The Livy Method Podcast - The Tweak This Week - Fall 2024 - Week 4

Episode Date: October 9, 2024

Join Gina and Program Manager Kim as they break down and dig into the tweak we see in week 4 of The Livy Method. This is the live recording from October 9th, 2024.You can find the full video hosted at:https://www.facebook.com/groups/livymethodfall2024Topics covered:Downsizing: What feels and associations is it bringing up for you?The truth about portion sizes and eating what your body actually needsDownsizing is more about the feelings that it brings upThe fear of being hungry: Are you actually feeling starved and deprived?Working through food waste issuesAre you feeling hungry in the evening?Asking the 4 questions: How do you downsize when your portions are already really small?How to pack your meals and snacks for the dayWhich components of your meal are left on your plateBonus snacks: should you be having them this week?Looking ahead to next week's tweakTo learn more about the Livy Method, or to sign up for our Winter 2025 Program, visit www.ginalivy.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 from 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. The tweak this week, let's get into it. It's a big one. We are downsizing. Some people are loving it. Some people are freaking the fuck out over it. It can mess you up. I love that people are resistant to change because they got used to giving their body what it needs, eating dissatisfaction the last few weeks. Welcome,

as always, Kim. She is the manager of the Weight Loss Program, which means she knows what's going on. She knows where our members are at. She knows the questions that they are asking. you get a good sense of how people are feeling? I mean, 20, God, 21 programs, 22, 23, 23 program. I don't know. I made the mistake of going down the Reddit rabbit hole. I think I was Googling something to see if people could find our website. And I came across some Reddit page and some woman was talking about how I was all, what'd she say? The word scatterbrained and whatever and lies. And one other woman's like, no, no, no, she doesn't lie. I believe she actually really wants to help people, but she's really scatterbrained. I'm just like, yeah, fuck off.

There's a lot going on. I got to help 100,000 people lose weight every year. I got a lot. There's a lot going on. I gotta help 100,000 people lose weight every year. I got a lot. There's a lot of working parts to this. Leave me alone already. It is, it's a lot on your plate. It's a lot on your plate. But not a lot on everyone else's plates this week

because- Not a lot on everyone else's plates this week. How are we feeling? Love, hate, relationship with downsizing, says Pamela. I hear you. Okay, so downsizing this week. How are we feeling? Love, hate relationship with downsizing says Pamela. I hear you. Okay. So downsizing this week. I know. So first of all, how are people feeling? How are people feeling? Yeah. It's interesting as we talked about this the other day about how, you know, just trying to figure out where people are at and listening to you and Dr. Dana Karraschafer talk yesterday and stuff. it's thinking like,

I'm trying to think with some of the feelings and associations that people are feeling with this, is it this or is it other things? Because there is a lot going on. And I wonder if some of the, I think some people are super excited to try this because if they've experienced the scale not moving or having a plateau, they really think that eating less is still going to be the answer to their scale moving. So I think that's one thing that we're feeling. You know, the other thing is just that resistance to change and that fear of trying something different.

So there's a lot of mixed emotions going in the group. And I think that's a little bit escalated by mixed emotions in life and society in general. So I think we're dealing with a lot this week. We are dealing with a lot this week. Okay, so let's talk about that. I hear you. This is like the first week where people feel like they're doing something. But it's interesting because in the same breath, you'll have people who are just following the basic food plan and their weight has been dropping. All of a sudden they'll get to downsizing and then they'll be on

a plateau. And people are like, what, what's going on? Why am I not losing and downsizing? Well, because you've already lost and chances are your body needs time to adjust to the weight that you've lost. But this is the first week where we actually start to try to lose weight up into this point. We've just been building that foundation and yes, it's normal for people to lose weight up into this point, we've just been building that foundation. And yes, it's normal for people to lose. Most people do lose in the first few weeks of the program. It's still normal to have not lost yet. And it will still be normal to not have lost still a few weeks from now, though. Week seven, we start to be like, okay, there's got to be something else going on here, which is why next week we are going to have that conversation about four reasons why your weight can be slower to move, inflammation, food sensitivities,

