Just As Well, The Women's Health Podcast - 17 Simple Ways To Reset Your Routine with Dr Chatterjee

Episode Date: May 27, 2020

Have you found yourself thinking lately about your habits? Maybe you’ve been reflecting on what actions, thoughts and behaviours from the time BC (Before Covid, that is) are worth incorporating into this ‘new normal’ we’re hearing so much about lately - and which ones you’re better off without. If you’re privileged enough to be able to do your non-essential job from home right now, without needing to simultaneously care for children (major props, by the way, to all parents pulling it off) your days may well have gained some additional white space. And this, according to Dr Rangan Chatterjee - medical doctor, lifestyle medicine advocate and host of the Feel Better, Live More podcast - presents a real opportunity. One in which you can reflect on your daily routine and begin making small adjustments that can have a big impact on your physical, mental and emotional health. In this episode, he joins Roisín to discuss the healthy habits worth building into your schedule, and the behavioural science-based techniques you need to make these changes last.  Join Dr Rangan Chatterjee on Instagram: @drchatterjee Join Roisín on Instagram @roisin.dervishokane Join Women’s Health on Instagram: @womenshealthuk Topics:  Why lifestyle medicine is so powerful  A 15-minute daily plan for mind-and-body fitness How to turn behaviour changes into lasting habits  A simple rule to curb mindless snacking How to hold yourself accountable when it comes to self-care --- Want a new workout routine? At Women’s Health we have created a 10-week Sweat & Reset workout plan that's available on Fiit. Whatever your fitness level, this 10-week full-body programme will help you cultivate a weekly fitness routine at home. Right now, we're offering you a 14-day free trial plus 25% off the plan you choose with Fiit. Sweat & Reset is included with any Fiit Premium membership - just head here to sign up: getfiit.tv/wh. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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We'd love to talk, business. Now streaming on Paramount Plus is the epic return of Mayor of Kingstown. Warden? You know who I am. Starring Academy Award nominee Jeremy Renner. I swear in these walls. Emmy Award winner Edie Falco. You're an ex-con who ran this place for years. And now, now you can't do that.

And BAFTA award winner Lenny James. You're about to have a plague of outsiders descend on your town. Let me tell you this. It's got me consequences. Mayor of Kingstown, new season now streaming on Paramount Plus. Hello everyone and welcome to Going for Goal, the weekly Women's Health podcast. My name is Roshin Devichael-Kane. I'm senior editor on Women's Health and this is your weekly chance to plug in, be inspired and get expert advice on how to achieve the health and wellness goals that matter most to you.

Those of us privileged enough to be able to do our non-essential jobs from home right now and not needing to educate and entertain children, there's a lot of reflecting going on. Routines have been shaken up and there's a lot of thinking. what from the old normal is worth taking into the new normal and what behaviours and habits we've realised we can just lose. My guest this week believes it's a real opportunity and he has tons of simple suggestions for how we can all make the most of it, make new self-care habits and make them last. He is Dr. Rungan Chatterjee, a GP with almost two decades of clinical experience, a broadcaster, host of the brilliant Feel Better Live More podcast and author of four bestselling books. Down the line from the home he shares with his wife and two children in Wilmslow, Cheshire, he fills me in on the feel-good habits he uses to keep himself and his patience, physically, mentally and emotionally strong. And, of course, the behavioural science principles behind how we can all make these changes last.

Spoiler alert, one is basically to treat yourself like a primary school-aged child, and I am so here for it. There is so much to take away from this conversation, and I really hope you enjoy it. Dr Chatterjee, Rungan, welcome to going for goal. Roshin, thanks very much for having me on. How are you doing today? I'm doing pretty well, actually. You know, we're recording this on possibly the hottest day of the year. So, you know, the sun always puts everyone in a good mood.

