and that we are both, fairly up for adventures. I think that's the other thing is just, having these adventures, experiencing things together and the memories that it provides, because, w we have those things. It's like, oh my gosh, you remember that concert went to and this happened and it's, those are pleasant too. It's like when the, when it is a slow time and you're just kinda sitting around, not doing much and thinking about all these things, it's just, I think it adds to that pleasure from your partner as well. Yeah. Yes. For sure. Well, Roman, we appreciate you taking time to stop by and talk to us today.

00:33:07 Roy Any closing words, any closing thoughts on relationships before we wrap it up?

00:33:14 Roman Yeah. Yeah. One thought is that you need to treat a relationship, your relationship, a romantic one as an important area of your life, like your business or your health. You spend time in those interests, right? Both with your business and kind of your, how, and you also want to spend time, invest time and effort into your relationship. If you live it as is it well die pretty soon, right? So you want to at least read books about read books and get better at it so that you make sure that you stay motivated and you have the right information, the right resources to keep your partner happy. Yeah. Don't take it for granted. Yeah.

00:34:07 Roy Do you have any books off the top of your head, any recommendations that you can think of? If not, don't worry. I'm not, I didn't mean to put you on the spot. I just thought maybe you might.

00:34:16 Roman Have one, I would say two books. The first one is a general one, but it speaks a lot about whole, all things, relationship wise and this Stephen Covey's seven habits of highly effective people. Okay. The second one is by Sharon Salzberg called real love.

00:34:40 Roy Okay. Yeah. And I think it's interesting. I, I'm glad you bring that up because again, I can speak for me and that is a deficit in our relationship because we do something that we really enjoy. And so it's easy to spend. It's easy to spend a lot of time. There's, it's like, there's never an end to the things that we could do, even if we get things done that we've got to have done, there's still always looking at this new form of marketing, looking at this new technology, looking at this. Maybe we want to twist this or tweak that. Anyway, it, and this gets back to the communication is that Terry is, we are confident enough in our relationship. She can tap me on the shoulder and say, all right, you're done. And then, you know,

00:35:33 Terry Like, I'll say why I'll be there in a minute and now say you're a minute or my minute, because they're two different things.

00:35:43 Roy Yeah. It's easy to get hung up in that it just never ends. So, taking that time, if we're going to invest, like you said, we invest time and money in our businesses, in our homes. In a lot of things that we need to take that same approach to our relationships and, really invest and it's time. It's not, thank goodness Terry is not, she's not high dollar maintenance, so that's not an issue. But, just taking that time out of our day to, really be together to have those conversations, it's truly important. I think that's where people, kinda miss out some is that, you got, especially when you have kids, you got kids pulling you one way. You've got parents, you've got your job. Then, V go out and do stuff with friends that it just, it really divide your time down to where you don't have enough to devote to your relationship.

00:36:40 Roy That's the cool thing with Terry and me, it's like, we're best friends. We like to hang out with each other, even outside of work, we like to go do things together. So.

00:36:55 Roman Yes. Yeah. You, you are an inspiration.

00:37:01 Roy Well, we're trying, we have to work at it, but all right, Roman, well, tell everybody, somebody needs some relationship coaching. How can they get ahold of you?

00:37:17 Roman Yes. The best way is go to the website, which is Roman mirror knob.com, spelled as R O M A N M I R O N O V.com. There you have all the links to my social media and the ability to contact me for a free coaching session. If you match the lecture coming up, the Roy and terrorist podcast, I'll be happy to give you a 30% discount. Oh, wow.

00:37:43 Roy Nice. Yeah.

00:37:45 Terry You have a podcast as well, correct? Yes. It just under your name or is it called something else?

00:37:56 Roman It's called be version two of yourself. Okay.

00:38:00 Roy All right. Great. Well, y'all go out and give a listen if you need some help in a relationship and well, let me say it this way. Don't wait till you need help in a relationship, seek out somebody like Roman, that can be preemptive and don't wait until there's a problem. Get the tools that you need to have a successful relationship because it spills over into everything. I have a business show I was talking about, and were just talking about, you can't park your emotions at the door to work. Same thing, coming home, you can't park your work stuff at the door. Everything is all intermingled. For us to have a happy, productive life at work, we have to have a happy, productive life at home. And, again, I'm blessed to have somebody that supports me in everything. I know that she's my biggest champion and there's nobody in this world that I want to see succeed more than her.

00:38:57 Roy I think it's important to, get out in front of that. Don't wait till it's a, don't wait till it's a train wreck to try to clean up the mess, get out there ahead of the game and make it happen where you can continue to be happy in that relationship.

00:39:15 Roman Yeah, that is golden. Yeah.

00:39:19 Roy All right guys. Well, that's going to do it for another episode of feeding fatty I'm Roy. You can always find us at www.feedingfatty.com. We're also on all the major social media platforms, as well as the podcast platforms, iTunes, Stitcher, Google, Spotify. If we're not one in which you listened to, if you'll reach out, we'll certainly be glad to add you. So thanks for listening until next time. Take care of yourself and take care of your family.

www.romanmironov.com

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Change For The Better Is Possible, Small Steps Add Up To Big Losses with The Fit Mess Guys

In this world of instant gratification, we want to take action today and see the results tomorrow. It usually takes us a while to get to the point we feel we need to make a change. We have to realize it takes time to see results. Change is possible, and taking small measured action is generally better for sustainable change. Get started today, it's never too late.

About Jeremy and Zach

Zach Tucker and Jeremy Grater are the founders and hosts of The Fit Mess. For nearly a decade, they have pushed themselves to learn more about their own physical, emotional, and mental health. This has created a passion for using their acquired knowledge to help others. As hosts of the show for over 2 years, they have had the opportunity to speak to a wide range of guests, including some of the biggest names in health and wellness.

Zach Tucker, along with his wife and young daughter resides in Albany, NY. Zach has a passion for helping people define and meet their wellness goals. He thinks that every person is different and there is no one size fits all solution for someone's wellness. He is on a mission to share his story and some of the tools that helped him on his own wellness journey. Zach is certified to teach yoga and Insanity® Live.Jeremy Grater is a married father of two young girls and also lives in Seattle. He's spent the majority of the last decade experimenting with a variety of wellness tools to improve his mental health, lose 70 pounds and share what's helped along the way. He's also been in the broadcasting and podcasting business for about two decades.

www.thefitmess.com

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Full Transcript Below

Change For The Better Is Possible, Small Steps Add Up To Big Losses with The Fit Mess Guys

00:00:15 Roy Hello, and welcome to another episode of feeding fatty. I'm your host, Roy Terry. So we're the podcasts. That's chronicling my journey, Terry, my helper through this journey of wellness, losing some weight, getting in better shape. And, from time to time, we have, professionals in their field that come on and today is no different than Terry. I'll let you make our introduction of Jeremy and Zach. All right,

00:00:38 Terry Zach Tucker and Jeremy Grater are the founders and host of The Fit Mess for nearly a decade. They've pushed themselves to learn more about their own physical and emotional and mental health. This has created a passion for using their acquired knowledge to help others as hosts of the show. For over two years, they've had the opportunity to speak to a wide range of guests, including some of the biggest names in health and wellness, Zach and Jeremy. Welcome to the show.

00:01:12 Roy Yeah. Thanks guys. Thanks for taking time out of y'all's day to be with us. We just, I guess we'll throw it out there and see kind of what's new, as were talking in pre-show, some different new weight equipment and things out there, and Jeremy said he has started running, so we'll just kinda first off. It'd be nice just to find out, kind of how you guys found yourself here.

00:01:36 Zach Yeah. I'll start off because I think, my story goes all the way back to being a baby, of just being set up on a, poor, starting line in life. I had some heart defects. I had an absent mother, just, lots of issues, lots of trauma as a child, which led tons and tons of overeating. And, at one point in my life, I was, close to 300 pounds and eating terrible, not exercising. I was, not in great shape. Over the last 20 years, I've made small little changes to turn the health around, to make myself look better, feel better. I had to focus on the mental health and it was a long journey. Jeremy was also following behind on that as well. At some point I was giving him some advice and, we sat down one day and we're like talking about being vulnerable about, the journey that we're on and talking about the struggle and how hard it is.

00:02:42 Zach And, we came to the conclusion that, we need to get this out there and we need to share these conversations with other people, especially men who are sometimes afraid to share their feelings. Yeah.

00:02:56 Roy Wow. That's yeah. That's a, basically a carbon copy of where were, I've struggled. I've had, I can definitely go back and see, I'm kind of the opposite as a kid, I was very skinny, like to the point, people were like, oh my gosh, you got to eat to live. As an adult, definitely four or five stages where, put on 20 pounds, 25 pounds at this stage for this life change. Then, now I find myself here and it's just, it's hard because, we do good sporadically. We can do good for a couple months. It's like, we have an event change and, then things change. I typically go back to my old ways. So, we talk a lot about that. Surgery may be an option for people, but for me, I always thought if I don't change the way I think then I'll never, I'll just go back to my old ways.

00:03:50 Roy Anyway, but thanks for relating that story. I mean, it is, I think it is good to be vulnerable and that's why, Terry encouraged me. She's like, Hey, you need to get this out there because people are struggling. So anyway, Jeremy, what's your story?

00:04:05 Jeremy Similar, not quite the same trauma as a child, mind was much more garden variety, alcohol in the family and kind of absent father stuff. Yeah. Both parents working. A lot of, latchkey kid or the eighties thing. And it is funny. I remember I was around third grade when I really developed some really bad eating habits and it was like, my best friend would come over and we would just hang out and watch TV and raid the pantry during every commercial break. Right. That set me on a course of doing that for far too long. Yo-yo dieted most of my life and, got into, my career and about midway through my career. I really started recognizing a lot of imposter syndrome and really feeling like man, one of these days, they're going to figure out they made a huge mistake hiring me, and they're gonna, they're going to show me the door, know, and that lasted for about 10 years.

00:04:53 Jeremy I finally started getting into some therapy and that turned my life around. My therapist introduced me to meditation. That really helped, calm all of that noise and quiet. A lot of those voices that told me it wasn't good enough. I still don't get me wrong. I, I battle every single day I've fought depression my entire life. Meditation was the thing that set me on the course to doing other things. Along the way I had a bike crash got injured pretty badly. And, but I was finding that through biking. I was, I was also meditating. It was just this very in the moment experience where the whole point is to not die on the way to work. You have to be so in the moment and so focused on what's happening right now that I started trying to push that into other areas of my life.

00:05:41 Jeremy Like Zach said, along the way he and I met through, just through parent groups, we are our friends, our kids are we're friends, and we started hanging out and were just having these really authentic conversations. That's something I've always looked for in a relationship with any of my is who can I have real conversations with and who am I talking about the Mariners with? Who do I want to spend my time with? Especially because the Mariners suck. So, but like Zach said, we, the more we have these conversations, just, camping and whatever, were just like, we don't hear enough guys talking like this. So, like I said, we just felt like this is a show that needs to exist.

00:06:19 Roy Yeah. For the rest of the baseball world out there, you may want to tell them who the Mariners are.

00:06:31 Speaker 4 The Rangers, I mean, come on. Yeah. Right. Oh yeah.

00:06:37 Roy Yeah. That's why we holler for the red Sox or the Yankees, for winter. So, let's talk about that because, your ride at, the good thing about me I'm to an age that it's like, I am who I am. I mean, just because I don't admit that I'm overweight to myself, it doesn't mean that other people that look at me can't I can't figure that out. So, I mean, at some point you just have to say, Hey, I got to own this, but it's the funny thing for me is I don't think about myself as being overweight or, I picture, and I don't picture myself as old either. I'm thinking like that 25 year old in better shape self that's, just who I am until, you walk by a mirror or try to put some clothes on after being in quarantine for a year. And it's like, oh my goodness.

00:07:28 Roy Things are different, but so, let's talk about the difference in Mindshift body, habit shifts, things like that. Was there a point that for y'all either one that the, it was the, your mind engaged and then that's where your habits followed or did you kind of get on that path to habits and then the mind followed after that or some form of that?

00:07:56 Zach My first, my first, real big change was, so I used to smoke cigarettes as well. Okay. And, ate a McDonald's every day. I mean, it was, there was some pretty bad habits there, and it was, my mind shifted because of a comment that my boss made. And, I interviewed for the job and I decided to wear a nicotine patch that day. So I didn't smell like cigarette smoke. I got the job and I got hired in my first day, my boss looked at me and said, oh, you smoke. If I had known that I would have never hired you. Oh, wow. Right. Like that hit me really hard. I was like, wow, this habit, this unhealthy thing is now going to be a, a detriment to my professional career. Yeah. That was the first step of like, well, these are gone and my mind started shifting of what else am I doing? That's bad for me that will, not look in my professional career and right.

00:08:57 Zach That's when I started running and doing the little things, but that was the main shift for me, was this external judgment from somebody who said something like that. It just completely 180 degree my thought process of what I was doing to myself. Yeah.

00:09:14 Terry Yeah. Somebody else may have, you want, you always want to be in control. You want to think like, you're, you feel like you're in control, but it's for you to be able to know, to recognize that and actually act on it. That's those are the keys right there, just going ahead and act in on something that was a judgment call to you. That's that's good.

00:09:40 Zach Yeah. Acting on it was, I, I say, I quit smoking, right. That was probably one of the hardest things I ever did in my entire life. Like that is no joke, not easy. So, it's easy to say now. Right. But, at the time it was incredibly difficult, very painful and a big struggle, but it was worth it to make that change. That's awesome.

00:10:07 Jeremy I think I've had probably three really significant, moments that really changed everything for me. And, one was when I, I had the dumbest knee injury you've ever heard of in your life. We, I don't know if you guys have this out there, but Amazon, they deliver groceries. Yeah. We are, our daughter was very young. She was like, still in the crib. One morning the Amazon guy shows up at like six in the morning and he's dropping the groceries off and the dog loses his mind, starts barking. If you've ever had kids, that anyone who wakes up your kid deserves to be.

00:10:41 Speaker 4 Punished. Yes. I just,

00:10:43 Jeremy I rolled out of bed to like quickly try and quiet my dog. Somehow like rolled my knee and just collapsed on the ground. Couldn't couldn't walk, totally hurt my knee, literally getting out of bed. And it was the stupidest injury. And, so I started going to physical therapy for it. The physical therapist learned about my background and all that. She said, if you don't get on a bike, you're going to end up replacing both of your knees. Now. I was like, wow. Okay. I can do that. I bought a bike on Craigslist and started biking to work. And, and it was funny. I was having a conversation with my brother about it. I was like, yeah, I don't know if I'm gonna be able to, it's a 10 mile ride. I don't know if we'll be able to do this every day. He's like, dude, you just need to decide.

00:11:20 Jeremy You're that weird guy, that bikes to work every day, just make that mental shift and you'll do it. And he was absolutely right. Literally the next day I started biking to, and from work every day. So that was the first one. Another one was like I mentioned, yo-yo dieted my entire life. The conversations I was having with Zach, were camping one weekend sitting around the campfire and he was talking about how he had just lost, like, I don't know, 40 pounds or something in a few months doing the keto diet and like most conversations I often have with Zach, I started with, you're crazy. How do you do that? That's insane. Okay. I gotta try it. I tried it and I lost 70 pounds using the keto diet and just like some light exercise and of fasting and came off in a few months. So that was the other one.

00:12:07 Jeremy The other was, I've battled depression, my entire life on and off of various meds, to just to try and curb it. None of them really worked for me. And, it was shortly after my bike crash. I was on some opioids for awhile. I was like, man, these are really good. I stopped them after like a week. Cause like, that's, this is a dangerous road to go down. Once I stopped taking those, I also stopped taking my antidepressants and then it was new years. I had just a few beers, like nothing crazy woke up the next day with a hangover and just was like, I am just done. Like, those few beers were not worth feeling like this. Yeah. Literally quit drinking. That was like three or four years ago now. Those three things have been it, there's just, this really locked in mental shift where I just went, I'm done living that way.

00:12:57 Jeremy Yeah. I'm going to live this way now. Those three things I've never really looked back on it.

00:13:03 Roy Yeah. I'll just go, I can relate to the Amazon incident because I had almost a similar one. Usually they come in the afternoon or whatever. We've got a little, we live out in kind of in the wilderness. So, the front camera went off and usually it's like a varmint Armadillo or raccoon or something walking across. I just rolled over, pulled up my phone and looked at it and there was this car sitting up on the road that just won't leave. So, I did the same thing. I catapulted out of bed over both dogs and, threw the shoes and, slipped on the floor and getting out there. And it's just the Amazon grocery. I'm like doodles. She was at cigar in our space. Yeah. He delivers groceries at six 15 in the morning. Good.

00:13:47 Speaker 4 Tell him, I forgot to tell him,

00:13:51 Roy Talk about, Zach mentioned the opinions of others. It's funny because I being a heavy person, when I look at heavy people, I still have, negative thoughts. Let me just put it that way. I don't ever think about people thinking that of me. You really stop and think about, oh my gosh, all these, negative opinions that people form of me just because they see me without even meeting me or knowing anything. Now I try not to make the cover of the Walmart people page on Facebook with my pants riding down and my shirt riding up. I do try to stay, totally covered up, but still, I mean, it's just like people view you as inferior or damaged or something, but I don't know. I think about that, hasn't been enough to change me and it's like, I still continue on doing these things. So I don't know.

00:14:51 Roy It's I gotta give you credit for being able to, make that change based on that, because I, I wished I could, it's just been a struggle, finding that thing that works, that continues. We talked a little pre-show about, I'm good for about two, three months of something. If we have a little change in the way life goes, that, were doing good back in the fall and then Terry was gone for about three weeks. And, yeah. I mean, then McDonald's and taco bell became my best friend again, driving up there to try to get something to eat. Instead of cooking in, anyway, that's just kind of my downfall. It just be nice to be able to string together six months or a year, and stay on that path. Any advice either, but any, either one of y'all want to throw out about that would be very helpful.

00:15:41 Zach Yeah. A couple things. So, so the mindset of like what you look like. I do have like a quick, I I've, being 300 pounds, I have always felt as though I was a big guy. And internally it was never quite enough. Like I would push myself so hard to like work out, to eat, right. To the point where I made a comment to my wife one day that, man, I'm still, really fat. She was like, dude, you realize that I can see your abs. Right. She made me take a picture and like, they weren't showing much, but you could see a couple of ad muscles. That was a moment where like in our heads, we, for me anyway, even though I wasn't really that big anymore, I still felt really big. I was working really hard on it. Like that internal mindset of like what you think of yourself is really important to make sure that you're telling yourself the truth there.

00:16:43 Zach Yeah. To the other question of like, how do you stick to it? You can't like, that's what I had to accept. I would go really hard for three months and then I would cave. Yeah. I would beat myself up because I caved and cave more because I beat myself up and it would be this never ending spiral. Yeah. Three months later, two months of those games were gone. I've really just come back to like the 80, 20 principle. Right. If you're doing the right thing, 80% of the time, it's okay to go wild 20% of the time. Yeah. Right. Be okay with that and be forgiving of yourself for it.

00:17:24 Roy The thing is that forgiveness, because you're exactly right. When you fall off the, whatever you're doing, the Eaton exercise. I, I realized to lose weight exercise, doesn't need to be, we can lose weight with our diets 70, 80% or whatever, but I just feel like I've got to have that exercise. It makes me feel so much better. Anyway, it doesn't matter if we're talking about diet exercise or whatever. It's like, once you fall off, then it's like, so hard on ourself and then the non forgiveness. It's like, well, I've already, had three tacos that, what's it going to hurt? I'll have another, I'm going to go ahead and eat bad today. And then tomorrow I'm going to change. Tomorrow goodness knows something else pops up to where, it just, you just kicked that can down the road further and further.

00:18:12 Zach Yeah. I also try and schedule things too. So, ing that I'm going to be 80, 20. Saturday is kind of my, and I know some people don't like cheat days, but this is for me works well. Yeah. On Saturdays. I do whatever I want. If I don't want to work out, I don't work out if I want to eat pizza and ice cream, I do that. Having that schedule for me is actually really helpful knowing that I'm going to have a 20% of going crazy. Yeah. On Wednesday when I have that craving, I, I just go, okay, let's write that down. You're going to have that on Saturday.

00:18:44 Roy That's a, that's a good tip. I like that.

00:18:48 Terry Yeah. Just having something to look forward to that helps.

00:18:52 Zach The, the problem with that is once you do have the cheat day though. For me on Saturday, I eat all, I have sugar and junk food in your body. On Sunday you have that craving and it's really hard to go back into it. It doesn't work for everyone, but it definitely works for me. I wouldn't w it's something you can try.

00:19:13 Roy Yeah. Yeah. I've, I'm that way about, I guess I feel sometimes like I have to be totally strict and can't let anything creep back in because just that one, that little door opening for me, it's like back in the day when they came out with the little skinny blue, the skinny bell ice cream sandwiches, I mean, those are great. They're probably work well if you eat one, but if you eat a whole box of was like, well, that was so good. Let me just have six of them, and I, I'm an ice cream fanatic too. That's, that's even harder to give up something that is, and we talked about this with the, more of a psychologist type person the other day that, I, I grew up with ice cream, it was a reward. Now I'm thinking about that instead of thinking about, Hey, let's go celebrate and have some ice cream.

00:20:07 Roy It's like, what I get on my, TX band and do, 25 pull-ups or something, trying to shift that mindset from it's a reward because I think it goes back to the validation of us is that's what growing up, that was always the reward or the treat is, Hey, let's stop by dairy queen and let's go up to the soda fountain and, get a banana split. Trying to change that from, we can still celebrate, but now, it needs to be a physical activity, either walking or pulling up doing something to better ourselves, better myself.

00:20:43 Terry Jeremy, you were talking about, I think it was you, did you say something about meditating?

00:20:48 Jeremy Yeah. I was just going to say kind of two things on what you're talking about there. One I know for me, I look at my weight issues as being a symptom of my emotional and mental health issues. I can tell by looking in the mirror, how much I still have to do inside. That's where for me, the more I meditate, the more that I do that inner work, the more strength I find to do the outer work, to do the running and the other things. That's something to consider, but also, I just want to commend you on the fact that you're on this journey. This is an incredibly difficult journey at any stage of your life. Well, thanks. But, but especially in a system where the food that is affordable and accessible is garbage, right. Much of what you have available to eat goes against your body's biology and the way that it wants to live.

00:21:44 Jeremy You're fighting a losing game almost every bite fall. Yeah. To the amount of knowledge I think you need from a nutrition standpoint is almost impossible. I think for most people who have busy lives and things to do, because it's just not something that we're taught in a way that makes sense as we're growing up. Yeah. Every ad is, oh, you deserve a treat today. Well, yeah, maybe, but maybe I don't, maybe I'm just lazy. Maybe I just want to eat garbage because it tastes good. That makes me want to eat more garbage. So, so that, so two things there, but one, I think that is really important. I do think that for a lot of people, food is an escape from whatever the issue is that we're struggling with whatever trauma we haven't dealt with from our childhood, whatever. I do think that the, at least in my experience, and I'm no doctor here.

00:22:38 Jeremy The more work you can do, dealing with what's going on inside will allow you the freedom and the desire to do the work on the outside. And, and for me, exercise is almost never about building muscle or getting stronger, or it's all in my head. The more I run, the more I bike, the harder, the yoga, whatever I'm doing to push my body is all about releasing those demons. I like the phrase I like to say is a tired muscles, quiet, dark voices, because the more you quiet those dark voices, the more you're going to be able to live a healthier life and make better choices.

