SAMIA: Hello, Salaam, Shalom, Namaste, Sat Sri Akal, Aloha, Holah, Ciao, Bonjour, Buna, and Privet! It's really, really good to be connecting with you again and guess what? We have a returning guest... It's Emily Parsell, who is a Registered Dietitian. Welcome back,  Emily...

EMILY: Thank you. It's so good to be back Samia. I appreciate it... I'm excited to chat with you today.

SAMIA: Yes, me too. You know last time we talked a lot about the mindset aspect of, you know, when we're dieting... you are someone who helps women lose weight by ditching the restrictive diet and create a sustainable and healthy lifestyle... And I think last time we focused more on the mental aspects of how we make that happen. And so today, I’d love to sort of dig more into that healthy lifestyle aspect of it... like what are some sustainable habits that people can create to create that healthy lifestyle... So please, jump right in and tell us more…

EMILY: Yes, absolutely. So, you know, I think you touched on that exactly what I wanted to dive deeper in today... you know last time we had the pleasure of really diving into mindset which you know we could be doing everything right when it comes to weight loss with nutrition exercise... but if that mindset piece really isn't there it can make the whole process seem daunting... And really, that sustainable piece isn't there... And that's when we can get stuck in that diet cycle. And so combining the mental piece to your weight loss journey, that mindset piece, and pairing it with something that is, you know, not restrictive... that really is sustainable, is going to look like a habit-based program. And anytime we want to make change in life... whether it's you know a financial change or a career change or nutrition change in this sense... you know we do it in small increments… you know we don't just go out there and apply for the dream job out the gate... maybe you do if you're an extreme go getter. But out of college, you probably don't apply for that dream job… you take those baby steps to get there you know... financial goals you likely aren't just going to pay off your car in one day. If you are, that's fantastic... but you make those habits you know… you form those habits to get there a little bit easier... So the process isn’t so overwhelming… and when it comes to weight loss you know that's how you're going to feel confident and amazing and keep the weight off for good is really breaking it down. And that's my area of expertise is helping women to lose weight in a way that they feel confident and they are no longer restrictive... And that comes down to focusing on habits. And so really, you know starting small and growing from there… habits are gonna look different for everyone... And I'll share some habits that are easy that you could maybe implement in your own day-to-day life to get started and feeling healthier and being healthier... And you know, just feeling more amazing overall… but that journey is going to look a little bit different… our habits are unique… because some people, you know, you might already be getting all your water in for the day, for example. So you might not necessarily want to focus on something like that... But definitely starting small is really important... And I always tell my clients, and I really encourage those of you listening to this, like, make a list of things that you do really want to, you know, make some improvements on, or really, you know, make some healthier shifts towards to support your overall life... And if you're not sure where to get started, that's where having a coach can be really helpful. But from that list, pick one or two things you really want to focus on… you know, is it water, is it steps for example, and then start to go from there... 

SAMIA: That it's such an excellent point… actually you made a whole lot of really, really excellent points... It just reminds me of you know of the saying, “we are creatures of habit”... So, it's so critical that, you know, we understand that and incooperate that idea of creating habits anytime you're trying to create change and make change more fun and easy... And I loved your idea of starting out with that list of… what do I really need or want to create change around and then pick one... pick one thing and start with that... Can you give some more insight on how you guide your people to do that? Are there like specific habits, maybe one or two examples you mentioned briefly, but if you can maybe tell us more…

EMILY: Yeah, absolutely... So okay, I said like habits are going to look different for everyone… you know everything that I do is very customized to each and every single amazing woman that I work with... as it should be, you know… but some general habits that you know I think a lot of women would really benefit from is, you know, making sure that you're getting in enough water every day... Hydration is so important and making water your drink of choice is really, really important. It's a habit that you know is easy, it can be fun, you can do flavored water or sparkling water, you know... Adding you know… making kind of a game out of it, a challenge if you have kids at home you know… seeing who can you know drink their cup, you know, whatever, their water bottle, the first or the fastest… you know, it can be fun and easy to do... weight loss doesn't need to be overly complicated. And I think sometimes we really get focused on… we have to do all these things at once… and that just creates diet paralysis, it creates this like fear of, "oh my gosh, I can't do it all." It really, it really does come down to just picking those few things. Another thing you could really work on, you know, and I see and I really help a lot of women within my program do, is balancing out your plate... You know lasting weight loss is not… and feeling good about yourself too... I want to point out is not about restricting or cutting things out... I always say, what can we add in to really help you feel better overall… to meet your health goals, you know… And maybe it's sleeping better, maybe it's tackling overeating, whatever it is... I never talk about getting rid of things... It's always, what can we add in? So balancing your plate, you know… can we add in a vegetable, for example…you know a lot of people don't eat any vegetables… and just making that a habit to add in vegetable at one meal, even one time a week is a step in the right direction. You know...

