Speaker 1: I won't let my body out be outwait everything that
Speaker 1: I'm made done, won't spend my life trying to change.
Speaker 1: I'm learning love who I am, I get I'm strong,
Speaker 1: I feel free, I know everybody of me.
Speaker 2: It is beautiful.
Speaker 1: And that will always out way if you feel it.
Speaker 3: But you.
Speaker 2: She'll some love to the food. I get that.
Speaker 1: Say you one day and did you and die out way.
Speaker 2: Happy Saturday out way.
Speaker 3: I'm Leanne Ellington, and we are here to talk about
Speaker 3: one of the questions that I hear all the time
Speaker 3: from women that are stuck inside the food and body prison,
Speaker 3: which is does it get easier? And that really is
Speaker 3: the million dollar question that doesn't have a completely simple answer,
Speaker 3: but we are going to simplify it as much as
Speaker 3: we possibly can today, okay, and then stay next week.
Speaker 3: I'm going to give you kind of like a nitty
Speaker 3: gritty checklist that you can literally use to make sure
Speaker 3: that you are teaching your brain how to practice ease
Speaker 3: versus teaching your brain to practice hard. And it's kind
Speaker 3: of like learning how to speak the language of ease
Speaker 3: that your nervous system is looking to learn, not just
Speaker 3: your mind. So we're going to distinguish between those two things.
Speaker 3: But I'm going to go ahead and just dive on in.
Speaker 3: So I know it's April of twenty twenty four right
Speaker 3: now when I'm recording this, but I want to flash
Speaker 3: back to the holiday season of two thousand and eight
Speaker 3: through twenty thirteen, and so back in what really seems
Speaker 3: like a former lifetime when I own my own fitness
Speaker 3: studio for women, I used to offer this thing called
Speaker 3: a twenty eight day Holiday Body Challenge, and so every
Speaker 3: single year, what would happen is fifty or so women
Speaker 3: would sign up to work with me during you know
Speaker 3: that tricky time of year between Halloween and New Year's
Speaker 3: while I guided them through the process of you know,
Speaker 3: I'm putting this in air quotes, but dropping pounds fast
Speaker 3: or getting in their skinny genes by New Year's or
Speaker 3: getting rid of that muffin top or whatever words I
Speaker 3: was using in my marketing at the time, right And
Speaker 3: so for the record, I'm no, I'm not proud of that,
Speaker 3: but it's just who I was at the time, and
Speaker 3: I didn't know what I didn't know, and I used
Speaker 3: to punish myself more or less for you know, passing
Speaker 3: on the diet mentality to other women, but I've reconciled
Speaker 3: that shame now and here I am, and I believe
Speaker 3: I'm using.
Speaker 2: It for good.
Speaker 3: But back to this holiday challenge. Okay, So no, it
Speaker 3: wasn't rocket science. I would just put them on a
Speaker 3: calorie restricted meal plan and have them come to my
Speaker 3: personal training studio or my fitness studio at least three
Speaker 3: times a week to work out, and then we would
Speaker 3: strategically use the holiday so things like Thanksgiving Day or
Speaker 3: Christmas Day as a cheat day. And again I'm putting
Speaker 3: that in air quotes, and I know I don't like
Speaker 3: to use words like cheat anymore, but again I didn't
Speaker 3: know what I didn't know, and those were the words
Speaker 3: that I was using, right, And so, of course, as
Speaker 3: you do when you're in that weight loss challenge mode,
Speaker 3: we took pictures and measurements and body fat percentages to
Speaker 3: measure their progress. And so, as you can probably imagine,
Speaker 3: you know, pounds were dropped and physiques were chiseled, and
Speaker 3: body shaping happened right before our very eyes. And yeah,
Speaker 3: it all worked until it didn't work anymore, right, And
Speaker 3: so things were great for thirty days or six weeks,
Speaker 3: But what happened after that. Well, that's the part that
Speaker 3: my own shame and fear of failure really didn't allow
Speaker 3: me to share for a long time. Because the truth
Speaker 3: is that come January first, that dreaded bounce back effect
Speaker 3: was already in full force. Okay, they had grown tired
Speaker 3: of eking out the energy to monitor and count and
Speaker 3: measure and track every morsel of food that touched their lips,
Speaker 3: and their bodies were exhausted. They were sore and overtrained
Speaker 3: and in need of some major recovery after the literal
Speaker 3: and metaphoric sprint that they just participated in. But also
Speaker 3: their mojo was shot, like they just spent all of
Speaker 3: that time and energy using their limited stores of willpower
Speaker 3: and motivation to keep things going for that few weeks
Speaker 3: that they were there, that by the time the new
Speaker 3: year struck, they had officially nothing left to give, right,
Speaker 3: and their mindsets were starting to bounce back to whatever
Speaker 3: their default was, and oftentimes it was that good, bad, black,
Speaker 3: white in out all or nothing thought process that was
Speaker 3: perpetuating their problems in.
