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15: Trust Your Gut w/ Gina Worful · Harder Than Life

• 0:00
  I'm Kelly Siegel and this is harder than life a podcast about self-love self-awareness business and health We tell outrageous stories and boil everything down to simple practical advice. You can start using today. Let's get living
• 0:15
  We are so honored and lucky to have today's guest live and in studio. When I met her, she was living in the jungle, and she's headed back there right after the show. Life happens in the coolest ways. I happen to connect with this registered dietitian and master of human nutrition on social media, and as crazy as it sounds, she grew up near me. She happens to be home visiting family, and we nabbed her.
• 0:37
  You are in for a treat today as we chat with the sweet, dynamic, brilliant, yet beautiful Gina Werfel. Welcome to the Heart of the Life podcast and thank you for coming. Oh, thank you so much.
• 0:48
  So we could have talked forever before and I'm like, stop talking. Yeah. Because there's so much goodness that you have and your energy radiates. And I want if people don't know who you are, they have to look you up on Instagram and on your website. You're just amazing. And we're going to dig way into it. So.
• 1:09
  I'm going to start with me because I'm selfish. I have the worst stomach of all time. And I bet so many of the listeners do too. All of your material discussed mindfulness, yet it's a gut health program that you're pushing, that you're offering. Sorry. Can you explain the link between the two?
• 1:26
  Oh, so our mind is directly linked to our entire bodies. And I think it's so important to know how does our mind play a role in any aspect of our physical health, whether it's our metabolism or our gut and our digestion or your hormones.
• 1:43
  you're a whole being. It's all connected. We can't just isolate one thing or be fighting against our own minds. So it's really about getting to know how your mind and all of these different aspects, your gut, your physical body, how it all works together. I kind of flip these, flop these, but what's your story? Why does your story matter?
• 2:05
  So I've always been really into health and I've always been super excited about helping people with their health. And I could not wait to become a dietitian because I was that I was that kid who was like, I have to know the truth. There's so many different ways of eating and different fads and diets and all these different things. I was like, I have to know the truth. So I went to school at Eastern Michigan University, you know, Michigan hometown. And I did my undergrad to become a registered dietitian.
• 2:34
  And I did my master's in human nutrition because I had to know these answers. And I'm so grateful that I learned how the body works, that I learned physiology. But the downside when you go to school to be a dietitian, what no one tells you is that
• 2:50
  What they train you to do is give people a program. You calculate their calories. You calculate an estimate of how many calories they burn. And then you pull together these foods that the FDA recommends are healthy. And you put it together in a meal plan. And then you slide this sheet of paper across the table. And you say, here, do this. And we expect people to change.
• 3:10
  Unfortunately, people are not robots that just follow a sheet of paper. People are so much more complex than that. And so I realized that the only way I'd be able to help other people or even help myself, it went really deep and really personal for me because I've been so interested in health.
• 3:30
  But over time, like it, I didn't understand my body. I didn't understand why I was eating the way that I was eating and what my body needed. And it became really frustrating, confusing. And I realized I was not well equipped just with all these multiple degrees. I still didn't have the answers. Yeah.
• 3:47
  Oh, so much to unpack there. I'm going to skip around because now we just jumped right into it. So what is the biggest misnomer about diet that is circulating right now? The fasting, the keto, the gluten-free, which one of those, just when you hear it, you're like, and what do you recommend besides getting on your website and following your program? But you know, the average listener that's listening to this right now, what is, what
• 4:12
  Talk about those three fads. I'll call them a fad. I don't know. And then do they work? Are they legit? And then what is the one thing that they can do? I have the Twizzlers here and coffee. I'm sure that that's not part of it. Well, so there's pros and cons to different, I like to call them styles of eating. And some people like to follow different styles of eating. And if that works for you, great. Most people, when they follow something that's very,
• 4:36
  very hard rules. They have trouble sticking to it. Or they might say, like, I got, there's so many people that I've talked to who said keto works for me, keto works for me. And I'm like, awesome. That's great. If keto works for you, they're like, well, but it only worked for like two months. And then I, and then I sabotaged it and then I went back and then now I need to do it again.
• 4:57
  So I think the most important thing is really getting honest with yourself about what truly works for you and for your body. My philosophy around food is can we eat as whole natural foods as much as possible, move toward that direction?
• 5:12
  Moving that, depending on where you're at in that timeline, I like to think of it as like a really good example would be apple pie is going to be your far end of the spectrum, right? Like apple pie is low nutrients. Your next better step would be, okay, applesauce. We're getting closer to the real thing. Your best would be like the apple, right? So we can keep like moving on that timeline of getting closer to real foods.
• 5:33
  And then do some finessing, like dial it in, like what works great for your body? Like what way of eating makes your body feel amazing that you have great energy, your digestion feels right. You just feel like I'm in tune and I'm not eating foods that like give me more cravings or...
• 5:50
  make me feel this intense focus on food all the time. I did keto before and, you know, in order for me to stick with it, I had to be thinking about food all the time. It was exhausting. I was constantly thinking about carbs and counting them. And so that just to me doesn't feel like natural, rested, effortless health. And that's the goal of what we want is not to be forcing, holding on, white knuckling our way of eating.
• 6:19
  But that it feels free. I love that because anything rigid just never seems to stick for anybody. So take the message and not the mess and see what adopts to work for you, which is my whole motto in my book, Heart of the Life. I talk about that. Just take the things that resonate with you. Forget the rest because this is my life. And here's the thing about that, too, is that most people know the basics of eating healthy.
• 6:42
  Right. Ooh. Do tell. I don't, I don't know that I believe that because I think, don't you learn? It's learned behavior from your parents. So what they cooked, agreed what you cook. Okay. So I bet if you go out on the street and you asked a hundred people, what do you think is better? If you ate vegetables and chicken or pizza, most people would know. I think vegetables and chickens, right. Even a kindergartner would probably know. Most people know. I would answer pizza. I know. Yeah. Okay.
• 7:11
  That's actually a great point. Scratch kindergartner. But most people know like the basics of eating healthy. We don't even, but we're constantly seeking another plan, another plan, another plan. And so the bigger question is actually exactly what you said. What are the other influences that we don't even have awareness of that maybe is something we learned that we were really young about?
