Latest / Everyday Ancestral with James Barry / "Weight Is a Symptom, Not the Problem" — Jennifer Powter on Diet Culture, Emotional Eating & Body Trust

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"Weight Is a Symptom, Not the Problem" — Jennifer Powter on Diet Culture, Emotional Eating & Body Trust · Everyday Ancestral with James Barry

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We're not talking about food sourcing, organ meats, or ancestral rituals.
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We're talking about something very modern,
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diet culture, body image, and the mindset patterns that shape how we eat and feel about ourselves.
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Here's the thing, if we truly want to reconnect with our ancestral selves to be intuitive, grounded,
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and at peace with our bodies, we have to address these modern struggles head on.
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We can't live ancestrally while thinking like a
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dieter or constantly battling our bodies.
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That's why I invited Jennifer Powder.
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She helps people break free from diet culture and build a healthier,
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more compassionate relationship with food and body.
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Because diet culture isn't disappearing anytime soon.
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We need the tools to navigate it without losing ourselves.
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Jennifer, thank you so much for joining me.
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Oh my god, James, I'm so happy to be here and that is just such an awesome intro.
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I love it. I hope you guys like it speaks to the truth right off the bat,
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which is we are so focused on food and this relationship to food where I really believe
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we need to get back in touch with the relationship we have with our own cell,
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our own feelings, our own state of stress, the operating systems and belief systems we have
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around food, and that is what diet culture does not dig into.
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So I'm glad we're going to get the chance to do it today.
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Yeah, I mean as well, one of the things you say though is that weight loss is really not
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about the food, right? Never. It's the why. Yeah, it's not about the food.
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Weight loss, well, let's start with the, so the problem for so many women and for anybody listening,
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I've been overweight. There's a reason why I'm so passionate about being in this industry,
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which I think the weight loss industry in itself can be a very toxic industry.
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And the weight is a symptom. If you are carrying excess weight on this,
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your perfect beautiful body that functions, when we treat it well, it functions as it should.
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But when we carry excess weight, we view weight as the problem. And then we try to treat this as
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a problem. And for so many of us, it's a symptom of so much else that's going on in our life.
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And for some, you know, sometimes it's food misinformation. We've embarked with
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diet culture about how to eat and diet dogma and good. And we've got shame on food and red light,
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green light, aren't we? A lot of times it's around not recognizing our own inherent patterns with
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food, belief systems around food, the way that we use food to emotionally cope when we're
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suffering in our lives. And so it's a much more complex problem than just eat this, do that.
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Emotional triggers though. And this food culture, they're just kind of hijacking our capacity to live
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in alignment with ancestral rhythms. So how do we, like how, well, let's first identify how
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they are doing that. But then how do we break free from that? Okay, I love this. So let's talk about
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what you and I are probably going to be super in alignment on and agree as food production has changed
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dramatically since World War II, but really in the 1970s, right? We know that companies and food
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companies became very interested. I mean, in how to get food, shelf stable, last longer,
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be quick and convenient, convenience foods because women were now going into the workforce.
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And we watch this rise of food production while the war on fat began at around the same time,
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which meant sugar was being madly poured into our food to make it taste good. We have this bliss,
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you know, it basically food started to become a chemical composition of stuff that we could buy
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off a shelf and no longer the way we were meant to eat. Now at the same time, we have this emotional
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dynamic of technology that was supposed to make our life easier, have more free time, which is the
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exact opposite. I know your life, I know mine. We are often now wired in a way that we were never
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meant to be wired and living in a state of chronic stress that many of us were never, well, most of us
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were never designed to live in. And so life became hard, food became easy. We also have the increase
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in plate size, bull size, portions have increased. And then all of a sudden, we all think we have weight
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problems instead of recognizing the how the when the why we turned to food. And this is, I love this
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topic because knowing better does not equate to doing better. I think every single one of us knows
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that carrots at 9 p.m. are a healthier choice than chips, but is are you really going to grab the carrots?
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Even when you know, so how come why not? And that's the deeper conversation.
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Yeah, yeah, really is. One of the tools I am always recommending to people and I'm curious
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which ones you would add to this. So I know myself now at this age. I'm like, look, I have no will
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power. If it's in the kitchen, I will create an excuse to eat it. And the excuse doesn't even
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make sense. It doesn't matter. But I will make an excuse to eat it. And one of my big ones is
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it's going to get it's going to go to waste because it's going to go bad, right? That's one of my big
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ones. But the tool I'm always imparting to people is like, just don't bring it into your kitchen.
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If it's not there, you're now making it harder for yourself to get access to these emotionally
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triggering foods or these foods that are triggered by the emotions we have. You know, however you
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want to word that, right? So that's one tool that I always imply to people, what are some other
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tools people can have to immediately like just not even like take take it the option off the table.
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So then that way you're kind of forced to just be in the emotions or or whatever state you're
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currently in when you're craving those trigger foods. So I love it. And I'm hoping you're okay if I
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add in because one of the things that we teach in the academy is trying to create or live in a
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perfectly sterile environment where your trigger foods are not around you. It still gives your
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power to the food not to yourself. And it means that your success will be conditional. It'll be
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conditional upon your environment. It'll be conditional upon the friends you're around. It'll be
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conditional on your social situation or if you're traveling around vacation, which then if we
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can't or don't feel like we can control that we lose our ability to stay or remain disciplined,
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successful, committed. So I like to take a second part of that. And this goes to my own story of,
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you know, back when again, I had masters level up for level training and nutrition, physiology,
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et cetera. I knew better and did not do better. So I knew that the chocolate chips in the wine at
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night were not the best choice, but I wanted them. And I think this is where diet culture is
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failing people so much is we just try to give people this rigid set of structure and rules to
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live by, which is how diet culture creates the narrative of deprivation, restriction,
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can't have, don't get. And the minute somebody hears that, what do they want?
