The Energetics of Food

I just spent the past two weeks prepping food with my mother and aunt for Easter. It was exhausting, glorious, and 100% #notshedapproved.

Not even half of the tadalles we made!

We made these Italian biscuits/cookies/bagels(?) we call “Tadalles” (I think it is derived from the Italian Easter cookies, Taralli). Our family recipe differs from any other recipe I’ve ever seen for them though, which makes them even more special to us! I also helped make a taleggio cheese and mushroom lasagne; lamb stuffed with spinach, goat cheese, and garlic; carrot cake; appetizers; and more.

The food tasted amazing, but I think it has an extra special je ne sais quois that comes from the joy of cooking and preparations for our loved ones.

This is one of my more “woowoo” inclinations, but I believe the energy that you have when you prepare food gets served to whoever is the lucky eater. So when you’re cooking, I think it’s important to mind your attitude and try to make it a joyful, loving experience.

Along the same lines, if you choose to eat animals, I think the energy of the animal gets transferred to you! If those cows had room to graze, and were treated well, their happiness lives on and that’s what you absorb. If, on the other hand, they had a miserable existence and were crammed into small stalls with never any exercise or sunshine– I believe we absorb that energy too. When you view the world from this perspective, it encourages all of your eating decisions to be “soulful” and healthy! It broadens your viewpoint beyond just ourselves, but also to the experience of other life forms.

Traditional Chinese Medicine takes it to another level (see chart below!). Certain foods have certain energetic properties. Feeling anxious? Skip the alcohol and sugar! Have you been a running all over the place lately, super busy? Have some fish with root veggies for a grounding meal!

Why do we tend to crave root vegetables when its colder? Besides being more readily available, they are warming to the body! Why do we like salads and smoothies in the summer? They are cooling, and its what our bodies need!

Eating seasonally and locally helps us become in tune with the natural rhythms of the earth. Not to mention, some local foods can have awesome benefits only available to you– like local bee pollen! If you add it to your diet you have protection against some seasonal allergies! Growing your own food or purchasing from the local farmers markets helps to create connection to our food and locale.

Reprinted with permission from the Institute of Integrative Nutrition.

Have you ever thought about the different ways foods can affect you? What ways will you take the different energetics of food into account as you prepare your meals next week?

• Will you cook with love and mindfulness?

• Source your animal protein from happy animals?

• Go to your local farmers market?

• Choose to eat or cook foods to help you round out your own energy?

I want to know! Leave me a note below or on social media! xx, AHS

Q & A: How do I lose belly fat?

First clue: skip the bagels! I know. So hard!!

A very common question I get as a health coach is “how do I lose belly fat?”.

[Note: I’m not going to evaluate the validity of the question- if it matters to you, it matters to me! I’m here to support you the best I can!]

Well unfortunately, there is not a simple answer. There is a lot of information out there, a lot of it is nonsense. Please skip the “teatoxes” or anything that guarantees fast results. Furthermore, no amount of crunches will eliminate that extra cushion in the front! You may have heard that abs are made in the kitchen, not the gym– and that is absolutely true!

I believe the best approach is one with slow, sustainable progress. That’s not what most people want to hear, but that will leave you with lasting results. It’s important to remember that it is very common that belly fat is the last to go! You need to be consistent, and put in the time to even approach losing excess from your midsection!

The Shed program is designed to help you tackle this issue! You eliminate and scale back on some of the most problematic foods for your middle!

Foods that can hinder belly fat loss:

• white or refined carbohydrates (see above bagel)

• sugar

• dairy

• alcohol (beer especially can be problematic!)

You don’t need to eliminate these from your diet forever. But skipping them for a concentrated period of time will help push your body out of it’s current de facto state and will allow you to start losing.

But if you are skipping the foods above- what do you eat? Prioritize eating lots of vegetables, protein at each meal, and healthy fats! (If you are looking for guidance on this- the Shed program has meal plans included!)

You may eventually hit a plateau. There are a variety of ways to tackle a plateau– it really depends on your body and circumstances. Oftentimes you just need to change up your exercise routine. Doing more or LESS may be the solution. If you are putting too much stress on your body, it releases cortisol- which is the enemy to weight loss! If you have been doing light exercise like walking, it may be time to add an extra boost. Plateaus are really where coaching is the most helpful– everyone’s life is unique and what may be causing your plateau may be completely unique to you. (Shoot me an email if you are interested in one-on-one coaching!)

Back to cortisol– if you perpetually feel stressed– this could be your biggest issue with losing weight around your tummy. Try to find ways to manage your stress. I highly recommend meditation and yoga to bring some calm to the chaos! Other people manage their stress with running or other cardio. Just try to find something that can consistently bring you some zen!

In summary, the steps to losing that pesky tummy:

1. Eliminate problematic foods (white/refined carbs, sugar, dairy, alcohol) from your diet for a period of time

2. Eat a healthy diet filled with lots of vegetables, protein and healthy fats!

3. Push past plateaus

4. Manage your stress

5. Have patience and enjoy the journey of changing your lifestyle for the better!

5 Ways to Practise Self-Love from Bridal Coach, Georgina Lucy

Georgina Lucy. Photo by Ashley Kingsbury.

