Episode 200. Non-Diet Nutrition Coaching: Carrie Head's Business Birth Story
In this episode, you’ll meet Carrie Head, recent Podcasting with Heart graduate, non-diet nutrition coach, wife, and mom of two. Carrie shares her entrepreneurial journey and transition from a stay-at-home mom facing health challenges to a successful non-diet nutrition coach. Carrie shares her pivotal realization about the true meaning of health, emphasizing the transformative power of food as medicine and challenging the weight-centric approach in healthcare. Join us for an insightful conversation on navigating health and entrepreneurship with Carrie Head!
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Transcript:
So we have a guest again this week, and I am excited to introduce you to my friend and a recent graduate of podcasting with heart and somebody who has recently [00:01:00] launched her podcast. So yay, this is Carrie Head. I am actually going to give you the floor and let you tell us your business birth story to begin.
How did you get to this point where you went from whatever you did before to what you do now and what is the now? Okay. Well, I'm Carrie and I live in Colorado. I'm married. I have two kids and I Did a lot of things before I was always trying to find like what I was meant to do, what would make me happy.
And I always knew that what would eventually , really make me happy was not working for somebody else. , I just struggled. I would get into a job. I would love it. And then eventually they would tell me to do something that I'm like, I don't agree with that. And , that was the end of it.
, I was checked out. I had quietly quit. At that point, and I was done, but I have always been. Interested in doing things that helped other people. And so I [00:02:00] always knew I was going to do my own thing. But what that looked like was me making a decision that I was going to be an entrepreneur and then trying to find the things that I was going to do.
And so when I had my oldest child. I stopped working and I became a stay at home mom and I thought, Oh, great. Now I have all the time to do all this business stuff. Spoiler alert, the newborn takes up a lot of time and energy and my health sort of tanked after having her. And so I couldn't do any of that, but I dabbled in various different things, but it was the fact that my health tanked and I.
Went on that journey to figure out how to build myself back and I refuse to believe that this was just my new normal. Like, everybody would say, oh, you're a mom now. You're just going to be tired. That's just the new normal and I thought I was looking at the rest of my life going. No, I can't accept that.
Like, it doesn't, I don't think it should [00:03:00] be. I don't think it should be normal. I was building back my own health and it is that when I realized what was possible that made me switch into, oh, I can help people do this. And that's when it became. Not just what I was doing for myself, but it became like, this is why I'm here and my journey with health was for the longest time just based around weight, losing weight, maintaining weight, and I have never been thin a day in my life.
And so that was the constant. Every day was, if you would lose weight, you'd be healthier. If you lose weight, you'd be healthier. And as a child, I thought I was pretty healthy. Turns out getting strep throat multiple times a year is not normal and not healthy, but I could keep up energetically with the things I was doing.
I could be social. I could go out and do things. I didn't get a lot of illnesses very often, except for the [00:04:00] tonsils and strep throat situation. And so I was like, Oh yeah, I'm healthy. Once I started cycling, I was. skipping periods months at a time. And as a teenager who didn't want a period, I was just like, Oh, that's fine.
I don't have to deal with all of that. I'm good with that. Not knowing that, Oh, that's a sign that things are starting to cause be go wrong for you. And so in my early twenties, I got diagnosed with hypothyroidism and PCOS. And I was told, Just don't eat white bread, white pasta, or potatoes. We will see you when you want to conceive, because you'll need help.
I was 20. I had never tried to conceive. They didn't know I was infertile. Like, how could they give me that label at that point? Yes, they could diagnose me. Yes, PCOS causes. can cause challenges with conceiving, but it's not a guarantee. [00:05:00] And I was just like, Oh, okay. So, and I would go back and they would weigh me and it was all about my weight.
It was still not about these other things. They're like, take this medication and have a good life. And I took it for a couple of years and was like, I'm done. I don't want to just take pills for the rest of my life. Like, I think there's something else I can do. And so. I sort of exchanged that for a cabinet full of supplements that just went there to die.
And that wasn't the answer either, but I was like, Oh, I hear this is good. And I hear that is good. And it wasn't until my thirties when I had, I had my. oldest child when I was almost 32 and I fell apart, absolutely fell apart. And I had, it had been a long road to like have her. And by the way, conceived naturally, [00:06:00] never needed fertility treatments or anything.
Um, but I just fell apart and I just thought I, it took so long to get her and I faced. Pregnancy loss before her and now I'm not gonna be able to raise her. I don't have the energy and I Decided at that point I was gonna flip things around and I was gonna figure something out And so I really invested in learning about food and learning how the different foods Made me feel and then I would notice that My back pain was gone and I had energy despite not having caffeine and I had, um, joints were not hurting anymore.
My digestion was significantly better. My digestion got so bad that I was afraid to leave the house because I was afraid of not making it to a bathroom and so. I saw like people talk about food as medicine all the time and I really for the first time in my [00:07:00] life it became real. It was not about changing what I ate so I could lose weight.
It was not about getting the, these amount of calories or these amount of macros. It was just about let me try to eat food that is as close to its benefits. Natural form as possible as least processed as possible and see what it does for me and it did wonders for me. And so it was a couple of years later that I had the energy and had the clarity of mind and felt like I could run a business.