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What they can have and we want the thing. And so what I often ask in a tool, I would so invite
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any listener to ask himself is I want the thing, the food, but what's the thing under the thing?
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And every single time it is for the emotional reward that you are craving that you do not know how
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to meet or regulate or satisfy or give to yourself in a non harmful way. And that becomes the
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emotional resilience work that we have, we get to do at this point yourself. Aware me too.
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And I still had to skill build to handle the triggers of my life, because life, frankly,
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it's not getting easier, James. There's like the stride, you know, the kids and the pressures. And
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so if I kept using food and outsourcing my feelings to food to soothe, cope, numb, distract,
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it's pretty possible for me to be 200 plus pounds. And not that there's anything wrong with that
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if you feel good there, I just didn't feel good there.
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Well, you know, and I know this is controversial given that we're trying, you know, in this
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and please no one listening to think I'm body shaming, but I actually don't think you should feel good
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being 200 pounds overweight. Because the reality is is we treat people how we feel. And I've
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witnessed it in my 20 plus years, you know, in this field of just seeing people not feeling good
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in your body. And so I'm not saying that 200 pounds means you're not going to feel good. I'm more
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just saying, if you don't feel good in your body at an underweight, being underweight or overweight,
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then that to me is the issue. Like we feel good in our body.
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Well, I think totally. And that's why I certainly don't prescribe a weight for somebody to be at.
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I think BMI and all of the stuff that's out there right now can be really harmful for some people.
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I've got some clients who starting weight as other people's end goal. But at the end of the day,
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we are very clear. I know you have a research background said, why there are certain indicators
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that say when we are X percent over our typical healthy body weight, we were going to have
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comorbidities and excess fat mass on a body frame. And our body composition matters most. And right
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now a lot of us are over fat and under muscled. And that is because we're so sedentary. And then
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we're tired. And then we're not eating well. And then we're jacking up on coffee and calming down
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with wine. And we wonder why we don't feel good when we're, you know, if we take a look and I love
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this because of the way you talk about ancestral living, you know, the conveniences and comforts
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of life, which have created our misalignment with our health, they didn't exist way back then.
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Life was harder. There was more natural hardship. And we adapted to that. Now we have a lower level
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of emotional resiliency. And we've adapted to being comfortable. I love that you're talking
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about emotional resilience. Because to your point, resilience is, I believe, what we should be
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putting in front of us. Like we have to be more resilient. The current modern society we're
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in, but just entering the future, resilience is key. Resilience from viruses, resilience from,
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you know, anything that comes away, whether it's franken foods or now they're even talking about,
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you know, putting, there's already experiments happening where they're putting vaccines in foods,
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which is crazy. But then also they're on the flip side of that, there is, you know, basically where
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you can genetically create the child you want. Which to me, that's a, that's a Pandora's box because
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it's like, well, then what does resilience look like when you think you're in control of things?
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Because the reality is is what we're talking about is we're never really in control of things.
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And so there's a totally 100%. We're not, but we're not in control. We're not, and I love that
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this because I'm not in control of what you do. I'm not in control of what my children do. I cannot
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micro-manage everything out there to make myself comfortable, which is why, and I say it, I always
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tell them and I work with predominantly, listen, no one's coming to do this for you. If it is to be,
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it's up to me, my health, my life, my happiness, the quality of my life. Like I get to be the one
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that creates that. And if I'm living an outcome right now that I do not like, let's just say
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I'm overweight or I don't have the bank account or the relationship that I desire, the only reason
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is because of the past and previous decisions. That's it. And your future is completely unwritten.
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So being stuck becomes choice, especially if you believe that it's just around, oh, I just need to
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know more. Most people could write their own health book or diet blog or something. It's not
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the knowledge that's the problem. I mean, sometimes it is. It's the application of it and the
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application of it consistently over time because health does not change in a day. There is no
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365 day cleanse. There was no whole 365, right? There are short-term things that allow people to
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pretend that they can try for a period of time to get them a result and then it gets too hard
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and they quit. And so I'm a big fan of bringing stuff in and why I love so much about what you do
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is you're making it easy so we can add every day good nutrients, dense nutrients to our everyday
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foods and we're missing the boat on that in a big way. Yeah, I agree. Okay, so for the people,
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the listeners that are entrenched in this busy modern life that we're highlighting, the high stress,
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the process foods, the digital overload that we're highlighting, how do you guide them back
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to the ancestral principles of nourishment, rest, movement and recovery? How do we guide them back?
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Well, I think that's the perfect word. Listen, if you're at a point in life or you're not feeling
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awesome, you probably do need a guide because you got lost. I love that you use that word. Maybe I
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might use the word coach. Somebody else might use a different kind of word, but if you are not
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living the life or you're, if you do not have optimal health, the way that you wish,
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then you are going to probably need some support in helping you skill belt. I went to school for a
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long time to become an expert. So many women believe in or people believe that they can and should
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be experts in this one particular area of life and yet the knowledge hasn't been passed down.
