Latest / The Seed Project / Discovering the Emotional Roots of Eating to Feel Better Eat Better: A Conversation with Heather K. Jones

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Discovering the Emotional Roots of Eating to Feel Better Eat Better: A Conversation with Heather K. Jones · The Seed Project

0:42
Charlotte: Hi, everyone.
0:43
Charlotte: I'm really excited for our guests today.
0:45
Charlotte: Heather Jones.
0:47
Charlotte: Heather is a registered dietician, a wellness guide and an author.
0:51
Charlotte: She specializes in nutrition, communications, weight management, and behavior change therapy.
0:57
Charlotte: Heather has spent the last 20 years empowering people who struggle with food.
1:01
Charlotte: Health and emotional eating issues.
1:04
Charlotte: She's the creator of several online programs, including her signature program.
1:08
Charlotte: Feel better.
1:09
Charlotte: Eat better.
1:10
Charlotte: For women to end emotional eating and transform their relationship with food, body, and self.
1:17
Charlotte: She is also the skinny taste dietician and co author of the New York times.
1:21
Charlotte: Bestselling skinny tastes, cookbooks.
1:24
Charlotte: Heather has also written hundreds of articles published in healthy living magazines, including self fitness, good housekeeping and more.
1:34
Charlotte: She spent seven years working for the center of science and the public interest in its award-winning newsletter.
1:40
Charlotte: Nutrition action, health letter.
1:43
Charlotte: And then five years working with Oprah and the best life team.
1:48
Charlotte: Hi, heather, thanks for being here.
1:50
Heather: Thank you.
1:52
Charlotte: So, Heather, you are a dietitian, an author, and a coach.
1:56
Charlotte: What led you to get into this work?
2:00
Heather: Um, for me, I really teach what it is that I've healed in my own life.
2:05
Heather: So I wanted to share the issues that I've walked through and how I healed them myself.
2:12
Heather: Like it felt like everywhere I went, I was talking to people about this and finally I was like, I need to actually create this since it's something I can share with the world.
2:20
Heather: So I struggled with food and with body and weight for most of my life.
2:25
Heather: Like a lot of us.
2:26
Heather: The conditioning around that was pretty intense.
2:29
Heather: My dad struggled with his weight.
2:30
Heather: Um, he was obese and then my mom was very concerned.
2:34
Heather: We were going to end up like my dad.
2:36
Heather: So there was just a lot of food restrictions and diet talk and just a lot of condition conditioning around that.
2:43
Heather: And so it was something that I had a really hard time with, and I had a nutrition and health degree and I still had a really dysfunctional relationship with food, so I felt like I.
2:51
Heather: You know, it just felt really unbalanced to me.
2:54
Heather: And once I finally learned that it wasn't really about the food, it was about what was going on inside of me and healing those wounds inside of me and releasing the beliefs that no longer served.
3:04
Heather: When I did that inner work, it helped me in all aspects of my life.
3:07
Heather: And so I felt really called to share it.
3:10
Charlotte: That's amazing.
3:11
Charlotte: How long have you been working on this inner work?
3:15
Charlotte: And when did you start teaching your program?
3:19
Heather: Feel better, eat better.
3:21
Heather: It's been around for about 10 years now, um, I have been on this journey of, you know, to heal and to release what doesn't serve me for about 20 years.
3:31
Heather: So I think there's around over 2000 people in feel better, eat better now.
3:36
Heather: So it's reached, um, you know, it's reached quite a large group at this time.
3:42
Heather: And I know that there's so many more who can use this type of work.
3:45
Heather: So I love sharing it and I love being able to provide a new perspective and to help people sort of wake up into a different point of view to see their struggles with food and weight from a totally new point of view.
3:59
Charlotte: I mean, I definitely relate.
4:00
Charlotte: I would say I have struggled with emotional eating.
4:04
Charlotte: Um, Hmm, probably most of my life, a lot of different, um, voids that I am, filling with the wrong things, but, I think that even if you have, what you kind of said, had the right nutritional guidelines and whether you did a diet program but if you haven't really done the inner work to why you're using that, I guess, as a coping mechanism, it doesn't matter how healthy you eat, you will probably still end up having a breaking point where you kind of gravitate back to those kind of comfort foods.