gut issues like your microbiome, and then of course hormones as well. But that doesn't mean that there still isn't a lot of work that you can do right now. So you have to address portion sizes. You have to. Like if we talk about calories in versus calories out, I mean, that's based on starving, depriving, forcing your body to burn fat. And yes, you will lose weight that way. The problem is you will gain it all back because doing that reinforces the fact that your body needs that stored fat. So we know it helps you lose weight. It doesn't do anything for helping you to maintain and sustain your weight. And chances are you're going to gain it all back plus more. But there is truth in portion sizes and eating in tune to your body's actual needs. Now, eating more food than you need in terms of healthy, nutrient-rich foods, not going to cause you to gain weight, but eating

more than you need is definitely going to slow down what's happening on this scale. So the sooner we can get in tune to our body's needs, obviously the sooner we're going to start to see and feel that scale. But the reality is most people, because we live in a supersized society, have been eating way more food than they need, even when it's good, healthy, nutrient-rich foods. I remember I was helping my friend a few years ago lose weight and she was following the program and I was at her house and she made this salad. The thing I swear was this big. I'm like, what is this? She's like, well, I enjoy a really big salad. I'm like, what? If you describe anything you are consuming on a diet as big, there's something off there. Just to fit that in your guts. I'm like that. Okay. I get that you can eat that, but that's not

how much your body needs. So we do have to get real and get in tune to your portion. So chances are most people will have to eat less because you have been feeding the size body you are now. And we are assuming that you want to downsize the size of your body. So this is about downsizing the size of your body more so than downsizing your portion. So portions obviously really important. And there are other ways that we're going to be addressing portions as well, right? This is just how we're starting to address portions. I love this tweak also because it's less about eating less and more about all the feelings that are brought up because of our history with dieting. So it is making people nervous. I love that. If you are nervous about it, you have strong feelings about it. It means you have things that you need to work through

and things that need to be brought to light for you to be able to work through them in the first place. So I love this week. I can understand how it's like, you want to eat all your food. It's hard to leave it on its plate. You're feeling extra hungry. I get that. I get that. But everything, if you look at it, everything is a means to an end. Yes. And I think the big picture for this is if we're comparing, if we want to compare to other things, people do compare this to past diets and say, this brings up past diet feels, this brings up feelings of deprivation. When you're doing other things, you're that calories in calories out thing is about cutting and purposely eating less and often less than you need because you're not being in tune with this tweak here. We are

addressing portion sizes by leaving ourselves feeling slightly different, which is slightly unsatisfied at the end of it. That slight difference is the key because that's when you're starting to address it. We're not, you're not, you shouldn't be putting yourself into starvation. Are you going to notice that you're a little bit hungry maybe later on? Of course, you're going to notice because you're doing something different. And that's the whole point. You want to notice you're making a change. You're trying to get your body's attention, but it's not so drastic that you're depriving yourself of anything at the end of the day. Yeah. You shouldn't use the word starving or deprived to describe this week at all. And if you

are saying that in your mind, okay, that might be mentally how you are feeling because you're being triggered because that's probably associating eating less to old feelings of when you did actually starve and deprive yourself. Go into your body about that. Like, am I actually feeling starved? Am I actually feeling deprived? I'm still eating six times a day, nutrient-rich food choices. So that fear of being hungry is real. Here's what I have to say about that. We eat so often on the food plan that there's another meal and snack coming down the pipeline. By the time the food you do eat gets processed, digested, and stored into usable energy, you will start, start to feel more

satisfied. It takes hours for your body to break down the food that you're eating. And then by then you have another meal and snack coming down the pipeline. Remember you have that, that half hour to three and a half hour window. So if you are like, let's say you have breakfast and then an hour later, you're hungry, Have your morning snack earlier, right? Have your lunch earlier. Like you can play around if you have the luxury. I know some people don't have playing around with the timing of your foods. Food waste issues to me, put it in a takeout container, like bring it home in a takeout

container or put it in a Tupperware. I heard someone the other day, someone was talking about money. They're so mindful of money. Well, you're not a garbage can and you're not saving money by eating more than you need. You're not, you're not saving. I hate to tell you, but if you're eating more than you need, you're not, you're not, you're not saving money or not, not wasting money by eating something that you don't need. And then they're like, well, I don't like leftovers.