Today’s post is a special guest share from Mindful Bride Coach, Georgina Lucy! I love her thoughts on this topic. Please note I left the post written in her delightful British English. Enjoy! -AHS

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I get it, as a bride you want to look and feel your very best for your wedding day.  You’d be hard pushed to find a bride who doesn’t want this. With this being an important goal for so many brides it can also bring up challenges. By focusing on what you want to change about yourself it can lead to unhelpful and often quite punishing self-talk and that’s no fun!

I want to help you turn this on its head and practise some self-love during your engagement, whilst staying committed to your goal of looking and feeling your best come the wedding day. I promise you, these two things are perfectly compatible.

1. See yourself through the eyes of someone who loves you

So often we are our own worst critics. We look in the mirror and see all our perceived flaws and fixate on them. We give ourselves a hard time when we make mistakes and put insane amounts of pressure on ourselves when we’re not ticking things off the ‘wedmin’ to-do list fast enough. It’s exhausting isn’t it?

Have a think about all the people in your life who love you. Hopefully you have a few special people to pick from. Take a moment to put yourself in their shoes. See yourself through their eyes.

What do they love about you? What little quirks make them smile? What parts of you do they adore the most? Really feel that love they feel for you. When we see ourselves through the eyes of someone who loves us it can feel a little more comfortable than looking in the mirror and chanting, ‘I love you’ (don’t get me wrong, there is a place for that too).  Hopefully this will allow you to see yourself in a loving way. Tap into this feeling next time you’re giving yourself a hard time.

2. Be careful what you consume

Do a social media audit. What’s dominating your newsfeed? Does it make you feel good? Often, we follow ‘aspirational’ accounts and people to give us something to aspire to but is this making you feel good? If it is, then great but really question the impact certain accounts are having on you. Do you notice a shift in energy when a particular person pops up on your feed? Really notice these shifts and don’t be afraid to hit ‘unfollow’ or ‘mute.’  Believe me, it can feel very empowering!

By consuming content that lifts you up and nurtures you you’re being kind to yourself and this is a huge act of self-love. What podcasts make you smile and make you feel good about yourself? Listen to more of them. We have a lot of ‘dead time’ in life – travelling, loading and unloading the dishwasher, sorting laundry. Use this time to absorb anything that makes you feel good about yourself. Some of my go-to feel-good podcasts are, Oprah’s Super-Soul Conversations, Project Love and Wobble.

3. Be Obsessively Grateful

As I said before, we tend to fixate on what we don’t like about ourselves don’t we? What about fixating on what we love about ourselves instead?

Think of just one thing that you’re grateful for about your body. For me, it’s my long legs. I used to hate being tall and felt like a freak when I was head and shoulders above my school friends but now, I’m so grateful for my long legs. They carry me through my day, get me from A to B, and often rather speedily! Not everyone can say that. Maybe you have incredible skin, beautiful long eyelashes, strong arms. Believe me, you have multiple parts of yourself you can feel gratitude towards, if you let yourself.

Really focus on that feeling of gratitude. Notice how it feels and sit with it a while. Simply the act of noticing things to be grateful for shifts your mindset and sooner or later, when you look in that mirror, your mind will go to the good bits first.

4. Let yourself off the hook

When you’re planning a wedding, it can become ALL about the wedding, ALL of the time. If this creates feelings of pressure and overwhelm rather than feelings of excitement give yourself permission to take a break.

One of the brides inside my Facebook community, The Mindful Bride Tribe was feeling totally behind and overwhelmed. The solution wasn’t to work out how to fit yet more tasks into every ounce of spare time she had, it was the opposite. She let herself off the hook and had a weekend off.

When we’re not doing what we think we should be doing, we can beat ourselves up can’t we? Just like your mobile phone, you need a recharge once in a while. How about a wedding free weekend? A date night free from wedding chat?  Time spent doing things that light you up? I bet when you come back to it you’ll have a new lease of life to tackle that to-do list like a boss!

It all starts with giving yourself permission to do what feels good for you. Listen to your body and if there’s signs of stress, that’s a clue you need a break and letting yourself off the hook is such a wonderful way to show yourself some love.

5. Write a love letter to yourself

Get quiet, put on some lovely music, get a pen and a notebook and write a love letter to yourself. If you find yourself staring blankly at a page then think about how you’d support a friend who needs some words of wisdom? Treat yourself as you treat those you love.

If you’re stressed, anxious or under confident give yourself advice about what steps you could take to ease that pressure. Don’t give too much thought to what you’re writing. Just let it flow out of you. It may feel hard at first but persevere. This is just for you. There is no judgment and you may just find you have some real breakthroughs.

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Find out more about Georgina and how she is supporting brides with their wedding wellbeing by visiting her website georginalucy.com, or joining The Mindful Bride Tribe Community on Instagram or Facebook.

