The Livy Method Podcast - The Human Diet

Episode Date: May 26, 2026

This one is tasty. Today Gina Livy gets into the food of it. From the Canada Food Guide to calories in versus calories out, Gina breaks down why so much of diet culture has left people disconnected from their bodies and what foods are most important. She get’s frank about how to feed you and your family for less and how all of these factors contribute to sustainable weight loss. This episode aligns with day 36 of our Spring 2026 weight loss program. You can find the full video hosted at: www.facebook.com/groups/livymethodspring2026To learn more about The Livy Method, visit livymethod.com. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

I'm going to be honest with you, this podcast is unapologetically a hot mess because that is what midlife feels like sometimes. Why, though? And how do we make it better? Do we all just need facelifts and JLP ones? I mean, let's talk about it. No bullshit, no wellness wankery here because we're trying to make real change and change is hard. But we're in this together. Welcome to the Livy Method podcast.

I'm not going to lie. This week feels really fucked up to me. I don't know what's going on. Yesterday I went live into the abyss. I'd have never experienced that before. Today I thought I had Dr. Paul joining me for a guest segment. I don't. I'm on my own.

I just, I don't even know what it is. I just literally tied my microphone into my necklace, so I'm just going to wear it like this. The rest of the podcast, how are you doing? So Kim just reminding me, it's quiet in the group, but we also have end of school coming up. People have proms, kids graduating, trying to wind things down, our friends in the U.S. are soon to go on summer holiday tis this season. I do not want this to be all consuming for you. Absolutely not.

Both the spring and summer is a great time to focus on fat loss. You know, less is more with that, or it's a lot easier because the sun is shining and we have more energy and, you know, all of that. It's going to be a hot day today. It's supposed to be like 28 degrees. I'm totally here for it. The winter was dark. It was dark. It was cold.

It was long. and so we obviously don't want to like be stressing about what to eat and when all summer long but we also want to feel our best that's the conundrum i've never used that word before um that's it isn't it like life is short we want to enjoy it but we also don't want to feel like garbage every day dragging our asses here they're not wanting to go places because we don't have clothes that fit can we have our cake and eat it too absolutely we can we can we can we can um because I don't have Dr. Paul today. I don't have anything really scheduled to talk about, but I have a couple questions that Kim sent in. So if you were with me and you got questions, let me know. We had a great

Q&A session last night. I love the evening Q&A's because like guards are down, end of the day. We're just shooting the shit, getting real and that's what this is about. I don't think you need 15,000 to do list. Here's my top 10 tips for this. Here's my things for that. You know this. We're smart. We're grown up. Right? You know this. It's about getting deeper. It's about having conversations that maybe make you go, huh, okay. Yeah, or oh yeah, I feel this too, right? Or yeah, I can relate to that. There's a great question today about the Canada Food Guide from Carol. Is it possible to get Alicia Steinberg, or Alyssa, Alyssa Steinberg. I have a friend named Alicia, or at least I did

in the past. She's since unfriended me. I guess we're not friends anymore, but whatever, and Alicia. So Alyssa Steinberg, our dietitian, on a guest segment to talk about the food guide. I'm sure she would love nothing more. But did you know Sean Wharton are like resident obesity medicine specialists, one of the top and brightest minds in obesity medicine in Canada, actually helped write the food guide. So we can go write to Soros and just talk to the guy who actually wrote it

because he's been on in the program many times, Dr. Sean Wharton. and talk about how misguided if that is the case. If not, then what general guidelines should all Canadians be following? Not to lose weight necessarily, but as a general guide of what to eat each day, the four basic food groups, and if that is all relevant. First of all, you stump me with the four basic food groups, right? Because there's like proteins, there's carbohydrates, and there's fats. And I'm missing, I'm trying to understand, I guess starches would be the next one.

I haven't looked at the Canada food guide. Canada Food Guide is the sole reason why I did not become a dietitian. Straight up. Because back in the day, you rewind the Canada Food Guide to, when did I go to school at 9.1,191 was my grad year. So you go in the 90s, late 90s. Canada Food Guide had you eating 12 servings of grains. What's the surplus that Canada produced back in the day? Grains.

