The Ultimate Human with Gary Brecka - 161. Shayna Taylor: Healing Chronic Anxiety and Gut Inflammation by Returning to Nature

Episode Date: April 29, 2025

What if your quest for optimal health is failing because you're overlooking the most fundamental human needs — connection to nature, meaningful relationships, and genuine presence. Shayna’s journey is the perfect example. Despite living the “healthy” LA lifestyle as a model and chef, she struggled with chronic gut issues, anxiety, and skin problems that 11 different doctors couldn’t solve. The turning point? Moving to Italy and rebuilding her life around her non-negotiable wellness practices.  Join the Ultimate Human VIP community and gain exclusive access to Gary Brecka's proven wellness protocols today!: https://bit.ly/4ai0Xwg Connect with Shayna Taylor: Website: https://bit.ly/4iMCCla  YouTube: https://bit.ly/4jL5NWk  Instagram:https://bit.ly/4jvVgyQ  TikTok: https://bit.ly/3GGfya2  Facebook: https://bit.ly/3EIyFzO  X.com: https://bit.ly/3Yk6i1D  Thank you to our partners: H2TABS - USE CODE “ULTIMATE10” FOR 10% OFF: https://bit.ly/4hMNdgg BODYHEALTH - USE CODE “ULTIMATE20” FOR 20% OFF: http://bit.ly/4e5IjsV BAJA GOLD - USE CODE "ULTIMATE10" FOR 10% OFF: https://bit.ly/3WSBqUa EIGHT SLEEP - SAVE $350 ON THE POD 4 ULTRA WITH CODE “GARY”: https://bit.ly/3WkLd6E COLD LIFE - THE ULTIMATE HUMAN PLUNGE: https://bit.ly/4eULUKp WHOOP - GET 1 FREE MONTH WHEN YOU JOIN!: https://bit.ly/3VQ0nzW MASA CHIPS - GET 20% OFF YOUR FIRST $50+ ORDER: https://bit.ly/40LVY4y VANDY - USE CODE “ULTIMATE20” FOR 20% OFF: https://bit.ly/49Qr7WE AION - USE CODE “ULTIMATE10” FOR 10% OFF: https://bit.ly/4h6KHAD HAPBEE - FEEL BETTER & PERFORM AT YOUR BEST: https://bit.ly/4a6glfo CARAWAY - USE CODE “ULTIMATE” FOR 10% OFF: https://bit.ly/3Q1VmkC HEALF - GET 10% OFF YOUR ORDER: https://bit.ly/41HJg6S BIOPTIMIZERS - USE CODE “ULTIMATE” FOR 10% OFF: https://bit.ly/4inFfd7 RHO NUTRITION - USE CODE “ULTIMATE15” FOR 15% OFF: https://bit.ly/44fFza0 Get your Genetic Test here: ⁠https://bit.ly/3Yg1Uk9 Watch  the “Ultimate Human Podcast” every Tuesday & Thursday at 9AM EST: YouTube: https://bit.ly/3RPQYX8 Podcasts: https://bit.ly/3RQftU0 Connect with Gary Brecka: Instagram: https://bit.ly/3RPpnFs TikTok: https://bit.ly/4coJ8fo X.com: https://bit.ly/3Opc8tf Facebook: https://bit.ly/464VA1H LinkedIn: https://bit.ly/4hH7Ri2 Website: https://bit.ly/4eLDbdU Merch: https://bit.ly/4aBpOM1 Newsletter: https://bit.ly/47ejrws Ask Gary: https://bit.ly/3PEAJuG TIMESTAMPS: 00:00 Intro 02:15 Shayna Taylor’s Journey 07:44 Moving to Italy and Buying a Property and a Farmland 23:23 Research on Regenerative and Biodynamic Farming 25:56 Reconnecting with Nature 33:37 Living in Italy vs. USA (Food, Cost, Mentality) 41:10 Inspiration for the Inner Alchemy Wellness Program 49:46 Shayna’s Spiritual Journey 57:44 Lifestyles in Europe 1:00:42 Healing by Getting Back to the Basics  1:03:33 Shayna’s Daily Rituals 1:06:18 Impact of Meditation 1:12:09 Connect with Shayna 1:12:26 Final Question: What does it mean to you to be an “Ultimate Human?” The Ultimate Human with Gary Brecka Podcast is for general informational purposes only and does not constitute the practice of medicine, nursing or other professional health care services, including the giving of medical advice, and no doctor/patient relationship is formed. The use of information on this podcast or materials linked from this podcast is at the user’s own risk. The Content of this podcast is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Users should not disregard or delay in obtaining medical advice for any medical condition they may have and should seek the assistance of their health care professionals for any such conditions. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In Italy is like insane. They love food. They love community. They love long meals. Even me before I moved there, I could go and eat all the pasta and cheese I wanted and it wouldn't affect my gut and my skin. Most people have their own garden, produce their own olive oil. You know, it's normal for them. That's their life and they appreciate the ingredients. Because it is back to the basics. There's your grass-fed meats, your raw dairies, you know, all of the things that in Italy are just the norm and here they're the exception. Food became transactional, which is our biggest problem. You go to the market, you have no idea where anything's from.

You buy it in plastic, you check it out, you pay for your credit card and then you go home and you eat it. If you walk into your grocery store and they have a health food section, what does it say about the rest of the store? As Americans, we're so spoiled in the way that things are quite easy for us to do. We're so disconnected from Mother Nature and we're actually disconnected from each other. I find it so cool to learn about how nature used to work before we manipulated it so much.

This kind of started my journey, not only in entrepreneurship, but also this journey of like, I'm ready for something new. Talk a little bit about what led you here and what inspired you to put this together and like, what does it entail? It's a great story, but I'm gonna share the honest part of it

because I think everybody needs to know. Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo!

Woo! Woo! Ultimate Human. Hey guys, welcome back to the Ultimate Human podcast. I'm your host, human biologist, Gary Brekka, where we go down the road of everything anti-aging, biohacking, longevity, and everything in between. And we have a super treat for you guys today, a really, really unique guest.

My wife is in love with this guest, and so is my daughter. And I think so many of you know who she is. And I think she exemplifies everything about society today when you reach the point where you just say the heck with it. And you hear me talk all the time about how my favorite thought leaders in our space, anti-aging, biohacking, specialists, scientists, researchers, functional medicine, doctors, they're all getting back to the basics. So today is going to be an amazing podcast about getting back to the basics. So today is going to be an amazing podcast about getting back to the basics. So welcome to the podcast, Gina Taylor. Thank you. Thank you for

having me. I'm so excited. Your journey is so, it's so unique, but I want to say it's like, it's inspiring because I think you probably have a lot of people go, gosh, I wish I could just do that. You know, my, I'm stuck in this job or this relationship or you know, kids are in school or whatever it is and they just don't have the gumption to do it. I wonder if you just share your story with my audience. Yeah, of course. I actually get those messages every single day.

Yeah, we were just talking about it. Yeah, yeah. Every single day I have people write me about how they wish they could move or it's a plan that they have in two or three years to move to the countryside somewhere or to Italy specifically. But yeah, so my journey is a wild one.

So I'm born and raised in California. I got into the health and wellness space in my early 20s when I went to culinary school for college and became really passionate about food. I also was a model for many years, which was very counterintuitive to each other. But that's what kind of like pushed me towards wanting to be more on the health side of things

versus a traditional chef. And then I had a lot of my own health problems, especially related to like gut health and, you know, specific things around skin and- Which of course, if you're a model and you're having skin breakouts and you've got- It's a big problem, yeah, exactly. And then I, so I was in an eight year relationship,

most of my twenties, and in 2020, I decided to end the relationship. And this was like a huge pivot in my life, I have to say. I was going through Saturn return, cause I was 28 and I was just, it was like, all just made sense. I had a very intense Saturn return for people who know about it.

And so when we broke up, I was basically had to start my life completely over because my life was totally a shadow of that person. Was your partner in LA? Yes, my partner was in LA. We also lived in New York for like three years. And then I decided to move back to LA when we broke up. And so this kind of started my journey, not only in LA, we also lived in New York for like three years. And then I decided to move back to LA when we broke up. And so this kind of started my journey,

not only in entrepreneurship, but also this journey of like, I'm ready for something new, like really to start over. And so I was building my businesses in LA. I always had this drive to wanna move to Italy and buy farmland and like be a farmer and grow my own produce and have my animals. And like, that was my dream. The chickens, like all this stuff. And I was just like,

I thought that it was going to be something in my life that I did when I was like 45, you know, I didn't think that it was going to be in the next couple of years from when I was dreaming about it. And then I started deep diving into spiritual practices because I was trying to not only heal myself from the relationship of eight years, but also all of the things that brought me to be in an unhealthy relationship and childhood stuff that I felt I just didn't unravel because I was just in survival mode.