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Cooking practices. Do you know how many women I work with who don't like to cook, never got taught
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how to cook? Basic skill sets. And so we're expecting that we should be an expert in nutrition and
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expert in physiology and expert in fat metabolism and expert in hormone regulation and expert in
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our own cultivation of emotional resilience. I work with a majority of 50s and 60s population
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who've never been to therapy. We don't sometimes know our own stuff and so being guided to
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get tools and not just teach the tool. I always say it's like my husband's a contractor.
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You know, I could have a picture on my desk and be like, I really want to get the picture on the
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wall and there could be a hammer right beside it and he could be like, oh, well, just pick up the
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hammer and put the nail in and I could be like, I don't really feel like I'm good at hammers.
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I don't really feel like using a hammer, right? So sometimes the tools are right there and then we
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get a hijack but there are feelings and it's like who cares if you feel like using a hammer or not
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pick it up and put the like put the nail in the wall and hang the picture. Like get over your
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feelings and take the action but you got to know the tool exists to even do that. You're smiling.
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I love that. The way I bottom line it is it's not about one day. It's about day one.
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Yeah. Start now. I just do it. Oh my god, James. Yeah, it's like I just, you know, my mom
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85 completely wheelchair bound. I've been a caregiver since she was 72.
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Narapathy got to her and diabetes and she was a smoker and high cholesterol and high blood pressure
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and all the things sedentary woman and I always say listen if you're somebody out there right now
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who wants to be able to get to a toilet. Get off the toilet when you're 85. Start now.
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Start now because we're going to be taking massive deposits out of our health bank account and
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most of us aren't putting deposits into it and you know what we do now at this stage of life
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it'll never get easier to change than right now day one and so we have to take a look at what
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blocks us. Yeah and I want to let's talk about some of those blocks because you know really
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what we're talking about is probably people have heard a lot in this way you can either
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spend the money now on your health or you can spend it later in hospital bills right that's
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that's the kind of phrase people hear a lot. Yeah. So let's identify what can people do right now
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that will help them get change this mindset to help them change these kind of sedentary
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patterns. The answer is we got to get radically responsible. We really do. We lie to ourselves.
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Let's be honest. We pretend we're going to start tomorrow. We're going to start next Monday.
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We're going to start January 1st. We lie and you know my second book I wrote self sabotage or
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stop sabotaging because knowing and doing the gap in between is sabotage and until we can recognize
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our own unique patterns of sabotage we keep chasing and trying to solve the wrong problem.
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Most of us have a sabotage problem and the sabotage what it looks like for so many of us is
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self neglect. You get habituated to neglecting yourself often it's you're busy you're a young
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family you're running your careering you're parenting your husbanding or wiping your volunteering
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and your own self care really slowly falls off the priority list. Self betrayal. Anybody who said
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I'm going to start eating better tomorrow. I'm not going to drink tonight. You drink tonight. We
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the impairment to our health is like death by a thousand cuts or a thousand white lies made
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every single day and repeated. So when you start to become radically honest with where you're
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lying to yourself why for me I indulged in over consuming alcohol and chocolate chips because I
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was in the lie that my marriage was okay and that everything would be fine when the truth was it
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was falling apart and I was lonely but it was easy to make my weight the problem not the bigger life
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circumstance that I didn't want to admit to ourselves and so I think a lot of us stay and denial
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because it's easier to have a problem that's out there that we think we can solve out there versus
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as to what's really going on with me right now and self-worth is also part of that low self-worth
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that we get our worth out of chasing our productivity and forget that it's we get to spend our
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own time energy money on ourselves it doesn't have to be for the house or the family or the
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vacation and for so many people that is where we we spend we spend on what we value isn't a lot
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of this sabotaging really trauma response anyway yeah really candy you know James if you had told
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me 15 years ago when I entered this industry how many women would share with me stories of trauma
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and I mean for sure the big T stuff I wasn't prepared for early childhood sexual abuse physical
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abuse incredible emotional abuse has been neglect abandonment but what's more interesting too is
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I call it little T and all of us have it it's all of the little traumas which really would be
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all of the needs that you had as a child that did go unmet be seen not heard show up conform
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contort yourself don't express those negative feelings that aren't acceptable just be polite be