Okay, well, I don't know what to say about that. Put it into a container, give it to someone else. I don't know, feed it to your dog if you can, or try to maybe incorporate it into another meal somehow. But it's still, even the money issue, you eating food that you don't need is not helping out there no all it's doing is causing you to pay in other ways which is your health and wellness well and also we're not addressing those portion sizes and you're going to continue to over serve yourself

you're spending more money you're going to eventually when you get your portions to where they need to be for what your body needs you're going to be making yourself less dishing yourself out, satisfied on less potentially. And that's where you're going to have savings. You can't look at in a moment what's happening to you as the only result of what you're doing right now. You have to look ahead to the end and where you're going to be at that point. If you're looking for something like saving money or, you know, even when it comes to your scale and stuff, you can't be so in the moment that I need to have the reward right now. I need to see the results of this right now. You're going to feel this up, you know, moving forward. Yeah. And it's, you're going to, we are, we are messing with your hunger levels. We are getting your body's attention. It's noticing

a lot of people will say, well, I'm really hungry in the evening. Yes. But also being really hungry in the evening is a sign your weight is about to drop as well. This is where you have to take a logical look and be like, okay, well, I ate all this nutrient-rich food throughout the day. I'm far from starving. I'm far from deprived just by eating a few bites less of each meal and snack. Here's a question. If I'm downsizing and not feeling extra hungry anymore before my next meal and snack, am I doing the tweak correctly? So what you will notice in the first few days of the week, you will feel like your body will notice you're a little extra hungry, and then your body will actually start to adjust to the amount of food that is coming in, and you'll start to feel more satisfied on smaller portions. Now, the goal is to leave

yourself feeling slightly unsatisfied so you can continue with that throughout the week and eat a few bites less from that, right? Again, not starve, not deprive, but we are chipping away. It is going to blow your mind how much food you do not need to eat in order to feel satisfied. And in our supersized society, portions have gotten way out of control. It's not us. It's society and the massive portions we're being served. And we're used to seeing. We're used to seeing. So I'll have people say, well, I'm concerned I'm not eating enough. How do you feel? Feel great. What's your energy been like? I've never felt better in my life. How are you sleeping? I'm sleeping amazing. Is your body changing? Yes, it is. Is your weight dropping?

Yes, it is. Are you actually hungry? Well, no. Then why do you think that you are not eating enough because what they're seeing? Because it's not the same as what everyone else is eating. It's not the same as what I'm used to seeing, right? So getting in tune with that. There are some other questions here. So Claire, you're totally doing it right. That's totally normal and expected. Now, all of this would still happen if you just followed the basic food plan. Many of you are probably following the basic food plan and noticing your portions have naturally been getting smaller just as over the last four weeks. Eventually, you'll get more in tune to your portions. Eventually, you're going to lose your weight. These tweaks each week are

designed to fast track that. We're just like putting pedal to the metal in terms of getting as in tune as quickly as possible with these tweaks each week. Sometimes I'm really hungry in the evening, but then I notice the next morning I don't feel as hungry. What's up with that? Was I not really hungry? So it could be a lot of things. It could be like, yeah, you got triggered and you saw something. So then you're like, oh, I'm hungry. I want that. It could be residual based on the habit of you eating in the evening. It could be just knowing that this is the tweak this week and that's messing with your head. So it's making you feel like you're hungry. Could also be your weight is about to drop. Like I said, it's normal for you to feel extra hungry. Don't forget about the signs of