• 7:32
  or something that was really ingrained in us, or even something that's in our subconscious mind that's driving our food choices and why we do what we do. Because we're surrounded, if it was an information problem, health would be easy, right? There's way more beyond just which plan do I follow?
• 7:53
  Well, the information is there's so much readily available, period, and you can get both sides. Fasting is good for you. Fasting is bad for you. Everything I've read and heard is that most of this is the placebo effect in that, you know, you just start focusing on it, whether it be fasting, intermittent fasting, the keto, the gluten-free.
• 8:10
  See, myself, I'm on a seafood diet. Seafood, I eat it. I have to... I am always hungry because I operate at the speed of 150% all the time. And you have, like, an insane metabolic rate. So you just, like, you need calories. You can't be snacking on carrots all day, right? But I don't... I keep... My advice is sugar. I love... I used to drink a lot, and I got all my sugar from that. And now I get it from candy. Yeah. So, um...
• 8:39
  You know, it works like I don't hold a real strict regimen, but I'd also don't eat like crap. I know how we didn't even talk about this. The reason why your gut and your is for your energy and for your livelihood and talk about what it does for your mentality. And because there's I got your form here. Sorry that.
• 8:57
  you know, it's literally says cardiovascular health, longevity and health, hormones, inflammation. Inflammation is a huge one. Since I watch what I eat and I gave up alcohol, my inflammation in all of my joints and my gut, it's just gone way down. I don't have to take, I used to have to take, um, uh, the stuff for your throat to, to, what do they call that? Uh, the anti, oh, antacids. Yeah. Antacids all the time. Cause I always had, oh my God.
• 9:24
  I had eternal, not indigestion, acid reflux. Oh, stop drinking? What do you know? Oh, yeah. So talk about how it all interrelates and why it's, I mean, you have liver and kidneys and health function. It just talks about being a high performance CEO. How does it all relate together?
• 9:44
  Yeah, sometimes I think like when we're really busy, especially the entrepreneurs and people who are achievers like yourself who are go, go, go, super busy, sometimes these things around our health can really feel like a burden. Like it can feel like it takes extra time and sometimes it can feel like- There's no sometimes, Gina. It always does. Anything that just isn't- Pulls you away. Instant gratification, it feels like, but that's why discipline and consistency is so important. That's where the heart of the life comes in. Once you get on it, I-
• 10:14
  Do you put pizza in front of me? No, I love pizza. I know that I'm going to be lethargic, and I'm just so disciplined because I'm not going to eat it. And I always yell at my office at National Technology Management. It's so easy and so mindless to just order pizza whenever, because I like to buy everybody lunch whenever I'm there, and all the time, as a matter of fact. And they keep ordering pizza. I say, guys, I have one rule. When I buy lunch, it has to be healthy, because I don't want all you guys napping after, and I don't want you to be...
• 10:42
  I'm big into health. Yeah. I just, it's very important. Well, you said that, you said that word, right? It's just mindless. And that is where we go wrong, right? Is when we're mindless and we're on automatic, which was what a lot of busy people do is they don't ever stop and realize that sometimes we live in like a hypnosis where we just automatically grab everything.
• 11:03
  And things like our stress hormones cause us to do that. It's a fight or flight survival mechanism. And so when our stress hormones are revved up, it drives us to grab things like sugar or sweets to actually satisfy that stress craving response.
• 11:18
  And so when we do that, we're in this autopilot and we're not thinking about why am I doing what I'm doing? But when we can actually pause, like you're saying, and you're thinking, how is this going to make me feel? Is this going to like, what is it that I'm really trying to feel? And when people connect with like, I want to feel confident. I want to feel powerful. I want to have energy, whatever it is that you're really craving. When we can connect to that energy, we can pause and use mindfulness, which is just having confidence.
• 11:44
  that greater awareness of like, what am I doing and why am I doing it? We can understand so much about ourselves and we can really be in choice. Like that's how we reclaim our power is pausing and asking, is this really going to serve me? So I was going to ask you, what is mastering mindfulness? You kind of went into it, but dig it deeper. And then the pause is,
• 12:07
  I want to say it's easy. That's my gut reaction, but it's not easy. Let's say that we successfully pause. What should they do then? And then please do a deep dive into what mastering mindfulness is to you. Because this is actually the same question I actually, actually. Because really just pausing and then you got to get into the mindfulness. Yeah. I just teed it up for you.
• 12:30
  So mindfulness is having greater awareness. And when it comes to health, I think of it as having greater awareness of how your mind and your thoughts, your physical body, your emotions, your relationship to food, how they all play a role in your health together. When you understand that, then you actually become a master of your health in your own body.
• 12:49
  So most people are relying on diets and diet plans. And if you're only relying on a diet without understanding this whole physical being, you're missing 90% of the mark, right? You're missing the relationship with yourself, the relationship you developed with your food, with your cravings, with your habits, your behaviors. And instead, you're getting a sheet of paper that says, don't trust yourself. Trust me instead. Trust this diet. Trust this sheet of paper. Yeah.
• 13:16
  And so because we distrust what's happening inside of our bodies, we end up trying to use our mind to tell us what to eat and how much to eat. And our mind can be a really cool tool to learn more about health. But this doesn't tell us how hungry we are, how full we are. Do foods resonate with our body? So now we're trying to use information.
• 13:37
  And our mind's job wasn't to get us to eat. It's actually our body's job. So we actually miss out. And a lot of people start asking themselves these questions like, why don't I trust myself with food? Why don't I have more discipline? Why is it that this diet works for other people, but it doesn't work for me? And we start asking all these questions. And...
• 13:57
  We don't have the answers because we're just using our mind instead of the relationship with our body. So mastering mindfulness is about having deeper connection and relationship with what actually influences our choices. And when we understand that, then we feel so deeply empowered in our choices and our health and our bodies because we know it. It's like this is the longest relationship we'll have. The one with ourselves is we better get to know it. Right. We can't ignore ourselves and our bodies. Right.
• 14:25
  There's so much you just said, the trusting yourself. If you, if you, if you do, if you look good, you'll feel good and you're just going to do good. So trusting yourself and being self-aware is the key to just being happy. Absolutely. And there's no better feeling. There's no, no better feeling than self-trust.