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pleasant be kind be sweet be beautiful whatever it is the messaging was in a family system
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and so yeah it really is a huge trauma response and I definitely had to build my skill set up
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not a therapist but I would be remiss in my professional duty if I did not have emotional
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intelligence and why are we the way that we are if I didn't do that work to support the change
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yeah you know one one kind of story I was telling myself particularly whenever I would travel
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on my own you know for conferences or whatnot it I would be like well this is my little secret
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you know like that I'm now traveling so I'm away from the accountability that my wife and I
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share with each other I'm away from my normal life my routines so I can eat whatever I want here
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and not be mirrored back that I'm checking out you know or that I'm you know not being an
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integrity with kind of the health promises that I make to my audience but also to myself right yeah
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and so I would do that and then never tell anyone because of my little secret and
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and I was sharing with my wife just about a week ago because I just got back from a trip
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and I was like something's changed because I'm now traveling and I actually don't want to do that
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like I want to be an integrity with my own health with my own declarations of what I want my
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health to be I want to I'm holding myself accountable now for for the outcome my desired outcome
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and I'm not wavering and I'm like I now see like something I told a friend of mine who was
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struggling with stuff is I said oh actually I may have even been my daughter too I think I talk
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to a couple people but point is is I said you already know what a chocolate chip cookie tastes like
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you know I mean like why check out like why check out like you think is gonna be so grandiose but
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you already know how it tastes and you already know how it feels in your body so what about your
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commitment to you and I feel that like I feel like I am more committed to myself and because I'm
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more committed to myself I'm more committed to my family to my wife to like it extends beyond right
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but it has to start with me I love this so much can I give like a funny metaphor that I use in my
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community I don't know if it will be off-putting but okay it was just because you used traveling
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and staying and you shared this so again it comes down to belief systems and it comes down to
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value and I love that you use the word integrity we use that word integrity in our community all the
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time are you who you say you want to be when no one's looking right and I joke and I say women
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will say well it's just so hard for me to do do this when I'm out and I'm like look let's just
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say you're married I'm married I love my husband we have the agreement of commitment to each other
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and so it'd be like oh I'm so easy to be committed and faithful when I'm in my house but God when
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I go to the bar I just can't help it I mean I'm just out of control with men I mean I flirt and when
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I travel off like but because I have a commitment to him somebody else no I honor that commitment
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and it's a very unique spin to recognize that I'm just as worth it to honor commitments to myself to
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around my health and to like recognize the absurdity of our thinking sometimes like oh it's easy
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for me to be in control in my house but the minute I'm on vacation at a restaurant out with friends
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I have no control no you've got an excuse because you're saying something else is more important than
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the commitment to yourself why do you think we do that let's be honest a lot of people do cheat
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on their commitments to their marriage a lot of people do cheat on their commitments to their health
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right so why do you think that we do that I do think it is a huge part of only allowing ourselves
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to accept what we believe we're worth and we'll sabotage the good we'll sabotage it and I don't
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believe that there's a lot of people out there who are consciously wanting to destroy I mean listen
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let's just take a look at the definition of sabotage to deliberately take actions to make something
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not work that's a definition of a dictionary put self in front of it to deliberately and I believe
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it's conscious subconscious take actions to make myself my life not work which is why we usually
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have to go back to those belief systems the identity that you hold and go where does this need
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to transform what part of this is not working for me anymore what part of me at 20 that maybe
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had as women you know many of us have gone through horrible situations where personal safety or
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emotional safety was violated and not hold like hold ourselves hostage to the version of us
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of when that happened but to recognize hey I'm at a new point like I'm I'm personal I'm 50
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I get to respond differently and to really get out of being a victim to what happened to us at
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a point in time and get radically responsible to how we deal and heal with our own traumas negative
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thinking dysfunctional aspects of our personality that we just say well that's the way I am
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and we now know you can change like that's the beautiful thing but we also get really good at what
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we practice and many of us will practice breaking our own commitments to stay stuck in a loop
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that keeps our identity intact as opposed to getting really uncomfortable and changing