And through that process, my drive to want to leave LA and go live a different life just became stronger. And then I, my family knew I was thinking about moving. So we decided to spend Christmas there for holiday. And I had this attachment and in spirituality, you start to learn about non-attachment. So I was in the process of learning non-attachment at the time. And I had an attachment to my house because it was my first house I ever owned. I like made it exactly how I wanted it.

It was a content creator's house and I was building my social media following then and building all my recipes. So I was like, wow, to leave this house feels like very daunting, but like it doesn't make sense for me. Then I was like, do I rent it? But then I was like, no,

because then I can't invest in a property in Italy because you know, it's like I needed to sell it to then have this dream. So I literally like, I'll never forget, I woke up one morning and I was journaling and meditating. And this was very new to me at the time. I was like, started with a five minute journal and it took me like months to integrate it into my life

because I was so used to waking up and just like going straight into my work, running away from my underlying anxiety, which I learned later in life. I didn't realize that I was just like running on the crazy cycle because I was trying to run away from the underlying anxiety I had. But I just like woke up one day and I was like, you know what, I think I'm ready to sell this house.

Wow. This was October. I was supposed to leave for Christmas, December. So I was like, if my house sells before Christmas. You put this frame around. Yeah, I will go, I'll just basically go on a whim, so and not take anything with me except for three suitcases.

So I put my house on the market and it sold two weeks later. And I was like, okay. You know what's funny is like you either get buyer's remorse or like, you're like, shoot, I didn't ask enough. I should have asked for more money, sold too fast. But that's amazing. So I was like, okay, either I'm leaving LA for sure.

And my second option was Nashville. I was thinking, I love Nashville. I wanted to leave LA. So I was like, okay, I'm gonna move all of my stuff to Nashville in storage. And I'm gonna go to Italy with three suitcases, and I'm going to really explore the idea of living in Europe.

So I don't recommend this is the way people should do it because I went there, decided to stay, and then had to figure out my visa process. So I was flying back and forth and wasted a lot of money and time because I didn't prepare myself. And I was really on a whim, which is very much me.

Like I love spontaneity. So I was just like living a spontaneous life. But yeah, while we were there for Christmas, we stumbled into a real estate office and I wanted to look at how like properties for fun. And I wasn't really sure what I wanted and what I was looking for, like a bunch of land or maybe later or just like a small house or a retreat center. Like I didn't really know. And so I started looking

and they sent me some properties in Umbria region specifically because I really love Umbria because it's still the raw, authentic Italy. Like Tuscany is amazing. It's beautiful. And I do spend most of my time now outside of Florence, but it's so touristy and it's everybody knows about it that it it's just not as authentic and umbria like good luck finding an English speaker and I like that, you know, it's like the Authentic Ness of Italy and it's so beautiful They call it the green heart of Italy because it's literally the center and it also gets a lot more rain So everything is so green and lush all the time Whereas Tuscany gets very dry and the summertime like Umbria stays very green.

So it's stunning, really beautiful place. So it has four seasons or is it? Yeah. But it's temperate, right? It's not, like winters are not drastically winter. Like maybe it snows for like two days and then it melts. Okay. And that doesn't happen every year.

Does it have that like seasonal affective disorder period where it's all really gray and not really? No, because honestly, the climate of Italy, especially, you know, Southern is even better, but where we are central-ish, the seasons are really nice. They're becoming shorter now because the whole world is getting warmer and summers are really hot sometimes.

But I have to say like winter was very chill, nothing crazy, there was like two weeks where it was like kind of cold only because the wind. Did you buy a place there? Yes, so back to the story. Full commitment. Back to the story, it's actually kind of a, it's a great story,

but I'm gonna share the honest part of it because I think everybody needs to know the goods and the bads of when you do something like this. Because as Americans, we're so spoiled in the way that things are quite easy for us to do. Everything is hard, don't get me wrong, but like starting a business, anybody can start a business.

Buying a home, like to get a loan and all these things, like it's actually very easy compared to other countries. And when you have this mindset of like anything is possible, which is the mindset I had, and then I decided to be a single woman, like turning 30 and move to Italy on her own and try to buy a property and land and like be a farmer, I got so humbled.

Wow. So humbled, because the way that we do things is the opposite of the way Italy does things. So to build a business, to start a business, to do things right, to have tax write-offs, even as, I lost so much money because the original accountant that I got introduced to didn't tell me any of these things. So I had to unravel myself out of using,

for us, for instance, a small example, if you use your personal Amazon, but you use your business card, right, for something, you can justify it for tax reasons or for stuff. And in America, it's always, of course, you should open a business Amazon account. I'm not saying not to do that, but like, that's a small thing that I've never had to think about

because it's easy for us to justify it. In Italy, even though I'm the owner of the business, it was the business credit card and it was under my personal Amazon account, they take it as I stole money for my own personal buyings from Amazon, from the company. So I personally had to wire the money back to the company to justify the money when I never spent it.

Wow. So you owned a business. Yes. You used a business card for personal things? No, business card for business things. Business card for business things. So like I used my business card in Italy. But it was your Amazon personal card.

But it was my, exactly. So it was like for farm stuff. It was like you can clearly see it was like stuff for the chickens and like random farm supplies. Like I would never use that, it's for it. But they literally, it doesn't matter because I used it on my own personal Amazon. They consider it that I stole money from the company.

So I had to wire all the Amazon accounts, like whatever I spent on my Amazon, back to my agriculture company to pay it back for the books of finance. And I was like, this is a small example, but like, you just don't think about those things, you know? But anyway, so I'm gonna tell you in short, like a little bit about this story.

So I started looking at properties with my family when we were in Christmas and I stumbled upon this property, which blew my mind. I, the energy, I'm very sensitive to energies of places and this energy of this place was magical. So I was like, I know this is it, but my logical mind was like, you can't buy the first place you look at, Shayna.

You need to like look around a little bit. So my friends were coming for New Year's and I remember the house, they're foreigners as well. So they said like, we also rent it for vacation rentals, one of the houses, because it was two with two different owners. And so I decided like,

oh, can we rent it for New Year's? So I can live in it and see what it's like. So we rented it for a week. And then during that week in meditation, I was called to rent it for a month. So I rented it for the whole month of February. And that allowed me for it to be the base, which I could go and look at other properties

around the area to be sure this was the one I wanted to put an offer on. And in that time, in February, I also started asking questions because the Olive Grove, so it was only three hectares with the houses. And then the Olive Groves used to be attached outside of the fence. So I was like, who owns the Olive Grove

outside of the fence? And they were like, I don't know, let's find out. So they find out, I go to find out that all the land around it is also for sale. Wow. And so this is when I was like, this has to be the place because this is like the farm dream and also the retreat dream.

Like this was like the both tied together. So then I inquired about buying the land outside. So it was a different transaction. And long story short, I moved into these houses. They let me move in before I bought it because the houses didn't pass the inspection. I was supposed to sign the houses in August, 2022 when the Euro was equal to the dollar.

And- And we're just coming out of the pandemic here too. Exactly, exactly. Exactly. And it was very new, very fresh. And they were supposed to be done with the works that needed to be fixed by December, 2022, which then turned into June of 2020,

or sorry, yeah, December of 2022, then turned into June, 2023, which then found out more works that needed to be done, which turned into July, 2024. So I was supposed to start the project to refurbish this house because it was really old and start hosting small gatherings so it could pay for itself. This was an investment property. It wasn't for me to like live in Gallic around. And I made a mistake of starting to invest money

into the farm and my garden and the chickens and all these things. And before, you know, I bought this house because I was like certain that this house was gonna be purchased. But then three years of my life goes by and I realized like, oh my God, like a road was gonna be erected. And then they were like,

like there was so many discrepancies of this property that were on, they didn't tell me. And I don't think that the owners are like bad people. I just think that they didn't have me. And I don't think that the owners are like bad people. I just think that they didn't have their paperwork in order. And in order to sell a house in Italy, unless it's like really written that you, everything is whatever, like transparent, you cannot sell something.

