The Livy Method Podcast - Maintenance & Mindfulness: Midweek Motivation - February 11, 2026

Episode Date: February 11, 2026

Welcome to your Midweek Motivation!This week, Gina is joined by the manager of the Weight Loss Program, Kim. Together, they remind listeners to start with a simple vibe check and get honest about how they’re really doing, especially in the middle of a 91-day commitment to themselves. They unpack the difference between choices that truly bring joy and the habits or triggers that keep people reaching for “bites of bits,” encouraging self-awareness instead of guilt. With real talk about the damage diet culture has done and why sustainable change requires more than just following a food plan, they reinforce that weight loss is as much mental as it is physical.You can find the full video hosted at:https://www.facebook.com/groups/ginalivymaintenanceandmindfulnessTo learn more about The Livy Method and our Maintenance & Mindfulness group, 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. It's your maintenance midweek motivation.

Some of my favorite conversations are taking place here. Wake up, look good, feel good. No matter what life throws at you, you got this. No matter what life throws at you, you got this. Well, we do our best. Well, I think we do have it. It just maybe doesn't look like we want it to look, right? Right?

We don't have it always in the way we think we want to have it, but we do have it. We do. Doing our best. Look at this. I'm here today. That's probably not what everybody wanted, but here we are. Here we are. Yes.

I shared with everyone in the morning live. People have been so kind. I mean, Odette cares. She's amazing. Her love for this maintenance program and it's people is like, honestly, it's unparalleled. She's incredible. Obviously going through a really rough time.

the worst of the worst of times dealing with the family situation this week. So she's away this week, or we told her to stay away this week because she's got a lot of things to focus on. We'll see if she's back next week or not, but we're all sending her some love to help her and her family get through this time. Yeah. And until your point of her being so passionate about this group, we still got our little note from her. She gave us no. Some suggestions of things. Right. So let's get into this because this is what we'd want for my. She'd be like, okay, you guys, let's go. This week we're talking about confidence and consistency and consistency leading to confidence.

Again, if you are, if you're new to the maintenance program, the 91 day program itself, it really is important. It's not just a repeat of the weight loss program. The steps are very similar in that your body loves routine. And then once you've done, you know, maintaining your weight, you're just living your life. Whenever you go off routine, that basic routine will be used as back on track. will be very beneficial because it'll be so familiar to your body. And following the routine allows you to dig even deeper and level up even more. So make sure you are reading over all of

the information because it's all relevant and tied into maintenance. It's not just recycled information from the weight loss program. I used to back in the day before I had a maintenance program suggests that people do another round of the weight loss program to solidify their weight. This is like a million times better than that because it's all very much intentional. So this week we did downsizing last week where this is more like a stabilizing week this week, really focus on that consistency, really allowing the stuff to bubble up to the surface, eating dissatisfaction, then we're going to downsize again next week. So what did you learn this week after downsizing last week that you can build on and dig deeper on next week? Yeah. And I think we have a little

comment from Judy in here that I can figure out how much to eat while I'm eating it, but I still have a problem with determining in advance how much I should put on my plate. And I don't know, I feel like that sounds like a win. That's great that you can feel it in the moment. But I get how that would be frustrating to be like, oh, like, stuck out these leftovers. Well, it's one of those. I sort of addressed this on Monday with Judy, where it's like that how is this portion for me. You know when it's too much, right? Like, you know when it's too much. Someone plops down a big

portion in front of you and you're like, oh my God, that's way too much food. So that usually tends to be very clear. You know when it's not enough when someone puts a little couple of peas on your plates, right? And it's interesting because they always show this like with fine dining where you're being served this small little portion. And yet whenever I've done like a tasting menu at a fine dining restaurant. It's the smallest portions, but they serve you like 10 of these portions and they come like every 15, 20 minutes. So by the end of it, you are so full on these small little portions. But for the most part, you know if something is not enough. So really just getting into how is this portion for me, is it too much? Is it not? No. Is it not enough? Whatever that might