• 14:46
  Right. At the end of the day, it's like, what are you really doing this for? Do you forever want to be on a rigid diet? And I'm not saying you can't use meal plans and tools and information. I love science. I love information. You know, seek out support.
• 15:01
  But if you're just relying on diet after diet or meal plan after meal plan, and it still feels like there's this inner resistance, there's actually stuff below the surface that you can't see. And you're like, why don't I trust myself? And your body is like, hey, listen to me. I'm trying to get your attention.
• 15:19
  Dig deeper into that. So that's inner child work. Yeah. Keep going. That inner, that inner resistance. When we feel almost like I'm, I'm deeply craving to be healthier or I really want it, but it almost feels like I'm resisting it at the same time.
• 15:36
  Or it's almost like I sabotage it or it's hard or there's resistance. Why doesn't it feel natural? And I believe that all of us, we naturally, we do want to eat healthy foods. We do want to move. We do want to take care of ourselves. But sometimes things get in the way, whether it's coping mechanisms or things that we've learned as a child, whatever that might be, we can do some deeper self-discovery. And a lot of that comes from most of us being in a state of survival.
• 16:04
  And we don't realize it, right? Whether it's all the way from childhood or present day or both, when our brains interpret the information that there's a stress, maybe it's your present day, you're slammed, you're busy, you're overwhelmed, or maybe there's this unconscious belief that you've had since childhood of you're not worthy of health or you're not worthy of what you want or you're not safe, right?
• 16:30
  You're so good. Are you a therapist or a dietitian? Literally everything you're saying, it makes sense for your mindful and to live just an alignment, a life in alignment. Yeah. And you just have a, a food. If you can master your food, your association with food, you're going to master all the other things with alcohol, with working out, with work, with everything. So, uh, you use an eloquent way of saying, uh,
• 17:00
  don't meet resistance with resistance and just let it be. Well, I think we have so much shame around when we don't have discipline, right? Don't go say that word Brene Brown loves. Shame. It's so hard to look at because society tells us that if we get the diet plan, we should be good, right? You have the information, just do it. And I can be the one to tell you all about shame because I had two degrees of,
• 17:27
  A ton of education, a private practice teaching people how to eat healthy. But I really was holding on and really struggling to stick.
• 17:35
  to a healthy eating plan because one, I didn't understand my body's chemistry, like my hormones and my stress hormones. And I didn't understand all of that. And the other aspect was I didn't realize I had all this hidden resistance that I couldn't see. And so I was trying to outrun it by beating myself up, shaming myself, thinking that I had all these things wrong with myself until I started to understand, wow, if you're in a state of survival,
• 18:04
  Your body, it's actually just science. So if you're like in a state of stress, it actually activates a different area of your brain. So when you're calm and your body thinks that you're safe, that's just your prefrontal cortex working. You have great willpower. It's easy to eat healthy. You know, if you have a day where you're happy and you're like, it's sunny out, I feel great. It's easy to eat healthy. I'll eat the salad. And then all of a sudden you have a stressful day or it's hard. That actually activates a different area of your brain called your amygdala.
• 18:34
  And its job is survival. Its job is to say, it is not time for you to lose weight. Let's stop fat burning. Let's stop all of your willpower. And let's drive you to eat sugar for survival. So now all of a sudden, it's like we're on the prowl. Like we have this animalistic like response. We're like, we're looking for food. We're looking for carbs and sugar because that's quick energy.
• 18:56
  And we're like, man, why do I feel hungry all the time? Or why does it look like this is a big enough portion, but I just can't stop eating. I never feel satisfied. And that's a clue that there's the stress response there. And then we can get curious. We can, instead of being so shameful, we can get compassionate and curious of like,
• 19:14
  What if I were my own research project? What if I wanted to understand myself? Where could this trigger and the stress response be coming from? Is it something I'm going through today? Is it something I learned as a child that I needed safety? I mean, food is like one of the common, one of the core foundational things that we need for safety, right? We need shelter. We need food. We need water. So if we're getting triggered and we need safety, food is going to be the one that we go for, right?
• 19:44
  Mine is the opposite. Whenever I'm hungry, I start feeling unsafe because when I grew up, there was no food in the house. So I was always hungry. Yeah. That's another thing, too. I like to eat really good and eat a lot because I was starved. I think so. Of that one as a child. I cannot work through that one, but nor do I try. I mean, I eat healthy. So it's like I'm hungry. I eat some chicken or something.
• 20:08
  Yeah. So what you said, I mean, this is a great one. You said, I can't work through that one. So if you're open to exploring this one a little bit. Okay. So if you're open to exploring it. I'm always curious. I love it. I love to grow. I love to expand my mind. So, and it sounds like you kind of are working through it because you are able to have the discipline to say, I'll just have a salad and chicken when I'm hungry.
• 20:28
  And a lot of people don't have the discipline to be able to do that. They're like, what, you know, when I feel that hunger, when we, when we can go into when we feel that trigger, that hunger, hunger, what are we feeling? And you identified it, right? You said, um, I'm scared. I'm scared. That's survival, immediately survival. I know that. And to reiterate what you said, to, to show that, you know, what you're talking about
• 20:55
  hence you're on the show. I literally, I meet it with lots of love, lots of compassion and say, Kelly, you haven't eaten. Exactly. Anything that comes out of your mouth or that you're about to do is wrong. So on the way here, I was late for eating. So I called my assistant. I said, I just got to vent to you for a second. And I'm going to start with, I haven't eaten yet. She's like, oh, you better go somewhere. So I stopped next door and had a burger with no bun.
• 21:22
  Yeah, so you're able to stop and use mindfulness to pause and make that rational decision. Sometimes when we're in that trigger and you can immediately identify, I feel scared, where there's an opportunity to explore that healing is just like we talked about the inner child work, going back and visiting that young Kelly when he felt scared and sharing with him, like, I know you feel scared. Don't worry, there's going to be enough food, right? Because here you are, you made it through today. Yeah.