right and it had us eating 12 servings of grains avoiding fat like the plague protein was like someone down the middle section like no leafy grains but vegetables right and so very clearly it came you know it occurred to me this fucking canon food guy doesn't make any sense it just made no no sense to me so that is the main reason why and it's all politics it's all politics in fact you know I've had a meeting in the last couple of years. Jackie Laroque, she's this incredible woman. She actually sponsored the award. I met her through Canada's Top 100 Most Powerful Women,

and she's in Ottawa, and she's the mix of everything. Everything is political. It's all about politics, even our Canada food guide. So it takes a lot to change the Canadian food guide to what it is. And science is science until it changes. And because there's not a lot of money in, trying to research the healthy foods that we consume, there's just like there's not a lot of research there. So for example, when I go to the obesity conferences, there's so many talks on

the science behind weight loss and all the new weight loss medications. You know what? There's not a lot of talks on. Behavioral therapy. Behavior. And you want to know why? Because there's really no money in that. And so it's people who get grants to research things. that don't really impact anything because you can't scale behavioral change. That's the thing that, well, why don't we put more money into this? Well, because there's no money pharmaceutical companies. And I'm not into conspiracy theories or like anything like that. But there's no money in helping people understand their issues.

There's no money in helping people make change. Zero money for anybody out there. Right. And so whenever I have these conversations, I'm like, this is so important. We know behavioral change is the biggest part of it. why don't we talk more about this? And they're like, there's no money in it. No one cares. I'm like, but this is how you actually address obesity is this is such a huge missing piece. There's food noise. There's like, you know, there's all of that. And they're like, yeah, no money in it.

And so when it comes to things like the Canadian food guide where we believe what we believe until the science tells us differently, and that's the problem with science. Like insulin resistance, we have a post on insulin resistance today. If you go back to my very, first book, I don't know where it is, but it's in my cupboard somewhere. If you go back to my very first book, it all it talks about, the whole program is based on set point in insulin resistance. But at the time, the naysayers out there were like, this is pseudoscience and this is whatever and this is like, you know, because I science, I do a lot of reading. I'm not just like, you know, here's saying what I see on the internet. And so it was littered with insulin resistance. Used to be the conversation all the

time. And then, you know, the naysayers like, no, it's not a thing. It's pseudos. And now look where we are at with insulin resistance. And those people, the naysayers, well, we didn't know. Same thing with water, right? I've been talking about two and a half, three and a half liters. It's just like it's not hard to figure out how much water people need. And then back in the day, people like, oh, you're going to kill people by telling them to drink so much water. And now, years later, the science is, right? Two and a half, three and a half liters. And not to say, like, I, you know, I'm the smartest person on the planet. I'm far from it. I've just I read. I read journals and I'm open to things changing. And so look at the menopause conversation,

for example, right? If you go back two years, what the experts were saying about menopause has now changed dramatically now that the science is changing along with it. So the Canada food guide is kind of no different. And so what do you need? You need 40% of your diet needs to be energy foods. What are energy foods? Energy foods are things like fruits, vegetables, not starches. Like no one needs bread and pasta. Like bread and pasta essentially is a processed food. So no one needs bread and pasta to survive, right? But there are those heavier carbs like potatoes, for example, rice is quinoa.

Like when we talk about heavier carbs, squashes, that's what we're talking about. Those are energy foods, food that break down into glycogen, your body. body stores this energy that gives you energy. And then there is, of course, protein for building muscle, maintaining muscle, right, which of course we need to function and move our bodies. And then 30% of your diet is fat, which is really important for cellular function. Your body needs that. Without enough good fat coming in, your body is reluctant to let go with that. And fat is there also help to decrease inflammation and to have offset stress. So you need fat. And that's where, you know, many years So, you know, we were vilifying eggs, we were vilifying butter.

We had the whole low-fat, no-fat era made everybody fatter in the end. Like, honestly, I mean, that's a good part about yogurt, is the actual fat in it. Fat feeds into your satiety hormones, makes you feel more satisfied and you need it. The problem is there are different types of fats, right? There's the trans fats, which you break them down. They are almost immediately artery clogging, right? Hydrogenated palm kernel oil, stuff like that. then there is like your omega sixes, your omega-3s, your omega-9s.

The problem with seed oils, and I talked about this last night, everyone's vilifying seed oils, right? You can't have seed oils. There's nothing really wrong with seed oils. It's just that they are overly abundant in our diet. And when you have too much of omega-6s, it can cause inflammation in the body. How do you offset that is omega-3s? And if you're not eating a lot of fish, right, like three, four times a week or eating flax or food, are higher in omega-3, chances are you're getting way more omega-6s than you are omega-3s. And as much as your body needs fat, that can cause inflammation. And so 40% of your diet is carbs, energy foods, 30% protein, and 30% fats. And so how do you know what to eat? Like the living method is a very

balanced diet. People are like, well, it's not rocket science. And I'm always like, no shit, Sherlock. It's like just what the human body needs. And that's why we have 25,000 people following, if you are human and have a body, we all need to follow the same basic diet. In fact, I was at one of the Canadian obesity conferences, and this is where I was just new. And I was like standing around a bunch of like really brilliant fucking people. And they're like, yeah, there is no one diet fits all. And I said, yes, there is. And they're like, first of all, who are you?

