The School of Greatness - 125 Master Your Health and Become 20 Pounds Younger with Michele Promaulayko

Episode Date: January 14, 2015

"All the same things that affect your waistline also affect your appearance." - Michele Promaulayko If you enjoyed this episode, find show notes and more at www.lewishowes.com/125.

This is episode number 125 with Michelle Pramaleco. Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur. And each week we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin. What's up, everyone?

Thanks so much for joining me today. And this episode is brought to you by Onnit.com. If you're looking to take your health and your life to the next level, make sure to check out Onnit.com and you get 10% off when you use the checkout code greatness on all supplements. Check it out over at Onnit.com. Thanks everyone for joining me today. Very excited about this one.

It's with my good friend, Michelle Pramaleco. And for those that do not know Michelle, she is a extremely intelligent, wise, loving individual and is the editor-in-chief of Yahoo Health and former vice president and editor-in-chief of Women's Health Magazine, which is an award-winning magazine. And as a dedicated health journalist, she empowers women to live their best lives by bringing them the latest information and advice in all areas of wellness, fitness, and nutrition. And I got to sit down with Michelle today and talk about how to really live 20 pounds younger. And that's the title of her new book, The Life Transformation Plan for a Fitter, Sexier you. And she is basically just like me in a way where she

has access to the most intelligent fitness and health and lifestyle minds and experts in the world. And she's connected with them, broken down their systems, learned all the tricks of the trade to figure out really how to live your best life and have the best health you can have. She is a expert at this and has been doing it for a number of years and has been testing things herself. And we got to dive into this on our conversation today. And I'm very excited to bring you her message, her gifts, and her wisdom in this episode. So without further ado, let me introduce you to the one and only Michelle Pramaleco.

All right. Welcome back to the School of Greatness podcast. I'm with my friend, Michelle Pramaleco. Good to see you. Good to see you. I'm very excited. We met four years ago at the place where I have these boots right now, Summit Series. Exactly. On a ship on the way to Bahamas? Tahoe. Oh, it's Tahoe. I thought we met on the ship. No. No?

Oh, man. They wouldn't have given you those on a ship. That's right. The year after that. I'm getting them all mixed up. Okay. We met in Tahoe. Right. At an incredible event. Incredible event. There was no snow on the mountain, so we couldn't go snowboarding. We had to just go to sessions and hang out and talk to people. That's it.

Which turned out to be way more awesome. But you were one of the most interesting people I met there and someone that I was like, I need to follow up with consistently. And I've been following up with you ever since. That's a huge compliment. Thank you. It's a lot of inspiring people there, but something about your energy is so, it just, it's like so grounded. Oh, thank you. And I don't know where that comes from, but I don't know either, but it's, it's so like, it's just enjoyable to be around you. And so I'm so glad we get to spend some time together. Thank you. And talk about everything that you've been up to, but also your new book, which is called 20 Pounds Younger.

Not 20 Pounds Lighter, but 20 Pounds Younger. Right. There's a little twist there. So why this book? You're former editor-in-chief of Women's Health Magazine. Right. Before that, you worked at Cosmo, right? I was the executive editor of Cosmo for eight or nine years before I made the leap to women's

health. So yeah, but health and fitness has always been a deep passion of mine. So when I had the opportunity to go to women's health, I grabbed it. And by the way, I just want to say I'm a podcast virgin, so you need to be gentle with me. I will touch you lightly. See, you can take the girl out of Cosmo, but you can't take the Cosmo out of the girl. Exactly. Now, why are you so passionate about fitness and health? Yeah. So, well, one of the reasons that I wanted to do 20 pounds younger is that as I entered my 40s, I wasn't, you know, I wasn't going to give into that supposed inevitability of, you know, being less fit, less healthy, less energetic. I mean, you hear people say all the time, oh, my metabolism slowed down or this happened

or that happened. And I was like, that's not going to happen. It doesn't have to happen. Certainly you go through changes, but they don't have to, you know, impact you in such dramatic ways. So I wanted to explore you know what are the tenants of health that can keep me feeling good hopefully looking good and share those hmm now how long you've been in the city for almost

20 years 20 years you do not look like you're in your 40s but living in the city for that thank you for that thank that. Thank you for that. So whatever is, you know, for people that can't see you, make sure to get this book because it's working. Oh, thank you, Lewis. You know, the thing is I feel fortunate that as a health editor I've been able to access the greatest minds in fitness, nutrition, mental health, you know, sleep experts. So I think of myself in many ways as a conduit, you know, to these experts to share that exposure that I've been able to have because I've benefited professionally, certainly, but personally as well.

So I feel like we're basically the same person because I do the same thing on the School of Greatness. I try to bring the brightest minds in sports and business and doctors. So you have a lot of information to share with people. And I want to talk about first is why 20 pounds younger, though? Like, why not 20 pounds lighter? Right. Exactly. Well, because.

It's catchy. It's catchy as a marketer. You know that. For a couple of reasons. I mean, 20, that target number happens to be what most Americans target as their weight loss goal. But all the same things that affect your waistline also affect your appearance. So your level of stress, you know, what you eat, your level of physical activity, all of those things age you both outwardly and inwardly. And when you lose 20 pounds,

and not everybody obviously needs to lose 20. Some people need to lose more, some less. But when you lose 20 pounds, that's a critical benchmark at which things improve dramatically. In the way you look, in the way that you look, in your energy level, in just a bunch of health metrics, cardiovascularly, and other things. And so 20 seems to be this pivotal number. Gotcha. You basically become younger when you lose weight. Right. So you can, as one of my friends says, grow younger. And as I say in the book. I like it. Yeah. We're all about trying to grow younger. I like it. I interviewed Dr. Daniel

Amen. I don't know if you're familiar with him, but he's a brain researcher, a brain expert. And he says that the heavier you are, the smaller your brain becomes. Absolutely. And therefore it takes, you know, time off of your life. So the lighter you are, the bigger your brain is, the more mental capacity you have. Totally. Well, you just, energy, right? Yeah. You've just hit on one of the things that I would say as a health editor, I've been most fascinated with, which is the relationship between cognition and nutrition. And it is so linked. And I think, you know, more and more science is coming out about that.