4:37
Heather: Yeah, I think it's a really common thing that so many of us struggle with, um, in terms of not understanding why we can't just stick to a certain diet plan or not understanding why we continue to struggle with food in the way that we do.
4:51
Heather: And it's because most of the mainstream information out there is about this external path, right?
4:57
Heather: It's all about If only I had more willpower, then I would be able to stick to this diet plan.
5:02
Heather: And so a lot of people who struggle with food and weight walk around believing that they're weak and that something is terribly wrong with them.
5:08
Heather: And they're not understanding the energetic and emotional route that is, um, sort of driving these behaviors with food and.
5:18
Heather: Distracting ourselves from emotions is just a very common thing in the society that we live in today.
5:23
Heather: We do it not only with food, but with TV, with our telephones, with games that we play, with shopping, with working.
5:33
Heather: I mean, there's like so many different things that we do to distract ourselves from the uncomfortable feelings that are coming up inside of us that we don't have the tools or understanding to support ourselves.
5:47
Heather: And so really helping to sort of Connect those dots right as soon as I understood that my relationship with food was about so much more than food and once I could finally understand what was going on inside of me that was driving my destructive behaviors not only with food but with lots of different things in my life I was struggling with drinking and partying and My relationships were really dramatic.
6:14
Heather: Like I had so many self destructive behaviors in my life and they were all pointing back to what was going on inside of me.
6:22
Heather: I was abandoning myself, abandoning my emotions, not mentally or emotionally supporting myself.
6:28
Heather: And once I understood that, that clarity was so helpful.
6:32
Heather: And so I hope anybody who's hearing this now who has felt like, why can't I get this to work?
6:38
Heather: What is wrong with me?
6:40
Heather: I hope that it, you know, awakens that part of you that's like, Oh yeah, there's something to heal here.
6:44
Heather: I feel it's always a call to heal.
6:48
Charlotte: Definitely.
6:49
Charlotte: I think that also gives people a little grace when you have so many people who kind of yo yo, you know, you feel like you're on a good stretch and good pattern, but then might revert backwards and you're.
7:01
Charlotte: I guess not punishing yourself, but you're like, why can't I, why can't I be successful at this?
7:07
Charlotte: Why can't I be consistent?
7:09
Charlotte: And, learning there's so much more within that needs to be healed you need to heal that inner wound of what's causing, these destructive behaviors.
7:19
Charlotte: And like you said, a lot of people.
7:21
Charlotte: Use food, alcohol, social media, things like that, that they're still trying to kind of fill this void.
7:28
Charlotte: I know that we're getting ready to go into busy holiday times, and that can be a lot of food, alcohol, family drama, that, can just stress people out.
7:37
Charlotte: Usually that's what they're probably going to gravitate.
7:40
Charlotte: Towards is either probably some sort of food or some sort of alcohol
7:46
Heather: Yeah.
7:46
Heather: It's very common that we get triggered when we're around the people that we love and the families that we grew up with.
7:51
Heather: So it's always like, uh, I always say like a masterclass in your, your healing path.
7:55
Heather: If you're.
7:56
Heather: Going back to spend time with people that, you know, your, your parents or your siblings, so understanding that when you get triggered and when you get really upset that it is again, it's about what is going on inside of you, like somebody could say something.
8:12
Heather: To you, and it suddenly erupts these emotions inside of you.
8:15
Heather: But those emotions were inside of you before that person said that thing to you.
8:20
Heather: It's just that they open the door and allow you to see what you need to see inside of yourself.
8:25
Heather: So it's a great mirror.
8:27
Heather: And if you understand that, instead of projecting that onto anybody else, instead of drowning all of those emotions and food, you can start to get curious about what is going on inside of you.
8:37
Heather: And you keep saying, you know, to fill a void.
8:40
Heather: It's.
8:40
Heather: And it's so important to think about, well, what is that void?
8:43
Heather: Like, what are we trying to fill ours?
8:45
Heather: You know, what do we need to fill ourselves with?
8:47
Heather: If it's not food and alcohol and shopping and all of these things.
8:50
Heather: And what we're all looking for, I believe, is to fill that void with more of our own soul, more of our own heart, to be living more from the energy of our authentic self, right?
9:02
Heather: When we are living from fear.
9:04
Heather: And we are living from the wounded ego parts of ourselves and believing that we're not good enough, we're not lovable, we're not strong enough, or believing, um, whatever that story is inside of us that puts us into a very low vibration.