• 21:51
  You made it. You have food today as an adult. And so letting older Kelly, let younger Kelly know, like don't worry and soothe and calm his nervous system. And I've had to do that a lot where when I felt triggers of anxiousness and I'm like, my mind wants to be like, this is stupid. You don't have anything to feel fear or anxious about. But when I trust in the feeling and I'm like,
• 22:12
  what is that? And I'm like, okay, this feels like a younger anxious me. And then I'm like, hmm, what if I go sit with her? And then I can actually drop into a meditation and like, I can see her and I'm like, oh yeah, she's anxious. Like, what does she need? And I can like talk with her and calm her down a little bit, listen to her if she needs to say something. And then we're like, okay, we're good. And that, that the anxious, the wanting to grab food out of anxiousness actually went away from exploring the origin, the root where it came from.
• 22:41
  You're fabulous. And I want to take that a step further and say, it just doesn't happen overnight. You got to keep doing that. Keep doing it. Every time it's like a muscle that you're exercising. And if you do that several times, it gets less and less and less. And eventually, hopefully it goes away. Mine doesn't go away. Cause I mean, I'm telling you, there wasn't just one incident. It was from the day I was born all the way until I was probably 18 years old, where I was constantly scared and no food. Yeah.
• 23:10
  I've seen, I've watched your social media and you eat, you practice what you preach. You are the real deal. I am in awe of you. You live in Costa Rica most of the time and you go talk about your daily habits and routine because I've seen you shop for the week and it had a little bitty basket and I'm like, oh, and then it triggered me. And I'm like, I need food now. Yeah, yeah. Well, I'll have to say that that wasn't, I actually realized after I shared that, I was like, that was...
• 23:38
  I put, this is my food for the week. It's actually not my food for the entire week. It was like groceries for like three days or whatever. And I was like in the middle of my grocery shopping, but yeah, I moved to Costa Rica and I've always been like a health conscious person, but it has actually helped me shift a lot. I think, especially because of the environment that I'm in, the environment really supports it. Uh, no, uh, near Nosara, Nicoya is one of the blue zones in the
• 24:02
  to be over a hundred years old. And I think there's only, I believe there's only five blue zones in the world. I could be wrong, but these are the areas in the world where people are known to live the longest. And so it's really cool to be saturated in an environment where people naturally take on these behaviors where they live the longest. Behaviors, what would do number one thing? Is it eating right or is it mindfulness and not having the daily stressors of just life?
• 24:26
  Well, I'll tell you a few things, I think. Number one, in Costa Rica, for me, I thought when people said Pura Vida, that it was just something you put on a t-shirt, which means like pure life or free life, a stress-free life. The people there live and breathe it. Like they are everyone from the construction worker to the person at the fruit stand to...
• 24:48
  Like anybody who lives in Costa Rica, everything is Pura Vida, Pura Vida. And could you imagine? Pura Vida. Pura. P-U-R-A. Pura. Like pure. Pure. And then life. Vida. So if we, could you imagine in our country, if we had something that we all bonded over that was like pure living, pure life, stress-free, that's like...
• 25:10
  And so that's what they actually want to embody. And they want to act. They are so open to teaching it to foreigners. And it's amazing that they don't see us Americans who are used to having all the perfect things and the nice things. And they're so embracing and warm and loving. And they're like, hey, this is if you if you take on this life, you could have this, too. So number one, I would say that they have a motto of a stress free life. They live by it. And the other thing is there's a ton of natural movement. I was.
• 25:40
  Going from walking, I don't know, maybe 5,000 steps a day to now like 15,000 steps a day being in Costa Rica. I mean, I'm walking so much. And all of the fun is movement. You surf, you do yoga, you do walking. It's like everything is movement and the food is fresh. There's not processed foods. So it's just the way that it is. And so sometimes it's way easier for us to eat processed foods here, but in Costa Rica,
• 26:08
  Fresh food is just the way of life. It's just all that you'd really have to go to a grocery store and like go find some. It's just not really a thing. Everything is fresh. So that brings up an interesting point. So the pesticides and the and the steroids and how does that lead to the gut microbiomes? And how does that lead into the problem? The United States has.
• 26:32
  of being a capitalistic society where they have to mass produce everything versus being just living off the land is what I think I'm hearing you. Yeah. I mean, it's horrible. And then I would love to say that I fully stand by and believe in the health things in America. But the truth is what my first dietetics conference that I went to in college while I was getting my degree was funded by like Coca-Cola and General Mills, like the worst food companies on the planet.
• 26:59
  You know, so I'd love to say that we we can we have a great thing here, but we really have to fight for it. And so unfortunately, what we consume directly interacts with our gut. So if you if we're spraying pesticides on plants to keep bugs away, well, we're ingesting those pesticides and that destroys the bacteria in our gut.
• 27:19
  And there's many, many studies that show that people who have unfavorable gut bacteria balance, which happens when you eat pesticides, when you eat sugar, when you eat processed foods, what ends up happening is these microbes want to be the dominating species. So then they send a signal to your brain. It's called a short chain fatty acid. It travels up your vagus nerve and it goes to your brain.
• 27:42
  And it regulates the way you eat because those bacteria want to live. They want to dominate. So they will drive you to go. You'll get the signal to go eat sugar because things like yeast and bad bacteria feed off of sugar. So they want to dominate. They're actually controlling your brain. That's why the stomach or the gut is now being called the first brain. Yeah. Yeah.
• 28:00
  Who knew? Yeah. So this is how powerful it is. There have been studies where they take mice and they swap gut bacteria. So they'll take an obese mouse and they'll take a lean mouse and they swap the gut bacteria. And the one that was obese becomes lean and the one that's lean becomes obese because these gut bacteria actually regulate what we eat, how much we eat, what kind of foods that we crave. Yeah.
• 28:24
  And beyond just the foods that we eat, they can actually control our personality. So there was another study where they had one mouse that was very anxious and scared. It was like a scared, timid mouse. And they got another mouse that was like very daring and brave. And it was like adventurous. And they put each one in a maze. And the one that was timid, it didn't move. It wanted to stay in the corner.
• 28:46
  The one that was adventurous wanted to go explore through the maze. And then they took their bacteria and they removed their bacteria from their intestines. They swapped their bacteria. And the one that was scared and timid became adventurous. And the one that was adventurous became very scared and timid. Where's that study? That's amazing. No. Really? Where?