So the commune is crazy. They check every single detail of every little thing of the house to protect me as a buyer. But long story short, I was just like draining money without being able to make money. And so after this road got erected and all these things, and I realized the value that I paid was just not the value that I should have.

So I also got taken advantage by the real estate agent and the owners because I didn't know. I was an American thinking like, wow, this is so cheap compared to what I'm used to in Los Angeles. And I didn't know. I was an American thinking like, wow, this is so cheap compared to what I'm used to in Los Angeles. Yeah. And I didn't do enough research and really got fucked over. If you want protein to build lean muscle, but without the caloric impact or need to cut, you need perfect amino. It's pure essential amino acids, the building blocks of proteins

in a precise form and ratio that allows for near 100% utilization in building lean muscle and no caloric impact. So we build protein six times as much as way but without the excess body fat we normally get during bulking. This is the new era of protein supplementation and it's real. If you want to build lean muscle without having to cut, you need perfect amino. Now let's get back to the Ultimate Human Podcast. Wow. So then I decided to back-

And as an, not to break your story, but as an American citizen, can you just go over and buy land there? You don't have to be native or get any kind of special visa or you can just own land there. Yes. Okay. You don't need a special visa. You actually can get a special visa if you own land there.

Okay, so once you got it, then you could- Yes, so if you're an American, yes, exactly. I have a self-employment visa if you own land there. Okay, so once you got it, then you could, and I assume you have a visa now. Yes, exactly. I have a self-employment visa because I also have a company there, the agriculture company, yeah. So in the end, in the meantime, I bought the land all around it,

which is where my olive oil comes from. So I don't know what your resources were, but it sounds like you drained a lot of resources at this point, yeah. Yeah, drained a lot of resources. It was very humbling. I made- It was scary. Yeah, very scary lot of resources. It was very humbling. I made- It was scary.

Yeah, very scary because all this money that I would have never had from this house, I was like putting it into, investing into this project that was supposed to make money and I ended up losing like so much of it. And now when I backed out, because it had been three years, the owners said that they spent the deposit

and they won't give it back to me, so now I have to go to court. Oh my God. Yes. On the land that you currently own but are trying to give back. No, so the land is separate. Okay.

So the land I own outright, and the land is owned by Shana Agricola, which is my agriculture company. It was just the houses that I was trying to buy, which is in the middle of the land that I own. So it's like, I own 88 hectares, or 88 acres of land, and the houses are in the dead center of it. And you've got to get out of that.

That's what you're trying to get out of. That is what I'm trying to get out of, is the house situation. So I was trying to- Because you're overpaid and- Yeah, I was trying to just renegotiate with them, but they weren't willing to budge. So then I was like, okay, well then just give me my money back so that I can go on with my life.

You guys wasted three years of my life because you didn't have your paperwork organized and you expect me to just like take the brunt of it. And they said no. So unfortunately there's nothing else left for me to do then to... And it's not like in the States where they hold the money in escrow, they released it to them. So they spent it. So they're saying to, they're telling me they don't have the money to pay me back. And then, so now I have to, I'm literally filing with them in court because my lawyer is like, you, you have the right to have the money back because it's, they didn't do the, like they were supposed to finish the work as of December and you were so kind to wait two and a half more years for them to finish the work and they didn't. So like you, by law, you are supposed to get reimbursement

for the deposit, but you know, in Italy, to go to court is like, it's a minimum of four years for this to be resolved. Oh my gosh. Yeah. Wow. Yeah. Wow. Yeah. So, you know, I, listen, I love what I do

and I love my land and I love producing this olive oil and like, we're gonna do so much more with the land to make more products to sell because it's so magical. The land there and the olive trees are, you know, 200, 300 years old. So it's why they have such high polyfinal count because the older the tree, the deeper the roots and that's where the polyfinals come from is the nutrient dense soil. So it's like, I'm so grateful and I wouldn't change anything also because I think I needed to be humbled coming from Los Angeles and like

thinking anything's possible. Like I, I'm happy that I went through that spiritual humbling. It was obviously very hard because then I like, all this dream of everything I thought I had figured out just got totally taken away from me. And I had to figure out like, okay, well, what is my life now? And I met my fiance in the meantime, through moving to Italy, he's Italian, we

just got engaged. Oh, congratulations. Thank you. On New Year's Eve. So you didn't know him when you were going and buying this land? No, I met him like a year and a half after I moved. That's cool. Yeah.

How's your Italian? Not very good. How's his English? Great. Good. Okay. Yeah, he lived in New York for like five years. So yeah, no, my Italian is like, I can understand a lot,

but for me to talk, it's like very basic. I need to like go to an eight week course, but I like don't have the time. And then I also speak in English all day because my companies are based in America. So I'm still doing Zoom calls all day in English. And then I have a translating assistant with me in Italy who like helps me translate everything.

So I'm pretty much crippled myself to learn Italian at this point. But I will learn, especially before I have children because they're gonna know more Italian than me. And that's not, you know, I'm gonna have a codling. I'm dropping my back. Yeah, because he's obviously fluent. So he's gonna, yeah. Exactly.

And growing up from, you know, when they start out being multilingual is easy. It's almost like they don't know the difference. But learning it as an adult is tough. So you're living in the property that you're trying to get out of now until you figure it out, right? No, I moved out.

Or, okay, so it's just vacant. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So when you say moved out, are you on the property now? So no, I moved to Florence area because my fiance works closer to Florence. So I actually moved before it kind of went sour because I was like, okay, I'll move out of the Umbria property because it's gonna have to be totally redone anyway.

So we moved in together like a couple, a year and some change ago outside of Florence. And so I already kind of like moved. So I was like, perfect, I can commute to Umbria like while the project's going. And then we live together here. So it's easier for him to go to work cause I don't have to go to work every single day He has to drive to an office every day, right?

So that was kind of our compromise and I moved him out of Florence City Center because I refused to move back to a city I was like, this is our compromise So now we live like 20 minutes outside of Florence still in the countryside and in a town called Improneta That's awesome. And what happened far away is that from your place? It's like an hour and 20 minutes drive. So you know what's fascinating to me is, so I have a dream of eventually selling my concrete jungle and starting a regenerative farm.

Like I wanna ride out my years on a regenerative farm. I even have a piece of property that I really like that I've sort of picked out in Colorado, a place for grass-fed cattle and pasture raised eggs and free range chickens and hydroponic microgreens, really nutrient dense microgreens. And I grew up on a farm, so what was really weird is when I left high school,

I wanted to get as far away from the farm as possible. Of course. And then the further I get into adulthood, I want to get back to the farm as fast as possible. And we kind of had that talk before the podcast. You know, sometimes we just miss that connection with mother nature. We just miss the basics, just grounding, sunlight, breath work, eating whole foods.

I mean, the food in Italy is very clean. It's amazing. I mean, I'm sure you could find bad food. I mean, it's westernized there too. But for the most part, I mean, it's real whole foods. Olive oil's arguably one of the best things you can put in the human body. I do a shot of it every day.

Thank you for the bottle, by the way. You're welcome. But what fascinates me is not only how bold and intimidating and scary it must have been just to relocate your life there, especially as a single woman, is I can't imagine you had a skill set in regenerative farming or anything, right?

Like, I mean, you didn't learn how to raise all the trees in LA. Honestly, I- Chickens you didn't learn in New York? I mean- No, no, I didn't, I knew nothing. I only knew from- That's what's so fascinating to me.

Obsession, I only knew from research on my own. I mean, we're really lucky to live in the time that we live now because so many things are available to us on the internet and books and all this stuff. So it was more of an obsession of wanting to learn all this stuff. And then the best way to learn, and I say this for people in business,

business school is amazing. And it does teach you a lot of things that maybe I wish I had when I started entrepreneurship. But what really teaches you how to run a business is running a business. Business school is amazing and it does teach you a lot of things that maybe I wish I had when I started an entrepreneurship, but what really teaches you how to run a business is running a business because there's nothing that school can teach you other than real life scenarios. And it's the same with anything. I was like, I will figure out how to do this and the best way for me to do it is just to immerse myself in it. So that's exactly what I did. I went there and I figured it out as I went and I've learned so much. I got really into biodynamic farming. That was what I wanted to do was biodynamics

and using the ecosystem of the area and the farms. And I find it fascinating. I find it so cool to learn about how nature used to work before we like manipulated it so much. So yeah, I just came from pure passion and throwing myself into it. Wow, that's amazing. Yeah.