So, yeah, I'm feeling pretty good, if I'm honest. Happy days. I'm very glad to hear it. I wanted to get you on the show because at the heart of everything you put out, whether that's episodes of your show, feel better live more, or your books, there's this real sense that you're coming to health from a very rounded and holistic perspective, like someone who really gets that health is multifactorial. For anyone who is listening and who is not familiar with your work,

can you share how this kind of mindset, this philosophy came to be formed? Yeah, wow, how long have you got, Roshin? I'll try and give a sort of simplified roadmap through how I've ended up to where I am today. So yeah, I'm a medical doctor, I'm a GP. I've been working now, seeing patients for almost 20 years, which is just remarkable to think about it. And, you know, I remember I qualified for medical school and I thought that I'd been taught everything I needed to go out into the world now, see patients and get them better. And I started off as a specialist. So I was, you know, working in hostel medicine. I did some specialist exams. I thought I was going to specialize in kidney medicine. but then I was sort of getting a bit frustrated. I sort of thought we're overly focusing on one organ system and I don't want to just spend the rest of my career just seeing one thing. So I took the rather unusual step of moving to general practice because I wanted to see everything how different parts of the body, how different symptoms actually all relate together. So I moved over to general

practice and there was one day. I remember at the end of my clinic in the NHS. I remember looking at my whole list thinking, how many people have you really helped today, Rangan? And I looked at this list of maybe 45, 46 people that I'd seen, and I honestly felt I'd only really helped 20% of people. I felt the other 80% I'd done something for them. You know, I'd set them off for a test. I'd given them maybe a pill, which would often simply just suppress their symptom or put a sticking plaster on. And I thought, I can't go through the rest of my career for the next 34 years. Just practicing like this, there's got to be a reason why so many people are coming in with these health problems. And I didn't feel that I had

enough of a toolbox to help those people. Coupled with that, I haven't really spoken about this for years, but couple with that, when my son, my firstborn child, basically, when he was six months old, he got really sick. He had a convulsion when we were on a home. He was on holiday in France. We thought we might lose him that night. And he was in hospital in France for five days. And it turned out that he had a preventable vitamin deficiency. And I thought, this is ridiculous. I've got all my specialist qualifications, my general practice qualifications. I've got a degree in immunology. Yet I wasn't able to prevent a preventable vitamin deficiency in my own child. And I'm You know, that really affected me. That really, you know, modern medicine saved his life. But at the same time, they didn't tell me anything about the implications of what might have happened. So he was deficient in vitamin D, probably for the first six months of his life, which led to his convulsion. And I thought, okay, well, if they're not going to help me get him better, I'm going to figure this out myself. So I was, you know, if there's anyone listening to this who has had an experience like that, you know, thinking you may lose your child is,

probably, not probably, it is the most significant thing that's ever happened in my life. And it drove me, I made a commitment to myself, Roshin, that I'm going to get him back to full health as if this has never ever happened. And so I would read two, three hours a day, I'd study that vitamin, I'd study nutrition, I'd study the gut microbiome, I'd start traveling around the world to learn from leading experts. And I thought there's so much information out there that exists that we're not taught as doctors. And that's still the case today. There's so much information.

So I started applying that with my son. He's now a thriving nine-year-old boy, soon to be 10. I started applying the same principles with myself, my family. We're starting to feel as well as we've ever felt. And then I started applying those principles with my patients. And I was getting to the point where, wow, I'm starting to get to the root cause of my patient's problems now. I'm actually starting to use less medication than I've ever used before.

So like a migraine, for example, a common complaint. In the past, my toolbox would have been first, second, third line drug to treat a migraine, even though I always wanted to try and find out the root cause, whereas now it's like, okay, well, maybe we will use a drug for a week or two to help you with your symptoms. But in the meantime, let's also see if we can figure out what's causing that. And so, I've refallen back in love with medicine again, basically. And there's a lot of doctors out there who I teach and I train and when they do our courses there, they start to fall in love with medicine again because we became doctors to help people. And 30, 40 years ago, Rishin, when most of what we saw were what we call acute problems that respond really well to our magic bullets,

like a chest infection, we give you an antibiotic, the problem goes away. Brill. Patients happy, we're happy. But when you come in with these chronic issues that are often driven by stress, our work environment, on nutrition, our sedentary jobs, then all of a sudden that magic pill doesn't work as well. And it can be quite frustrating for the patient, quite frustrating for the doctor. So that's how I changed my mindset, basically. And then that led to me, there was no plan for this.