That I was like, let me help others because I was in I was a new mom still. So I was in these birth groups, new mom groups, and everybody was tired. Everybody was exhausted and their doctor was like. This is normal. This is your life. Do you want anxiety medication? That was [00:08:00] everything that they were experiencing.
And I'm like, no, there's, you can build back. Like you can have more energy and feel better. And so that's when I decided that was what I was going to help other people with. I enrolled in a couple programs to. Get more information in a more structured way to learn faster and learn how to coach others to do the same and then got started.
And I've been, I just completed a whole year in business where I had my 1st. Paying coaching client a year ago, and I knew that what was possible for me. I saw it happen for me, and then I've seen it happen to my clients, and I'm like, food is amazing. So, I am, I call myself a non diet nutrition coach, because it's very important to me to help people understand that you can improve your health without needing to [00:09:00] focus on the size of your body.
Like there's the model of weight inclusive care or weight centric care. And a lot of the stuff is weight centric when you go to the doctor. In fact, there's some hospitals that if a BMI is over a certain number, it is protocol for them to address that 1st before talking to you about what you came in for.
I'm so grateful for people like you and for your mission, because I remember being really young, not knowing any different and hearing the doctors, the way they spoke to my grandmother and exactly what you're describing.
It was. The only thing that was discussed and it would often say, like, they were always so curious about why she was so healthy because she was in a large body. And they're like, how is it that your blood pressure is great. This is great. That's great. Your cholesterol. Everything is checking [00:11:00] out fine, but you are in this large body and absolutely not.
And it was. Just really a mind screw because they were telling her, you know, go to weight watchers. So back then, you know, the nineties weight watchers was the thing and it was like points, right? So now knowing now what I didn't know, then one point of artificial jello, let's say, you know, you could have all this freaking jello with red food dye and aspartame and sugar free jello.
Right. And you can have all the jello you want because there's no points or there's like one point I forget. I think it was like 60 calories per point. They probably have modified it a little bit over the years, but the premise back then I was like, Oh, and I remember her wanting to go to this one place for Froyo.
Back then Froyo wasn't what it is now. I mean, now in Florida, anyway, Froyo is like the thing. My kids go berserk over good Froyo. I mean, it's good, but back then there was only one shop that we knew of anywhere near us. And it was like a British owned little, um, shop shout out Northdale court.
And they had [00:12:00] this. Almost point free fro, you know, , I remember my grandmother would buy it in bulk because it was the only sweets she could have, but what was in that shit, , what was she consuming and how healthy really is that? , and she was not able to conceive actually.
So I'm calling her my grandmother. Because we adopted her as my grandmother, , but she didn't actually have blood children of her own. , she also didn't have a cycle.
Um, there were a lot of telltale signs that she actually wasn't healthy, even though her blood pressure checked. The box, , she wasn't diabetic, like she had no other stuff going on until she got cancer. Right. Um, but I remember that. And I remember a lot of shaming and I remember just feeling so every time we'd go to her doctors or when she had a health, when she had an episode, I was in college.
And I remember going to the hospitals with her and it felt, it was like, Like you had to put your protective shield of armor on before you go in and start talking to all of these ER doctors and surgeons and because that's always what they go back to is drop bait and it's like, okay, cause we're [00:13:00] eating as little as possible.
That's the goal to eat as little as possible and to eat stuff that has no points, but , what's in it and calories or energy. Hello. Yes. Yeah, energy. And it's been common, you know, for since the forties or so to eat low fat. Fat builds hormones like so many of us who have had issues with our hormones, like how many of us were eating low fat because we were told that that was the better way to be.
And yeah, there's beneficial fats and non beneficial fats, but we need fat and fat is calorically dense. So you're going to have more calories. It just creates this cascade that is a problem when we focus on weight and it's not only a problem for those of us who are in bigger bodies, , it's a problem for people in thinner bodies too, because you're thin, so you're healthy.
So you must be making up whatever you're coming to see me about. Well, there is that assumption that just because you're thin means you're healthy and that's not because a lot of people who are starving themselves and are very. Um, I guess malnourished, you [00:14:00] know, their body's not getting the proper nourishment, even though the scale is like the number they want it to be.
And now I don't know, maybe you have seen, there's like this whole craze about this. What's the drug that people are using? It's supposed to be a diabetes drug. Ozempic. Ozempic. What's it called? Ozempic. Ozempic. I don't know a lot. I know there's another one, but Ozempic is the one I hear about the most. And it's becoming the people are like, oh, bringing back this 90s trend of getting as skinny as possible.
And I'm like, absolutely not. I, for 1 will not be participating in that. And I think the kids are even getting wind of certain things because I've heard conversations about, um, foods, making you fat. And I'm like, listen, if you don't have any fat. You're going to die of hypothermia, maybe not in Florida, but like other places, right?
Like you, we have to have this, or we will die. We need, we need it. You know, this is why whales have blubber. . Is why polar bears have so much fat. I'm like, fat is not bad. You have to have fat and I need to eat fat.
Your body needs nourishment because there's so much. Of that brainwashing. And I listened to the first few episodes of your podcast and I was like, yeah, yes. Nailed [00:15:00] it. Nailed it.