be, right? And that can, that can really help you. Just asking those two questions. Is it too much? is it not enough? And if you're like, I don't know, then it probably could be somewhere about right for you. Yeah. And I feel like it's one of the things I always think about with the portions and how much I need is you get really, the one thing that can throw you off is that everything is just a different size. Like it's not easy because you look at a chicken breast and you get a package of chicken breast. And every single chicken breast in that package is a different size. So sometimes we get caught up and we're, when you're serving a meal, you have, you know, you cook chicken breasts for your family and everybody takes a chicken breast on their plate. And so you're not thinking like half is not quite enough of that for me, but oh, that full one looks like it's too big. And we can kind of get tricked with that sort of just looking at it as like, is one chicken breast enough. Well, that's not enough information because chicken breast comes at all shapes and sizes. So it's really digging into that,

like you said, and I see Judy, she doesn't have a problem with the leftovers. But yeah, judging more clearly, that's, that work can be done in the, in that stage, even when you're not cooking it, but when you're looking at it out on the table for you is just, ah, how much of that do I want and maybe look at it in all the individual pieces of your meal versus putting it together as a whole? Well, I look at Karen. Hi, Karen. I looked at my plate that moved food over to my husband's plate when he isn't looking.

Oh, I do it when Tony. looking because oh no but to your point right like you might look at a piece of um piece of chicken like say they're all the all the just the chicken breasts on a plate in front of you like some people serve food differently um where you grab that and it's like it you don't want that whole one but the small one is too small and the big one is too big and then you it's weird and you're cutting it off but like why don't we do that right we're not like oh they we just take it's same thing with apples so you take an apple and all you have left is big apples, and that might be too much for you, but we just eat it anyway because,

well, it's an apple. If you have three quarters of an apple, like, people will leave a half an apple, but it seems weird to leave a quarter. What do you do with like two slices from the apple? I think we get like, we just, there's, it's not helping us with this situation that the food's all coming at us in different shapes and sizes too, right? Well, it's all the, at the end of the day, it's not about getting a right or wrong. It's about practicing being in tomb. Yeah. Right. And you might not know how this portion for me, it could be that you are getting the

portion correct, but without seeing more, without seeing less, there's no reference to that, right? So what do I need? So you see your portion, how's this portion for me? And you're like, oh, I don't really know. And you could be like, well, what if I added more? Oh, no, don't want to add more. What if I was take some away? Oh, well, I could actually take some away and be okay with that. So that's, sometimes you have to, you can't see one without the other kind of. So I find that really helps me to be able to see kind of like what's going on over here, what's going on over there. And then you can assess what's happening right here, if that makes sense.

Yeah. And I think backing it up from like you taking your first bites, like take it, strip it down. Like when you look at your plate, stop, look at it as a whole. Stop before that. Look at it before you put that next scoop on and break it down that way. Every step of the preparation of it, you can continue to ask yourself the questions too. Yes. like each, break it down on each individual, whatever you're putting on your plate.

That's a great tip. That's a great tip. We're going to move on to consistency here. When you embrace it as who you are now, this is where the magic happens, right? And there's a great comment from the net. I can't believe I lost three pounds without even trying. I was just being mindful of what I eat, how I feel, adding a bit of small exercises here and there. I walk my dogs every day, even if it's cold, lots of water and sleep.