It's like what you eat doesn't just affect your gene size. It affects your brain size. I mean, that's powerful. I mean, if you don't care, you know, if you're not vain enough to care how you look, you know, in clothes, okay. But you should definitely care about how your brain operates. Yeah. Interesting. Now, what about restrictive diets?

Because I am a huge fan of sugar. I love sugar. Okay. We're going to turn that around. It's my vice. I don't drink. I don't smoke. I've never been drunk.

I know. You have so few vices. I've never been drunk in my life. You have so few vices. It's true. It's true. And, you know, I'm not perfect. That's for sure. I've never been drunk. I know. You have so few vices. I've never been drunk in my life. You have so few vices. It's true. It's true. And I'm not perfect. That's for sure.

I mean I'm not like the perfect person. But sugar is one of the things that is just like – So restrictive diets don't work, OK? It's human nature. The second you tell somebody they can't have something, they want that thing, that exact thing. Yes. So I'm not a big proponent of restrictive diets. And for me, I think like you, I enjoy food, period. I call myself a hungry girl. I like to

eat. I live in New York. I like to go out to dinner. And so for me to have, you know, every meal meticulously mapped out, counting it, it's just not going to work. So what I wanted to do in 20 Pounds Younger was explore other ways to maintain weight or to lose weight if you need to. So there's a couple of things. One is called flexible restraint. And flexible restraint is really about focusing on the foods that you like rather than avoiding the foods you like. Focusing on the foods that you like rather than avoiding the foods you like, right?using on the foods that you like rather than avoiding the foods you like, right? So like focusing on the amount that you can have of those foods that you like or the time frame? Spending more time thinking about the good for you foods rather than thinking about,

oh, I like that thing, but I have to avoid it. Right, right, right. So flexible, yeah, flexible restraint is just saying, I don't eat, you know, I don't eat potato chips, not I can't eat potato chips. The second you say I can't, yeah, it's a choice. It's an empowering phrase. So it's empowerment versus deprivation. Gotcha. I mean, I'm a big fan of Dante, Cafe Dante in Greenwich Village. They have the best gelato in the world. Okay. Every time I come to New York. I do like gelato too. Oh my God. You have to go to Capedante. It's amazing.

And whenever I go there, I get two scoops of gelato. I get Stracciatella and Tiramisu. And then I always ask for a second round because it's amazing. So for someone like me

who loves gelato, what do I tell myself? Okay. I choose not to eat this gelato right now and choose to eat... No, it's not even that because what you just described to me, maybe save for the second helping, but what you first described to me was a conscious indulgence. Okay.

You made a decision. I really enjoy this. I'm not going to feel guilty about it. I'm going to just savor it. That right there makes a huge difference, your approach. So it's what's a mindful approach. So a lot of what's in 20 Pounds Younger is all about mindful eating. And when people hear the term mindful eating or just mindful anything, mindfulness as applied to anything, they immediately think, what is this? Is this some, like, do I have to be some mantra spewing yogi to adhere to any mindful

practices? And it's no, because mindfulness is really just raising awareness and attention about experiences. And it's about, you know, decision making and considered thought and not letting a thought, you know, have control over you and not placing judgments on that. So back to your gelato example. If you, you know, enjoy that, then you should have it. Because the second that you judge yourself for having it, that's when it has power over you. And that's when you enter that, you get on that slippery slope. Because you start feeling guilty.

You start beating yourself up. Totally. And the stress that we create in ourselves is probably worse than actually eating bad foods because the stress is what puts the weight on and what slows our metabolism, right? Absolutely. You just hit on such a key thing that I think is such an ignored concept when it comes to weight and to eating and nutrition and food and health is that you're your worst enemy. You can be your worst enemy. So when you, that's self-induced stress. Self-induced stress then causes you to, you know, it increases those cortisol levels,

right? What does that do? It triggers that hunger hormone that makes you then want to go seek bad for you foods or supposedly bad for you foods. And then you feel guilty about it, right? What are we creating? A vicious cycle. Negative viral loop.

Negative viral loop. Bad foods and then you're beating yourself up for eating it. So you eat more bad foods to feel better and you keep beating yourself up. Right, exactly. So dispensing with the judgment is the best thing that you can do. The other thing about mindful eating is that many of us can't tell when we're actually hungry because we're on this sort of autopilot. There are all these external and internal cues, right? An external cue would be like what are other people doing or how much food is on my plate.

If there's still food on my plate, I must still be hungry, right? Yeah, or I need to finish it. Right, right. But that's actually, that's mindless eating and not mindful eating. I've been a champion of mindless eating as a kid growing up. I mean, I would eat all the time, everything. Here's a tip for you to become a more mindful eater and a less mindless eater is leave something on your plate, right? Just as an experiment, leave something on your plate. Because if you do that,

over time, you start to realize that you don't need that empty or clean plate as the visual cue to tell you when you're hungry. You can actually tune into your body to be like, am I still hungry? And then also what I say in the book, put your food on display. So if you're eating a packaged food, take it out of the package. If it's in that package, you're going to just keep eating it until it's all gone. What do you mean? Like a box of cookies? Yeah, or cookies or chips or whatever it is.