Even if you're super, super thin doesn't mean you're healthy and not having a period while as a teenager, you think, Oh, this is convenient. I don't have to worry about it. Um, It's a sign of health, right? Yeah. And as you address things for your health, your body may naturally get smaller. That may be a side effect because inflammation can drive weight gain.
And so that happens like sometimes weight gain is from an underlying health reason, but it's correlated like the weight gain is a symptom just like. Blood sugar, just like poor digestion. It's not causative and , the research does not point to weight causing these things. , some of my clients come to me and , they list weight as one of the things they wanna work on.
And we just have the conversation and I say, let's take this piece, let's take this weight, let's set it aside. Well just set it aside. What are the other things? How do you want to function every day? What is [00:16:00] impeding your function? Like what is causing things to be difficult? Because yeah, the weight piece can affect your mental health mostly because of other people's opinion about the weight, but it's not There's so much other we can focus on to improve your health.
And if weight goes down from that, then it does. And that is just information. We see an effect from something that we've done. And it's not good, it's not bad, it's just completely neutral. But what is going to improve your life? What's going to allow you to play with your kids? What's going to allow you to create a business and have the mental capacity to do so?
What is going to cause you to Return to having great sex with your spouse. Like, what is going to improve your life? On a daily basis, what are you actually struggling with at a cellular level and it's harder to focus on that because it takes time. Whereas weight loss can be such a thing. That is such a quick win.
Or if we medicate [00:17:00] something, it can make the pain go away. But if we want to start to change things on a cellular level and improve your health for the long term, it takes longer. It takes more intention and it takes, it's not as easy. And I understand that in our society, we're busy. We have to work to survive.
And so it's much easier , to find the quick wins. So that's one thing I do too, is try to slow things down and say like, this is a long term thing. This isn't a diet where there's a start and a stop. This is just how you're going to start to live for the rest of your life. To support your longevity to despite chronic illnesses, because I still have a thyroid problem and I still have that doesn't go away, but how it affects me changes
I can put it into sort of a remission or sort of a non symptomatic. Or I can have the symptoms come back and I've seen that happen and it's okay. I know what to do to kind of get it back under control, but. Let's look at [00:18:00] how we can improve your life because I feel like our health, I've gotten on this kick lately where I feel like my health is A resistance to the world because I'm like, there's not anybody else that cares.
I mean, my family does, of course, but like nobody else in this world is invested in my life and the longevity of my life. So what can I do to be invested in it? Because I do want a full, long life for as long as I can be here and I deserve it. And it's a middle finger to all of the systems that. Like want me to believe that I'm not capable of changing anything unless I change the number on the scale.
So many of your examples remind me of business, the way that I think about business and slowing down and , let's say weight and dollars, right? , not thinking about weight as the primary motivating factor, but also not thinking about dollars anymore as a primary motivating factor.
But when you are doing the thing that you love, I mean, you're allowing yourself to be so expressed in your business. , money just. It [00:19:00] happens. It's going to happen naturally when you are doing what you enjoy. We're rewriting so much of the conditioning and the hard wiring that we experienced up until we became, you know, this certain point in our lives, probably around the time you started having babies and you wake up with this new, this new consciousness really.
And you're like, oh, wait a minute. And then you have to deprogram all the BS. So it reminds me a lot of that and slowing down. I was thinking about this the other day so much of what we do and what we experience right now with social media. We've talked about this, how.
Creating reels, , when we were doing the podcasting course, we're talking about, , how you're letting people know about new podcast episodes. And I create these little, , snippets that are 60 seconds, 90 seconds, depending on where you put them. So I edit some clips down. So it fits. And there's so much of the social media community that's like, you have a couple seconds to capture attention.
And I'm trying to slow us down a little bit there. I want to pack helpful information into that 60, 90 seconds, but I also want us to [00:20:00] be. Guiding people, whether it's in their health or in how they promote their business and connect with their audience, guiding people to like, okay, let's, let's slow it down a little bit.
We've all been told this lie that we're supposed to be as productive as possible and fit as much into our minute to minute day to day as possible. And that was, , a big thing for me and a lot of my community, but I think there's just so much beauty and. Expansion in slowing down.
So many of the best things in life are not as fun when they're super fast. If we slow down, like what's better when it's slower. I like to eat a little bit slower and savor my meals. If I cook it a little bit slower, it cooks more evenly. I'm teaching my son how to use the air fryer to make wings right now.
And I was like, okay, so you don't want to turn it on the highest temperature. It's going to burn the outside and the inside will be raw. So we're actually going to, he's like, but it'll cook faster. I'm like, not the point. Okay. We want it to cook nice and evenly. So you enjoy it when you eat it,
, your mornings are better when they're slower. Sex is better when it's [00:21:00] like, think about all the things in life that go a little bit nicer when they're not rushed. Having a baby, you know, giving birth slowly down. We're trying to slow down all of the OBGYNs. Like, Hey guys, there's actually not a rush in the absence of, , a real complication.
Right. But most of the time, why are we rushing? Like everything is rushing. And it's one of the things I hate about, I don't know, this is a bit of a side tangent, but. YouTube, you know, when the kids want to watch YouTube, I, I will let my daughters watch it when I'm doing their hair, but I almost always make them turn the volume all the way down.
