The Livy Method Podcast - Introducing Our Guest Experts - Fall 2025

Episode Date: September 11, 2025

Introducing some of our guest experts!In this episode, Gina brings together four of our incredible experts—Dr. Beverley David, Dr. Deena Kara Shaffer, Dr. Olinca Trejo, and Dr. Paul Hrkal—for a powerful conversation that sets the tone for the 91-day journey ahead. With deep insights into psychology, hormones, learning, and nutrition, the panel explores why weight is often a symptom—not the problem—and how lasting change comes from building health, not chasing numbers. Dr. Beverley shares her SECRET formula for success, while Dr. Deena reminds us that this program is built for every learner, at every stage. Expect honest takes, practical tools, and a few aha moments—especially as each expert shares one simple action you can take today to show up for yourself. This is one you'll want to listen to, and then re-listen to.You can find the full video hosted at:https://www.facebook.com/groups/livymethodfall2025Every season brings a fresh opportunity to reset. Don’t let this one pass by without making yourself a priority. Our Fall registration has been extended to September 14th. Sign up HERE before it's too late.Contact info:Dr. Beverley David:IG - @drdrbeverleywww.yourpsychologycentre.caDr. Deena Kara Shaffer:IG - @awakenedlearningwww.awakenedlearning.caBooks - Feel Good Learning, Raising Well LearnersDr. Olinca Trejo, ND:IG - dr.olincaemail - [e-mail]. Paul Hrkal, ND:IG - @drpaulhrkalwww.paulhrkalnd.comTo learn more about The Livy Method, visit livymethod.com. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

I'm Gina Livy, and welcome to the Livy Method podcast. This is where you'll have access to all of the live streams for my 91-day weight loss program. With a combination of daily lives, guest expert interviews, and member stories, there is something new almost every day. Miss the morning live? Want to re-listen to one of our amazing guest experts? Well, this is the place. This podcast is hosted on ACAST, but it's available on all podcast platforms, including the one you're listening to right now, Spotify, Apple, and Amazon Music. We're focusing on sustainable habits, not quick-fixing.

Is it an opportunity to get curious? We're here how people get to their health goals. One piece of each time. You build and build and build and build. Good morning. Good morning. Hi. I was just saying behind the scenes, this never gets old. get excited about seeing your beautiful faces, but also more so the conversations that we're

going to get to have. For all of our new members, I want to introduce you to some of our incredible guest experts. Dr. Beverly David, clinical psychologist, she helps us with our mindset and the emotional side of weight loss. World renowned learning strategist, Dr. Dina Kara Schaefer helps us with smart strategies to help us. make change and to grow and evolve and help us with all those new habits. Dr. Alinketrejo, she is what I like to call our hormone queen. Hormones are her love language and she breaks it down in such a way we can actually understand. And of course the OG, Dr. Paul Herckel, natural pathic doctor, he makes supplements and nutrition so simple. He offers practical

and science-backed info, and he's not afraid to tell us how it is and what we need to hear. How's that for an intro? Yeah? That's good. That's tight, Tina. I think that's your best one, Gina, that you've done. Well done. That's, like, succinct to the point hitting the high points.

I'd come back. If you asked, I'd come back. Good. I was up for last night practicing it. Um, okay. So today we have, you know, 25,000 members joining us. Some new, some returning. Um, it's the first week. So it's prep week. We're just getting into it. And I know we have the same conversation every time, but it's always a little different. So today I want to ask you what you think is the secret to sustainable weight loss. But before I do that, I want to get into asking each and every one of you sort of like, Being a clinical psychologist, natural pathic doctors, learning strategist, how does that fit into weight loss? So that's my first question. So how does that fit in? So, Deina, you're like, you're like, yes, let's go. Let's start with you. I wanted to go last, but I was so excited. Sorry. I can do that. But I was like, oh, yay. But I can. I can. How does being a learning strategist, somebody who helps learners, you know, like grade five, middle school, high school, university college, what does that have anything to do with weight loss? Yeah.