Speaker 2: The first place.
Speaker 3: And so yes, I'm sharing examples from the holiday season,
Speaker 3: but the problem that I'm talking about here is this
Speaker 3: year round thing right, and looking back, I know exactly
Speaker 3: why it happened to Okay, we only made over part
Speaker 3: of them. We didn't do what needed to be done
Speaker 3: on the inside, like the headwork, addressing the actual problem,
Speaker 3: addressing the right problem, I should say, and creating actual
Speaker 3: brain change. We never addressed the cause of their struggles,
Speaker 3: their relationship with food, their relationship with their body. We
Speaker 3: just essentially threw another diet, another plan, and another short
Speaker 3: term band aid at the bigger problem. And so here's
Speaker 3: what inevitably happened as a result. Okay, the change was temporary,
Speaker 3: and to be on, they always had to be on,
Speaker 3: like they were playing a game of all or nothing,
Speaker 3: and they were either in or they were out, and
Speaker 3: we were addressing the symptoms and never addressed the causes
Speaker 3: going on upstream in their brain. So think about it
Speaker 3: once all of that, you know, go hard or go
Speaker 3: home kind of motivational raw raw wears off. We all
Speaker 3: go back to our own default thinking and our own
Speaker 3: default way of living in habits, because we are creatures
Speaker 3: of habit and like that part really is just science, right,
Speaker 3: And boy oh boy, the truth that I'm sharing today
Speaker 3: costs me a lot of shame.
Speaker 2: And heartache. And again the truth was, I didn't know
Speaker 2: what I didn't know.
Speaker 3: But in reality, this was some of the most valuable
Speaker 3: experimentation that I ever conducted, because here's what I discovered
Speaker 3: as a result. Some of my clients really only did
Speaker 3: need to change their diet or start exercising more, or
Speaker 3: just be mindful of what they were eating. And so
Speaker 3: for some of those women work out in nutrition programs,
Speaker 3: that was enough to completely change their life forever, right,
Speaker 3: But most of them needed more. Most of them were
Speaker 3: being held back by something bigger, and most of them
Speaker 3: were caught up in the same up down, short term
Speaker 3: you know roller coaster that I had been stuck on
Speaker 3: for decades, And it's that same roller coaster that kept
Speaker 3: me feeling like a slave to dieting and a slave
Speaker 3: to working out harder, faster more. And just like me,
Speaker 3: none of them really had a food problem per se,
Speaker 3: or a motivation problem. It was a thinking problem. It
Speaker 3: was the kind of thinking that they downloaded, they developed.
Speaker 3: It was a language that they learned to speak, and
Speaker 3: more specifically, it was the diet mentality language that was
Speaker 3: causing and perpetuating the problem. And so that all or nothing,
Speaker 3: Black white up down roller coaster was the problem. But again,
Speaker 3: if you think that that's normal, or you think that
Speaker 3: that's something that you want to keep getting good at,
Speaker 3: you keep getting back on it, back on it, back
Speaker 3: on it until you realize that that's the real problem.
Speaker 3: But when you're in it, when you're on it, it feels
Speaker 3: like you can't ever get off of it, or if
Speaker 3: you do, you just become terrified that you're going to go,
Speaker 3: you know, gain a bunch of weight or go off
Speaker 3: this metaphorical deep end. And either way, what happens is
Speaker 3: you end up just feeling like a slave to it,
Speaker 3: like you are a hostage. It controls you, It controls
Speaker 3: your life more than you do. And so we've talked
Speaker 3: about this a lot on this podcast, and the fact
Speaker 3: that you're never going to be able to outdiet or
Speaker 3: outwillpower or outsmart your relationship with food, like never, it's
Speaker 3: not going to be able to happen, and trying to
Speaker 3: address your internal struggles or the current wiring in your
Speaker 3: brain that's causing you to think and act and feel
Speaker 3: and behave the way that you currently are around food
Speaker 3: or just feel about your body, and trying to combat
Speaker 3: that with another diet or another exercise program.
