If you’re in a long-term relationship (married or not), how’s it going? Be honest. No one’s watching.
If the answer is just so-so, I hear you. I’ve been there, but let’s not make this about me. Let’s focus on you.
So-so means something’s missing. For one reason or another your relationship isn’t quite as fulfilling as you’d like it to be, but it isn’t terrible. Gotcha.
You look around at other relationships and think, “wow, mine could be so much worse.” And with that simple observation you decide that not terrible is good enough.
The house is nearly paid for. Your kids are healthy and happy. Your partner’s nice and your relationship is relatively free of drama. All in all, it’s not too bad.
So what if you spend more time engaging with your Instafriends than you do with your partner. So what if you don’t laugh together quite as often as you used to. So what if you haven’t had sex in six months.
“It is what it is,” you tell yourself.
It is what it is. Oh, how I dislike that phrase.
Granted, it has its place, like when you’re in a massive lineup at the grocery store and there’s nothing you can do about it if you want cream for your morning coffee.
The thing is, though, we tend to throw that phrase around as a rationale for accepting things we’d never say yes to given the chance to start over. And if you were to start your relationship over, would you be satisfied with the situation you find yourself in today?
If the answer is yes, I’m genuinely happy for you. If the answer is no, however, ask yourself this: at what point in your relationship did you decide that it was no longer reasonable (let alone important) to ask for what you want?
Here’s the thing. Whether you’re 30, 40 or 50, you potentially have decades of life ahead of you. We’re talking 30, 40 or even 50 more years. That’s a long time. A really, really long time to live a life of mediocrity – especially given the alternative is a life of joy.
Consider what might unfold if you were to stop saying it is what it is and start acknowledging that it could be something greater.
Imagine what your future might look like if you were to say so long to so-so and hello to the possibility of something greater.
Can you see it? Awesome. Now you have two options. Sweep it under your living room rug and pretend you didn’t see it OR start taking steps to make your vision your reality. Which do you choose?
If you aspire to better than so-so but can’t quite picture what better looks like, contact me to book your free discovery call. We’ll talk about steps you can take to get really clear about what you want so that you can get yourself on the path to true fulfilment.
With love,
Viv xo
Viv Singer is a life coach with a passion for helping women navigate relationships while remaining in true alignment with their most authentic selves. In addition to her 10-week coaching program, she offers a Visibility Assessment to help women understand why they’re feeling invisible in their relationship and discover actions they can take to become more visible – because we all deserve to be seen. You can connect with Viv at vivfortoday.com, or by following her on Instagram and/or Facebook.
Sexual health and well being is our basic human right and we need safe and trusting platforms to express ourselves and to receive accurate information. As a sexual wellness coach and sexual health educator, one of the most common concerns of my clients is lack of libido.
Sexual health is an integral component of spiritual, emotional, mental, and physical health and its intricacies are unique to each person. Since sexual health is entwined with these four aspects of our being, changes to our sexual health are rarely the result of one factor but rather the collective combination of factors that either move us towards or away from sex.
Seeking support of a trained professional is beneficial for sexual healing, to resolve your sexual or relationship roadblocks, and achieve your own sexual self-realization.
Arousal first, desire second.
As we age and our hormones change, our desire becomes much more responsive than spontaneous. In general terms this means that the conditions and environment need to be such that we can feel aroused. This could equate to fewer or no distractions, more organized surroundings, more time, feeling rested, greater intimate connection through play and touch and a whole range of factors unique to you. These individual factors need to be identified in order make lasting changes that are beneficial. By knowing the optimal circumstances and environments to activate arousal, we in turn, cultivate desire. This requires note only the intention but the continual openness to curiosity and the commitment to practice.
If we don’t use it, we lose it.
Our biggest sex organ is our brain so get sex on the brain! Read erotica, watch ethical porn, talk about sex with your trusted friends, hire a sex coach or therapist, find sex positive role models, listen to sexy podcasts, create a desire list, and explore the ways you like to be touched and give touch sexually and non sexually. There is no shame in being sexually proactive.
Give yourself permission for pleasure.
Explore your body - EVERY FABULOUS PART OF IT
Create a self care, self pleasure practice. Use lots of lube and find yourself a great vibrator if you have not already done so. Use a mirror and get up close and intimate with your genitals. Not only can this be humbling but it can also be incredibly empowering. Most of us had very little sex education growing up and as a result we may not be familiar with our body parts that are not easily visible.
Schedule sex - this can be sexy, trust me. If you don’t place intention around sex it will likely not happen.
Communicate with your partner and remove expectations around “the finish line” and focus on nourishing pleasure and cultivating desire. Slow things down. Spend more time with massage, foreplay and play in general and agree to including penetrative sex as one of the many ways of enjoying sex, rather than the primary focus.
Add some spice to that vanilla
Loss of desire can also be due to boredom, so it is important that this is acknowledged, and changes are made - new positions, new places, fantasy play, the addition of sexy toys and clothing – the skies the limit!
Address other factors that may be contributing to loss of libido such as stress, sleep disturbances, diet, and exercise.