I had no plans to be in the media, but then I ended up getting my own BBC One prime time series called Doctor in the House, where I would go and live with families, live alongside them. people like you, like me, who were struggling with their health for years, were under GPs, were under specialists, yet still couldn't get better. Within four to six weeks, I was very fortunate to have that experience, but I managed to get pretty much every single person significantly better, sometimes full remission of their problem,

but certainly at least 70, 80% better, all by making small changes to their lifestyle. So, you know, I helped someone reverse their type of diabetes, anxiety and panic attacks down by 70% someone with fibromyalgia, pain free after six weeks. So I felt very fortunate that I could show the British public, you know, how small changes to your lifestyle can make a big difference no matter what your symptoms are. So that's kind of where I am today. And since then, that led to the books, the podcast. And, you know, I could keep going, but that's kind of a rough history of how I got to where I am today. Wow, thank you for sharing all of that, Rungan.

I'm so very glad to hear that your little boy made a full recovery and then some. Throughout your life, then, you've encountered all these case studies that provide really powerful anecdotal evidence backing up the argument that lifestyle adjustments can have a huge impact on health. Like the percentages you gave there for improving certain conditions, they're really something. And I think this message about making small changes to reap rewards in the way we feel over the long run is so relevant right now when people's routines have been so adjusted. I'm in a very privileged position as a non-essential worker able to do my job from home. And I think for people in my position, you know, routines have been shaken up. But for those of us without children to homeschool or care for, there's actually quite a lot of reflection going on. a lot of thinking what from the old normal is worth preserving and bringing into this,

I'm using quotation, air quotes here, new normal. And what habits and thoughts and behaviours would be better off shedding? It feels like, weirdly, it feels like there's a bit of an opportunity. So how do we make the most out of that? Yeah, look, Rachine, I think you've just brought us some really, really good points. First of all, you, like I will, will acknowledge our privilege and be down to look at the situation and think, what can we evaluate from this time? How can we improve our lives going forward? Whereas I think both of us recognize that not everyone's in that boat. Some people are crippled with losing their job,

they're stressed out. You're going to have parents who are two parents, maybe who were trying to work full time and are having to homeschool their kids and frankly just trying to get through the day is enough. So I think it's important to acknowledge that. And of course I appreciate that everyone's life is different. Yes, I'm a practicing doctor, but because of my profile in the media now, because of my books, which are out internationally and my podcast, I travel quite a bit. I'm in London quite a lot, and I don't live in London, I live in Cheshire, or overseas. I've got to say for the last six weeks in lockdown, I've had most days, three meals a day with my wife and with my children. and almost every single day we've either together gone for a long walk or a bike ride together.

I don't think we have ever done that in our entire lives with that degree of consistency. I've got to tell you, it's been phenomenal. And it's really making me reflect and go, well, you know what? I think I had a pretty good work-life balance before. If you'd asked me two months ago, I would say, yeah, I've got a pretty good work-life balance. And I think I did. But now on reflection, could I tweak it a little bit? yeah, I think I can. And that what I'm doing and what I've recommended people and the last few

podcasts I've put out, I've said one thing I'm finding really useful at the moment is journaling every morning because that first stage in the morning is when we have a lot of creative thoughts on our head, we can have a lot of anxieties and worries that are built up in our head overnight. And unless we actually process them, and one of the best ways to process them is to write them down, they can start to play and niggle away at us for the rest of the day. So, journaling has many, many benefits, but one of the cool things at the moment, I think, is if you are learning things about yourself each day, write them down, just write a few notes. Oh, you know what? I've realized how grace it is to eat with my partner every day and not be home later at 8pm every

night on the tube, for example, right? Because you're going to want to remember that in six months time when the wheels of society have probably, you know, who knows how long this is going to go on for. but I think many of us don't want to slip back into that old busyness, that old rushing around mentality. And so I think write it down is, I mean, that's certainly one way I would answer that question is a tip for people. If you're feeling it, do document it because we will forget very, very soon, you know, a few weeks of being back in the old normal, we may well forget and go, oh, wasn't it great that I actually wasn't commuting every day? Well, for some of us, we probably we realize we don't need to commute every day. Some of us probably we do, but some we don't.