00:23:13 Roy Yeah. No, and I think you're right. And that's something, yeah. I don't think I've told, we haven't really put this out there, but what, cause I think back about that, what am I not dealing with because it's just been so difficult. I just I've become to feel that if I wasn't dealing with some, or wasn't not dealing with something, if there was an unresolved issue, it would be a lot easier. I'm actually going to do, I'll let Terry say the name of it. Reiki, Reiki.

00:23:41 Terry I did my first Reiki session yesterday.

00:23:43 Roy I'm actually going to go try that. And, supposedly it can, it's supposed to be a big release with some things like that. So, I'm open to try and I just I'm to the point in life that I want to make changes and it's, things that I've done in the past just haven't really worked or they've worked. Then, like Zach said, you put it all back on eventually. And, I'm just ready to make a change, for a lot of reasons, but just to get all this behind me. So.

00:24:13 Jeremy Something, something to consider too, like you seem to be aware of the pattern, right? Like it two or three months of this is going to fail me. Yeah. Just when you go with, go into whatever you're going into go, I'm going to do this for 30. I'm going to do this for a week next week. I'm going to do that. Like, just give yourself smaller goals because none of us is going to stick to anything for a year, for 10 years for it's never going to happen too much is going to get in the way. Right. Today I'm going to decide every day, this week I'm going to go walk for 20 minutes next week, it'll be 30 minutes, whatever it is, but just give yourself those smaller goals. And, and the more you pick up those little wins, the confidence grows and you'll be able to score those bigger wins.

00:24:53 Jeremy That's.

00:24:53 Roy Great. Yeah, that's a good point. Cause I, I am too much in that, looking at a year lifetime or whatever it is instead of just, and I guess this gets back to the meditation and being in the moment is just take it one meal at a time, one day at a time, one step at a time. It's, I guess it's the other part I, I have to say is it's daunting because it's like, the impatience is all I can say is like, it, and I think why haven't I been impatient, putting on all this weight now, all of a sudden I'm here now, all of a sudden I'm impatient. I want it all gone. It took years to get here. It may take years to get away from here, but it's like, nah, if I do something, if I go out and walk around the block, I expect to come home and I've lost 15 pounds or something ridiculous like that.

00:25:46 Roy It's like, it's just take it that whatever I did today, exercise wise and eating wise, that's better than what I was yesterday. I, trying to break it down into those smaller wins is definitely something I can work on for sure. Sure.

00:26:00 Terry Yep. Have you guys done a plant-based diet where we're delving into that now? Do much about the plant-based?

00:26:12 Zach I can I'll let Jeremy talk about that because I am a carnivore and I love hamburgers and steaks and chicken. Yeah. I've, I think I've tried it once or twice for maybe a couple of days. And, while I'm sure there are some health benefits and I'm sure there's some good stuff about it. I just really enjoy hamburgers. Jeremy's the vegetarian though, so we can talk. Okay.

00:26:39 Jeremy Yeah. I've been a vegetarian for probably 25. Oh, w w with occasional cheats here and there. Yeah. Any diet, if you don't do it right. You're, it's just a mess. When I talked to him nutrition at one point and a nutritionist at one point, and they said, I kind of told them what I, and oh, you're not a vegetarian, you're a cheese and bread. Attarian, you know, that's not good. You don't want to combine your fats and your carbs at every meal because that's how you put on a bunch of weight. So, definitely I think any diet, if you do it well, is going to beneficial. There are loads and loads of studies that will tell you a plant-based diet is ideal, is what you should be doing. I, I read a book, man, I'm forgetting the author's name now, but he broke down diet in a really simple way.

00:27:29 Jeremy It was just like, eat food, not too much. Oh, what's the third thing, eat food, not too much. Mostly plants. Yeah. His whole point was like, so much of what we eat is not food. Much of what is in the store is not food. If it didn't grow out of ground or it doesn't walk on the ground, it's not food. Right. You know, I, I eat impossible burgers. I eat, I eat tons of like processed fake meats to get my protein because I'm lazy. Because I have childhood associations with, a meat and potatoes diet. It's a lot of just a conditioning that I need to break. Yeah. But if you can eat, yeah. I mean the more locally sourced and plant-based, and not too much is a pretty simple rule to live by. And, and, I definitely think it's worth experimenting with, if you haven't before.

00:28:17 Jeremy Yeah. Why not?

00:28:18 Roy I haven't in a, we're in a touch second week and I feel like we're doing good and we're not the we'll never eat meat again. Were talking the other day that, if we get hungry for Terry was craving a hamburger yesterday and out so bad and she had to go somewhere and I'll say, well, just get it on, stop by and get one on your way. It's not a big deal. We, I think because the other part of this is, I think the more you tell yourself, oh, you can't have that. The more, psychologically, we want that. It's like, if we want to eat a piece of meat or a piece of fish, just we can do it, but I just, we're trying, I want to eliminate that because I've gotten to feel how, when I eat beef, especially it just, it seems to weigh me down and bother me the next day.

00:29:01 Roy Like being, not being able to get up. I'm telling you that, I felt my inflammation go down the last couple of weeks. Also just being, much, easier flinging up out of bed with a lot of energy and feeling good, but that's, and it's have to be fair to say, that's not meat or beef or proteins fault. That was, that was my fault for eating at the wrong time of day. That's another thing that we kind of have to talk about that goes with this. We, we're doing the intermittent fasting, so we try to eat our last meal by seven and then we're not eating again until lunch. So, I feel like that has been the most beneficial for me because I'm a late night eater. I mean, at nine, 10 o'clock at night, man, I am ready. Before, before Terri, man, I would physically get in the car at nine o'clock at night and go up to the convenience store and raid the shell, and get the little nacho bowl and a candy bar and come home and eat it.

00:30:03 Roy It's something about going to bed, feeling that full, satisfied feeling. Trying to get rid of that as well as the other thing, I kind of laugh about is that if I get just a little twinge of hunger and empty stomach, I'm like, oh my God, that must be death knocking at my door. It's like trying to realize that feeling can be there for a couple of hours and I'm probably not going to pass out or have any negative reactions. So, that's something that's like, oh my God, I felt my stomach. I need to run to the cabinet and load up on something, ?

00:30:36 Zach Yeah. I I've so I intermittent fast most days. It's actually 1:30 PM here right now and I still haven't eaten anything. I probably won't until dinner at this point, just because, if I eat now, my dinner will be ruined. Like my dad would always tell me. But interim and fasting is great. It really teaches you the difference between I am actually hungry for food and my body is craving food and I need the energy from food and the, I have something emotional or mental going on that I want to go crack the cupboard open for it. I did a three-day fast one day, or over three days, I did three days. That was such an eyeopening moment because you go three days without actually eating anything. All of these little, I had all these moments of like, I need to go eat Y oh, you're about to do a task that is hard or something that you want to avoid or remind you of something.

00:31:44 Zach I had all these connections in those three days of why I wanted to go eat. None of it had anything to do with being hungry. Yeah. It was, it was a really great realization.

00:31:54 Roy That's awesome. I had, I I'm going to brag. I don't usually do that. I want to brag about last night. I was sitting here putting together one of our episodes and, I don't even know why I just got up, went to the cabinet, opened it. This is like, what? Nine 30 got up, went to cabinet, opened it up and it was chickpeas. So, I mean, I have to say it wasn't like Doritos, but, and I had the chickpeas out. I had them open. I had my hand in it and I thought, why am I eating these it's nine o'clock I'm not supposed to be, I don't want to be doing this because it'll make me and I actually put them up without eating them. For me, that's a huge victory because what I have found too, is that it's that mindless eating, like in the past, I would have gone over there, ate a handful of, and then, 10 minutes, 15 minutes later realized, wow, I wish I hadn't had done that.

00:32:43 Roy Or, you know why I wasn't hungry. It was just a habit. So, yeah, I'm kind of fighting that too is just breaking these mindless habits of always feeling like you have to have something in your hand, eating.

00:32:56 Zach Good for you though. You were at the point of no return. That's, that's hard to turn back from that point.

00:33:01 Roy I, it was so bad. I actually had to wash my hands to get all the salt off of my hands. I have my eye on that board.

00:33:11 Jeremy We had a really interesting conversation. A few episodes ago. We had a guest, Dr. Judson brewer, and he's really big on curiosity when it comes to breaking habits and whether it's addiction, food, whatever. And we talked about that specific thing. Because I'm the same way I have to fast, otherwise I will nine, 10 o'clock whereas the popcorn where something quick that I can just emotionally escape into. Yep. And he raised the point. He's like, just get really curious every time that those urges come up, rather than giving into them, rather than fighting them, rather than like having this volatile relationship with that experience. Just get really curious with why do I need eat right now? What does is my body sending me a signal that says, Hey, you're really hungry. You're about to snap somebodies head off, or are you bored? Are you sad? Are you lonely? What's driving this? And it is amazing how just asking yourself, why am I doing this? Yeah.

00:34:05 Jeremy Will completely shift your relationship with that moment. To put you on a course, to your bigger, better offer, right? Your bigger, better goal. If I want to feel better, I don't want to wake up with this Dorito hangover. I want to wake up clear of brain fog and I'm ready to take on the day and know that I don't need to eat until lunch because I'm not going to starve. I'm in one of the wealthiest countries in the world, I'll find foods.

00:34:28 Roy And the paramedics are at nine one. They're just a moment. Give me an Abbey and get me back up on the ground.

00:34:34 Jeremy I don't think they delivered Doritos. I mean,

00:34:38 Speaker 4 By the way, I go by QT and grab us some bags and stuff.

00:34:43 Roy Yeah. That's a, I guess a good question for you guys since y'all have y'all are pretty far down the journey, but one of the, I was just thinking about the name of our podcast is feeding fatty. It was kind of a irreverent comment when were kicking it around, cause I just said, we're trying to find a name and all the healthy ones are taken or sound too corny. Were like, eh, and I just said, yeah, we could just say something like, feed no fatty. And Terry said, yeah, that's it. The other thing I think about is that, I think I will always be, even if I lost weight and got to where I want to be, I feel like I will always be that heavy person inside that I always have to be on guard. It's like, and I'm going to ask, I asked this question of both of y'all, but it's like being a reformed smoker, being a reformed drinker, because I, I'm not, I never smoked like packs and packs a day, but on the may have one and there are times that cigarettes, you smell very good.

00:35:41 Roy I mean, they smell good enough. You could eat one. It's like, I'm not even a, really a smoker, but that temptation is always there. I assume that temptation is always going to be here with food. That it's something you got to fight forever or not fight, but deal with put it that way.

00:35:57 Zach Yeah, it is. I mean, it's always there's a lake Jeremy side, right? There's a whole industry on making sure that, this kind of food is there and there's marketing and it's made to make you want more. The way I've tried to live is, for every, all of every single attempt that I've made at eating healthier, of it has stuck. The next time, a little more stuck and the next time, a little more stuck. Now if I look back like, I had to take my mom somewhere one day and she wanted to go to McDonald's and I had been eating healthy for three months and I ate McDonald's and I felt so bad after eating. McDonald's like brain fog. My body hurt my stomach was in doing somersaults. Even the next day for a couple of days, I didn't feel good. I thought about it and I was like, okay, I have now conditioned myself to feel good when I eat good food, because 20 years ago I would eat McDonald's for lunch and dinner and then I'd go back for a snack.

00:37:09 Zach And that was just normal for me. Every time I've tried to eat healthy, right. You're just going to reinforce it more and you're gonna fail and you're always going to go backwards. For me, that's always been the case like now where I'm at now, while I still don't feel like I eat as well as I want to eat, I look back at the journey and how much it's different. Yeah. How much change there is, how much the, those little steps have now added up to this one big thing where I'm doing pretty well. I could still grow, but I'm doing pretty well. Yeah.

00:37:46 Terry It's good that you realize that now because you guys, I mean, you guys have young kids too, right? I mean that you have to factor all a nine-year-old, you have to factor all of that in and what your world can handle and, how much time you have and trying to do, that's what we just get caught up in the rat race, going through the drive-through having everything right there at our Beck and call. That's gotta be an issue too. I mean, that part of it.

00:38:19 Zach Yeah. Well, and also, I mean, having my daughter watch what I'm doing, right. It's for me, it's, I watched my dad, I watched my mom and it was poor choices. Those poor choices lived on in me. It's my responsibility kind of break that chain and have my daughter watch me make good choices most of the time yeah. With the occasional reward. Right. And, and break that chain. She doesn't grow up in the same way, having those, poor relationship with food that I always have. Yeah.

00:38:51 Terry Right. Yeah. I always, I have, my daughters are almost 23 and 29 now. I used to tell them all the time, I thought you were only three. I'm sorry, did I say 29? And.

00:39:07 Speaker 4 Let the cat out of the bag there. But.

00:39:11 Terry I used to tell him all the time and I still do just joking with him, add that to your list for therapy, for your future therapist. That's just something that you're going to have to, but the more that you, like you were saying, your daughter's nine and she needs to emulate you and your decision, your choices. She doesn't have to deal with this later on in life. Yeah.

00:39:35 Zach Trust me that there's plenty of other things that I'm doing that is going to need therapy later. She has, she'll.

00:39:41 Terry Have a running list. It'll go forever.

00:39:44 Zach She has a little notebook that says notes to my future therapist.

00:39:48 Terry Get rid of that. I mean, gold frame it,

00:39:51 Roy Well, the other thing is that we're, I'm getting to a point of, we start thinking about outliving our wellness and that's a new little catch phrase that we like to use is because, you see so many people that they age and, either they're, they've got a good mind and their body's broken down or their body's broken down and they still have a good mind. A lot of times they have to have intensive care from somebody else, a family member typically. So, at some point I've started really thinking that one through that, I wish I'd have started earlier, but it's never too late to start, but the sooner we can think about what are we going to look like when we're 80, because, nowadays they talk about, diabetes or they talk about dementia being the, type three diabetes. And, just some of the things that we've done with the quality of food that we've eaten and, it really can lead to our detriment.

00:40:51 Roy Sometimes that doesn't manifest it until later in life.

00:40:56 Terry Yeah. The closer we get to that's something I,

00:40:59 Speaker 5 Go ahead. Sorry.

00:41:01 Jeremy Yeah. I was just gonna say that's something that I think about a lot too. I've had a number of friends and family members that have had cancer. I always think it's so interesting how we need that. You're going to die really soon unless you start eating this way. I, I constantly say to myself, get online and Google what your doctor would prescribe. If you were diagnosed with cancer and start eating that right now, it seems really simple. There there's an outline, there's a nutrition plan to fight off cancer, but we don't start eating it until we have it. Exactly. Yeah, I think about that a lot. I also think that is one of those things similar to, I'm going to do this for a year. I'm going to do this for five years. Yeah. If I worry about how I'm going to feel in 30 years, I'm going to lose sight of what do I need to do today.

00:41:48 Jeremy Right. To me, it's just, it's those baby steps. It's whatever I can do today to better than I was yesterday is ultimately what's going to happen when I'm 65, 70, whatever I look back and go, oh, those are the, I made good choices. I did the best I could with.

00:42:02 Terry I know. That's what we just got a, book is called how not to die. It's, it's amazing, but it talks about all those different diseases, the type two diabetes cancers, I just, all of that and inflammation. That's why we decided to kind of go with the plant-based diet because, we have different medications that we're on, for different things. And, just trying to get off of those, you can get off of those medications through eating properly, what you eat. Yeah. It's, that's what kinda turned us in toward that direction. Not only that, but, because it's better for us, not to pack on the pounds and all of that. I know we're.

00:42:49 Roy Way long on time guys, but just one more topic I want to bring up is the emotional, cause we're talking about this and, one, another big thing I'm struggling with and trying to break is that, not necessarily like the bad stuff, but more the good stuff, the celebrations, everything is emotional. Like let's go eat or get the ice cream for this to celebrate, but also, factoring in or thinking about it as fun because going out with friends and family and you go somewhere and you eat and chat and the reality is we can go eat healthy, but we can go chat with people and not have to eat bad or eat food that is not as good for us as we would like. So, not tell the story that it's very fresh in my mind that Terry was out running around one day and she called and said, I'm on my way home.

00:43:46 Roy Have you eaten yet? And I said, no. I started welling up inside, like, she's going to say, great. I am going by Chick-fil-A to pick up some stuff. She's like, okay, well there's some salmon and some asparagus in their fridge. I just felt like I just was deflated. It was like, all the air just blew out of me. That again, it's a realization that, oh my gosh, you have this, such an attachment to food that it, what does it matter? Does it really matter if I ate the chick? whatever I eat it's as long as it's healthy and it gives me fuel to live for another day. That's really all this is about, but these, all these attachments that we have, it's just crazy.

00:44:31 Jeremy I know in my case, all of that links back to sugar, the more processed and sugary foods I have, the way easier it is to cave into those cravings, to cave, to those emotions and eat that way. I, I mentioned that I, I started doing the keto diet after a conversation with Zach, and it wasn't even that strict about it. I just went, what, I'm just a hundred carbs a day. That's it, that's my limit. I'm going to experiment with that. And we'll play with that. See where that leads me. I got more and more strict about it. I started working out every day and doing these things. It was so funny because I distinctly remember this day at work when, one of my colleagues was eating wheat thins. She's just sitting at her desk snacking. I mean, she was like a cheerleader for the Houston rockets.

00:45:13 Jeremy I mean, she's in fantastic shape and she's, she can eat whatever she wants. She offered me some and I looked at it and it was as though she was offering me a hockey puck was just like, I was like, that's not even food. Like how, what you're asking by offering me this. I can't even process that as a question because you're not offering me food. My relationship just completely changed with those kinds of foods because I had just so completely cut them out of my diet and was feeling so good. They're just like, it just doesn't I two and three makes 47. That does not compute. I can't do that. Yeah. Just changing that relationship was huge for me. Again, not to be repetitive, but I just think that why question is going to be the thing that is a game changer for so many people.

00:45:58 Jeremy When I, when I still get an occasional, craving to drink a beer, I love beer. Love it, delicious, amazing. It just, it's, it causes more problems for me than solves them, although it does solve some problems, but by shifting to non-alcoholic beers, I've found some really high end ones that are really good, that tastes like real beer. You mentioned those reward systems and like the hanging out with friends, I can drink those and have that in my hand. It feels exactly the same as it used to only I don't wake up feeling horrible the next day.

00:46:36 Zach Yeah. Yeah. I quit drinking probably five years ago now, too. I was gonna use that as an example, the, it was a very hard thing to do because so of all of my friend group, I was the first one to do it. We would, but one of the things we would do is we would meet at a pub to socialize and everyone would drink beer. I was showing up and not drinking beer and I was drinking water. It was really hard to do, mentally, right. Because you go, you're going to drink beer. From the food perspective, I will say, I started earlier, like I did a three-day fast and having, that data of really reflective moments of why am I hungry? Yeah. Like what is the real here? I know I'm not going to die. What's the real reason. And, and just exploring that and being curious about it.

00:47:37 Zach I think that's one of the things that's really helped me is the curiosity, the, having the courage and to be brave enough to explore that stuff. Because if we're all being honest, right, you open some of those doors, you don't want to look inside. Right. Right. You want to keep them closed. If you can get to the underlying problem as to what's going on, right. It, it really does change your relationship now. Now my reward for, Hey, I want to go eat something. My reward is I go do 10 pushups. Yeah. I switched it. If I can.

00:48:14 Jeremy Jump on something that you said there too, even it doesn't always have to be the dark demon in the closet. I know for me, I have a habit of, during my Workday, I just, I need a reason to get up and walk away from the desk. Right. Way too often, it's go grab a snack from the kitchen. It used to be, go across and get another cup of coffee and a snack from the kitchen or whatever. When I get real honest with myself, the reason I'm doing it is I don't like my job. I don't want to be doing it. I won't come up with any distraction to go do something else, even if it's for two minutes. And even if it poisons my body. That's not like, dad beat me up when I was three. That's just, Hey, I got to find another job.

00:48:53 Jeremy This isn't working out for me. It doesn't always have to be basing your deepest, darkest fear. Sometimes it's just overcoming whatever the small hurdle is. That's right in front of your face. Yep.

00:49:02 Roy Yeah. Are feeling like we need that reason. Cause I'm the same way of being like, I love my job. Thank goodness. It's like, task within that, you bump up against something that's kind of hard. It makes you have to sit and think, and it, and I'm the same. It's like, well, let me just get up and get something to eat while I think about this. The other thing too is I, I feel so much better if I just go for a walk. If I take the same five minutes and go outside fresh air and clear my head, I would come back and even perform better, but not eating and then feeling bad. And, talking about the beer and stuff, around here going and having some, Mexican food with margarita and some chips, but I'm telling you, I could, and it's it, wasn't a hangover, but I could drink one margarita and the chips and I could feel so bad the next morning, till 10 or 11, o'clock it just a cloud and feel like, for my eyes and above was just full of congestion.

00:50:00 Roy So, that's been a big reason too, for me to switch some things and not to go do that it's because I just got where it makes me so feel so bad the next day, I'm trying to get out from under it got worse and worse. So.

00:50:14 Jeremy Yeah, your body's going to be the best teacher in all of this. It's just pay attention to attention or do whatever it is you're going to do and you'll make them, you'll make the right.

00:50:21 Roy Choices, guys. I know we're way late, for, we go couple things. What is a tool, a habit? What is something that each of y'all do in your daily life that adds a lot of value, professional, personal whichever.

00:50:34 Zach Yeah. I'll I want to make sure I mentioned something that I haven't mentioned already. So, as weird as this sounds journaling for me is a huge one. I, I currently use a, a product called the full focus planner and it's just a kind of a methodology and this planner that you get, your three biggest things done and you schedule everything. Within that, it's professionally personally, right? I schedule my healing time. I schedule my work time. I schedule my, family time and it allows me to be productive and not put things off, but it also gives me a place to get my thoughts out on a piece of paper, because once they're out of my head, they're not circling around and causing trouble anymore. So, and that's my own preference for journal. If you can just spend a couple of minutes with yourself, getting the thoughts out of your head onto a piece of paper and being grateful about it can make a huge difference in your day.

00:51:38 Zach Yeah. Way to steal my thunder. And you.

00:51:43 Jeremy Say the exact same thing. It is, it is so important to me every day to envision the day, the way I want it to go so that when I do run up against those roadblocks and I feel like, oh, I need to, I want to eat something I want to not work out. I can look back and go, well, what did I tell myself this morning when I was alert and on it and focused and knew what I wanted out of life. Yeah. And I can refer to that. It just, it really keeps me accountable. Most days what I wrote down doesn't happen. A lot of it does some of it doesn't and that's again, getting comfortable with forgiving yourself and forgiving that you cannot create the exact life you want, but you can work toward goals. Yeah. The closer you get, the better you'll feel along the way.

00:52:22 Jeremy Then, just in terms of something practical or something more tangible that I have been experimenting with, and it might sound weird, and this is probably a whole other show, but I've been experimenting with using CBD as a supplement. Because I've found that it really regulates my anxiety and my depression and it helps keep me focused. It's not, there's no high, there's no psychotropic effect. It's just, it's about balancing your body's natural cannabinoids to a level that is the way they should be functioning. That so many things like diet and busy lifestyle center.

00:52:56 Roy Okay. Interesting. Yeah. The journaling, it's funny, you mentioned it cause I've been trying to do better about that. And, not just, and I think like Zach said, it seemed like just getting things. It doesn't have to be stressed, but just getting the thought, whatever it is out of my head and on paper, it just seems to be so much more clearing. I feel like I've had a clear head, doing it too. So,

00:53:21 Terry Yeah. Zach, you mentioned it's so important to be grateful. I mean, just think about being grateful at least a few times a day, that has a lot to do with it. Just keeping that positivity go. And.