9:19
Heather: And it creates a lot of inner turmoil inside of us.
9:22
Heather: But when we learn how to connect to ourself, connect to our heart, remember who we are.
9:29
Heather: Then we won't be called to fill that void with all these other things.
9:34
Heather: So during this time of year when it's so busy and when we're running around, taking time to connect with ourselves, taking time to love ourselves enough, to spend time with ourselves, to connect back to our hearts, to quiet our minds, to find out what we need, will make a huge impact on how you experience Your day to day life and also how you experience the conflict in your life because the more that you spend empowering yourself and Filling yourself more with your own love the more of your heart power grows and the more heart power you have the easier it is to Respond to whatever triggers happen in the external with a more curious compassionate point of view.
10:19
Charlotte: and for some people who are like well When you say just starting to even spend more time with yourself to get to know yourself better for some people that may seem very overwhelming people who've been like, I don't even know if I like myself that much.
10:33
Charlotte: How am I going to start learning how to spend time with myself to figure this out?
10:39
Heather: There's a really easy beginning exercise that you can do, and it's very confronting, and it was for me when I first did this work, and it's with the mirror.
10:48
Heather: So you can go sit in front of a mirror, literally look in your own eyes, and say the words, I love and accept myself exactly as I am.
10:58
Heather: And what you will find is that anything that is in resistance to that, any Any beliefs that are in, uh, resistance to that idea that will start to bubble up, right?
11:09
Heather: You will start to feel everything, every part of you that doesn't quite believe that yet.
11:15
Heather: And if you sit with that energy that comes up and you breathe through it and you kind of support yourself through what is coming up, then you will start to have a deeper connection with yourself.
11:27
Heather: And then you just keep saying it in the mirror.
11:29
Heather: Until enough of that resistance goes away that you start to build a more intimate relationship with yourself.
11:35
Heather: And it feels awkward, I know, like it's so weird to sit in front of a mirror and say these things to yourself.
11:41
Heather: Like it's so awkward, it's so weird.
11:44
Heather: And yet it is the most healing thing in the world.
11:47
Heather: And you can use the mirror to say lots of different things.
11:50
Heather: Like you can say, I forgive myself for the relationship I have with food, or I forgive myself for whatever it is that you're going through.
11:59
Heather: Like you, you can use the mirror to really help you to see whatever is.
12:05
Heather: Inside of you that doesn't believe that yet and to release to allow the energy to come up when that emotion comes up, allow it to be there, right?
12:14
Heather: Just allow it to be there and breathe through it and then allow it to release.
12:18
Heather: So that's a really beautiful, powerful, awkward exercise you can start with.
12:25
Charlotte: Yeah, I would imagine, you're in front of a mirror, you know, brushing teeth, putting your makeup on, but actually, looking into yourself and into your eyes, just in itself could be uncomfortable.
12:36
Heather: For sure, because what we immediately do is we see what we perceive as our flaws, our flaws, or we see the things that we don't like.
12:42
Heather: And we're never really looking deeper into our heart.
12:46
Heather: So if that's too awkward for anybody here, you can actually just sit down and say those affirmations, say, I love and accept myself exactly as I am.
12:55
Heather: And notice what comes up without having a mirror in front of you.
12:58
Heather: If it's too much for some of us, it's just too.
13:01
Heather: awkward to do that.
13:02
Heather: So just do it without the mirror and you'll still start to get clear on what's inside of you, right?
13:08
Heather: You'll still start to understand what needs to be healed inside of you.
13:11
Heather: And you start to release some of that emotional weight that you're carrying around because that emotional weight is very connected to the physical weight.
13:19
Heather: And as we start to deal with the emotional weight first, you'll be amazed at how much better you feel.
13:26
Charlotte: And as we start dealing with our emotions, and I guess unlocking them, and releasing them.
13:33
Charlotte: Changing what you said, your vibrational energy, then that also helps you, make better choices for your, for yourself that actually make you feel better.
13:43
Heather: Right.
13:44
Heather: What most people are doing is from a very low feeling place.
13:47
Heather: They're feeling guilty.
13:48
Heather: They're feeling afraid.
13:50
Heather: They're feeling like they're not good enough from a very low feeling place.
13:53
Heather: They kind of force themselves to do the things they feel they have to do in order to lose the weight in order to be good enough in order to finally fix this.