Aging and a reduction of estrogen causes the vagina to atrophy and the tissues of the genitals to thin. Increasing blood flow to the region through exercise, sexual activity and use of oral and topic products will help to enhance stimulation and prolong the health of the tissues.
If pain and/or loss of pelvic floor tone is an issue, seek out the services of a pelvic floor physio therapist.
Plant Based Options
Ashwagandha: Also known as Withania somnifera, is one of the most powerful herbs in Ayurvedic medicine. This ancient ingredient is used as an 'adaptogen' and has unique anxiolytic stress-relieving qualities. Often called 'Indian ginseng', it's rejuvenating properties provide a plethora of health benefits for both body and brain.
Early research shows that taking ashwagandha extract daily for 8 weeks along with receiving support from a sexual health professional increases interest in sex and sexual satisfaction in adult women better than counseling and coaching alone.
CBD oil and CBD-rich cannabis oil may combat some of the most problematic symptoms associated with menopause, including sleep disturbances, mood changes, and aches. Anecdotal evidence and animal model studies suggest that combined cannabinoids, rather than the more readily available CBD isolate, may be better at alleviating some of the more severe symptoms associated with menopause. When high-quality CBD oil is combined with positive lifestyle changes, there may be a greater synergistic effect, though further research is necessary.
Topical cannabis oils, lubes and suppositories have been very helpful to many women. They help to increase blood flow and support prolonged orgasm.
Check out:
https://blissforia.ca/collections/pleasure
Other natural plant-based products such as horny goat weed and essential oils such as Ylang Ylang are aphrodisiacs and help to increase blood flow.
Life is better with lube
It takes the vagina a minimum of 20 minutes to “sweat”. If there is penetration before this time and not adequate lubrication, we can get micro tears in our vaginal wall which can cause sex to be very painful! Lube not only makes sex more enjoyable, but natural, water based, plant-based lubes specifically designed for women can help to slow the aging of the vulval and vaginal tissues.
Try Sutil Rich lube by Hathor:
https://blissforia.ca/products/sutil-rich-body-glide-lubricant
Hormone Replacement Therapy as well as low dose Testosterone has been known to help some women. Schedule an appointment with you doctor to find out about what is best for your body.
No one needs to go through this alone. You can get your sexy back and to stay around for the long term! ❤️
I am here to help. Feel free to book a complimentary, confidential discovery call:
https://choicesforsexualhealth.com/request-empowerment-coaching
Always in support of your sexual health,
Corinne
Corinne Underwood is the founder of Choices for Sexual Health. She is a Certified Therapeutic Sexual Wellness Coach, Sexual Health Educator and CBD Advisor. She works with clients to repair and strengthen the relationship with themselves and others by supporting them to heal trauma, love themselves shamelessly, embody pleasure, deepen intimacy, and utilize sexual energy to live fulfilling lives. www.choicesforsexualhealth.com www.blissforia.ca
“Identity is this incredible invisible force that controls your whole life. It’s invisible like gravity is invisible, but it controls your whole life.”
- Tony Robbins
Have you ever done something or said something and then had to ask yourself "Why did I just do/say that? Where did that come from and what was I thinking?"
Or maybe you have struggled with something for a long time and you've asked yourself "Why is this something I still struggle with? Why can't I just get over it, or past it, or around it?"
I know I have - and it can be so frustrating!
To feel like you are in a situation that you have no control over, where you spoke or acted before you could think it through and at the end are just left wondering what the heck happened!
We so often don't realize that we are being controlled by our identity - by how we have chosen to see ourselves.
So what is this all-powerful identity that controls us?
Part of our identity are the facts of our life:
"I am a mother, a wife, a sister, a lawyer, an entrepreneur" etc.
But our identity also runs much deeper than that.
It runs into words like worthy and deserve and good and bad.
So one part of our identity might be "I am a mother" but a deeper level of our identity is "I am a good mother."
Things like 'mother,' 'daughter,' 'sister,' 'wife' 'entrepreneur', 'employee', are all parts of our identity that come and go.
For example: Although I am a wife and mother now, there was a time when I wasn't.
But what tends to stick around and cause us some grief is the deeper identities of 'good,' 'bad,' 'capable, 'unworthy,' etc.
And here's what happens:
If we have decided to see ourselves as not good enough, we will act not good enough.
If we have decided to see ourselves as bad, we will constantly be defending ourselves. If we have decided to see ourselves as incapable, we will constantly view ourselves as coming up short.
This part of our identity is a self-fulfilling prophecy that unless we acknowledge and uproot it we can not get past.
We may say we feel like we are capable, and we may read all the self-help possible, and we may talk a good game - but if in the back of our minds (subconsciously) we have attached ourselves to a negative deeper identity then that deeper negative identity is in control.
So how do you know if you have attached yourself to a deeper negative identity?
So how do we change things? How do we give ourselves a new deeper identity?
Well, one of the quickest ways is to give yourself new evidence of who you are and what you contribute to the world.
New evidence can always be found in a new perspective!
Our old identities are built on a certain way of looking at the world, and that way of looking at the world dismisses anything that doesn't agree with that specific world view.