00:53:37 Roy Most of us have a lot to be thinking, yes, we do. You get it instead of getting focused on that negative and why we want to go eat, because let's focus on the, all the great things. We talk a lot about that too. If you've got 10 things on your to-do list today, and you get seven done, we beat herself up over these other three, but let's celebrate the seven. Let's take away some gratitude. Anyway, I'm going to wrap it up. You guys, we could talk for a lot longer, so thank y'all tell everybody course, how can they reach out and get a hold of, y'all talk about your, podcast.

00:54:10 Jeremy Yeah, the website is, thefitmess.com and we're fitness guys on pretty much every social platform that's out.

00:54:17 Roy There. Okay. All right. Well, great. Well, thanks so much. I can find us, of course, at www.feedingfatty.com. We're on all the major social media platforms, as well as the major podcast platforms, iTunes, Stitcher, Google, Spotify. If we're not one that you listened to, please reach out, be glad to get it added. So till next time I'm rolling. I'm Terry take care of yourself and take care of your family. Thanks guys. Thank you. Thank you.

www.thefitmess.com

www.feedingfatty.com

Want to Rock Some Good Food? Pair With A Great Beverage and Even Better Music with Josh Kemble

There is nothing better than good food, a good beverage, and great music. We talked to Josh about how he goes about pairing food, beverage, and music. Some times it can start with the music, something that might remind you of a trip you were on. Then of course there are the sides. What goes good with a brisket? Mac and Cheese? Is there a way to jazz it up some? Listen for more.

About

Josh K. "Yosh" or Chef JK. Proud Husbo and 3x Rad Dad. Exec Chef. Punk Rock. Beer and Wine Pairings. Podcast Host of The Family? Cast: Food and Music Is Life, Yes? Spiritual Free Thinker. PMA. Expert level fluency in Movie Quotes and 3rd Grade Spanish. CA Teaching Credential Culinary Arts. Food Safety and Hospitality Management Exam Proctor. Restaurant, Event, and Strategic Planning Consultant. Usually hungry and or thirsty.

www.feedingfatty.com

Full transcript Below

Want to Rock Some Good Food Pair With A Great Beverage and Even Better Music with Josh Kemble

Sat, 5/29 8:53AM • 56:01

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

people, food, eat, pairings, pairing, music, punk rock, vegan, good, chef, big, beer, play, texas barbecue, diet, cook, fun, meat, based, called

SPEAKERS

Terry, Josh, Roy Barker

Roy Barker 00:14

Hello, and welcome to another episode of feeding fatty. This is Roy. This is Terry. So we are the podcast that's chronicling our journey, my journey through wellness, trying to get healthy, lose some weight. And, you know we talk about what's going on in our life some and we also have guests from time to time and today is no different. We've got Josh Kemble with us, Terry, I'll let you introduce him.

Terry 00:37

Yeah, Josh Kemble is an executive chef and credential teacher for the culinary arts. He specializes in pairings particularly pairing music and food and beverage. He's been singing in a punk rock band since he was 17. And has helped other bands and musicians write and record their songs. And he loves both industries. He hosts a podcast called family food and music is life. Yes. And they talk about they talk to people on both, either or both food service and music industries and how the two intersect. Josh, thank you for coming onto the show. We welcome you and are excited to talk to you about all these pairings with food and drink and all of that.

Josh 01:26

Yeah, thanks for having me. I'm excited to be here. I was thinking as, as the intro music was going painting, we should have just jazz us up with some. Yeah, that'd be fun. Right? I liked that song, too. The one you had is pretty fun.

Roy Barker 01:42

Yeah. Yeah, we try to find try to find something a little bit whimsical. But yeah, you also talk about I mean, I know your love for food and music kind of puts you in this space. But tell us a little bit number one about how you got here.

01:55

You know,

Roy Barker 01:56

a lot of us in I think we've had this discussion prior that you know, it started out going to some wine tastings and wine pairings. And, you know, after about three, four is like, to me, my palates, not that delicate. So it all tasted the same. But I tell you where I had fun was with beer, because there's just so much beer out there now. But we didn't have that musical element. So I think it's the kind of cool, cool deal to think about not only the food and the drink, but also putting some good music with it. So how did you? How did you put all this together and end up here.

Josh 02:34

Um, I think I think probably started when I was learning how to cook as a kid, with being my grandparents were always cooking in the kitchen. And they also always had music playing. Okay, so it's probably always just been, it's been a sensory, almost like a sensory pairing. But from when I was first learning how to cook. And there was also singing happening at the same time and dancing. all at the same time in the kitchen. Both of my grandparents, these are my Mexican grandparents. And I was always in the kitchen with them because I was always, you know, at their side. And my grandfather had a farm but you know, animals and stuff like that. So he was always there was always just music playing and no matter what they were doing, so the activity of life was always paired with music already. Yeah. And then you know, who would eat with music, we would go to parties, and there'd be music playing. So it was always just the sensory experience to have those things together. And I think if you go to those restaurants, any resume, or coffee shop, they're probably playing music. They're sure that there's a certain pattern that we're we're maybe not aware of,

Roy Barker 03:38

I don't know. No, didn't even think about that. But you're right. Usually there's some little background music going on.

Josh 03:47

Yeah, and if there's not, it's it's it. Maybe it's awkward. It's too quiet. You're gonna have to hear each other talk.

Terry 03:52

And then you have everybody eating crunchy and down the street. Yeah. Yeah. scraping the forks,

Josh 03:59

weights. Exactly. So. So it's a good thing to, I think to do it because also it's, it's a little bit fun. It's fun to do it together to kind of figure out what goes with what. So it's not just your average run of the mill tasting experience that most people have had at one point or another. Whether it's sipping wine or sipping coffee. One of my favorite ones that I've done recently was actually with the Texas bourbon company, garrison brothers, where they came out here and they did a they brought their big ol hat cowboy hat 10 gallon hats, and they were telling telling everyone how bourbon in Texas is made. And you know, we paired food with it. And they Yeah, it was just a good time. Awesome.

Roy Barker 04:42

So where do you even start? I mean, like, you know, it doesn't matter if it's beer bourbon wine, but you start with the drink. Do you start with the food do you in and then how do you add music and on top of that

Josh 04:58

sometimes it starts with the music actually. I just I think it depends on how you're inspired first. And whether it's if you hear something and you're like, oh, wow, this reminds me of taking a trip to Hawaii. And we went to this place and there was a, there was this band playing on the cliff side, and we were drinking these drinks or having this good food or even just having a good experience with the music. You say, I could imagine, like, relaxing in my backyard listening to this music, you know, having my favorite coffee in the morning or cocktail night or whatever the case may be whatever you do or don't enjoy. But so sometimes it starts with the music in that sense. And then sometimes it can be like the food experience. Well, you know, some people can't have peanut butter and jelly sandwich or cookies without a cold glass of milk. Like, there's automatic pairings that you you think are what's it called? You have to have them, it's a guarantee that you're gonna have milk. And if you're gonna have cookies, yeah, but it? I mean, it doesn't have to be like that, but it's good. If it is it makes friends. Yeah. Yeah, it makes sense to your brain growing up as mac and cheese, you know, certain things that go together, you know, they don't have to be that way. But it's just the way that it works. So you take that pairing, and you say, Can we do a different kind of cheese with the mac and cheese? Can we do a different kind of jelly, and so you start playing with it. And then you expand from there. And then you pair different kinds of, for examples, coffees with different breakfast foods or different excuse me different sandwiches with that milk, or you know, you can play around with whatever, yeah, take it from the experiences that you may or may not already know, Texas barbecue, everyone has this idea what that should or you know, should be, there's like the Bible of you know, Texas barbecue right there. And then you kind of do pairings based around that. So it's automatic, you know, if you want it to be, it just has to ask to make sense to some degree. But there also has to be a sense of showing the person enjoying your, your, your pairing, like why it works, because it's so crazy that it works. Yeah, it's always sometimes it's crazy.

Roy Barker 07:04

Yeah, and I've got a good example of that we, like I said, we went I went used to go to a place that we did the wine pairings for a long time. And it just got boring. So the shift started doing the different beers. And one of the things that he took was he had, I don't like dark beer, I like light, lighter colored beer. But he took this dark vanilla beer, and he paired it with a chocolate. I mean, like a deep dark chocolate cupcake with sea salt on the top of it. And who I wouldn't have thought I would like that either. But it was amazing. When you had those two together, it just tasted, it changed the texture and the taste of both of them where the beer was actually good. And this chocolate cupcake, you know, because if I eat a cupcake by itself, it was way too chocolatey. And it just I don't like that much. So But anyway, I think it's just interesting, the way that the different taste kind of meld in our mouth to make something we probably wouldn't even enjoy to something we really like.

Josh 08:06

Exactly, yeah, you might not like, like, like you said, it's not it's not about them separately, it's about them together, and they, they should elevate each other in your on your palate, your scent. And you kind of I kind of teach people when we're doing the pairings, it's I use it as a educational experience, too. So you're trying to use all five, maybe even six senses, when you're doing the pairing. So you got to look at your drink, and you're going to you're going to touch the glass and you're going to smell everything and taste everything, see everything, you're going to even listen, if it's a beard, you know, for the for the carbonation. So you want to make it a full sensory experience, so that it evokes everything from either your memories from the past that we're doing something that's like, say like a Girl Scout cookie pairing or, you know if it's something fun, or especially with Texas barbecue, because there's all the smoke and all the flavors of that just the inherent, you know, history of the being that we're trying to portray. On on the plate or on the menu. So we explain every dish, we explain every course every pairings I do it with I could do it with beverage maker, whether that's coffee, tea, liquor, whatever. Beer wine, like you said, I do love a good, there's some really good beers coming out of Texas these days. And so we've done some beer dinners with some of those beers as well. And it just has to the beer, the beverage and the food should elevate each other. And then you add music into that layer, another layer of sensory, you could say sensory overload to some degree, add another layer to that. And it's going to make the pairing experience that much more unique and memorable. And, you know, it could be the highlight of the menu if there's a perfect song with this perfect pairing or whatever, you know, like eggs can be can be really awesome. For some people. Some people like I didn't like that one. And maybe Maybe it was because they didn't like the way the music sounded with you know, whatever. Yeah,

Terry 09:58

so it all has to Work together. So it should Yeah. So what kind of I'm very curious. I am old, old school punk rock. So I'm thinking, you know, remotes and the B 50. twos before love jack, you know? Yeah. So bands like that, you know, the clash, Sex Pistols, all of that. So what kind of what kind of food would go with punk rock?

Josh 10:28

Oh, that's a really good question. So, so So my first experience with with the genre of punk was was the clash, you know, back then, I heard it on the radio, I think they started getting radio play in in California and like, 7980 Yeah, around there. When the I heard it on the radio, I was like, What is this and, and my uncle, he remodeled car redid cars. And we drove around cool looking old cars around around town and stuff like that. So he would restore old cars, and they had old stereos, but he would always get radio. And so we're cruising around, you know, cruising low red or cruising around the city, and the clash comes on. And so we're one of the only like, low rider cars cruising through not playing all these is playing the clash. And I'm like, What is this because I'm used to hearing other music coming out of history. He's like, Oh, that's punk rock, you know, this, this the bank of the clash, you know, because there wasn't a lot, there wasn't a lot of that on the radio. Right. And so I had already started associating kind of that, that music with, with, with my experiences in the in the Mexican culture. Because Because we are driving to a backyard barbecue, you know, we're we're gonna have a bunch of, you know, kardinya, salad steaks and tortillas and all this stuff. So I had already started doing some kind of, you know, not I wasn't trying to bury it, but I was already doing those pairings. So when I hear when I hear the clash, or some some of those older punk rock bands in my from my life, they were like, I learned about those bands a little bit later in my punk rock career, actually, after I really found out who the clash was, and what they stood for. And all this stuff started learning about, because they have a lot to say about government and politics, rebelling, and being yourself and, you know, speaking up for the lesser person and stuff like that. So I so in that vein of punk rock, I really latched on to that. And then the more you get into punk rock, ethos, and values and stuff like that, it's more like, Oh, we have a lot to learn as a society about major corporations and big food and small farms. And, you know, learning about like what Cesar Chavez did for the farmers in California, and what, what the heck, the class was actually talking about when they're talking about, you know, the stuff that they were talking about in England and coming to America and all this stuff. And I think that a good food pairing with punk rock would be anything that's kind of against the norm, anything against McDonald's, anything against mainstream food, or like, you know, like I said, corporate, like Tyson and Monsanto, and conagra and those kind of things. So, to me, being a punk rock chef, excuse me, is being able to make kind of make your own menu, and or play off of those things that people know, like I said, like, for example, a Big Mac, and you make it you make your own thing, you know, and that's punk rock, because you're taking the established, like Bailey's, you know, punk rock solid, like, anti establishment, right? You take the established, like, say, McDonald's, for example, I hate I hate given them shout out, or whatever company big corporation, but everyone knows McDonald's because they're worldwide. You take their food, and you make a play on it. We do a whole McDonald's inspired menu. And it's punk rock. It's, it's not the Big Mac, it's whatever we do, but it's like, you know, organic produce grass fed beef homemade buns, the way actually technically the way McDonald's started, as was like that. And then they started growing and growing, growing. So yeah, in the punk rock spirit of things, you know, how big do you how big do you can you get and still be punk rock, you know? or? Yeah, How big? How much can you grow without hurting yourself? Or your fans? or whatever, you know? Yeah. So to answer your question, it'd be any kind of food that's anti establishment is that I guess

Terry 14:17

that makes tons of sense.

Roy Barker 14:18

So you brought up something good memory is, you know, things that we relate to when that song was popular when we were younger and things. So like, when if you were going to start putting a menu together, do you? Do you kind of rely on that experience that you had to think about? Oh, well, you know, when I was listening to the class, we were going to the you know, the backyard barbecue, so that's pretty cool. Or do you think about now I've eaten this food before, and it kind of has that texture and flavor. It may go good with this and because that's what I don't really like. Like I said, my palate is not that deep. delicates I'm not the right guy to be talking about it, but

Terry 15:03

not just everything.

Roy Barker 15:06

But you know, thinking about just, you know, the different things that may even go together. And I guess that's even the probably the fun part of your job and getting to do that is you get I guess you do a lot of taste test and to see how this goes. And

Josh 15:21

yeah, yeah, we call it a we call it quality control. Right? Yeah. Because, because also, because we're in we're here in San Diego, some people call it the craft beer capital of the world. And I have so many really good breweries and wineries around around my kitchen around my house around the county around the whole area. Right, right. So we want to figure out what tastes the best with what, right. So I mean, you can have an idea, like once you do the pairing, like like your friend did the pairing with that certain beer, and that certain cupcake, yeah. And you could do something like that again, and make a little bit different or use a little, little different. I mean, a different beer company that has a similar beer, and put it in there. But the memory, the memory, part of it is definitely a strong, a strong way to I mean, I think we eat with our memories sometimes. And we eat with our eyes first, as the saying that we've talked about in the kitchen, when we're when we're pleading the food all beautifully, or whatever. And if you have an experience at a restaurant, or a wedding or event or anything like that, I think and this, you can both correct me if I'm wrong, but more people talk about a negative experience with food than they do a positive. Yeah, it's Oh, my gosh, the food was, you know, or the one thing that you remember at a wedding, besides the actual marriage is the food. Yeah. You know, like if whether whether that's food I ever had, or Whoa, whoa, everybody got sick from the food? That's all we talked about.

Roy Barker 16:52

Yeah, no. Well, there's so there's, there's a scientific evidence on that the people that have a bad experience will tell eight people and somebody just told me that that number up to 12. Now and if you have a good experience, you're lucky if you tell one person so yeah, definitely. The bed makes the rounds quicker.

Josh 17:13

Exactly. Especially in the days now of Yelp. And other other Oh, you know tattletale websites or websites that are meant websites that were meant to help other businesses or have now just become like a complaining that a complaint forum rent, as it were, you know, that can hinder the businesses at least have an independent chef or food truck or whatever. Yeah. So the memory part of it is almost like, we don't, we don't, some people are not even relying on the memories anymore, because they're just, they'll just go to Yelp to look for something and up to many negative reviews. I'm not gonna go there and check it out myself. Somebody

Terry 17:50

is worried that they don't even know. Yeah,

Josh 17:52

exactly. Yeah, exactly. So. So that's, that is part of it. But But if, like, if you can think of say, you know, your favorite song or whatever, you might even have memories associated with that, where you were cruising around in your car, eating something and drinking something with your friends, you know, automatically without even having a chef's mind behind it. It might be like, Oh, yeah, we used to go to this place and drink the actual Texas Dr. Pepper and like, do this stuff. Or, you know,

Roy Barker 18:20

it's funny, it's, it's, uh, you know, I was just saying about that there used to be. We were, it was talking about one of my first business experiences, we me and a friend of mine, you know, when we were like, 14, we, we sold, we sold what we cleaned out of barns for fertilizer. But it's funny, you mentioned that because that was kind of our reward was the 711 had a two for two hot dogs and a Dr. Pepper for 50. That's Oh my god, that sounds terrible. But anyway, you know, so thinking about that, I think, anyway, the memory and the memory of those hot dogs and us being out, you know, hauling that fertilizer around that that does go together.

Josh 19:04

Exactly. Yeah. So So now hopefully, when you think about hot dogs, you're thinking about fertilizer.

Terry 19:12

fertilizer.

Josh 19:14

I mean, I do love I do. And I mean, most chefs will agree no matter how healthy you are, or what you've gone through in your eating career in life or whatever. Sometimes we this love late night junk food thing, you know, like we go to a taqueria that's open till 2am or whatever, because we're making good food all day long for hundreds of people. I just don't I just want to talk you know you want somebody else to visit there's nothing wrong with it but I just want to or I just want to come home and put food in a tortilla and eat it you know what no plate

Roy Barker 19:42

simple you know that's that's what I like to though simple is good and that you know we have that discussion all the time because Terry's always trying to outdo herself and make something that's more fancier than last time like simple can be good and overcomplicate it and that you know Something not this the shift that I had mentioned earlier, that's something that me and him had a conversation about. Because, you know, we had what I would call some snooty people at the wine event. And, you know, they'd get on to him about this or that. And, you know, when when he came over to the beer crowd, I'm like, you know what, take a chance, take a chance and gamble because you know, what, if this isn't any good, there's a McDonald's or Taco Bell on the way home is like, we're gonna die. And we're not we're not gonna starve to death. But I think that's how these creations I think that's the best creations is when somebody really steps out there and takes a chance on the the food, drink the music.

Josh 20:41

Yeah, definitely. And that's, that's kind of a it's a fun way. For brewers and white wine makers and chefs, distiller it's a fun way for people to kind of show off the stuff that they've been making. Or, and or it's a fun way to experiment. You know, sometimes I tell people, we're gonna have an experimental dinner, you know, it's not going to be your, your classic pairings that, you know, people who go to the dinners a lot, they kind of know what's going to be there, right now, there's always gonna be the X amount, of course, it's going to be around this price. So you kind of have to play to them a little bit and or you talk to those people and say, I need you guys to come to this one, because I just really want to try something, but I can't try on the general public kind of, right. Yeah, and especially with something like a music pairing. That's very specialized. It doesn't have to be it could be very, it could be very simple. Like, hey, we're just gonna have we're just gonna listen to like the Beatles while we're, you know, doing this food or I had some I had one plan for last year that we're gonna have to bring back. Now that things are we're kind of reopening in California. Slowly but surely. Basically, it's a like a Metallica themed brunch. Right? So it's a metal, heavy metal. And all the food. Food is that we're cooking is based on like food puns based on their song titles. So so people, yeah, so it's not necessarily specifically paired with the music per se, because it's all about one band. Yeah, but it's all it's a theme on the band. Everybody's gonna kind of land we're gonna say it's not snooty, we're gonna you're gonna come dressed like you're going to a concert, you know, denim, denim vests, you know, whatever you want to wear to a Metallica show. Yeah, and we're gonna have brunch. And we're going to try to get, you know, Metallica has a bourbon Metallica has a beer. And they're going to have a friend come and play acoustic Metallica songs on the guitar and whatever. So it's just gonna be a fun time. And it's brunch, Saturday or Sunday morning, whatever. But it's not like other pairings where it's like, you go into a dinner, I mean, to a restaurant, or whatever. And you have to have your restaurant manners on, you know, like that. You have to pay, you know, this high a super high amount of money. And you're going to have this kind of a steak that you might always have or whatever, we're just at a higher price because it's appearing. So I like to have fun with it, and make that unique experience. So that's kind of one of the musical pairings. It's like, I just pick a theme and say, we're gonna we're just gonna make puns that have all their song titles, because they have like, over 100 songs, so why not? You know?

Terry 23:20

Surely there are some pens and yeah, that's awesome.

Josh 23:23

Oh, yeah, just, you know, just just making dad jokes all day long.

Roy Barker 23:29

When we can get back to it, there's nothing better than you know, going out and listening to a band and you know, having some good food and good drink.

Josh 23:40

Yeah, for sure. Yeah, we have. Yeah, definitely. Something something we've been longing for. Oh my

Terry 23:45

gosh, we have we have stones tickets. We were supposed to see him this time last year. And still, you know, we still don't know anything, which is fine with me and hanging. I'm hanging on to them because I've never seen them. I've seen a lot of people but I've never seen Oh, never seen them. So if they do it, that'll probably be fun. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, they

Josh 24:10

were supposed to play here in town, actually in our at our stadium, but we're our baseball and football team used to play but they they actually tore down the stadium during because they canceled you know, at the beginning of everything kind of last last spring. It was like, well, the stones aren't going to play here anymore. Let's just

Terry 24:27

get rid of it. So they took it down. It's gone. That's good reason. Good enough. Okay, so we are we have just started a plant based diet. Okay, so what kind of use as a chef you cook with organic and grass fed Whole Foods and all of that. Yes.

Josh 24:54

Yeah. Yeah, yeah. sustainable and all that kind of stuff. Yes.

Terry 24:57

sustainable. That's what I was looking for. I'm so I'm just a whole bunch of words. Yes, there really are. So I'm just kind of throw in stuff to get I'm doing, you know, I've been doing some reading and we've been doing some interviewing of, I mean, everything points to plant based as, as, you know, helping with inflammation and diseases. And yes, and we're getting older and needing to worry about things like that, which you should do all the time, then you won't have to worry about it later in life, necessarily. But so what do you have any good? good ideas for me for like, keen? Any good? keen, Wah or? lindo?

Josh 25:44

Yeah, so a lot of it's based on, you know, how much of one thing you're trying to get, like, so it's, even if you're doing a vegan diet, or plant based, or keto or any of the diets, you still have to, I believe, you still have to have some kind of balance for your own ecosystem. body. So some, if you do too much of what, you know, for a while it was the fad was Atkins style dieting. And that's basically though, if you break it down, though, that's all high cholesterol, fat, you know, which is bad for some people to do that. It has the benefits of the diet, but then what are the end? What are the end results? You know, what's your return on investment for doing this diet? Right, you know, so, for the plant based, plant based and what I mean by the balances. I'm not, I'm not a vegan person, but I understand the value of eating having a vegan part of my diet. At my kitchen, we do. We do all the lunches for this company called Dr. Bronner's. They make all the soaps and stuff like that. But they, they, they, they are feeding, we're doing 125 meals a day for them. And they're 100% vegan and organic, right? So we have to think of every single week, every single two weeks, we have to think of new menu items to feed 125 people every single day. So you take like your basic, say, even the first food item that comes to your head, no matter what kind of diet, we say, Okay, can we do that? We do shrimp and grits as a vegan thing. How do we do that? So? Or can we do like a clam chowder and turn it vegan so so there's, there's there's always ways to do it. Not every single thing is a hit, you know, but there's, but there are there are ways to incorporate those things into your into your life and cut out. You know, things like, you know, meats that are too Fatty, or dairy, too much dairy, too much dairy in your diet, too much gluten in your diet, right? Because our bodies are designed a certain way to not really handle that there's a really good argument to be to have a vegan and plant based lifestyle because we you may or may not be able to digest that because you were probably not created today, just that we started doing that it's through and through our own macro evolution as humans, we started digesting animals and animal products and stuff like that out of some necessity or just, or just the way that that America was conquered. You know, yeah, he came. came to America.

