The Livy Method Podcast - You Changed Your Body. Did You Change Your Mind? w/ Dr. Beverley David

Episode Date: May 7, 2026

In this special Maintenance & Mindfulness episode, Odette and Clinical Psychologist Dr. Beverley David explore the mental shift that comes with moving from weight loss into maintenance, and why maintaining weight can feel just as challenging as losing it. They unpack food noise, identity changes, body image, and the emotional side of sustainable weight loss, while sharing practical insights on letting go of old diet mentalities and building trust in yourself and your body. If you’ve ever wondered how to stop obsessing over the scale, navigate mindset changes after weight loss, or create lasting healthy habits without falling back into dieting patterns, this one is for you.Dr. Beverley is a Clinical Psychologist registered with the College of Psychologists of Ontario. She also holds a Ph.D. in Sleep Research (Insomnia) and a Master's in Health Psychology.Find Dr. Beverley:https://www.yourpsychologycentre.ca/@drdrbeverleyYou can find the full video hosted at:https://www.facebook.com/groups/ginalivymaintenanceandmindfulnessTo 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 wangery here because we're trying to make real change and change is hard. But we're in this together. Welcome to the Living Method podcast.

Dr. Beverly is in the house and we always love when you're here. Whether it's here in the weight loss group, I know all of our men. members love to see your face, love to hear your voice and love to hear what you have to say. And I just want to say anybody that's new to maintenance or new to Dr. Beverly, Dr. Beverly has been with us for so long. She understands your journey. She knows who you are. And we're just so excited to have you here today.

Thank you. Thank you for having me on this very blue sunny day. Oh, my goodness. Have we not waiting for this day to come? I just don't know what to wear. It's like very British. I'm like I should, I have to wear layers. Something has to come up and something has to go back on.

Well, you're ahead of me. I have my pajamas on from the waist down. So let's be real. Very good. I may or may not have my lulus on from the waist down. There you go. There you go. So Dr. Rubberle.

We were just talking before this conversation about our members and maintenance and how they have so much going on in their minds. and, you know, they've accomplished so much with their weight loss journey, hitting these goals that they've set for themselves. And then they come to maintenance and we're like, surprise, the work's not done. Here we go again. And you just wanted to be smooth sailing. We just want it to be easy.

And we come to realize that this is a shift. It's a shift in the way they have to think about their goals. You know, what is their goal now? What is their why now? It's their shift. and mindset that they have to release what they believed before was part of their reward system. They have to release what they believed for about that diet dialogue, that losing and gaining does not have to be part of their new story, part of their new identity. And it's a lot.

It's a lot for them. And so they come with their questions and they come with their curiosity. And they come with their challenges as well. So I really just wanted to get into that. Our members knew you were coming today. Our members were excited that you were coming today. So I hope you're excited to be here. And I hope that you're just going to give us all something very profound to think about. No pressure. No pressure.

Well, yes. And they have brought some questions, haven't they? And you wanted to share a very good question that sort of dug into that. Exactly. Do you want to read, do you want to just read the question? Yes, I'm going to read. Jody's going to bring it up. It came in last night in the evening from Kim. So Kim, she's a very vocal member here in our group. She's been with us doing the work. And just

to preface this a little bit. So another Kim, Kim from the weight loss group, weight loss group manager, joined me on midweek motivation yesterday, which is this live segment we have, just to get us over that hump day. And she joined us. We were talking about how we have changed. Our bodies have changed. Our ages have changed. Our needs have changed. And we have to to let go of what we always did before and what we come to believe is going to work for us now. So I'm going to read this question from the member Kim, not weight loss group manager, Kim. So she said, what do you think is the key mindset shift in maintenance around food and food noise that can help us move away from our shorter term weight loss goals to long term maintenance goals?