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yeah it's the it's the being in the discomfort though that is so challenging and to your point
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it's if you're not training for if you're not training like if your life is always so comfortable
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then of course the uncomfortable is going to be even harder right so if you're not finding resilience
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in your day to day and how does one step out of that cycle I love that word this is such a great
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conversation because notice how it's not about the weight or the food like right this is the
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crack so what we're all up against which is one of the very foundational principles I teach is
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you know you it's our responsibility to have a vision for our life a vision we can say dreams
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goals and vision to have a vision of wherever going but most of us are so tired we're just like
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getting through day to day and the vision can get money we can lose sight of it and then we get lost
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in just the busyness of life because let's be honest that's possible so if we're not taking time
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to self-reflect or to contemplate our own lives where who we are what we want to still see do be
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experiencing create we can't actually live it because everything's created twice once
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up here next to reality so we've got to be brave enough to give ourselves the benefit of our own
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time to ask what does my best life look like and to not look to our past to predicate our future
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most of us look to our past well I can't do that because my person you know somebody told me
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in high school I was a horrible writer oh I wrote two books but I had to overcome that because
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I thought I was a horrible right even as I'm writing it but in 2012 I put on a vision board a
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little snapshot I cut it out with a printer I put my name on a bestseller list I had no idea
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what I might write about but I knew I wanted to write and yet I had to overcome the story of
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someone telling me a harmful story that wasn't really true it's just her opinion but somebody's
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opinion of you does not make it fact but it does you know I can't hurt our feelings so I think
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that's what we have to take ourselves on which is why having a guy to coach and mentor a therapist
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helps us expose our own belief systems and stories otherwise we're just swimming in them all the time
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it's like a fish and water it doesn't know what's in water it's the same with us there's a couple
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of questions that are definitely popping in my head around this topic but the first one I'd love
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you to advise us on is we're talking about guides right like of getting support but as you and I
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both know not everyone provides the same kind of support you know the support that is the most
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helpful there's a lot of kind of people out there with good intentions but not great execution
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so what should people be looking for when they're trying to figure out who to guide them and who
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to outreach to like are there qualities are there words or is there something that people should be
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kind of specifically looking for I think so I think we don't know to look for it because we hope
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that the level of affect in our life will come from action okay and let me explain that so it's
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like we just want to find the person who's going to tell us what to do and give us the perfect plan
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the perfect exercise plan the fruit like perfect food plan the perfect list of foods we can or we
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can't you probably already know that but we still search for something to attack our problem at the
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level of action and what I believe should be in a necessary component of any guide is are we
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looking at the level of thought feeling are we is there a mindset component to whatever program
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or book your reading or I mean almost all books will have some sort of mental emotional component
27:43
to it to help us with processing a lot of stuff out there for sure in the weight loss space for
27:48
me it's take this pill take this injection take this supplement get your prepackaged food two bars
27:53
two shakes like it's like how does that help you when you're emotional and a mess at 9 pm are you
27:59
going to go get your bar and your prepackaged food like no so I think that you know on some level
28:04
you've got to be looking at yourself and recognizing emotional resilience doesn't come
28:10
uh in a product that we've got to find a way whether it's even a sage friend or at older friend
28:17
or a different somebody more objective to you because the truth is our immediate circle they just
28:22
want to see us happy and comfortable right hey James have a glass of wine with me let's just
28:27
say oh what oh come on let's just have fun or oh let's eat ice cream together that'll be really
28:31
fun to go and do and then we can shake up they're not like oh okay let's hold you to a higher
28:35
level of integrity and honor that commitment you've made for yourself so a lot of times our
28:40
our family and friends can actually be an external sabotaging force not intentionally
28:45
but they also have a narrative about you that's what James does or that's what Jen does
28:49
Jen likes wine let's bring wine or Jen likes to eat this so I made this for you how come you're
28:53
not eating it and then we get into the implicit nature of exchange through action oh you made
28:58
this I better eat it to show you I love you as opposed to thank you so much for thinking of me I
29:03
love the recipe I'm full right now and keep that boundary for myself in my health and on the flip
29:10
side of that it's also the projection right so the person could be actually it could be more about
29:15
them and they're just trying to get you to be inclusive so that they can justify their desires right
29:21
100% hey if I think you're a good person and you do what I want to do you're good so I'm good
29:26
because you're doing the behavior I want to engage in I've now validated myself
29:30
yeah or I want to drink so if I get you to drink then that justifies me drinking during the day
29:36
or whatever it is right anything yeah it's why you become like the people you hang out with
29:41
right you and I know this we put ourselves into communities where we're around people doing
29:45
incredible things it's inspiring and it shows us what's possible if your circle is someone who's