14:01
Heather: Right.
14:02
Heather: But I take the exact opposite approach, whereas you start to flow this love to yourself.
14:06
Heather: You start to release this emotional weight.
14:08
Heather: You start to lift yourself up into a different state of being when you're in that different vibrational state of being, you're drawn to do other activities with ease.
14:18
Heather: You actually want to go for a walk.
14:20
Heather: You're not forcing yourself to go for a walk.
14:22
Heather: You have like, you can feel your inner desire to want to go for a walk.
14:26
Heather: And so you start to naturally be drawn to take better care of yourself.
14:30
Heather: As you flow this better feeling, um, this, this love to yourself, as you start to have compassion for yourself and forgive yourself and treat yourself with respect, your energy starts to rise and then you're, you're put on a path.
14:44
Heather: You sort of start to follow that intuitive path to what will most serve you next.
14:48
Heather: And so instead of trying to force yourself to change, you're allowing the change to flow.
14:54
Charlotte: And when we're more in alignment and more in flow, then we start feeling better and making better choices and that's helping us lose.
15:02
Charlotte: The physical weight.
15:04
Charlotte: So when you're teaching, are you going over the inner work, emotional work?
15:09
Charlotte: Do you add in.
15:11
Charlotte: Basic nutritional.
15:13
Charlotte: Tips and steps to.
15:16
Charlotte: Help you with your eating patterns.
15:19
Heather: The way I set up the course is in module one, which is support yourself.
15:23
Heather: And there's a bunch of different videos in there on this.
15:26
Heather: It's about reconnecting with yourself, reconnecting with your heart, forgiving yourself, starting to release some of this emotional weight, starting to take control of your state of being every day, starting to realize that where you focus your consciousness every day is up to you, right?
15:42
Heather: You have the power to focus your mind in ways that support you.
15:45
Heather: Or you have the power to take yourself down a path of, you know, despair and hopelessness.
15:51
Heather: And so it's really about refocusing yourself, changing your mindset and starting to do some of that emotional work.
15:57
Heather: So that's module one.
15:58
Heather: Module two is heal yourself.
16:01
Heather: And that's where we start to look at some of these deeper beliefs and some of the reasons why perhaps we are holding onto the weight.
16:07
Heather: For example.
16:08
Heather: If you do not feel safe in the world, if you were, um, abused as a child, you might be using the weight as a way to unconsciously keep yourself to feel safe, right, to have a little bit of protection from the world.
16:20
Heather: So you start to look at some of those deeper beliefs and deeper things that need to be released so you can align yourself with your desire.
16:28
Heather: to um, have a healthier relationship with food.
16:31
Heather: Then module number three, trust yourself.
16:34
Heather: That is when we start to, now that you've done some of this inner work and you've started to heal some of these things, now you start to form a healthier relationship with your body and start to really tune into what feels good in your body, what does not.
16:49
Heather: Start to trust your body again because so many of us that struggle with food and body after years and years of having such a difficult time like we.
16:56
Heather: need to reconnect to our body and really remember that, you know, the same way that an acorn knows how to grow into an oak tree, right?
17:05
Heather: Like the energy of the planet, the energy of the cosmos is flowing through that acorn.
17:13
Heather: No one has to tell the acorn what it needs to do to grow into a tree that happens, right?
17:17
Heather: It's like the universal principles are flowing through that.
17:20
Heather: And our body is the same.
17:21
Heather: Our body is incredibly wise.
17:23
Heather: That same, that same vibration is running through us.
17:27
Heather: And so we start to form a trusting relationship with this amazing body that we have.
17:31
Heather: And then finally, module number four, nourish yourself.
17:35
Heather: We do go into some of the nutrition there, but at that point you're more in tune and you know, you're in tune with yourself.
17:40
Heather: You're in tune with your body.
17:42
Heather: You understand.
17:43
Heather: The things that trigger you, you understand the reasons why you struggled for so long.
17:47
Heather: And I find that's a much better place to start, um, looking at the nutrition piece from that clear place.
17:54
Heather: And you'll naturally be led to things that feel better to you when you're going on a journey of that sort.
17:59
Heather: So I did it the opposite way.
18:01
Heather: We don't get to the nutrition piece until the very end.
18:05
Charlotte: Well, which is so important because I think that's why people go back and forth.