So if your deeper identity is that you are 'unworthy' no matter how well you do something, or how much you succeed you will only allow into your consciousness the evidence that confirms your 'unworthiness.'
In order to change our identity, we must let in other evidence. Evidence of our goodness, of our worthiness, of our capabilities.
We must ask ourselves these questions:
By asking these questions we can find new evidence for who we are - which in turn affects our deeper identity - finally giving us what we actually need in order to make the changes we want to make, show up the way we want to show up, and simply just feel good about ourselves!
XOXO
Meg
Meg is a life coach, blogger and event host that is passionate about walking with people who want more out of life than just the status quo!
She believes that life doesn’t have to work out exactly the way we think it “should” in order to be enjoyed and that people don’t have to be perfect in order to be loved.
She believes that we all have the voice of truth inside of us but sometimes it can be hard to hear. And most importantly that we must live between the tension of accepting the things we cannot change and taking massive action on the things we can!
Meg creates spaces where women can slow down and process all the things that are influencing and controlling their lives - their everyday thoughts, emotions, and the stories they have been telling themselves.
Spaces where they can look at their inner world, gain valuable insight and then reclaim their personal authority, and make conscious decisions that transform the way they experience their lives!
Through one on one coaching, group coaching and workshops Meg helps women show up in the world with more love, and less ego, more compassion, and less judgment, more vulnerability, and less shame, more emotional agility and less fear!
Meg lives in BC with her husband of 20 years, two teenage boys and their little dog Charlie.
To learn more about Meg and her business, visit her website realexcellentliving.com
Ahhhhhhhhhhh, the brand-new year smell is in the air, can you sense it? The excitement, the shiny new hopes, resolutions and goals, and magical guiding focus words for the year... We’re so excited by the possibilities of manifesting something previously unreachable, that it’s making us giddy!
Is the new year really the best time to make such declarations? Hardly! Who knows, maybe it’s a part of the reason why the majority of new year resolutions and goals never come to fruition?
The new year is a man-made, artificial concept, which does not fit with the Universe’s cycles at all! There are plenty of better occasions to make new plans and set new goals, such as:
All of these natural occurrences will support you in making new goals and planting seeds for manifestation by adding a strong push of energy behind your intention, so you can create powerfully!
What happens if you fall off the wagon or if your path becomes convoluted due to circumstances beyond your control? When is the best time to get back on? Is it on Monday? On the next Full Moon? When the snow melts? Noooooooooo!
My friend, please understand (and I mean FEEL IT in your gut and in your bones, feel it until it hurts and imprints deeply on your psyche) that tomorrow is not promised to any of us! Your next breath might not come. None of us are entitled to “next week”.
Please understand that your every breath is a gift, the Universe breathes you full of exquisite lifeforce, which gets distributed to every single cell of your body. It’s a miracle!
In our illusion of “being in control” we think that we TAKE a breath, but in reality the breath enters our body passively! The exhalation requires work (the diaphragm muscle contracts, pushing the air out). When your diaphragm relaxes, the air rushes in into your body passively, due to the pressure gradient between the outside and the inside of your body.
Therefore, you receive the gift of breath, so accept it with grace and appreciation. Treasure it and use it with the deepest reverence. Treat it as the most sacred gift, because that’s what it is!
Coming back to my earlier question, when is the best time to pick up your goals, resolutions, intentions, if you still find them meaningful? Know this: your EVERY BREATH is a new opportunity! Your every inhale is a new beginning! Use that brand new opportunity every time, and never give up! Keep doing it until you succeed, because I know you will!
If you feel you need something different to gently jostle you out of your element and back towards your greatness with more vigour and energy, I want to offer you my 2021 Mind & Body Reset Bundle. It consists of 2 simple, tasty and powerful recipes, and 3 short Kundalini Yoga practices designed to keep you energised, balanced, and healthy.
Enjoy, and Happy New Breath!
With love and gratitude,
SevaRam Spronk
SevaRam serves Happy Healthy Women as the Kitchener branch director. She is a level 2 KRI-certified Kundalini Yoga teacher (RYT-500), and she shares the life-saving tools of this technology with her community through on-line classes and workshops. In her life-coaching business she helps entrepreneurial women to destroy their self-perceived limitations to reach the next level of success.
www.SRKKundaliniYoga.org
The current health crisis has caused a lot of uncertainty — from stock prices to daily routines. This, in turn, has forced people to rethink their finances and focus on long-term plans.
Indeed, 4 out of 10 Canadians are anxious about how COVID-19 will disrupt their lifestyle in the future and are thinking of postponing their retirement plans, as many haven’t been able to contribute to their retirement savings since the pandemic started. Despite this, we believe that you can still plan for your future even if you are currently experiencing financial setbacks due to COVID-19.
In this post, we’ll discuss how you can successfully plan for your retirement during times of crisis.
Understand Your Finances
It’s incredibly important to evaluate your finances and gain a full understanding of them — especially when faced with tough predicaments. In order to be aware of where you stand financially, you should learn the basics of personal finance such as saving, budgeting, and investing.