Fundamentally, this is a bunch of learning. You're asking people to learn new material, new modes of being, new ways of thinking, new habits, new relationships with food and movement and sleep and stress. and to unlearn a bunch of things, internalized shame, disconnection from body. And so in that way, I just sort of insert myself amongst these really brilliant humans wherever I can because I really like hanging out with you to have the rest of the team. It's about learning.

This is a learning project. And so I'm here to talk about the how folks who might be feeling like, well, this is big. I'm not sure where to start. I'm a little bit behind on week one or week four. So I'm the how person when it comes to strategies and the implementation. Love it. Love it, Paul.

Yeah, so I started working with you, Gina, five years ago. And really that initial conversation, which was centered around supplements and their complementary role to people's journey through weight loss and improving energy and improving sleep, kind of morphed into how do we really get to some of the deeper root causes that might be limiting a person's ability to lose health and, sorry, to lose weight. And ultimately, people start this conversation around weight, but they really end up in health and wellness. And that's, you know, one of my goals.

And as a naturopathic doctor, I know Alink also is in the same profession. We have to kind of understand the way things work under the surface. So a person presents with a symptom, being overweight, I believe, is a symptom of a lot of things going on underneath. And my goal and my role as a naturopath with my patients is to try to help people navigate that and try to figure out what are some of those underlying things and ultimately allow your body to heal itself because that is a naturopathic fundamental belief. So that's the angle that I'm coming at and we're going to have lots of conversations. yeah a lot of people are trying to lose weight to be healthy when in reality you have to be healthy in order to lose weight um who wants to go next dr alenka dr beverly we're going to rock paper scissor it who wants to go i don't know because i'm just going to say exactly what paul said

um listen i think that our i think for paul and i um it's so important to help people understand that we're more than just our symptoms, right? And we have always been told that weight loss is about calories in and calories out. And I think that our entire conversations actually for the 91 days are trying to break down exactly that concept because while calories matter, for sure they matter. Nobody's saying that they don't. It's so much more than that. And exactly like you said, I think that people think that you think that you're

you need to lose weight to be healthy, you actually need to be healthy to lose weight. And I think that often we lose the perspective or, yeah, lose the perspective that we're here to actually focus on our health because your health matters and you're taking care of yourself. And while weight matters, it's not actually an overall measurement of your overall health, right? You're so much more than that. And so for us, it's so important to help you understand how everything is connected and how learning and unlearning is going to finally help you get to your physical, mental, and emotional goals. Love it.

Love that. Dr. Beverly, that's deep. That's deep. We're getting deeper. It's a good thing we're ending on Dr. Beverly here. But yeah, it gets deeper and deeper. Okay, so yes, why would a clinical psychologist be involved and how lucky I am to be here? Well, I work across the lifespan, so want to be parents, parents, all the way up, little

people all the way to the end of life. life. And as a psychologist, we know that we have these loops that we get into. We know that every human being has thoughts, what we think, how we talk to ourselves, what we think about others, how we judge ourselves, that internal critic, how confident we are in our abilities, all of those thoughts that run through our brain. And if only we could be mind readers. But thoughts get involved in the want to change, the hope to change, the motivation to change, why we signed up, things like that. So we unpack thoughts. Then we have our feelings, good and bad, and in between, our positivity, our nervousness, our anxiety, our hopefulness. And that also then connects with

our behaviours. And behaviours are not only what we do, but what we don't do. And we're all doing something this morning. So this is a behaviour. We're turning up, we're listening. We might have our pen ready. We might have our notepad ready. We're here with some sort of intention. And so our behaviors are really important to see how are they linked with how we're feeling and how we're thinking and of course how is our body responding our very clever body that's responsible for that nervous feeling that's in my stomach right now because I know how many people are listening wrigglingness in my legs because I'm just feeling a little bit anxious so psychology impacts that all and hopefully by learning the loops of our thoughts and our feelings and

our behavior and our body and getting to know ourselves and our patterns, we can identify the blocks that have been there in the way perhaps in our past and how to unblock them so that we can move on and change the pattern. So thank you for letting psychology be part of this conversation. Very important. Honestly, thank you all for being here. What I've been saying to our members about you coming on is, one, we don't pay you. So you're actually here because you, What? Helping people. I mean, we had the best community.