Because if you've noticed on some of these kids stuff on YouTube, they speak as fast as they can high pitched. Cause they're trying to keep the attention. I'm like, what is that doing to her little mind? To me, it's like. My body's rejecting that sound, and it's just so stimulating.
And I'm like, we're going to watch with the volume off and it's a little bit changes the experience. And usually they're watching like crafty things that are really satisfying to watch, like people painting things and whatever. , but I, I [00:22:00] do see that that's an issue because I think that kids are, it's a bit of a.
It's a bit of a dopamine hit too. Right? Like that, like instant excitement. And it's like, okay, slow it down, slow it down. And so whether it's, you know, taking a longer term approach to your health, your wellness, or a longer term approach to your business,, I no longer put. The same value to 10 K and 10 days that I used to think was the way to build a successful business.
Now I feel like slow down, you know, are you going to be in this for the long run? Are you taking care of yourself for the long run? Like January 1st resolutions? I'm sure you've seen it like January one. This is what I'm doing. And it, a couple of days ago was supposed to be, what was it? The biggest failure day of the year?
Quitting day is quitting day. National Quitters Day or whatever, like the majority of people have quit their resolution by that day. And I did a story on my IG about [00:23:00] it because I was like, how many of those resolutions that they quit were weight related. And it's just weight loss is not sustainable and it's more detrimental to your health to cycle your weight than to be overweight.
And I just did an episode about that. So I did a lot of research on it, but the weight cycling causes more health concerns than just me being in a bigger body over the course, long term. Oh, you just had an episode come out on it? Yeah, my most recent one was on weight centric versus weight inclusive. Okay.
I did hear that one. Yes. Okay. Am I caught up? I'll just make sure I'm caught up. I don't listen to very many podcasts, but I do enjoy listening to your partly because you're my friend. You also took my course. Before we talk about the show, , when you start working with somebody. So I guess for anybody who's like, you know what, I actually do want to take a different approach. What is your, , cosmology when it comes to health and wellness?
, , where's the starting point? So I have everybody [00:24:00] do some paperwork and it's not labs, it's questions. And the answers to those questions can point me to what's going wrong at a root level. Like what's going on underneath that we can't see. And your symptoms can tell me, , where do we need to focus to start strengthening that area and then we start from there.
, over the course of 3 months or 6 months, we meet and we talk about what are your long term goals and then what are the short term goals that we can change the behavior on? So sometimes that's as simple as if you could add a protein to every meal Instead of having it be carb heavy.
I do not demonize carbs, but put some clothes on your carbs Don't eat them naked have protein and fat with them as well because that helps sustain your sugar over time and you're not doing the crashing. And so add a protein with your meal. Like we do the quick wins. , are you having trouble sleeping?
Go out in the sun earlier in the day that starts to reset your circadian rhythm. We work on [00:25:00] the, what are the behavioral things you can do that are accessible to you. Everybody has different financial capabilities. They have different time. Constraints. . And I understand, , what are the things that are causing you struggle here?
And then we look at what are the simple ways to start to change your meals. I do have people keep food journals, not counting calories, but just telling me what ingredients they ate. And then also listing their energy, , their bowel movements because we talk about poop because that tells you information and then supplements and how much water are you drinking and then I can, I can connect dots and then if it's like, hey, we need to start to eat a little more protein, I'll say, here's your meal.
Here's what you ate yesterday. Add this to this, add this to this instead of. Hey, go clean out your kitchen, throw everything away and start over with foods. You may not even know how to cook. And so we do a [00:26:00] little at a time. I have people usually start with 1 meal a day starting to change it. And my preference is breakfast because it sets off your whole day and it helps you create energy 1st thing in the day.
And then if you. , double fist Oreos later in the day, then it is what it is. And you'll restart in the morning with things that support your energy. , we start simple. We start with , where are you at? And what little things can begin to tweak that for you? I love the root cause approach.
, especially the more I become aware of how Western medicine operates, , since I've taken a more active role in caring for my dad and being his person in that, in that capacity, , seeing the Western band aids. For everything it's infuriating and I don't know how much of this I've shared, but, , with his permission, I'll share more eventually, but, you know, he did work with an Indian doctor who, , practiced Ayurveda and I loved their intake.
I was there for the intake video, you know, [00:27:00] helping, um, English is his 2nd language. He speaks fine, but sometimes people don't always understand, especially when we have somebody who English is their 2nd language as well. I need to be the in between. Right. Right. , their intake was just it really. I appreciated it because they weren't asking the same things as Western medicine doctors were asking.
They were going to root cause. And they were saying, , within this many months or years back, , have you had any significant life events that were stressful, , and that I was like, They get it, you know, because the body knows, , and the body is expressing symptoms because there's something else going on.
Right. So you're experiencing symptoms, whether it's weight gain, whether it's a disease, whether it's, , functionality of something not working properly or no period, like it's an expression and it's, the symptoms are an expression of something that's happening.
, it really takes it back to such a basic. I think sometimes human beings over complicate things. , unfortunately, because I'm just going to say it because they have.
Shitty intentions, , and [00:28:00] so when profits are your primary motivating factor, you over complicate things to , to create a scenario, to make people believe that that's the thing that's wrong. And now this is the solution that we have, and this is how much it costs. So bring out your credit card.