Terry 28:14

Yeah. And that's kind of why Roy, I mean, in that,

Roy Barker 28:17

yeah, there was just a couple there's a couple things I was reading and you know, we've talked about it because no, like, beef and meat, it sets heavy on me. Now. I don't you know, I think we are plant based. I don't think we're like never ever again. You know, we were talking earlier tonight that you know, Terry said she may be getting hungry for a piece of fish or something. So you know, we can go out and have but we're just kind of like yeah, making the focal point more the plant based but you know, I read some material that said, like, dairy that we should be, it should make people sick. We're the only humans are the only people that drink other animals milk. And it's and we're the only people that drink milk after infancy because but they said that that was an evolution that milk was very, it's very high caloric. So people found a way to use it, you know, to live and then also some of the shepherds that that's what they had to so the other thing I read was that our bodies you know, we are more the omnivore because we're not totally meat base because we don't have the fangs and our in our digestive tract is too strong. And vice versa on the plants. Our teeth aren't right for that as well. And our digestive system is too short. So you know, I think some write some meat or beef or protein is as good for us. But you know, it's just all the, the we've just read some healthy benefits of that and also doing some intermittent fasting. So it's just something we're going to give a try to see if it's any bad. You know, I think yeah, we kind of preach that as well as that everybody has to find what works for them. I know some people that you know, they're on the keto and they love it. That's good. You know, we're Of course we're not doctors, nutritionists or dieticians, you know, anything with the language behind our name. So, you know, we really report on is kind of what we're trying what's working for us and what's not. And, sure, anyway, we're just gonna see, but it's all about,

Josh 30:17

you got to add some exercise into the mix, you know, like, kind of work off whatever is coming into your body, because I have a lot of vegan and vegetarian friends that are still still struggle with weight loss or keeping weight on or whatever the case may be, because, you know, they're still eating stuff like vegan doughnuts or cheese, you know, like they're still eating, they're still getting full all the time and eating high fat, high caloric diets. But just because it's not, you know, meat or their ovo pescatarian, like you said, they eat eggs and fish still. They are not there. It's not a balance, like I was trying to say it was not, they're not getting exercise, they're not drinking half gallon of water a day. You know, so they're they, they're they strict, they adhere strictly. And, you know, I, it's not for me, it's not it doesn't work in every part of the world. I don't think like being having the choice to choose your diet is very awesome. And a nice privilege of being an American, I think because I've traveled a lot. I've traveled all over all over the continent. And, you know, choosing your diet is is so it's so rad that we get to do that. Because when we went to Alaska, I stayed up there for, you know, half a month with one family and all the kids, the kids were responsible for hunting for the family, you know, for meat. Well, think about it, though, in Alaska that the northern most state in our country, right, there's no farmers markets. There's not having they don't have the produce that we have here in San Diego. So what do you do for survival and putting it like that, like you make it happen? Okay. And you can grow stuff? Sure, you can make your own garden but like, it's not, it's not the wealth, the bountiful, the bountiful farmland that I have here in Southern California, you know, so they do it that way. Yeah. And then in southern parts of southern parts of Mexico, they can't afford to eat meat. So they are vegan by default. Right? So they everything's, they have some really good Vegan Cuisine in Mexico that a lot of people don't may or may not know about, but they can make anything into an awesome spread of food with not, you know, with either the worst parts of the animal in the food, like, you know, they make something good out of it, or they just don't have it at all, because you can't afford it. Right. Right. So there's the kind of two extremes of our and we're, you know, we're sitting here in the middle between those two extremes that I just talked about, I guess, we get to choose because, well, I mean, that's just what's afforded to us, we get to do that. And so I, I have to keep that in my mind that I have that. I have that awareness of that privilege that we get to choose what we eat, you know, just verges. I'm thankful. I'm thankful for that. Yeah,

Terry 32:53

I know for sure.

Josh 32:55

Yeah. And there's some places even in California, like when we I lived in San Francisco, we thought we did a food training program in the more impoverished neighborhood up in San Francisco area. And there was not even there. It's they call it a food desert. There's nowhere to even buy healthy food. Yeah, they're there. There's like liquor stores, and, you know, cheap pizza joints and whatever. But there's no way to buy farmer's market food in that neighborhood. You have to go somewhere else to go to even like a whole foods or the nearest whole foods was like a pretty long bus ride from where we were, you know? Yeah. So it's not accessible.

Terry 33:32

I think there's like that in Dallas as well, aren't there? Yeah. Oh, yeah. I mean, I think every big city has something like that.

Roy Barker 33:41

Well, and we're lucky in the fact to that some countries, it's like, you know, we get to walk into these nice grocery stores, and there is a selection. Whereas sometimes, you know, some countries you walk in, and you take what they have that day. I mean, it's Yeah, you know, it's one thing and there is no so we Yeah, we are definitely lucky that we not only live in this time, but we live in this country because we do have so many choices. And

Terry 34:03

some people got a big wake up call to that, you know, just because of COVID because everything was gone. It's like you go in just tried to get a couple of things. I mean, who knows toilet paper and all that stuff would be going for Clorox I'm still trying to get some this

Josh 34:18

break. We had we had a little we got a little smidgen of what other people I guess experienced in those. Yes, in that sense, I guess, you know, so. But so I try to keep that in the front of my mind. You know, be aware that we are we're, you know, just I guess be aware of my flute privilege in a sense, you know, yeah. And my son, my son is he's allergic not allergic bees. You know, he's basically allergic to lactose, garlic, and gluten. Oh, so I so I have to be able to I you know, he's, he's lucky and blessed that I am a chef and I can cook different things for him because he would screwed otherwise you know like yeah, like it's easy to get almond milk and cashew milk and stuff like that or whatever. But he you know how we have to make it I have to make him a special dinner that we can all enjoy. I don't want to make like three different dinners right I want to make like one thing that we can all have so we do a lot of we do do a lot of plant based cooking here. But I have to make it have to be able to make it garlic free and still taste good. No dairy and still taste good. You know say I could do a separate one but

Roy Barker 35:26

I could do without the dairy but the garlic. That's, that would be a problem.

Josh 35:32

Yeah, it's tough. So like if he's gonna if he spends a night at someone else's house, we're like pizza.

Roy Barker 35:39

So tell me um, so what is the biggest surprise and you know from the meat from all three standpoints? The music, the food and the beer? What's the big what's the, I guess your biggest success that you put together? And you're like, that was awesome.

Terry 35:56

Oh, so many isn't there, Josh?

Josh 36:00

Oh, my gosh, too many to choose from a cool one. I have a list right here. I honestly I feel like I feel like, aside from aside from being able to have a family that's a big success. No. Wife and Kids. I think that every time I finished like someone's wedding, I feel like it's a big success. Because I just you know, you feed you feed 30 250 people, all this food, you know, all these courses? And does it you know, everything start to finish make their dreams come true. You know, whatever on this night. I feel like that's a good success. I feel like it's a big. I feel like a little six on a smaller scale. But it's still a big success is when I can make those non garlic non dairy non gluten foods and the whole family is still stoked on the food. Yeah, you know, yes. So because, because sometimes, you know, sometimes it doesn't work.

Roy Barker 36:52

Yeah. Is there? Is there a particular pairing that you've put together? That you can remember? that really stood out? Yeah,

Josh 37:00

yeah. The last one that we did was really awesome. It was we did try to on a big Santa Maria grill, which is a style of cooking out here. It's kind of like Texas barbecue, except in the fact I mean, don't nobody shoot me.

Terry 37:18

Oh my gosh, it's disclaimer.

Josh 37:22

Yeah, it's a California style of cooking that was invented by the by rancheros, the Mexican ranchers that were coming up from Mexico through California, with all the cows, and they basically cooked over an open fire. And they the tri tip is a cut of meat that you can really only get and kind of it's really only the western states. They don't do it out west of Texas, you know, maybe not. I don't even know if they do in Texas. But I have never because I know you guys are big on brisket. So you don't need Yeah, it's it's it. It's a special cut. And I did a whole dinner based around it. Excuse me, and I paired it with one of the local breweries who does. They also do gluten free beer. And we did a whole dinner with and everything was basically it was really cool because we brought up the huge grill. Yeah, and everything was cooked on the fire. Everything from the talk, you know, the chicken for the tacos, the tortillas. Everything except for the desserts because my sister's a baker and she didn't want to do her desserts on the fire. But but it was just it was a success in the sense that I was a little scared doing tacos at a beer dinner because it's not it's not super high end. But you charge a little bit more for a beer dinner right than you would for maybe just if I'm selling tacos and beer. It's a full dinner. But but people who were like taco connoisseurs were there and they're like, this is the best taco ever had the pairing made it so much better. You know, like, pairing was is the key when you ended the success comes from when you actually nail the pairing? Yeah, because the because the beers already good. Food The food's already good. Like I have to. I bet the validation comes from when you people are like, the pairing made it awesome, you know? Yeah, so I am like, Yeah.

Roy Barker 39:02

Did y'all have music? Did you have music there?

Josh 39:06

at that one, that one. That one wasn't music pairing per se, but I told them to. I gave him some ideas of what kind of music should play, you know, like more like, up up tempo, maybe Mexican inspired punk rock. So bands from Mexico that do rock and roll a punk rock would pair well with that. Yeah. All right. It was fun. And it worked. It worked.

Roy Barker 39:27

So now you know, the next question come in is what was the biggest flop that you've put together?

Josh 39:39

Trick question. Yeah. Well, I think it would be more like, I think that'd be more maybe in the, the, in the music side of things. When you know as if you put out a record, and it doesn't do as well as everyone's anticipating or whatever because like as as music as music trends abin flow, and we put out a record and it doesn't sell as much as the previous record or whatever, right. And we change the style of it, you interrupt the fans perception of what you think music should be or whatever. And I see chefs do the same thing too, if they put something new on the menu, and it doesn't go over as well. So I think, I don't know if it's the biggest flop ever, but like, you know, we've on that kind of, for example, on that vegan menu. But we have to, we have to entertain so many people every single day. 125 people a day. And we put curry on the menu, like just the regular kind of a delicious little Thai curry. Yeah. And we did it twice. And we got feedback that that they said nobody liked it. They liked everything else. Surprise, well, but it's something that it's funny though, because I you make it, I make it for weddings, I make it for different events. And it's always like, Oh my gosh, it's so this is so good. And then you give it to this one company. And they're like, we didn't like it. So we take off the menu. But it's such a weird thing. Because you're used to it being like your go to Yeah, and so, so they don't get it anymore, they decided that they're not going to have that, you know, so it feels like a flop in a way. It's like, well, what am I? It's hard to ask somebody, What don't you like? Yeah, they just don't like it? Well, you can't, you know,

Roy Barker 41:22

we've all got different tastes and different backgrounds. So do you find that you put something to get, you know, we're looking, we only have to talk about the curry. But, you know, just in general, you put, you put these two things together that you just think, oh, man, I knocked that one out of the park these tastes so good together. But then other people's taste is just not, not where yours was? Or, you know, are you? Has it gotten to the point that when you think it's pretty good, you know, generally the following is pretty good as well.

Josh 41:57

Yeah, I think that even even at the if it's a three course, a three course tasting. And let's say there's like, even if there's 20 people there, and it's like a smaller one. Yeah, almost every single person will have a different favorite of the night. Yeah, they're like, I really miss one. So this will this are like the song you miss chorus, whatever, everyone's gonna pick and choose a different thing. So it's hard to it's hard to gauge my success or failure on on those kind of events sometimes, because, you know, like I said, it's almost like, like a, but when you when the people are at your event in front of you, at the table, or at a wedding and you're trying to impress the bride, or the bride's mom, or whatever the case may be. It's like a living Yelp. Right, right there. Right. And I'm not I'm not like going on the website saying like, Oh, what's this restaurant? Like? Let me let me find out about their their meal, Hawaiian tacos special or whatever. They're right there. And they'll be just be like, yeah, it wasn't good. Like it or whatever. Or, I really liked it. Thank you, I'm going to tell everybody about it, you know, so you wait for that validation. And that's, you know, and that's, that's hard to do as an artist or creators, like, get that validation from people, or, or get that constructive criticism, or feedback. Hey, I just wanted to let you know, I think that blah, blah, you know, I mean, there's ways to do it. And I'm, I'm mature, and I can hear people, I can accept people saying, you know, maybe it wasn't as good as your last time or whatever. But if they do it in the right way. You're sensitive baby.

erry 43:35

Yeah, they are. Right.

Roy Barker 43:39

Like I said before, and I mean, it is that I think we have to encourage our local chefs to, to take a chance. I mean, we would all be eating meat, potatoes, and green beans, if people didn't take a chance, so may not be our favorite.

Terry 43:53

Those aren't bad things. But they're now the same thing over

Roy Barker 43:56

and over, we just have to encourage our chefs to take a chance, it may not be our favorite meal, but we got to encourage them to keep trying and coming up with all these different cool things. I mean, there's, that's the other thing, you know, talking about the grocery stores and how plentiful food is, if he just stop and take all the local restaurants that people have around them, you know, in urban areas. There's so many different varieties of food, not only the Mexican, Italian and different ethnic groups like that. But even within that group, you know, like we've got two or three Mexican food places that they're they're just totally different. But they are still good in their own right. Yeah. So anyway, they're

Josh 44:37

just, I mean, it's a huge country. So they're everywhere, right? Yeah. Yeah. Different. cuisine is all over the place. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And there's like Texas barbecue versus Missouri or Kansas

Terry 44:49

City. Yeah. States, California. Yeah.

Roy Barker 44:52

Yeah, for some right. I get that. Yeah, Tennessee, and I guess Missouri, St. Louis. They all want to have their own Are we? I don't know. I mean, I'm not that much of a connoisseur I guess I like I'll eat it it in. If it's good now.

Terry 45:05

Well, I grew. I grew up in Nebraska and we had some good beef. I'm telling ya, I am. This plant based stuff was very hard for me to say yes to. I mean, it's, it's good, but I did make a really good I was gonna tell you I mean, it was really good 10 pay Boland ace. Oh my gosh, it was getting squashed. And I had never cooked with Tim pay before. So I didn't really know what to expect. We've kind of played with some tofu, but it turned out really good. I was proud of myself. That was one one good thing. Yeah.

Josh 45:39

That's a good one. Yeah. A lot of stuff with that.

Roy Barker 45:41

That's good for the home audience to to, you know, step out there. And like I said, I encourage Terry to take a chance that we're not going to start we'll throw it out whip something else up. It's not a big deal. But she's about 100% she never she never misses. So I'm lucky.

Terry 45:54

He just wants to eat. He knows.

Josh 46:00

Yeah, I mean, you got to have an adventurous spirit to know, some of the stuff that you like is already vegetarian based. You know, grilled cheese sandwiches vegetarian? Yeah, mac and cheese is vegetarian and vegan necessarily. Right. You know, I guess it depends on when you say plant based if you're talking like full vegan, or vegetarian with, you know, or, you know, most of the, you know, like I said that balance?

Terry 46:23

Yeah, we're trying to do the full thing because

Josh 46:26

some some of the some of the diets or some of the diets are calorie based also, like, it doesn't matter what you eat depends on the calories. Yeah, you know, right. So like, there's all different ways to pends on your own health, you know, your own your own goals, their, for your health, you know, I was, I was overweight as a kid, you know? And oh, yeah,

Terry 46:47

we can talk about that a little bit. Yeah. Okay. I mean, if you want to, probably pertains to the title of, there you go, we need to tie back.

Josh 46:59

Yeah, cool, baby. Sir. I think that I think that some of it was, like I said, I don't know about the food desert thing. You know, we were we're not, we're not a rich family by any means. But I think a lot of food that was brought home was not healthy food. And then, you know, it was a tumultuous family situation, too. So I think the trauma adds to adds to some of the weight issues with some kids, you know, growing up and not having, when your parents are so involved with what's going on in the, in their relationship, they might not see everything that needs to happen for the, for the diet, for the health needs. And you know, a lot of a lot of the kids in San Diego and Southern California in different sections to two meals of the day, maybe sometimes two and a half meals are coming from the school, you know, not even coming from their house. So. So that says a lot about like food, and you know, nutrition and homes and stuff like that. It's like some parents just aren't aware of how much a kid actually needs nutritionally. And yeah, there's tons of calories in the house, but it's like, what is it? Twinkies otter pops Kool Aid row, big, big macs, Happy Meals. You know, I don't want to cook tonight. Let's go get a happy meal. This other other bullshit, you know, like, so like, I think that people it's okay every once in a while. Sure. I love I love eating out burger. I mean, Oh, you don't have that in Texas, but

Terry 48:22

Oh, yeah,

Roy Barker 48:23

yeah, we just got

Terry 48:25

in and out. Yeah,

Josh 48:27

I I good. Yeah, I everyone loves them for their good reason. It's it's fresh stuff. It's still fast food. It's still a hamburger. Yeah. So if you eat a ton of it, you're gonna get sick, but it's better than other things, you know. So like I said, Every once now might even okay, but when your parents are heavily relying on, on that to support your nutritional value and our nutritional, you know, outcome and your life and stuff like that. It's not it probably won't end up well for the kids. You know. Luckily, I got into, I started getting into sports and music and other things so that I could tone it down a little bit, you know, because the coaches don't put up with that. Yeah. And then, and then if you're into music, you just can't be, you know, you have to be a little bit healthy to be able to play on stage every night to like, you'll just get sick. Yeah, he basically just get sick. Yeah. So, yeah, that was a thing I went through.

Roy Barker 49:17

Yeah, um, you know, as well, and we were guilty even as, as adults, you know, it's, it's easy and quick and hitting the drive throughs and it's just, you know, it's making the commitment that, you know, we're going to eat at home and just, you know, try to cook and try to do all these different things, but it's, you know, it's an easy habit to fall into, unfortunately. And you know, I can speak from that that's, you know, why I gained so much weight is just not only poor eating habits, but poor, poor choices of foods are placed to go to so.

Terry 49:52

Yeah, and I need chocolate. Yeah, I need it. So you do yeah. Do you need chocolate? It's good for your heart. Yes, it is. Yes. Oh snap this pic how much you think you got to pick how much Yeah, but right and I can just do a little I can just do a bite and be okay.

Roy Barker 50:11

It is plant based so I mean, yeah nothing wrong with that all right Josh sweet yeah all the all the all the old stuff. Yeah. Well, any last word before we wrap it up. I know we've gone way long we appreciate your time and you being Oh yeah.

Terry 50:31

Yeah, yeah, just the name of your restaurant and and your band and all of that too.

Josh 50:38

Oh sure. The so I worked at I worked for harvest kitchen. And so we're we're, you know, a catering a boutique catering company in San Diego, and we got a food truck and we go all around all around the state and stuff like that wherever, wherever food, food festivals, music, festivals, golf tournaments, whatever, weddings, but but we're really focused and committed to like grass fed and organic and local, as local as possible farms and stuff like that. Eating, we don't say healthy, typically we say helpful, helpful, you know, balanced stuff, balanced diet, because like I said, we do love a good braised short rib or like a really good juicy burger. But Where's it coming from? Yeah, and do it. Do I know the person that grew this produce? And you know, so I talked to my reps all the time. And you know how organic stuff like that. Blah, blah, blah. It's a whole it's a whole other topic. Right? But yeah, so harvest kitchen. And so that's, that's, that's where my main chef gig is. And so I do my events based out of there my pairings and stuff with the local breweries and everything like that. And then yeah, my music is I was in a band called dogwood for a long time. So we were all over the place with that I did that full time straight out of high school for about 14 years or so. Yeah. And we put out records and went to Texas a lot, you know, all over Texas, every, every every cool place you could be. And then now now, now I do music called it's called St. delicous, which is the patron saint of San Diego. And so I just, I thought that'd be fun. Yeah, and now, you know, I have, I have different things to say now that I'm, you know, a dad and seeing seeing the world the way it is now versus when I was in high school and things change. So now, that's how I do it now. Yeah. And then, and then I do the podcast, the food and music podcasts, because so many people from both of my careers are kind of doing similar things, whether it's musicians who cook or brewers who used to be musicians, or people who put on concerts or whatever. So I was I just wanted to talk to those people and kind of give voices to you know, more more women in the industry. Because Because in our in the music and food industries, the women have lesser voice a little bit, you know, like they have they have big voices, but they're not always heard. Right. So I kind of wanted to give a platform to more of those people, more of those creators who are kind of keeping helping keep the industry afloat and doing cool things. So yeah, my my show coming out tomorrow is with her. We're kind of a local female chef who used to do music. So it's kind of cool. doing all this stuff to see. And then hearing people's stories. Really, when I do these shows. I'm like hearing Everyone's story. Yeah, learning. Like that. So yeah, yeah, yeah, definitely.

Roy Barker 53:27

So tell me one more time

Josh 53:29

10 parting words of wisdom is usually just stay safe and be kind to each other.

Roy Barker 53:34

So tell me one more time about the love the catcher's mask. poster behind you. Is that is that a that is? The padres?

Josh 53:45

Yeah, it's, it's from the deep padres and the Detroit Tigers 1984 World Series nice. Just a local artist was commissioned to do it. I found it at some thrift store in the corner, like oh, we're getting rid of this. Because that was that was the first time when I was little the Padres had gone to the World Series. Yeah. And they got they got killed in the World Series, but they still went Yeah, so I have this. Yeah, I don't know. It's just a funky colorful back. Yeah. Does my son

Terry 54:22

likes baseball?

Josh 54:23

Yes. I like baseball. Yeah. So that's fine. That's what it is. All right, Josh. Well, thanks

Roy Barker 54:29

a lot. Y'all go visit Josh podcast. It tells how the if somebody wanted you to put on a pairing for them out in the San Diego area How could they reach out what's your email

Josh 54:42

either Yeah, either through my my podcast page the family cast on Instagram or or even just my personal one is Josh camp EMB. That's my and then at the through those two it kind of links to all my other stuff too. So I got I got a food page and a music page and hardest kitchen page. So Kind of active all over the internet. Yeah,

Terry 55:01

good. Good. You're everywhere.

Roy Barker 55:03

All right, we all go out everywhere. Go visit Josh and see what he's got to offer. Thanks so much for your time. We certainly do appreciate it.

Terry 55:10

Thank you, john. Yeah, it's been fun.

Roy Barker 55:12

That's gonna do it. I don't know that episode. You bet. that's gonna do it for another episode of feeding fatty. Of course. I'm Roy.

Terry 55:18

I'm Terry.

Roy Barker 55:19

You can find us at www.feedingfatty.com. We're on all the major social media platforms as well. video of this interview will go up when the episode goes live. We're on all the major podcast platforms as well Google, iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify. If we're not a one that you listened to. please reach out we'd be glad to add you. So until next time, take care of yourself and take care of your family.

55:50

Yeah

www.feedingfatty.com

The Six Dimensions of Wellness and Achieving Your Full Potential With Terry and Roy

The six dimensions of health and wellness are physical, intellectual, emotional, social, spiritual, and vocational. These dimensions are also interrelated. If you are having trouble at work this can lead to deficiency in other areas. If we are off on our physical shortfalls it can have an effect on our emotional dimensions. We need to work hard to balance all of these and every day. Not easy.

