I firmly believe that the main reason so many of us struggle with weight is that we don’t understand it.
And this desire to “lose weight” too often manifests itself in this attitude where food and your body are the enemy, and you have to defeat them.
That’s depressing. That’s a losing game. And it’s really unhealthy.
I also think it’s demeaning. It’s like we women don’t think we’re worth much if we put on extra pounds. And so we have to go back to some magical number on the scale that we may have hit back when we were 17, as if the pinnacle of our lives was before we had kids, before we matured, before we were actually, you know, women.
To tell you the truth, I’d rather be in pyjamas right now still on vacation. I was originally going to take a break from this blog until January 2, because I really wanted some time off.
But something’s happening right now that I just had to tell you about because it’s so important, and it transformed my life. And I just don’t want you all to miss it.
I used to vow to lose weight every New Year’s. I didn’t have a lot to lose, mind you, but I spend my 30s creeping up by a few pounds a year, which, after 10 years, can easily be 25 pounds. And I had to lose it. I tried to exercise. As I explained in this post, I tried to count Weight Watchers points and save up so that I could have the occasional piece of chocolate cake. And my weight kept going up, and I kept feeling awful about myself.
I also thought all those people who bought food from the organic section of the supermarket were rather ridiculous health nuts. They were going overboard on stuff that didn’t really matter.
And then my stomach pains started, and my periods got so bad I actually ended up needing surgery.
Around that time I started learning about the Ultimate Bundles people–people who are now my friends.
Ryan and Stephanie Langford started them, and their goal was to gather the absolute BEST online materials on different subjects, and then offer them all together for a five day period for a ridiculously low price. Plus they’d get businesses to offer physical bonuses! It was a way to help online entrepreneurs (like me) who create products get a bigger audience, but also a way to give consumers an incredible deal.
Because most of these bundles are worth about $2000, but they sell them for $29.97.
One of those bundles was the Ultimate Healthy Living Bundle. It’s offered every year (though the resources in it change completely each year), and I bought my first one four years ago. It changed everything.
I learned that the reason that I’ve been having trouble losing weight is that I’ve been focusing on losing weight.
I’ve been focusing on depriving my body, rather than focusing on giving my body what it needs, and NOT giving my body what it doesn’t need. I learned that my body actually needs certain fats (olive oil, nuts, avocadoes, coconut, fish, etc.), and that low-fat foods (like low-fat dairy) are actually bad for you. I learned that the problem with weight is not so much calories themselves as where you get those calories from.
Too often we put things inside our bodies that our bodies can’t process properly. Take preservatives, for instance. They are an absolutely amazing invention. I am completely pro-preservative, because it allowed people to have a steady food supply even in winter. It allows us to get food to people who would otherwise starve. Preservatives allow people short on food to actually get food.
But that’s where the benefit stops. If your biggest problem is no longer lack of food, then preservatives become the enemy. Here’s why. Preservatives stop bacteria from breaking down food, so that it doesn’t spoil and it lasts longer. So far, so good. But how does our body get nutrition from food? Bacteria breaks it down. When your body is trying to process food with preservatives, it doesn’t know what to do and it can’t get the nutrition properly. So it just stores it as fat. And you get very little nutrition from it.
I learned that most of my stomach problems were caused from eating at restaurants and from eating canned goods. So I simply switched to real foods, and stopped eating preservatives and stopped going to restaurants so much, and my weight dropped overnight without me trying to deprive myself.
And I learned about the benefits of essential oils, too!
I love them. I clean with them. I set up my aromatherapy machine with them.
Every year the Ultimate Healthy Living Bundle is available, and every year it has completely different resources in it. This year the bundle had all kinds of amazing courses that taught me about the role that hormones play in our libido and in our digestion and in our health, stuff that I had never understood before. I learned that a lot of anxiety can actually be managed by diet (not that people shouldn’t be on antidepressants if they need them, mind you!). I learned how to get better skin.
It’s the absolute BEST collection I’ve ever seen. It was available in September for five days, and I sent out some emails about it.
But it’s back today for a flash sale. It’s gone tonight at midnight.
And so I decided that despite the Christmas holidays and despite my urge to be in pyjamas, I would tell you about it before it’s gone.
Because it really did change my life, and it changed my whole focus on weight to something that is so much emotionally healthier and more manageable.
The neat thing about the flash sale is that when you buy the Healthy Living Bundle for $29.97, you get the opportunity to ALSO add the Essential Oils Super Bundle for just $15. So for $45 you can get about $3000 worth of ebooks and ecourses on healthy living and essential oils, plus about $250 in physical bonuses that can come right to your door.