Yeah. I mean, you, look, we all know how. hard it is to lose weight. You have to be really intentional about that. But your consistency and routine with the maintenance program, even when not trying to lose weight, might lead to losing weight. And this could just be where everything in your life is also aligning. Your stress levels are lower. You're getting more sleep. Maybe you're not being as social. You're not going out as much. So you're able to eat more according to plan, whatever that might be. And then you'll have like times where your weight might go up a bit depending on what's going on in your life. Right. So you're not going to

lose more weight than is unhealthy for you, but it's not unusual to continue to see that scale move. Because remember, your weight always sits about like, you know, three to seven pounds above your lowest low anyway on any given day. So this is sort of where, yeah, maybe your, your weights went up and now it's back down because you're focused on doing all these things again. It might, it might not have been real weight gain. It might, you know, it might not be in real weight loss because it wasn't real weight gain in the first place. But it is also very possible to see real weight loss while following the maintenance plan without trying. And this is your body just continuing with, I have this excess fat. I no longer need it. Let me continue to be

focused on releasing this fat that no longer serves a purpose. Right. So yeah, I love hearing that. Yeah, great, great comment. And I, you know, I rolling into that is the next thing that was mentioned. And I comment from Kim and it's about, you know, just what you're doing day and day out once, if it's not ingrained yet, it can still feel like it's the process. And, you know, Kim commented, I remember always thinking, I just want to eat and do whatever, even though that was about things that were sucking the life out of me. It's work to become healthier and it can feel overwhelming. But damn, when you get there, it's amazing. And I will not go back to that old life of feeling like crap. And, you know, that's part of it.

the transition from making these habits and their daily choices become part of that fabric of who you are and your body automatically wanting that. So you're not feeling that fight of, oh, I want something else. I want something different. That's part of the process of getting into maintenance is getting to the point where you are so in tune with what your body wants and needs that you naturally just want those things that make you feel good. and it's not going to be a switch that you flick on like, okay, I've reached my goal weight,

flick. All of a sudden, I'm a healthy person. That's the work in maintenance is getting to the point where you're so in tune that you know exactly what you want and need. Well, it's the hard work you're doing now. Like this is like the maintenance group is not, it's to work, right? It's not not doing the work. You're doing the work now. You work so hard in weight loss to get to maintenance.

And the work that you're doing, you're working very hard in maintenance to get to a point where it's just all second nature and who you are. Or like I see Karen here. I thought of your comment yesterday, Gina, you shouldn't feel like you have eaten even after you eat. That was my dinner. And kind of once you get that, then it kind of sticks. And then you like you rack it.

Same thing with your cues when it comes to your hunger cues. Like no, you'll, you'll know the exact minute when you've had enough. And if you eat one more bite, you're going to, you're going to walk away feeling like you ate too much, right? Like once you catch that feeling, that's when you're like, oh. And that's that aha moment. that enables you to see it differently or like recognize it so that it just becomes part of who you are. So it is work now.

It's, it's work. And but it's worth work, so worth doing because it's a heck of a lot harder to constantly gain and lose and gain and lose and gain and lose and count and weigh and measuring all the stuff that you've done before. And the great thing about this work is it's like just making your whole life better. Well, and yeah, when you get that aha moment, that's what you got to, you got to capture that. Like we talk about capture, cancel correct. we've got to catch those good things too. When you do that, that's what you want to be consistent with like, ah, I felt that. Yeah. I want to feel that at every meal now. And, you know, hang on to that and try to keep that momentum going. And that's where the consistency comes from, too.

Here's Christine. I enjoyed Super Bowl munchies, but did not overindulge. The scale was still up, of course, because like salt and all that back down today in my range that I see is consistent-ish. So consistency is what my body loves. Yeah. Right. And obviously while you're going through the maintenance program, you want to minimize any indulgences, just like when you're doing the weight loss program, but there are going to be times you're going to find yourself indulging. And what you didn't do was feel the need to berate yourself, punish yourself, starve yourself, deprive yourself the next day because you had a few bites of bits here and there. And you see just by, you know, continuing the process, indulging in foods,

didn't cause your, didn't cause you to gain actually any real weight, right? So it's that pattern of behavior now has, has changed for you, which is so huge. I want to just get into what Elsie saying, hi, Elsie. My husband really struggles with being in tune. He grew up with not always having enough to eat. So when there was food, he ate as much as possible. Yeah, my husband comes from his parents' mentality of this where, like, you're lucky to have food, you shut up, you sit there and you eat it and you eat as much as you possibly can, right? Like that's, and he does it to this day.