And a lot of what you're doing right in the wellness industry. And then, , what I'm doing in business now is peeling back the layers and coming back to. Before we overcome and in birth, a lot of what birth workers are doing is saying, okay, like, I remember when I had my baby, when I had a money at home, a lot of people were like, that's crazy.
That's crazy. And at first I felt like, holy crap, this is crazy. And then the more I thought about it, I was like, actually, it's. It's the most normal thing ever. We made it crazy because whoever decided that birth should happen in the hospital and overcomplicated things because , you make a lot more money when you overcomplicate things, whether it's how to do business or how to podcast or how to whatever you overcomplicate it.
And then there's this barrier where people think they don't know what to do next and in health. , just as an [00:29:00] aside, if I see one more health and wellness and fitness person promoting, um, health and wellness via tons of artificial protein sources, like I get it, you know, there's times I do, I like protein shakes.
Right. But I mean, Oh, some, I'm struggling to say it because I feel like probably I don't want to offend anybody to each their own. Okay. Drink the, drink the thing if you want, but like the protein milk, I don't know. Some of them are probably decent ingredients, but some of the ingredients, when I see what these, you know, certain wellness influencers are promoting and it's these protein milks.
And when I look at them and I bought some of them and then I go look at the ingredients, I was like, Holy shit. Like that's, I don't think that that's. Yeah. You know, when I weigh the benefits versus the risks, like, I don't know if that's really great for me. Yes. I'm counting more of the protein grams, but at what cost?
Yeah. There's a whole lot of protein and natural stuff. And even [00:30:00] if you're like, like, you don't have to go eat three steaks a day. You can, , get your apple, put a little bit of nut butter on it and sprinkle some hemp seeds and . It's not just a plain apple, , you've put some clothes on your carbs,
and that doesn't add a lot of bulk to where you're full, you know, like chia seeds are great. Hemp seeds are great. They're great proteins. I did try something this morning that was this recipe that this, and I do like this girl, she promotes, she shared this recipe on her stories yesterday and it looked really good.
And I was like, you know what? If there's a little bit of process stuff in it, but it was like yogurt and the PB powder, which I used to use way long ago. And I stopped using it and I was like, I'm going to get some, just try this out. And it did call for natural almond butter. A couple other things. a rice cake.
It looked so good on her stories. And I was like, that actually looks really filling. I made it this morning and I couldn't get like halfway through it. And I was like gagging and I'm like, this is so gross. Like, why am I doing this? I know the only time I like protein powder is if it's in a shake. And I only do one of those a day.
Cause I like it. [00:31:00] And I loaded up with vegetable. It's part of why I like the shakes honestly, is because I really don't like the taste of avocado. But I like the benefits of eating and consuming avocado, so I blend it into the shake so I don't have to taste it. And that's why I like the shake really is because it's disguising my avocado.
, And I, and I really liked the protein that I get because it's a brand that I like, and maybe I should link it in the show notes. Yes. So little accidental bug for four sigmatic protein. It's my favorite and has stuff in it. And there's all the benefits you can read about, but I'll plug it and then I'll link it in the show notes.
Um, and I do one of those every single morning. Cause I like it not because I have to, , but I like this longer term, more sustainable, slow and sustainable approach to wellness. So I'm with it and there's this idea that so then you talk about the products and then everybody thinks that health is expensive because these products are expensive.
And it's like, no, go get a good cup of [00:32:00] bone broth. And you got great protein and great collagen. And, , people are putting collagen in their coffee now, which is fine, but. The isolated protein is not as great as the whole protein. And so just go drink some bone broth, go drink some miso broth. Like those are going to get you the proteins and they're not, I mean, if you make it yourself, it's really cheap.
You just take your carcass from whatever you just ate. If you're a meat eater or you, I haven't ever done miso broth, so I don't know how that's done, but I've made bone broth from a Thanksgiving turkey and it's It's cheap. Like you've just reused something that you use, you didn't throw away the phone.
Fast foods or no food is cheap anymore, honestly. , when I was taking my son to an appointment and the person who was at his appointment, she's like, Hey, while you're out, can you grab me something to drink? I don't care what it is. I just need a drink. And I don't usually buy drinks out is what I noticed because I almost always have, this is embarrassing.
They look like such a basic. You know what? [00:33:00] I have a Stanley because my husband gifted it to me. But I, I only, I don't care what the cup is, but I like having my electrolytes drink. Mine isn't Stanley, but it's pink. I like having electrolytes. , and I like my coffee at home. I prefer mine over buying it outside.
So I don't usually buy stuff out. And if I take the kids out, we do go to Chick fil A sometimes because. We're human and occasionally we go to Chick fil a and they'll usually get a water bottle with their drink. But I'm saying this to say, I don't usually buy a, just go buy a drink. So I bought her a drink.
It was a lemonade. And it was like 3 and 79 cents for a lemonade, like a fountain drink lemonade. And I was like, damn, it's almost 4 for a lemonade. And it was at Chick fil a. And I realized , I just don't buy a lot of beverages out, but it's not cheap to. Eat the cheap fast on the go stuff either. Like that stuff is pricey.