For example, as Kim, weight loss group manager Kim talked about in the midweek motivation conversation in yesterday. I've also changed my workout routine from a cardio focused one where I ran a lot to a more weight training and less high impact cardio because I have changed. But when it comes to food, though, I find it more challenging to get out of that diet mindset and into a maintenance mindset, where it's not about the number on the scale going down. It's a gray area that I still struggle with and would appreciate any insights. What a very good question. question. Okay, so I'm going to keep it up in front of me so that I can get it. But how would I unpack that? Yeah, and let's just break it. Let's just break it down, you know, like, I know,

break it down. It's a heavy question. And that's exactly it. That's exactly what I do. As a psychologist, I start breaking it down. And even when you were giving the introduction to think we have changed, If I was going to be speaking to your members, I might tell them, I draw it. You know, we have changed or I have changed right in the middle of your piece of paper. And then let's start thinking how, you know, because everybody's change will be different. So you said maybe our body has changed. Maybe our age has changed. Maybe our circumstances have changed.

Perhaps we're looking after our parents. Perhaps we're empty nest. us, maybe we find ourselves single or comfortable. How have we changed and have it on a piece of paper so that we know it? You know, we have these fancy little like Facebook reminders, don't we, the then and then and now photographs. And that's often when we're like, wow, look at how much has changed. Maybe it's not just the length of our hair.

Maybe it's not just the backdrop that's behind us, but unpack that and think, okay, what has, and maybe we do write, okay, inevitably our age has changed. How has our body changed? How have our needs changed? How is my timetable around the day you change? You know, are we commuting? Are we working from home? Are we doing both?

And get to know who you are because sometimes we get very hyper-focused because that's often why we're here on we've only been concentrating on the weight and the diet story or what we're eating, when we're eating, how we're eating. And we want to think, do I know me? Do I know my interests, my hobbies, the season of my life, my age and my stage? And start to focus on that to begin with, because that's going to already invite you to be thinking slightly differently about why are you here and what are you doing. then your next sentence included, how do we let go?

How do we let go of things that maybe don't serve us or we don't want anymore? And maybe it's not about letting go. It's about leading into the new because sometimes it's like really hard to just let go of things that we have held so tightly along the way. may have, we may have believed, worked, all that armour, all of those thoughts and those schemes. So it's, it's hard just to let it go. So that would maybe be that opportunity to those three ends, like name it, think, oh, I'm still in that maybe old mindset, or there's still a hangover or a shadow of how I thought, how I behaved, how I felt. Now normalize it,

the second end, think of course, I've been doing that for so long, it's going to take time to extinguish and unlearn and practice and rewire. And then the third end, navigate, navigate how you want to be. And that might be when we go back to the eye have changed. And then I think, okay, so here I am on the piece of paper, and I'm going to keep changing. Now maybe I want to turn over the page and think, how do I want to be? And sometimes to know what we want to be, we want to remember what we were. So we might think, okay, what did weight loss mean to me or what did healthy mean to me? Because just like you were introducing, it may have been the weighing scale. It may have been monitoring. It may have been a particular target. It might have been a

particular feeling of novelty or structure. So if somebody starts to realize, okay, that's what it meant. Training for this thing, whether it's training for weight loss or training for that race or training for that exam, what did that look like? Because now we want to see how were we moving around the world and our day that we might want to start to tweak into the maintenance. Because as a lot of people know, I'm a master swimmer. When I talk to my friends at the club, some of them are 20 years, my senior, phenomenal swimmers. But now we're talking more.

And lovely Mike who is there. He's 20 years older than me. He's like, now I know my times are not going to get faster. I'm at the age that they're not going to get faster. The new people joining our group, the younger people or the people that are learning to become good swimmers probably still are going to. to see some personal bests in the next few meets. But for the maintenance bit, how do we start to accept that our times aren't going to improve? And if we parallel that to wait, how are we

going to start to understand our weight isn't going to keep on going down? Because that's not healthy. And my times in the pool are unlikely going to significantly go down. But how do I stay in it? Why am I there now if it's not about the dopamine and the reward and that feedback of I'm doing I'm doing well? What are the intrinsic rewards that I'm noticing? So that would be then where you then compare perhaps what weight loss meant to you on this piece of paper, you know, measuring, monitoring, structuring to trusting that you now know, you know what you do, you know how to eat, you know how to fuel, you know how to move, and to now start thinking, why else am I here?