I'm like, it's called the human diet. Like, you may have special needs, right? So you may be gluten intolerant. You may have allergies to certain foods. you may like choose not to eat meat or whatever that might be. But we're all human to have a body. It's the same basic needs and function. Regardless of your race, your sex, skin color, anything like that, we still, our bodies

to process and digest foods the same way, right? There may some variations. Like, for example, Asian people, like can't convert alcohol and there's like, you know, certain sensitivities. And, you know, there's obviously some special needs, for lack of a better word, happening there. this is about you understanding what works best for your body and everyone's a little different, but it's the same. You need carbohydrates, need proteins, and you need fats. Like, that's, that's it, right? And so the thing where they really messed you up is that you have to count and weigh and measure

everything and follow a fucking guide. And the reality is you really don't, it's this where we're not really taught how to eat. We're not really taught how to eat. And then this world of like takeout and Uber eats and fast food and all of these things, We'd never really been taking the time to be taught how to eat. And if we have, it was based on the old Canada food guide. I remember when my kids were young and one of my kids was taking like a nutritional class. I'm trying to remember exactly what it was.

But it said that a Pop-Tart was healthier than peanut butter because peanut butter had a lot of fat in it. Yeah, I made notes all over that fucking thing. I was like, what is this? This makes no sense. What are you teaching my kids? Like, this is garbage. It's scent and fat. Like, my kid is not doing this.

not teach my kid that a Pop-Tart is healthier than peanut butter. Are you crazy? But that was based on old Canada food guide. And one of the reasons why I have so much stuff added to our food, so much processed foods, is because no one studied how food breaks down on your body. No one cared. Nobody cared. No one was talking about insulin. No one was talking about hormones. No one was talking about your microbiome wasn't even a word. No one talked about microbiome 30 years ago. It just lifestyle wasn't even a word. We talk about lifestyle and wellness. No one was using the words lifestyle and wellness 30 years ago.

And so this is why food companies have been able to process foods and add all these dyes and colorings and all of these things. 80% of the stuff we add to our foods, processed foods in North America, are banned in European countries. They have what's called purity laws. And that's why, you know, cereal you buy here is different ingredients than cereal you buy over there. And this is not like woo-hoo and conspiracy theory.

It's just legit how it is. And so these companies have been able to produce this food long before we were able to study the effects. And that's why they exist. So now it's hard to change all of that, right? I mean, look at Weight Watchers even. Like Weight Watchers built its whole empire on calories in versus calories out, right? You don't lose weight. You're not counting and restricting enough.

You gain weight back. It's your fault. You have no willpower. And calories were based on this woman, Lulu Peters, who really made it kind of, like mainstream, which was a way of conserving food, rationing food during the war. It really had nothing to do with actual weight loss. So we found that if you restrict food, yes, of course, you lose weight, but no one studied the fact that you gain it all plus more on the other side of that, right? It's taken as how many years to catch up to that finally. So people have just,

just keep digging their heels into calories in versus calories out when it's just, yes, no one is saying that that's not how you lose weight, but that's not how you lose weight in a sustainable, healthy way. That's why I love Jason Fung. So Jason Fung is a doctor who wrote the obesity code. And this is where people are like, wait, but he's all about fasting and yours is the total opposite. And yeah, because mine is more sustainable. His is like, lose your weight and, you know, continue fasting methods for the rest of your life. Mine is lose your weight and eat normally and live your life. So he's, you know, I agree that there's benefits in fasting and he agrees that there's a benefit in the way that people lose weight on my program. But it's really breaking down hunger. And yes,

there are calories. Eat less, exercise more. You will lose weight, right? You also lose muscle and you don't learn anything and it doesn't help you make sustainable changes. Then there is, yes, the calories matter, but what matters more is where those calories are coming from. What matters more than that is what your hormones choose to do with those calories, which is a learned behavior. You keep starving and depriving, starving and depriving, starving and depriving. Your body learns, I need to store more fat. So that's how your body gets wired. Then there's the digestion process, right? The strength of your microbiome, what your body chooses to do when it comes to how your body is able to process and digest those foods and extract the nutrients from those foods. And then again,