The way I do it, it tends to be cheaper if you prep and eat at home anyway. And I prefer my own food. If I go days or weeks without cooking a lot, I [00:34:00] just don't feel very good. I like my food and my food has my love frequency in it because when I'm cooking it, I'm cooking it with the intention of pouring my love into it.
. There's ways of making food at home fast, if you're a meat eater, marinate your throw your meat in a marinade at night and let it marinate through the day. And then when you get home from work and your kids get home from school and everything, cut everything up, cut your veggies up, put it on a pan, put it in the oven, help your kids with homework.
Do your stuff for the end of the day, eat, and then have the rest of your night. , We get so bogged down in recipes, just cook a few things and throw it together. Go back to your old lunchable situation, but have, , some cooked chicken that you made and some carrots and broccoli , , and if you don't like raw vegetables, cook them and not by boiling.
Please stop boiling vegetables. If you want vegetables to taste good, stop doing it. , I [00:35:00] love roasted vegetables. When I started discovering roasted vegetables, I was like, Oh my gosh, just a little bit of oil and a little bit of sea salt. And it's like candy. It like sweetens it, you know, when it cooks and it caramelizes naturally.
Like, oh, it's so good. My son loves chicken. He likes wings. Bye. I will. I shared it on my stories a couple days ago. I prepped like 16 pounds of wings. I got from Costco. So I'm marinating it. So at this time, because especially I'm going to be gone next week for a few days. So while I'm gone, they'll have pre marinated wings. All they have to do is defrost and put them in the air fryer and he inhales them.
And it's easy. I want to shift to asking you about the podcast, . When did you first feel like you wanted to start a podcast or when did you first know that that was something you wanted to do? Well, it was like a two piece thing.
Okay. So I'm a generator. So sometimes I get, I'm like, I'm going to do this and it doesn't work out. So a couple of years ago I thought, Oh, [00:36:00] I'm a podcast. Everybody's doing a podcast. I'll do that. And then I was deciding on the podcast. And then I was trying to think of themes, you know, and I'm like, uh, this is not working.
I'm going to put it on a shelf. I'm doing my business and everything. I had shown up on my first podcast as a guest and I was like, oh, I really like this. I really like the interaction and talking. And so I. Was like, huh, maybe I will consider that again in the new year. This was, you know, in the fall, probably by about August or September.
And then one day I just had this download of like, I was so frustrated that. I couldn't talk about all the things on my social media, which I can, but there's this idea of niching down and I want people to really know what I do and what I do well. And so I niche down on my social media, but I want to talk about all the things of wellness because I have been helped with sound healing and energy work and EFT and other things that I'm not [00:37:00] an expert in.
And so I was like. Oh, this is what my podcast is. It's introducing my audience to all of the possible ways they can be well and create wellness for themselves. And I don't like this idea that people gatekeep wellness and health only looks like one thing. I created this process called Undefine Your Health last year and It's the idea that you decide for yourself what health is, and that is where you set your goals.
And it's not 1 thing. Like, you're not going to let somebody else tell you what health means for you. And so my podcast is wellness undefined. It's the greater, you know, wellness as a whole. And you deciding, you finding what makes you feel well. And how do we know what makes us feel well if we're not exposed to it?
So I bring in, I'm, I've only solo casted so far. I'm going to start interviewing some people and just exposing people to all of the areas of wellness that you can improve [00:38:00] your life with. And so when I finally had that moment of like, I'm going to do this podcast two days later. You started talking about, Hey, I think I'm going to share what I know about podcasting.
And I'm like, this is definitely the right time then. And I thought I'll probably launch it in the beginning of 2024. And you said, have it done by the holiday. And I was like, you mean Valentine's I could not conceptualize that I could be launched by Christmas because I just thought there was so much involved and then as we get into the podcast for some, like, there's not a lot of involved.
Like, yeah, there's marketing it and doing this and that, but, like, the creation and putting out of the podcast. It's so much simpler than I thought it was. And so, you know, plug for Podcasting with Heart, [00:39:00] because you broke it down so well to be like, oh, I can do this. I can absolutely do this. And so, yeah, I launched December 19th.
Um, I had big grand plans of having a lot of episodes and I didn't do that and that's okay because we're doing the slow game. My podcast is going to be here for years and we're going to have a lot of amazing conversations and it doesn't all happen, doesn't all have to happen right now. So I'm getting my, I'm getting the kinks out, I'm getting my process and getting into, uh, the swing of things and I'm excited.
That's so good to hear. And by the way, so December 19th is like five days after our last call for podcasting on December 14th, if I remember correctly, because it had to be done before my kids winter break. That was the way I scheduled it. And so you were like, bam. And to hear that it was actually easier than you thought it was going to be brings me so much relief because I [00:40:00] also, I don't know.
I think I told you the story of how, when I bought my first microphone, not this one, because I had to replace it. And my daughter took mine. My first one and broke it, but I bought it and had it for a year and a half before I actually started using it for all these reasons. And part of that was because I thought it was going to be just way too much.
And it felt like such a steep hill to climb. And once I got into it, I was like, Oh, my God, this is so much easier than I thought it was. And then when I started editing it myself, I thought, damn, this is like really not as hard as I thought it was going to be. So during the summer, the, the podcast took a bit of a summer break, um, which coincided with my life.