detox. Extra hungry, heading into the evening, even though you're eating all this nutrient-rich food throughout the day, right? Waking up in the middle of the night, three or four o'clock time, water not being appealing, weight being up, feeling bloated and all that. So we can't lose sight of the basics, right? But everyone gets fucked up because all of a sudden we're eating less. So everyone's panicked. I'm starved. I'm deprived. I'm hungry, all those things. And forgetting the basics, right? This is how, this is the effect it can have. Some people got some deep issues here with this. What about concerns? What about portion sizes? Like I mentioned, some people are concerned they're not eating enough. What else are we dealing with there? Yeah, I think with the being concerned is like some of the people portion size wise,

they are scared that their portions have already become small. They're not, they're no longer, they're having their token bites. They're no longer, you know, sort of hungry before their meal. They're having token bites. And how can they make this work for them when they're having just token bites? That's one of the concerns that they have is if I'm just having token bites. And how can they make this work for them when they're having just token bites? That's one of the concerns that they have is if I'm just having token bites, then how do I downsize that? Well, you know, it's I think that people are getting stuck in certain meals and maybe not

going through those mindfulness questions when they're asking if every meal and snack you are not hungry at all. You might need to slow down and ask yourself the questions a little more closely. Yeah. It could stem from overeating in the first place. What you think is satisfied is really overeating, right? Because it can back track to the beginning of the program and understanding what satisfaction means to you. So you still want to have token amounts, even if you're not hungry, because it's normal, even with downsizing, because hunger levels change that you might have a day that you're not hungry, because it's normal, even with downsizing, because hunger levels change

that you might have a day that you're not even hungry at all. How am I supposed to downsize if I'm not hungry? So you still have that token amount. And then, yeah, there are probably people saying, well, I'm already, I'm already just having a few bites of something, right? Like, how do I downsize? They're probably the same people who are like, how am I going to lose weight eating six times a day? It's not normal to eat six times a day, right? We're really spreading that food out throughout the day for a variety of reasons, going back to the basic food plan. Eventually, what we want to do is get in tune to our body's needs and our body's needs change every day. So at the end of the program, for example, you will check in at each meal and

snack time and assess if you're hungry, need to eat, could eat, should eat. But it might look a little different. One day you might have breakfast, choose not to have morning snack, have lunch, choose to have both afternoon snacks, and then choose not to have dinner. And then the next day it looks completely different. You have breakfast, you have snack, you have lunch, you don't have any afternoon snacks, and then you have dinner. So this concept of these structured meals, you know, at breakfast, lunch, and dinner don't really make sense because we don't need to

eat more at that meal. So some people are really still stuck on having that bigger meal. What you might find is you need more for snack time. So that's why you got to ask those four questions and less for lunch, right? So if you keep not being hungry all day, it could be because you're eating these bigger meals at mealtime, which is way more than you actually need, right? So if you get satisfied on a snack, you would also get satisfied on a snack-sized lunch if you weren't hungry for that. And then you might have a large lunch and not be hungry for it at all, eat a few token bites and need a larger snack. So it's just about getting in tune

to those portions in the moment. So to Kim's point, asking those four questions is really important with this tweak this week. Yeah, and I think part of that too is making sure that you're not stuck in the idea that I think a lot of people have preset notions of what their portions are, not just for in general,

but for each meal and to your point for each snack. So there are going to be days when that's going to shift, but it's hard to anticipate that. You need to be prepared for anything. And that's where the food waste issues come up because people that go to work, they have to pack their lunch ahead of time. You don't want to end up having people have said they've done in the past is making sure that they bring something that isn't going to sort of be ruined. If they know that they have in their head, I don't like leftovers, I don't want to. Make yourself like a snack like lunch that includes all of the vegetables that you need, has some healthy fats. But maybe it's more of like a bento box style where you're having different things and you can pack it up and that lunch is going to be exactly