People really showing up, trying hard to make change. But our conversations are very focused. So if you take the food plan, we've talked a lot about routine. And there's a rhyme and a reason to everything we do, prep week, week one, week two, and so on, especially the changes that we're making along the way. It tends up to bring up awareness and it brings up a lot of thoughts and feelings. And you guys come on. like you know exactly what we need to hear because you know exactly the kind of things we are

working on depending on where we're at. You know the program inside and out at this point. You've all been with us for a while now. So I'm going to get to the big question is, and I know it's a loaded one, but what do you think the secret to success on the Libby Method is? I was going to have other questions too, like your tips and your thoughts, but I'm just going to start with that one. What do you think the secret to success? If you could pick one thing, what would it be? Or maybe two. I can go because I've studied.

I came prepared. What do you think I prepared with? If anybody knows me, well, well done, team. Well done. They know me so well. So this time, the last time I did an acronym with the word source, the secret source, but this time I've gone for the word secret. So if anybody wants to know how my brain works, because I like to be able to remember and think and hook things on to things, which Dina teaches people how to do this, which I wish I'd had when I was younger, but I'm going to use the word secret to think about what is the secret to this successful journey that Gina is going to encourage you to embark on.

So S, self-awareness, and Gina just said it, it's that awareness, noticing our patterns, noticing our triggers, noticing our habits, awareness is first just to be aware of how we are around food, how we are with our thoughts to healthy living, do we feel like we're worthy, do we not self-awareness? E, energy management, often we forget this, we think about just food, food, food, But we also want to become very mindful of how we fuel our body and fuel our mind with nutrition and sleep and movement and nourishment so that we can then make these decisions that we're going to be faced with. C, consistency. And I thought, okay, this consistency, which lovely Alinka talks about, we want to be able to keep going.

So consistency over perfection, but you will have heard progress over. perfection. Steady, small steps showing up every day and not falling into the trap of all or nothing. If it didn't go well, we don't want to just think that's it. I'm out. Ah, resilience. That's about how do we manage setbacks learning from them instead of just thinking, I am a failure. Fail stands for first attempt in learning. We want to learn and when we return back to our plan of action, we want to return with self-compassion and curiosity. What happened there? Why did that happen? How did I feel about it? E, emotional regulation, more psychology, noticing how do we react to things? Do we react or do we respond? When I feel this way, do I reach for some chocolate? When I feel this way, do I avoid

and go into myself? So we want to manage our emotional regulation so that we can then manage our relationship with ourselves ultimately and then the food and the choices that are going to be in front of us. And T, this is a big part of the successful journey is to trust the process. We are probably all going to start finding that we think in moments, oh, I don't trust it. I'm going to go back to that starvation thing I used to do. But trust it. Let your body start to trust that you are going to nourish it, nurture it, look after it. And when it trusts you, It will let things happen. Just like Paul said, your body will start to heal itself because it trusts you.

Oh, come on. Drop the mic. That's brilliant. Yeah, you stole all our stuff. All right, let's go. We'll have our coffee now. That was brilliant. That was a good.

Brilliant, brilliant. Thank you, Paul. Makes it not. That is so good. Self-awareness, energy management, consistency. I love that. consistency, like over perfection, rather than the progress over perfection, because it seems like the consistency comes first. Resilience, emotional regulation, and trust. Who wants to go next?