And during that summer break, I was learning how to edit, you know, one of the things I did in my spare time while I had three kids at home was, um, learning how to edit my own show. And then I'm like, Oh my God, this is not hard. This is so not hard. And then I thought, well, is it just me thinking it's not hard?
Can I teach it to other people? The goal would be to teach it to other people in a way that it's also not hard for them. Right. And yeah, if you can release perfectionism and just [00:41:00] allow yourself, like you said, you know, I didn't have all these episodes. Okay. And, and now you're, you're moving forward and you're in it for the long game, this nice, slow and steady long game.
And I don't think anybody who comes and listens to your show is like, you know what? She didn't launch with four episodes. I'm pretty sure I'm not going to listen to her again. Like that's, that's, I don't think we're doing that anymore. Um, permission granted to every single entrepreneur listening. Like if you think that podcasting has to be whatever you think it has to, it really doesn't.
And it, would you agree that like, if you can log into zoom, if you can post anything to social media, if you can navigate an iPhone, then you can podcast. Yeah. Or an Android. I'm, I'm not an iPhone person. That's right. So shout out for Android. Um, but yeah, the biggest frustration I had was trying to get my intro in.
It wouldn't do what I wanted it to do. And I was getting frustrated. That was the biggest frustration, but that intro is done now. So, I don't have to do it every time. It's done. And [00:42:00] so I just added in. So, whatever was causing me frustration there, I don't know, but I won't have to do it again until I decide to have a new intro.
And so, like. Yeah, it's the slow roll, like, and I have decided to not, I have this issue of constantly checking. So I'll post social media and I'll constantly check, you know, who's liking, who's responding, what are my analytics? And I'm like, I need to let that go because it's the slow roll. Business is a slow roll.
If we have a job, the longer you've worked for somebody else, the harder this is to break this habit. You do your work the same way. And then you get paid on Friday, you know, every other Friday, every Friday, whatever business is not that it is not an immediate. Payment for what you did yesterday and so getting that slow roll learning that you plant a seed 1 day and you can't eat the strawberry the next like you have to wait.
And so I don't check my analytics. I don't. In fact, I missed a review. I was like, oh, [00:43:00] somebody else sent me the review. She's like, did you see this? I'm like, no, because I didn't check it and so I'm like, you know, I need to do better at checking that because I want to shout out people that are giving me reviews and thank them and everything.
But. Yeah. Um, just looking at the numbers so much because this is a long term thing. This is going to be a cumulative effect. I want my podcast to do 2 things. Primarily 2 things that is, I want to teach people things and connect with people and, you know, I want it to be a way for people to learn about me so they can decide if they want to work with me.
And that is a long term theme. Like, there may be somebody that listens tomorrow who. Hires me five years from now and that's fine. I don't need an immediate result.
That's really good. It reminds me, it reminds me of actually, so, you know, Danette, she was also the podcasting with heart and she, she was a guest last in the last episode. [00:44:00] When this comes out recent, she was recently on my show. It came out. Actually yesterday. Anyway, she was a guest on the show and she was also my longtime client and we talked about her experience, um, hiring me from listening to my show and there have been not just in that, you know, over the last several years, there have been.
A handful of people, quite a few that I can think of. I don't always ask, Hey, where'd you find me? But sometimes I do on a discovery call and I've heard over and over and over again, over the last four years, I listened to your podcast. And there was this moment where I was like, Oh my gosh. And so for Danette, it was like, She didn't even hear a full episode and she reached out and she was a client within like, a very short amount of time and other people may have listened a little longer, but and I, it's not the intention going in.
And I think that's the most important thing is like, like, we talked about with weight in dollars, right? If that's not the primary intention. Right. Like I don't go to the podcast, like, how can I make money off the [00:45:00] show today? I go to the podcast, like I have important stuff. I want to say that I want to share with people.
I have conversations I want to have. I want to connect. I want to whatever, share what I'm thinking. And I also need more than 90 seconds that an Instagram real will allow. We are the talkers. We are the people that got separated from our friends in fifth grade. And put on the other side of the room so that we would stop talking jokes on them, because there are things nowadays called podcasts and we can talk to our heart's content.
Ideally somebody will listen. Um, so I do think it's, it is, it's an, it's a natural by product of enjoying the creation. Right. And so for me, I do also feel like that's why I called it podcasting with heart instead of originally I toyed with it being DIY podcasting, but I'm like, that's not capturing the essence of what I want to do here.
I'll teach you how to DIY in case you want to DIY, but more important, I think is doing it from the heart and doing it with an intention of pure, clean energy intention of like, if you have a client comes from this great, if not, it's still very fulfilling. It's a medium [00:46:00] for me. It's a form of art. It's a creative expression and it feel it fulfills a part of me and it brings me a lot of joy.
Um, and so I, I think that that's. I think that can be felt, you know, and that is for those of us. I heard this. Gary V talks about this sometimes how lots of people start podcasts, but a lot of people don't stay in it because they wanted the quick, they wanted quick money, quick clients. And I, even my dad, I love my dad, but I've shared this story before too.