And so you were, you know, I mean, how to raise a chicken, how to like, you know. Yeah, exactly. And you literally went out there and I don't even know where you get a chicken. I mean, you started to- Researched. Because I also was like, I need to make sure

I have chickens that are organic, that were never fed corn, that also, you know, it's like, there's a lot of things that I'm obsessed with. Like I will never eat a corn-fed chicken because I have a huge allergy to corn. So it's like, then I had to find specific farms that were also believing in that in Italy, which are luckily you can actually find them, you know,

often, I don't know if anyone knows this. Probably more common than not. Italy is the most sustainable agriculture in the world. They invest so much money into organic agriculture. I was in Medellin, Colombia a year and a half ago. And I just remember I was at a restaurant and I was in Medellin, Columbia a year and a half ago, and I just remember I was at a restaurant, and I was reading the menu of the steak,

and the waiter came over, and I was like, you mind if I ask if this is grass-fed steak? And he looked at me like three heads, he's like, what else do cows eat? I'm like, oh, my bad, we actually have to ask that back in the States, you know? And he was was so confused, cows don't eat chickens,

I mean, what's your question? The corn, the whey, the biocs, the hormones? No idea what I was talking about. So it's a cow in a field. But it's just so funny because they don't know any other way, but here you have to try to get around the system with all the processing and everything. And this brings me back to the conversation we were having before the

podcast because truly I believe that nature heals and I truly believe because I've seen it in both clinical practice, my own life, my family, is that we're so disconnected from other nature. And we're actually disconnected from each other. You know, meaningful relationships, just conversation. In my previous podcast that I had on, she was talking about how we're human beings and not human doings. And can you just be like,

I'm sure you had a lot of alone times on this farm when you first got there, overwhelmed, not with an exact roadmap, probably going to sleep in Italy. There had to be some nights where you're like, what did I get myself into? Oh yeah. And so talk a little bit about,

I mean, I'm talking about before you had a relationship and someone to share ideas with and things, but like, you know, when you were that single woman by yourself, foreign country, just bit off this project that you're probably think it was more than I could chew. What were you doing actively to just reassure yourself, not get into that panic state, you know, not sort of just collapse from, you know, from overwhelm.

Yeah, from overwhelm. So I have to say that all the spiritual work that I did before, and this was like the beginning, actually, I learned way more in the process of me moving. But I had some basic tools of learning how to be okay in my own body. Like home is your vessel, it's your body. Home is not a place that you live. And if you feel home in your body, then you can essentially be okay in any environment. And this was ultimately like the biggest realization I had

of like, I can create home anywhere. It doesn't need to be in Los Angeles. And so I'm gonna sell this materialistic thing and I'm to go try and recreate it in a different version in Italy. I'll never forget though, I was staying in Paris in London before I finally like got moved into the place in Italy. And let me remind you, these country houses are old. They're like 30 years, you know, wear and tear and there's no kitchen cabinets on the thing. And there's like, you know, I had no furniture at all. So I had the house manager guy who worked for the owners

before just buy me a mattress. And like, I had a mattress when I arrived. And then he gave me like, you know, a table and some chairs. So I came with my three suitcases and that was it. You're like, what's the wifi password? He's like, there is no wifi. He's like, no wifi.

Yeah, by the way, the Wi-Fi that the house owners did have set up didn't work at all. So of course I had to go get Starlink and then try to figure out how to use Starlink. So I remember I arrived and at this time I already kind of stopped drinking alcohol through my spiritual journey, but I would still occasionally have organic wine

here and there. And my girlfriend, bless her, so one of my best friends, Olga, I met her actually in Italy before I moved and she helped me actually feel comfortable to move there because she was like, she lives in Paris now, but she was living in Rome at the time. And she just became like a sister really fast.

And so on my solo trips, her and I used to hang out. And so when I finally made that decision, I was like, at least I know I have one friend that is close by, you know, in case something goes wrong. I also have like one of my best friends in Denmark, but she's a mom of three and it's not like she can just like leave and help me, you know? So I got to the houses and I like,

I like, was just sitting in the kitchen houses and I like, what is this, so funny. I like was just sitting in the kitchen and you're like, it's really isolated. Like I'm not, like this is also to my, I'll tell you a side story after too, which is so funny about my fiance. But I just sat in my kitchen and was like, oh boy, like what did I do to this too? I had no car.

I had no car and I was in the countryside. So I was like, how am I gonna get groceries? Like I need to like, what is my game plan here? So luckily I had Matteo, who was like the guy who was the property, he like watched the property for the owners before. And so he like really helped me manage everything. But like, you can't buy a car as a foreigner in Italy.

So I had to go buy a car in another country. So I had to go fly to try to find a car to then drive back to Italy so I could have a car because I was like wasting money on leasing a car. You can buy property that you can't buy a car? No. Wow. See like that's the stuff that

of course nobody tells you. No one tells you that. No one told me that. Yeah. So I, yeah, I just had this moment where I like almost had a meltdown where I was like, okay, I know you're really like a bold woman, like you're in areas

and like, you know, you've done a lot of things in your life and you just go for it. But like this one, this one is like next level. So I literally have never drank alone in my life but I poured myself a glass of wine because I was like, I need a glass of wine. I think my whole audience has already forgiven you for it. I said, don't worry, this is a judgment-free zone now.

And I remember my girlfriend, Olga, bless her, she literally calls me and she's like, how's it going? Like, how are you doing? And I was like, well, I'm just like having a glass of wine. And she was like, you having a glass of wine by yourself? I was like, mm-hmm. And she was like, okay, you wanna talk about it? Like, how do you know how you feel?

And she's so sweet. She literally surprised me and flew the next day because she knew I was unwell because it's like, I don't drink in the first place and then I'm drinking by myself. It's like, really, something's wrong. Something is not right. So she literally came and surprised me next day.

And called me at like 9 a.m. and was like, guess where I am? And I was like, where? She's like, I just landed in Florence. I'm coming to you, bitch. And like literally came. Yes, and literally came and helped me just like get the basics.

She was like, let's go get the basics so you can feel comfortable. Cause I was like, what do I need to make myself not feel like I'm in a complete panic? So basic needs. So I went and got like kitchen stuff and knives and cutting boards and like things that made me feel, you know, I love to cook and I'm in the countryside.

So like, I don't have, you know, I can't go to a restaurant on the street every day. They're not even open every day. So I like had to get myself in like this country living, you know, vibe. And then of course, all of my spiritual tools is what actually like helped me and grounded me. Like having my feet in the grass and actually grounding myself every day and

hearing the nature and having the view and like going outside and being like, what was the reason why you did this? And reminding myself why I was there and just like continuing in my spiritual practices of like figuring out as I mentioned to you before this podcast, like it wasn't until I landed in Italy and I had to sit in silence that I realized my underlying anxiety was chronic, like really intense. And it started bringing up all these feelings

and all this stuff. And then I started realizing how much grounding my energy, like physically grounding my energy and also visualizations and meditation helped me actually start to combat and realize when my anxiety was okay and when my anxiety was heightened. And so I just like,

that's when I started promoting a lot in my journey of like putting your feet in the grass and how important it is and how it's this free tool that we have. And it doesn't, if you don't have grass, it can be sand. And if you know I'm sand, tool that we have. And if you don't have grass, it could be sand. And if you know I'm sand, it could be dirt. And if you don't have dirt, it can be leaf. It doesn't really matter what it is.

It's just grounding in nature in general. And so this whole process, and of course, spending time with animals and buying my chickens. And when I started to really develop out this dream that I had, it just made me feel so grateful. I was just like, how blessed am I that I'm able to do this? And also, the cost of living in Italy is so little

compared to here. It's like traumatizing when I come back to the States now and have to go to the grocery store. I swear, I'm like, I'm paying six pints for a freaking blueberry, six dollars for like a thing of blueberries. And like what I can get for six euros at the grocery store in Italy

is like a whole bag worth of fresh ingredients. Wow. Like I just did this grocery haul because I wanna tell people, wanna show people the comparison. And I bought, I'm not even joking you, like three huge bags of vegetables, so many different types,

like six cucumbers for my juices and four celery things, bunches of celery and like two kombucha things and onions and garlic and all this, everything, 51 euros. No way. 51 euros. If I went to Air One. Definitely not at Air One. When I go to Air One. 1500 euros. Yeah, exactly.