back to hormones where your body decides to allocate those resources, right? So it's so much more complicated. Then you add in hunger, which is not just I'm hungry and need to eat, right? There's actual hunger. Then there's conditioned hunger out of habit, learning to clear your plate. And then there's emotional hunger, which is eating because we're sad and we're mad and we're grieving and all of that. So it's like so complicated and yet we've oversimplified everything. So the kid at a food guide, I don't know even if they got it right that it would be helpful at the end of the day. Like what I'm teaching you here. And if you're new to the program is that we are, I am teaching you to get into and understand and learn what your body needs, not just to lose weight, not just to maintain your weight,

but to be able to live your life where you can trust when to eat, what to eat and how much to eat. And one other reason why calories in versus calories out doesn't make any sense is your body's needs change. You're not a fucking robot, right? Like every day your bodies needs change. One day you might be really hungry and need more food. And then other days you're not hungry at all. And if you've had children, you will see this in them, right? Your kids will eat you out of house and home. And then the next they go for weeks and it feels like, how are you surviving, kid? And they're just like, I'm not interested in food. And the next thing, you know, they're asking you for food every five minutes. They don't think about it. So they're just naturally in tune with their own hunger levels. They don't

have the same issues. They're not eating out of habit. They're not eating out of emotions. We teach them that. You are taught, right? Like, here's a treat, you know, eat this. You did this. You're sad. There's a cookie, right? You got good marks in school. Here's a treat. You know, kids are starving all over the world. Eat all of your food. Broccoli is good for you, you know, all of those things that were taught. So, yes, it's also more expensive to eat healthy than buying processed snacks. They should make it cheaper to eat. You know, I kind of agree with you, but then I kind of don't, right? Like, I think in some instances, because McDonald's is no longer cheap anymore. I don't know. I got four kids. and McDonald's used to be super cheap, right?

You get a burger and you get fries and a drink and it was super cheap. Now that shit is really expensive. And there are like, you know, even I like I love Farm Boy because it's just it's quiet. It's like good for my anxiety, but that shit's expensive. So there's like no frills, right? Like no frills in Canada is like the same foods that it all goes to the same market. So all the foods get imported and all the farmers bring their food to the same like depot. right and so all of the grocery stores go to the same depot it's not like metro has its own depot and loblas

has its own depot and you know superstore has its own depot and no frills has its own food basics they all go to the same depot to get their foods all the same so it's all coming from the same farmers it's not like metro has its own ghetto farmers right and no frills has its own ghetto farmers for lack of a better term you know what i mean like everyone thinks that no frills is like who goes to no frills like i do you know Why? Because I don't like spending three more dollars on toilet paper, the same toilet paper that's available at another grocery store for more money, the same can of beans, the same lettuce, the same grapes, the same everything. So no frills, for example, you have to bring, like everyone has to bring their own bags now, right? So no frills isn't sparkly. Like it doesn't

have nice signs. It's just, you know, yellow and it's just really super basic. Maybe it doesn't look as beautiful, but it's the same fucking food. It's the same food. Right. For some reason we just don't, you know, people don't think of going there. I don't want to go to no frills. Are you kidding? I'm going to no frills. I love a good farm boy. I do, but I do not like the bill at the end of it. So yeah, so it's kind of like there's also a great program. Gosh, what's it called? I used it for a while where it's like odds and ends. So it's fruits and vegetables and whatnot that are not perfect. God, the amount of food that we throw away because it doesn't look perfect. And so you can get a box delivered. I found it. I found it.

What is it? Wow Foods. I can't remember. I actually just follow them on Instagram. And so they, they have this, like they deliver a box. Oh, sorry, my Instagram is really loud. They deliver this box of like imperfect like foods to your house, which is, and there's also, there's also a kind of, God, I suck right now. My brain is fried. There's also a service where you could go. There's an app where you can go. And if you guys know the name of it, please put it in the, hopefully you guys can understand what I'm saying today. So you go and they prepare a box for you. And it's like all the, not the lower price, but the, you know, the stuff that's, you know, about to go whatever. And they put it in a box for you and you can pick it up and you can save so much money.