18:10
Charlotte: It's because they're trying to do the nutrition, but haven't touched into their different emotions.
18:16
Charlotte: As you started helping people.
18:18
Charlotte: Deal with emotional eating and doing the inner work.
18:23
Charlotte: Did it trigger anything in you when you first started having people have the same issues that you dealt with or were you like, finally, I found what I'm exactly called to do.
18:33
Heather: Um, I think because there is such a long time between when I started my journey of starting to heal and when I started to share.
18:41
Heather: I mean, there were 10 years that I was basically just on my own path of doing my own inner work, reading different modalities, doing different things like reading different books, studying different modalities, working with different teachers and that kind of thing.
18:55
Heather: There was 10 years before I started to share.
18:57
Heather: So by the time I started to share, I think it was just the natural next step for me.
19:02
Heather: I didn't have any.
19:03
Heather: Years of sharing.
19:04
Heather: I think what I had to work through for myself when I shared was, um, I stuttered when I was young and the idea of, you know, going into groups or putting myself online or putting myself more out there that felt a little scary.
19:19
Heather: There were parts of me that really needed to be looked at.
19:22
Heather: That was, I was afraid to share my voice in the larger world in that way, afraid of being persecuted or afraid of being judged or, or afraid of people not understanding or, you know, Just afraid of putting myself out there, so I had to really work on healing the part of myself that was afraid to be seen and afraid to share this information.
19:42
Heather: So that was probably the most difficult part for me, um, working with clients and, and sharing what had helped me.
19:48
Heather: That was a very natural, easy thing for me, working with clients intuitively and all of that came with a lot of ease.
19:55
Heather: Um, having the courage to put myself out there, that was definitely the hardest piece.
20:01
Charlotte: Right.
20:02
Charlotte: I think always when you try something, I don't care if you're five years old, riding a bike for the first time, or you're, you know, in your forties, reinventing yourself.
20:10
Charlotte: I think, having the courage to start anew and reinvent yourself is always a challenge.
20:18
Heather: Yeah.
20:18
Heather: And just learning how to run a business online, how to create a website online, like all of that, um, was an interesting journey as, as well.
20:28
Heather: And there's so much more information out now than there was before.
20:31
Heather: And gosh, when I started on this path 20 years ago, nobody was talking about healing.
20:36
Heather: Nobody was talking about trauma.
20:38
Heather: Instagram and YouTube didn't exist.
20:40
Heather: It was like Me and a couple of books and that was it.
20:45
Heather: So it's wonderful how much information is out there now.
20:48
Heather: And I also know that some people will be served by hearing it from me.
20:53
Heather: So I always trust that the people that are meant to hear this from me, the people that feel called to work with me, you know, that, that it will line up.
21:00
Heather: I always, you know, I sort of have a prayer or an intention that, you know, I hope that whoever I can best serve finds me with, with ease.
21:10
Charlotte: Right.
21:10
Charlotte: That you have a certain energy that kind of attracts those people.
21:14
Charlotte: And
21:15
Heather: Yes.
21:16
Heather: Yes.
21:17
Charlotte: I think that's awesome.
21:18
Charlotte: I think you're kind of a pioneer talking about healing and trauma.
21:21
Charlotte: Now I feel like everyone's realizing how important healing of your inner child.
21:26
Charlotte: And childhood trauma.
21:29
Charlotte: Is, and even just trauma from.
21:32
Charlotte: Life that you absorb on a daily basis.
21:36
Heather: For sure.
21:37
Heather: And I've had amazing mentors.
21:39
Heather: I mean, I learned about inner child work from Tara Brock and from Tichnot Han and the mentors that I found years ago, I'm so grateful for them because it was definitely not as available as it is now.
21:52
Heather: And I was led to them, similar to how people you know are led to to me it feels like I was meant to find those things and to heal, and then to share that it's like once you heal and you learn.
22:04
Heather: how to create a sense of peace inside of you.
22:06
Heather: The desire to share it, at least in my case, is very strong.
22:10
Heather: You're like, I want, you know, it's like, I want to share it.
22:14
Heather: You want other people to know about it.
22:15
Heather: You're like, wait a minute, I've got this amazing information to share.
22:20
Heather: So it's wonderful to see that there's so many people out there sharing this kind of information now.