Speaker 2: I mean it with so much love, but it really
Speaker 2: is just a recipe for failure.
Speaker 3: Like I can flat out guarantee that that will not
Speaker 3: solve the bigger problem because again, you'll never be able
Speaker 3: to outwill power or outsmart your current relationship with food,
Speaker 3: your current relationship with your body, and really until you
Speaker 3: swim upstream. And I'm putting that in air quotes because
Speaker 3: what I really mean is I'm pointing to the brain,
Speaker 3: the nervous system, the source of the problem, and really
Speaker 3: go address your relationship with food and the wiring in
Speaker 3: your brain and go heal that. Diets will end and
Speaker 3: they will fail you, and not because you're a failure,
Speaker 3: but they set you up to fail because your brain
Speaker 3: will never get good at them, and you're going to
Speaker 3: stay stuck on that all or nothing diet roller coaster
Speaker 3: because the solution does not live in another diet or
Speaker 3: program or plan.
Speaker 2: And trust me, like I wish it did.
Speaker 3: At one point in time, I try to outdiet and
Speaker 3: outwill my food struggles and the sugar addictions that I
Speaker 3: realized were not really sugar addiction. It was just I
Speaker 3: practiced a thought process and a pattern of it was
Speaker 3: more like a recipe of thoughts and beliefs and behaviors
Speaker 3: that made me feel like I was addicted to sugar,
Speaker 3: and that's what I was practicing for decades. But bottom line,
Speaker 3: you can't outdiet that it will never get healed from
Speaker 3: a diet or a losing weight or a workout program,
Speaker 3: because you'll just bring the old thinking with you, which
Speaker 3: is really that definition of insanity, you know, doing the
Speaker 3: same thing over and over and again and expecting a
Speaker 3: different result. But when you change what you are seeing,
Speaker 3: and when I say seeing, I mean seeing in you,
Speaker 3: when you're what you're seeing when it comes to what
Speaker 3: you think food will like, the void that it will
Speaker 3: or will not fill, right, and what you're saying to
Speaker 3: yourself and about yourself. So when you see what when
Speaker 3: you change what you're seeing and saying to yourself and
Speaker 3: about yourself, which is really the self image and the identity.
Speaker 3: But then also, yeah, you do need a better strategy
Speaker 3: and system of thinking around food because the whole eat
Speaker 3: less move more calories in, calories out thing. That's a
Speaker 3: logic and reason solution to a deeper emotional struggle. Right,
Speaker 3: But when you change all of that and yes, get
Speaker 3: a better strategy. That is when the diet madness, or
Speaker 3: the body dysmorphia, or the toxic disordered relationship with food
Speaker 3: can finally come to an end and the real healing
Speaker 3: can begin. But when you change all of that and yes,
Speaker 3: get a better strategy, that is when the diet madness,
Speaker 3: or the body dysmorphia, or the toxic disordered relationship with
Speaker 3: food can finally come to an end and the real
Speaker 3: healing can begin. And so that's the part where it's like, okay, Leanne, simple,
Speaker 3: not easy, especially if I've been practicing this my whole life.
Speaker 2: And that's where you know, it's like, okay, is there
Speaker 2: a catch?
Speaker 3: It's the number one thing I hear when people are like, Leanne,
Speaker 3: I don't even know if that's possible.
Speaker 2: Is there a catch? And there is a catch.