Anybody who hasn't heard it. When I first told my dad, I had a podcast. Quite a while ago, he was like, what is that? And I explained it to him. He's like, that's great. How much money do you make off of it? And I was like, Oh, dad, you know, it's just, it was sweet and he didn't mean it, you know, but it was, um, yeah, it was very cute.
And I wanted to also speak to what you said about your statistics were funny enough, right? Like I. I'm a very numbers driven person. That was my upbringing, like grades, straight A's. I'm quad left in human design. Like I'm all about logic and structure [00:47:00] and numbers. And when I was very, had a very unhealthy relationship with my body, um, I was very hyper focused on numbers, the number on the scale, the number of calories, the number of sugar grams, all of these numbers, even approaching my first birth.
I was so Unhealthily attached to numbers and there came a point when I was prepping for my second birth where I was like, you know what these numbers like, I don't care. I just don't, I don't need to know because some of them are not actually helpful. And after I had my 2nd child, when she was about 1, I remember her walking behind me in the bathroom and getting on the scale and I was so triggered.
And it brought up so much of my unhealthy stuff that I was like, okay, the scale goes in the trash today. And I threw my scale away and this she's 7 years old now, and I haven't wakened myself since. Um, I had to during my 3rd pregnancy, but I asked the people at the doctors not to at the midwife's office, not to tell me unless it was alarmingly, you know, [00:48:00] an issue, but I would turn, I'm like, I don't need to know.
And they looked, they're like, you don't want to know. And I was like, no, I really don't care. Um, I don't care anymore. So it's been a big healing thing for me to release the numbers, but I say all that to say. I was podcasting for like, I don't know, a year and a half and I never checked my stats. I was just out here living my best life, like talking and talking and talking.
And one day I was like, Oh, and I wandered into the section of my host where I used to host in lips and I don't anymore. Now I host in Spotify, but I wandered into lips and in this section and I was like, stats. And I just kind of barely, you know, like here I had been podcasting, I don't know, probably over a year.
And I went and I was like, I wonder how many people have listened. And there was like 30, 000 something downloads. And I'm like, Oh shit, that's a lot. That was more than I thought it would have been. I had no idea. And I celebrated and I had this moment. So I still have to have this, like, I step [00:49:00] away a little bit and I'm like, don't need to, I really don't need to know.
And to be honest, even if there were five people listening to an episode, It doesn't sound like much, right? And what we're seeing in the online business world and the podcasting world, people that are like, I've had a million downloads. That's awesome. I have not. But if you brought 5, 10, 20 people into this, my office, and they were all standing here listening to what I was saying.
That's pretty big to me and that's impactful and I have been also healing my relationship with things like stats because so much of the business world, um, attaches success to dollars, to stats, to your, um, engagement, to your audience size, to all of these things. And I kind of have reached a point where I'm like, I honestly just don't give a shit.
I care about people. And whether it's one person, five people, or 50, 000, I don't know even what my stats are right now. Um, last time I checked, it was probably 60, [00:50:00] 000. That's 60, 000 times somebody has hit play. Like what? That's more than I could have ever thought possible. Yeah. So that was what I wanted to share back.
And my question to you too is okay. So reflecting back on your experience with launching the podcast, the harder thing for you, you said was get something that we were fumbling with, with the intro, um, what has been, if you had to say like your biggest piece of advice for anybody, who's like, gosh, I kind of want to start a podcast, but I just think it'd be too hard.
Like, what's one thing that you would tell somebody. about starting a show?
I would, oh, just one. Um, I would say, I mean, it's easy to say just do it, but like figure out why you want to do it. Like, do you just think, oh, people say it's good because it's going to bring me a lot of business. [00:51:00] If that's your reason, don't do it. Don't do it yet. It's not, it's not the right reason. But like, why, what message are you trying to get out?
What purpose are you doing it for? Don't let it stand in your way that there's everybody's doing a podcast now. So what? I don't listen to every podcast. Do you? Like, I, I listen to the podcasts that resonate with me and I don't resonate with the people who are having millions of downloads. Like, those are not my people that I'm listening to.
So, If you have this idea that nobody's going to listen to you because you're just one person like somebody will listen. Somebody would rather hear you than somebody else. And so if you have a true message to get out, like, do it and don't overcomplicate it. Yes, there people are doing giveaways and there's all kinds of ways to bring traffic to you.
But if you think, oh, that sounds really overwhelming. I thought I was going to have this big grand opening type type thing and a party and I didn't do it and that's fine. I can do it. I can do it a week from now. I can do it a month from now. I can [00:52:00] do, I can do whatever I want. There's no rules. So, like, just do it.
Just get on, practice recording, download AutoAI or some kind of voice note app, and just riff on something. And then listen back to it. And think, like, if you were somebody that needed to hear what you just said, would you find value in it? And if the answer is yes, go record a podcast. Because other people will find value in that just talk to who you were 5 years ago.
, what did you need to know? That's what I do a lot because there is a lot that I needed to know several years ago about all of this and it took me a long time to learn it so I just speak to myself, , and remind myself that my value is in things beyond the number on the scale.
. I'm so here for it. Thank you. You're welcome. And thank you for hanging with me and thanks for sharing all your stuff. I'll share links to your socials and all the places so people can connect with you. , this has been [00:53:00] awesome. Thanks for having me on. Yeah, it was my pleasure.
Thank you.