• 29:03
  I actually learned about that at a conference that I was at. There's a really amazing neurologist that I love to learn from. He's incredible. His name is Dr. Datis Karazian. And I've been to many, many of his trainings and conferences. And they were discussing the gut microbiome. And that was one of the studies that we went deep into exploring is how the personalities change by changing the personality.
• 29:28
  Because those bacteria regulate your neurotransmitter balance. They send messages up to your brain. So we think that this is the brain, but like our gut is now being considered as the first brain. Collectively, all those bacteria in your gut weigh more than your brain. My brain's small anyway, so I'm sorry.
• 29:48
  I get the feeling, well, I saw that your eyes and venom light up when you said General Mills and Coca-Cola. There's more to that that I'd like to explore. What are your non-negotiables and what...
• 30:03
  I think it's going to lead right into that. Is there something about their practices or is it just the food from them that lit you up? What is it about Coca-Cola and General Mills? Is there more to it than just, is it their company practices? Because I get the feeling there's more there. It's just the most unhealthy foods on the planet, right? What are your non-negotiables? For myself? Yeah.
• 30:27
  Because you don't look like you've ever been out of shape or ever had a problem. You look petite, beautiful. You seem to have very healthy boundaries and always have is what I'm picking up. So I actually would love to share a little bit about what my journey has been like.
• 30:45
  Um, so years ago when I was going to school to be a dietitian, I had a lot of very high expectations for myself and I was giving myself a lot of food rules, but what I was doing was I was using a lot of fear around eating healthy and I knew all this information and I was really trying to motivate myself. Um.
• 31:05
  And follow a lot of rigidity. And I was really trying to hold on to that. And I really held a high expectation for me being someone who's in the health industry. And over time, I really started to like struggle with that. And for me, food started to become this daily battlefield war zone. And so I started giving myself more rules because I didn't trust myself. So the foods that I love to eat, I actually started leaving out of my house.
• 31:33
  And it got so bad that I ended up in a place of having like probably five foods in my fridge. And I could literally end up overeating those foods because I was in such like a mental fight with food. And so the more rules I gave myself, the less and less I could trust myself. And, you know, I was never an obese person, but I probably was...
• 31:56
  I don't know, maybe like 20 pounds heavier than what I am now. But like, I don't even really know. Cause I, like, I never got to the point where I like, I wanted to weigh myself or like, and I was working out so hard and I was trying so hard. I was trying to do keto and I was trying to do all the things. And, um, and that's where that place of like shame came the hardest for me. Cause I'm like, you have two degrees and healthy of all this science. Like what is wrong with you?
• 32:24
  And so I went through this really, really difficult period where I went deep into finally looking at,
• 32:33
  and looking at number one, what were all the hidden things that were driving why I was doing what I was doing, why I couldn't really hold onto that discipline. Like I was so regimented and so disciplined, but it was so hard and exhausting. And I was like, it felt like I was on a hamster wheel, not getting anywhere. And I was like, I think what I really had to come to myself with was like, is it always going to be this hard forever? Am I always going to feel like I'm chasing and chasing and chasing myself?
• 33:02
  And is this how I'm going to help other people? Cause I can barely, like I'm hanging on every day is a fight and I'm working out. So just so hard. So imposter syndrome is sitting in.
• 33:14
  Yeah. And I was like, am I, is this how I'm going to help people? Like I can barely do this. And can they do this? And so I went super deep into exploring how my mind and how my emotions were playing a role and how so much anxiety was driving me to make certain food choices. And so for me, it was like, why don't I have enough willpower to,
• 33:37
  But it wasn't about having more willpower when you're in a state of survival, right? When your stress hormones are taking over, your brain's number one job is for you to get protection. And I didn't understand that mechanism. If I would have understood that, I would have had so much more compassion. And so as I started to understand that mechanism and how our bodies do that, I was actually able to learn how to regulate my nervous system, how to learn about how my mind and my body were communicating to me.
• 34:06
  And so I was actually able to have a moment of surrender. And I love naturally. I think I enjoy eating healthy, but I don't give myself rules anymore. And I actually, I don't think I have any non-negotiables. Like I now I let myself get wake up when I want to wake up with what feels good to my body. Pura Vida, Pura Vida.
• 34:29
  Pura Vida. I wake up when I want to wake up. I check in with my body and I do movement that feels good to my body. I think sometimes I could in that state, you know, I don't push myself as hard as I used to with exercise. I could probably, uh, take some of your wisdom around a little more discipline and push. Um, but I feel healthier in my body than I ever have in my life. And I feel
• 34:50
  It feels natural. Instead of forcing something from the outside in, it feels natural from the inside out. I'm working with my body instead of against it. Like I'm learning how to listen to my mind and what my body is telling me. And I'm so tuned in with the difference between when am I getting a food craving and what, what is it that I'm really craving? Or what is it that would resonate with my body? And I'm just, it's,
• 35:14
  like years of practice of learning how to work with it and flow with it. But now I have a great relationship with it that I don't feel like I need rules and boundaries because I trust what my body's telling me. So good.
• 35:25
  The only non-negotiables you have is you don't drink Coca-Cola or eat oatmeal from General Mills. You know, there's a lot of things that I don't eat, but I don't feel like I have to have a rule against it. It just doesn't vibe with me. Like soda, pop, whatever. It doesn't resonate with me. It just doesn't call to me. Gina, tell me, you see me drinking coffee. Is caffeine bad for you? No.
• 35:49
  we should check out your stress hormones and then we'll know. So the only thing with, the thing with coffee, people are different depending on their genetic. Some people do well with coffee, some people don't do well with coffee depending on their gene variation. But I think what's important is that caffeine can raise your stress hormone cortisol, it's a stimulant, right? So if you're the kind of person that you run high on cortisol all day, cortisol is your wear and tear hormone.
• 36:16
  It tends to break down our bodies and it does drive us to eat sugar if our stress hormone cortisol is high. And so if cortisol is high all day, it basically breaks down our stored glycogen in the liver and it dumps sugar into our bloodstream. And then it stores belly fat because...
• 36:32
  Fat is protection for our organs. Not for you, but for people who do not. Good, good. Not for you, but for some of us who don't have as high of a metabolism and we're wondering, why can I not get rid of stubborn belly fat? Cortisol is like a...