29:52
well just look at your circle right with health outcomes and look at our family circle you know a
29:56
lot of times um husband's wives will grow their health together or think their health together
30:02
because of the family habits and values you know children when I was going through my schooling
30:08
you know if you had one obese parent that child that child had a 60% more likely chance of being
30:14
obese of two parents were obese that child's risk was 90% and then they say it's genetic no I'm
30:20
sorry it's not who controls what comes in the house right um so there's it's multifactorial it's
30:26
multi it's multi layered if it was simple um we'd solve these problems and so I think that's
30:35
you know anything too good to be true is and when something makes sense and lands it makes sense
30:40
ancestral eating going back to whole foods not shopping chemical made food stable shelf stable
30:47
products you go to Costco you take a look at the size of a cart and what's in there
30:51
and then you can objectively look at the health of the person you know there isn't there's a connection
30:56
sometimes I just thought of something and I think we should establish it together right now on
31:03
this podcast because I think this is one of the first times anyone will ever say this is you know
31:07
how we normally look at a plate and we say oh let's divide that plate into the categories that we
31:12
want to emphasize you know so we we talk about protein should be a certain percentage we talk
31:17
about um vegetables fat you know we break it down by the plate well what if we did the same thing
31:23
with a cart well what should the grocery cart look like like what what percentage of these
31:28
it should look alive like it should look alive and not full of things that that are in jars bags
31:35
or boxes like even that you know simple things like uh you know we got I had I listen I say this
31:43
with so much love and compassion because I've done it all I've been the woman who was 40 pounds
31:47
overweight who was an emotional mess who did not have resilience who had unhealthy patterns for my
31:52
past uh and so I've been able to go on a journey of discovery and of healing and of all the things
31:59
and it's probably a forever journey frankly but I would go to Safeway I'd be hungry I didn't have
32:04
much money I would immediately go to the chocolate almond section because I've been running all day
32:08
and I would get a little bag of chocolate almonds and I would be eating them as I was grocery shopping
32:12
I would just go up and down and you know I had to learn this is ridiculous gen perimeter of the
32:19
grocery store shop by a list do not make don't put anything in the cart that isn't on the list because
32:24
if it goes into your cart like you said you're making a commitment to eat anything that you put in
32:30
you can pretend it's for somebody else you can pretend it's for when you have a party
32:33
but I mean let's be honest how many of us have bought chips and said oh that'll be for Saturday
32:38
and Tuesday night you're in the chips at 9 o'clock like we're human and of course the size as well
32:43
right like what we're buying the family size or the or the value pack because well it's cheaper
32:48
and well you know what we'll use it during the week we won't eat it all on one day we'll just
32:54
use it throughout the week it's like no probably you're gonna need it on one day and or you're gonna
32:58
make excuses of why you need to eat it every day if it's too big yeah you know what I find I just
33:03
did a presentation and I had a bunch of food I had gummy bears and licorice and chocolate and wine
33:09
and chips and smart pop or skinny popcorn and the martis we looked at the marketing of it and then
33:15
we looked at the serving sizes now everything has a food label food companies are actually telling
33:21
you hey this is the recommended serving size but for most of us we don't look at that we each the
33:27
power of completion which means the bag is done the jar is done the box is empty and often you're
33:33
eating five six seven servings in an evening of this fake food but you won't eat a sandwich right
33:40
you won't you're avoiding the real food so you're giving yourself the treat and have no idea that
33:45
you've just consumed equivalently the you know a loaf of bread in the form of calories but not
33:51
nutrition right so it's like we've also got that misinformation out there where we really just
33:56
don't know we don't know how to interpret a label we don't know or understand about the
34:01
impact of sugar we just need to look at diabetes right now I like you know we're it's wild
34:07
this world and so when we start to recognize a food can make us sick and healthy or sick and fat
34:12
and not feel good and have all these biochemical markers of dysfunction disease it can do the opposite
34:20
it can make us feel vibrant and healthy and alive and energetic and it doesn't have to be a pain
34:26
in the ass like I feel like everybody thinks that taking care of themselves is just such a difficult
34:31
pain in the butt thing to do and that would be a trauma thing why is looking after ourselves
34:36
such a pain when we look after the things we love like our children we'll go to the ends of the
34:40
world for them but not ourselves do you think that that's one in towards supporting you know
34:48
confidence and and accountability is to actually start looking yourself as you know maybe putting
34:57
photos of yourself of when you were a baby and just reminding yourself that you were once you
35:02
know you are that child that you that that you aren't how you feel but you are a real
35:10
person who's vulnerable who's susceptible who's who needs love just as much as you are probably
35:16
giving out to other people yeah of course of course I think a lot of times you know I want to listen
35:24
my dad's past and before he even had my life for a long time and you know one of the things I
35:30
crave the most was like the love and approval of my dad right and I had a therapist who said you
35:36
know what Jen stop asking the questions can get grateful for the lessons right imagine your dad
35:42
as a little boy who did the who had his own traumas imparted on to him who then became a man who
35:47
married many times had children um did the best he could with what he had and it wasn't what I
35:54
needed or wanted but like as long as I was to hold myself to a victim's story of well I didn't get
35:59
the love I needed and wanted for my dad or my mom they didn't show up for me the whole point is
36:04
I get to show up for me and to not make my love or myself worth or my acceptance conditional on
36:11
somebody else but to learn how to give it to myself and uh yeah let me just say it was it it's not
36:18
like a switch you know all the things that people said would help me like journaling and uh
36:24
meditating and processing and I was like well that won't work for me I'm too busy to turn
36:30
all like I used to really uh be arrogant frankly in what I thought wouldn't want work for me until
36:35
my life got really bad really hard and you know what that did made me humble and it made me willing
36:42
to try and that was my entry point into a new a new beginning do you think that life has to get
36:50
really bad for us to actually see that light because I do notice that with health or let's say with
36:59
dietary change typically in my experience it comes really in two ways you get sick or someone
37:09
you love gets sick but most people won't leave that comfort zone without either those two things
37:17
yeah no I don't believe it has to get to that it's not uncommon in my world too a lot of times
37:24
it'll be a woman will see the highest number she's ever seen on the scale or all of a sudden she's
37:28
being told she needs to go on medications and doesn't want to be on medications like a diabetes
37:32
medication or hypertension or statin and they're like oh let me just try on my own um what I do see
37:39