For instance, learning how to create a detailed budget and sticking to it can help you avoid spending too much money, as well as guiding you to adjust your expenses, so that you can pay more towards your retirement contributions. Additionally, getting a grasp on your financial standing can also help you sort your short-term and long-term goals — whether it’s paying your debts or using your RRSP to finance your future home. By mastering these concepts, you can help to manage your finances much better and prepare yourself for the future.
Avoid Dipping Into Your RRSPs
It might be tempting to break into your RRSP piggy bank — especially if you’ve lost your source of income due to the pandemic. However, it is important that you think long and hard before you take any money out of your RRSPs.
Additionally, withdrawing your RRSP early has a lot of implications not just on your future retirement fund, but also on your present tax bill. For one, you’ll have to declare the full amount withdrawn as income in the year you withdraw — and this can end with you paying a sizable tax bill during tax season. Moreover, you’ll have to pay a withholding tax when you make a withdrawal from your RRSP. Your withdrawal tax varies depending on the amount you took out and the province where you live in, so be sure to look into that before using your RRSPs. You run the risk of losing the benefits of RRSPs and possibly face harsh penalties for dipping into them, so as much as possible, try to avoid prematurely withdrawing from your retirement funds.
Invest in the Stock Market
If you have plenty of savings, now might be the right time to invest in stocks for your retirement. Compared to a savings account, you can reap bigger profits over time to use for your future as stocks can rise significantly over a long period of time. And even if things aren’t looking up for the stock market right now, whatever you invest in it has a lot of time to recover.
So although it seems irrational, you should start buying stocks now while we’re still in a crisis. When choosing where to buy stocks, be sure to look for an organization that has a record of responding and adapting well to market changes. Furthermore, make sure that you diversify your stock investments across industries, locations, and asset classes to mitigate any losses.
Facing a crisis shouldn’t stop you from achieving your long-term plans. Through meticulous planning and smart money management, you can find ways to contribute to your retirement plans and secure your future.
You get it.
Setting your business up with the right foundation and multiple sources of revenue flowing through is key...but I have seen this backfire for many that move with an idea, and forget to take these three things into consideration.
1. What's your mission? My philosophy: one mission, many vehicles.
Your business serves a purpose. You've likely figured out your niche, who you're serving and what problems they need to solve. You're likely on a mission to serve as many people as possible who have that same issue. So the question becomes - is this new project/source of revenue in alignment with your mission? You'll have a much easier (and way more genuine) time implementing it if it is!
2. What's the model? Does this new stream of revenue require you to trade your time for money? Is it a set it and forget it type deal? Does it grow exponentially over time? Looking closely at these areas is going to help you assess whether or not it's a fit for you. If you're looking for a life of less work and more freedom, you'll want to keep that top of mind when making decisions.
3. Will it flow? Is this new stream of revenue a natural fit into the sales funnel/process of your current business?
For example - A Personal Trainer who is always recommending people head to the nearest health store to pick up supplements, could instead consider aligning with a supplement supplier and making those recommendations for their own line. It flows naturally and saves the client time and energy as well!
There's so much more to consider but these three are biggies! Are you in the midst of creating additional sources of revenue in your business?
Wishing you so much love and abundance!
xo
Natalie Colalillo
Natalie Colalillo is the founder and CEO of Happy Healthy Women, a global collective of women entrepreneurs who see happiness, health and success as one full circle. Her heart's calling lies in bringing amazing women together and empowering them to step into their greatness. With over 20 years of experience in both wellness and business, Natalie is also a Plant-based Lifestyle & Business Coach specializing in empowering Solopreneurs to establish and succeed in their dream business. Starting Happy Healthy Women and coaching others to success has been the most fulfilling of her projects, as she feels fortunate to work with such incredible women who are living their dreams and changing lives.
"Gratitude turns what we have into enough and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos into order, confusion into clarity. It makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow." - Melody Beattie
Nothing can change things as fast as gratitude can. We can be spinning in circles, feeling overwhelmed and out of control, thoughts bouncing from thing to thing faster than we can keep up with, and then, in walks gratitude!
All of a sudden you are opened, vast and expanded, you relax into a place of peace and contentment and best of all you are delivered to your highest self.
Gratitude is so powerful!
In fact, let's try it right now: bring into your mind someone or something that you feel grateful for. Maybe it is for your loved ones, your kiddos, or your life partner. Maybe it's the home you live in or the work that you do. Maybe you have recovered from an illness, or someone has really been there for you, or you've had an opportunity open up.
Whatever it is for you, hold it in the center of your awareness and acknowledge the gift it has been in your life. Place your hand on your chest and become aware of your heart and feel for a moment what you are experiencing when you feel grateful. Notice the openness that you feel, notice the expansive feeling, how you begin to relax, and begin to feel a sense of peace.
And notice what is most important about gratitude - that it is not the thoughts that you have, but instead it is a feeling, an explosion of sensations in your body and spirit. It is a state of consciousness, a way of showing up in the world.
So often we think of gratitude as an attitude to live by - that it's about thoughts and beliefs.
We think of gratitude as being positive, seeing the good in things, and using language that reflects that.