• 36:50
  main like main contributor so for people who really need to bring their cortisol down coffee and even intermittent fasting is an extra stress wow so i think about like not eating not eating is an extra stress to the body right it would drive up stress hormones so you have to be the kind of person that you feel like you're regulating your nervous system really well and
• 37:15
  If you're not eating all day and then you feel like later you lose control and you just can't stop. Yeah, that's a sign that intermittent fasting is probably, you probably need to create more safety in your body. Let's talk about water. Everybody seems to think you need to drink a gallon a day everywhere you go. I recently read that there never has been a scientific study that confirms that. What's your opinion?
• 37:38
  You know, I'm like, are people really, how much more like measuring in numbers and are we gonna measure the gallon that we do and the things? I don't really know if someone's body needs a gallon or how much it needs, but I think a great, okay, so a great way to master mindfulness from the body perspective is like, look at your pee. When you pee, is it like close to clear or is it dark, right? That's how you can regulate. How much water is my body needing? It might change on a day-to-day basis, right?
• 38:05
  So, yeah, I think numbers are kind of silly. Like when we're calculating, it's just, do we always want to track and get so heady? It's like, how do I get to know my body? And I think water is a great way to check in. How's my energy doing? How energy is a great way to see, am I getting enough water? You can even check like your skin tightness. You can like grab your skin and like on your hand and pull your skin up. And if your skin...
• 38:33
  comes right back down, it's a good sign that you're well hydrated. If it kind of like slowly goes down, you might, might be dehydrated, maybe from too much coffee, not enough water, possibly. You keep looking at me funny. I resemble that remark. We're not assessing you, but, um, so there's different ways of getting to know your body. And so, yeah, looking at your pee and I'm like, first of all, I want to tell you, you go to my house, there's pure Vita. There's no stress. I have clear pee. And, uh, what was the other? No belly fat, no belly fat. So I'm good.
• 39:04
  You're totally in the clear. You're fabulous. It's just, it's so ironic because everything you see in social media, everything you hear in the media, it's completely opposite of what you're saying. Yeah. So basically what we need to do is just shut our ears off and stop listening. Well, I forget that actually. Like I forget that this isn't, that people don't realize that they can trust in their body and start looking inward because it's easy to start.
• 39:27
  looking for answers all the time. And that's the funnest thing. The funnest experience I have with my clients is they'll come in and they'll be really defensive. Don't tell me I had this one client. He said, don't tell me to not drink coffee and to not drink alcohol. It's not going to happen. I love a glass of wine and I love coffee. Those are my two favorite things in life. And I was like, okay, I'm not really going to tell you to do anything. That's if that's what you want to stick with, that's fine. And I never told him what to eat or what not to eat. And
• 39:52
  And I just kept asking him, how does your body feel? How does your body feel? And he started noticing and he's like, over time, he's like, man, I really realized that I was always drinking like three cups of coffee a day. And after one, I actually feel worse. And I'm like, oh, that's interesting. And then with the wine and he started exploring with everything, how he felt. And he's now like two years of no alcohol.
• 40:17
  He's just like, I'm fine without it. My body feels better. No alcohol. And he drinks about one cup of coffee a day. But it was just the power of, if I would have told, if he would have started and said, I don't want this, I don't want that. And I said, no, you can't have it. It would have been this huge. No one wants to be told what not to do. And that's what diets do to us, right? So even though we're motivated, there's like this inner child in us that's like, I want my sovereignty.
• 40:40
  So when I was a dietitian originally giving people plans, they actually kind of sometimes would fight back and I knew it on their own. They'd be like, well, I can do what I want. Right. And then we're faced with this resistance. We want to feel powerful. We want to feel in our sovereignty. So there's, it's so much more powerful when we can ask ourselves, well, how does this make my body feel? Do I feel good on keto? Do I feel good eating paleo? Like what is my body saying? Yeah.
• 41:05
  You were wise beyond your years. How old are you? I'll be 34 in June. Oh, okay. You're, I think. I'm older than you thought. You've taken care of your mind and body so well, you look 25. So I was like, how am I, am I talking to say some of it?
• 41:21
  have to have with wisdom comes experience or with experience comes wisdom and i just think that sometimes you need to experience things in life and if a 25 year old walks in even if they're killing your life you're like a little skeptical i get i get it
• 41:35
  So I'm a big habits and routine guy. And you alluded on it a very, so I believe in positive momentum, negative momentum. You can just look at the world and see that. That's simple. Once you get on that, it's tough to get off. But positive momentum does the same thing. Before I even think when I wake up in the morning, I've got my gym clothes on and I'm headed out the door.
• 41:58
  So I'd have to interrupt that momentum. It's just a good habit to have. So you talked a little bit about what does your daily routine look like? Specifically acknowledge the first thing you do in the morning and the last thing you do before bed. I say gratitude for what I'm grateful for in the morning and then what I was grateful for that day.
• 42:17
  I love that. So yeah, it's, it's changed. It's changed a lot for me from very routine to now. I think I wake up and one of the things that I like to do is even if I, sometimes I do a long meditation, but sometimes I just like to sit for a few minutes and get really quiet with myself. What's a long meditation to you?
• 42:38
  Hmm. I mean, it could vary sometimes like I haven't been as much lately, but sometimes like 45 minutes to an hour, depending on what I'm doing. But it's not typically lately. It's been around a half an hour. Um, but sometimes what I do is if I'm not up for a full meditation or I want to do something else, I think it's so valuable instead of waking up and like notifications and this, and I got to go and to do's.
• 43:05
  from a science perspective, it actually activates that fight or flight system. And I know I'm probably going to be on the prowl or something for food later to calm that nervous system. So I feel so much more powerful in myself. If I just take a minute of just quiet where I'm breathing with my body.
• 43:23
  And I'm actually taking a minute to just use my breath to calm my nervous system. And I can feel. I can feel when I'm like up here in my head and going, going, going. This is nervous system response. If I can breathe and come into my body, I actually create more like it's almost like my body's my partner and I'm connecting with it first thing in the morning so that if it has something to tell me throughout the day, like, hey, we're getting anxious or hey, we're really stressed or hey, we need this or...