When I go to Air One, it's a minimum of 250. Yeah. Wow. For a minimum of 250. For like half of that. Right. You know why? Because Air One is not the readily available grocery item. I mean, right? It's the specialty item because it is back to the basics.

I mean, there's your grass-fed meats, your raw dairies, you know, all of the things that in Italy are just the norm and here they're the exception. Yeah, I know. You know, I remember Max Lugavere saying one time on a podcast, he's like, you know, if you walk into your grocery store and they have a health food section, what does it say about the rest of the store?

It says everything it needs to tell you, right? And then the health food section is the most expensive. It's a tiny little area. It's like, you know, the shelves are kind of off on the side and you're the exception to the rule. I think, you know, which is why I'm so excited about this Maha movement because I feel like it's not gonna happen overnight, but you know,

going back to supporting our farmers and local agriculture, there are apps now that will tell you where your local farmers markets are, where can you get raw cheese and raw dairy? Where can you actually get locally grown chickens and And where can you get you know eggs from a hen house twice a week that are not so commercial? I think you know us getting back to the basics. I mean number one you're neutrifying the body. Yeah. Right? I mean you're getting the minerals, the raw materials, the vitamins, amino

acids. And number two you know just you're sort of reconnecting with nature. We didn't even think about shopping outside in a farmer's market. You know, we think about under big fluorescent lights in a warehouse. Yeah, exactly. Well, food became transactional versus actually being like a relationship you have with food,

which is our biggest problem. You go to the market, you have no idea where anything's from, you buy it in plastic, you check it out, you pay for your credit card, and then you go home and you eat it. And like, that's the disconnect between the relationship with food and human beings.

And obviously city people feel that the most. And it's another huge topic that I'm really passionate about is connectivity with food and how if our children were raised to understand where food came from and the joy that it is to watch a seed turn into a sprout and then a sprout turn into a plant and then a plant that gives you something you can eat.

Is even for an adult, even 90 year old grandmas in Italy find it incredible. I mean, the relationship that they have with food in Italy is like insane. They love food, they love community, they love long, long, long, long, long meals. And they love growing everything. I mean, most people have their own garden,

produce their own olive oil, even if it's a small amount. And it's normal for them. That's their life. And they appreciate the ingredients. And they tend to the soil. It's like why the food is so good in Italy and why people, even me, before I moved there, I could go and eat all the pasta and cheese I wanted

and it wouldn't affect my gut and my skin versus I was gluten-free, gluten-free, dairy-free, refined sugar-free, corn-free. Like I wouldn't eat anything being in LA and I was more inflamed than when I was eating the food there is because they've been passing down generations by family owned farmers, the old way of farming. And yes, of course, some of them did, you know, they do have pesticides. It's still there in Italy, but like generally speaking,

it's family owned businesses and they've been doing the old regenerative practices forever so they never felt the need to change that. And so the food has more nutrients because the soil is not over tilled or over poisoned. And so when you eat the food, you're actually absorbing the nutrients that your body needs versus feeling like it's just inflamed

and you're not getting the nutrients. It's like an apple in America, you eat one and you actually only get the nutrients that is like a quarter of an apple and then so you have to eat six apples in order to get the nutrients of one apple. Whereas when you go to Italy and you eat a tomato or an apple, you're like, whoa, this tastes so good. And it's like, well, yeah. And it's nutrient because it's nutrient dense. Which actually releases GLP-1, which is ozempic, naturally in your gut, right? I mean, it's a hormone we make

in response to nutrient density. I mean, and so many people are on the highly processed diets and so they're not releasing a lot of this satiety hormone that says, hey, stop eating, which is why in tons of different studies, you see people giving equal caloric density diets, one highly processed and one a whole food diet. People that are eating the whole foods

will eat less calories because they're more satiated because there's more nutrients and people that are the processed. Do you notice, I mean, when you come back to the States, you actually notice the difference? I'm sure you're militant about trying to control what goes in your body, but at some point, you gotta eat. And so, do you actually feel that difference?

Everybody I know says, yeah, gosh, I could about Italy, I have a bowl of pasta and I have a basket of bread and I actually feel fine. I lost weight eating pasta and bread and olive oil and drinking wine in Italy. Yeah, it's totally like that. Yeah. It's so accurate and so many people do that.

Yeah, because you're regular. Yes, and listen, because Italy is not into health and well, like I can't go down and get a green juice down the street or like go, I miss some of the biohacking wellnessy stuff that we have here in America because I do love that stuff. And so when I come here, I like totally go to like, all the juice places and get all my smoothies

and like, you know, versus having to make it for myself every day, which by the way is the way of, you know, I preferred way, but of course it's nice when you don't have it is like these, these conveniences of America I miss sometimes because we live in the world of convenience and Italy is the opposite of that. It's like how unconvenient can things be?

I'm not kidding. Really? Yes. Itient can things be? I'm not kidding. Really? Yes. It's just so backwards. I'm not kidding. It's so the opposite of how we are. It's actually wild. Which, by the way, it's amazing because it's why Italy is Italy, right? It's 100 years back in time.

Yeah. And so people love to go there to experience that. But, you know, there's a pros and cons of everything, right? Hi, guys. Gary here. I want to take a few minutes of your time to invite you to my ultimate human VIP community. This is a private community with front row seats to my most advanced health protocols,

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fast pass to better health. So don't miss it. Now let's get back to the ultimate human podcast. Yeah. Um, I want to talk a little bit about some of the projects you've worked on, the inner alchemy and your gut healing course, your online gut healing course. I think we agree, because we talked about it before the camera started rolling, about everything comes back to the gut.

I mean, if you heal the gut, you heal the biome. And I think only recently has modern medicine even begun to shine a glimmer of light on how important gut health is. I mean, it really is only one single cell layer separating us, our outside world, from our inside world. I mean, this system that we call the gut, the colon, the small intestine, the stomach, all the esophagus, all of these areas

is technically outside of the body. And so it's as much a barrier to keep things that shouldn't come in out as it is a gateway to let the things that should go in in. And if you think about the sophistication of, before you even understand any of the physiology, like this stuff shouldn't come in and this stuff we need to let in. If we let enough of this in, we're healthy.

If we let some of the things in, we're unhealthy. And in the connection, not only to our immune system, but to our emotions, to our mood, you know, to so many different aspects of being optimally healthy. I believe so many people that are diagnosed with a mental illness, just throw that category out there, or mood disorder, actually just have a lack of mental fitness because of the gut. So talk a little bit about what led you here

and what inspired you to put this course together and what does it do? Yeah, so I agree with everything that you just said. I, of course, where I started this journey was my own health problems. I had so many weird health issues that I could not figure out what was causing them from skin problems to chronic bloating

to cystic acne all over my back to like, just like weird things constipated. Like I thought being constipated for like three days was normal, you know? Like, and it's just, it's just not, nothing about that is normal. Super not. And, you know, I was in,

I was on a quest to figure out how to heal myself naturally. And I would go through these phases where I would like get a little better. And then I would go backwards five steps. And then I would get a little better. And then I would go myself naturally. And I would go through these phases where I would like get a little better. And then I would go backwards five steps. And then I would get a little better. Then I would go backwards five steps. And I went to 11 different doctors, all different types, medical doctors, holistic doctors,

like all these different types of weird, you know, Chinese medicine doctors to like organ, like measuring your organ doctors to like, I was literally like, I'll do anything to figure out what is wrong with me and not live in this. Like I had also chronic like brain fog and memory loss and so many things that I was like, I don't understand I'm the healthiest person I know.

Like, how is this possible? I ate all the right things. I didn't eat any gluten. I didn't have any dairy. I didn't do, I ate, I was literally like, I work out every day. I don't understand. Right. And it wasn't, I don't understand.

And it wasn't until I met actually Dr. Joffrey, who is my partner in inner alchemy. And when I met him, we became friends first, I was actually going to him for like chiropractic in New York. I met him through Kelly Ripa. Oh, wow. Because he's in Naples.

Yeah, and I was in Naples, but he was in New York originally. Oh, he was in New York originally. Yeah, so he used to live in- I think the world of him too, by the way. I use his acid-kicking alcohol. Yeah, get off your acid, the green minerals. Yeah, exactly, I use all his stuff too.