But gratitude is not an attitude - gratitude is a state of consciousness. It is a way of being in the world that comes from a soul level. After all, we don't experience gratitude in our heads (how often have you said "I know I should be grateful for this") we experience gratitude in our hearts.
All we have to do is bring to mind the face of a loved one and our hearts begin to sing, our bodies begin to vibrate with love, in fact sometimes when we add words our gratitude goes away (lol) as we being to think about something they said or did that didn't match the blueprint of what we wanted!
When we move from gratitude being about positivity and about our thoughts to an actual expanded consciousness that we live with we find something amazing happens: we find the quote from above actually becomes true in our lives.
We find that we move from conditional gratitude to gratitude beyond conditions!
For so many of us, we only allow ourselves to feel gratitude when things are going the way we want them to go, when people are treating us in a way that meets our needs and when our circumstances match what we want them to be. It's so easy to feel gratitude then!
But when we move from an attitude of gratitude to a gratitude consciousness we no longer need our life circumstances to match our needs to feel gratitude.
After all, sometimes the things that don't feel good are extremely good for us - and sometimes the things that feel good are not that good for us!
We are often so terrified of feeling discomfort, or unpleasantness, that the minute these feelings come up we have to do everything possible to get rid of the feeling! We have the unhelpful habit of measuring our success by if we feel good or not!
But when we instead pause with the feeling of uncomfortability we find out that these feelings are often doorways to awareness, enlightenment, and healing! What feels good and what feels bad is not always the best way to measure success! When we slip into black and white thinking or either/or thinking we believe that if we are uncomfortable then life is terrible, and if things are great then we allow ourselves to be happy.
But when we take on gratitude as a level of consciousness, as an expanded world view we can be uncomfortable and be dealing with hard emotions and still be grateful - you can acknowledge that you are unhappy and still allow your consciousness to notice and feel gratitude for the life you are experiencing!
So spend some time today in gratitude for everything - make a list that includes the beautiful things in your life and the not so beautiful! Hold each thing in your heart and allow yourself to feel grateful for it without slipping into thoughts or beliefs! At first, this may seem so difficult (trust me it was for me!) but with time and practice you will find yourself observing all the areas of your life without judgment or rational and you will find yourself being grateful for things that you thought you could never feel grateful for!
Today I am practicing the gratitude consciousness with you - today I have things on my plate that make me uncomfortable, that I dread, that cause me pain. But each time they come to mind I say to myself "I am so grateful that I get to experience life, and this is part of my life."
When my mind wants to slip into old thinking I repeat again "I am so grateful that I get to experience life, and this is part of my life." I hold each situation in my heart without judgment, I allow myself to feel whatever feelings come up and I say again "I am so grateful that I get to experience life, and this is part of my life."
And I am always surprised and delighted at how the tension in my body begins to fade, and how I can stay with the uncomfortability all enough to see it as a step on the path of lessons the universe has prepared for me.
May it be the same with you!
XO Meg
Meg is a life coach, blogger and event host that is passionate about walking with people who want more out of life than just the status quo!
She believes that life doesn’t have to work out exactly the way we think it “should” in order to be enjoyed and that people don’t have to be perfect in order to be loved.
She believes that we all have the voice of truth inside of us but sometimes it can be hard to hear. And most importantly that we must live between the tension of accepting the things we cannot change and taking massive action on the things we can!
Meg creates spaces where women can slow down and process all the things that are influencing and controlling their lives - their everyday thoughts, emotions, and the stories they have been telling themselves.
Spaces where they can look at their inner world, gain valuable insight and then reclaim their personal authority, and make conscious decisions that transform the way they experience their lives!
Through one on one coaching, group coaching and workshops Meg helps women show up in the world with more love, and less ego, more compassion, and less judgment, more vulnerability, and less shame, more emotional agility and less fear!
Meg lives in BC with her husband of 20 years, two teenage boys and their little dog Charlie.
To learn more about Meg and her business, visit her website:
I just celebrated my 4th full year as a vegan - and I've been reflecting on all the amazing change that has taken place as a result. While the changes have affected every area of my life, I thought I would share 7 HUGE differences the change has made in my body alone. Can you relate to any of these?
1. Inflammation dropped away and the shape of my body totally changed. This was a change I started to notice right away. It was as though my body was saying "Thanks for giving me more of what I need and less of what I don't. I can be ME!"
2. My hair grew back. For a long time, I carried an embarrassing bald spot on the top of my head. My hair was thinning and I knew it was hormonal, but nothing I tried worked...until I stopped eating meat and dairy and started filling up my plate with more nutrients. My hair is thicker now than it's ever been.
3. Menstrual Cramps disappeared! I'm 100% serious.
4. My skin cleared up. Face and body. Healthier, softer, clearer skin.
5. My digestion improved. I used to not feel well a LOT. Tummy trouble was a normal occurrence and I just thought ...."meh, it happens to all of us". Truth is - meat and dairy are REALLY hard on our digestion and our body will often let us know it's not happy.
6. I sleep like a baby and am energized like a bunny! I can accomplish a LOT in a day, and thank goodness because - big goals...but my sleep is soooo much better too.