He'll just wolf down his food. And then he'll get up and leave the table and we're like, okay, well, well, like this is dinner time like that's it right so that's a hard habit to break and now even though we may have too much food he still feels like he needs to eat all the food he is working through his feels that feel there's so so what i would say there is there can be an uncomfortable feeling that goes with changing your habits right you it's this uncomfortableness of not following through in other cultures like Thailand if you clear your plate it means that you're still hungry and you'll keep wanting more.

So it'll just be an endless clearing of your plate of your more food, more food, more food. And then like at what point do you stop, right? But that can be that can be ingrained really deep. And so this is things, I know this might sound corny to him, but you are safe. You have enough. There is an abundance here. This, like this is, like you don't need more than you need. And I don't mean like more money or more, what, anything.

like that. But I think this would be like trying to get into him seeing a different perspective. And like, because as soon as he starts eating, that's just habit. His brain is going into that mode. His body is used to eating a certain amount. So there's a lot of things that are going to make him feel uncomfortable. Not just him, anyone. This goes to anyone listening to this comment. There's a lot of things that will go into making you feel uncomfortable and very unsatisfied, even if you're satisfied, right? Like he might walk away feeling unsatisfied. even when he's already had enough because he's in satisfied of the fact that he didn't complete the job. He didn't do what he's been taught to do. He didn't, you know, do what fear is

telling him to do, like eat it all now because there's no, there's no coming. So that uncomfortableness, right? Sometimes you have to sit in that uncomfortableness. Yeah. And it's hard because you feel like, too, you know there's people that don't have enough still and that feeling of gratitude for having it there is, you know, switching that narrative so that it's not that you're not grateful for having it. It's that you just have enough that you need because it's not doing the many favors if you're overeating the people that don't have, but less waste and less, you know, the more you take off your own shoulders with that food waste stuff and all of those things that have been grained in you, the actually the better it is for everyone because the guilt starts to go

around when you guilt is something that creeps through, you start feeling guilty about not finishing on your plate. Then the person who's cooking for you starts feeling guilty about giving you too much or making too much. And it can all really go from there. So, you know, really getting into just what you need and not having all those feelings in it is going to be best for everyone, taking it all off their shoulders. And this word downsizing could be just serving a smaller portion and seeing how you feel with it, right? You know, because if you think about it, it's a matter of, okay, well, if I don't eat this, then I can put it away for later too. And it's kind of like, that's how we deal with downsizing, because that can be very hard for people.

But that's kind of how he is all the time. And so what can you do, right? Like put a little bit on your plate. If you finish your plate, you can always have more. There's more if you need it because it might just be a finishing the whole plate issue. Or if you're leaving leftovers, let's take the leftovers, put them into the fridge and incorporate them to the next day. So at least you know you get to have it, if not now, then at some point. So you don't think about, we don't really think about doing that in the regular weeks.

We only really talk about that downsizing. And that's something that you can do at any time with the program. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Speaking of comfortable, feeling comfortable or uncomfortable, Kath is talking about it in the messy middle, trying to feel comfortable at a range that fluctuates five pounds above my lowest low.

Reflecting on I have not been mindful or is this normal, So much to learn in the messy middle. Yeah, that's probably the hardest thing for people to wrap their heads around is that your set point or your weight is not one number. Your set point is a range that will fluctuate according to what's going on in your life. You know, you have an indulgence. Your body's inflamed. You like you work out.