SAMIA: Yeah...

EMILY: Lasting weight loss is about sustainable change... And can you see yourself adding in a vegetable every day… or excuse me, every once a week at one meal... Probably that seems pretty easy, right? And the more that you do that, and consistent... it's going to be easier to make it two meals and then three meals, you know… now working with a coach, you're gonna have support and guidance and accountability and, you know, some push to get going a little bit quicker and reach those health goals quicker. But starting out on your own, absolutely... just make it as simple and straightforward as you can.

SAMIA:  Oh my gosh, okay so you mentioned two really, really important concepts... From my perspective the idea of rather than focusing on what not to do or what to take away... you focus on what can we add that will help... Oh my gosh, you know that is such a positive psychology way of thinking about things... 

EMILY: Oh yeah...

SAMIA: It’s like the essence of positive psychology to focus on what's right with people and using that as a way to sort of build yourself up …and help you focusing on your strengths to help you resolve your challenges or problems... Oh, I love that... That is so wonderful...

EMILY: Oh, yeah, yeah, there's so much to be said… you know it's... you're right. There is a lot of… there's a lot of psychology behind that too when it comes to weight loss... We constantly… you know think about like for example, a toddler… if you tell them they can't do something, you're constantly saying, "Nope, don't touch that, don't touch that", they're gonna want to eventually… maybe it's the stove... I hope it's not the stove... That's a really bad example. But whatever it might be, they're gonna want to do that after a while... The same thing goes with weight loss. If we're constantly being told, "Don't eat carbs, don't eat carbs, don't eat carbs",  you're constantly going to be thinking about carbs... And then that's all you're gonna want to do is eat carbs. And then you eat the carbs. And you think, "Oh gosh, I just failed my diet. I wasn't supposed to do that." There's so much psychology to that… versus, "I'm allowed to have this, I'm actually gonna… what can I add in?" You know that… it's… there's a lot of psychology to that... And when we add in the right foods that's going to help us feel better in so many areas, not just weight loss… but we're also going to feel better mentally you know and physically as well...

SAMIA: Yeah. And it's not like you won't get rid of, eventually, in the long term, the bad food.. but it's just that it's going to happen so naturally, in the sense that when you start eating let's say a little bit more of the veggies… over time and you're increasing the number and the frequency of, you know, how much and when you eat veggies... well, it's like you are eating more veggies, you only have so much space in your tummy, so you’re going to eat less of something else. So what is that something else going to be... Whatever it is, you know, the point is that you're getting some more healthy stuff into your body… and overtime… you're not just going to stop with the veggies... you're gonna keep adding more awesome, awesome stuff… and eventually, in a very happy, easy way, it'll just have naturally pushed out the not-so-good stuff for you...

EMILY: Yeah, that is a good way of looking at it... And you know something I love that you... you know, we're just naturally adding more things. And there's so much truth to that... And I know last time we really talked about, like fueling foods and fun foods and the mindset around that... And that's where I like to say, let's add in fueling foods. But the whole point is not to get rid of those fun foods completely… it's really about finding that balance where we do have all of these really great things added into our overall eating plan that makes us feel good supports weight loss, you know helps us feel better and our clothes and just more confident in general... But then also, we no longer feel guilty for making space in that plan also for those fun foods. So it's about really finding that balance... So you don't ever… you don't feel restricted, you know, in really finding that sweet spot.

SAMIA: Yeah. And I mean, like for me, you know nothing can just back to my own experience of... like for sure, I want to have fun foods in my plan and my habits of how I live and eat. And at the same time, there's like for me... I sort of drew a distinction between fun foods that, you know, I really love to eat and that I really enjoy whenever I have them... and foods that I was eating in a mindless way. And they weren't even really good for me, and didn't necessarily even make me feel better... But I didn't realize that they weren't even really making me feel better because I was eating mindlessly, you know… I was just stuffing myself and not really paying attention to the impact of how that was making me feel, you know… and it's like, it's not good for me, it wasn't actually making me feel good, but I was still eating it, because I had gotten into the habit… into that habit of eating that food in that mindless way, you know... So I imagined that what gets cut out... is that, you know, those kinds of… not the good fun foods, but you know these other kinds of things that are not not even really truly fun for us when we start to pay attention to our feelings and how the foods are making us feel...