7. Mental clarity. Say goodbye to brain fog and hello to clear, intuitive, inspired action. Eating closer to the earth means you get your head out of the clouds and become so very grounded.
Like all things, these changes didn't happen overnight - but I truthfully wasn't expecting them to happen at all. I got so used to the way I was feeling, I didn't know any different...and I'm so so glad I listened to the nudge.
Where are you on your health journey? Ever thought about adopting a more plant based life? Maybe you've been vegan for years too?
In our Wellpreneur 30 program, we dive into plant-based nutrition, and business success for 30, amazing days. When you feel great, your business does too. Join our next group here!
Natalie Colalillo
Natalie Colalillo is the founder and CEO of Happy Healthy Women, a global collective of women entrepreneurs who see happiness, health and success as one full circle. Her heart's calling lies in bringing amazing women together and empowering them to step into their greatness. With over 20 years of experience in both wellness and business, Natalie is also a Plant-based Lifestyle & Business Coach specializing in empowering Solopreneurs to establish and succeed in their dream business. Starting Happy Healthy Women and coaching others to success has been the most fulfilling of her projects, as she feels fortunate to work with such incredible women who are living their dreams and changing lives.
There are so many of us that use food for more than just nourishment, or enjoyment, or as a way to connect with our community...there are so many of us that use food in a desperate way to fill some deep emotional hole that we have.
We use food to somehow make us happy, or calm, or just plain "feel better," whatever that means to us!
For the most part, we call this EMOTIONAL EATING (Check out the blog I wrote about emotional eating here https://www.realexcellentliving.com/post/emotional-eating-been-there-donethat)
But for some of us, the eating has reached a tipping point and it's more than just emotional eating, for some of us it's become something darker and seemingly harder to overcome.
Some of us have tipped over into Binge Eating.
So what is Binge Eating?
Binge eating is an aggravated form of emotional eating. Over time, an emotional eater moves from just eating in response to emotions to MASSIVELY overeating in response to emotions once you are no longer able to get the good feeling from food that you are used to. Often you tip from emotional eating to binge eating when you have a major life trauma or upset that you can't cope with or process.
So how do you know if you have tipped over from emotional eating to binge eating?
Well, if you are a binge eater you :
So maybe you've tried everything to gain some control over your eating and maybe you have always thought you were an emotional eater...but now you recognize yourself in the description above!
Maybe why all the advice you have heard and tried has never worked makes sense now!
Maybe you have done so much work on yourself, have walked the path of self-discovery and growth, have dived into self-care, and self-image and self-esteem work, but for some reason have not been able to let go of what you thought was emotional eating.
Binge eating might have a lot in common with emotional eating, but it requires a different strategy and mindset when trying to heal from it!
The first thing I had to realize as I went deeper into my relationship with food, was that binge eating was not something I was doing wrong, it was not a weakness or a lack of self-control, it was my brain actually doing what it was supposed to be doing!
I had to realize that it wasn't that I wasn't working properly, but rather that I was working properly!
See when we are emotional eaters we are using a different part of our brain then if we are binge eaters, when we are emotional eaters we are using our limbic brain that is responsible for our emotions, but when we are binge eating it is something much more primal, we are actually being controlled by our reptilian brain, where our amygdala is stored, which is where our fight, flight or freeze response comes from. The questions that our reptilian brain asks are "Can I mate with it? Is it safe? Can I eat it?"
If you are a binge eater it feels like you have no control, it feels like something else is taking over when you eat and that is because something is...you are being controlled by our most basic survival instincts. This is your mind trying to take care of you - not trying to harm you!
But so often we are trying to solve our binging by using our limbic or prefrontal cortex which we actually don’t have access to when our reptilian brain is in control.
Hence the reason that when we come to after binge eating it seems like we were someone or somewhere else, and why we promise ourselves it will never happen again (that's our prefrontal talking) but it always does.
For so many years, I was trying to fix my binging with my logic, reasoning, higher thinking, etc that my prefrontal cortex offers (focusing on self-love, etc), never realizing why I wasn’t making a dent. All that personal growth didn't help when I was faced with the temptation of food, or when the end of the day came. My brain was too busy trying to protect me!
So how do you deal with the reptilian brain?
Your work is to address the fear and create a space where you feel safe. When you create a space where you feel safe and you address that fear you can again access your higher mind. Without creating the feeling of safety, which is what the reptilian brain is trying to create with its overeating, you can not get past the instinct and begin to function from a higher level of thinking
Almost all advice on how to deal with emotional eating makes the assumption that you have access to your limbic or prefrontal cortex -which you don't have when you are in reptilian brain mode- which is why all that advice hasn't worked. All information that we receive first flows through our reptilian brain and then moves to the limbic and the prefrontal cortex.
So how do you create a feeling of safety for your brain so that the information can naturally flow into a part of your brain that allows you again to access things like reason, logic, self-love, disciple, etc?
Here are 6 things that worked for me:
So instead of consuming more food then my body could possibly ever need, I found myself learning how to make myself feel safe, accepting myself for who I was, and learning how to grow in areas that were long overdue!