His minerals, I take his vitamin D3 every morning. Yeah. No, he's amazing. Yeah, I've been taking his stuff, I think, for like seven years now when we met. So when we met in New York, he was helping me with my scoliosis, and then that turned into,

he was like all into this, all this other stuff, with gut healing and whatever, and so I was like starting to pick his brain about all of it and asking all these questions, and then that turned into, he was like all into this, all this other stuff, with gut healing and whatever. And so I was like starting to pick his brain about all of it and asking all these questions. And then he was like, we have to do testing, let me help you. And he was the first person that was like, we should do a GI map and test your gut health.

It sounds like it's a gut problem. And I was like, cool, I don't know what that means, but like, that sounds good. It was like the first time I actually felt like I was, I got it as something that made sense to me, right? He like tested my blood, live blood cell analysis. He like did all this stuff that like no other doctor I went to did.

They didn't like ask, even the top medical gut specialist in LA, like I did a colonoscopy and the otheroscopy and like everyone was like, you're fine. And I'm like, well, I'm not fine. So I don't, you know, and yeah, so I did a GI map with him. He was like, oh girl, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I had like everything under the sun for gut, Candida overgrowth, parasite.

Like all the bad bacteria were like 10 times higher than the good bacteria. I had H. pylori. Like I basically had like the perfect formula of like a very fucked up guy. I had H. Pylori, like I basically had like the perfect formula of like a very fucked up guy. Yeah. Yeah. And so through that, you know, doing a whole protocol with him.

And at the same time, I also, so this is why we came together. So I was doing these protocols and they were helping me, but I had so much underlying stress that it was making it go backwards. And it wasn't until I got my stress under control and I moved to Italy and like realized all this stuff spiritually that I actually was able to heal my gut.

So it took me six years to like get to where I actually was like healed. And it wasn't because of what Dr. Joffrey was giving me. It was because I had so much chronic underlying anxiety that it was wreaking havoc on my gut. And that's why I couldn't actually fix it. Yeah, and it was just like the genesis of serene soul retreats, is that how, okay.

Yeah, so I host retreats, wellness retreats that happened when I moved to Italy. It's one of my favorite offerings I've ever done. We do week retreats with women and it's amazing. And then now I have a Shane and Serene Circle, which is an online community that kind of brings the retreats to everyone because obviously it's not everyone can come for a week

or can afford a retreat. So I also launched this platform online called Shane and Serene Circle, which is like everything I cover on the retreats because we do food, relationship with food, spiritual work, fitness, and then of course, like enjoy Italy at the same time. Wow, so women come from the states and go to Italy Yeah, they come from all over the world, but I would say like half of them are from the states

Yeah, how big are these retreats were between 10 to 16 Wow and do they stay at your farmhouse? So that was trying to get out of The original plan was for them to stay at my farmhouse, but because everything started to be delayed, I ended up collaborating with other luxury properties around Italy. Yeah, so I've done a couple other properties in Italy, and then now we're trying to do weekend retreats, and then I wanna do event day events on my land.

So we wanna do like, have you, do you know the brand like Outstanding in the Field? Have you heard of them? So I wanna do like that on my land. So huge table long dinners where people come and do a wellness day. So we do like a day retreat on my land so people can actually be in the Olive Grove.

They can like see the land because so many people are invested in this land. So I want to give them the opportunity to come. And even though the house is like TBD what happens, like I could end up getting them in the future anyway, but for now like it's just in the loop of whatever, at least allows them to come and like be in the olive groves and feel the energy of the land

because the energy of the land is what everyone should feel. It transformed my life, transformed my life. Wow. And so you host these retreats for women. When you say a day, it's like breakfast, lunch and dinner. Do you guys hike? Do you meditate? Yeah, so we do some sort of,

yeah, it'd be different per event. We'll see, we Do you meditate? Yeah, so we do some sort of, yeah. It'd be different per event. We'll see, we haven't done any yet. We're planning them now for this year. Okay, cool. But we wanna do, come like a little bit in the later afternoon, we do some sort of physical activity.

So whether it be yoga, hike, Pilates, or whatever. Then we move into some sort of spiritual work. So whether it be a sound bath or meditation practice or whatever, then we move into some sort of spiritual work. So whether it be a sound bath or meditation practice or whatever, then we do a long table dinner and then we wanna do a after party with a DJ. So it's like a summer vibe. That's so cool.

Yeah, that's so amazing. So you're on this journey with Dr. Joffrey who's technically working on your God. When I say technically, like he's a technician, right? Yes. He's like the specter is low, overgrowth with the SIBO, H. pylori. So we're addressing all of these issues. And he has an amazing protocol.

I actually did a challenge with him and it was one of the most successful challenges I've ever had. We had 30, I don't know, 5,000, 37,000 people online. And it was amazing. And I also find him, which I think is important in a practitioner, just very intentional and very caring. Like when he engages you,

you feel like you're his only client. And we used his greens, and then we put together different recipes with like fermented veggies and everything. So you're on this protocol, and then what did the spiritual journey work look like for you? Oh man, yeah. Started with like journaling,

and if you don't wanna talk about it. No, no, no, I'm happy to share. Because I feel like a lot of people are spiritually devoid. And when I say spiritually devoid, it's not that you don't believe in Allah, or you don't believe in Jesus, or you don't believe in Allah or you don't believe in Jesus or you don't, it's like you don't have a calling other than your job. You really

don't identify with the purpose. You know, interestingly, when you look at the blue zones, I talk about this a lot, there wasn't continuity that ran between diets. The only thing that were between diets, the only thing that were not exceptions were mobility until later in life, basically exercise. And it wasn't like intended, you know, these centenarians were not doing hits cardio. Oh, they were walking. Yeah, walking. Gardening.

Yeah, gardening, exactly. Swimming. But when they garden, got down on their knees, squatted, you know, biting it, stood up, carried a bucket. Chopped wood, carried a bucket. Yeah, exactly. Like a sack of potatoes. Exactly.

But the other was a sense of community and purpose. And is that sort of what you're getting at? Yeah. Oh, okay. Like what's my purpose? Yes. So in my own journey of diving into spirituality, I realized that all the things that we want in life,

like empowerment or setting boundaries with others and attracting abundance and having our dream job and attracting the right partner, all of these things in order to get the real version of what you dream of, you have to do the inner work and understand your inner world. Because if you don't understand your inner world, you have no idea why you're attracting different things into your life or why you're not attracting different things into your life. And the only way you can figure that out is if you start to have a better relationship with the soul within yourself. And through my own journey, I realized how completely disconnected,

I thought I was like, I was an intuitive person. I was like always into health and wellness. I was always, you know, I loved crystals. And like, this was like the surface level of actually getting into the inner work of myself and understanding where all of my triggers came from and how I actually was a very reactive person in life and would react to small shit that didn't matter, right?

Or get angry or annoyed, or like even if I didn't snap at someone else, it was like my internal world was reactive, no? And it wasn't until I was like, oh my God, like I don't have to live in reactivity. I can actually live in peace. And the only way that I can do that is by figuring out where it comes from and why I would become reactive

over something that like essentially doesn't matter. And even if it is something that would upset you as a human being, it doesn't mean that you get to choose how it affects your wellbeing. And on my anxiety journey, that was the missing link is that I was letting everything affect me at such a deep level because I was so used to being in survival mode and like a warrior, you know, chick and just like,

bah, ready to like fight a war, you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah. That everything hit me like it was the worst case scenario, even if it wasn't. So obviously I was attracting different things into my life. Like I've been through so many crazy things and it was because my energy was waiting for the worst case scenario

because that's what I was used to since I was a kid. And even though I've had so much good in my life, it all came with some depilitating challenge to get over. And it was, I literally was like, what is this? And why, like it can't just be like, because, you know, because I, you know, it's a hundred percent something inside myself. So what I love about spiritual work is that

just asking journaling is like, people laugh at journaling, but like it's one of the main starting points of being able to ask yourself questions because we don't ask ourselves enough, how do you feel today? People don't actually ask themselves that. And like, how is your internal world? Like is something off?

Like what emotion do you feel? Did that like, people are so reactive and move forward in life so fast that they actually forget the connectivity with themselves. And our phones don't help because then we're looking for instant gratification through social media versus like having you know these it's like dopamine hits right? It's like we're looking for every dopamine hit we can find in society whether it be friends, buying something, Instagram, whatever. And instead of like finding the happiness and the light, the like joy that we have, the happiness that we're supposed to have, the abundance that we're supposed to have

in our energy every day. Because then those dopamine things aren't necessary because you're just embodying the energy of all those things with you all the time. But in order to achieve that, you have to dig deep within yourself and your inner world and figure out what parts of yourself you don the time. But in order to achieve that, you have to dig deep within yourself and your inner world and figure out what parts of yourself you don't understand. And we're so, as we discussed before on this podcast,

people are so disconnected from themselves, they're disconnected from the others, they're disconnected from so many things because we're going into this virtual world of like everything is a different reality than the present moment then from nature, then from, it's crazy when you think about it.