About Terry and Roy

After years of weight, health and fitness challenges, Roy Barker and Terry Mallozzi made a commitment to changing their eating habits. And implementing realistic fitness goals for them. They chronicle their journey for health on the Feeding Fatty Podcast speaking to experts about related aspects of health challenges (type 2 diabetes, hyperthyroidism, hypothyroidism), losing weight (need to) and staying positive (easier said than done). Little did they know it's not just counting calories and cutting out sweets.

www.feedingfatty.com

Full Transcript Below

The Six Dimensions of Wellness and Achieving Your Full Potential

Sat, 5/22 5:43PM • 20:30

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

wellness, physical, meditation, couple, people, podcast, social, crossword puzzle, nice, find, occupational, pencil, dimensions, learning, week, good, encompassing, long, talk, cocktail napkin

SPEAKERS

Terry, Roy Barker

Roy Barker 00:03

Hello, everyone, and welcome to another episode of feeding fatty. I'm Roy,

Terry 00:07

I'm Terry.

Roy Barker 00:07

So we are the podcast that we are chronicling our journey through wellness, that encompasses a lot of things, different things from day to day. But, you know, as well as we, you know, we want to talk about things going on in our life as well as have professionals on from time to time. And we've got, we've had a lot of great interviews in the past, and we have got a lot got a lot of great more, a lot more great ones that we have already got taped. And then we've also got, you know, probably a hand while probably a couple fistful of people that are out there waiting to, to get a recording date. So yeah, we're very excited about that. Thanks for our listeners, and to all of our guests that come on, y'all are the ones that really make this great, but sort of day, I think we want to talk a little bit about wellness, it was kind of a, the six dimensions of wellness, it was kind of a long journey about how we got to this subject that I won't go into the whole whole thing. But we were on another podcast I was listening to something came up about, about loneliness, and how detrimental to our health it can be. And so, you know, we started looking at these six dimensions of, you know, their interdependence, I guess is another way to look at it to to Achieve Wellness.

Terry 01:31

Yeah. And let's describe, let's define what wellness is. It's, it's the practice of building a holistic sense of fulfillment, in your health, you know, in all aspects of your life. So,

Roy Barker 01:49

yeah, and this particular model, I mean, we want to be sure and give credit where credit is due. Because while we would love to say that, you know, we penciled this out last night on a cocktail napkin, that's not the way that this was a developed by Dr. Bill Hitler, he is a co founder of the national wellness Institute. And, you know, they developed this in it's been around, I think, it looks like since about the mid 70s. So it's nothing new. But it is kind of interesting, you know, when we think about the different components, and let me just the other thing, I think we need to say too, is that dependent, you know, there wasn't eight, a model that had eight dimensions in it, I think you found one that had seven,

Terry 02:30

like 6789, there was one that had nine, nine,

Roy Barker 02:34

so yeah, and this, I guess we decided to go with this, since this is a reputable institution with, you know, some, I guess, people that do research and things like that, yeah, and they've been around for quite some time. So, but anyway, we'll just talk about these six are physical, intellectual, emotional, social, spiritual, and vocational, or occupational, depending on where you read it. A couple others were that were left off, were the only eight model were financial and environmental. So we may just hit on those that they're not going to be as big since we don't have a lot of research on those. But, you know, I think it's important because really, you have to be hitting on all of these and you know, somebody that like me, that probably eats emotionally, you know, if I get kind of out of whack on any of these, you know, it probably would make me want to eat or be bored enough to eat. So I think that we have to think about our wellness, not just in our diet, or our weight, or our exercise, but you know, this all all six of these dimensions.

Terry 03:45

Yeah, and I mean, everything works together, so you can balance yourself and, and just be more complete right now. And I think would be remiss, also, I wanted to make sure that we mentioned that global wellness day is June 12 2021. So I'm excited about that. We're gonna have to celebrate, we're gonna have to go out and eat a big meal. Like cake, and wine. No, I'm kidding.

Roy Barker 04:13

Yeah, so let's just start with the occupational that's the one that they've got the top of their list. But basically, what this is just saying is that, you know, we need to have satisfaction and enrichment through our life's work. And, you know, on, on our business podcast, we talked about that quite frequently, especially if you're an entrepreneur is that you really need to find something you like, because you have to put a lot of time and a lot of energy into it. And, you know, there's nothing worse than getting up in the morning and just feeling like you have to take a beating if you you know, go to a place of employment or even if it's your own business,

Terry 04:50

so you need to look forward. You need to look forward to everything but especially work if that's, you know, something that you spend a long time you know, Building relationships there, honing your craft all of that you need, you need to find some satisfaction in that.

Roy Barker 05:07

Yeah, because we will typically spend, you know, half of our waking hours there. And most of us spend a lot more than that, you know, we're fortunate enough to do a lot of our stuff together. So it's not like, you know, we're being neglectful. So that's a positive. But, you know, you really need to find, if you could find the podcast I'm working on for the businesses this week just happens to be the profit with the purpose. And so that's one thing that he's talking about is not only finding something that you like, but you can also have social impacts as well. And one was, you know, a lawyer that did some housing law that, you know, she would actually take on some cases for free, I think, to, you know, help people that were going through hard times and trying to be evicted. So, you know, there's a lot of things that we can do to earn a living, but yet, we can also have some run off to that social impact. So I think that's very important.

Terry 06:07

Yeah. And I guess we'll cover social in a minute. Yeah. But the next one is physical, the physical dimension, yeah, the need for regular physical activity. You know, they physical development encourages learning about diet and nutrition, while discouraging smoking and alcohol and drug use. Yeah.

Roy Barker 06:33

And, you know, when we talk, this is physical, all encompassing, but you know, when we talk about exercise that, you know, I'm of the belief that our weight can be controlled, you know, probably 75 80%, through our diet, we don't, the exercise has very little impact on that weight loss, but all the other physical benefits that we get from that the endorphins that it releases, just keeping your joints and everything limber, because I know I said, when I sit in a chair too long, I know, I start getting, you know, very tight, and just harder to, you know, stretch to get up. And part of that just from, you know, not getting ups frequently enough to take a walk. So I really feel like and that's something that, unfortunately, it started raining today. But that's something that, you know, I think we are going to start working on more this week is just yeah, we used to be fairly good about getting out and taking those 15 minute walks. And I think we're going to try really hard to get back into that again. Yeah,

Terry 07:34

I've just been finding, finding it. Well, it's just been hard for me to find the motivation to do it. I'm just so tired. And so I don't know, I I don't know where you find that motivation helped me. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, really?

Roy Barker 07:52

I don't either, I think. Yeah, you know, and it's Jay, you know, we've just had, I think we've had a lot of stressors, the last month or so. And we've been really busy and staying up too late and not doing you know, again, this just gets back to the, you know, some of the other things that we talked to the sleep, you know, it's very important for us, and you know, that makes you tired, where you don't want to, you know, get out and go do that walk.

Terry 08:17

So yeah, and if I had I mean, like, this week has been beaten on me as far as sleep just because, you know, I've been waking up early in the morning, and then staying up and just start starting to get lost in my phone. And then next thing I know, it's seven or eight o'clock in the morning, and I'm like, Oh, my God, I need to go to bed. Yeah, you know, and then that just sets the tone for the rest of my day. So I have not been very fruitful.

Roy Barker 08:45

Yeah. Well, we can get back into that. I think that's a, that'll be, it'll be good. It'll be good. I think you'll help your sleep as well.

Terry 08:53

I think so.

Roy Barker 08:54

So the The next one is the emotional. And, you know, this is just talking about the awareness and acceptance of your feelings. And, you know, we, we've touched on that before that, you know, you can't block off bad feelings, and we've got a guest coming up on. I think she's coming up on feeding fatty. We haven't taped her yet. But I've talked to her a little bit. And, you know, we when we had a conversation the other day, that's one thing that she said is that we can't block those feelings or these thoughts from coming in. And so what she just was recommending is that you just acknowledge it, and basically say, Thanks for reminding me brain and because she just said if you don't, it will just be a constant reminder. And just that nagging where if we just accept it, sometimes even set with it for just a minute, then you know, we can deal with that.

Terry 09:52

Yeah, and emotions are just so, so tricky. If you don't deal with them, they have a tendency to creep back up and then you're If you stuff them down and stuff them down, and then you don't know what to do with those emotions, or how to deal with them, you know,

Roy Barker 10:07

yeah. Yeah, and there's things that we can do. And I don't want to belabor it too long, because, you know, sometimes we can control those. And sometimes we can't. But if, if you're in a bad situation, look for ways to change that to where you can gain that happiness back there. Sometimes there are things we can do. And unfortunately, there are times where we just can't But

Terry 10:34

no, and you know, finding, finding your gratitude, just giving yourself grace, and being kind to yourself. That's, those are huge. You know, it just sounds so simple when I say it out loud. But really, you have you have to practice all of that.

Roy Barker 10:51

Yeah. And you know, I think we released an episode last week about our meditation journey. And then a couple weeks ago on the Reiki, reiki, I can't. So but you know, I think this meditation, it's been good. And I've been really staying on top of my journaling, and it's not always it's not, you know, for me, the journaling is not bad. I mean, I don't really, you know, my life is pretty good. So I don't have negative a lot of negative stuff to journal. But it's still just good, just rattling the thoughts down and just keeping up with it. So, again, it's a couple of different things that be might suggest that, you know, give it a try. And

Terry 11:35

then you don't have to write the best novel, you know, that's sometimes what I do is that when I sit down journal, Oh, my gosh, I got to write a whole novel, and it has to be perfect. Now, you can just do some bullet points and get on with it, you know?

Roy Barker 11:47

Yeah. And that's the same thing with the meditation, I think people are like, Oh, I can't, my mind is not still I can't stop. But you know, you don't have to you don't have to be perfect at it. Every time. They're just like myself, there are days I'm better than others. Sometimes my mind is running all over the place. But it lets me realize that my mind is running all over the place to try to take a step back and take those deep breaths. So

Terry 12:13

anyway, yeah. So the next so the next one we're going to go to is the spiritual dimension, and it recognizes your search for meaning and purpose. And your existence. You know, that that is hard? That's hard to find, you know, I don't know.

Roy Barker 12:33

Yeah. Well, that kind of gets back to our meditation. Yeah, yeah, it's a good time to, to, you know, to your higher power, I don't want to, you know, say, everybody may not believe in, you know, that God is that person, but whoever they feel like, because it doesn't matter, it's whoever you feel like is your higher power, it's a great time, just to take a few minutes to say, thank you, thank you for all these good things that have happened to practice that gratitude. And then

Terry 13:03

it opens you up to receiving, you know, more positive vibes. And it just all around. I mean, it does. Like I said, it sounds so simple when you say it out loud, but it really is true, it just, you know, practice what you preach.

Roy Barker 13:20

Yeah, and you just got to take the top, make yourself do it, and just sit down. And like I said, Some days are gonna be better than others. But

Terry 13:27

in whatever works for you is what works for you. It's, you know, it doesn't have to be a certain way. And if you need, you know, Google if you need to have some low, some way to help help you search in your spiritual, spiritual guidance and all of that. And your spiritual dimension of wellness.

Roy Barker 13:52

Yeah, so the next one is social. And this is just talks about contributing to one's environment and community, the interdependence between others and nature. So I think it looks like it's fairly all encompassing. That, you know, we are social beings. And this is kind of what led us to this is, you know, the, in the other podcast, I was listening to this morning, where the guy talked about that, actually being isolated. It can have the same effect on us as smoking a pack of cigarettes a day. And I saw somewhere else, they actually said 15 cigarettes a day, so I guess that's, I don't know, like, almost a whole pack or something. Oh, yeah. So anyway, it is real and we are social beings. And I think we can, you know, it's getting a little easier to do that face to face now. But still, if you're concerned about that, I think, you know, for me, zoom is pretty good because our, that FaceTime whatever because Cuz you still get to see the person, you get to have some social interaction. And I know that you and your ladies group that y'all have been doing the, you know, y'all do a call, yeah,

Terry 15:11

y'all did a call party stuff, we do that we try to do that once a week. And sometimes it drags out for a couple of weeks, but we're actually going to go have lunch, we've had a couple of outings now that the masks are down and everybody's vaccinated. So it's, it's nice to be able to have the physical presence, you know, and to hug or bump fist or whatever it is that you choose to do. Is is a nice thing. Also, you know, volunteering, you can do that how, you know, you can do that in a number of ways. But that's that can help with the social aspect. I mean, kill two birds with one stone, you know?

Roy Barker 15:57

Yeah. And there's so many people out there that need to eat them need it,

Terry 16:01

and you need to give it I mean, it's just makes you feel so good. And, you know, just helping other people No, helps yourself. It's like the, I don't want to like it, liken it to this 12 step program, but it kind of is in that, you know, you just, it just it just, it just helps your well being. Yeah, sorry. I lost it.

Roy Barker 16:31

No, I mean, it's good to give in makes you feel good for giving back. But it's also that social stimulation, and when, unfortunately, when we all get older, and you know, we're gonna wish we had that. So anyway. Well, the last one is the intellectual. And it just talks about the recognizing your creative, your stimulating many, many mental activities and how you expand your knowledge. And so we should, that's another thing is we should always be be learning, I think it helps to keep the brain young and there's a while we didn't pull it for for today, there's a lot of research out there that you know, if you do these, even if it's something as simple as doing a crossword puzzle to keep your mind active, you can help ward off, you know, a lot of dementia. For a while, you know, there's some some you can some you can't, but it does give you a fighting chance anyway.

Terry 17:31

Yeah, crossword puzzles, Sudoku, learning a new language, you know, learning anything

Roy Barker 17:38

learning instrument. We have,

Terry 17:41

yes. Oh, Patrick Patrick.

Roy Barker 17:45

Not long ago, talking about how the especially older people have been really reaching out trying to learn an instrument. So

Terry 17:54

yeah, again, for brain health. I mean,

Roy Barker 17:56

it's never too late. And, you know, music always kind of sees you anyway, whenever, you know, whenever you're maybe a little down, play a little music or put the radio on. So that's always a good thing. Good memories. It's

Terry 18:10

nice to go down memory lane.

Roy Barker 18:12

Yep. All right, well, unless you have anything else, those are pretty much covered the six dimensions, again, they are get back up here. And they are emotional, occupational, physical, social, intellectual, and spiritual. And we have to, you know, have a good balance and try to be in a good place. And all of those things, I just challenge everybody to go over to the national wellness Institute. And there's a lot of literature on it. And there's other literature, you know, just Google it, but go over and take a look at it, and see if it can help you and your wellness. This one happy global wellness day, June 12. Yep. That's right.

Terry 18:55

Yay. I'm going into it. I'm like decorate. Okay.

Roy Barker 19:04

All right. Well, that's gonna do it for another episode of feeding Fanny. And, again, if there's a topic that's that that's on your mind that you feel like you'd really like us to either talk about or find a guest, please reach out and either by email or social media, let us know. We'd be glad to cover you know, some things that the listeners want to want to hear. Oh, great. That's gonna do it. You can find us of course at www.feedingfatty.com. We are also in all the major podcast platforms, all the major social media networks, and we got a new logo that we didn't even talk about. Got a new logo that should be coming out. I put it up on the podcast cover this week, will probably take me a few days or a little longer to get it put out on all social media but we'll eventually get it changed out so be interested to see what you think Terry? Pretty much design that when it's Just a white background with more pencil pencil looking lines, and it's kind of based off of the old Alfred Hitchcock getting his show he had a little drawing of a of a man. And so that's kind of what this looks like. profile. Yeah. Anyway, so yeah, give us some feedback on that if you'd like this one and see what you think we'd be glad to hear from you. All right. Until next time, take care of yourself and take care of your families.

www.feedingfatty.com

Beliefs Drive Behavior, Talk To Your Inner Child To See Why You Feel That Way with Dee Woolridge

What are your triggers? Is it an unconscious need to protect ourselves? If we are lacking pleasure, we are going to seek it. This explains when some people eat or drink to excess, do drugs, sex or other ways to fulfil that need for pleasure. The first step to mindset is being mindful. Think self love, take time to love yourself.

About Dee

Specialist on Resilience, Mindset, and Communication

As a result of her speaking, coaching, and writing, deep has helped thousands of people stop the cycle of self-sabotage and realized their significance. They speak up, stand up, and show up as the leader in their own lives. They move beyond stuck to live and work within their genius.

Dee Woolridge, a specialist in the effective communication, success mindset, and resilience, is a bestselling author and writer of numerous self-help books, she is the founder of two training and development companies. One that helps young adults on the autism spectrum.

Dee is a 30-year U.S. Navy veteran covering three wars she LED at the executive officer level and was a military consultant in Hollywood. She is the 9th of 13 siblings, a breast cancer survivor, and parents of a daughter with autism. Oorah....she's married to a Marine

Also, a clinical hypnotherapist, gifted spiritual counselor, and light worker, Dee has an open, friendly demeanor, and conversation is one of the things she does best. She relates well to military audiences, women, shows on spirituality, disabilities (autism), entrepreneurship, Wellness, mental health, emotional intelligence breast cancer, self-help and personal development.

www.deewoolridge.com

www.sanantoniohypnosis.com

www.feedingfatty.com

Full Transcript Below

Beliefs Drive Behavior, Talk To Your Inner Child To See Why You Feel That Way

Sat, 5/22 1:48PM • 1:03:24

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

eat, mindset, body, hypnosis, belief, feeding, people, pleasure, banana split, food, roy, called, sprouts, wheat grass, terry, dee, journey, hungry, feeling, thinking

SPEAKERS

Terry, Dee, Roy Barker

Roy Barker 00:15

Hello, and welcome to another episode of feeding fatty. This is Roy.

Terry 00:18

I'm Terry.

Roy Barker 00:19

So we are the podcast journaling my, I guess chronicling my journey to wellness and you know, as I've aged wellness is become a much bigger importance because I want to age well, I don't want to outlive my wellness. And so what we do is we bring you some episodes based on some things that we're trying. And then we also bring guests professionals in different fields to the show to talk to us about different things that we can do to help ourself and so, Terry, I'm gonna let you introduce our guest today, the Dee Woolridge

Terry 00:52

Yes, as a result of her speaking, coaching and writing Dee has helped 1000s of people stop the cycle of self sub sabotage and realize their significance. They speak up, stand up and show up as the leader in their own lives. They move beyond stuck to live and work within their genius. Dee Woolridge, a specialist in effective communication success, mindset and resilience is a best selling author, and writer of numerous self help books. She's the founder of two training and development companies, one that helps young adults on the Autism spec spectrum. Dee is a 30 year US Navy veteran covering three wars, she lead at the executive officer level and was a military consultant in Hollywood. She's the ninth of 13 siblings, a breast cancer survivor and parents of a daughter and parent of a daughter with autism. Oorah. Hi, Dee, welcome to the show. I just wanted to say that my dad was there for

Dee 01:56

me, Terry and I, Roy. That's right, the Air Force doesn't really have a call. No. And that call really belongs to the the Marine Corps. That Ron, we just kind of borrowed it from them because we carry them around.

Roy Barker 02:14

Yeah, that's what, that's what some movie, they said something, you know, the little rivalry between the Marines and the Navy and said, like, Hey, we y'all are just our transportation.

Dee 02:25

And we are

Roy Barker 02:28

great, well, thanks so much for taking time to be with us. You know, one thing that we talk about a lot in this journey is mindset. Because, you know, the reality is, is I could go, you know, I'm overweight enough, I think I could probably go qualify for surgery, or have other things done. But my, my hesitation for that has always been that if I don't change my mindset, I will never change my body. And because I know people who have, you know, done the different things and had had failure, because they just continued to eat, or drink consumed calories in some manner that just exceeded you know, what they were expanding. And I know, it's not always just about calories in calories out. But you know, we kind of have to have some kind of an equilibrium there. So it's a pleasure, you know, thanks for taking time to be with us and help us, you know, with this part of the part of that journey.

Dee 03:21

For sure, it's an, it's I know, it's important to you, Roy. And, and it's important to me, also. And it's important for that I live, what I teach, so that I can teach it well, right? So mindset is everything. And even with our wellness.

Roy Barker 03:43

So what are some things that you what are some challenges that you see that your clients have in trying to get the mindset, right, and some things that you've done to help them?

Dee 03:55

Well, there's, I think there's two parts to if we're talking Wait, in particular, one reason is triggers, you know, what our triggers are and then we have this unconscious feed into the trigger. And then the other thing is the unconscious protection of, of our body of our of ourselves. So, for example, if we are feeding ourselves because we are lacking pleasure, because eating is pleasurable. Yes, you know, and if we're lacking pleasure in our lives in some place, then we were always going to seek it out. We're going to figure out how to make ourselves feel good. So that's why people eat an excess or drink in excess because it makes them feel good, because they're filling a hole that that's not being filled somewhere else. Okay? That that pleasures Enter. So other people do it with drugs, they do it with sex. There's different kinds of ways to fill that pleasure. And so that's one thing. And the other thing is, we have an unconscious way of protecting ourselves. And we'll do it like even from stress. So if you and I know this about me, so if I'm, if I'm working on something, and then I get to a place where it's particularly hard, I'll get up, and then I'll go right to the pantry.

Roy Barker 05:35

I guess I had an episode like that just the other day, rather.

Dee 05:40

And the, what I'm doing is trying to get back to that trying to get rid of that uncomfortable feeling that's in my body. So you know, we, when we're hungry, are our body sends a signal to our mind, we're hungry. So there's a discomfort that's going on. And so we associate that discomfort with beating ourselves feeding ourselves. So we use it in every other thing that we do. Okay, if we're not, if we're in a state of discomfort with, you know, with work, we don't like that feeling. How do I get rid of that feeling? Oh, I'm used to eating. And what eating does is slow down the digestive system, or gives the body something else to do and concentrate on. So we're not concentrating on that hard thing, that stressful

06:35

thing? Okay,

Roy Barker 06:37

no, and it's funny. I mean, I was kind of joking. But it just the other day, it wasn't necessarily like, Oh, my gosh, moment of heart or stress, it was just, you know, kind of bumped up something I was thinking about. And I thought, I got out my chair turned around the head of the kitchen, thinking, you know, I'll get me a little something to hate. But that's interesting how that how, you know how you explain that about it, kind of that unconscious thing, because it is in the past while notice, you know, you run in there and get something to eat, and you eat it. And they think, oh, gosh, I shouldn't have done that. You know. And I think the other thing that you talk about too, is that feeling of hunger. One thing, and I verbalize this to Terry, so I can talk it out, but it's separating the feeling of a little hunger twins from the feeling of death. And it's like, Okay, that was just a little hunger thing. It doesn't mean, it doesn't mean that if you don't eat, you may die in the next five minutes. There's no urgency to run in there. Because a lot now, we've been really working hard on the last week to get back on track. And so I feel that little hunger and I go get a glass of water or you know, something else.

Dee 07:48

And it passes, you're hungry, you should eat, you know, because our body is doing exactly what it's supposed to do what it was built to do to tell us when to eat that we're hungry. But the other times, we have to ask ourselves, what are we really hungry for? Right? You know, am I Seeking Safety, satisfaction? Pleasure to get rid of that discomfort? So, you know, what are you really hungry for so that is the that's the thing, or am I thirsty? Yeah.

Roy Barker 08:19

Well, I'm

Dee 08:20

getting that question. And you know, what am I really hungry for? Yeah, am I bored? Do I need excitement here?