22:25
Heather: It just, it's, It's incredible
22:28
Charlotte: It's so beneficial.
22:31
Charlotte: Then how did you get into, to writing or becoming an author?
22:36
Heather: with, um, so I'm the coauthor of the skinny taste cookbooks.
22:41
Heather: when I started to build my brand online, I started to think about how can I reach people who are struggling with this type of thing?
22:52
Heather: And intuitively I was led to, well, people that are on cooking blogs and specifically.
22:58
Heather: Skinny taste.
22:59
Heather: They're struggling with weight.
23:01
Heather: And so I started to reach out to some of the blogs that I liked, and some of the blogs that I cooked from.
23:05
Heather: And she was one of the first ones that I reached out to Gina from Skinny Taste.
23:10
Heather: And I just, you know, said, hi, I'm an RD.
23:12
Heather: I've been cooking from your blog for so long.
23:14
Heather: You know, if you ever have any questions, let me know.
23:16
Heather: And I had no idea where that was going to go, but my thought was maybe somehow I'd be able to serve the people that she serves and I can help her as well.
23:25
Heather: And then she happened to be at a blogging event.
23:28
Heather: Um, very close to where I was living at the time, San Francisco is where I was at the time, and she was going to be at the blog, a blogging event the very next week, and so we agreed to meet there, and then when we met, we just immediately hit it off, we had this instant connection, and she was looking to do a book, and I had already written a bunch of books with other brands like Self and Good Housekeeping, I had been the nutrition expert on a bunch of different books, so I was able to connect her to my agent, and then they asked me to do the book with them, and And so it just kind of, you know, unfolded in that way that allowed me to create, I mean, her brand is huge and her brand has connected me to so many people who need this kind of help.
24:09
Heather: So it was like the perfect symbiotic relationship that came together at exactly the right time.
24:15
Charlotte: Oh, definitely.
24:16
Charlotte: And honestly, that's how I found you is because I found you through the cookbooks I was looking for, ways to swap out ingredients to, start healthy cooking.
24:26
Heather: I think it's a combination right like it's it's doing the internal work and then you're naturally led to eat in a lighter healthier way but as you know I don't believe in restriction and so if you find this really balanced way to eat and what I love about skinny taste is that she takes Food and she makes them healthier and better for you and they're amazing.
24:48
Heather: I mean, they taste great.
24:49
Heather: They're made with whole foods.
24:51
Heather: They're just a lighter version of some of the things.
24:54
Heather: So, yeah, I love her food so much.
24:56
Heather: And we've worked on, gosh, we've done seven books together so far.
25:00
Heather: And all of them have been New York Times bestselling books.
25:02
Heather: So that's
25:03
Charlotte: the one that just came out a couple of weeks ago.
25:06
Charlotte: is that the simple one?
25:08
Heather: Skinny Tastes Simple.
25:09
Heather: Yes.
25:10
Heather: Yes.
25:13
Charlotte: list.
25:14
Charlotte: Congratulations.
25:16
Heather: Thank you.
25:17
Heather: Super fun.
25:18
Charlotte: That's super fun.
25:19
Charlotte: do you have any aspiration to write a book about, more of your emotional program or do you like to have it in your class
25:29
Heather: thought about doing that at one point.
25:31
Heather: I was never, I have not yet been intuitively called to do that.
25:35
Heather: Um, it's been so easy to reach people online.
25:37
Heather: I feel like a book would give people like a starting place with that, which would be nice.
25:42
Heather: And my free resources that I have on my website do the same thing, but the program is, is pretty deep.
25:48
Heather: And I feel like it requires, it's easier for me to express it and to, um, Sort of walk people through that journey on an online course.
25:58
Heather: It'd be much more challenging and I don't think I could really do that in a book.
26:01
Heather: So I thought about doing some kind of introduction book, but I haven't felt called that hasn't unfolded yet.
26:07
Heather: It's been so easy and so joyful to just share the information online.
26:11
Heather: And I love doing the online classes.
26:14
Heather: I love supporting people online.
26:16
Heather: I love doing the group coaching calls.
26:18
Heather: It's been such a joy to do it that way that I haven't gone that direction yet.
26:23
Charlotte: I think to doing it online, you also have the interaction and people in the class have the support that they're.
26:31
Charlotte: Not alone on this as well.
26:34
Heather: Completely.