Speaker 3: And it's really like a catch twenty two more and
Speaker 3: more so, I should say, and I call it the
Speaker 3: catch twenty two of dieting because I've never met a
Speaker 3: woman that struggles with food or struggles with her body
Speaker 3: that isn't absolutely one thousand percent sick and tired of
Speaker 3: dieting right, or sick and tired of constantly weighing and
Speaker 3: measuring and calculating because that's what she thinks will keep
Speaker 3: her in control, or sick of, you know, stressing and
Speaker 3: guessing and obsessing over every morsel of food that touches
Speaker 3: her lips or her weight, right, and then of course,
Speaker 3: like you can't help but be sick of all of
Speaker 3: the judgment and the self criticism and the self loathing,
Speaker 3: and don't even get me started on the shame, like
Speaker 3: the shame prison that that keeps you in, and then
Speaker 3: of course getting sick of valuing yourself based on how
Speaker 3: much you weigh or how much you ate that day,
Speaker 3: and sick of absolutely living in a prison, right, a
Speaker 3: prison that is, it's a body prison, it's a food prison,
Speaker 3: it's an emotional prison that when you're in it, you
Speaker 3: don't even know how to get out of it because
Speaker 3: it seems like it just seems normal. And so when
Speaker 3: I talk to women about what they're currently doing to
Speaker 3: address all of those struggles that I just mentioned, ironically,
Speaker 3: dieting is the number one thing I hear, or controlling
Speaker 3: themselves more is the number one thing I hear. And
Speaker 3: so what's happening is, you know, when you're in that cycle,
Speaker 3: like I said, it feels impossible to get out of it.
Speaker 3: You're actively voting on the thing that you hate and
Speaker 3: actively choosing the thing that's keeping you stuck in the prison,
Speaker 3: and actively choosing something that you've probably identified hasn't worked
Speaker 3: and isn't working, and if you get really honest with yourself,
Speaker 3: you know will never work. And that's why I call
Speaker 3: it a catch twenty two because first of all, there's
Speaker 3: absolutely no shame and no judgment around this whatsoever, Like
Speaker 3: this is the cycle that I was stuck in for decades,
Speaker 3: And of course there's nothing but love and compassion for
Speaker 3: those of you if you're listening to this and you're
Speaker 3: stuck on that same up and down roller coaster. But
Speaker 3: it absolutely stinks, right and it is a prison. And
Speaker 3: that's why I'm simply here to just point it out
Speaker 3: and shed some awareness and hopefully just shine a light
Speaker 3: on this catch twenty two that a lot of women
Speaker 3: don't even realize they have become entangled in. Importantly, it's
Speaker 3: really an invitation, because that's what this podcast is all about.
Speaker 3: We're here for just weekly doses of inspiration and motivation,
Speaker 3: but also an invitation, like what if instead of committing
Speaker 3: to another diet or another quick fix. You first identified
Speaker 3: and got really clear on what's not working right, and
Speaker 3: you created an awareness of what not to do more
Speaker 3: of and the road to not keep going down. Like
Speaker 3: what if that was the first step, right, instead of
Speaker 3: committing to another thing or to do or a you know,
Speaker 3: do this, eat this, don't eat that. It's like, no,
Speaker 3: I am going to just draw that line in the
Speaker 3: sand and stop committing to all the things that I
Speaker 3: know don't work and not witness myself trying to commit
Speaker 3: to something that I know will never work. And that's
Speaker 3: when you can get really curious about your struggles instead
Speaker 3: of keeping you in them, and you can identify what's
Speaker 3: not working instead of going down the roads that aren't working.
Speaker 3: Like that's a big difference too, Like, and what if
Speaker 3: that was the game plan?
Speaker 2: And again, I know that might not sound as sexy
Speaker 2: as you know.
Speaker 3: Oh, I've got to get into action action action, because
Speaker 3: it's not a game plan.
Speaker 2: There's no action steps.
Speaker 3: It's not like a go get them tiger, let's raw
Speaker 3: rah and hustle, right, It's really just an awareness and
Speaker 3: thought and mindfulness and insight and a decision to stop
Speaker 3: going down the roads that you know won't ever work.
Speaker 2: And so when you commit.
Speaker 3: To just stopping the insanity, what thoughts does that spark
Speaker 3: in your beautiful brain?
Speaker 2: Right?
Speaker 3: And that's really what we're here to do today, is
Speaker 3: help you shift the thinking that's causing your current results
Speaker 3: and outcomes. And if you're listening to this podcast, it's
Speaker 3: probably because you know the subject of health or what
Speaker 3: to eat or what not to eat, or food or
Speaker 3: your body, they are eluding you, right, And if you're
Speaker 3: stuck in the prison or feeling like a prisoner to
Speaker 3: you know, gaining and losing and gaining and losing, or
Speaker 3: feeling obsessed over that loss or that gain, or simply
Speaker 3: stuck in the black white, all or nothing binge restrict
Speaker 3: roller coaster, or if you're like me and you are
Speaker 3: just falling through the cracks because maybe you don't fit
Speaker 3: neat and tidy into a category of a typical eating disorder.