Roy Barker 08:26

So you know, that's me. And let me rephrase my what I say when I say hunger, I mean, maybe a little twinge in my stomach, not like full blown stomach, ground. But that's the thing is, you know, in the past, it's that, that very first trigger, like it's just kind of that little empty feeling. It's like to go fill that hole. But then the other thing, like you said to is the excitement and one of the funniest things when I first realized that is, you know, Terry was out running around, she called me one day and said, I'm heading back home. Are you about ready for lunch? And I said, Yeah, I am. I'm getting kind of hungry. And so then, in my mind, I'm getting all excited because I'm thinking, Oh, she's gonna go buy chick fil a, and she's gonna get us a chicken sandwich. And then she said, Okay, well, we've got some leftover salmon and expired asparagus in the fridge, right? And I just deflated

Terry 09:18

and I heard it over the phone. I could see it, you know,

Roy Barker 09:21

and luckily, I kind of had some self realization there. But I'm like, wow, I was putting way too much emphasis on this takeout lunch to make, you know, excite me or make me happier, be something different from the day. It's strange.

Dee 09:37

Because that's the pleasure in it. Eating is pleasurable, you know, food is, is delicious. That's why they put that you can make food delicious, right? So there's a difference between feeding hunger and satiating the hunger. So you can eat and then you just go that just wasn't good. Like you're But you're not satisfied, right? And that that makes you eat more, because you're trying to satisfy whatever pleasure it is that you're looking for. Yeah. So making healthy delicious food is the best deal. That's, that's the best and it's

Roy Barker 10:21

no fault to Terry's but just for me dressing,

Terry 10:24

was it really dangling a carrot?

Roy Barker 10:26

I No, no, no, I didn't mean making healthy delicious food. It's just, it's hard for me to seize on some vegetables or something. Something that is healthy. Goodness knows she tries very hard to jazz stuff up and hide it in this and turn it around and make it that but sometimes I can just always tell it's a it's a vegetable that one

Terry 10:51

can't do? Well, how do we find out? Which pleasure we're trying to go after? I mean, how do we find that out?

Dee 11:02

You ask yourself and so that that's part of the the mindset thing is, is first is being mindful? Are you guys familiar with you know, with being mindful? is just being in the moment right? Not in the past? Not in the future? Just a moment? Yes. And observing What's going on? Okay. So and then you can do that with with your body? You know, with the body scans, this is from head to toe, what do I feel in my head, and my throat and my my chest and my stomach? And you can when you're mindful you know your body You know, when you when you're used to doing that body scan? If you do that every day, you know your body then you know when you're hungry. You know when you when it's when is boredom or you're seeking pleasure or happiness or or something else besides food? Because you're so in tune with your body. Yeah, so just starting starting there with being mindful.

Roy Barker 12:08

The other thing Terry is kind of pushed me into doing a little more is the mindfulness actually, when we eat to help, it seems to have helped me slow down and not eat as much because if I'm sitting here at my desk, eating or if I'm up walking around, or you know, watching the TV or whatever, sometimes it's like you're not really paying attention. It's just the process. Yeah, you're just shoveling it. And then you find out you know, he passed home you pass being not hungry about five minutes ago, but yet you're still here eating.

Dee 12:42

Yeah, it's like, that's why by I used to love Doritos. I mean, like, Doritos were great. But I couldn't eat a little bag, I had to have the family size. And then I would just eat mindlessly, right? Just eating them. While I stopped doing that, and just getting a small bag because I wanted to savor them. So was mindful about how long it was taking me to eat one chip, right? Because I wanted to make it last. So I could eat that one bag, that one small bag. At the same time. The same rate, I could eat a big bag, but I'm eating less. Yeah. The other one is just crunching through them. And I'm not paying attention to what I'm putting into my body until I started keeping a log that I just did it for three days. And I was just discussing, I was like, okay, three days.

13:40

Oh my,

Dee 13:40

I'm good. I see this. And these are easy things to break. Because one of the things that I'm about mindset is self love. is loving yourself. You can drive past Wendy's and say that's not loving me. That's not loving me. So I started doing that. years ago when I had breast cancer and I went straight raw vegan. So, Roy, you're saying, you know the vegetables? That's all I had was the festivals. I didn't even have fruit because it had too much sugar. And the vegetables were mostly raw. You couldn't cook them pass 130 degrees. Oh, well. So and I did that for three years, three years and three years. Yeah. But that's I did that instead of chemotherapy. So what I was doing was feeding my body was improving my health instead of tearing it down with a chemotherapy drug which kills everything right? what I was doing was building my immune system up and making my body more alkaline. And you do that with raw vegetables, were all organic vegetables interesting. And I lost weight. Because of that not because I was trying to it was because because I was eating clean. Now, I'm, I'm not a raw vegan now. But that lifestyle I was it was all about self love and helping myself feel better. Like, I felt like I was tearing my body down because I didn't love me enough, I would put everything before me and then just throw some stuff in my face, Feed my face, whatever, and go help somebody else I was good at helping other people but not me. And that showed in in my weight it showed in my skin, it showed in my hair. It showed in my quality of sleep, because I wasn't caring for myself. And then it manifested into cancer. After that, and there's some other mindset things going on with that too was relationship with my mother and other things that I was trying to disguise or mask with food. And cancer was the Okay, you can do this or you can die. You know. So I changed my whole life with changing the way I ate and how I thought about food, food was medicine, instead of pleasure eating, you know, the redoes you know, and then just like drive in Platt pass those places. I would say, if I craved it, when I would say to myself, that's not loving me. That's tearing me down. Would I let anybody tear me down? Nope. So I would drive past it. And then I stopped even seeing the chick fil A's. I stopped even seeing the McDonald's and the Wendy's and the places I used to go because my husband said this a Popeye's chicken over there. And I go Really? It goes. I was like, I've been driving past here for three years. I haven't seen it. It's like Yeah, because it wasn't even in my conscious awareness. I would be looking for the whole foods, you know, the sprouts. So those those kind of places where I can get the healthy food for me? Does that make sense? Yeah, it

Roy Barker 17:28

was just a, it was the way I was thinking my on my radar. That's what it was on my radar, what were the best places that would serve my body and keep me well. So again, back to the interesting concept about the pleasures about I guess I'm that way as well, when you drive down the road is that you? You see that as that's pleasurable or adventurous. And it's, you know, we're trying to go with this mindset of, we eat food to live and you know, I'd like if you want to tell us more, I'd be glad to, you know, would be interested in hearing your story about the cancer and eating claim because we have been trying, you know, we're not totally vegetable or plant based. But we're trying to move that way. And we've, yeah, we've been this week and you know, we're getting rid of some things but we're trying to move plant based for a lot of things the we've heard the digestive system works 80% of the time, you know, burns 80% of the time trying to digest food and so the other thing we've tried to do is do a little intermittent fasting as well and I tell you what, I can tell the inflammation in my own arm injury is way down because it had gotten so bad, you know, the last four or five weeks and I couldn't even you know, move it across the front my body without it hurting but inflammations down the sleep is better just like this morning. You know, I made up my mind I'm sleeping in till you know whenever I wake up and you know about 536 o'clock, Ma'am, I'm I was up without an alarm and you know, feeling energetic, not just an old drowsy, wake up. So But anyway, if you want to, if you don't mind, you can expand on that. I'm interested to hear about that.

Dee 19:15

Sure, um, first of all, I'm not a dietitian, or nutritionist. This is just my journey. Yes, yes. So I was looking for alternative ways to treat cancer. Because I was always, even though I was a vegetarian, vegetarian slash vegan. I was a junk food vegetarian vegan, which means I had Doritos as one of the food groups made from corn, and processed cheese. It's not even real and things like that. So um, so even though I didn't eat meat, I said Ate poorly, which contributed to, to my bad health. And when I was diagnosed with cancer, I had to make some decisions like everybody else does, like what kind of treatment are you going to have? Are you going to have surgeries are you going to do all of these things. So I was looking for alternative ways to, to treat it. And I found this Health Institute called Hippocrates. And I drove down and went to their, their day of orientation, we tasted the food, they wish they showed us the grounds, because you you can live on site, it's like going away. So went away for six weeks. And they have a medical staff on premises, you know, they, they have your diagnosis, and they design a plan for you. But mostly, and you can, for people that are interested in this, you don't have to be sick to do this, you actually want to do this before you're sick. You know? And there's lots of videos if you just go to YouTube and look up Hippocrates. And you can they have many videos on why the food, the food that we that we just go to the store is damaged, basically, you know, and we all know about GMOs and, and all of those kinds of things. So try to eat. So eating vegetables is not just one thing but eating organic, that don't have pesticides, even we even got down to like the type of underwear that I wore, you know, was it cotton? Or was it all synthetic and polyester because it doesn't breathe, your skin needs to breathe. So I feel things when I go to the store and I'm just like this is dysplastic I'm not you know, my my I'm not going to be able to breathe, my skin's not going to be able to get what it needs from that. The mattress that I I bought you know I got rid of the old mattress and now that the matches that I have is a Stearns and foster was what is this just cotton and wool? You know, it doesn't have any of the synthetic stuff on it because everything else has chemicals and things in it. So I was like strict, strict on all of those things still. As far as the food is concerned, it was his juicing. And then it was raw veggies, lots of sprouts, everything that is in its first stages of growth. So sprouted foods, sprouted grain if you're eating bread. So those kinds of things that are healthier for you.

Roy Barker 22:46

I just asked her yesterday we bought something and it said sprouted and I asked her what does that mean? So

Terry 22:52

thanks for some sprouted lentils. And

22:55

yes, so that

Roy Barker 22:56

just means that it's young, younger in the growing cycle.

Dee 23:00

That's when it's, it's the most nutritious, okay? Because it is the like you can even get vinegar that has the mother. That means that it's giving life. So you want to get food that's in the giving life stage. Okay? Because if you if you get go to a store and you get broccoli and it's slim, there's no life force in it, it can't give you anything, okay, so you want to get veggies and fruit as close to off the vine or off of out of the ground as you can get them because that's when it's going to be most life giving. So if they're frozen if you're eating frozen vegetable, if they're frozen at the at their ripest or if you can sprout your own mung beans and I did that for a while I grew my own wheat grass. Because I you know, doing the three years I did regress twice a week. I mean, I'm sorry, twice a day. Oh, wow. Okay, now just squeeze in a week. Yeah. You know, you take a bunch of wheat grass, you take this much of wheat grass and you get this much juice.

24:14

Oh my god,

Dee 24:14

but that juice the wheatgrass juice and you can look that up. And this is something that you might want to look into Roy, because it's going to cleanse your body. Like all the waste that your body is holding on to that's what makes you sick. And that's what makes you stay fat. Okay,

Roy Barker 24:33

I'll check that up.

Dee 24:34

It's wheat grass and sunflower seeds, sprouts. You know, there's those that you put on your salad, it's gonna make your salad. Don't put wheat grass on your on your salad but sprouts put them on your salad. wheatgrass the body can't break down is to phosphorus. fibrous, so you want to juice that oak but spring outs, like broccoli sprouts, they have flavor. So if you if you're having a sandwich like zucchini, man, I'm telling you guys come to my house. And it'll be delicious. Okay, because it has to be because otherwise you're gonna want to go eat somewhere else. Yeah. But if you do, you know, a simple wrap, like, you take a Ezekiel bread wrap, because it's it sprout it, and then you spread hummus on it. And then you put a layer of sprouts, and then zucchini. Okay, and then you can put some shredded carrots and put peppers, things like every all of these things that have flavor, and then sprinkle some. I go to Zoe's and get there. Do you guys have always there? It's like a Mediterranean restaurant. Yes. And and I buy their seasoning. Okay, because it's already mixed. It's all instead of me going to my cabinet and getting all this stuff I love there's so I just I put it on everything. And then to some salt and pepper. And then you roll that up and you have this fresh. So good. Sounds great. Yeah, it just happens in there. And then there's, they make. It's, I think the food industry is catching on. Now. They're making more plant based foods.

Roy Barker 26:43

Yeah.

Dee 26:45

So you know, if you shop but you just have to know where to shop to get them. You know, to get the things that tastes delicious.

Roy Barker 26:53

I'm sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt your story. If you want us finish, tell us about your journey. I just think I thought it was interesting that we were just talking about the sprouts, sprouts last night because I was like, I don't even know what's good. Yeah.

Dee 27:06

It's good. It's good. So basically, that's the story is just, you know, I went to the Health Institute, instead of going to chemotherapy, and I didn't know what I was gonna do. I was like, you know, you don't know what you're gonna do. Everybody's coming to you, hey, do this, read this book, drink that take this shot, go to that place. I mean, everybody was an expert in cancer. You know, everybody is my cousin had cancer. And she did this, you know, so everybody's telling you all of these things. And you don't know which one to do. Everybody's journey is different. So I did go to the oncologist and sign up to have chemo and had an appointment to get my port put in. And I remember sitting there thinking to myself, I cannot do this. I cannot do this, but I went, because that was an option, right. And on the day, I was supposed to start my first I to get my port put in. I found myself on the road drive into Hippocrates. Wow, I don't even know why I got the money to go to Hippocrates because it wasn't $12.

Roy Barker 28:17

Right.

Dee 28:19

But I went I showed up. And the first part of it was just a detox like that first week. I was just detoxing. My head was hurting all the time. You know, and I had, I had three roommates. And all of us were crappy. You know, if you ever had a headache, and somebody is trying to talk to you, or you hear somebody else talking on the phone, like everything was bothering me, oh my god. So but then everybody was going through this, this detox. And then we just were you know, we're building the body up. And it wasn't just food. There were also different treatments. Asana, I still do sauna. I have a personal sauna. I do a sauna three times a week. It helps with detoxify your body. If you have cellulite. That's toxins in the body. Okay, yeah, I've

Roy Barker 29:11

heard that that there's a guy that he actually developed a like a sauna routine because Well number one, it's you know, I've always heard it just sweats the poisons out of your body but he had developed this routine where you know, you go in for so long and then you come out cold shower, hydrate, yeah, go back in but it was a whole process that he developed.

Dee 29:34

We had all of that there. Okay, it's a cold plunge. Okay, so you come out of the sauna, and then you go into the cold plunge. And then you go into the it's a saltwater pool. So and they had all of those things there for us. So, coming out of a hot sauna going into a cold plunge pool. It's like needles on your skin. It wasn't something because you're supposed to just play To the pool, oh, yikes. So I would just step in and then want the needles, needles, needles, and I get down in it for a little bit. And then I go to the saltwater pool. So we did that, draining the lymphatic system, getting the lymphatic system going, because that's also how you are releasing toxins from the body. So just jumping on a trampoline. So in the morning, we get up and jump on a trampoline. Or you can go to the you know, the little personal trampoline, or go to the, to the gym, and there was this thing that we stood on and it was Shake, shake. So all of those things are releasing the toxins plus colonics. I know that sounds extreme. But look, I had cancer. Yeah. colonics. And we were doing go to the website and see all the stuff that we were doing because it may sound extreme to the people and I don't want to scare people. Eating was just part of it. How we were treating our body, this vessel that carries our soul. What is the important thing and loving ourselves?

Terry 31:16

Well, and How is your health now? That was three years ago? You said?

Dee 31:22

That was 2013? Okay. Oh,

Terry 31:25

that was a long. Okay. Okay.

Dee 31:27

That was 2013 No, I I said I was raw vegan for three. Yeah. Okay, so I, I am, I call myself a flex, vegetarian now because I eat meat sometimes. And I eat meat when I crave it. Yeah, if I, if I'm craving it, that means that it's something from the meat that my body needs. But most of the of the time, you know, like I said, I'll make a wrap. Or I will have a, you know, some kind of I like this brand is it's a frozen brand is called rabbit. I think it's called rabbit food. But it's like, you know, the their bowls, and they have qinhuai and veggies and all kinds of really good stuff in in those. Okay, so, and I eat pizza, cuz I love it. Well, you know, but I, you know, I'm just making sure I know that when I'm eating it. I'm just like I call I know what I'm eating. But most of the time is, you know, I try to eat clean.

Roy Barker 32:34

Now, that's our approach is that, you know, it's not, if we wanted meat or fish or whatever, it's definitely okay to go have it, it's just, if we're not craving it, trying to stay off of it, just, you know, like you said, Our body is a vessel and we need, we need to take care of it. And because what we see is so many people you get once you get into older, become older, then all of a sudden, you know, you start having things happen because of the way you live when you're younger, and then you can't recover from that. And so, you know, my hope is to be in a little bit better place. But anyway, I think the the body as a vessel because it has the eating, but then we have to think about our sleep, our mindset, you know, we need to have that positive outlook gratitude. And you can, you know, I'd be glad for you to speak to that portion of it as well.

Dee 33:28

Yeah, mindset is everything. I mean, my I do this thing with my clients where it is I help them with their life categories. Okay, so life categories are things like work home, education, leisure time, how you, how you spending your life, and I have them, choose the categories and then rank them. So I show them an example of mine. And spirituality is ranked number one in mind. And my spirituality doesn't mean church, because I haven't been to church and I don't know how long because I that's not how I do spirituality. My spirituality is all encompassing, it is my personal connection to what I call source. And when and how I commune with source is through meditation. I believe that prayer is talking to source or talking to God and meditation is listening for the answer. So that is when I'm quiet. You know, I may go to source with a request or a need or even gratitude, and then it's my turn to listen for the answer. is an in that quiet is when I get the things that I need. I used to go I don't know, I don't know, I don't know and spending 30 years in the military, that wasn't an acceptable answer. I don't know. So I descripted from my vocabulary I was I rarely said, I don't know. It was, I will go find out. Let me check on that. Yeah, that's what I substituted. I don't know what so saying it, I don't know was it was like a failure to me. So I had to get over that I had to get over is over, saying that there was something wrong with me not knowing. And then going into meditation, saying, I don't know what to do. Help me. I don't know what's next. I don't know the answer, and just being still and quiet. And then I would just, I would hear it, or I would dream it, or I'd be in the shower, and I would just be downloaded with all of this information. When you were I got a lot of my inspiration. Like, oh, yeah, I'm gonna do that. Let me Hurry up and get out of here. So I can go and do it. Yeah. But it was always the answer to what I was needing. But I had to be in that space to listen to it. And I did that all through my cancer journey. That's when I was the closest to God is through that journey? Because that's when I just surrendered and said, I don't know what to do. I don't know what the answer is. You know, I'm, I'm just surrendered into this. And I'm just going to go where I'm led to go. So that is my mindset with this is there is a spiritual answer to every problem. And that comes from Dr. Wayne Dyer. Wayne Dyer, Dwayne Dyer, Wayne Dyer. Wayne Dyer. So he says, There's that and he actually wrote a book called there's a spiritual answer to every problem. And that's what I believe. So my mindset is, how do I get help for whatever this problem is, that I can't solve? By what I already know. Then I go outside of me for that resource, not to my husband, or my uncle Jimmy, who uncle Jimmy is like, he's like, he's the vegan max. Man. I'm telling you, he's anything you want to know about veganism. My uncle. We had a whole conversation yesterday, he was telling me something else to eat. But anyways. So in the spiritual practice, stems everything else that I do in life. It's my coaching. It's, it's the work with my clients. It's the speaking as the workshop is the books that I wrote, they all come from that stillness, that moment, those moments when I've just been quiet. So I'm divinely directed on everything that I do. So that gives me this positive feeling that feeds into everything. And all that stuff that used to bring me down that I used to care about, I don't anymore the things, you know, that I used to care about what other people thought about me or my family, and how things looked. You talk about optics, especially about being a naval officer, everything was how things looked. Right. How you present yourself, and I used to tell my husband before we went places, okay, we're going in with my people. Don't talk about your toenails. Okay, so my husband is a marine. And so, we had these two, two sets of friends and he was enlisted Marine, and I was a naval officer. So to to set two different sets of types of people. So I felt most comfortable with my husband's people. But my work was these people from the Navy, the Naval Academy and Admiral disan. Captain this in general, that, you know, so and I was a public affairs officer. So I did a lot of work with, with the higher echelon in in the Navy. So when we went to these affairs, I would tell my husband, okay, we're not with the grunts. Gonna have to do this because this is how it looks. And this is my community. The community is small and everybody talks. If I want You get promoted, then you need to be polished when we go to these things. So my husband goes on staying home.

Terry 40:09

Oh, man, I don't blame him for that at

Roy Barker 40:11

all. It's interesting, though.

Dee 40:14

Yeah. Oh, no, I'm

Roy Barker 40:14

sorry. Go ahead. Go ahead. No, go ahead. No, I'm just gonna say it's interesting because I have another business show, and I just had a conversation with the guy. And we were covering these kind of the same things like the recruiting, you know, we were talking about knowledge on paper versus I want somebody that is self reliant enough or self

Terry 40:39

confident?

Roy Barker 40:40

Well, I guess mindfulness of themself or in their moment that it's like, they don't have to have every answer. You have to know when to go seek the answer, and or how to go seek the answer, not necessarily having all the answers. And then the other thing about the facade is, you know, a lot of businesses, you know, there's a great book, and I wish I could she's an upcoming guest on the business show, but she talks about that most businesses have a facade, you know, you look at it, and you think, well run this is this, but once you pull the curtain back, there's total disorganization, and everything behind that. Yeah, I mean, yeah, I just think it's, it's a parallel to our personal life. I mean, we've got to get our personal life squared away. And what's important to us and I like that spiritual side, because I'm the same way my, my connection right now, you know, is going for a walk, I can take a 15 minute walk, and it's like, cleansed fresh ideas coming in. And but you know, when you're sitting here, on the computer, or right in the midst of it's hard to, it's hard to gain that clarity sometimes.

Dee 41:52

Until you get up and walk away. Yeah. Yeah, and release the mind, you're releasing this, the subconscious mind. When the subconscious mind is engaged, it's going to, it's in charge, basically, because it's feeding you all the things that you believe. And then when you get up and go for a walk, you disengage from that subconscious mind and you're conscious. That's why mindfulness is so important. You're not on autopilot anymore, which is the subconscious. It's, this is how we do this. This is our regular routine. This is what we believe in, and how we do it. When you're conscious, you can change it.

Roy Barker 42:35

Okay. And

Terry 42:36

so, I was gonna, I'm sorry, I was gonna ask so how, how much time do we spend subconsciously thinking versus consciously thinking like throughout the day or week are?

Dee 42:51

Your subconscious mind is 24 747, that's 24 seven that's always on 24 seven. So like, when you go to sleep, you're not conscious. You're not dead, but your conscious mind is engaged. But your subconscious mind is Yeah, yeah. You know, so it's always going on it's always it's, it's a tape this plane in the background even now.