The other way I'd sort of like to address that, if I may, is you mentioned routine and health snacks. And I'm really quite passionate about this idea because we all need a routine. I think routine, human beings thrive on routine anyway. That's sort of pretty well established. But what's hard at the moment is that many of us, because we're working from home, you know, we don't have those sort of structures in our days. Get ready. Get out. You know, go to the office, you know, take a break at lunchtime, go to the cafe and pick up your lunch. You know, we don't have that. And for some people, it's really easy to be stuck in their pajamas still at 10 a.m. Still watching the news, panicking about what's going on. Again, I'm not judging that. I get it. But I think of really simple framework for

people. It's literally the framework that has really taken off. It's the one that was in my last book, feel better in five. And it's all about these five-minute health snacks. So one of the problems regime that people often make when trying to make health change is that they make things too difficult, right? So it's like, okay, I need to be more active. So it's like, I need to go jogging for 40 minutes every day. Then hold on a minute. You wouldn't do that in any other aspects of your life, yet when it comes to health, we make things tricky. So if you look at behavior science, the way you create new habits. The way you turn new behaviours into long-term habits, there's a few rules to follow, and they're not that complicated. Rule number one is you've got to make it easy.

And this is the rule that people don't tend to follow. Now, tech companies like Amazon, Netflix, YouTube, they know this. You make it easy, people do it. So when Amazon went to one-click ordering about five years ago or so, estimates say their profits went up by $300 million a year. right, just from one-click ordering. Now, why could that be? That's because in the past, you had to click to checkout, confirm order, put in your card details, expiry date, next page, confirm order, right? So there's four or five steps.

Every step is an opportunity to pull out and say, no, I'm not going to do that behavior. YouTube, Netflix, they run one episode into the next. Why? So before you realize it's like 11.30 at night and you should get to bed, right? you're straight into the next episode and then you're like, oh, you know, just one more. Right. So those tech companies use behavioural science to get us to spend more time on their platform. So the way you make new behaviour stick is you make them easy and you do the small things consistently. And so the framework I talk to people about, which I think is perfect for lockdown, it's five minutes a day

on your mind, which is mental health, five minutes a day on your body, which is physical health, and five minutes a day on your heart, which is emotional health. And I think it's a really beautifully simple framework that feels achievable, but you tackle physical, mental and emotional health in very bite-sized, you know, in these small bite-sized health snacks. And it doesn't mean hard. And I've got people who are doing that since January now, within weeks, anxieties down. You know, some people have started to lose weight just from those three, five-minute.

health snacks a day because they add up. And the analogy I'd give people is tooth brushing, right? We don't think with tooth brushing that, hey, you know what, I'm not going to brush my teeth every day, but on a Sunday, I'm going to just hit it hard. I'm going to go for one hour off real deep cleanse on my team. No, we don't, right? Because it probably won't undo the fact that we haven't brushed our teeth for six weeks. And I think the same thing applies to our physical, mental and emotional. Do five minutes a day. Just the small things consistently. And I've had, you know, I don't think I've been to a gym in about two years, but I do a five minute strength workout every single day. Not because I'm motivated because I understand behavioral. So the way

I do it, Rishin, is I do a few things as part of my morning routine, but one of them involves coffee. So I make a pot of coffee at home and I'm a bit precise, you know, a bit particular about my coffee. So I put the coffee in the French press, and then I put a timer on for four minutes. In those four minutes, right, I don't go on Instagram, I don't look at my emails, I don't faff around, I do a workout, like a body weight workout, or I've got a kettlebell in my kitchen, and I'll just do four minutes or even five minutes every morning. I don't need to find time in my day later. That is dead time where you don't have to persuade me or motivate me to go down and make a cup of coffee.