I mean, it could be something. Put them out of the bag into a bowl. Eat what's in the bowl, not the whole bag because I'll finish it. Because then you're just, you know, it's just a hand-to-mouth thing. Yes. You know, and really appreciate your food. I mean, you don't have to sit there, like, closing your eyes and savoring every single bite. But if you spend the time to, you know, appreciate your food, you know, act like a food critic.

Like, if I were a food critic, what would I be saying about this right now? You'd be taking it very slowly, deliberately. Yeah. And in the beginning. Intentionally. Intentionally. And when in the beginning, when you're trying to eat more mindfully, it is a little bit of a slower practice. But with practice, you get better at it.

And then it becomes your default. You've got to form a new habit because I was, you know, as a kid, I was the youngest of four. So I was like just a scavenger of food on the plates, like just whatever I could get. If you didn't get it, there wasn't going to be anything there. Exactly. So we've got to really train ourselves differently, our eating habits. Well, you totally hit on something, which is just the conditioning that we go through. And that also applies to the foods that we like or dislike,

right? So I talk in the book about evolving your palate to like better for you foods, because the fact is what we're exposed to, what we eat most, what we ate as a kid is the stuff that we crave. And one of the things that I say in the book is if you think about kids in India, they're happy to eat spicy curries, whereas a kid here probably isn't going to do that or like it in the beginning because that's not what they've been exposed to. Sure. So we can adapt our palates and evolve our palates to like things that are better for us. And I think a great example is chocolate. Love chocolate.

So, right, chocolate's great. I love chocolate too. But I used to eat, you know, milk chocolate back in the day. Now it's dark chocolate. Now it's dark chocolate. So, right. Chocolate's great. I love chocolate too, but I used to eat, you know, milk chocolate back in the day. Now it's dark chocolate and I can now tolerate really dark chocolate and still it tastes sweet to me because over time I've exposed myself to that. And now the milk chocolate is too sweet and actually isn't enjoyable. You know, the same can be said for, you know, green drinks and things like that. And it's not an overnight process.

Yeah. But the fact is exposure will – is more apt to make you like something. Interesting. You know, when I was – when I moved to New York in 2010, I believe it was. I'm now in Los Angeles. But when I moved here originally, I was like 35 pounds heavier than I am now. Wow. And my sisters started calling me Fluis for Fat Louis.

Aw. Because I had a little belly and my face was like a little chipmunk face, chubby. Right. And I'm a tall guy, so I could like kind of wear it well, I guess. Yeah. But it started to bother me. Yeah. And a friend of mine, a buddy of mine, James Wedmore, started drinking green juice.

And he was like, this is the new thing in Los Angeles. You've got to try it. Like it's going to help you lose some weight. Check out this movie, Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead, this documentary. I don't know if you've heard of it. Yeah, definitely. And I watched this movie and I started like, I was like, all right, I'm going to get in this green juice thing. And I started drinking a green juice over in Union Square, a little juice spot over there every single day. And I have a few a day. And I lost 28 pounds in 28 days by eliminating all sugar, except I would have a little bit of natural sugar every day, but eliminating all junk food.

Right. And drinking green juice. And at first I did not like the green juice. Right. Who does? The first time they drank liquefied spinach. It was nasty. Right.

But now it's like I crave green juice every single day. Isn't that amazing? I just had it before I came here. Right. It's sort of – it's – you know, we are adaptive creatures because if we only, you know, historically chose to eat these three things and then those three things didn't become available, we would die of, you know, of hunger. So we have to adapt. We're able to adapt. We're incredibly adaptive.

And so that's just one of the ways that you can do it. So that's great. That's great to hear. You talk about in the book evolving your palate. Yeah. And I am probably one of the pickiest eaters you'll ever meet. Like literally there are so many foods that I won't even touch. If it's touching one of my foods, I cannot have the whole plate.

Well, that's a whole other thing. The food not touching thing is a whole other form of disordered eating. I've gotten a lot better. And actually, a chiropractor, a friend of mine, said that picky eating is actually a form of genius. And so I took that as a compliment. You ran with that one. I don't know if it's true or not, but I was like, I'll take it. Again, I think it's what we've been

talking about. It goes back to exposure. So what I would say to you is to have a broader array of things that you eat, you have to start eating a broader array of things. I know. I don't like it. You seem scared. I have like a five-year-old's palate. I know.

Now I feel like you've issued a challenge and I need to somehow – I'm getting better though. Like I don't need salads. Okay. I don't like – But if you eat green juice, at least you're getting your greens. Right?

Yeah. So I'm changing it up. I just don't like certain textures and smells. Like the salad dressings. Like I can't smell it. I don't know. I think those are – those sound like – I'm not a shrink. But those sound like –

Some other issues. Deeper issues sound like associations with something bad. It might be. We need to deprogram you. I think it's just because I grew up with eating chicken fingers and pizza and peanut butter sandwiches. That was it. I think that it all eventually comes back down to how does it make you feel, right? And you're going to do things that make you feel good. And I also think the eating well, it's a domino effect with everything else.

If you're sleeping, you can't just eat well and then, you know, if you're not sleeping well or not, you know, moving or not having positive thoughts. Like, we are systemic creatures. We are not a collection of isolated parts. We are all, you know, it's all interwoven. It's a lifestyle. It's not just eating. Yeah, all cylinders need to be firing.