Roy Barker 43:18

So how does, how does hypnosis tie into this? Because I guess it it kind of reaches out to what's in the the unconscious mind to pull that forward? Is that a correct way to explain that? Well,

Dee 43:37

somebody use my hands for that. There's these four, four pieces on that decides our behavior. Okay? So are five pieces, there's events that go on in our lives from zero to 10 years old when we're babies to about 10 years old. When information is just coming in. And then it gets stored in the subconscious mind like a file like file cabinets. And some of that information changes. If we can disprove it, like Santa Claus. Hopefully no children listening. Oh, sorry, guys. Yeah. There's no Santa, Santa Easter Bunny Tooth Fairy, all those things that we are taught or shown when we're children. We're excited about them when we're when we're kids. And then something comes along for us to disprove those things. So they're not stored anymore. They're stored as a memory, but then we still have the truth with them. Then there's other things like if you for example, if you believe in God, if you believe in God than that, and and that is your rock solid belief and you and it's there until unless some Then comes along to disprove it, it is your belief. Right? Right. So we have trillions of these beliefs. Because they've, we've been conditioned with them as kids. As Don Miguel Ruiz says, he's the author of the Four Agreements. He says, we've been domesticated, to believe these things. Like this color is blue, that's red, this is yellow, we've agreed that these are the things our beliefs, so. And then along with those benign beliefs, like the colors, we have events that happen in our life, say, for example, you burned yourself on the stove. And so now the belief is fire is hot. Fire is dangerous, it's an event. And you remember it, because it was a traumatic event or something profound that happens. So that is the event that causes the belief. Events, or, or repetition and conditioning causes the belief. Why is that important? Because I beliefs make us feel the beliefs make us emotional. And that emotion is what drives the behavior. Okay. So for example, if, when it comes to our health, if as children, we were conditioned, that sugar is bad, sugar is bad, sugar is bad, we were never given sugar. So our belief is, sugar is bad. The feeling is when you get something that has a lot of sugar in it, you will just go you're feeling oh my goodness, this is just so bad for me as you're feeling. So you You're, you're really pointing in about whatever that is, or sugars dangerous. So you have fear around it. So what you do is when somebody serves you ice cream is you push it away. That's the behavior. So if fork and the opposite is if someone always if you did something great. And you were rewarded with cake. Yeah, your belief is, yeah, when I do something great. I'm reward, this is a reward to have something sweet. And that makes you feel good about yourself. And then a splendid Dairy Queen.

Roy Barker 47:35

Exactly, exactly.

Dee 47:37

So you're getting the pleasure from that eating things is pleasurable, and it makes me feel like a winner. It is my reward. interest. So the behavior is I aced this thing at work. Now I'm going to Dairy Queen, that's the behavior, right? So the subconscious mind all this beliefs, drives the behavior. And everything that we do. It's all coming from the belief. So how. So if you want to change a behavior, you need to figure out what the belief is that drives this drive in that feeling. So many times when we talked earlier about where we're feeding something that is not hunger, we could be feeding an emptiness, an empty feeling that that that you associated with pleasure, I need pleasure. I feel empty right now. So how do I get that pleasure? I remember that eating gives me pleasure, because it makes me feel like a reward, like I'm rewarded. So I want that reward feeling right now. Interesting. So I'm going to go do that. So all of that little stuff is all tied together. And when you recognize that you can change it, you can change that belief, like eating doesn't have to be associated with a reward. What else can you do? What can you replace it? It's good to have that is it's good to have the feeling of being rewarded or the feeling of pleasure, or feeling of happiness. But what can we replace the eating? Yeah, to still get that feeling of happiness? Well, and so you can change that belief. Or you can change that belief, the belief to I'm amazing anyways, the belief is I don't have to be, you know, I don't have to be amazing with a banana split. I'm amazing with a sticker, or whatever that is. But so just if you change the belief, you can change the behavior.

Roy Barker 49:54

Yeah, that's easy. Talk that through. I think maybe you know, when you're down are not feeling good. That's another reason I guess you seek out that Banana Split is because it's that trigger of the memory of Oh, that was a happy time or that was a good time. So if I had me some ice cream, I'm gonna feel feel that way. Yeah. Interesting.

Dee 50:14

What are you really happy for? Right? I mean, what do you really hungry for it? You're hungry for an Attaboy you're hungry for acceptance. You're hungry for acknowledgement, right?

Roy Barker 50:30

Wow. That's pretty insightful. Yes. That's good.

Terry 50:36

Yeah.

Roy Barker 50:38

Yeah. And then it gets back to being mindful of taking the time to know what that feeling is and why, you know, and then you can kind of sort this out of why we're doing that. Yeah.

Dee 50:50

And were you asked about hypnosis on how hypnosis works with that, or was it uteri? So knowing this process, these things, hypnosis, what I do is I regress people back to the initializing event. So that first event where they begin where they stored, or created that belief,

Roy Barker 51:13

okay,

Dee 51:15

so if there's something traumatic right now, we're talking about something we're talking about pleasurable, it's like, you know, but even then, we would go back to that event where you were given the ice cream every time you did something and give you an ice cream. So we would go back to that first event. You were you were three years old, and you peed in the potty. So and then you get something every time you pee in the potty. So you would say that in hypnosis, I peed in the potty, then we would we I would talk to you. And I would say things right at that time, and I would just go give yourself a high five. What do you want to do? I want to go get ice cream. And I would we would make some corrections right there. And I would say Roy instead of ice cream, because adult Roy finds this as a problem. What do you want to do three year old Roy to to change that instead of what do you really want? What you really want is approval from your parents. So they can put on potty music for you what I that's what I used to do for my daughter. We used to play the music it was some song that says party dance party party because she was being conditioned to dance after okay doing party. So we could change that they're in hypnosis. And the reason why it works so well in hypnosis is because it's an extreme form of focus and, and relaxation. And there's no interference from this thing called the critical factor. The critical factor is the thing that analyzes and discerns everything okay, it's part of the conscious mind. Interesting. So that is not activated when we're in in hypnosis. So it's nothing blocking you from taking in this new information and making it your new belief. That's why hypnosis is so effective.

Roy Barker 53:12

Right? Okay, no, that's cool. I you know, I've never really thought about it that way but you know, it makes sense and goodness my problems are multiplied times three because I had like both my both my grant one set of grandparents they had the Dairy Queen up by them so it was always that was the celebration I had another grandpa that they had a local drugstore that was you know, going to the soda fountain and getting a banana split and then my dad he had a place out by his office so it's like you know, it my world has seen now that I'm thinking about it my world revolved around ice cream No wonder I love ice cream Yeah.

Dee 53:50

Was that a reward? Or those rewards for something you did? Well it

Roy Barker 53:55

rewards are just like Sunday Yeah Dad or you know just like whenever I was a little kid and go to work with dad, it might be like three o'clock. Let's go take a break you know, so we go down there you know at my grandparents maybe mowing the yard or doing some chores it's like Hey, you got that done? Let's go you know so i think it was a combination of a way to take a break and socialization but also you know, definitely that reward in you know, growing up the way I did it was like you know you had a bad day well let's go get something to eat that'll take our you know, my grandma she cooked cakes and stuff like well here's this piece of cake or you know the other you celebrate you know, did something good Yay. Let's go Oh, you don't feel good. Oh, you need to eat you're feeling great. Let's go eat You know, it seemed like everything was everything was a trigger.

Dee 54:42

And that's how that's how most families are. It's centered around food.

Terry 54:47

Yeah, everything is

Roy Barker 54:48

and then that socialization part two, because you know, the pandemic has kind of been a little different for us, but you know, we miss going out with like our daughters and kids and going out and You know, meeting somewhere and just the socialization or going with friends. But, you know, there's other things that we can do. And that's kind of one thing we've talked about in the past a little bit, was that that reconditioning of you can socialize without having to, you know, eat, eat things that aren't the healthiest for you. You can have a glass of water or a lettuce wrapper, you know, there's ways to make adjustments, I guess, is the thing. Yeah.

Dee 55:31

Sounds now.

Terry 55:34

Anything sounds good right now?

Roy Barker 55:36

Well, I know we're way long be and I appreciate your time. Is there anything else that you want to enlighten us with before we wrap this up?

Dee 55:46

Well, I do want to talk about self esteem. Yes. All of this certainly self esteem and how you feel about your self esteem is how you feel about yourself. And it's everything, okay? Because you will treat yourself like your best friend. If you love yourself, okay. And for your listeners that might need some help in that there I have a free workshop is self esteem is a self esteem workshop. It's It's Sunday, it's a it's not a work, stop. It's a five day challenge. Okay, raising your self esteem. Okay. So, how do you get there? I have to send you the link. Yeah,

Roy Barker 56:26

no, no, that's because the link is pretty long. Okay. Now we will post all of your stuff in, in the show notes as well. But now self esteem, let's let's Can you just expand on that just a little bit? Because, you know, it's it's a thing we feel bad about ourselves. And I think, you know, we talked about this in the business into LOD is, we are most of the time, we're the hardest on ourselves. If I have if I have 10 things on my to do list today, and I get seven done. I'm like, I missed three.

56:59

Thank you.

Roy Barker 57:01

I should have you know, I could have done this. I could have done a banana split for you. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Instead of just half one flipping that script and saying Holy smoke, I got seven done 70%. If I could hit 70% in the major leagues, I'd be a gazillionaire. So I mean, there's something to that. And the that positive stuff that we run in our mind, you know, we've talked about that again, but we get to choose whether we run negative or whether we run positive. And so, you know, just like me, I don't think about it a lot. But you know, you think out of shape and not looking the way I want to or I can think of I'm making efforts to get where I want to be, you know, I can take that positive spin on it. So I'm sure I'm sure that's all interrelated, correct.

Dee 57:50

It is, it's all of it. I'm loving every part of you. Even the parts that aren't as attractive to yourself as you like. But it's, it's where you are right now. And many of us think I can't love myself until I know, fill in the blank, whatever that is. self esteem is loving yourself right now as is. Right now as is. That's why people sell houses and cars, and they could still they can sell things as is because somebody still wants them. Right? Yeah. So why should we discard ourselves? As is?

Roy Barker 58:33

No, you're right, in the journey, you know, we need to enjoy the journey. Because I think the other part is we have this hollow goal that you know, when I get skinnier whenever I get the new car, the new house, we have those things that's gonna make me happy. Well, when you get there, it's like, okay, not really. Yeah,

Dee 58:51

wherever you are there, wherever you go. There you are. Exactly.

Terry 58:55

Yeah.

Dee 58:56

So I think Oh, there you are. So if you're not happy at the big size, you're not going to be happy at the small size either. You just might like what you see the reflection in the mirror, but she's still that self love is everything

Roy Barker 59:09

right? And, again, this is affects so many things about ourselves, not only our weight, the way we interact with our loved ones in our work life. I mean, it just ripples through every every part of our life.

Dee 59:27

It does, yep. So and if you want a mindset, if you want to work on your mindset, I have a mindset membership called mind shift membership, and it gives you daily things to chew on. Okay? It gives you meditations, visualizations, there's hypnosis, there's daily inspiration, motivation information, there's free courses, and you can get there from deewoolridge.com. Okay, so if you're if you're looking for mindset if you don't know how to change your mindset, and you don't really want to do a challenge or a course, this is an everyday thing is 365 days. Oh, wow, you get information, it comes straight to your email right now. Yeah. So just Yeah, well, there we go check

Roy Barker 1:00:20

that out. And we'll we'll say, we'll be sure and put the links in the show notes as well. Well, thank you so much for taking time to be with us. It's been a lot of great information. And I know me and Terry have benefited and hopefully, we'll have some audience members that will as well. But yeah, I mean, be happy. Love yourself, take care of yourself, and where wherever your journey is going. Enjoy it as you go.

Terry 1:00:44

And if you don't know how to do it, get a hold of date.

Roy Barker 1:00:46

Yeah. One more quick thing not to be too morbid, but the, you know, there, there's just been a lot going on lately about, we never know when we're going to take our last breath. And I think that's even more of a reason to be thankful and have that gratitude is that you just never know when you or your loved one may be taken away. And so, yes, kind of put a little more emphasis on that just being able to tell somebody Hey, I love you. You know, you're awesome to me, as Terry is and yeah, we just, you know, I think we need to I don't think people say that enough. And then there's just been some, you know, some people that have passed this last week at very young ages. That just makes you think that you know, we're always living on borrowed time. So make the best of it. Amen. Yeah.

Dee 1:01:41

Second that,

Roy Barker 1:01:42

yeah. All right. Well, thanks a lot. I tell people, how can they reach out and get a hold of you for more information? DeeWoolridge.com is my website and all of this stuff that I was talking about? is on that website. If you want to know more about hypnosis, you can go to San Antonio hypnosis.com. And that's my website for if you want it, you know want a session or you want a consultation, San Antoni hypnosis.com for everything else. DeeWoolridge.com, okay. And that's Dee spelled out d e e. Okay, great. We'll put like I said, we'll include all that. But just somebody driving down the road wants to pull over and look you up. We will make sure they get to the right website.

Dee 1:02:31

Yeah. All right. tastic.

Roy Barker 1:02:33

Yeah. Well, thanks so much. Again, appreciate it again. We you can find us at Of course, www dot feeding fatty.com. We're on all the major social media platforms, as well as all the major podcast platforms, iTunes, Stitcher, Google Spotify, we're not a one that you listened to please reach out. So that's gonna do it for me.

Terry 1:02:54

D Thanks so much. We appreciate it. You really shed a lot of light. You explained it in ways that we hadn't had it explained before. Appreciate it.

Dee 1:03:03

It was my pleasure to drive here.

Terry 1:03:06

Okay, that does it for me. Sorry. You were wrapping up.

www.deewoolridge.com

www.sanantoniohynosis.com

www.feedingfatty.com

We Have Found Meditation As A Great Start and End To Our Day with Roy and Terry

Meditation has been an interesting journey. We have started meditating most days for 10 minutes in the morning and 10 minutes at night. The morning session is great to think about what you have to be grateful for and start the day out grounded. The evening session is great for being grateful for the day and clearing the mind in order to sleep better. It's not always easy, but worth trying.

About Terry and Roy

After years of weight, health and fitness challenges, Roy Barker and Terry Mallozzi made a commitment to changing their eating habits and implementing realistic fitness goals for them. They chronicle their journey for health on the Feeding Fatty Podcast speaking to experts about related aspects of health challenges (type 2 diabetes, hyperthyroidism, hypothyroidism) losing weight (need to) and staying positive (easier said than done). Little did they know it's not just counting calories and cutting out sweets.

Listen to more great episodes of the Feeding Fatty podcast here

www.feedingfatty.com

Full Transcript Below

We Have Found Meditation As A Great Start and End To Our Day...

Sat, 5/15 7:29PM • 13:22

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

meditation, deep breaths, breathing, talk, breathe, breath, reiki, mind, work, feel, concentrate, started, journal, roy, professional, quiet, reframes, gratitude, mantra, internet

SPEAKERS

Terry, Roy Barker

Roy Barker 00:15

Hello, and welcome to another episode of feeding fatty. This is Roy, Terry. So we are the podcast of course we're chronicling our journey into wellness. And that includes many things, you know, trying to clean up our eating habits, better exercise, better mental space, just just a little bit of everything. And, you know, as we spoke last time, we are having some internet difficulties that we will apologize first, for that if the video is a little bit jumpy. We are working on getting that fixed. And, you know, we have actually had to push out some of our guest interviews until we get a little bit more stable internet. So hopefully we'll get some cable buried around here sooner rather than later and be back to it. But we're also trying to beef up these Thursday, shorter posts kind of about what's going on with us. And today, I think we will talk about meditation just a little bit. Yeah,

Terry 01:11

we have been incorporating meditation daily, you know, at least twice a day, in the morning, first thing in the morning, and then in the evening, and all the different aspects that go along with it, you know, keeping everything quiet, everything and every dog quiet. And playing music that helps helps us focus and gratitude and journaling and all the things that go along with it.

Roy Barker 01:42

Yeah, it's been a it's been a different I mean, I guess I've just always been on the run fast paced. And so it's kind of been different, it's a good thing, I think it's, you know, it has a very calming effect, we actually like the incense, we have the, the Asian meditator, it's, I think this is a Reiki track, but it's you know, it's got the, the Asian feel to it. It's just awesome. I mean, we try to do 10 minutes in the morning, 10 at night. And, you know, some days are better than than others, I'm not gonna lie to you, I wish, I wish I was better at it. But, you know, some days the mind is just running and scrambled. And, you know, you just have to kind of deal with it and do the best you can, I think the other thing, you know, I try to follow up with journaling, either a little bit before a little bit after just in case things, you know, come because, you know, every now and then you just kind of have a feeling or some words, maybe it's just, you know, reinforcement of words that you need to hear, you know, we talked about that a little bit last week, and the one about the Reiki, that, you know, the like in that when not strength wisdom patients came, but you know, I've in meditation, other words kind of seem to come up to the top that feels like I really need to focus on that for that day.

Terry 03:06

Yeah, and I didn't, you know, I've just kind of stayed away from it. It's kind of like the in the Reiki and the energy and all of that meditation all I've just kind of stayed away from it, because I didn't know how to do it, I want to do I want to be a professional as soon as I start doing something. So I, you know, I looked, I looked into meditating, and I did a couple of sets of self guided meditation, you know, Google Apps or sites? And no, it was everybody has a different what, what works for them different? Yeah. You know, just practicing gratitude saying, a Mont repeating a mantra. And then, you know, reflecting on the day and the week and I, once I started getting into the habit, you know, just trying to try and, you know, doing the mantra and then being quiet. Yeah, for the rest of the time. That that helps me, but I kind of feel like we need to do it more than 10 minutes. Yeah.

Roy Barker 04:15

I need to expand that out. Yeah. And, you know, I just, I guess it like I said, Well, first off, we're not we are not doctors, and we're not professionals that really anything. But, you know, we are just on a journey to you know, I don't know if he can say find ourselves or find our better self and, you know, trying to get our mind right about different things and, and we feel like that the, that healthier aspect of our, you know, our eating and exercise will kind of follow in that as well trying to, you know, round it all up. But anyway, you know, what I what I do is I just start with like three deep breaths and just you know, and I'm, I'm a Christian, so speak to God or talk to God and I That's something that everybody, you know, if ever, if you have a higher power, then that's a good time to talk to it. If not, it's not necessarily you can focus on your breathing, there's a lot of ways to do it. So, you know, don't feel like it has to be associated with religion. But it is a good time if you if you do have that conviction, but anyway, you can, you can go on the internet and find a lot of information. But I usually just start with three deep breaths and just, you know, ask for an open mind to be receptive, to give me strength, you know, for either for the day, or, you know, if there's things I know I need to work on, that are top of mind, you know, sometimes it's patience, empathy, those kinds of things, you know, I just really ask, and it's funny, because when we started this, I did, you know, the picture of the people sitting cross legged with their, you know, hands like that. didn't really start that, and I can't I don't sit cross legged, I couldn't do that anyway, but I have started doing my hands that way, because I feel like it's an opening, it's like in a receiving position, to receive the message to receive that energy that you get from it. So it's interesting, but, you know, again, everybody has to find their own way and do what really works for them. But, you know, I had tried meditation years ago. And, you know, back then the, I think I was using some kind of an app, but it was basically just talking about, you know, just concentrate on your breathing, try to clear your mind of everything that you can't totally do that stuff always creeps by, but you just have to reset and say, you know, take those really deep breaths and let it go all the way down, and then breathe out and just kind of focus on that.

Terry 06:49

And blowing it all out, too. That's a huge part of breathing out. Some people they use some people just don't think about it that that specifically as far as breathing goes, but you know, breathing in through your nose, and then blowing it all the way out through your mouth, all the way. I mean, everything, every last bit of it until you take another breath, that that's part of the cause. She's She's young that I can't say, when we talked to joy and Yachty when they were on about Eastern medicine, that, that I think is really important as far as

Roy Barker 07:30

meditating. And yeah, yeah, and that's something that you know, I've picked up from yoga before is that how important breathing is to a lot of things to you know, our temperament. And our physical health. I mean, when we, when you start feeling yourself getting agitated, if you'll just take that deep breath, sometimes you can kind of Ward it off. And, you know, make yourself have time to think, you know, we were, this is a little off topic, but we're talking about something somewhere the other day, it was like, you know, don't, don't react, but respond, which is it kind of resonated with me, because sometimes now, if you take that deep breath, you can put up a delineation line between that initial reaction versus response, where you can kind of gather yourself and think about it. So it's, uh, you know, it's something to think about. It's a good practice, you know, when you're in a stressful situation, I

Terry 08:25

think, I think that that makes the whole difference between responding and reacting. Yeah, I mean, for me, and and, you know, something else that I do that I didn't realize was sort of meditation? I don't know if it's, I don't know, breathing wise, is sigh I sigh Yeah, a lot. But it doesn't necessarily mean anything, it just means that, to me, it just means I'm kind of clearing out all the clutter from my head, so I can concentrate on the work at hand, you know?

Roy Barker 08:53

Yeah, not do that. Like, you know, if I'm in the middle of a difficult spreadsheet or something, you know, tough formula, or trying to figure it out. You know, I noticed that with me, I'll be like, you know, just let it out. And but part of my problem is holding that in to that, you know, I tend timber, yeah, I tend to hold my breath when I get not necessarily in a, you know, not stress, it doesn't have to just be stress. I mean, it could just be something where you're thinking and concentrating really hard. So, just remembering to take those breaths along the way I used to, I've said this before, but I used to have a sign over my desk that said, to breathe, and you know, people would kind of snicker and say, Well, you know, you have to tell yourself to breathe. And it's like, well, no, not not in certain situations. And I've been called out on this from you know, when I used to do some martial arts, my Sensei, he'd walked by and you know, he didn't pat me on the shoulder and say, it's okay to take a breath. And so that's when I first became kind of self realization about that and then the other time was a one of those painting parties, you know, where the ladies up at the front painting and you're kind of following her. And, you know, she walked by and said, It's alright, you can breathe while you do this because I was like, so intent on getting it and I was all you know, just holding my breath.

Terry 10:15

Did you turn into Michelangelo? After she told you to breathe? I want to send say,

Roy Barker 10:24

yeah, another cool air cool.

Terry 10:27

We are looking for a sensor.

Roy Barker 10:30

But yeah, anyway, I think it's a, it's been interesting, you know, and we've we've been doing it a couple weeks now. So we're still new at it. But I think we're growing, I feel like we're growing it's come become more second nature. And it's just something we start our day out with. And it's something we and that's what I was gonna say is the end of the day. I like the beginning of the day, because it starts out on the wrap step. But I like the end of the day too, because it's a chance to just clear your mind of all the stuff that has happened during the day and basically just prepare yourself for sleep. And sometimes, you know, for me anyway, if I just go straight from doing something to go try to lay down, everything is still swirling in my head still thinking about this and that. Whereas if I take that 10 minutes to do this meditation, it really puts me in a much more relaxed space to go lay down.

Terry 11:26

Well, another thing that we do, I think we've already mentioned this, but we journal also and we've been journaling afterward. You know, I've been I've read a couple of articles that say to journal beforehand, so you can meditate on it. And then I and then do it afterwards, too. I don't know.

Roy Barker 11:45

Yeah, I think a little bit time before that. We do the meditation and I journal some I don't necessarily look at it. But it kind of reframes me of some stuff that I really want to give a lot deeper thought to. Okay, anyway. All right. Well, unless you've got anything else that was it, just want to talk a little bit about meditation,

Terry 12:06

just that we try to do at the same time every day and in the evenings as well and just kind of trying to keep a schedule schedule about it, you know.

Roy Barker 12:16

Alright, well, thanks a lot for listening. Of course, you can find us at www.feedingfatty.com we're on all the major social media networks, go over to the Facebook group, we'd love to start some discussions over there. Also on Instagram, and this will go up the video of this will go up on YouTube once we release the episode so he can find a scene where you can always reach out like said we will be glad to answer any questions that we possibly can

Terry 12:45

return now Well, fine.

Roy Barker 12:46

Yeah. And we're not professional. So you know, sometimes we have to just refer people out and say, you know, you need to seek a medical doctor or dietitian or you know, get some advice from a professional for sure. But we can answer any simple questions for you. So anyway, until next time, that's gonna do it for Roy.

Terry 13:05

I'm Terry. Goodbye.

www.feedingfatty.com

The How to and Benefits of Plant-Based Nutrition with Olivier Mankondo

Olivier tells his story of going plant-based in his eating. He was able to lose almost 80 pounds while reversing his diabetes and high blood pressure. In addition to plant-based Olivier is also intermittent fasting. He eats his last meal at approximately 6p to 7p, then his next meal is 12p or noon the following day. He also goes into detail about eating raw versus cooked vegetables.