Cheering you on as you journey,
XO Meg
Meg is a life coach, blogger and event host that is passionate about walking with people who want more out of life than just the status quo!
She believes that life doesn’t have to work out exactly the way we think it “should” in order to be enjoyed and that people don’t have to be perfect in order to be loved.
She believes that we all have the voice of truth inside of us but sometimes it can be hard to hear. And most importantly that we must live between the tension of accepting the things we cannot change and taking massive action on the things we can!
Meg creates spaces where women can slow down and process all the things that are influencing and controlling their lives - their everyday thoughts, emotions, and the stories they have been telling themselves.
Spaces where they can look at their inner world, gain valuable insight and then reclaim their personal authority, and make conscious decisions that transform the way they experience their lives!
Through one on one coaching, group coaching and workshops Meg helps women show up in the world with more love, and less ego, more compassion, and less judgment, more vulnerability, and less shame, more emotional agility and less fear!
Meg lives in BC with her husband of 20 years, two teenage boys and their little dog Charlie.
To learn more about Meg and her business, visit her website:
Diets tend to promise losing a large amount of weight in a short time by removing a mass number of calories/foods from our diet.
Lifestyle changes are about adding in new habits that are sustainable and bring joy into your life. To me a ‘diet’ is about having an end game in sight – as in you can stop at some point whereas a lifestyle is about making it a habit for life! Small steps, small habit changes and consistency is the key. This is different for everyone, so we all must figure out what works best for us and slowly change up our habits. Meal planning and prep are my life savers!
If you're about to start a program of some sort and you're asking yourself:
Can I sustain this?
Keep going at such low calories, depriving myself, and shelling out so much cash?
What do I think will happen when I stop following it?
Am I happy during the process?
Do I still love food?
Chances are you've started a diet, and maybe it's time to start a change in lifestyle. I have found meal planning to be one thing that helps me maintain a healthy lifestyle and I love to share how to do it with others as well.
How to get started with meal planning: Start with one step at a time.
Don’t get me wrong I do fall back into my old habits too. It usually has to do with stress which leads me down the spiral of eating junk and then causing more stress on my body. My strategy is to have an accountably buddy who checks in on me and a food journal has done wonders. The signal for me is getting a migraine, once I feel one coming, I know I need to stop and reset myself again!
I have learned a lot about myself during this journey with food and continue to do so every day! Happy to share more with you!
Kandice-Lee Doucette
Meal Prep Whiz
Independent Epicure Executive Consultant
kandiceleedoucette.epicure.com
Happy Healthy Women Trailblazer
Follow me on Facebook & Instagram - Kandiceleefiredup
Check me out on YouTube
So I would be curious how many of you can relate to this, or to a story like this:
You are home and you are alone, maybe you live alone, maybe your family is sleeping already, but however, the circumstance was created you find yourself alone.
The house is quiet and dark and the sun is going down - another day is coming to a close.
It has been a day full of activity, full of hustle and bustle, of work and kids, and husbands/wives, and commitments and now you finally have some time to yourself! You are looking forward to it until all of a sudden it starts - the fridge is calling you, or maybe it's the pantry - and just like that you have no control, you are on autopilot and before you know it you've eaten a bag of chips, a piece of pie, the leftover chicken wings and half a container of cookies!
When you come to again you want to cry! You ask yourself "Why do you do this? What is wrong with you? Why don't you have any self-control?"
This was me for many, many years! I felt like I had a secret that I could never share with anyone - that every night I turned into this crazy eating monster that had no control!!
I was embarrassed and ashamed and I felt like something was 'wrong' with me!
Can I get an 'amen?' Any of my sisters out there that have been through the same thing? I feel ya!
Like so many people that are emotional eaters or binge eaters, I was careful about what I ate during the day. My days were filled with skipping breakfast, eating salads for lunch, and filling up on energy drinks in the afternoon - all in unconscious preparation of what I was going to do when the sun went down!
For more years than I care to think about, I saw food as a gateway to feeling better instead of a way to nourish, feed, and take care of my body!
If you find yourself in the camp of emotional eaters one of the most important things that you can do is create a healthy relationship with food!
Here are 5 steps that can help you on the journey:
1. Identify your emotional triggers - since so much of what is happening to us is processed at an unconscious level you have to become like a detective and bring things up to the surface so that you can take an honest look at them. Ask yourself "When do I find myself eating to feel good? What is happening just before I eat? Where am I when this happens? Why do I feel like I have to eat this?" When I first started to clue into the fact that eating was an emotional thing for me and was my tool to feel better I quickly saw that I was triggered at the end of the day, right after everyone was asleep, while I was sitting and reading or watching tv. This was the time when all of the things that I experienced during the day came up for me to process and I distracted myself with delicious cookies instead of doing the hard work of processing my feelings and thoughts.
2. Understand why you are eating - which are the emotions that you want to avoid? Which emotions are you trying to access? What need are you trying to meet? When I would eat at the end of the day when my family was asleep I didn't want to face the feeling that I wasn't in control of my life, there were so many things I was responsible for and so many activities that I had to participate in that it all felt so overwhelming. I needed to feel like there was something I could control and I gave myself that relief and a sense of control with every peanut butter cookie I put in my mouth!