If you're not getting sleep, your body is going to be, you know, 50 pounds older. Yeah. You know, or whatever. Exactly. And I talk a lot about that exact stuff in the book. So the goal was really to make it this, you know, plan of transformation because you need to sort of address all of these issues, not to make it sound arduous or labor intensive, because I'm also a huge believer in micro actions, you know, adding up to big benefits. What's a micro action? What do you mean? Just a small action, something small,

you know, a decision to go to bed 30 minutes earlier can have a huge impact on the way that you feel, look, you know, whether you work out the next morning, what you choose to eat for breakfast the next morning, it can have this, you know, this impact. So it's called microaction, you know, or small, just a small shift. Yeah. Okay. Can add up to a big benefit. I like that. So you've been in the health and fitness lifestyle business for how long? Well, I mean, professionally, you know, just about seven years, seven years. But before that, you know, I've been in the magazine industry for, you know, 20 years. And before I was a health editor, I certainly cared about that stuff. I wrote, I wrote about it and I obviously read about

it, but I didn't dedicate myself to it until, you know, seven years ago. But for the last seven years, you've seen a lot of different books come out, a lot of different experts, fitness, nutritionists, um, talk about different diets, different ways of eating and how to lose weight, feel better, you know, everything. Why are there so many different opinions when it comes to fitness and lifestyle and living a better life? Well, it's a great question. And I don't think that health and fitness is a one-size-fits-all proposition. And so clearly different things.

I mean, you have foundations, right, that apply to most people. But it's not a one-size-fits-all thing. So people, some people do well with intermittent fasting. Yeah. Have you ever done that? I'm not one of those people. I haven't done it. I mean, I've maybe, you know, dabbled in it like a tiny bit, but I haven't dedicated myself to trying it. You're like, I need to lose a couple pounds. Because again, back to the earlier quote, like I'm a hungry girl. So, you know, only eating in an eight hour window is probably not going to work. Yeah. My girlfriend, she could eat all day. But some people,

it works for them because they don't care that much about eating or that eight hour window is enough for them, whatever the reasons are. So in one sense, I'm heartened that there are these options. In the other, you know, in another sense, I'm not because there's so much focus on quote unquote diet, right? And restriction. And I'm not really into the whole restriction thing. I mean, certainly you could say like eating a high sodium, high sugar diet's not healthy. We know that. I'm here to express that. But the second you put your mind in that place of deprivation, you are setting yourself up for failure. So it's better to have the sugar as opposed to beating yourself up by not having it or restricting. In moderation as a conscious indulgence, not like I'm not tasting this. I'm

not appreciating it. I'm just shoveling it in. I mean, clearly it's not good for you. I mean, we kind of know a lot of, you know, the evils of sugar. But if you're having a little bit now and then, it's definitely healthier than beating yourself up. So, you know, it's also I feel like flexibility needs to be built into any eating plan because, listen, you and I, we're busy. We travel. You know, we might get invited to something at the last minute. With great desserts. With great desserts. You and the desserts.

But if you're so tethered to this idea that, oh, my God, tonight I have to eat this, like, grilled piece of fish and vegetables, or you're going to get thrown for a loop the second something spontaneous comes up. That's not sustainable. So my whole goal was to figure out and to talk to the best minds in mindfulness and in nutrition to find out what the most sustainable way to eat is. So what is it like, you know, a cheat day once a week? Is it like a cheat meal? It's not even that.

It's not even that. It's not restricting yourself that much. That's restricted, right? It is. Like saying I'm setting aside this one day. And I'm not saying that doesn't work for some people. And then you just have all the donuts you can eat. Right.

And then it's just a binge. And are you going to feel good after that binge? No. Well, maybe for a moment. A very fleeting moment. So that's restrictive in itself. So how does someone approach this then? How do you take on your intake?

It's building in flexibility. So it's the it's the it's the flex. It's building and flexibility. So it's snacks at 12 noon and it doesn't mean that snack only consists of, you know, cut up vegetables. But it's just saying like these are the guidelines I'm going to follow and they're going to be different for different people. But it's just the main thing is building some flexibility into how you go about eating. And in the book, I certainly talk about the things you should be eating. about eating. And in the book, I certainly talk about the things you should be eating. I'm not here to say, you know, gorge on high sodium, high processed, you know, carbs or something. That's not, that wouldn't be wise advice. I talk about, you know, eating healthy fats, you know, mood boosting nutrients, you know, the things that you should, that should make up the biggest part of

your diet. So I, you know, I do, I do have, you know, things that I think are smarter to eat, but again, you first have to get the right mindset. Sure. Yeah. And you also cover, you know, I think being younger and looking younger and being younger, it takes working on your body as well, not just eating the right things or having a flexible eating schedule but you talk about strength training and strength conditioning as opposed to just cardio so and primarily this is geared towards women wouldn't you say yeah i started the book when i was an editor-in-chief of women's health and now i'm the editor-in-chief of yahoo health um and so i finished it when i was here but i was it's certainly for both genders but i do talk a lot to women about women and their specific needs.

And strength training is – Why is it so important for women? It's one of those things that I'm really passionate about getting more women to strength train. And absolutely more women are strength training. Yeah. But of all the people who strength train, only a third are women. Right? So not enough.

Yeah. of all the people who strength train, only a third are women, right? So not enough. And it's so important because it is, you know, I think an underappreciated tenant of health, right? It's good for lean muscle building, which burns more calories all day long, even at rest. It is great for bone density. It's great for joint mobility. You know, you're going to look more compact, leaner, firmer, all of these things. And I see a lot of women who will go to the gym and get on the treadmill and just run on it for an hour. And I know what their goal is. Their goal is like, I want to be fit. I want to be in shape and I want to lose weight or whatever the deal is. And it's actually not the most effective way to do those things.