Sharing is caring Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and LinkedIn

About Olivier

Olivier Mankondo is a speaker, author and weight loss and wellness coach with a passion for shelf-help books. He empowers people with the knowledge of a plant-based nutrition so hat they can make good dietary and lifestyle choices. Throughout his talks, he has been able to inspire and change a lot of people.

Olver can speak four different languages, including French.

He is the author of the book "The Plant-Based Nutrition: How It's Going To Change Your Life"

www.oliviermankondo.com

www.feedingfatty.com

Full Transcript Below

The How To and Benefits of Plant Based Nutrition with Olivie...

Sat, 5/15 7:28PM • 32:54

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

eat, milk, protein, olivier, plant, processed food, drink, people, lose, fruit, vegetables, osteoporosis, meat, enzymes, based, digest, food, body, suffering, lots

SPEAKERS

Olivier, Terry, Roy Barker

Roy Barker 00:00

Of course, this is, uh, this podcast Chronicles our journey, my journey into wellness, losing some weight, also, you know, just wanting to eat better, not just not feeling bad, you know, eating too much being more active, just, you know, we're trying to put the whole package together. So we can, I can enter later life and a little bit better health and feeling better than what I do now. So what, you know, we bring things, different things that we're doing from time to time, but we also bring different guests with different perspectives. And we're very happy today to have Olivier Mankonda. He is a speaker, an author, weight loss coach, wellness coach with a passion for self help books. He empowers people with the knowledge of plant-based nutrition, so that they can make good dietary and lifestyle choices. Through his talks. He's been able to inspire and change a lot of people. And Olivier, welcome to the show. And he is the author of the plant-based nutrition, how's it going to change your life, and it's a very impressive book. So thanks for taking time out of your day to be with us, Olivier.

Olivier 01:07

Thanks very much for having me. Yeah. And

Roy Barker 01:10

so you know, we talked a couple of weeks ago, and you know, me and Terry, have been kicking around this, you know, more of that plant based trying not maybe not getting rid of meat totally, but trying to move away from eating so much. Because our, you know, especially where we live here in Texas barbecue and beef, it's really big. But, you know, it can weigh me down for two or three days after I eat it, it seems like and so we actually have given this plant based nutrition, with the intermittent fasting a little bit of a world this week. So we're excited to have you on and, you know, be able to ask you some questions that have come up for us. So kind of tell us before we get started, though, how did you find yourself here? What What made you explore plant based and kind of jump into that? with both feet?

Olivier 02:04

Yeah, it's such it's happened a little bit. I didn't plan to do it. Okay. It was just one day. It was a sudden, Wednesday, I was watching YouTube video. And there was a ninja Yogi, his name is Sadhguru. And he was talking about the meat. We're saying that meat was not designed for the human mechanism. And it was the message was so powerful that I decided that I will go ahead and try it. And it was like I said, it was a Wednesday and I spoke to my wife and I told her that I will stop eating meat. And on Thursday, I went to work. And when I came back and asked you to cook me my last meal of meat, and it's been five years of not starch meat anymore. Wow. So I've stopped all the dairy product or most of the processed food. And it's been like that. So it was not like I was expecting something. It's just because I watched that program and I made my decision.

Roy Barker 03:06

Okay, yeah. And you have for those that haven't seen the book yet, we number one wants you to go out, pick up a copy. It's a great book. But on the cover, you have a before and after photos of yourself, which is really incredible. If you don't mind sharing, I don't want to get too personal. But about how much weight did you lose between these two photos?

Olivier 03:28

Yeah, so on that photo, my original weight was 100 kilo, which is 220 pounds. Okay, and I lost something like 77 pounds. So now my weight is 143 pounds.

Roy Barker 03:47

Oh, Holy smokes. Yeah.

Olivier 03:49

So and I lose that in just nine months. Okay, okay.

Roy Barker 03:54

Yeah. So So let's take us through this just a little bit. Because the other twist I think, is, if I'm not wrong, that you have is that it's not just plant based, but it's also this intermittent fasting that you do on top of that. So can you kind of walk us through what your day looks like? I'm sorry, Terry. I didn't mean to interrupt. You

Terry 04:12

know, I was gonna say he said it was nine months and we we talked about it or it's like he had a baby. And birthday.

Olivier 04:21

Yeah. So what I do, basically, is that when I wake up in the morning, I don't eat nothing. So I only eats twice, twice a day. So in a week, I've got 14 meals and in the at 12 eat just fruit. And at 7pm I eat either a fruit or a salad, or I eat cooked food. So I've got a 14 meals out of those 14 meals. 11 are row so it's fruit salad, and only three cooked meals. And why do that? It's because When you eat raw, your body doesn't have to produce some type of enzymes, because all these raw food ivali got these enzymes, and your body doesn't have to produce that. And basically, it's really soft on your body. That's why I do that. And why do I eat, I do intermittent fasting, because our bodies spend 80% of its energy, trying to digest food. And when you keep grazing, during the day, your body will not have the chance to heal and cleanse. So it's really, really important to not grace not to eat all the time, because your body can only cleanse and heal when it's not digesting food. It's like for example, if you've got your car, you take it to the garage to EBIT fix, you can't drive it at the same time. And your body, that's how the body works. You can only cleanse and heal when it's not digesting food. And that's why I only eat twice a day. And in between, I have no sack snack or things like that just water. Or sometimes I can ever make juice. That's all I do.

Terry 06:17

Well, and that's what I was wondering the other day I was, you know, what the difference between the raw versus the cooked plant based food, you know, what, which one was better for you, and the explanation that you just provided? Just Can we just reiterate. So the raw helps with the digestion is just not as hard of a digest Gen process.

Olivier 06:43

Yeah, so basically what happens is, when you eat raw food, raw food, I've already got a lot of enzymes, okay, but when you eat them, your body will not have to produce those enzymes. And it's very easy for the body to digest raw food, okay, but when you cook those food, there's a lot of enzyme that your body will have to produce lots of enzymes, and a lot of nutrients as well are destroyed during the cooking stage. Right. That's why it's always better to eat raw food. But I don't want to completely stop with the roof. Sorry, the cook food. That's why I only eat fried cooked food during the week. Okay, all the rest is raw. Okay. Yeah,

Roy Barker 07:29

yeah, that's interesting, because I've heard that over time, especially with vegetables is that when we cook them, we actually cook a lot of the goodness out of them as well. So that's another good thing about eating the raw. So the other thing that we you know, in our preliminary talk we talked about was milk. And it's funny, because I did a little research and was just, you know, and there's a lot of research on both sides. I know that but the piece that I was reading was a scientist, actually, that was saying, We are one of the only mammals that drinks milk after our infancy, I guess, you know, after we get weaned off of food, that back in the olden days, that, you know, we people quit drinking milk, but one reason that they they went to it is because it's high caloric. And it was easy to get. And it's basically like if you were hurt or something you had, you know, goat's milk or whatever available to you. But they said that that was a definite shift in our body mechanics, you know, from, I guess, during this evolution process that really, if you drink milk at our age, it should make you sick.

Olivier 08:43

Yeah. So what's really happened is that, when you look as well, you will see that human beings is the only species in the entire creation to drink milk from another species, you will never ever see that you will never see for example, cats drinking dogs milk for goats drinking cow's milk, because every milk is specific to his own species. So for example, if you look at the rabbit milk, it contains 10 times more proteins than the human milk. And why is that? It's because when the baby rapid is born is so small, that they need to double it size within the first week, if they want to sustain life. If you look at the seals, milkweed content 40% fat, because the baby seal need to build up fat very quickly because it's very cold in the North Pole. Okay, you look at the human milk, it contain lots of lactalbumin because we need to produce amino acid. And you look at the cow's milk, it contains lots of casein. So you can see that every milk is specific to his own species. And when you drink cow's milk, because the Wonder cow is born is in weight, something like five stone or 30 kilos. And after three months, you need to triple that weight. That's why in the cosmos, you've got to loads and loads of calcium. And when we people will drink cow's milk, our body will analyze and see that now we've got too much calcium. And when we go to relate, we're going to lose that excess calcium to the expense of our own calcium. And in the cosmic as well, you got loads of phosphorus. And again, our body will have to neutralize that phosphorus. And to do so it's going to leech off the calcium from our bones and our muscles. And that's why you will see a lot of people suffer from osteoporosis, which is a condition which make your bone brittle, and you start suffering from the inflammation of the joints. And you will see that in the countries where the milk intake is very high, you will see a high incidence of osteoporosis as well. Interesting. And you will see as well that human beings are the only species as well will drink milk when they're adults, you will never see any grown animal drinking milk. And there's an enzyme which is called lactase, which enables people to digest the milk. And when we reach the age between two and four years old, that enzyme says to be produced, which is suggestive that we need to stop drinking milk. And that's why you will see that 70% of the world population is lactose intolerant. Wow, we'll see that. Yeah. And when you drink cow's milk, it's going to give you a lot of diseases such as anemia, ear infection, eczema, asthma, osteoporosis, cancer, obesity, appendicitis, you got lots of all of these diseases. And there's another thing as well is that when we drink cow's milk, boys and girls will go through puberty at a very early age. And when you go through puberty at a very early age, your body will start producing estrogen in excess, and an increase of estrogen is linked to cancer. And that's why you will see in the future, later on in life, these girls will start suffering from breast cancer, uterus cancer, ovarian cancer, and for boys, it's going to be prostate cancer, cancer, you can see that the dairy products are really not designed for the human mechanism.

Roy Barker 12:04

So what so what about in, I guess in the world and in our world, like, and we're you know, we're based in America, you're based in the UK? Is that correct?

Olivier 12:14

Yes. Yeah. So

Roy Barker 12:15

now, what about across the world? Do are Americans the ones that drink a lot of milk? Or is there a lot of animal milk consumed across the world?

Olivier 12:26

Yeah, we did, I would imagine that it's mostly in America, Canada, and in the your European countries where the milk intake is very high. Okay, for example, if you go in Africa, you don't really drink that much. And you can see that the incidence of osteoporosis is less in this Africa, in Asia and stuff like that. So it's mostly in European countries, and in America and Canada, where you got really that problem.

Roy Barker 12:56

So one of our challenges, I think, is, you know, of course, we, we are heavily, you know, protein focused is kind of where we're coming from. And so, you know, moving into plant based, I know that, you know, there's soy and beans and a lot of other stuff that you can gain protein, but kind of talk, talk through that process. Because, you know, as we did this, this week, we mixed in some beans with our salad. And, you know, we're trying to be conscious about getting, because it's not highly concentrated like beef, you know, trying to work it in wherever we could. So tell us a little bit about how do you work in enough protein in your diet? And then of course, some of those sources, where you get that from?

Olivier 13:40

Yeah, for example, the example that I like to give to people is that when you look, for example, at the elephant, is the biggest land animal on earth is not deficient in protein. But where does he get this protein from? Just from the green study, it's okay, you look at the gorila, we should 99% of the same DNA. But what do go really eat, they eat fruit, vegetables and tender roots, they do not eat meat. And you can see that the gorilla is very powerful. So if you want to get your protein, what you need to do, you just need to eat lots of legumes like beans, lentils, chickpeas, peas, all this stuff, spinach, and you will your requirement of protein will be met. You don't have to worry about all these things. You just have to eat all this stuff, all those legumes and stuff, and you will not have no problem at all. It's like me, I've been on eating this way for five years. And I'm not deficient in protein. It's just gotten in the environment that we live in. They've stressed a lot of butter, protein, everyone needs to need a lot of meat and stuff like that, but that's really not what we should be doing. We should Getting those protein from plants.

Roy Barker 15:03

Yeah, and I was looking at because I looked, I was doing a little research on this as well. The other thing that we lose, I think when we when we take protein is the is iron if I'm not correct, but if we eat the spinach and kale, we more than make up for any iron deficiencies that might, you know, we may see across that and it was an interesting article. And I'll just put this out there to see if you've read this guy or if you know about it, but he was talking about one thing about our teeth, that we're not carnivores because it well we weren't designed to be total carnivores because if you look at our teeth structure, we don't have the fangs for you know, ripping flesh and things like the big cats that eat meat do. And and then he also talked about our digestive system. I think that meat eaters have very short digestive systems, where ours is fairly lengthy. And then the opposite side, he was talking about that. We're not totally plant either, because our because of our teeth again, but our digestive systems weren't long enough. So it's, it's some interesting concepts to think about the way that our bodies are designed and the way that we eat today. Not that they are totally all, you know, in line with that, but the Do you even keep up with how many proteins that you may get in a day, do you? No, no, no. Okay.

Olivier 16:34

Do any calorie counts? I don't do any protein count. What I do is just I need a balanced diet. Yeah, I try to eat every not attracted. Every day. I need fruit. I eat fruit every single day. Because like I said, At noon, when I eat it's always fruit. Alright, so I eat a variety of fruits. And at night. We'll have for example, a salad with lettuce, cucumber, tomatoes, onions and stuff like that. Or I will cook maybe some potatoes with beans and spinach, or maybe some brown rice with mushrooms, lentils and Tempe, something like that. So I don't keep track of my protein intake because I know that what it will be okay with that. Okay.

Roy Barker 17:22

Do you eat? tofu? Yeah. Do you eat? Do you work tofu into your diet as well? at the tip? Yes.

Olivier 17:30

Yes, I do have a temper. Yes, definitely. Yeah. Oh, that's a sign that the tofu has got lots of protein as well. The tofu and the Tempe got lots of protein. Yeah.

Roy Barker 17:40

Can you explain what the Tim I don't know what TMP is just.

Olivier 17:44

It's just it's a little bit like tofu. It's made with soya beans. Okay. Yeah, it's basically the same process that they use. Okay. It's just a texture. It's different, or the taste is a little bit different. But it's done with soybeans. Okay.

Roy Barker 18:01

I guess I should ask Terry, do I know what that is? Have we had? I don't know, maybe.

Terry 18:07

There's so many different types. You know, I was gonna ask you so. So when you started your journey, your plant based journey? What was what were the reasonings? I mean, I know that you you wanted to lose some weight. Did you have some certain health issues that you wanted to address? And then see maybe if you could deal with those instead of taking medication deal with those with the plants? What was behind that?

Olivier 18:40

Yeah, like I said, I didn't know anything about the plant based nutrition. It's just when I watched that program, I and I decided that I will go ahead with that. But in the meantime, I had lots of health problem. I was suffering from high blood pressure. I had a massive headache every day or every other day. And the ad was so bad that that was me all the time. Dangerous chest pain, back pain, abscesses, john pain. So all this was really bad. And what happened is that when I changed my way of eating, after a week, I lost 11 pounds, just in one week. And this was very surprising for me. And four months in into the change, I went to my doctor to have my blood pressure tested. And he was surprised that I had I don't I didn't have any blood pressure problem anymore. And normally, my doctor told me that I will be on my medication for the rest of my life. But at that time when he told me that I said, No, I'm not going to take any medication. And he asked me, What are we going to do? And I said, I will try to do some sport, and I joined a karate club because I was tired. too, I thought that maybe it's going to solve the problem. But there was no changes. It's only when I stopped eating all the meat products and dairy products of this process food that my blood pressure went down. And basically all this was without any medication. And for the past five years, I've not been sick a single day, not even the flu. Nothing. So my my hair is.

20:29

Wow, okay.

Terry 20:31

That's, that is awesome. Yeah.

Olivier 20:33

When you look, for example, my brother as well, my brother has been able to follow that path as well. He's been able to lose. I think it's 73 pounds, that is being able to lose. And it was a he had a blood pressure as well, he was pre diabetic. And he had a psoriasis, which is a skin condition. And the doctor told him that he will have that for the rest of his life. And he had the psoriasis for eight years. But when I introduced him to this plant based nutrition, all these problems were gone, as well with no medication, no medication at all. And my wife as well, she has lost 99 pounds, just on this.

Roy Barker 21:17

Well, you know, talking about the inflammation, I've got a, I've got a little shoulder issue that I tore some ligaments or tendons in years ago. And when I eat wrong, or don't want to say wrong, when I don't eat correctly, I can feel it restricts my movement, and I can feel the inflammation. But after doing the plant base for a couple days, I was telling Terry that the my range of motion was almost back with this thing. It's been you know, the last two or three weeks, it's been killing me and it kind of restrictive in what I can do. But it was amazing how different I felt just after a couple days of you know, eating the plant based and staying. And we really, I think we still had a little protein in our diets. And we you know, we had a refrigerator full of meat that we were trying to you know, kind of work through as we start into this but it was amazing how I felt and then and I don't know which you know, which is which but the other thing was this fasting in the morning breakfast used to be my biggest meal the one I used to look get for look forward to getting up and having. But I haven't really missed it. One thing I've done is I drink coffee, and I put a little ghee in my coffee to thicken it up. So you know, it's a, it's a good fat, but it also it's heavy enough that I really haven't been hungry in the morning. So that's been an interesting transition. And of course, I think the other great thing for myself is just at seven o'clock being done because we were used to snacking late at night nine or 10 o'clock and then go into bed with the full stomach and you know, you know how that goes. But anyway, so let's talk about the other thing I want to talk about for a minute is the volume so because in in IE any people can tend to even abuse good and healthy things. So let's just talk about you know, what kind of volume should we expect to to eat?

Olivier 23:22

Yeah, so what you have to do is that like I said, when you on the plant based nutrition, you don't have to restrict your, the way you eat. So what I do is I eat as soon as I feel full stop after all you have to do and it's difficult to binge on foods, it's very difficult and because the fruit I've got loads of fibers and it's full of water you get full very quickly so it's difficult really to binge on fruit or plant based it's very difficult and so you will tend to feel old really quickly and as soon as you feel full you stop eating and that's all you have to do you don't have to look at small portions and not just it when you feel full you stop that's all you have to do.

Roy Barker 24:12

So what about mixing it up because I I don't like fruits or vegetables well i like i like fruits I you know I like to eat an apple but I mean an orange or maybe a banana but vegetables not so much so I guess is it important to to be experimental to bring new fruits and vegetables into our mix so that we don't get burned out from just the you know, feeling like we just eat a banana every meal or eat an apple every meal.

Olivier 24:42

Yeah, but you have to do is you have to mixed all the fruit. So you need to eat really a very approved. And yeah, that's what you have to do. And you have to incorporate that slowly because if you Stop eating lots of fruit at at one go because you're not used to it, you can have some detrimental consequences. Not in a bad way, but your body will try to detoxify quickly. And this really I had to work again, abscesses and stuff like that. Okay, yeah. But if you want to avoid that what to do is that you need to incorporate that slowly. And in the meantime, you decrease your intake of meat, dairy products, all this processed food, and at that time, you're not going to suffer from all these detoxifying symptoms.

Roy Barker 25:54

Okay. Okay, great. Well, is there any other, you know, we're just getting close to wrapping up, I just want Is there any other points about plant based that you want to get out there, or, you know, some of the other great side effects that you've had from it.

Olivier 26:14

That's all the side effect that I had. But in the process for this plant base as well. What I would like to add is that a lot of people, when they go on these plant based nutrition, they tend to replace that with unhealthy, vegan processed food, which is really bad as well. You can add that as a treat, but it doesn't have to be your meal that you will have to eat a lot of time because when you look at the processed food, the food that has been transformed and resemble to nothing in nature, they're essentially the manmade food. And when you look, you will see that 51% of what we eat as a rest is processed food 42%, the animal product and only 7% of fruits and vegetables. And in indoor 7%. Unfortunately, the majority, it's the potatoes to make french fries. So we eat very, very little of fresh produce, right? And when you look at those processed food, they are full of additive, calorie flavoring preservative, which are chemical substances not recognized by the body, and they create havoc. Okay. And when you look as well, you will see that in this process food, they've put us what is called aspartame, aspartame is very toxic, and it's a nerve poison, and you find Hospital in more than 10,000 products only in the supermarket. Wow. You'll find that in train gum, in drinks in solder. Ice cream, breakfast cereal in lunch product. That's why I always say to people that if they go on this plant based nutrition, yeah, they need to try it all code and avoid the processed food because the processed foods are not even vegan. Okay,

Terry 28:07

yeah, just because it says vegan don't automatically assume that it's going to be healthy for you. I was looking. We like cheese. So I was looking at you know, I've been seeing a bunch of information about vegan cheeses and all of that. I mean, is there a healthy? Well, I guess it would all be processed and

Roy Barker 28:26

processed. Yeah.

Olivier 28:28

Yes. So for example, the even the vegan cheese their process. So for example, if I have to look this month, I mean, predated the third last month. For example, if I have to count the time that I've had the vegan cheese, it's only one slice that I bought for the whole month. Because they are still processed food, right? Yeah. Yeah,

Roy Barker 28:53

I was thinking the other thing was about these vegan sausage patties. You know, anything, like you said, if they have to transform it into something that is not recognizable, probably a good sign that if you eat it, you need to eat it in limited quantities. And it's best just to go over to the vegetable while and pull the fresh fruit and vegetables run off the the stand there and just, you know, try to find a way to eat them without incorporating these because like, goodness, I don't know what Yeah, I don't know what it would take to turn a turn something into a vegetable sausage Patty, but probably probably not. Not good. Good. All right. Well, Olivier, we appreciate you. We're excited. We're excited to try this. I feel like that. You know what little we've done, has made us has made me feel better. I don't want speak for Terry, but we felt better. And it's just a matter of getting these things out of our diet and then figuring out you know, how we can incorporate the fresh fruits and vegetables. So we're looking forward to We're excited. And hopefully in a couple months, we'll reach out and have you back on and we can be your next success story.

Olivier 30:08

Yeah, yeah, we'll be afraid. Very happy to do that. Yeah.

Terry 30:12

Olivier, thank you so much. We really appreciate all of your insight and your story, sharing your story as explanation of all of the all of the plant based nutrition.

Roy Barker 30:27

So if you don't mind, tell everybody, of course, how can they pick up a copy of your book, the plant based nutrition? How's it going to change your life? And then also, you provide coaching? So if somebody wants to reach out to you for some coaching information, how can they get ahold of you?

30:44

Yeah, if they want to get a hold of me, they can go on my website is oliviermankonda.com, that's oliviermankonda.com. And we'll be able, first of all, they can see I've got an eight step, weight loss and wellness program, that they can go on my website, and they will see that. And with that weight loss program, it's not only a weight loss program, but it's packed with lots of powerful insight that they can, if they put that in practice, they will be able to have optimal F. So it's not a diet, but it's a lifestyle change that I can expect from that. And if they want, they can read my book, they can go on Amazon. So the book is on sale on Amazon, they can have the book over there. And they can reach me as well on the if they want. They can go on YouTube, I've got a YouTube channel, where I put a lot of videos where I speak about all this stuff, where they can get all this knowledge where I share all this knowledge and you're

Terry 31:48

available as a keynote speaker as well. Yeah, yeah, yes.

Olivier 31:52

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I'm doing I've been keynote speakers as well. It's just because we are locked down all the the place where I was supposed to speak, or it's been canceled. Yeah, but I speak as well. I'm a speaker so people can reach out as well. If they want me to speak in their event. Yeah.

32:11

Okay. That's great. Awesome. We all reach out. I know you can and we will put the spelling of your name and website up on our show notes as well when people can reach out and find you. So thanks again. Like I said, we're looking forward to it. Y'all reach out to Olivier and let him give you a hand if you're thinking about the plant-based nutrition. So that's going to do it for another episode of Feeding Fatty. Of course, I am Roy stary. And you can find us at www.feedingfatty.com we're on all the major social media platforms as well as a live video of this episode will go up on YouTube once the episode goes live. So until next time, y'all Take care of yourself.

www.oliviermankondo.com

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