EMILY: Yeah, absolutely... I love that you shared that mindfulness piece, you know, that is... that's one of the last steps with working with me is really tapping into that mindful piece… becoming a mindful eater and really appreciating and understanding food and how it makes us feel…. And kind of reconnecting to that, you know… we look at like little kids when they eat and they're so mindful you know, they really savor foods, they take their time with eating, and somewhere along the way when we start to grow up a little bit we lose that connection. And it's really beautiful... And I just remember one time a client saying to me, when we first started working together, she's like, "I'm a chocoholic. You know, I just can't get enough chocolate”… yada, yada, yada. And then I had her do a mindfulness exercise around chocolate... And she sat down and ate the piece of chocolate really slowly... You know I had her think about how the chocolate smelled and the experience of unwrapping it... unwrapping it and what it tasted like all these things... And then she came back to me and she's like, "I don't like chocolate." And I just thought that was so funny because when she first came to me she was like, "I'm a chocoholic. I'm addicted." And then she was like, "I did the exercise and I realized no, I'm not addicted to it. I was addicted to the idea of it”. And it was really, she was just stress eating. And so the deeper root was the stress eating and we needed to work on managing that… and she was like, "I don't like chocolate." And we just like laughed about it, which is fine… but you know it just goes to show me sometimes we just don't even recognize that hand-to-mouth connection.

SAMIA: Exactly, that, that... thank you for sharing that example… because I had such a similar experience. Like, for example, there is this cookie… like this... and it's like a stuffed cookie... And I thought, I loved that cookie. But actually when I started to mindfully eat it, I realized... now the thing was that this cookie was like… it's a big cookie... And when I started to mindfully eat it, I realized actually, I would take like maybe eat a quarter of it... And I was like fun. But after that, it stopped being fun… it got too much and the very taste and the sensations of how that cookie was tasting in my mouth and making me feel, after I got past that 25% or so of that big cookie, like, it was no good... And so like, oh my gosh... So now I'm like even if I ever do have that cookie I'm like, you know, I'm just gonna eat to the point where it really feels good to me... and then stop. And I had to same experience with  mindfully eating ice cream... I used to take like, scoops and scoops… like I... like if I went to an ice cream shop I'd be like, yes, throw in double scoops, triple scoops… But after...

EMILY: Oh yeah...

SAMIA: Honestly, you can't even taste the difference between what you're eating because your mouth, like your tongue is like so cold and the...

EMILY: that's so true. Yes, yes, yes… slowing down and savoring food does wonders for our taste buds... It really brings that connection and satisfaction to eating.... It's a really important... it's a habit that can be worked on. A lot of times, it's something that if you are trying to lose weight, you know, addressing other things first, like are we eating consistently? You know what does that look like? What does our stress levels look like? And that's why the mindful piece is, you know, one of the last steps have working with me really to kind of complete the circle to have that sustainability in weight loss... So you don't ever have to go through a journey again. But it really is… it's so mind-opening and it's just it's very empowering to recognize some of those things...

SAMIA: Yeah. Oh my gosh, oh my gosh... Okay, so I'm starting to like… you've shared so many, so many... what I might call like signposts in terms of like things that we can use as indicators of, okay, it's important to have these elements to our plan for how we're going to create sustainable and healthy changes in our lifestyle and our diet... Wow… and I think that's like so helpful… So... could you just so it's like all together sort of like in a nice summary for people who listened to the first episode, now they're listening to the second episode and all of these signposts have been sort of like distributed across all this time... Could you like maybe give sort of like an overall big picture, quick review of what that arc looks like that you take people through? And you know, the sort of the signposts or indicators for them to be watching out for… and so like if they're trying to make change on their own, or if they're considering different plans, or different, you know, like which plan to go with... like what are some criteria they can use to sort of filter things by, you know...