You can burn more fat by doing 20-minute strength training, HIIT workout than running for a And that's a hard sell for some women. They just don't get it. Yeah. And the reason that they might not... Women just like to beat themselves up. I think that the sweat factor, not that you can absolutely sweat weight training, no doubt about it, but I think the sweat factor that you get from a cardio workout, running on the treadmill,

somehow is this like instant gratification payoff, like I've done something, you know? And the fact is you're really, it's mostly water weight that you're shedding at that moment. And so that time could be better spent strength training. And then that lean muscle that you build is going to burn calories all day long. When you get off that treadmill, you're done. Sure. I definitely think there's a shift in strength training for women. And you say, you know, strong is the new sexy.

There's a huge shift when you crossfit, bringing awareness to it. Although some women see like the extreme crossfit women and they're like, I don't want to look like that. So I'm not going to lift. Right. But there's a lot of women out there who are, you know, I talk about women as like skinny fat or like strong and lean. And lean and strong is like the way to go in my opinion. But the skinny, but it's like hanging fat.

Yeah. Like it's no good. Yeah. It's not cute. Not cute. I mean, it may look okay from a distance. In clothes, in clothes, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

My first book was called Look Better Naked. So it's all about how you look when the clothes come off. I like it. It's a great Cosmo headline. Right. I was at Women's Health all the time. So when did you start getting into strength training? You know, I actually started a little bit back in high school, which was like way before any women were into it.

Because my high school boyfriend was into strength training and his dad had gotten him into it. And so it was either like stand around and watch or jump in and participate. Um, and I was an athlete and you know, it helped my athletics, but it wasn't until probably college that I got, you know, sort of more focused on it. Um, but I, yes, I've been doing it for a long time. And quite frankly, I just, I enjoy it more. I enjoy it way more than cardio workouts. Yeah. Or I should say traditional cardio workouts. Yeah. You know, which just bore me to death.

But like you, I was super excited when the whole strong is the new sexy, you know, I don't know what you want to call it, you know, trend. Movement. Movement's a good word. Happened. I was seeing all these things on Instagram. Oh, yeah. And people were talking about it more. Tons of ripped girls now. Yeah. And there's, you know, way more. Yeah, they look great. And there's just way more excitement around it. There still isn't, there hasn't been enough of a conversion. And I think part of it is what you touched on, right? There's what I call gym, you know, gym intimidation. So like people

being intimidated by the weight room. And then there's all the myths that still persist about like bulking up and, you know, what's going to happen. But the fact of the matter is, is that most women don't have enough testosterone to super bulk up. Yeah. And, you know, I've heard women say, what's another one? Oh, like, yeah, muscle will turn into fat. Muscle doesn't turn into fat. They're two different tissue types, right? What happens is if you stop lifting, you have less muscle. Therefore, that doesn't, your body isn't burning calories as efficiently

anymore. And so, yeah, you might get quote unquote fatter. It's not the muscle turning into the fat. So there are all these myths that I try to bust. You're not going to get huge and bulky. The muscle's not going to turn into fat. I'm trying to think what some of the other ones are, but it's amazing how ingrained some of these fears are. Yeah. From an early age, we just believe this. What's the biggest lesson you learned about yourself through the process of writing this book? I think one of the things was just about how critical it is to control our stress levels because they can just destroy everything. And we all have stress.

It's a part of life. But it's about finding ways to mitigate it and finding ways to decompress. And again, these can be like small things that you do, like taking time out to do a mini meditation before you eat or just getting a dose of nature, which is pretty tough to do in the city. But there are a couple of green spaces. I think realizing that I couldn't just be this type A personality that was just go, go, go all the time and not have there be some fallout to that. There's going to be fallout to that.

And that figuring out ways to decompress and to de-stress were just going to give me more of an edge. Wow. And like you, I'm pretty sure you're, you know, an endorser of meditation. Yep. You know, that's one of the things that I've learned to turn to. Really? So I am trained. Do you have a daily practice with this?

Yeah, I'm not perfect and I'm the first to admit it. Me either. High five. There you go. High five. But that's what's great. It's like it's always there for you when you want to go back to it. Yeah.

Right? It's there. It's immediately accessible as soon as you want to go back to it. Yeah. Right? It's there. It's immediately accessible as soon as you want to go back to it. And I was trained in transcendental meditation. There's a lot of different forms. I keep hearing about that constantly. Yes. And, well, the thing about transcendental meditation, it is a bit more of a time commitment because it's 20 minutes in the beginning of the day and 20 minutes at the end of the day.

But it's the most studied, which is not to say it's the only one you should do or can do. But me being me and, you know, being an editor and wanting everything to be vetted and bona fide, I turned to that because I knew there was so much science backing it. Wow. Okay. So it makes you less reactive. Grounded. So it makes you more grounded so that you're not, you just don't fall prey to, you know, impulses as easily. And it's just, it's good on a physiological level, right? Good for your body. Good for your brain. You're probably your heart too. Yeah. Good for

every system. And I think it's gaining in popularity, which really, you know, which makes me really happy. It is. I feel like I was just talking with a friend earlier today that what yoga was 10 years ago and taking over, you know, the country at least, and I'm assuming the world, I believe there's going to be meditation facilities and franchises. They're already, yeah, and they're already popping up. Yeah. I feel like it's going to be like. In L.A., of course. Of course, yeah.