• 43:47
  Hey, we're hungry or whatever it is. Like I have that direct connection. I have direct access to it. So I usually just spend a couple of minutes just breathing with my body, calming my nervous system. And I'm doing just like a check of like, what do I really need? What's present today? Is there any anxiousness? I can have awareness of it instead of letting all this stuff that I don't even know what's happening in my body control my behaviors and actions. It's like we're, we're tapped in. I can't believe we've been talking for 45 minutes. It's, it's,
• 44:17
  I could talk to you for hours. First of all, you're going to teach me how to meditate that long. I do 10 minutes and it's a lot for me. And I just, I want more. I find myself whenever I miss it, I can feel it, but I need more. I want to do more. And you know, I'm not, I'm totally not perfect with it either. Sometimes it's a 10 minute meditation, but what I end up finding is that the 10 minute meditation sometimes is harder than the half an hour or so because it's a 10 minute meditation.
• 44:40
  Because sometimes that 10 minutes is the busiest my mind gets. And it's almost like I have to push through the first 10 minutes. And then I like kind of sink in a little more. And I'm like, okay. Okay, we can be here. Okay, we can be here. I love your perspective on things. It was, was it?
• 44:57
  The Dalai Lama said that, I don't know where I read this, but I read so much. It all blends together. Said that if you're busy, you should meditate for 10 minutes. And if you're stressed. You don't have time. If you don't have time, you got to do double that. And I'm kidding. Not kidding. I noticed that if I can do it longer, that my day gets better. But I literally. It's hard. In my life.
• 45:20
  I'm making excuses. I'm just going to shut up right now. Well, no, it's great. I think that this is super valuable for people because this is where we're all at, right? Number one, we're up against an environment that's like, go, go, go. Notification, notification, things to do. Productivity. And for me, the...
• 45:37
  Why meditation has been number one, my biggest challenge, but also my biggest teacher is I can sit in with it and like just drop into it and be like, what is my discomfort with just being right now? Is it my fears around productivity? Is it my like, what does it actually bring up?
• 45:56
  of just sitting with myself in silence. It's the hardest and it's the biggest teacher. I can't stop. Like you see me looking up, you're just bringing out thoughts in me because I'm thinking of my meditation this morning and what was I thinking about? And it was a lot of what I'm doing with my daily routines. I'm so excited to live.
• 46:16
  Yeah. And I'm so I was so excited to meet you. I love coming into the studio. I like my producers are just life is so good. So I get going and I hit the ground. I'm like, I'm ready to go. Yeah. And I forget. Be here. And now be present right here is the moment. So the longer I can meditate there, you hit it on something.
• 46:46
  before the world pulls away at my mind, at my things, my creativity, whatever else, like, it's kind of like that, you know, it's like the relationship that you nurture, the relationship with yourself is the longest one you'll have for the longest relationship ever. So just anything that signifies before I pick up my phone, and I check emails, and I do all these things, what would it be like to do anything gratitude, a meditation, something that lets you and your body
• 47:15
  Yeah, I say it all the time. Self-care is not selfish, but I struggle mightily because I put everybody before me. Everybody. Because I'm so strong. It sounds so arrogant, but I'm so strong. I am harder than life. And I've been through it. And I trust myself emphatically. So I can give everything to you, be running on E, and still be okay. I know that without a fact. Yeah.
• 47:38
  Um, we're coming up against time and I got a bunch of questions that I want to ask because I just, I just adore you and I want to know more about you and I want the listeners to know about you. What do you do in your free time?
• 47:52
  You know, it's so, it's interesting because I, my life is very different here versus Costa Rica. When I'm in Costa Rica, I do a lot of walking, a lot of walking on the beach, a lot of being in the jungle. And I've actually been loving just creative work time where I'm carving out the space just to like think of ideas and be creative. And I love the coworking space that I'm at in Costa Rica. So I actually enjoy a lot like working on projects.
• 48:19
  Um, I've been exploring different healing modalities. Uh, Costa Rica has so many different opportunities for things like even just deeper yoga, meditation, breath work. They have so many different types of ceremonies you can experience. And I think that that I'm in a stage right now where just going deeper within myself has been the most exciting thing I could do. Do you, you, you live in San Diego, correct?
• 48:45
  I was, I moved out of San Diego. So I actually don't have a home base right now. So I'm actually going to be in Costa Rica for March and April. And then where I'm going to plant after that is kind of pending. Well, if you come back here, let me know what I can do to help you. I'm here all the time. You know, I visit Michigan all the time for sure. Add me to the list because I just, I love your energy. You're, you're, you're just, I don't know. I'm gushing over you and I apologize. What are, do you read or do you listen to audio books?
• 49:13
  It depends. Like I love, so I, it takes me about an hour to walk to my coworking space every day. I walk, I take about a 20 minute path through the jungle. And then I take about a half an hour walk down the beach to get to my coworking space. And I see the monkeys and the iguanas. It's like living in a zoo. It's super cool. That sounds, I'm going to kick you. My younger Kelly would have been laughing at me. That sounds amazing. It is.
• 49:35
  It sounds so peaceful. That's pure of either right there. Walking through the jungle. So when I do that walk, I like to listen to audio books that are very easy to understand. I think I'm I love audio books, but I don't think I'm an. What's it?
• 49:51
  audible learner is that right oh uh yes it is i'm more visual i'm the same way i have to yeah but if it's something i really need to like try to understand or it's a little bit pushing my uh my brain capacity i think i need to hold a physical book and read it that's similar what uh so what are you reading right now um
• 50:13
  Right now, I'm actually reading a series of books by there's it's called the Alexander Lowen Foundation. And this guy is a psychotherapist who wanted to change the world of psychotherapy. And he teaches something called bioenergetics, which is which is.
• 50:32
  Um, how like our emotion and our energetic state impacts our behavior. And so I'm reading a little, I'm reading a series of books. One of them is called, um, um, I think it's called the psychology of fear and terror, which is very interesting. Um,
• 50:52
  which talks about how when we're young and we have a really traumatic or difficult experience, or anytime we had an experience, it was too painful to experience. Sometimes those emotions are too intense and we leave the body and we go up into the mind. And that's known as the mind-body split. So now we're afraid of our emotions. We're afraid of anything that's actually happening in our physical body, which means like hunger, hunger,
• 51:16
  any kind of sensation, we kind of numb out from our bodies. And so when we are living in a state since we were younger of fear and terror,
• 51:25
  We're actually just living in our mind. And just like we talked about earlier today, your mind's job is to get you to have food for survival. So that means excess calories, sugar. So how that relates to health is that most people who have sugar cravings, they overeat, they don't understand, they don't trust their own bodies. It's because they're not living in their body because they don't trust their body. It's a very painful place to be in. Trust. That word trust keeps coming up. Right. So a diet isn't going to fix it.