Because that was amazing, honestly. Dr. B, you want to go? Dr. S.R. D. Dr. D? Absolutely. So, I mean, I could just keep listening and learning from you, Dr. Beverly. What a gift. So I'm a learning strategist. I teach people how to study and take notes and take multiple choice tests, how to do and feel better in learning. So again, it's like, why am I here and what's the, how do I see this secret sauce? I will never come with a good acronym, friends. Like, that's what I can do is in my long-winded way. Try to offer something from that kind of that learning approach.

so my lens is always around inclusion who is let in who is welcome who has a sense of belonging and who feels alienated who is is not really kind of open armed welcome in so i'm sure someone else is going to speak to community and community is going to come up in probably every um conversation that you have because it's so powerful here but what i actually want to name is the inclusion and access part so this is a body inclusive, age inclusive, illness and injury inclusive, gender inclusive program. And for me, perhaps the most important, it is a neuroinclusive program. How do I know? You offer your teaching. You offer this 91-day beautiful health-promoting program by way of

conversations like this, by way of a Facebook group that you can check in or not as often as you want, you can listen to a podcast, either you can catch it live or you can listen to it in your own way on a walk or a commute or if you've gone on vacation, you come back, it's there, it's evergreen. You have a book that people can take notes in. You have a journal, you have an app. When I hear somebody offering, you can find your way here, you can find your way here, you can find your way here. That means you are saying, look, however you learn, however, that beautiful brain and beautiful heart works over there. There's a place for you to access the information in a way that makes sense. Now, what you don't say is do all of it. In fact, we have

conversations discouraging that. So if anyone already feels that O word, that overwhelmed word in their life, like that's not what you have to do. It's never what you're asked to. In fact, this could be step one of stress, fatigue, burnout, and overwhelm management by going, I'm going to choose the most resonant first pathway in and for me that is podcast for me that is the book for me that is whatever it is make that part of your consistency over perfection make it so that it is knitted in to each day it's like i do that morning thing or i do that afternoon thing and then if that's oh cool i can experiment with another so all to say that you offer this beautiful program and all of these modalities means that all are welcome.

And I think that is part of the secret sauce. I love that. She may not have any acronyms, but she does have a book on the number one best seller list right now. You can pick this up, Feel Good Learning, Dr. Dina Carrey Schaefer. Congratulations, my friend, congratulations. I love that.

Yeah, you know, weight loss is complicated enough that we're not trying to overcomplicate it. In fact, we're trying to really, just simplify it and, you know, help people in any way that we can. I love that. That's from the heart. I love that. It is time to hear from our podcast sponsor today. It is Colgate Parial Guard. Let's have a real conversation about health and wellness because I think talking about our oral health is underrated. I mean, we need to talk about it more. Think about it. Your home is probably ready for any kind of cut or a scrape. You probably have bandages

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to the Livy method? Babies first. Go ahead. I wish that I would have gone first, you guys, because I probably would have sounded smarter than I'm going to sound right now. But listen, I know, right? So, listen, I think that the only two things that you can control going into anything that you do is your effort and your attitude.

The effort piece for me is really important. Yeah, the effort piece is really important because this is what I always talk about. I think that perfection is the enemy of consistency and especially when we're trying to change your lifestyle and your life into being healthy, being strong versus being skinny and doing a diet. I would rather you be consistently good

than inconsistently perfect. right because that is never so this is like the all or nothing mentality this is and so that's the one thing that we're trying to break down yeah when it comes to attitude i think it's so important for for everybody to understand that you can't have and you can't have a new reality with an old mentality which is actually why we leave all of that old mentality about just calories about starvation about exercising more about sleep not mattering about like all of the things that we know right that's actually well, we tried to park it at the door. And I think that especially if you've done this program before, I just want you to remember that you can change the trajectory of this journey by changing the narrative in your mind, right? And the thoughts that you've had before have created the results that you had before. And the thoughts that you have now are going to create the reality

and the journey that you're going to have this rounder for the first time when you join us for the first time in this program, right? So I think it's so important for us to kind of like go at it. And I think that Dr. Paul said this and the last conversation that we had for the last program, but it's with fresh new eyes, with like leaving everything that we, all of our preconceived notions at the door and just kind of like starting with that curiosity and that like openness and those like wide eyes to focus on consistency over perfection, to focus on, you know, a new mindset and a mindset that focuses on the why am I here? Like, why does this