the same and just as edible the next day at lunch. Or you can take your vegetables and your healthy fats out and have them for your veg snack after if you didn't finish them for lunch. You need to sort of be a little more mindful when you're putting things together for your meals and keep in mind what it is, like what does hold you back from this. If it is the food waste issues, there are ways around that and figure out what works for you, what kind of compromise you can make in your mind about wasting that food. Because the bottom line is once you've prepared it, the grocery store is not going to take it back. The restaurant will not take it back once you've started eating it. So you're not saving any money

by putting it in your body versus just leaving it behind. Yeah, that packing, it is tough, but think about bigger picture of this, right? Because this is more than just downsizing right now and getting used to leaving food on your plate. This is for once you've lost the weight and you go to a restaurant and you literally are satisfied on your food and you can't eat anymore. Getting used to leaving that food on your plate and seeing that on your plate and packing it up.

And like, I still take, I don't care if it spoils the next day or whatever, I will take anything home because in my mind, I feel like I paid for that. So I'm going to take it home. Sometimes I eat it. Sometimes I don't, but I still take it because that is a bit like I paid for that. So I'm going to take it home. Sometimes I eat it. Sometimes I don't, but I still take it because that is a bit of an issue for me, right? So I still, I still, I bring it home every time. I bring it home every time. So do what you need to do for today, but this is all how it's going to factor in later on, right? Because you can't just go back to just eating everything on your plate mindlessly. Part of being able to maintain and sustain your weight is being in tune to your body's needs and getting used to that.

You will become a person. How can you just eat one bite of a donut and be fine? You will buy a chocolate bar and maybe have a few pieces and then pop the rest in the freezer for another day. I have a chocolate bar right now sitting in my dresser that is like, I just took a little piece off of it the other day. I haven't eaten the whole thing. I'm not tortured by it sitting on my bedside table. I had a little piece. It was dark

chocolate. I enjoyed it. That's it. That's where you want to get to. You want to get to that calm place. And this is starting to do the work to get to that calm complex. I do want to, someone was talking about how when they were downsizing, they were leaving, I think, vegetables or whatever it was on their plate, let's say for lunch. And this is a really interesting thing when we start to get into what foods you're eating, what you're leaving on your plate. So we still want to prepare our meals with the star of the meal right now. But don't overthink what you're leaving on your plate. Like I want you to be so in tune. You're instinctually just eating what feels best for you. Sometimes it'll be the leafy greens you'll want more of. Other days it will like for me, Tony always saves his best tasting bite for last. He also is, I know he's probably aware now,

he also clears his plate every time. So his focus since the day I met him was saving the best bites taste-wise for last. It's always his last bite, which means no matter what he's eating, he eats everything on his plate, right? Because my son mentioned this the other day to him, oh, you're not eating this or I'm leaving. He left a bit on his plate and I said, are you done? He's like, no, I'm just leaving this. I want, I'm eating this last piece. He saved the protein. And then we had a conversation about Tony. And so I want you to be more intuitive. For me, I just leave whatever I'm not interested in eating that day. So I will go for the, whatever's most appealing. Sometimes it'll be protein. Sometimes it'll be the leafy greens. Sometimes it's the veg. Like it's what I leave on my plate changes every day. So I'm not

worried about getting enough protein in because when I've had enough, I've had enough. Right. So you don't want to overthink what you're leaving on your plate. You want it to be more instinctual than that. Just kind of eat whatever you feel is appealing, especially if you're putting your meals together with nutrient rich food. So I just wanted to get that point in there. Yeah. Yeah. I think another question, just one more that I want to touch on is the bonus snacks because people are feeling like they're exceptionally hungry after this at times and letting the and whether or not to have them. I think, you know, the big point with that is if you've been needing them up until now, because you've got, you know, working shift work up for longer hours and you