New York is happening too. Yeah feel like it's going to be like. In L.A., of course. Of course, yeah. New York is happening, too. Yeah. And it's so great. And I think there's just more adoption from people who never thought they'd be a meditator. I never thought I would be a meditator. No way. What did you experience once you started meditating about yourself? It is, it just feels good. I mean, it is almost like a euphoric feeling, you know, not that you're chasing some high,

you know, that would be beside the point, but it just feels good. And you just feel, it's funny, like, I think I'm a nicer person. I hope I'm a nice person all the time. You are. Or thank you. Or, you know, at least the majority of the time. But I think when I'm in a regular meditation practice, I don't know, it breeds compassion. It makes you think about what you're about to say to somebody, you know, in that split second before you actually say it.

Yeah. And speaking into that, when I meditate, I recognize that I don't react to people. I don't get frustrated or angry as often. Exactly. Or, like, stressed out about, you know, something happens and that's out of my control. I'm not just, like, getting don't get frustrated or angry as often or like stressed out about it. You know, if something happens and it's out of my control, I'm not just like getting mad at the person or whatever. Exactly. All right.

Whatever. Yeah. And that applies to, you know, food and other temptations and other things too. Interesting. Interesting. So, yeah. So it's a big deal. What would you say is if people could only take one thing away from the book?

Obviously, there's a lot of things you cover and it's a holistic approach to the whole body and lifestyle. But if it's like, add one element to your life that someone's not doing, if they're doing all the things wrong and they're 20 pounds older than they should be looking, you know, maybe they just need to lose 20 pounds, but they're stressed out, they're eating bad foods, they're not sleeping well, you know, they're whatever, doing all the things wrong. Right. Well, what I would say is you can start today and start changing small things and there's

going to be a cumulative effect to that. And it's like a snowball rolling down a hill. You know, every little thing that you do starts adding up to, you know, to bigger changes. little thing that you do starts adding up to, you know, to bigger changes. And also, and this is my big thing is that being healthy and fit doesn't have to be a buzzkill. Like this isn't a chore. This shouldn't be something. I have so much fun and I eat and I drink and I see, I see you are your Instagram photos and you're, and I was going to ask you about this. Have you been taking more kind of like breaks in the last year and a half since writing this book because of what you've learned about yourself? It's funny.

I mean, I think that – Every Instagram photo is you on a vacation in some beach with wine. Yes, yes, I do. There's a couple of cocktails. Good food and wine. Definitely a couple of cocktail Instagrams in there. I do think taking time to unplug is huge. And now I'm in a digital world.

And so I can work remotely, which is a great thing. It's an amazing thing. But absolutely. And whether it's a week or 10 days or two days, it matters. And I'm a huge travel buff. So for me, you know, getting somewhere, you know, not just because it's beautiful and it might be a beach and it might be relaxing, but just because it's new. And I think novelty and newness and being exposed to new people, new cultures, new foods, new sites,

like is so invigorating and so inspiring that I just get so much out of it. I like it. So if people had to do, obviously talking about doing little small things to get started, to build in the momentum, but if they had to start with one thing first, that you felt like would support them with everything else, would it be the daily meditation? Would it be eating better foods? Would it be strength training? It's so hard to pick one thing.

What do you feel like you've noticed and experienced over this process and over seven years of being the conduit of the most highly sought after experts in health people in the world? Right. What would be? I would say, you know, we both know Gabby Bernstein. And she once said, you know, like, sleep is sacred. Sleep is a spiritual practice. And I have really begun to realize how critical sleep is to health.

And so I touched on it earlier. And believe me, I never thought I'd be saying this because I try to eek every moment out of every day. But now I realize, like, go to bed a little earlier and your body is going to thank you. That's just step one. Sure. Of course. Of course. There's a whole system and everything. And just think more positively and optimistically about what you have the power to accomplish.

I mean, this is such a theme, you know, in your life, in your podcast, and the people that you talk to is just, you know, starting with the right mindset is absolutely everything. Of course. Very cool. How important do you think gratitude is in the process of living a healthy lifestyle? Wow. It's so critical. And, you know, it's unfortunate that it often takes hearing someone's, you know, tragic story to have gratitude for your own well-being, right? For your own health status.

But sometimes that's what it takes. And we all encounter these stories about, you know, somebody passed away early or they're struggling with something. And you realize, wow, like having this, you know, able body is an absolute gift. And, you know, health is wealth. And you can, you know, spout off all the, you know, Instagram mantras in the world. But they're true. Yeah, they are.

And they resonate for a reason. They resonate because they're true. So I think it's easy to let that perspective get away from you. But when you return to it and you're like, wow, I have no problems because I have a healthy body. I can walk. I can do that. Yeah, exactly. And one of the things that one of the quotes that I often repeat is, you know, take care of your body because it's the only place you have to live.

Yeah. I say that a lot because to me it's a great reminder to myself, like, this is it. This is it. This is your house. Wow, interesting. It's your mobile home right here. It's true. Were you always practicing gratitude before this process?

No, definitely not. Really? Absolutely not. I mean, I just took health for granted. I took youth for granted. I took, you know, a lot of things for granted. And I think entering my 40s definitely, you know, was for me a very pivotal time. Again, you know, part of what inspired the book was saying, like, my life could very well be half over.

You know, what do I want the second half to look like? That's crazy. And I want to be as, I mean, listen, I hope it's a long, more than, you know, more than 40 more years away, but who knows. And, you know, more than 40 more years away, but who knows? And so, you know, what can I do to reclaim some power and, you know, what the next half is going to look like? But, yeah, absolutely was not something that, you know, was front of mind before. Interesting. You think it's an important part of the… Such an important part.