though is we ignore the whispers we just ignore the whispers along the way and if you ignore the whispers
37:46
of gut of intuition of somebody even telling you a doctor 10 years ago you know you should probably
37:51
get a little healthier then the messages get louder and louder and louder until we're hit without
37:56
proverbial two by four and we wake up so how you know for anybody listening who is getting messages
38:04
and that message could be like this is how I view it we have a message of let's just say it's
38:09
nine o'clock I'm gonna go for the glass of wine I might have a message that says oh you don't
38:12
really need that right now go to bed and I could hear it but I'm gonna immediately override it
38:17
with let's find just go get the glass of wine and enjoy yourself so it's like really to become
38:22
discerning of the voices you're hearing you're gonna have a gut instinct and I call it your heart
38:27
of heart self who's trying to guide you and you're gonna have an inner critic nasty little voice
38:32
that just is seductive and is trying to enroll you into doing what you've always done and stay
38:37
comfortable and I think I don't think it has to be bad I'm for some people it we don't learn it
38:44
I was told once people either learn through pleasure or pain most of us will learn through pain
38:50
uh I made a radical decision to start to enjoy wanting to learn through pleasure I'm in practice
38:56
I'm in practice you know like this is fun let's do more of it as opposed to uh this is really hard
39:01
I got to fix you know and pain attention to the messages do you know what I mean on those
39:06
I find a lot of times when we're relying on our head space to change that it actually helps
39:13
it's even more important to shift your physical space so do you have any tips of what someone can do
39:18
when when they are kind of playing the angel on the shoulder versus the devil you know where they're
39:23
kind of going back and forth mentally what can they do in that moment to break free from that like
39:31
is it like leave the environment go for a walk like what what do you recommend I love this so uh
39:37
we actually teach our my community you actually need to pre decide so like right now while you're
39:44
listening to this episode or watching or however you're consuming it is like you got to know
39:48
you're witching hours you got to know when you're at your weakest because if you're trying to make
39:52
a logical decision in the moment your brain is emotionally hijacked you won't the brain science
39:57
tells us you're going to go back to what's the fastest pathway is the habit you've got not the
40:02
habit you're creating so we have to look at brain science and let that inform us and go okay
40:07
I'm going to get out sticky notes I'm going to write down five things that when I feel the
40:12
beginning of that feeling or the seduction of the voice to go and be engaged in something that's
40:17
self-harm let's say I'm gonna go to bed take a shower call a friend get out for a walk uh put on
40:24
music light a candle you need to have your options actually written down ahead of time because
40:32
we can only be as good as our structures of support and if we don't have structures of support
40:38
already it's like our scaffolding then we fall so I want to have scaffolding around me to keep
40:45
me safe and to like to support me but I have to think of it ahead of time I love that I want to
40:52
repeat that we're only as good as our structures of support I love that don't have good ones right
41:01
and really it ties into the resilience right you can't you can't just one day be resilient you have
41:05
to have struck you have to have practice and learnings that you know come with it so that way
41:13
when you are in that environment of like high stress it's like well you've been practicing that
41:18
meditation and practicing like finding calm you know no matter what's going on you know like it's
41:24
not just something you just do one day it's like you you you are literally structuring your
41:29
structuring your life where every day you're incorporating you know micro dosing of whatever
41:35
that resilience you're building towards so if it's meditation that's one thing if it's if it's
41:42
you know movement you're every day you're doing a little bit whatever it is it's like being
41:48
stronger to kill you know whatever it is right yeah you know I love it because I mean if you think
41:56
of yourself like an athlete like you know if you're somebody who's in training any high performance
42:01
team high performance player there's coaches and they don't just play their play out I mean look
42:06
at the blue jays right now I'm in Canada you can tell but like they they practice with a level
42:12
of intensity so they can play like how they practice and so they practice the things are good at
42:19
the things are not so that when it comes to game time it's almost autonomic for them and we got
42:25
to look at ourselves the same way um we get good at what we practice if I and this is the other part
42:31
is if I've practiced self sabotage for 40 years what do you think I'm good at sabotage right
42:38
so it's not going to change in a day just because I have a new thought which says I'm going to get
42:43
healthier I'm going to eat better I'm going to get more committed to my core values around health
42:47
movement I said no I'm going to have a whole like 80,000 worth of thoughts and operating systems
42:54
that tell me who I've been in the past so I got a practice shedding an identity that is no longer
43:00
working for me and let's just say like if you're here right now like God you made it here right now
43:06
stop punishing yourself for anything you did to get here and recognize you did what you had to do
43:11
to survive or make it through and you now have the privilege of new decisions today and the new
43:17
decisions today are going to pave the way not for tomorrow your brand new health but two months three
43:23
months a year from now and to recognize we're just a we're cellular beings everything's like
43:29
degenerating and propagating and renewing every single day and the cellular being you are today
43:35
in nine months we know you're almost a completely new cellular being so let's feed those cells
43:40
today with everything that you want to create for yourself in the future oh I love it what I hear
43:46
you saying too is like let's release the shaming and really be present just be present fill your
43:53
butt on that chair if you're sitting or your feet on the floor if you're standing
43:59
feel the clothes on your shoulders if you're wearing clothes and the glasses if you're wearing glasses
44:05
you know against your nose and just and feel the the stretch of your face as you smile you know
44:10
whatever it is but to be you know identify the physical so that you can really just be present
44:17
yeah and make peace with your past right make peace with it and whatever happened to happen
44:24
maybe it wasn't fair or maybe it wasn't right maybe it shouldn't of all of those things maybe
44:28
true but it did you've been working with enough people I think at this point where you would you
44:36
might be able to identify like what are some of the people when they start your program what like
44:42
what are some of the initial aha moments like is it like self-worth around self-worth is it around like
44:51
food is controlling me like what's the first kind of aha you witness and a lot of the people
44:55
that do your programs and I know it's different but I'm sure at this point you sort of you see like
45:00
common things I love it I love it so much the number one is they can't believe they're losing weight
45:08
and they're not hungry that's one of the biggest ones is there's a belief system that to lose weight
45:14
I need to starve be restricted be miserable and that because that's what they've done in the past
45:20
so as we nourish or like we talk about nourishing our clients they just can't believe it and then
45:27
the second thing that they can't believe is how much energy they start to have like how good
45:33