And Kim beautifully talked about changing and changing her exercise. Now, how has she done that? I want people to think, okay, the version of me that needed dot, dot, dot, and maybe she would have written the version of me that needed all that cardio, dot, dot, dot, dot, is not the version of me, I want to be long term. Because long term, what do I want to be and what do I need? Long term, we need a strong body. We need things to support our hormones, our strength, our mood, our energy, our longevity, our quality of life.

Now, if I keep swimming, I know I'm tending to my strength. my mood, my energy, my longevity, my quality of life. And if you stay in maintenance and stay looking after your body, you're going to win. You're going to win all of those intrinsic rewards that allow you to then go on to have the quality of life. Because that old way is going to be sneaky. So we've got to think, how am I adjusting, how am I recalibrating, and how am I on the lookout for that bit of brain that says, okay, that diet mindset might have said, this is good, that is bad, you know, that quick,

good, bad or on off, or I'm earning this or I'm burning this, I'm successful or I'm failure. Okay, because it's all or nothing's often. And we want to, and it always comes back to the T, the trust, we want to be trusting, we know what to do. Okay. And it's not being perfect because that isn't real life. If I miss a swim, I know that I have enough in the bank. You know, I know that I'm going to be swimming tonight. I know I'm going to be swimming on Sunday. So it's about trusting that you know how to move around this new vehicle of yours. But I think it requires maybe some work to put it on the paper, to think, okay, how have I changed? And maybe now, how do I want to be? You know, maybe it's calm around food.

I want to have a quiet knowing, a quiet trust around it. And I want to start being that person that knows that food is important. Rest is a priority. Calm is essential. All of those good bits for our body. And then maybe we map that out to think, what version of me would be doing? that. Well, all of that was profound, but I'm going to go back to what you said near the beginning about letting go. And you said, you know, maybe don't focus on letting everything go.

Something like that. Like, we're so focused on. I have to let that go. I have to let that go. I have to let that go. And you get stuck there rather than, no, what is coming? What is ahead? What can I lean into? And then, you know, I think if we keep thinking like, I have to let it go, then that becomes a spot. That becomes a spot that feels uncomfortable and scary even. Well, I know that. I know that. I don't want to let go of that part. So maybe that part will be kind of hanging around a little bit. But if we're looking forward, thinking about that version of who I want to be, that what do I want to see ahead of me? How do I navigate getting there? And like you said about your swimming, you're not going to stop swimming because your numbers aren't improving. You're going to keep swimming because your body is

going to continue to stay strong. You're going to continue to do something that you love. I mean, don't we love feeling good and knowing that we're hydrated and we're doing good for our body? Like you're swimming, I'm getting in the pool. I enjoy it. I'm doing something good for myself. You're not going to stop just because your number's not improving week after week, day, after day. You're going to keep being there. And I think that, you know, and then we talk about that version of ourselves. How do we become that version of ourselves? Or how do we even see that version of ourselves when we've never seen it before. I think that's the part that our members in maintenance can struggle with too. How can I see that identity or see myself as that person when I've

never seen it before? I don't have that history. I don't have that experience. My history and experience is losing gaining, losing gaining. It's this cycle. It's this diet dialogue of you've seen the before, you've seen the after now go figure it out on your own. How do we trust that that version of ourselves can be real, that we can become that person, we continue to live as this person that we have created at this point? I think that's really very smart of you to ask us

because the power of our own messaging to ourselves, like what we believe we then see, because our brain trusts our thoughts, and we all know our thoughts can be very sneaky and tell us all sorts of things. So we must try our very best to script our thoughts, to think I can, I am, I'm doing instead of I'm less than I'm not, I can't, I won't, I'll never, you know, so we've got to notice where our thoughts lead us

because then our brain very smartly looks for the evidence and says, I knew it, there it is, there's more evidence. And if we put out negative thoughts, we're always going to find them. There's always going to be enough things in the day that confirm our worst version of our beliefs. So it's very important to intentionally start to be positive, to be thinking, how am I going to seize the day? Because probably, and I hope that when people do the exercise of I have changed, maybe you've already noticed that your thoughts are changing or when you look back at how you used to

act and feel and think when you were in a very very diet sort of routine or place what were your thoughts then now I want you to think okay how can I set myself up for success what would the person I'm becoming do next I wonder if people remember me talking about my coach who's an Olympian. She, since she was little, somehow it was just in her. She always thought to herself, how would an Olympic athlete behave? What would an Olympic athlete do next? And so she was visualising it.