I'm going to do that, right? And that's the second tip to behavior changes. Number one, make it easy. Number two, you stick on that behavior onto an existing habit. So you stick onto something you already do without thinking about it. And I promise, if people listen to this now, Roshina, if they think back to habits they've tried to bring into their life and have failed in the past,

I bet you that they didn't follow one of those two rules. First thing in the morning, I think, is brilliant, because every day you have a wake-up time. So, and again, if, let's say you want a journal, right, make sure you've got a pad and a pen always on your bedside table, right? Because here's the thing. If you don't, as soon as one of those pieces is missing, I wake up today, there's no pen, oh, the pads there's, oh, where's the pen? Is my daughter taking the pen and put it somewhere? Before you know it, you procrastinate, you think, oh, forget it, I'll do it tomorrow, right? And tomorrow, Because there's a barrier. There's a barrier. And if you make, this is what, I'm a fan of workout. I work out

on my pyjamas every morning, right? I don't put on workout gear. I don't, like, literally, whatever I sleep in, that's what I come down and make coffee and that's what I work out. And so even the barrier of having to pop on some workout clothes, I don't have that. I've removed that from my life because I know, and I've seen it with patients. I've been using these five minute health snaps with patients for years and they love them. because once they get their head round it, they do them every day. Like I've got a patient who wouldn't go to the gym 40 minutes three times a week when he was trying for ages to help with his weight, to help with his well-being and his moods. But I gave him a five-minute kitchen workout to do.

He's been doing it every day in his kitchen before his evening meal for over five years now. Right? And he's in great shape because of it. So I'm not just a fan of making things simple and achievable because it makes people feel good. I'm a fan of it because it works. And as I said at the start, I've been seeing patients for almost 20 years now. So I think having that clinical experience

really does offer value because you learn how to treat patients by seeing them, not by going to medical school, not by reading the latest paper. That's all very well and that informs your decisions. But it's when you see those patients who come back and you told them what you wanted them to do and they didn't do it.

And then I've always thought, Ronkin, why are they not doing it? Like, you're clearly not giving them advice that's good enough in the context of their life that feels relevant for them. No, of course. And letting their experience be your teacher. I want to bring you back onto snacks. As always, I love to talk about snacks.

That was a great one that you gave for movement, the morning workout in five minutes, if you're trying to create a routine. But you said there was also a mind or a heart one, so one for mental health and one for emotional health and one for emotional health. Would you mind giving an example of each, as I think many of us tend to think about emotional and mental health

is kind of the same thing? Yeah, I think that's a great question. Now, I will say these are sort of artificial constructs in some ways because actually physical, mental and emotional health are all linked. But I think it's a useful framework to look at it. So when I say mental health, I'm talking about our minds and how we can keep our minds calm. So for those five minutes,

I would choose one of the following, right? One of the following. You don't have to do them all. That's the point of simplifying. It's like, okay, journaling could be one of them. A breathing practice could be one of it, right? So one of the breasts that my patients love is something I call the three, four, five breath. When you breathe in for three, you hold for four and you breathe out for five. Really easy to do, really helps with anxiety and stress levels. Again, you could do a few minutes of that. Another mental health snack that you might want to do is do something creative, like, you know, adult coloring in books are incredible. They really switch your mind off or do something that puts you into flow state. Flow state is that beautiful state in mind where your mind just switches off. And it's usually when you're doing

something that is a little bit challenging, so you're fully immersed, but not so challenging that it's too hard and you actually switch off from it. So for many people, it's like learning a song on their guitar or trying a new yoga move. or, you know, playing a board game, for example, something like that. So I'd say to people, any one of those, whichever one appeals to you, that could be really helpful for your mind or what I call your mental health. Body, we've already touched on. Yes, that could be a strength workout.

It could be a five-minute yoga flow. It could be five minutes of dancing. You know, again, Brescine, just to be super clear, if we want to make things easy for people, there is very little that's easier than dancing. Right? you put on a tune and you dance. That's the work.