matter? The attitude that is, you know what, I'm going to celebrate every little step forward and every non-scale victory. Because if you don't look for rewards in your day, you're going to try to find them in the pantry. That is how your brain works, right? Yeah. And so I think that if it was like, if like for me truly it's I think that we can just change so much of our journey and our path by really truly focusing on the attitude and the effort that's why I would say and being intentional about it being intentional man I can go into everything you just said there but I'm conscious of you know making sure we end on time here it was good go back go back and re-listen to that that was some good stuff oh man attitude it really is everything and for so many reasons you know we can

all be pissy pants about the diet industry and our past experiences and, you know, so many people feel like they're a failure or they feel of shame when reality, they've been working their asses off. They've been working their asses off to lose this weight. It's just that the way they have been shown or taught to do it has been a little messed up, right? Like it's in pieces and it's just, all right, enough. Thank you. That was brilliant. Dr. Paul, Dr. Paul. there's not that much more for me to say because really these three brilliant women have honestly a lot of a lot of gems and pearls in all of that yeah you know I've had the privilege to be able to like journey with people through the program so I know the program as the program itself and so I know

kind of what you're going through but I also know it from a patient's perspective because I've been able to kind of see so many of them the last five years and you know just I want to speak to everyone that's probably listening to this right now, that you are coming to this program from all sorts of different walks of life, past experiences, already previously mentioned here. This morning was previous diets that you were put on. So a lot of what has to happen first is unlearning and unlearning some of these habits and unlearning some of the, I'm going to even say, preconceived notions and myths that we've been told, lies that we've been told about our body, about our health.

So a lot of what we try to do as experts and as people trying to help you on this journey is we're trying to give you knowledge and truth and facts so you can be empowered to make these changes. And those changes sometimes come really quickly for some people. And some of those changes happen slowly. And so there's been lots of conversation already about the consistency aspect. I love how Dr. Beverly mentioned the trust, the process, that really resonated with me because I think that some of the challenges that you're going to experience is not just unlearning all the things that you think you know about the diet because, yes, you go lose weight if you calorically restrict and basically go on a starvation diet, but as you've experienced, you will gain it back and more. And so your body has to unlearn things. Your metabolism has to unlearn things.

and you on a psychological level have to unlearn a lot of things. So I want to encourage you to trust that process, even if you feel like we've all heard it before. I'm eating more. What's up with that? So there'll be things that, especially if this is your first time going through program, there'll be things that are going to challenge you in some ways that maybe you didn't expect.

This is not your typical type of diet, weight loss program. It actually is very disruptive. And I kind of like that. It's a little bit bucks the trend and a little bit rebellious compared to what you'll find. And so it's not what resonates with me as a natural biotic doctor is that it's not necessarily a quick fix, but for a long-term loss. I started working the program because it was in line with what I think is a way of eating that you can sustain for the rest of your life. And I'm not saying you need to be in diet mode your whole life, but the principles that you are going to learn through the next three months or so

are things that you and your family can incorporate and you can change your life and you can change the trajectory of the lives of your loved ones. So a lot of people that are going through the program are people of all walks of life, but a lot of them have spent decades giving to other people around them. And this is the first little steak in the sand saying that I'm actually going to do something for myself. I call it the mom syndrome because a lot of the moms I see, they are in their late 40s or 50s. Yes, I know you're out there.

You're listening to this. Not saying that there's other people that haven't done this, but there's a lot that whatever you are, you've probably given a lot. And I want you to spend the next three months of thinking about this is an act of self-care and ultimately self-love. And that's really what our body needs on every single level, on a cellular level, on a psychological level, and everything in between. So I'm looking forward to kind of helping you along that journey and guiding you.