Let me see what this is called. What is this box called? This delivery service. Anyway, there's some really good ones. Did I save it? I probably didn't save it now like it. Anyway, if I find it, I'll repost it. Because I forgot about it. It was something I ordered back in the day. The other thing I do too is a grocery shop more often and I go for the sales section, especially on the on the fruits and the vegetables. You know, they pack it up and they're like, you know, this is like 30% off or whatever. So, you know, I obviously I run a very successful company, but I, when you've been broke before like I have and wondering how you're going, like when you've gone and you've been that person that you go to pay for your groceries or why they're scanning it, you're doing the math in your head. And you're like, oh my God, please have enough money, please have enough money.

Or, you know, you go through the end and you have to like put stuff back because you don't have enough money and your card comes declining. I'm like, oh, shit. You know, you're very cognizant of this. And, you know, this is why I, you know, I'm very cognizant of not wanting people to spend more money than they need on this. But yeah, so there is there is a way to eat healthier. And then one of the things that happens when you follow the program is you end up eating less of the foods that you're buying. So you end up saving in a way.

So we should have like a grocery save share page. I don't know. I know Kim is listening and she's writing that down. There's an app called Flash Food where you can get discounted items that need to be sold or used ASAP. Yeah, the odd bunch. That's it. That's it, Debbie.

The odd bunch. Try foods I would never eat beats. I love them. Flip for price matching. Right? Yeah. You don't remember like coupons back in the day and used to be price match? I don't love those used to do that.

But, you know, so community good food boxes. Yes, love this. I did fasting for years and loved how it helped my inflammation and lost a good 50 pounds. But now the last year really messed with my mind and body. Let me just reply to that so I can read it. Okay, I did fasting for years and loved how it helped my inflammation. Yes, because there's this thing called autophagy, where if you give your body time without food,

it's able to better repair and rebuild and regenerate and rejuvenate and kill off kind of like old. slumpy cells, for lack of a scientific term, right? This, your body needs time without food. And this is why it can be such a game changer as hard as it is to not eat after dinner, truly, to eat dinner as early as possible, to not eat after dinner. And then if you choose to go a little bit longer, obviously if you choose that, let's say you eat at five and then you choose to have breakfast, you get 15 hour window.

If you choose to have mid-morning snack, 17-hour window without eating, and then you can still eat all this nutrient-rich foods. People tend to, though, push it too far and then they won't eat until lunch and then they overeat because they're so hungry. That's the problem. What you don't want to do is overeat any of your meals. You still want to keep smaller, more digestible portions. And so that's why it's way better and more effective in my experience to choose not to eat after dinner and either have breakfast, that's higher protein. Or you can choose not to have breakfast and go for that mid-morning snack in which you need that fruit to replenish your glycogen store.

It's all about the messages. You don't want to leave your body at a deficit, right? Anyway, back to Samantha. I did fasting for years and loved how it helped my inflammation and lost a good 50 pounds. But now the last year it's really messed with my mind and body. Now I turned into binging in my window of eating because my head was thinking, eat everything you can because now you can't eat until 3 p.m. And this is that conditioned and emotional hunger, right?

And this is where you, because it's not like you've just done fasting. you're probably coming into fasting after spending time in that diet mentality, right? Like less is more, feeling restrictive with eating. Even though we have this abundance of food available to us, we have a very restrictive mindset. And that's what we're working through with this. And I'm not against fasting at all. I think there are benefits to fasting as a fast, but a lot of times people confuse

fasting with just simply eating less and or for like just periods of time without. eating, right? Where it's actually, it's a lot more nuanced than that. I've gained back 20 pounds and I'm devastated, but now I'm slowly learning with your method. Eating is important to fuel your body properly. I'm still trying to wrap my head around it because, but loving, showing up every day and your method is so refreshing, looking forward to seeing the scale move. Currently hasn't yet, but I know not to give up. So this is too, right, if your body is coming from a fasting fat storage mode, right? Like, so fasting is interesting because you, again, forcing their body to utilize. This is why you're never really hungry. You're never really starving if you have, if your

body's carrying excess fat. Like, it's like carrying an extra fridge around. Like, you're not ever really starving because your body's learned it needs this fat. So it's like, you can't have any of my fat. Right? You can't. This is why we got to give the body what it needs work with the body, not fight in. I know it sounds overly simplistic. Give the body what it needs. Create that routine of food coming in, food coming in, food coming in. So your body's like, oh, we don't need this fat. Let go with the fat. Let go with the fat. Your body has learned to store this extra fat as an energy reserve four times where you go through deprivation and starvation. Right. And so you're never really starving, even when you're really hungry, your body's just like, yeah, I don't want to use this.