need to stretch it out. We had someone comment, a nursing mom who has had to incorporate them because of nursing. So her days are longer, she's feeding a baby. If you've been using them up until now, then of course you want to still use them, but you don't want to be using them because you're hungry, because you really want to be in tune, uh, to how you are feeling after you've downsized those meals and really have your body adjust to what you're doing this week. Perfect. Cause you are going to be hungry, but your body will adjust. But if you don't allow it to adjust, it's not going to adjust. That's such a, that's so important. Yeah. It gets to a point where like, if you haven't been using bonus snacks, you probably

shouldn't be adding in bonus snacks. I mean, we don't want everyone to feel, and if you feel like you're starved or deprived, obviously maybe you've downsized too much. That's like getting back to those four questions, but yeah, you are going to feel hungry. Your body will adjust. But if you just keep feeding it and adding in bonus snacks, you're, you're kind of, you're not allowing it to ingest you. There's nothing wrong with feeling hungry. It's not an immediate sign for food, right? Like it's once your body starts to process and digest and store that food, all of a sudden you're not, you're not going to be hungry anymore as long as you give it time. And then by the time you do that, the next Miller snack is coming down the pipeline. That's such a great point. I do want to talk about next week because next week we are

going to bring it back to satisfaction. So now we're not downsizing again. However, you will notice that your portions are naturally smaller. So it's not, it's not, we're not going back to satisfaction. We're taking what we've learned and how in tune we are now, but the goal will be eating to satisfaction again. So next week is all about leveling up, really busting out the maximizing stuff we can do, really being in tune and asking those four questions and eating to satisfaction. It's interesting because next week people will say, how come I'm losing this week when I didn't lose any last week? Every week is all about losing weight. But if you didn't lose weight during downsizing, maybe because you had lost weight before and your body just needed time, then it would make sense that you're going to lose even when

eating dissatisfaction. We're always, just by following the basic food plan, you are already doing so much to get and keep that scale moving. These tweaks are just to help that progress. But we always get asked that. They're like, how come my weight's moving this week and it didn't move last week? Well, I don't know why it didn't move last week, but weight loss is based on momentum. So it's what you did last week that's causing it to move this week. So there are people who are like, well, I'm downsizing. It's not working for me, but then you'll, you'll lose weight next week. So it was working for you. It just took a while for that to translate on the scale. Yeah. And I think a big question that we get specifically from newer members, but probably from some returning to is the concern about gaining weight

now that we're going back to eating more. And I'm going to use that in quotes that more, because to your point, you're not necessarily going to be eating more next week where the more fits in is you are, you should be more in tune with how much you need next week. And that satisfaction is going to feel differently off the heels of downsizing. It's also going to look differently when it comes to portion sizes, still changing from day to day meal to meal, you want to be in tune. But the whole, the main point of this first downsizing week, you know, in addition to getting your body's attention is actually getting your attention and bringing your attention to that awareness and that

mind body connection and that mindfulness and really digging into that, you know, how you feel while you're eating. How would I feel if I had a few more bites? And some of you were discovering this week that that feeling you had when you had a few more bites was actually full and not satisfied. So this week we're doubling down on those four questions. So that next week, your satisfaction that you're feeling is like a whole different level of feeling it and being aware of it. Yep. Love that. And if you feel like you're fucking up the whole week, you'll have another opportunity to downsize again the week after next week. So it's a chipping away, chipping away, chipping away. So yeah, next week we're not going back. You're taking what you've learned and where you are at in terms of being in tune to those

portions. So you're not eating more. Chances are you won't be eating more. You'll end up eating the same size portions that you did towards the end of the week of downsizing. So hopefully this answered some of the questions that you have, helped to understand it on a deeper level. I mean, that is the goal of the tweak this week

is to talk more in depth about the tweak each week, the rhyme and the reason behind it and answer some of your more frequently asked questions. Thanks for everyone who's joined us today. Don't forget to ask as many questions as you need in the group to be so super clear. Our team has been here before. They've downsized themselves.

So they have lots of tips to share. So make sure you reach out. Kim, as always, thank you for joining me today. I'm already looking forward to our conversation next week. Have a great rest of the day, everyone. And we'll see you again next time. Thanks.