She was being that and she was acting that. How would somebody that was an athlete act and move through the world? So ask yourself, what would the person I'm becoming do next? what evidence already exists that I am changing. So Kim can say, wow, look at this. I'm already adjusting my workouts. Now, for lots of us, that can be really hard. It can be really hard adjusting that thing that we've come to trust,

you know, like the cramming exam studying. We find it very hard to change it because it gave us success. It worked. So when we say, actually, go to bed, you know, study. sleep, you know, actually have a break, move your body and then come back to the books. That can be very hard to ask people to change the way that they think that they need to do things because we like to control things, the way we mow the lawn, the way we fill the dishwasher, we like an element of control.

So look at where you've already started to change. And you might have thought, wow, I never thought I would. I actually never thought I would believe that I could take a break or I never knew that I could have a weekend away and all would be well. I never knew I could have that night out and I'd be all right at the weekend. So notice where you already have collected data so that then you can think it is happening and now I've noticed that this can happen. I'm going to allow it to cascade into other elements of my life. If I can adjust my workout, I can adjust my mindset. I can adjust the way I move through the supermarket or prepare

my food or, you know, move through the day. And then ask yourself those long term alignment questions. What choices today align with the life I want long term? And again, that's a little bit like Kim spoke about in the gym. She's strengthening her body so that her body lasts longer. And I want us to be thinking that when we eat, when we fluid, hydrate, when we're choosing our behaviours during the day, do they align with you wanting to be here long term? And that still means having fun. Because again, the old version, that old version of our brain might have said, oh, you can't. But we can. Because everything just works itself out when our body trusts us, when our mind trust us, when our mind interest us when we know what we're doing.

So we want to be thinking, how have I changed? How can I optimize on that and start noticing, are you eating differently? Are you avoiding guilt and that punishment that often has become associated with old ways of dieting? Are you restricting? Are you doing things? are you noticing the numbers and then suddenly feeling bad about yourself and then think actually I want to address that and that would be those Cs. Catch it, cancel it, correct. Okay, that's,

that's the old chatter. Of course it's there. Look at it with kindness. So we're actually thinking, would I say that to a friend? Is this even true? Is it 100% true? 100% of the time. Try and try and give yourself a little bit of a debate with it. And then can you correct it somehow? Can you be kinder to it and think next time this comes up, I'm going to be quicker to find the alternative belief and thought and the facts. We want to be able to think that there's facts and then there's interpretation. You know, what is actually happening versus what do we sometimes think that is happening that isn't? And remember those. long term, I am strong, I am vital, I am energized, I seek quality of life, I deserve quality

of life. I love what you said there about the data collection because we say that to our members already. We're collecting data here. These are learning opportunities. You don't have experience in history to fall back on. So you are collecting this data each day. when you say, what would an athlete do? You know, well, what have I done?

Where's my data? What have I already done to this point? Of course, that is my example. What would they do? What's their mindset? How do they take action? And then bringing it back to our own collection of data. Well, I've done this.

Check. I can do this. Check. These are the learning opportunities that we want to pick up. I think sometimes we are looking forward, looking ahead so far. You know, I want to get there. I want to be that person. I want to do this.

I want to make these choices. But let's look at what we've collected so far. Let's look at how we have. Like, to your point, how have we changed so far? How have I gotten here? What have I already accomplished? And when you think of what would an athlete do, what would I do next? Because I've already done so much already.

You know, put yourself into that place as well. Look at this collection of this, everything that you've learned, everything that you've accomplished, there's all this goodness that's there that often we don't take the time to see. And that's part of that data collection that's going to help you move forward. I think that's so important piece. It's really tricky because people might, we might think that there'll be no noise, that it will be quiet. Oh, man.