And we can't escape AI, right? We can't escape this technology and like, it's great, we have a lot of it and it's amazing. Like I love using some certain things for business. I think it's amazing. But we have to find the balance between the inner work, the connectivity to nature, the caring about, you know, planet earth and the food we balance between the inner work, the connectivity to nature, the caring about planet earth and the food we eat

and the wholesome ingredients that we have and caring about sourcing and building a relationship with food again and ourselves as well as, if you wanna dabble in that stuff or if you live in a city, like you can have both, but you have to care about yourself and what you put in your body and your inner world

and like going deep. And yes, meditation is a really good way to do that. And yes, journaling is a good way to do that. I worked with many healers in my past to help me understand things better. Now I'm in a place where I feel I don't need that. And healers are amazing because they do help you like transform different energy.

But at the end of the day, it's you that transform it. It's never the healer. So people should never look to healers as if they have some sort of like, it's you that you choose. It's you that you transform yourself. They are just a guide to help you through that process. And I love, and don't get me wrong, like I've worked with some amazing healers.

I bring them on my retreats to work with the retreat members when they need like an extra up and feel comfort and like transform energy within themselves. But yeah, it's it's really coming back to where we used to be and how we used to live before all of this modern day world. And the Europeans have more connectivity to it because it is still there a hundred years behind. Whereas in America, we really struggle with that. You know, I'm all about optimizing performance. And lately I've been using the Ion weighted vest during my workouts and it's been a game changer.

It isn't your average weighted vest. It's designed to fit like a second skin, activating your core, improving blood flow, and even helping you with recovery while you train. What I love most is that the weight is perfectly distributed. It doesn't pull on your shoulders or throw off your alignment, whether I'm doing strength training or cardio, or just taking a walk, I'm burning more calories, building muscle

and pushing my endurance even further. If you're serious about leveling up your training and unlocking your full potential, check out the ION weighted vest at iongear.com. That's a-i-o-n-gear.com. And you can use code ULTIMATE for 10% off and start training smarter today. Now let's get back to the ULTIMATE Human Podcast. Yeah, you know, it's funny when you go to Europe sometimes, you walk down these streets and there's tables spilled out onto the sidewalk

and there's families at midnight that are still eating. They're done eating, but they're just sitting around and they're enjoying that time and there's kids running around and the kid gets on the uncle's lap and runs around and then gets on the mom's lap and it's like there's that interconnectivity around food and you know and I also remember years ago, it's going back into the early 2000s, being super frustrated because in August, when the Europeans take August off, they take August off. Everyone is off.

No one works. There could be a closing on a real estate project and you're like, oh, we're signing it tomorrow. Oh, my vacation starts tomorrow. Well, that's fine, just sign it on vacation. Nope. And they unplug for a month. And they take it very seriously.

Like don't go to a city in the summer in Europe because no one's working. No one will wait on you. It's like. No one's working. I think there's like a kind of a really interesting beauty. Like the more my life has grown and expanded and even socioeconomically becoming more successful,

because that's how society judges it, I can't wait to reconnect back to the basics. We have this little like ultra not fancy log house in Colorado, I talk about it all the time. It's like my favorite place on earth. We went there in the middle of the winter and it was the first time we went in the dead of winter, which kind of reminds me of your trip to Italy

because I was like, what the hell did we do? This seems so cool on Instagram. And then we had to take a snowcat up there and when the contractor left, I realized we were legitimately stuck there and there's no electricity, there's no running water and there's no heat and it was 15 degrees there. And there's no electricity, there's no running water, and there's no heat, and it was 15 degrees, and the temperature was dropping.

Firewood, we need fire. Had to dig down for firewood and put it in there, and then you walk over to wash your hands, the sink doesn't work, you're like, oh, I'll just take a shower. Oh, you can't take a shower. I mean, maybe I'll just boil some water. We got snow and boiled the snow.

But it was just something super magical about it. It's funny, because one of my wife and I woke up, and it had gotten so, I had started a fire, so the whole cabin warmed up. And then we went to bed and piled under the covers. Well, of course, the fire goes out every night. So you woke up freezing. So it's like 5.30 in the morning.

It's like 15 degrees in the cabin. And she's like, why don't you get up and start a fire? I go, why don't you get up and start a fire? I was like, somebody's dead out here. It's every man for himself. But it was, no, it's just amazing. And sometimes those connections, and I love the fact that you're doing this for women

because another common theme, and a sad fact about autoimmune disease is that the majority of it is in women. About 82% of all autoimmune disease affects women. And I think it has a lot to do with the journey that you were on. I mean, here you are a model and you're living in LA and you're gluten-free and you're dairy-free and you're probably running in the right circles and you eat really clean. And things are just all wrong. It's really the getting back to the basics that-

That healed me. Yeah, that healed you. And I mean, going back to inner alchemy and kind of why Dr. Joffrey and I decided to partner is because it's important for people in their God health journey to have a scientific person like Dr. Joffrey, a real doctor who's going to explain, why things are the way that they had,

all the technical things. And he's like insanely passionate about the amount of, like what supplements you should be taking and, you know, all this stuff. And so that is so important as part of the journey, but he also understands from his own world. And also from my journey is that the, of course, he really, he touches a lot on the food.

He's a very healthy guy and, you know, he's extremely healthy. I do the whole chef portion of it. So we have like a whole cooking segment where I teach you like the basics in the kitchen and how to make a bone broth. And like, we talk about the gut balancing plate. So like everything that you should, how your plates should basically be, you know,

organized when you're thinking about food. I also have, we have a huge section about stress management and how to unpack trauma and stress and different tools that you have in your life and going back to the basics of grounding your feet in the grass and getting sun in your face in the morning and actually having peace and learning what joy is again. Like I was living life so much without knowing what actually brought me joy in life. Now I do

ceramics like on my you know downtime. And when you're an entrepreneur too, I was like, I'm not working enough. What more can I do? And then I realized like, Shayna, when you do that, it actually depletes your energy field and you get drained and then nothing attracts to you versus having boundaries with your team and your job and everything and being efficient in what you do

and then spending time doing things that bring you joy. And Italy really taught me that because they don't overwork at all and have so much balance in what they do. And so I started, you start to be like, oh, this is actually okay to live like this. And it's when you're not in this rat race of feeling bad because everyone else is in the rat race

and you remove yourself from it, you're like, holy crap, like, okay, now I understand the balance of what life is supposed to be like. So now I've been able to find that balance. I'm not saying you have to move to Italy to find that balance. You can do it anywhere, right?

But so yeah, Interalchemy is basically, it's a very extensive 13 module online program that covers all of these topics. That now we just actually, we're about to break it up into three different phases because it's so much information. We realized that it would be better if we broke it up into phases

and also makes it a little bit more affordable for people who don't wanna buy it all at once. So we're doing three different phases now. And yeah, within those phases, we cover lifestyle choices, supplementation, diets, chef school, the science behind gut health, all the different gut-related, most chronic symptoms that people have.

So whether it be Lyme disease, autoimmune disease, brain fog, depression, SIBO. Wow. Basically, we cover all those things, yeah. So what's a basic daily ritual for you look like? I mean, I know that you're a big believer that you need to have rituals, right? What does that look like for you if you're in Italy

or when you're here, because you're traveling? So how are you maintaining this on the road? What are some of your non-negotiables? I have a few. So my morning ritual is the key to everything for me. How I start my day is the most important thing and helps me embody the energy of which I carry out for the entire day.

And when I start it stressed or rushed or not grounded or not listening to some sort of spiritual wisdom or whatever, like I really feel a difference in how I deal with things, how my anxiety comes back and just how like neurotic I feel. So my non-negotiables are, I don't care how early I have to wake up. I like to have two hours before I have to do

any sort of work. So it used to start with five minutes and then it turned into 10 minutes and then it turned into 30 minutes and then now it's two hours. And you say starting work before you get on your phone. Before I touch my phone, before I look at emails. So I'll touch my phone because I typically listen

to some sort of spiritual wisdom in the morning for 30 minutes. It's how I like to start my day. So I wake up, I have my bone broth, I have my olive oil lemon shot. I literally travel with my olive oil because I like need to have it every day. You're welcome. I have my matcha instead of coffee. It's actually how I started my first branch in this kitchen was I created a matcha brand because it helped me so much with my anxiety to switch from coffee to matcha. Wow. And got really passionate about finding the best quality.