So I'm just going to tell you that you're hungry. Meanwhile, like, how are you hungry when you literally have all this energy where you have this extra fat sitting there? So a lot of our hunger is psychological. Yes, it is like, okay, based on our energy reserves or glycogen reserves, based on our glycogen reserves, when your body breaks down carbs stores that it's glycogen, based on our glycogen reserves, you might want to think about eating something, your body knowing it has like a whole fridge full of food, a whole fridge full of food that it can tap into. But it's like, uh-uh, you can't, it's kind of like money, right? So let's say you get paid every day as opposed to once a month. Like every day, you get paid. Here's some money. Here's some money.

Here's some money. Here's some money. You got job security. You know for the rest of your life. Every day you're going to get money. So then you're like, oh, let me spend. Let me spend my last dollar. I'm good, I'm good, I'm good, spend, spend, spend. You get paid once a month and you're like, well, fuck, okay, I got like, I can only, like you're weary of spending because you have to make your money last a whole month, right? And if you spend your money too soon, you're going to be, you're not going to have anything left because, you know, you don't get paid again for a whole of the month. Your body's working in a similar way.

When you constantly give it what it needs, it's like, okay, great, here's good energy. You know, we don't need this fat. That causes inflammation. We don't need it. We don't need the extra insulation. it's hard on your body. Every extra pound of fat is hard on your body. So let me just get rid of it.

This is what downsizing does. Your body's like, oh, I'm not getting as much as I used to. I have this extra fat. I don't eat it. Let me downsize your body, right? So that's kind of like that mentality. And that deprivation mentality is also so ingrained with our brain. And your mind-body connection is real.

Your mind-body connection is real. And so when you think deprived, your body acts deprived, right? And so if you're coming from a deprivation, like, mindset and you're used to deprivating your body, you really want to dig into that routine. So small portions, eaten often, and don't skip meals and snacks, definitely stop eating after, because if you can do a fast and leave 50 pounds, stop eating after dinner, right? Stop, give your body that time because your body's used to that. So that's a benefit for you.

Give your body that time without eating foods. If you want, choose not to have breakfast. That's fine. But make sure you do mid-morning snack. And then then that way, you're not going in ravishing. overeating at the meal. So you still have to eat snack, lunch, snack, snack, and then dinner. You're still eating five times, right? Just like knowing you eat five times helps with that deprivation mindset. So that's the state of your body coming into this, is that deprivation, physically and

mentally. And so that takes time to address, especially if you're new to the program, you're second guessing, and I'm not sure, and how does this all work? It's so easy to fall back into that old, well, no, restricting food worked for me before. And as you get older, it gets harder and harder. Every time you do that, you are, you know, your metabolism is slowing because we are losing that muscle mass. We tend not to be as active when we're older and whatnot, you know. Morning. Wow, today I slept in, something I don't usually do. Right? Same. What's that about? It's some weird energy. Weird energy. Hi, Christine. Great chat. Gina's so real, so true. Yeah, I'm here for it. You know, I was sharing last day that I've been through an evolution and sharing my program.

I started in 2018 on a whim. I knew I was really good at helping people on a one-on-one. I knew I had something amazing. I had this opportunity to blow it up worldwide and make a lot of money. And I just didn't want to blow it on just like on a whim. And so I started this Facebook support groups. My first one was free. And can I actually help people en masse?

And that was really my intention. I shared last night how I really got sidetracked on the, business side of things. I never intended to, you know, I don't know how I was planning on making my money. I was just going to write a book and share what I did. And it became this big company. And I, you know, I'm really proud of it. And there's a lot of people that work for us. But it became very much about managing people and paying paychecks. And I had to then help people because I had to pay people's paychecks. And it used to always be just helping people for helping people. And in that, I became very much trying to be everything for everybody because you can't do this now and you can't.

do this now because it's serious business. And I am back. My sole focus is just connecting with you. I want to have conversations that are relevant to you right now. I'm not trying to control the process. I'm just trying to meet people where they are at. Continue to share what I've learned to continue to be inspired by it all too. Like the program works amazing. The program's amazing for weight loss. If you're taking GLP1s, it's the exact program you need to be doing to lose your weight in a healthy way in a way you can maintain and sustain. And these weight loss medications have come. People are going to realize that they're not a diet.

Helpful, yes. It's kind of like taking Ozempic to manage diabetes, but you still have to follow a healthy diet. Right? You still have to make sustainable changes. And yeah, I just, and this is why my focus is more. Our program works really well for everybody, right? Everyone.