Speaker 3: That was for me, I was just like, Okay, if
Speaker 3: I don't have an eating disorder, what is this?
Speaker 2: It felt like a.
Speaker 3: Gray area, right, And that gray area can make you
Speaker 3: feel very stuck and alone. But that's why it's so
Speaker 3: important to just have these conversations like to get really
Speaker 3: real And yeah, I mean, you can play the diet
Speaker 3: game and you can play it over and over again
Speaker 3: and never break the cycle. Or you can do what
Speaker 3: we're doing right here, which is to change your thinking
Speaker 3: and get really real about the problem that's causing the
Speaker 3: struggles so that you can break out of the definition
Speaker 3: of insanity. But that being said, and I mean this
Speaker 3: with so much love, and I hope you're taking it
Speaker 3: with the love that I mean it. If you want
Speaker 3: to do differently, you do have to think differently, and
Speaker 3: you have to break the cycle of insanity and not
Speaker 3: fool yourself into thinking like, oh maybe one day control, restrict, deprive,
Speaker 3: you know, obsess over my food, over food and my
Speaker 3: weight will actually work, because I'm telling you, it will
Speaker 3: just create more of the obsession.
Speaker 2: And here's the thing.
Speaker 3: Most women, unfortunately, I mean, they won't stop and do this,
Speaker 3: or they don't think that this work is sexy. It's
Speaker 3: not as sexy as lose twenty pounds and twenty minutes,
Speaker 3: you know what I mean. And a lot of women
Speaker 3: will just go look for the next game of control
Speaker 3: or the next action item. But those of you that
Speaker 3: do that, stop the definition of insanity, You're going to
Speaker 3: find that your journey to healing and to finally ending
Speaker 3: the suffering and struggling can actually begin. And so, coming
Speaker 3: back to the question at the top of this episode
Speaker 3: of like, does it ever get easier? And so the
Speaker 3: short answer is yes if you practice ease, and the
Speaker 3: short answer is no if you practice hard. And so
Speaker 3: we're going to get into the nitty gritty of what
Speaker 3: I mean by that and what that looks like specifically
Speaker 3: next week, and I'm literally going to give you a
Speaker 3: checklist of what your brain and your nervous system dictates
Speaker 3: as hard and easy so that you can, like, you know,
Speaker 3: use it as kind of a check in with yourself
Speaker 3: to make sure that you're teaching your brain ease as
Speaker 3: opposed to taking it down the dead end road of
Speaker 3: practicing hard. Okay, So I hope today's conversation simply opened
Speaker 3: your eyes, or maybe just played some seeds, or sometimes
Speaker 3: we just need a mirror to be held up to
Speaker 3: us to realize, Okay, what I'm doing is not working
Speaker 3: and it's not going to create happiness, and it's actually
Speaker 3: out voting health and out voting happiness. And that's the
Speaker 3: conversation I needed to have and so if that's all
Speaker 3: you needed today, then I'm glad that you got that.
Speaker 3: But we are going to be back next week with
Speaker 3: more of the nitty gritty and some actionable steps that
Speaker 3: you can take in the meantime, if you do want
Speaker 3: to learn more about how to turn off the part
Speaker 3: of your brain that's obsessed with food or obsessed with
Speaker 3: your weight and really rewire your own brain for peace
Speaker 3: and freedom, then head on over to Stresslessseeating dot com
Speaker 3: and just sign up to watch the Stressless Eating sneak
Speaker 3: preview where I've literally peeled back. It's really the system
Speaker 3: that I teach my clients to heal themselves of the
Speaker 3: all or nothing diet mentality for good, but without restriction
Speaker 3: and punishing your body, and definitely without having to use
Speaker 3: words like Macro's or low carb or calorie count.
Speaker 2: Right. So it's all there for you, easy to access.
Speaker 3: Over at stress us Eating dot com and if you
Speaker 3: like outweigh, I actually have another podcast here on iheartwhere
Speaker 3: I talk about all of this self image and body
Speaker 3: image stuff but from the perspective of where brain science
Speaker 3: inter sex faith okay, and so it's called What's God
Speaker 3: Got to Do With it and you can access it
Speaker 3: here on iHeart or wherever you get your podcast. So
Speaker 3: that is it for today. I am Leanne Ellington and
Speaker 3: I will talk to you soon.
Speaker 2: Bye.