26:34
Heather: I mean, I think it's really helpful.
26:36
Heather: It's always amazing to me during the group coaching calls.
26:38
Heather: If one person asks a question in the group, inevitably, there'll be many, many other people in the group who have the exact same thing going on, but they didn't necessarily willing Have the words or conscious understanding of it yet.
26:51
Heather: And so it's such a beautiful sharing and it's a very safe place to share.
26:56
Heather: And it helps people feel seen and understood.
26:59
Heather: And like you said, to feel this connection, right?
27:01
Heather: And as you start to connect to yourself and connect to your own heart and soul, then you start to connect to people who are like you and sharing the same kind of journey as well.
27:11
Heather: And then you start to, yeah, the connection is huge.
27:14
Heather: So I love the online group so much.
27:18
Charlotte: I think that's so important, being part of a community and, not feeling isolated in your journey, because you can easily, can just get frustrated with yourself versus when you're have support system in a group, you definitely don't feel alone.
27:33
Heather: Yeah, and I do a lot of those emotional processing.
27:36
Heather: I have lots of different tools that I share inside the group and I find that doing those kind of exercises together, there's an energetic space that's held in that as well so that you actually feel safer to meet some of these emotions that you've avoided for so long because it can be an overwhelming thing at first if you've avoided your emotions for most of your life, having people there in the group and having someone there to lead you through that.
27:59
Heather: Can be very helpful.
28:01
Heather: And I can't, you know, I can't really do that in a book, but I can definitely do it in the online classes.
28:05
Heather: So that's why I've taken that path.
28:09
Charlotte: think this is so helpful, especially coming into the holidays, I it's helpful all year long, but I know that the holidays trigger so many emotions for many people and, whether it's stress, but, I know that, it can also, trigger loss whether it's the loss of a relationship, loss of a, of a person.
28:26
Charlotte: I think this is really helpful for people to have some tools leading up.
28:33
Charlotte: To the next couple of weeks that they can start tapping into.
28:36
Charlotte: And especially with the mirror work, or doing some affirmations that can help them have the space to breathe and welcome these events versus being very overwhelmed.
28:47
Charlotte: And
28:48
Heather: Yeah, it's starting to become a more, uh, it's starting to become more emotionally aware and starting to open to those emotions and get curious about those emotions.
28:58
Heather: And instead of pushing them away, really welcoming, welcoming them and opening to them.
29:04
Heather: You know, grief is a very common thing that comes up this time of year.
29:07
Heather: If you've lost somebody.
29:08
Heather: Or just, just grief from other, like you said, lost relationships.
29:13
Heather: So starting to, you know, work with that grief and allow yourself to move through that grief and to heal through that grief instead of running away from that grief, or instead of just staying in the mind and in the constant busyness, like really taking some time to allow yourself to process whatever is coming up for you and then creating a better and more balanced and centered life.
29:35
Heather: time for yourself because of the inner work that you do.
29:38
Heather: It doesn't take as much time as people think to bring themselves back into a grounded place, but it's about becoming more aware.
29:46
Heather: Where is my energy right now?
29:48
Heather: Where is my frequency right now?
29:50
Heather: And what can I do to help me move through this so that I can be in a more balanced place?
29:57
Charlotte: I think that's helpful, what you were saying.
29:59
Charlotte: It doesn't take that long because if you just took five minutes of time to yourself, if that's all you could really give yourself to center yourself.
30:08
Charlotte: And be able to go throughout your day and be productive, it's not something that's an hour long meditation necessarily.
30:17
Heather: No, and you can add in you can create ways to send send to yourself throughout your days with the activities you're already doing and anyway, right like every time you wash your hands, you can make that a time where you check in with yourself and take a couple of deep breaths and, you know, check in with yourself and bring yourself back into a balanced place.
30:38
Heather: Every time you get into your car, you can take a minute to bring yourself back into a more centered place before you drive, right?
30:46
Heather: Every single time that you're in the restroom.
30:48
Heather: I mean, you can just add them into your already.
30:50
Heather: I mean, you're living your life anyway, adding these moments.
30:55
Heather: Throughout your regular life to to create more ease doesn't take a lot of time, you know, one of my favorite things to do is before I will go do something like, for example, I went and met a friend this morning at a coffee house.
31:08
Heather: And before I went there, I would set the intention of how I wanted the time to go right like I want to be.