We also sent you some matcha too to try. Oh, awesome. And so I got obsessed with finding the best tasting quality matcha you could find on the market. And so then when I found it for myself, I ended up creating a brand. That's actually how I started being an entrepreneur was through selling matcha.

And I called it, I call it morning ritual matcha because it was a huge part of creating my morning ritual because I used to make my matcha and then sit with my matcha and that's when I would journal and meditate and it was part of my like ritual. So in the morning, I always ground. So even this morning, I mean, Miami is a great place because you can walk to the beach.

So my grounding was out to the beach and I woke up at 5 a.m. because I wanted to work out at 8.30. So I have my time. So.m. because I wanted to work out at 8.30. So I wanted to have my time. So I always meditate, I always journal, I always do gratitude. Instead of thinking about the negatives, it's really easy to wake up and think about all the things you need to do and get stressed about it.

But instead, I always try to think of all the things that I'm really, really excited for and grateful in my life, which obviously helps set up my day in a sense of gratitude versus lack or stress. And then I always listen to 30 minutes of some sort of spiritual wisdom. So right now I've been really into Kabbalah. And so I've been listening to a lot of spiritual practice

related to that, just to like something new to educate myself on. And is this like a guided meditation or is it just verbiage? Verbiage. Okay. Yeah, meditations, I used to do a lot of guided in the beginning.

Now I do meditation on my own, like in my own guided head. I think a lot of people like me find it really hard. I mean, I think there's so many thoughts that start to creep in. When you start to quiet the mind, it sort of wakes up. And all the things that didn't get attention are now vying for attention. Meditation is a learned practice too.

I mean, it's like anything, it's like building muscles. I mean, you have to consistently work at it for them to grow. And I am committed to learning how to meditate, mainly because some of the people I look up to and respect the most meditate regularly. And I've never met somebody ever that has committed to truly learning how to meditate,

that's done so, that's regretted it. Yeah, not one person. Not one person. And I know hundreds of people, and every one of them will say it was life-changing. And these are a lot of the folks that socioeconomically, you would really say, okay, they're at the pinnacle of success and they'll tell you that meditation is one of those things.

So I'm definitely still committed to doing that. Yeah, you should. I mean, the biggest misconception about meditation, I think, is that you think you're supposed to think about nothing. But the reality is it's actually the opposite. Yes, of course, you're not supposed to think about your anxieties and your stressors,

but the amount of downloads and information that I get about my business or about something that I should do or about a friend is always in meditation. So you have to learn how to, of course, like go into your inner world, which can be a scary place for most people. But once you're able to tap in and release yourself from like all these like needs of things you need to do

that are over here and tap into this like soul calling of information of peace and tranquility and like all the things that you wanna think about from this side, that's where the meditation is actually like the sweet spot. Because yes, whenever breathing practices are amazing way to meditate, guided meditations of course are amazing

because visualizations allow you to be distracted enough to go into a different world, which is also your inner world. And people think that like visualizations, like I thought I was, I couldn't visualize anything when I first got started. I was like, it's impossible for me to visualize anything. Like, what do you mean?

Now I can, like, it's insane what I can visualize. And it's not about being able to see a clear picture. It's not, that's not what meditation is. It's being able to understand the essence of what you're trying to visualize and like be able to be in that essence of it. So maybe you don't necessarily see the details of a falling rainfall or like a falling waterfall, but you can like get the essence

of if you were standing in front of one and like in that moment with the waterfall and the energy of which the water is giving you. And that's where you kind of wanna like, drop into that place because that's what actually, you know, gets your body to drop into relaxation and you get the mental break. And when those thoughts come in,

you just say, thank you so much, but like, I'm not doing that right now. And like, go back to, you know, it's just like, thank you so much, but like, that's not what I'm doing. And it happens to me. Yeah, it happens to me still to this day, you know, sometimes I'll like think of something that's stressful and I'm like. And it happens to me. Thank you so much, me. Yeah, it happens to me still to this day. Sometimes I'll think of something that's stressful and I'm like, right now is not the time.

So I'll think about that later and put it over there in the box. Yeah, it's so good. I struggled with it so much. Years ago, I started doing CrossFit. And what was amazing for me is after every CrossFit workout, I felt so amazing, not like muscle body-wise, but just mentally, like any kind of intense exercise,

it can be anything, it's cardio, just weight training or yoga. But when you're done, you haven't, for at least a period of time, thought about anything other than that. Like if you've ever done CrossFit workouts, you don't think about anything but just trying not to die.

If you don't wanna quit at some point during the workout, you're not doing it right. But then afterwards, there's this eerily meditative state that you're in where you're just clear and you're cognizant and you're awake. I actually crave that post-exercise window, like a rat to cheese, kind of like cold plunging for me. It's like one of my drugs of choice.

That's one of the things that's non-negotiable for me. And I'm not a crazy workout person, but I exercise every day because when I'm done, it's like my transition into the day and I'm like just super aware and awake. And I think I'm gonna add, you're gonna be the one that's gonna get me to add meditation, so.

Yeah, 100 million percent. I mean, you'll be able to get something just as good. It'll be different, but it'll be very similar to that when you're able to like really embody meditation in your life. It'll be the same thing. It's like for me, I need it every single day, even if it's for five minutes.

Like it's essential because I know how much it grounds me in my wellbeing and like gives me certainty in my day and like relieves me from the crazy, you know, spiral of the trauma, you know, the stress loop, the fear loop that we all can get ourselves into, right? And it's not about, you know, running away from it or trying to control it. It's about like understanding it and giving yourself the tools and learning the tools that you can use to get yourself out of it

and back into the present moment. Because the fear loop and anxiety loop comes from the future. It doesn't come from the present. So if you can bring yourself back into the present, and that's what meditation is, is in the present moment. It's you're just present and nothing else. That's when you can really release and let go of the stress and anxiety of the world

that we have on a daily basis. Shaina, amazing. We're gonna go into my VIP community now. These are like my VIP community is like the community that I'm really trying to build to really kind of change the world Really pouring myself into educating and trying to inspire them to build an army of people that are doing a lot of what you're doing So before every podcast we let the VIP community know who's coming on so they have they have some questions for you So we'll go into that room in a second. But before we do where can my audience find you?

Yes, so you can find me and everything I do on social media, which is my full name, Shana Therese Taylor. Mm-hmm. Also. S-H-A-Y-N-A. S-H-A-Y-N-A, yes. And then of course, you can find all my offerings that I have like olive oil, matcha,

and retreats on shanaskitchen.com. And it's amazing, by the way, I will link all of this stuff in the show notes for you guys, and we always wind the podcast down by asking every guest the same question. OK. What does it mean to you to be an ultimate human? What does it mean to me to be an ultimate human? I feel like my whole body just relaxed when you asked me that.

I saw that. Did you see that? Yeah, I saw. I literally saw that. The answer is to be fully grounded and present in the current moment and like really happy and in certainty because I feel like when you asked me that question, it like it actually grounded my energy. I literally did see that. Did you see that? I did.

I was glad you brought it up. I felt it. So yeah, I mean, I would say being somebody that suffered a lot from underlying anxiety and being completely ungrounded. I mean, I remember I went to this Irish psychic reader and he literally told me I was like cut in half through like, he's like spiritually, you're like cut in half.

And to the world, you look like a swan, but underneath you're like this. Yeah. And I, when he said it to me, I was like, yeah, that's basically how I feel. And so learning how to not live like that, and being in the place that I am right now in my life, and knowing what it's like to be grounded and knowing what it's like to be happy and of joy and love what I do and remove the fear loop from my life is I think what it means to be an ultimate human.

That was amazing. Well, thank you for being on the podcast today. We're going to follow your journey. Excited about your partnership with Dr. Joffrey. He's a good friend. He's a great practitioner. He's healed a lot of my community and they know him very, very well. So guys, if you're interested in becoming

a Ultiman Human VIP, just go over to theultimanhuman.com and sign up to be a VIP and join us in these private communities where you get to spend time with the podcast guests, where we get to have open dialogue, Q and A's, special challenges. There's all kinds of benefits. I really pour myself into this VIP community. So I hope that I'll see you there. Until next time, that's just science.