EMILY: Yeah, absolutely... Yeah. So if someone's looking for a, you know, what's the right plan for me... because not every plan is right for every person, that's okay. That's why there's such a variety out there... We're all different and unique. So one thing that I would definitely say is really important when you're looking for a weight loss plan is that… it's number one customized to you... That is like the biggest thing… if someone says, point blank you need to you know go gluten free, you know, because that's what this plan is, but you don't have celiac disease or a health condition that's probably not the right thing that's very broad... Same thing with like if someone just says okay, you have to use 1200 calories... That's not very specific to you know a woman who is you know of 20 to 50 years old really... that range is much, much, much too low you know… that needs to be very individualized. So having someone who is really willing to work with you in a plan that is fit for you and your health goals and health needs… and you know that comes down even to like how you want to measure progress? Do you want to just measure progress by the scale? Or do you want to measure progress by how you feel… relationship around food, you know… health goals… maybe you're lowering your blood sugar… getting off of a medication… like all those things need to be individualized... So that's one of the biggest things. A red flag that I would say when looking for a plan is something that… where they tell you to cut things out …you know if a plan is telling you to be restrictive in any nature or they're telling you that you only have to do it for so many days, you know… a 30 day fix or whatever… a 14-21 day fix… something like that... Those fixes are really quick fix... And you know whether someone becomes a client of mine or not I think it's really important that everyone is aware of safe and healthy nutrition information... And it's really unsafe to do programs like that where they're very extremely tell you to you go all in or cut things out, especially for a specific number of days... It really, for women it can do a lot to our hormones and make us feel more crazy around food and less of a connection between our bodies too… it can make us feel you know, a little bit… we'd have more negative energy, and a more negative mindset around our body image. So that's definitely a big red flag... if it's… if there's a set end date… That's the beauty of a lifestyle change… there's no end date... it's just, you keep going and you feel great about going… and making sure that you know you're not being told to cut things out unless you're allergic to the food, it's spoiled, or you just don't like it... So that's really big. But as far as, you know, the process that I really take the women that I work with through, you know it does look different for everyone. But really making sure that you know the women I'm working with they feel supported every step of the way is huge... And with that comes, you know, a lot of different check-in points as well... But looking at what they're eating, you know… I always want to make sure that my ladies are really eating three meals a day at least and sprinkling in snacks where possible, not skipping meals… you know really balancing their plate making sure that they're adding in all their favorite foods. And so really working on the mindset piece you know... How we view our body, our relationship with our body... How we view food, you know really removing a lot of the food labels of good and bad and just allowing yourself to enjoy the journey. So like I said, that process looks different for everyone... But at the very minimum those are a lot of the main points that I really walk my women through. And all of that is done by focusing on habits you know every single week.

SAMIA: I love that. Thank you for sharing that... And thank you also for pointing out the red flags because I agree with you… that it is just as important to be aware of like the red flags as to be aware of the signposts to watch out for... Thank you, thank you so much Emily… we, we’re going to be wrapping up pretty soon... But do you have any anything else that you would like to share with us for today?

EMILY: No, I just really appreciate you being here and... or excuse me, allowing me to be here. I appreciate you having this podcast and allowing me to be here in your space... I so appreciate that. But should someone you know… one thing to remember too when you're you're making a  habit, when you're starting to make change... No matter what stage you're in of making changes, give yourself grace... shower yourself with grace and love and self compassion… you know that is one of the biggest things that we can do. Life's too hard you know as it is and we just need to give ourselves so much love and compassion now more than ever really. So just make sure that you're doing that every single step of the way...

SAMIA: I love that. And for sure when we shower ourselves with more love and compassion... it makes change more fun and easy. So thank you so much Emily for coming back and sharing more of your amazing wisdom with us... I love your approach of, you know, being so focused on this… taking this compassionate approach and being more focused on creating that healthy sustainable lifestyle as opposed to just, you know, being very narrowly focused on dieting or weight loss in that narrow sense... So thank you again. And for everyone, if you're listening or watching this interview... please make sure you check the show notes because we will be adding Emily's links in there so you can reach out to her for help and support… or even, you know, just check out her social media... By the way Emily, I must tell you, I have been loving your posts... They're so helpful… so informative...

EMILY: Oh thank you...

SAMIA: ..so yeah for all of our listeners, please check out those things, connect with Emily, even just if you want to get more information by checking out her posts like I've been enjoying... Please do it. And until we connect next time, I just wish you lots and lots of peace and joy :)