31:14
Heather: I wanna feel open, I wanna feel joyful.
31:17
Heather: I want to connect and I just kind of set the intention to stay in that space during the time that I was with my new friend.
31:26
Heather: So it's being more intentional about the energy you want to bring throughout your days.
31:31
Heather: Does that make sense?
31:32
Charlotte: Oh yeah, definitely.
31:33
Charlotte: I think that's, a great way to put it.
31:36
Charlotte: To add it to the things that you're already doing in your life setting the intention of this is where my presence is going to be, because I think that's what also makes us feel so frazzled as we're getting pulled in so many different directions.
31:51
Charlotte: But by setting your intention or focusing on where you want your presence to be and being fully in at that moment, that that also can relieve a lot of frustration and stress.
32:04
Heather: Yeah, and it's a good way to like check in throughout your day as you move into a different part of your day then set the intention again, okay, now I'm going to go shopping for food.
32:13
Heather: And while I'm in the store my intention is to be grounded, and you know that kind of reset it for each part of your day.
32:21
Heather: Something else that I share is called 60 seconds self care which is you know we walk around with these phones.
32:26
Heather: All day long, why not use them to help us to become more conscious and mindful.
32:31
Heather: And so you can set alarms on your phone to go off once every two hours or so.
32:35
Heather: And when the alarm goes off, and I always set a really nice sounding alarm, like chimes or something that feels good.
32:41
Heather: And when the alarm goes off, you just, you know, Check in with yourself.
32:45
Heather: What's going on?
32:46
Heather: How am I mentally?
32:47
Heather: Where am I mentally right now?
32:48
Heather: Have my thoughts run into a scary place?
32:50
Heather: Okay, let me bring myself back.
32:52
Heather: How am I feeling emotionally?
32:53
Heather: Is there anything I need to breathe through?
32:55
Heather: How is my body feeling?
32:56
Heather: Do I need water?
32:57
Heather: Right?
32:57
Heather: Like just creating more consciousness in our days is so important.
33:02
Heather: And that doesn't have to take a lot of time, but it makes a world of difference in how you experience your day and your life.
33:10
Charlotte: Yeah, that's a great idea.
33:11
Charlotte: Having those, check ins to kind of come back.
33:14
Charlotte: So your day's not getting away from you
33:17
Heather: And that way the energy momentum, you keep that energy momentum from getting into that very, very stressed, overwhelmed place because you're checking in with yourself instead of just letting that momentum kind of, you know, go with the tide.
33:30
Heather: Instead, you're choose, you're, you know, choosing to create the kind of days and the kind of experiences you want to have.
33:36
Charlotte: and that helps you really, truly live your life.
33:38
Charlotte: are you just kind of on this like steamroll?
33:41
Charlotte: You're not actually intentionally living your life.
33:43
Charlotte: Cause I think that so many people just get caught up and their days just all of a sudden go in a blur and you don't even know what you've done for the day.
33:51
Heather: Yeah, you just get, you know, you, you are.
33:55
Heather: Responding instead of creating your life and choosing how you want to live your life and being more intentional with your state of being and where you are in life.
34:04
Heather: You're just reacting to life all day long, right?
34:07
Heather: So you're not in a centered, grounded place and you're reacting to everything that's going on.
34:11
Heather: And then by the end of the day, you're in an exhilarating Um, and that is going to lead to a lot of emotional eating or drinking or whatever it is you do trying to come back into a grounded space.
34:22
Heather: So it makes a world of difference when you decide I'm in control of my life.
34:28
Heather: I'm the creator of my life.
34:30
Heather: I'm the only one who gets to choose how I live my days and I am going to take that creator power back.
34:38
Charlotte: Well, Heather, thank you so much.
34:40
Charlotte: Just so wonderful to kind of get to know you a little bit better.
34:44
Charlotte: And also hear all the wonderful things that you're doing helping people on their journey with food and healthier eating, but really starting to kind of tap into that inner work and inner child healing from the inside out,
34:59
Heather: Thank you so much.
35:00
Heather: It was such a joy to be here with you.
35:02
Charlotte: well, I really appreciate it.
35:04
Charlotte: Thanks so much.
35:06
Heather: Bye.
35:08
Charlotte: I appreciate you spending this time with me until next time, keep sowing the seeds of love in your life and those around you.