That is moving our body. And I tell you this thing, if you're feeling down or anxious, try to dance to an upbeat, feel good tune and try and feel anxious at the same time. It's almost impossible. You can't do it. Oh, yes, very much here for that. What's the one, I'm desperate to know,

what is the one super upbeat tune that you absolutely cannot take yourself seriously when dancing too? Man, gosh, yeah, that's a really good question. So, I don't know, the one I like at the moment, as probably a reflection of my age, is boys of summer, which I absolutely love. But I tell you the one that my daughter and I,

so my daughter's only seven, and over lockdown, sometimes in the evening, I've been sort of cooking the evening meal. Not that often, but sometimes. And often I make that a really fun experience, so I'll put some tunes on and stuff. And me and my daughter have started to rock out to, I don't know if you remember,

the Red Hot Chili Peppers album, blood sugar sex magic from way back. So we start to put that on and just dance a five or ten minutes together and we feel like we're laughing. You know, I'm not going to the gym. I'm not picking up a dumbbell, but that's a workout. And actually, that's physical health, but it's also affecting my mental health, right? So these things are all linked. But the final piece of what you asked about is what I call heart, which is emotional health. And when I say heart health, I don't mean that our heart is a physical organ that pumps blood around our body. I mean the meaning of hearts that poets and songwriters and artists have been writing about for years and that's about human connection.

We know that human connection, that feeling connected to people around you is probably more impactful for your health than giving up smoking or being obese. It's huge. We are wide for human connection. One study suggested that the feeling of being lonely is as harmful as smoking 15 cigarettes a day, right? So that's, and I think in lockdown, that's something that really, I think it was a problem two months ago, pre-lockdown. I think in lockdown it's become even more of an issue. Agreed. And so this is where I say for five minutes a day, make sure that you have connected with somebody else on some level. So obviously in lockdown, we have to do things slightly differently. That could be like, you know, a Zoom a FaceTime call. It could be something that I was doing for the first two weeks of lockdown

is every night I was picking out a random contact in my contact book on my phone and sending them either a really nice text message or a voice message. And I was connecting with people I haven't spoken to in years. And the beautiful thing about kindness, Rachine, is that kindness is not actually, yes, it helps the person you perform the acts of kindness on. But actually there's more benefit for yourself. You know, when we are kind to someone else, else, we get the benefits. Our stress levels, cortisol goes down, we feel less anxious. And I think we're seeing in the lockdown some beautiful examples of people being kind, communities coming together. It could be that you phone your mum or your dad or your brother or your sister once a day. Like,

it doesn't have to be huge. But one thing I will say, and I've covered this on my podcast quite a lot recently, but what is human connection? Like human connection actually is not about, physically being with somebody else, right? Human connection is about a shared experience. So I'll give an example, you could be in Trafalgar Square, let's say, a year ago, or Times Square in New York, surrounded by thousands of people, but you could still feel lonely. Right. Physically, you're surrounded, but you can still feel lonely. That connection comes from a shared experience, right? And here's the opportunity in the pandemic. We're all going through this pandemic together. Yes, we're experiencing it in different ways. But if you phone someone and say, hey, look, you know, I found today pretty

stressful, how was it for you? And they share that. You're sharing a common experience. You connect in a much deeper way than just a sort of, you know, just small talk on the phone. Even for the busiest of people, you're advising 15 minutes to put towards your health and wellness each day, five minutes on the body, five minutes on the mind and five minutes on the heart. Got it. Now, something we haven't mentioned. but that we're getting a ton of messages about right now is how to eat well in this adjusted environment. There have been so many questions about people getting quite stressed about their mindless snacking and stress eating that we are literally planning an entire episode on it.

But in the spirit of establishing healthy habits at this time, if we do have the privilege to do so, which we talked about earlier, what are some good nutrition-based ones to have in your locker? Yeah, I think that's a really good question. So, I mean, the first thing I was saying, say is go easy on yourself. You know, it is a stressful time. You know, don't beat yourself up. And social media, whilst I've said it can be helpful, it can also be quite harmful for many people as well. If you, if your feed is surrounding my people who are, you know, I've just taken up Chinese and now I'm fluent in six weeks with all this time I've had in the pandemic or, you know, look at this gourmet meal that I've created and you're like, oh, my food looks nothing like that. You know,

you can start to feel a little bit inferior. So I would say a general principle, that I think helps everyone is to clean up your own social media feed. Only follow people who make you feel good. Do not follow people who make you feel bad about yourself. They may not be meaning to do it. It may be a friend. Just mute them if you don't want to unfollow them completely. I've done that plenty because it really matters. If you don't take control of your online world, it will take control of you. So I would say, just go and be brutal because it makes such a difference. In terms of food, so there's a couple of ways of tackling this. Like some people don't know how to cook, machine.