All the reasons why your weight is up, right? And when you're not trying to maximize your ass off to. see your lowest low, see that move number, move even lower, try to manage your stress, you sleep, move your body. A lot of times people do those to lose weight at a level that they're just not doing when it comes to maintaining and sustaining their weight. And this is that this could also fall in line with people say, well, I'm easily able to maintain my weight, but I'm not feeling as good as I felt when I was trying to lose weight,

right? And so it's normal for weight to fluctuate because you might have lost weight before and just not wage yourself or, you know, like after the fact and not been using a scale. And that's how all of a sudden your weight crept up because, you know, you didn't notice you were gaining your weight or whatever. Of course, you can't not notice gaining weight. At some point, you need to do something about it. But yeah, that range is so normal. Like mine is a 10 pound range because I'm a big fluctuator. So I would be, you know, everything is aligning for me and I'm sitting on my lower range of 120 and then, you know, I go through the summer, even seasonally, this will change in the summer.

It's hot. My body swells up. Drinking beer, lots of chips, not enough water. You know, my weight sits in the higher end. Mine really fluctuates with heat so that I'm sitting around 130, right? And so, and most of the times I kind of land somewhere in the middle, but I'm also not trying to keep it there. Like, I'm kind of ebbing and flowing with life.

And I know what if I find myself indulging too much or not doing this or not doing that, I start to feel uncomfortable in my body. And so I'm like, okay, let's go, girlie. Like, that's enough of you. Put it, like, get your shit together. Let's go. And so that's sort of, that's the normal. And if you, that's the normal.

So you're not actually trying to stay at one number because life happens. Super Bowl parties, birthday, stressful times in your life, whatever. You will find probably if you were to take your average, you will probably sit, you know, and you're not going to see your lowest low if you start to do things like added more carbohydrates and whatever. It's just that you were really trying hard to see your lowest low. And if you're not trying as hard to maintain your weight as you did to lose weight, then chances are you're probably going to sit a little bit higher than that. Not real weight gain.

Just normal processing and digesting of foods and not being extra diligent about all the things that you did before. So you reflecting on if I have not been mindful of this as normal. Well, come on. Right? Like, let's be real. I love this, by the way. But, like, you know. You don't have to fucking tell me when I've been drinking wine, eating chips, skipping meals and snacks, not drinking my water, not moving my body.

Like, you don't have to fucking tell me. I don't have to say, is this normal or is this me not being mindful? This isn't me intentionally not being mindful. This is me not giving a shit. Therefore, I feel like this. Right? Like, you kind of know. Yeah.

Just like you know, if you do indulge, like have Super Bowl's a great example this weekend. a lot of people indulged and there was people who were like, my scale didn't change it all. My scale didn't go up or my weight still dropped. What are you doing with that after? So if you're really watching that scale and that fluctuation, if you indulge and the scale doesn't go up, do you then tell yourself like, oh, I guess I can have chippies and wine more often because of the scale? Or are you thinking like, oh, that was all the consistency and me being in,

tune with my body up until that point and that takeaway that you have when your scale is up too. Like are you using that as an excuse? Like, oh, the scale didn't move because if you keep doing it eventually the scale is going to, your body's going to feel it. Your scale's good. And that's when you start to feel that way. But it's those little micro things too. When you're making those choices, it's great to make them. And it stays the same. But then if you use it as an excuse, like, I can do this all the time now versus I enjoyed that because I wanted to. to I'll do it again next time I feel like enjoying it, but not turning it back into that habit. Yeah, you'll get to know how your body responds to certain things. Like, you'll, you'll get to know what,

I guess the thing I want to say is you'll get to know what's normal for you in terms of how your body responds to I had some nachos and fried chicken on Sunday, right? How it responds to you, I've been drinking wine every night this week. How it responds to you, I'm having chips. Like, you'll know, or how my body's responding to stress or what happens with my weight when I'm sick. like you'll kind of get to know your normal, right? Like you're kind of learning what your normal is. And then also sort of like what is causing your weight to increase that has nothing to do with maybe indulgences. So like doing a workout, right? You do a workout. Your weight will be up. That has your weight, not real weight gain, by the way. Bad sleep. Didn't have a great sleep. Next day your weight might be up. So there's so many reasons why your weight will be up that have nothing to do with weight gain. And then, then might also have nothing to do with you indulging or not being mindful either, right? Because doing a workout is great. But your weight's going to be up regardless. So I would say that's what that's about. This is such a great question because it's about figuring out what's