And I know we have men doing the program and everyone is welcome. This is my focus is primarily, you know, women who've had enough of diets, people who've had enough of dieting, and they want to do it a different way. And they're, they're concerned about losing weight, yes, but also being healthy, longevity, mindset, truly making the most of the life that they're here to live and creating and designing that life that they want to live. So, so I'm here. I mean, I've been really excited about the conversation. I've got this renewed energy about the program. And yeah, I'm just, you know, that's where I'm, that's where I'm coming from. And I'm not, I'm not really, I don't have any

other intention other than coming here and trying to help. So it's me. So it's me. The process is black and white. The process is black and white and absolutely works. Gina meets us in the mud of life and teaches us how to deal with that while in the plan. Yeah, I'm a very all or nothing person. And I've really learned that this gray area. Like if you do this, your body responds like that. And if it's not, why not? Right. That comes down to like this human diet and, and, and, knowing what we need and just being in tune to that, right? Like we just get so disconnected from ourselves. We really do. I think about this. There's a lot of things I think about, you know, how it can be so judgmental and how on these, and that's what, that's what like social media

is teaching us. You see something, you make a judgment on it and everything, our whole world is functioning within 30 to 90 seconds, you know, even like content, before people used to love reading and learning and now they just want like a quick video and I think that's what I also love about our age demographic. We're still a little old school where we still want to read and learn and not necessarily need things quick and fast and we're investing in ourselves and investing and learning and yeah, I think the world is really evolving in a really interesting way and trying to navigate that, you know, meet people where they're at, understanding what they need to actually follow through and make change. And that's why I want to talk to Dr. Paul about

tomorrow is because he sees people who are trying to get healthy, trying to fix health issues, trying to make change. What's the blocker there? Because this is where we see a significant drop in engagement, right? And I know it's busy. School season, summer, like last night, it was beautiful last night. Who's going to show up on a live when it's gorgeous outside? Right. Like I don't blame anybody for that because, you know, let's get outside. I'd rather have you be outside, then inside, listening to me at the end of the day. But why is it that it's hard to to work past week five, week six, week seven? Why is it hard to, even when we've been successful, to keep showing up to follow through on reaching our goals? And that's the blocker, I think,

for people, is that it just takes so long to reach our goals that life has a way of getting in the way, like smacking you in the face before you get there. And then we feel like we get set back. and then we're just like, oh, like losing weight is kind of like going to the gym, right? Where we go to the gym, we feel fantastic. And then for whatever reason, we stop going to the gym. And then it's really hard. We go back to the gym. We're working out.

It's really hard to get back into it, right? I don't know if that's only like, only like something like 85% of the population actually goes to the gym. So I don't know if that's a good example or not. But, you know, you get into a group. I said to Tony last night, God, I was feeling so great there, following the program, feeling amazing. and then I went away for work and then I went away for work again and then we got, you know,

my birthday, kids' birthdays. Today is Dead Dad Day. This is obviously the day that the kids' dad passed away and collectively. I know that may seem harsh, but that's what we call it because there's no other name that really, I think, reaches the depth of how these kids feel. Like it's such an impactful day in their life. And that's today. And there's just been a lot going on. And I think carrying the weight of all of that. And it's like, when am I going to come up for air. When am I going to come up for air, right? But I will. And I said that to Tony this morning. Like, God, we were doing so good. And like, last night we're eating brownies in bed. I said, I had a friend come over and her mom baked brownies for us. Hi, Lily's mom. Thank you. And there we are eating

brownies in bed last night. And I looked at him. I'm like, why did we do that? And he's like, you know, I don't know. Um, you know, so that's, and but then I'm going to get back at it and we're going to feel better again. And that's what it is. So when you're trying to lose, weight, you have to kind of spend more time making those choices. And then in maintenance, this is life, right? You have to kind of ebb and flow with life. And I think with weight loss, you have to ebb and flow. You have to never give up. You have to never give up. That's why if you keep showing up, you won't mess it up. You have to never give up on doing the things each day. They're going to get you one step closer because eventually you're going to get there. It's like you