I preach about gratitude all the time. And before I go to bed, I say three things I'm most grateful for to the last person I talked to on the phone or my girlfriend, or I try to write it down. And I try to evoke from the last person I talked to three things they're grateful for just from the moment in the day. So that's an awesome practice. I mean, that's great. I'm going to start doing that because it's so powerful. It's so powerful. And again, back to, you know, being, you know, the journalist that I am and always, you know, wanting things to be vetted, even though we know some things work that there isn't any science behind. But there is actually, you know, research behind gratitude.

Yeah, there is. I don't know what it is, but I know there is, that it's really powerful and important for you. And it's actually for three years now, I think it is. If you ever call me and leave a message, I won't pick up next time. In order to leave a message for me to respond, you have to say what you're most grateful for that day. I must have never gotten your voicemail. Yeah, that's what my voicemail says. It's like, thanks for calling. I'm not here. Leave a message with what you're most grateful for, and then tell me your message, and I'll get back to you. I love it. It's amazing to hear

what people say. They're like, wow, that's so thoughtful. They have what I'm most grateful for, and they take a moment to actually express it. They take a moment to think about it. Yes. And some people may be able to access that immediately. And other people actually have to spend some time thinking about it. But the great thing is you get them thinking about it. Exactly.

And when you take, I mean, there is research. When you take stock of what you have. I mean, listen, we all want things. We're all driven. Nobody's saying that's going to be eliminated. But when you stop and take stock of what you have. I mean, listen, we all want things. We're all driven. Nobody's saying that's going to be eliminated. But when you stop and take stock of what you have and if you have health, that's a huge one. You know, and for me, it's it's you know, I don't have the healthiest parents. And so that's stressful. They you know, I think part of it was generational and they just it

wasn't impressed upon them that they have to do things. And I think it's, you know, maybe one of the things that inspired me to go into this field. And it's the most frustrating thing because your parents, like, they don't listen to you. And I'm like, but people, like, buy my products to hear what I have to say about these things. And you – I'm giving it to you for free. You won't listen. It's the same thing with my family and business. It's so frustrating. Exactly. It's so frustrating.

Exactly. It's so frustrating. Exactly. You know, but they're, you know, putting your path in that way, I guess, for a reason to, like, inspire you to craft the message, you know, more carefully or in a way that will penetrate. Because let me tell you, it's, like, hard. I hear you. I hear you. Okay.

Well, a couple of final questions. Speaking of gratitude, what are you most grateful for in your life recently? I am most grateful for the opportunities that have come my way. You know, I'm a bit of an experience junkie. Yeah, you are. And I like doing new things and meeting new people and going to new places. I'm in a profession that, you know, encourages that journalists are curious people. And so I feel really grateful that, you know, in this in this competitive cutthroat city that, you know, I've been given the opportunity to work in media,

to experience new things. And most importantly, you know, right now to stay in the health field, because that to me is so incredible, because then I get to, you know, right now to stay in the health field, because that to me is so incredible, because then I get to, you know, pass it on and help other people. What's your mission in this role that you have? I mean, you have a high role at Yahoo Health. It reaches, I don't know how many millions of people every month, unique visitors, the message is getting out there. What is the message and what's your mission for why you work so hard in this industry? Right. What do you want people to actually achieve or what do you want to achieve in your career?

I think it is so much about self-empowerment. Right. It's, you know, it isn't health in particular isn't something that's going to be handed to you. I always say health is not a spectator sport. It's a participatory sport, right? You can't just sit on the sidelines and, you know, and watch it go by and hope that it's going to, you know, it's going to impact you in a positive way. You actually have to participate, you know, participate by moving, participate by, you know, making decisions that are in the benefit of your health.

And you have a stand-up desk. Yes, I have a stand-up desk. So you get to move. And Yahoo has made that, you know, very easy. It's just an automated thing. Press a button and it goes up. Press another button and it goes down. And it's, but again, like that's just a micro action right there.

Like deciding at a certain point in the day, just stand up for a little bit. Stand up. Get off your butt. I like it. Yeah, because actually sitting in a chair all day is good. Uh, yeah, it's not good. It's like sitting as the new smoking, you know, sitting disease, right. And the back and all these things shuts off those glutes. Oh man. Who wants glutes that are sleeping? Come on. Be serious. Okay. So, so yeah, self-empowerment, I think just proselytizing the fact that you can exert control over your destiny. Right. So that theme can be, you know, is in a lot of what you talk about. But it's so true. But you first of the day, 80 years from now, when... Oh God, these are tough questions. Time is up for you. 80 years, whoever knows how long, hopefully much longer.

Are you trying to get me to cry? I'm not trying to get you to cry. I'm just curious what... I want you to fill in the blank. Yeah. At the end of the day, what happens for you to feel like your mission is complete? Like what happens in the world with your life's work to feel like your mission is complete? Like what happens in the world with your life's work to feel like your mission is complete, whether it's this field or whatever it may be, but fill in that blank. Oh, that's yeah. It's like an enormous question. I think that I know it's strange to say the meditation thing, but I think if meditation became a universally accepted practice, then it would have this incredible domino effect on the world, right?

It breeds compassion. And I'm the least, like most people will tell you, the least quote unquote woo person in the whole world. I'm not that girl. You're not. But I believe in the power and what it can do. So I talk a lot about meditation in the book. I've done a bunch of things on Yahoo health about it at women's health. They did a bunch of things. And I think the reason that I talk so much about it is because I was the biggest skeptic. Wow. So for me to have gone from skeptic to passionate endorser, I think, says a lot about how deeply I believe in it.