normal for you in terms of how your body responds. Like I do a workout. My body sore. That's good for like four pounds for me. Easily. Well, and I find it for me, the first workout I don't get, Mine doesn't, but if I consistently do and then I start to get sore, it builds up for me. And that's when mine goes up. So it's not necessarily a instant reaction of workout, wait up, workout, weight up, could be also not drinking enough water at the same time. Yeah. There could be lots of reasons going on.

Lots of reasons. Odette wanted us to remind everyone to watch the segment with Dr. Beverly David from last week, the capture cancel correct part, especially because that matters in maintenance too, right, capture. You've never, you know, if your mind is saying you've never successfully maintained your weight. So why do you think you're going to be able to do it now, right? That thought, I'm not going to be able to do this. You're second guessing. You're unsure. Cancel it. You say to yourself, yeah, that might be true, but I'd never lost my weight this way before, right? It's always through deprivation, starving, depriving, and correct it is I feel confident in the routine I've learned

here and I've seen what has happened after I've indulged during the program. Simply got back on track. getting back on track is so much easier than the other methods of starving and depriving, you absolutely can do this. I can do this, right? So that is equally effective. I mean, I think that's effective in just life. I am a loser. I'm never going to be able to do this.

It doesn't matter if it's weight loss or maintaining your weight. I'm never going to be able to do this with my business, this and dating, travel, never going to be able to, any time you have that negative mindset, this comes into play. The scale just has a wonderful way of throwing our shit in our face. 100%. Yeah, right? It's really good for that. So next week, we are going to be downsizing one last time, an opportunity to really kind of create, dig into that routine and that baseline here and really dig into those four sets of mindful eating questions to really understand what enough feels like to you

and really like turn up the volume on those cues. That's what the routine is there. So you can really turn up the volume on those cues. And then that will be able to help you take advantage of what's going on when you go back from eating enough to feel slightly unsatisfied next week. Yeah, it's, you know, I think it's a great exercise just for continued too. You know, all of the questions and the worries, those that people have while they're trying to maintain about can I continue to do this, am I still being mindful? This, I think that downsizing and especially the second one after going back to the back and forth between downsizing and eating to satisfaction is key for that because it really,

I feel like it really brings some awareness. and it doesn't mean eating less and less and less. It just means like double, you're doubling down on checking in to make sure you're not eating too much or more than you need. So I think a great practice the next couple of weeks for all of the maintenance members. Great. Love it. I miss this comment here from Grace.

Doing the maintenance for a second time. You can do the maintenance program for as many times as you need to feel confident in moving to that next step that I'm ready to just wake up, look, good, feel good, live my life, personalize the plan, make choices that I know are right for me. doing the maintenance program for a second time after leaving it for a while definitely feels like the messy middle, but I'm definitely not looking at it as a negative thing. Absolutely not. It's about continuing and learning the journey. This is like you take time back and then you change. Things happen in your life. You're like you're evolving and you're growing and so many

things can happen. You could be 30 years I easily maintain my weight. Right. And then the last couple years, menopause, stress, a whole bunch of other shit, weight just goes up and up and up, follow back into old habits and I'm like, and then I had to pull out the big guns. I had to pull out things I've never done, but never needed to do before this time in order to get a handle on that. So that would have been like going back to maintenance,

30 years later. Right? And so this is what this is here for. This is what this program is here for. Thanks everyone for joining us today. For those of you joining live, all your comments and questions, anyone listening after the fact.

I'm going to be back. I'll be checking in again tomorrow. see you then. Thanks, Kim, for filling in for Odette. I appreciate you. Thanks, everyone. Have a great rest your day and we'll see you later. Bye. Bye, guys.