Banana "Nice" Cream

Banana “Nice” Cream

Serves 2

Ingredients

• 3 frozen bananas, chopped

• 1/4 cup unsweetened chocolate almond milk

• 1 tbsp almond butter

• ⅓ cup chocolate plant-based protein powder

• Optional: 1/2 tbsp cacao nibs

Instructions

Place bananas, almond milk, almond butter, and protein powder into a food processor or blender. Pulse until smooth and creamy. You may need to turn off the motor and stir the mixture a couple times while processing. Add in cacao nibs (if using) and pulse once more. Scoop/spoon ice cream in to a bowl and enjoy!

Note: Freeze for an hour to make easier to scoop. If making in advance, just thaw for 10 minutes or so to make it easy to serve.

Wellness is not exclusive

This week Kourtney Kardashian unveiled her new lifestyle and wellness site, Poosh. Well this brought up all kinds of feels for me and so I thought it was time I finally tackled the topic of wellness elitism.

My first impressions of the Poosh website was that it did a good job tackling a variety of topics, but was disappointed in the depth of the articles. I was impressed to see ”Tapping into your spiritual side” but was unsatisfied with the 3 uninspired paragraphs on the topics that really made one valid suggestion. It seems like they are attempting to grow their content and adding other authors which will be sure to increase the quality of the content, but in the meantime, it seems like Poosh is not really filling any void in the market. There is no shortage for lifestyle content, and I expected more than fluff. Beyond that, in true Kardashian fashion, they are perpetuating an unattainable body image. “An instant butt lift with Coach Joe” and “How to look good naked”–their headlines alone imply you need to change how you look. Beyond that, there are almost-naked photos of Kourtney of everywhere.

But this post was not meant as a critic of Poosh, or the Kardashians (not that they don’t deserve some critiquing!). When I read the name “Poosh” (apparently it’s so named for the nickname of one of Kourtney’s children) it immediately made me think of “Bloosh” the lifestyle trend app featured in a few episodes of the show Parks and Recreation. The CEO of Bloosh, Annabel Porter is maybe my favorite depiction of the absurdity that the wellness community espouses at times. A great example of this is from the episode “Recall Vote” she mentions that “in her home, they do not eat meals. They have ‘food teases,’ such as oat wedges and seaweed lozenges.” Enough said, right? I have no evidence of this, but I always felt that the writer’s were using Gwyneth Paltrow and her wellness site/brand, Goop as their inspiration for unattainable wellness.

Now, Goop has expanded over the years, and has become more inclusive of a diversity of price points, but it’s elitism is really what makes it stand out as a brand. By touting high end skin care regimes, designer fashion, and unique (read expensive) travel destinations–it’s a lifestyle brand that’s foundation is built on aspirational living. And wellness is no exception– with Goop branded vitamin packs retailing at $90/month– Goop defines wellness as exclusive. I appreciate Goop’s unique content, but it is definitely not created to be accessible for all. As it’s founder, through out the years, Gwyneth Paltrow has been criticized for being out of touch with the masses and being unaware of her privilege.

While dear Gwynnie has been out in the stratosphere in terms of her connection to the “every woman”, there is another public figure that is even more disconnected than our dear Gwen.

… and that’s Amanda Chantal Bacon (the irony of her name is not lost on me), the founder of Moon Juice. Elle magazine published her food diary in 2015, and I reference it whenever I need a good laugh. She is the real life Annabel Porter. Her daily diet–from ho shou wu to Shilajit resin–consists of foods that most of the population have never even heard of. It’s next level elite, and that’s how it’s intended. Rare, globally sourced ingredients are a huge money maker.

This parody of the article also continues to make me chuckle (but read the article first!):

So we now have:

• Poosh

• the fake, “Bloosh”

• Goop

• and Moon Juice

…coincidence? I think not. I’m not exactly sure why double Os mean elite wellness, but there is definitely a trend here (not to mention Well + Good. You could take it a step further and include dominant tech giants, Google, Yahoo, and Facebook!).

But I digress. These three (real :)) women and their empires are built on sharing their elite standard of living with the masses. To quote my current muse, Jameela Jamil,

“Let’s get real about money for a second. Because money is the reason most people don’t look as thin and young as celebrities. These people have trainers, chefs, access to the best organic food, they have the best beauticians, staff to help them do everything, a MUCH less stressful life, the best doctors, many have talented surgeons, they have make up artists and hair stylists. And then ON TOP of that, they are airbrushed without telling you they are. You are being set up for a fall with this comparison porn culture. Swerve the lies and just do you.”

Calling attention to these extreme examples in the wellness community is important because they set an unrealistic expectation of what the average person can do to make their lives healthier. Beyond the sheer expense of living the way they do, they overcomplicate what it means to be healthy. You don’t have to live like the 1% to have a healthy existence. Icons like Kourtney and Gwyneth set an unrealistic example of what wellness is for the every woman. While drinking adaptogens and cordyceps every morning can make you feel awesome, not everyone has the means to add this into their diets daily. Superfoods are great, but by no means are they a requirement to live a healthy life!

As a person who owns a wellness based business, I like to show you new trends, but I never want anyone to feel like they can live a healthy lifestyle if they can’t use a certain product. Because it’s NOT TRUE!! Wellness is truly accessible to all.

“Eat (real) food, not too much, mostly plants” - Michael Pollan

Don’t let the wellness elite make you think it’s more complicated than that.