But so far, I think that the gems that the ladies have so far dropped on you have been incredible. So go back and listen to this again because I think it's really helpful. And it's a great kickoff. That's great advice. I would go back, listen to it again, make notes. All of our guests are going to be. be back and joining us over the next 91 days. We're also going to link all of their contact

information so you can follow them over on social media or reach out to them along the way. What else was I going to say? They're all also amazing in their own right and in their own practices as well. So we're going to highlight as much as possible things that they have going along the way if you want to reach out and work with them as well. Okay. So I promise myself, I wouldn't go any longer than a half hour, but you know, that's so difficult for me. So in one sentence each, what is, before we go, what is one practical thing that someone can do today to get themselves ready for week one of the program? One sentence, one thing. Find the time of day eat that you.

you can consistently check in to this program every day. Find the easiest thought that has the least friction where you can have like the living method touch point every day. Reoriented and it's okay if it needs to change down the road. But today, find the place. Is it between 11 and 1115, you are going to open the journal or check, the app or connect like watch the the replay on one and a half speed or like whatever it is that

you need to do but find the place because it's not just going to happen we have to find a way to engage on purpose that intentionality piece so it's a long sentence but simply when is the window when is the livy method window in your day going to be that's how you prevent procrastination that's how you don't put something off. That's the beginning of consistency. I love that. That builds on what Paul was just saying about taking the time for yourself, right?

And yeah, pick that window. Okay, I love that. Okay, who's next? Olika, you're going to go. No. Oh, God. I was like, not me. One thing.

This one simple thing. Yes, what? I write down your Y in a bunch of post-it notes and post them on. your mirror next to your dinner plate on your computer. I really truly think it's so important for you to focus on why you're doing this and helping that guide this new identity that you're creating, right? Because we always talk about this, but success isn't a number on the scale when your goal is long-term transformation, right? And it's about shifting how you see yourself

and living that Y daily so that it helps you transform into the person that you want to be. Yeah, I'll leave it that. I'm going to get some sticky notes myself. I'm going to get some sticky notes myself. I'm going to start sticking out and everything. Brilliant. Love that. Dr. Tina has them in every color.

Yeah, you know that's true. Learning strategist approved. Dr. B? Dr. Bann? This is a very hard question, isn't it? Right. Well, because you've got, you can pick from one of us, I guess, because it's one thing. People will hear me say, try and find your fantastics, which can be totally different to anything to do with Gina's program. But I want you to start putting your positivity glasses on because we have to hardwire happiness, just like we've talked about, there's intention. If we do not put these glasses on, we are going to miss moments. So I always like to ask people, I used to do the five fantastics, but to make it even easier, three fantastics, go looking for them. It could be a cardinal in the tree. It could be that the kettle was still full and it was perfect, or there was a bit of milk left in the fridge. Three fantastics, look for them, catch them,

and then retell them later on in the day so that you see it, you feel it, and then you reap the rewards because you get to feel it again and that happiness just cascades into every part of your life. So consider doing that also depending on what you choose for your week. That's so important and so great because you're pulling in that that like, I don't want to say positivity, but that optimistic whether as you get on the scale and it's not showing the number that just puts you in a funk the whole day. We're so used to being frustrated and tired and things going to shit. that when you start pulling in or being intentional about looking for the fantastic, man, that drips into your attitude. That can, that can change your whole attitude. Okay, okay. I got to shut her

down. Dr. Paul. You know, I would say it's our first week and, you know, this is a journey that's not going to be won in the first week. So I suggest that you make your word or your phrase of affirmation is commit to consistency. The most successful people, on the program in my experience has been ones that have been consistent and they've committed to that in the start. And I'm speaking to the ones that are in this program because their friend invited them and they're in it and they're kind of excited about it, but they're not, no, I'm not sure exactly what to expect. Yeah. People that are most successful commit to consistency. And especially the, you have a beautiful opportunity in the first couple programs, especially the first one, to really knock it out

of the park. And so if you trust that process and commit to consistency, make that your affirmation every morning, every evening, I'm going to be committing to consistency. And that's an act of self-love. Drop the mic. Speaking of knocking it out of the park, thank you all so much, honestly. I'm so excited. I mean, when I say it never gets old, it never gets old because I think there's always something to learn, always something to work through. And I love that you make it, you make it seem possible and doable and achievable. I am procrastinating because I don't want this conversation to end. So I'm going to end it now. Thanks to everyone who's joined us live listening after the fact. Thank you to all my incredible guest experts. I'm so excited to get

this party started. Have a great rest of your day, everyone. And we'll see you next time. Thanks. Thank you. Bye, guys. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you.