they start to feel then the third thing is the cravings have dissipated like they're just not there
45:39
as much at night and we know that that's physiological reasons we know protein deprivation we know
45:44
fiber deprivation and overconsumption leads to overconsumption later in the day we understand this
45:49
but I mean I do you do but for people who are used to not eating all day and then hoping
45:54
that they're not going to have cravings at night I mean the brain is going to tell you hey
45:58
hey you don't have the nutrients in your body to heal repair grow and instead of being like oh I
46:03
just I really feel like a chunk of chicken I'm like I feel like chips so they start to get nourished
46:08
and then they lose weight have energy and there's no more cravings and then they start to get some
46:14
confidence back in themselves and then they start to like grow this you know this area of like
46:21
I am going to take time for myself it is okay I feel better when I do and those boundaries start to
46:26
come in I love it and I feel like this goes back to what we start out talking is that surround
46:32
yourself with people whether that's the coach you're choosing the guides you're choosing or the
46:37
literal people around you that are reflecting you back accurately because I feel like so many of
46:44
us are surrounded by people that are either just continuing the shaming piece or the critical piece
46:50
or are projecting their judgments of themselves on us right it's like but surround yourself with
46:56
people that love you and and see your potential and see what you're doing for these changes and
47:03
are mirroring them back to you like don't you feel so good in your body because you look really
47:07
good you know whatever that may be a hundred percent but for a lot of us we can be isolated I was we
47:13
can find it it takes energy to put yourself into new social situations to get that kind of
47:20
community and I read something the other day because sometimes I talk about how I don't have that
47:24
many like in Calgary in person friends but I have a lot of friends across country and it said that
47:29
to have a good community means to be inconvenienced that you're you're willing to be there for somebody
47:35
else go see their kids soccer game go visit their sick mom in the hospital help them move
47:40
something or decorate or clean a closet because you're building you're building a the fabric
47:46
of connection which isn't a one way street and so I was like oh it was really powerful for me James
47:52
because I'm busy my time is tight run a tight calendar and I was like I've been unwilling to be
47:56
inconvenienced sometimes and now I'm opening myself up to what a beautiful thing to have the privilege
48:02
of being inconvenienced for the sake of friendship and community to give so I can get that same feeling
48:09
of support right back and it changed something for me just about how I I want to share myself
48:16
and my energy and my time and to also make it productive um whether it's a walk or a coffee chat
48:22
I'm not the person who's like hey let's go for a glass of wine or let's go grab an apple I do it
48:28
differently oh I love it I'm so enjoying our conversation um and I've really enjoyed getting to
48:36
know you like I know the last time we saw each other we had a really powerful interactions and um
48:44
and you had me on your podcast but like every time I talked to you I just I feel like I get a
48:50
better picture of you and you're just such a beautiful person and I'm so grateful for you Jen
48:55
oh thank you I found the same way like I we had that chance interaction at an event and I was like
49:00
oh my god like you know because we have teams and stuff and people that help us coordinate our
49:04
calendars that is so excited to meet you and be like you're gonna be out by podcast and then
49:09
yeah I uh you've got my support I love your mission I love your viewpoint on it because it's just
49:16
well it's grounded in the roots of health and and what it takes to be healthy and that we get to do
49:23
it so your message is one I always love sharing and uh yeah it's been a privilege to get to know
49:28
you too thanks for having me on your show well before I let you fully go I would love to
49:35
just get your sense of like if someone only remembered one key idea from today's conversation
49:41
what would you want that to be uh you said it actually it's let today be day one and go after it
49:49
like nothing comes to us you know one of the metaphors I have and if you're listening don't do this
49:53
if you're driving but um I always share with my community like you know put your hands in front of your
49:57
face and pretend you're holding on to a trapeze bar I think we've all seen this in a circus right
50:01
and so you're hanging on to a bar and on the bar it says life is good good good enough good enough
50:06
health everything's good but in the few in the foreground you see another bar coming to you and it's
50:11
a little bit higher and it says great that it's great over here how do you grab the next trapeze bar
50:18
the only way to do it is to let go of good and go and grab great and make that leap so no
50:25
matter where you're at don't settle for good when great is just one small hand grasp away
50:33
and believe in yourself oh I'm getting chills oh you heard it here everybody let's go for great
50:39
together we are in it we are here with you and we're just so grateful for you participating
50:45
today Jen thank you so much for joining me on this call um how can people reach out to you to
50:52
work with you how can they just follow you on socials follow me on instagram at gen powder
50:58
easiest way i have all sorts of free resources free copies of my books you can buy them on amazon
51:02
or kindle or audible i give them away i think it's really important to understand that whatever
51:07
symptom or problem you've got the real problem underneath it will be sabotage of some nature
51:12
and when you start to address that you solve so many things in your life so uh follow me there
51:18
i'm learning how to create good content and share so i'm learning how to be a content creator at 50 but
51:23
hey that's that's the fun and i get to do that so that'd be a good place to start and your website
51:29
for working with your or participating the groups is Jennifer powder right yeah Jennifer powder
51:34
dot com so Jennifer powder dot com uh we are on all sorts of challenges and fun stuff and you know
51:40
things to bring you into the the mindset piece of it uh sure i can talk about food but i love
51:45
going into the deeper the deeper game that we're up against and how to change the rules so we win
51:51
well you got my vote i i just i just love that you're focusing on the how not just the what and you're
51:57
you're really supporting and what i believe is lasting change so thank you so much
52:02
yeah you're welcome thanks for having me on great conversation yeah well i loved it
52:08
well thank you and thank you all for participating i i'm just so enjoying being on this journey
52:13
with you i appreciate you for watching or listening to this podcast please leave a comment let us
52:21
know how it's been received share it with your friends and family just just spread the word i really
52:26
think that uh health is important i think it's important to reconnect with these ancestral principles
52:33
but make sure that we're also still you know in our modern selves and and and connecting those dots so
52:38
that we can be connected to the people that we love around us and connected most importantly to
52:44
ourselves in our highest self so stay curious and uh thank you again thank you so much for joining me
52:52
on everyday ancestral if you enjoyed this episode hit subscribe so you don't miss the next one
52:59
you could find the show notes links and resources mentioned at eatpluck.com that's e-a-t-p-l-u-c-k
53:09
dot com and hey if you know someone who'd get something out of this share it with them too stay
53:16
curious live well and keep it ancestral