A lot of people are used to takeaways, are used to buy and stuff from cafes. Okay, fine. You may find now that you don't have to commute, you may find this a bit of extra time. You may find, hey, you know what? In that time I used to spend driving in traffic or on the train, I could possibly prepare a meal now. So I would say make it a fun experience, right? Clean up the kitchen a bit. Put some music on that you love. This is what I do to make it. Oh, this is not, oh God, I've got to cook now. It's like, how cool. Right. I get to chill out, listen to some really good music or a podcast and now cook a meal. YouTube have got tutorials. There are loads of great cooking books out there, you know, that people can choose and actually maybe learn a few simple recipes. You mentioned stress eating. And I think one thing, we, it goes a little bit, it's related to what I said about habits. We kind of overestimate how

much willpower we've got. Like, we think we've got way more than we do. And we know that willpower comes up and willpower goes down. If you bring in foods that you're trying to avoid into your house, you are going to eat them. It's, it's that simple. A lot of the foods we're trying to avoid are designed in such a way that they spike a chemical called dopamine in your brain. And dopamine is what we call the learning chemicals. So let's say you feel low one day and you open the cupboard and you have a pastry or whatever you have got in there, right? Then that releases dopamine and that then reinforces that oh, next time I don't feel so good or I feel stressed, it reinforces that you're going to then repeat that behavior. It's very, very clever how it works. And so this approach doesn't work for

everyone, but I know if I'm super stressed, I will go for sweet foods. So I have a rule, I don't bring them in the house. Like, it doesn't come in the house. If there's going to be chocolate or crisp in the house, I can resist for a few days, then I will probably eat it. So we have a rule that we don't bring, I don't really like the word junk food necessarily, but we don't bring foods that we're trying to avoid eating into our house. Because, you know, as I've written about, I've said many times before, is that you can't control the environment out of your front door, but you can control the environment inside your house or inside your flat. And I would say control the environment you can control. I would say, look, just go easy on yourself. You know, if you struggle with food, first thing is

please try not to feel guilty about your food choices. It is so toxic. It really, it really starts to form these unhealthy relationships with food. I would encourage people who really are struggling, maybe to make a food diary for a few days and say, oh, you know, what have I eaten? When have I eaten it? What was the trigger before it? So some people, for example, they might open a bag of Pringles in the evening and do the whole lot. And so it's really trying to get that awareness. Yeah, it's that word, isn't it? Awareness. It all comes back to what we were talking about at the start with the journaling and the fact that building a routine and lifestyle that really serves you. is all about getting in touch with the things in your current life that work for you and those that really don't. On this show, we, like you, want to help our listeners build healthy habits that stick.

The sticking bit is really important. And increasingly, I'm coming aware of just how powerful accountability can be. And I think with these less tangible elements of self-care, accountability is hard. Fitness and to an extent nutrition tend to have so much more of a community, around them, post delicious healthy food images on Instagram and then have a little community online that way. And like your workouts, you can post a sweaty selfie online or kind of bring them up on your Saturday evening, like a Zoom chat. But when we're talking about meditation or journaling or whatever we're doing to enrich and support our inner life, there isn't that accountability

that comes from other people. So what I'm saying is how do we make? make ourselves accountable to ourselves. That was a really long way of saying that. Does that make sense? No, absolutely. And I think it's all very well having this knowledge and this information. But how do we turn it into action? And we know that accountability is huge for that. And accountability is something that actually is a lot harder now that we're in lockdown. You know, we don't have necessarily those communities that we can go to to to get that, to go to the gym or the park run or whatever we might want to do. So, I think it's first of all, you know, really taking time to understand why you want to do it.