So I think maybe demystifying that and getting it to be a more embraced practice would be a worthy goal. Wow. At least one. I mean, it's hard to pick just goal. Wow. At least one. I mean, it's hard to pick just one. Of course. Meditation. So kind of seeing it throughout the whole world as a practice. I think getting people to, I mean, I think what, if you take a broader view of what I

just said, it's about seeing health in a very integrative way. Yeah. To me, that's such a critical message, you know, that again, back to the fact that we're systemic creatures, we're not isolated body parts, we're interconnected, interwoven. And how much we move or how little we move, what we eat, the thoughts we think they all impact our health. And I think, you know, I just was spending time with my nephew recently and he's, you know, he's like a preteen or a teenager, he's 13 and he's an athlete and he's an incredible athlete and he eats terribly. And just like I did, he, I was like, you know, it wasn't preaching to him at all. I was just like having a simple conversation with him and saying like, and I couldn't get him because he's a teen. I couldn't get him to recognize that part of being a good athlete was fueling his body the right way. To him, those things were totally disconnected.

And it sort of was like, okay, on the one hand, he's a preteen and he's going to think that way. And, you know, he can still, you know, be energetic and not eat as well, but that's his baseline. He doesn't know the difference. He doesn't know how much better he could feel. What would it be like if he did eat well? If he ate better. And so for me, it was like, wow, there's still a lot of work to do to convince people that, you know, there's an integration here. Like that it's not just you can do this thing and neglect this other thing.

It wasn't until I was about 28 when I actually understood that principle because my whole life I could eat whatever I wanted. Right. And I was, you know, looked good and felt good. And I was a great athlete and, you know, did well. But I do remember, though, in practice and in games that I would yawn a lot. I'd be in practice and it wasn't for me tired of like working out. It was like my body was just like didn't have the nutrients. Right.

To give me the fuel and I'd be yawning constantly. Yeah. And like trying to get in oxygen or whatever that... That's it. And I remember like certain seasons we would just have like pasta before every game and I would just eat everything I could because I was like, I got to fuel up the tank.

You know, and it was just like sleep coma right during this. Right, there was a lot of misconceptions. I mean, I fell prey to the fat-free craze back in the day. And it was like carbo-loading and eating bagels and pasta and thinking that was a good thing. And fat was vilified. And now we know fat's your friend. And, you know, knowledge is power, right? So we have that.

But you're lucky that you came to the epiphany at the young age of 28. You know, like, whoa, you know, all of these things are working together. So meditation is one of it because it's, you know, it's integrating Eastern and Western modalities. But I think just getting people to realize that it all matters. You can't be this, like, high-powered, stressed-out executive who runs marathons and maybe, you know, eats, like, the best great organic food but be completely stressed out all the time and have the deteriorating effects of that. So I think getting people to get the integrative approach is a big mission and goal. I'm all for the message. I want people to check this out, 20 Pounds Younger by Michelle Promoleko. I've got one question left for you. Before I do, I want to acknowledge you, Michelle, for being so grounded and for being committed

to this work. It's so refreshing to see when people are up to big things and they're committed to trying things out that maybe they are so against, like meditation and putting themselves in the fire to discover something new about themselves that is then going to help everyone else in the world. Thank you. I take that as a huge compliment and it's my pleasure and my privilege. So thank you. Very cool. So final question, what's your definition of greatness? That is a really tough question. I think my definition of greatness would be finding the thing that you're passionate about and being brave enough to pursue that as your life's work. Right. Because I think there are so many people who kind of know what they want to do, but they think they need to do something else that's going to earn them more, this, that. And I'm such a big believer in passion breeding success. And, you know, we spend a lot of our life working.

And so for me, greatness is figuring out what you're passionate about and being brave enough to do that thing. I love that, being brave enough. That's really cool. Thank you so much for coming on. I appreciate it. Thank you, Lewis. Thanks so much. This was fun.

Thanks again, guys, for joining me today. I had a blast chatting with Michelle and I hope you guys get a chance to go check out her book, 20 Pounds Younger by Michelle Promoleko. Also go to the show notes over at lewishouse.com slash 125. Again, that's lewishouse.com slash 125, where you can get the links to her book. You can find out more about Michelle there. You can see all of her links to social media, so you can connect with her online and on Instagram and all these other great places and see what she's up to over at Yahoo Health. She's doing big things, so make sure to check her out over there as well. lewishowes.com slash 125.

Also, thank you guys so much for being a supporter of this show. Again, 125 episodes. We just reached 4 million downloads. You guys are insane. You're on fire. You're promoting it like crazy. You're leaving me amazing reviews. Thank you for that and for your feedback on how to make the show better.

I appreciate you guys. And I'm just on how to make the show better. I appreciate you guys and I'm just so blessed to be able to be your host of your show, The School of Greatness, because this is all about you guys. This is a passion of mine to serve you and to bring you the brightest people in the world that I can to help you have a better life. That's what it's all about here on The School of Greatness. So thank you guys so much for your support. Please keep sharing these out there with your friends. If you enjoyed this episode, share it with a friend. Again, lewishouse.com slash 125. Just post it on Twitter or Facebook or email a friend or two who you think might benefit from listening to this message by Michelle. I think you'll really be good for that. Big guest coming up next. Very excited about

this. So make sure to subscribe if you're not subscribed to this show yet. So you can stay tuned to all the big guests we have next and all the big content we've got. I appreciate you guys so much. You guys know what time it is. It's time to go out there and do something great. សូវាប់បានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបានបា Thank you.