And the thing is, our brain is always going to be talking to us. And it's always going to be busy. And we just want to notice if it's just changed the channel a little bit, instead of if the noise was very self-deprecating and very harming and very mean and very negative, I want the noise to be very inspiring and uplifting and encouraging. Because we do want our brain to be on our side to say, choose that thing that's good for you. Choose to meet your friends and go for the walk.

choose to sign up for that thing that you are on the fence about. And so your brain is going to keep talking to you. So also we want to make sure our members don't expect it to go quiet because choices are going to still have to happen. Am I turning left or am I turning right? Am I going straight over? It's going to be there for what am I going to eat? When am I going to eat?

Am I going to move? Am I going out? Am I mowing the lawn today or tomorrow? That's what our brain is going to do. But hopefully you've noticed that the DJ is positive and you can and you get to. And all of the positive endings of sentences, even if you don't know how to do something yet, you add the yet. You know, I'm not there yet, but it's going to still be there. The power of yet.

I know I heard this somewhere else, that power of yet, just putting that one small word at the end of a sentence. It's so powerful. It's not that hard stop. I haven't done it. Hard stop. No, I haven't done it yet. I don't believe it. I don't believe it yet. I think that's such an incredible powerful word, three-letter word. I mean, we like a good, our brain is listening. Right. We like a good F word around here, but we also, I think that might be our new favorite word yet. I think that's such, it's so profound. And I think it's just a matter of, you know, we don't have to have it all figured out right away. You know, we know our brain is going to keep talking to us. We know that we have to unlearn what we've learned.

We've got this reprogramming, but we've got this capture, cancel, correct, to help us. We've got this data collection that's going to help us, you know, really believe what we want to believe and see ourselves as that person. We can see ourselves as who, how would that person react? How would I react? What would I do? I think that's there, there's so much there for our members. There's comfort in knowing that they don't have to have it all figured out yet. That we're going to be able to get there.

We will get there through data collection, through these affirmations of I can, I am, I am doing. I think there's so much here that we can. And be with people that are like-minded. You know, the power of being with that energy, it makes it easier. It makes it easier. And it makes it valid and real, I think, too. talk about community so much that, you know, what you're feeling, somebody else might be feeling and might not want to say it or you're with like-minded people here. None of us have it figured out.

Yeah. None of us have it. Yeah. It's true that power of community and you have this group and I know you have groups to these community groups of people that are coming together and learning and collecting data. So maybe on that note actually, we'll go into what do you have coming up? I know you've got a few things happening in the next few weeks. Yes, I wrote it down because I couldn't remember. So May the 18th, that's not far away. The next sleep group is going to start the next insomnia groups of the cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia.

That's an evening group, May the 18th. And then my next catch it, cancel it, correct it, lunchtime group. That starts on the 29th of May and that will be a lunchtime for. four weeks. And lovely Jody put up the information on the screen there, but you can find it on my website and you can go to the basket and you can read more about it there and join in, if you like. And for the most part, people get it reimbursed if they have insurance for psychological services. So for most of you, hopefully it'll be covered. Yeah. And you know, this insomnia group starting on May 18th, I mean, we're just coming into this big seasonal

change coming off in Canada here our first long weekend. I mean, routines are changing. Things are changing. Your body would feel like change is the topic today. Everything's changing. To be able to really hone in on your sleep and figure out what's going on, I think is super powerful. And for, yeah, cat, what is it? Cap shirt. Cats shirt. Catch it cancel it. Correct. I've said it enough times. Do you think it would just roll off my tongue, but it didn't. Yeah, it's so important to like when you, when those thoughts are in your mind and you're just trying to navigate them, one of your ends trying to navigate. I mean, this can be such an effective and important tool to be around people that are with you.

So Dr. Beverly, people can find you on Instagram at Dr. Dr. Beverly. They can find you on your website, your psychology center.ca. I mean, and they can find you here. I mean, you live on forever on our podcast. You live on forever. You live on forever in our group, saved in our guides. So I just want to thank you for coming on again. I mean, I hope we can talk again.

We will. We have so much to say. We have so much to work through. We have so much data to collect. That's it. We're not done. Yeah. So thank you again for being here.

I love having you here. I love watching you in the weight loss group as well. Always awesome. Thank you. Some great takeaways. And we'll see you soon. Thank you for having me. Bye.

Bye-bye.