• 51:53
  that, right? You still don't trust you. It's confusing. You're trying to eat from your mind. It's like sugar cravings, overeating excess calories. It's like, why am I broken? But, uh, healing that is reuniting where we can trust the body again and trust in our emotions and our feelings and,
• 52:09
  And so it's, um, I, I'm, I brought up the book and I'm not necessarily saying I recommend it for everyone. Cause it's a, it's a very intense book. It sounds like it. It's many stories of very intense trauma and things like that, that it was a very hard book to read. Um, but I'm, I'm also, I'm very curious about going deeper into helping people reunite and,
• 52:32
  their mind and their body and their emotions. And so he also has different books on the science of spirituality and, uh, pleasure. And one of the reasons why we actually can't stop eating is because we're actually lacking the ability to feel pleasure. And when we expand our capacity to feel and receive pleasure, we don't need excess food to do it. You just explained why I drink. Oh yes. It's my mind is blowing. You were, if you,
• 53:00
  You guys have got to go to Gina Werfel's Instagram and look her up. She's fascinating. Gina is spelled G I N A dot W O R F U L. It will be in the show notes. She has a website. I'm not seeing any. What is it? What is the website? It's the Mastering Mindfulness Institute.
• 53:17
  You are just absolutely amazing. I want to continue this conversation, but we're up against it. I got to ask you a couple more things. And I just thank you for coming so much. Oh my gosh. It's so fun to hang out with you and jam. We could talk all day. This is an interesting one. Tell us something you believe in that almost nobody agrees with you on. Oh man. I don't know. I think I'm pretty convincing. Almost no one agrees.
• 53:45
  Your smile is so sweet and you're so unopposing that it's like, if you said it is something and I said something, they're going to listen to you every time. It's the same thing. So fair. I'm like, I'm like, Oh, is there something that people would be like, no, it just, it just cannot possibly be. I mean, I think that, man, I would say that some of the things that I, that I say people have a hard time believing it's possible for themselves that, that they can trust themselves and they haven't been able to see it. I think there's also things like,
• 54:12
  A lot of practitioners, you know, don't believe in supplements. And I think that's crazy. I think supplements, the right ones are so helpful. We're going to have you back and we're going to talk only about that because I didn't get to ask any of those questions. I take I tinker with everything and we didn't get into that. I want to end it with with with happiness, because I think I think it's in the Bill Wright's pursuit of happiness. What do you think the key to happiness is?
• 54:41
  I think it's an unwillingness or a willingness to feel unhappy. And I think when I, years ago, I was at this very positive psychology chasing happiness and I was trying to outrun my sadness and my anxiety and my loneliness and all these feelings that I was so afraid of feeling. But then it created this very muted life because I didn't want to feel the bad feelings. I couldn't feel the good feelings.
• 55:06
  And so contrast, they just, the social media team just posted, posted about that. You got to know the contrast. Like I, you know, I used to drink like crazy and now I don't, I know both. So I'm versed to speak about which one is better. So I love that.
• 55:21
  think you have to feel the sadness in order to go up and feel the happiness. It's, it's like a, it's like a, the most beautiful song that I know. There's, there's a song that I really love. It's beautiful. And I, it's so amazing because there's so much contrast, like they go so deep and so low and then so high. And that's when I started really experiencing happiness. So it's, um, you're going to sing it for us.
• 55:42
  No, it's actually all instrumental. Thank God. I need to want me to sing for you. It's called... I'm now drawing a blank. It's Odeza's Higher Ground, but it's the only...
• 55:59
  I'm actually familiar with that. Odessa's Higher Ground, but there's no lyric. It's the one without the words. It's just instrumental. It's just instrumental. It's the Higher Ground instrumental. I feel like it's another version that I can't think of. No big deal. It's not the one with words because that one's different. Maybe it's acoustic version. Who knows? Something like that. We'll figure it out. Yeah. Is there something I haven't asked you today that you feel compelled to share? Hmm.
• 56:26
  I think what I just really want to leave with people is that when they understand themselves, that's like where your freedom is. That's where your medicine is. Regardless of whether it's a food and you need to understand your body and your chemistry and your hormones, or whether you need to understand your mind and your emotions and why you do what you do. Like there's so much freedom and power in understanding yourself.
• 56:52
  What's the first chapter of my book? Number one, self-awareness. That's exactly everything. That's number one. I have a book for you. I want to know how I can personally support you. And I want to add one thing because you're so amazing. Something I want to share is people...
• 57:09
  Reach out to people and enjoy because most people are good. And I'm so glad that for whatever reason, you came across my feed and we connected. And I just see us being lifelong friends and I'm excited. And I want to implore people and tell people to go out.
• 57:27
  And meet new people and do new things and be comfortable being uncomfortable and reaching out and doing things that are different. And great things happen. We've made a great friendship. I'm going to come visit you in Costa Rica. And it scares the crap out of me. I'm so excited. And I want to end it with how can we personally support you?
• 57:45
  Oh, man. I mean, I so appreciate the conversation. This has been just amazing. And I'm always available. I'm on Instagram, gina.warfel. If anybody has any thoughts or reflections or you want to connect, you can check out the Mastering Mindfulness Institute. I have so many different workshops that come up and things. Yeah.
• 58:06
  Go to her website. She's got the ultimate personalized health program on there. And it is, you heard her say it. It's not just giving you a piece of paper and telling you what not to do. It is fully engaged and she will change your life. I want to remind you that each and every episode is sponsored by National Technology Management, the easiest and best IT company to do business with, delivering peace of mind with technology every day. Visit trustntm.com for more info. Until next week, be hotter than life.
• 58:35
  Thank you for listening. Please rate and subscribe to Harder Than Life and let's take this to the next level. Get connected at the links below.