3. Give yourself new options for creating the emotions you want and meeting the needs that you have. For me, I need a place where I could gain my center of gravity again, where I could get grounded and feel control, so doing yoga was a great and healthy replacement for me! It allowed me to get what I needed in a way that actually enhanced my life!
4. Resolve the triggers themselves. To have lasting change we need to go deeper than just solving surface-level problems, we actually need to dig deep! Doing yoga was great and gave me what I needed but I needed to go deeper than that...I needed to fix the problem at the foundation level! I had to look at all of my responsibilities and activities and really be honest about which of them were actually important and which ones I needed to eliminate from my life - even if that meant I was going to disappoint people or let people down! I actually had to grow in my character and learn how to speak up and ask for help and not feel like I had to have everything together all the time!
5. Implement self-care throughout the day - we can't just wait until the end of the day to process the things we are experiencing! Life can come at us so fast and we need to take the time to slow down and feel, express, and let go. Taking an extra 5 minutes here or there to check in with myself, journal a bit, go for a walk, or mediate was a lifesaver for me! When the end of the day came I wasn't at the end of my rope, but instead, I had the ability to relax and rest and rejuvenate in ways that were healthy! (And didn't involve a bag of chips or a jar of cookies!)
Overcoming emotional eating is possible! We can get to a place where we can look at our food and see friend instead of foe! Trust me if I can do it, so can you!
Meg is a life coach, blogger and event host that is passionate about walking with people who wants more out of life than just the status quo!
She believes that life doesn’t have to work out exactly the way we think it “should” in order to be enjoyed and that people don’t have to be perfect in order to be loved.
She believes that we all have the voice of truth inside of us but sometimes it can be hard to hear. And most importantly that we must live between the tension of accepting the things we cannot change and taking massive action on the things we can!
Meg creates spaces where women can slow down and process all the things that are influencing and controlling their lives - their everyday thoughts, emotions, and the stories they have been telling themselves. Spaces where they can look at their inner world, gain valuable insight and then reclaim their personal authority, and make conscious decisions that transform the way they experience their lives!
Through one on one coaching, group coaching and workshops Meg helps women show up in the world with more love, and less ego, more compassion, and less judgment, more vulnerability, and less shame, more emotional agility and less fear!
Meg lives in BC with her husband of 20 years, two teenage boys and their little dog Charlie.
To learn more about Meg and her business, visit her website realexcellentliving.com
"Well, I most certainly screwed that up" I remember thinking after I hung up the phone.
Oh, how I longed for the phones back in the day that you could actually slam down, instead of just pressing the end button, which for some reason does not carry with it the same umph you know what I mean?
I had just had the worst conversation with someone that I cared about so
much, and although the adrenaline was still flowing through my veins, I had
enough state of mind to realize - I had just totally overreacted!! So what the heck was going on? Why and how had that happened? And how could I prevent it from ever happening again!
As I walked my way back through the conversation I could see that at a
certain point I had let some negative emotions work their way into my being,
and instead of doing the right thing and expressing them, I had let them fester and grow until I had exploded! And now I could not feel worse! Which made me learn the hard way just how much our feelings affect and change how we interpret what we hear!
When we are in a state of fear, anxiety, suspicion or anger we interpret the
things we hear in a much more hostile way, which then, of course, causes us
to respond in a much more hostile way! Even something as simple as being
tired at the end of a long day can make a simple request feel like a massive
demand of our time and energy!
So what do we do?
A huge part of limiting the number of times that we overreact is to become
aware of what we are actually feeling. Overreacting comes when we have
been feeling something for quite a while but have been ignoring all the signs!
I know I am the queen at doing this! I so often say "I'm fine!" and put a smile
on my face when inside I'm just ready to explode! Or I tell myself I "shouldn't"
feel a certain way and so I pretend I don't but really...I do!
By not paying attention to what we feel or masking what we feel we take the
first step down the painful road of overreaction and misunderstanding!
When I feel frustrated or tired or anxious or any of the more uncomfortable
emotions I tend to hear what people say in a much more negative way, often
as an accusation or an attack. And then of course all too often I tend to
accuse and attack back which only makes everything worse!
Another important part of limiting the number of times we overreact is to
actually let people know how we feel without taking it out on them!
A simple statement like "I am feeling frustrated right now because I don't feel
heard." is so much better than yelling "You never listen to me!!"
By sharing our feelings and emotions we can actually build closeness and
trust in the relationship as well as give ourselves the opportunity to
acknowledge them and then let them dissipate!
So the next time you feel like you're about to blow your top, take a moment to
step back and ask yourself:
What am I really feeling?
When did I start feeling this way?
And how can I communicate my feelings in a way that is helpful, not harmful?
Meg Heppner is a Life Coach that helps women show up in the world with more authenticity, more confidence, more awareness, and more love.
To find out more about Meg’s work and to connect with her check out her website: realexcellentliving.com or send her a text at 1.204.384.9700