Like, do you want to do it to look better? Do you want to do it? Because actually, you really feel this deep urge now, you know, I want to get a bit of routine and a bit of structure into my life and really focus on my health now. A lot of people, because of coronavirus, have been, you know, realize actually, my God, I really need to, I really need to and want to start taking my health seriously now. I like it. It's almost for many people, it's been a huge wake-up call. One of the best ways to be accountable is to have a tick chart, right? It really works. We know it works with kids. It works beautifully for adults as well. Like all the apps use these kind of streets. So let's say the meditation app Calm, for example, which I use on and off. They know, again, they've studied

behavioral science. So once you meditate for a few days, you get a pop-up saying what your streak is, oh, your streak is now six days. Your streak is now seven days. And then you don't want to miss. because you don't want to go back to zero. I remember last year I was on 41. It was probably the most I'd ever meditated in my life. And I was like, oh, man, I don't want to miss. I don't want to go back to zero. And then I did.

I was like, oh, no, I'm back to zero. And it's a really helpful way. And so to bring it back to the framework I'm sort of outlining is, if you listen to this and go, yeah, you know what, I think I can do five minutes on my mind, five minutes on my body, five minutes on my heart, put a chart up on your fridge. and literally tick it each day.

To go at the end of each day or just after dinner, yeah, I've done my mind snack, body snack, heart snack. Mind snack, body snack, heart snack. We have been doing this as a family since January since the book came out. My kids have their own charts. And I can tell you they're not particularly motivated or have any more willpower than any other kids

but because there's a system there and because after dinner we tick our things off, they see it happening. They see mummy and daddy doing it. So they also want to get their tick. So the drive for them to do it is not they want to do the behavior. The drive is to get your tick. So if you live with someone else, if you have a partner, a flatmate, children, maybe it's something you can all do communally. Like you all think about which mind, body and heart sat you want to do. Like let people

choose their own one because it's a very personal thing. But then do your ticks together. That might be as simple. If you live by yourself, maybe just put a chart up on your fridge. I know it sounds totally low tech and old school. But that is, if you were in my kitchen now, you would see four tatty paper charts there with lots of ticks on them. Great piece of advice to make it social. That's something that's been coming up a lot on these shows.

And again, that feeds back into what you were saying previously about maximising the benefits of connection at this time when everyone's feeling weird. By being honest and saying that that's how you feel, I love that. Okay, so we're almost up to time. But before you go, Rangang, what's one piece of advice that you'd like anyone listening who's keen to use this time to level up their healthy habits and create a routine that serves them better than the one that came before? What would it be? Have a think about your life, about what's important to you, about what you want for the future.

And if you want to start making a change, I would say keep it simple. Go easy on yourself. Don't overplan. Don't think you're suddenly going to jog four times a week for one hour. Keep it really, really simple. And if you don't know where to start, I would start with five minutes of silence a day. Five minutes where you start to get in tune with who you are. It's very hard to do that. Every minute has taken up consuming, Instagram, emails, podcasts, whatever it might be. They're all great. They all have their role. But five minutes of silence just will allow you to start becoming in tune with your podcast. body, who you are and what your real emotions are. Without awareness, it's very, very hard to make long-term change. Absolutely. Dr. Rung and Chatterjee, thank you so much for coming on going for goal.

It's been a pleasure. Machine, thanks for having me. Thank you to all of you guys for listening. I hope you enjoyed that conversation with Dr. Rung and Chatterjee as much as I did as ever. If you enjoyed it, rate, review, subscribe, send to someone who you think would find it really useful right now. And as always, tell us what your goals are. All you need to do is message at Women's Health UK on Instagram, putting going for goal in big caps at the top of your message. So we cannot miss it. That is almost all for me. The one thing I have to tell you about is that women's health have created a 10-week sweat and reset workout plan and that's available on fit.

So if you're looking for a new workout regimen right now, this could be brilliant. Whatever your fitness level, this 10-week full-body program will help you cultivate a weekly fitness routine. at home. And right now we're offering you a 14-day free trial plus 25% off the plan you choose with Fit. Sweat and Reset is included with any Fit premium membership and you need to sign up online, not via the Apple App Store, but we'll pop a link to sign up in the show notes. That's all for me. I'd love to hear what you thought about this episode. I'll catch you guys next week.