were driving to Disneyland, driving to Disneyland. And some people live closer. Some people live farther away. Some people just as a straight line there. Some people choose to sightsee along the way. Some people choose to visit friends and family along the way. Some people are driving fancy new cars. Some people are driving beat up cars. They keep breaking down every five minutes. Some people are hitting roadblocks and detours. But if you want to go to Disneyland, you have to just keep going. And at no point along the way, do you go back home and start again? And diet culture has taught us to go back home, start again. Go back home, start again, because we love the fresh start. Oh, we love the fresh start. But reality, there's no fresh start in life. There's just a continuation, right? So how do we keep continuing? How do we keep showing out? Uh, got to go too, Leslie, never give up. Never give up. Yes, because you're worth it. And listen, you may not reach your goal, but you're going to come darn close. You're going to feel the best you possibly can. You're going to get as close as possible. You might get, you might before you reach your goal, decide you don't even want that goal anymore. The goal here is to get, help the

body release this fat that it no longer serves a purpose to make you feel more calm and comfortable in your body. So you're truly living your best life. You look your best, you feel your best. That's all it is. And it's not actually a number on this scale. Thank you for joining me today. You guys are giving me life today. This is my happy place and I need to be in a happy place today. So thank you for joining me today. I appreciate you. Dr. Paul is joining us tomorrow. Who knows what we're going to talk to him about. The poster has gone up for him. If you want to ask any questions that you have for Dr. Paul,

I'm going to make a list of them. We're no longer kind of like deciding what the conversation is going to be. We're just going to kind of meet you where you are at and what the conversation needs to be. So if you want to join us tomorrow. I hope you have a fantastic week this week. Take a minute. See where you're at. Check him with yourself.

Be your own cheerleader. Hi, Elfie. Creating the title likely helps. Sugar coding. Maybe not a sad. Yes, a sad name for a day. Right? Yeah, but you know, here's the thing about that. And it sounds so weird, but we're owning it is a super sad fucking day for the kids. Their fucking dad died. You know what I mean? And I think because kids have no context because we've had my aunt passed away, which was so tragic for our family, but the kids were very young. And even in the midst, because their dad took a couple days to pass away and they were there, they didn't know what it meant. Like when they were there and saying goodbye to their dad, they had no reference for what that. that meant that they would never see him again. And it's very sad. And they're almost, because we don't

talk about grief, they believe that they're supposed to just get over it. Like, and I was thinking about grief today that we just, all of us, as you get older, are carrying so much grief that we don't talk about. We don't talk about. And the kids are like, well, you know, their friends are back to school and their friends don't care anymore. And not that they don't care, but they don't, their friends don't have reference for it if their parents haven't passed away. And so this is where like I'm allowing my kids to call it what it is to own that for them and for it to be really fucking sad. It's so fucking sad. Their dad died. Do you know, and although him and I were not together, we were married for 20 years and he was very much a part of their lives. And so it's incredibly sad and I think it's important

for them to be incredibly sad. I think so often we're pushing away our fields, I'm fine. We're fine. Let that's how life is. Got to go back to work. That's how life is. Got to do your schoolwork. And we don't feel it. Like we don't, we let ourselves in pieces fall apart. You know what I mean? Like it's like you're walking around dragging pieces with you because it's the heaviness because we don't own the sadness. You know, we don't. No one talks about it. We don't own it. Like we don't think about weight loss and trying to reach your goal. And like so many people are dealing with grief, let alone trying to eat their fucking fruit snack every day, right? Like, I really feel like, especially as we get older, no one is talking about this and

we need to share a little bit. So I'm hoping that in letting the kids indulge in their full fields, you know, including myself, I'm trying to be strong and, you know, I woke up crying this morning. I'm trying to be strong. I don't know if it's the trauma of it or it's just, I'm sad for my kids. I don't know, right? And, you know, unless you're talking to a psychologist every now and then, or, you know, you feel like people get tired of hearing about your grief and how sad you are when, and so we don't, we don't express it anyway. I just want to anyone else who's feeling the same and dealing with grief today. I see you. I see you. And you know what? I keep repeating this thing that you are safe and you are loved

and it's okay, right? Like we sometimes I think we need to hear that and it's okay no matter what you're feeling today. So, um, all over the place this week. Thanks for bearing with me. And, you know, we're just, it is what it is. Yeah, I know you. No one gets over it. Nobody gets over it, right? No one gets over it. Um, love this program. Fourth program. I started at 217. Today, I'm at 168. Love that for you. I still have time to release it, but I'm here for it learning so much about me and I still have a lot to learn. And I am here for that. I am here for that. We're all in together. Okay, everyone, thanks for joining me today. Um, yeah, I appreciate you. Have a great rest of your day, everyone.

I hope it's a good one. And I'll see you tomorrow. Bye. Yes, I'll see you tomorrow. I'm in the maintenance group tonight. So I won't see it tonight, but I'll see you tomorrow. Okay, bye, thanks.