Seriously, there is so much to love in this bundle! The vast majority of it is digital products (like ebooks, printables and courses) that you can access right away, but look at what is delivered right to your door:
- Green Kid Crafts – FREE craft box ($19.95 value)
- Perfect Supplements – $15 gift certificate toward any Perfect Brand product ($15 value)
- TriLight Health – $15 off select TriLight products ($15 value)
- MadeOn Skin Care – FREE BeeCool Muscle Balm Stick and Natural Lip Balm Combo (value $15.25)
- The Maca Team – FREE Organic Gelatinized Yellow Maca Powder, 8 oz. ($15.44 value)
- Get Kombucha – FREE 2-week supply (15 ml) of Kombucha Pro: Liquid Probiotics (value $29.99) OR FREE 1-ounce bag of Custom Organic Kombucha Tea Blend (value $16.99)
- Orglamix – FREE Mineral Eye Shadow Trio ($18 value)
- Grove Co. – FREE Seventh Generation Laundry Detergent, Fabric Softener and stain remover, 60 Day VIP Trial, and FREE shipping with a $20 minimum purchase for new customers ($32.66 value) OR a FREE 1-year VIP Membership for existing customers ($39.95 value)
- Meal Garden – 6 months of Meal Garden FREE (value $35.70)
This is how I think about it: I get $30 of probiotics and $33 worth of laundry detergent, which in and of itself pays for both the essential oils and healthy living bundles.
Plus I also get all these resources:
Some of my favourite ones are in the women’s health department. When the bundle was for sale in September, I actually bought 6 myself to give to the people who work for me, my sister-in-law, and my daughters, just because of the Perfect Periods ecourse, which is amazing:
I took it and it had this self-assessment which correctly diagnosed my liver issues and my hormone issues, and then told me what to do (and I feel so much better!).
Of course, there’s more than just the Perfect Periods ecourse, but that course normally sells for $297. Yep, you read that right. Almost $300 (there’s a LOT of information), but just today it’s part of the bundle, and you get it plus everything else for just $29.97.
And that everything else includes meal plans, books on how to get kids to eat healthy, courses on how to exercise at home, alternative health, how to use essential oils, and so much more!
But the flash sale is over today, and then this combination of products will never be offered together again like this. The only reason they’re able to offer $2400 worth of stuff for $29.97 is because it’s for such a limited time.
And I didn’t want you to miss it, because this is probably the thing that has changed my attitude towards my body the most over the last decade, and has even helped me understand my libido fluctuations more.
So don’t miss it! If you want to make a New Year’s Resolution about your weight, how about trying this instead?
This New Year’s, I will learn about health. I will read a few books and take a few courses and just change a very few things, and I will see what happens.
That’s more manageable. That doesn’t make you feel like you’re inadequate or that you were better when you were 17. That’s empowering. And that’s the way to make real change!
I agree, the focus should not be on losing weight, but on eating healthily. Because of the yo-yo effect, one should think in terms of “from now on I will …” rather than “for a week I will …” There are a lot of pleasant things that one can do for their short term benefits, and healthy food and moving are among those. Long term benefits follow naturally. I lost 40 pounds (and probably turned another 10 into muscle) by just focusing on making myself feel better in the short term, on giving my body the substances it needs, not stuffing it with substances that make it suffer, and allowing it to get the amount of movement it needs. In the meanwhile, I didn’t really care much how much I weigh.
In modern society, when it comes to a woman’s beauty, there are these extremely unnatural and unhealthy ideas that to a big extent it is about being thin and young. I bet that right now there are millions of women who deprive themselves of foods they need because they want to be thinner, which is absolutely unnecessary for them, and a bad idea. Women should focus on what makes them feel better, and not on looking like photo-shopped non-existent models. Thinness and age should not factor into beauty, and beauty should be just one of the things that makes a woman attractive, together with strength of will, intelligence, kindness, purity, etc.
So well said, Dean! Thank you!
Hey Sheila! I’m curious which ebook or course you were referencing that talked about anxiety and diet. Sounds like something I need to look into. Thanks!
For sure! It’s one of the resources–Healing Patiently: Healing Your Gut without Losing Your Mind. She talks a lot about anxiety in there! Also, the Heal Your Gut Summit with Dr. Eric Zielinski has a lot on it, too.
I got the bundle when it was on sale before. I took some of the courses and downloaded some of the ebooks, but I haven’t read many of them. I need to see about downloading them to my tablet.
The concept of not trying to lose weight as a goal is relatively new for me. I hate that I’ve gained some weight the past few years, but more than that I hate that my health isn’t that great, and I’m only in my 30’s. I started cooking Paleo meals for myself in the fall (hubby didn’t want to try it), and lost a bit of weight and was feeling somewhat better. Then the holidays derailed the whole thing! Thank God for January!
One thing I find really frustrating is that now that I have had a few weeks of success with a diet that works for my body and doesn’t deprive me or make me feel hungry, I actually got some criticism that I want to eat a certain way that my husband doesn’t want to. Arggg! I need to do this for my health.
Yes, you totally do need to do this for your health! But I hear you. One thing I’ve found is that if I don’t tell anyone it’s healthy, no one really notices. The food still tastes good, so they don’t really complain! But I think that stopping cooking stuff that’s pre-packaged or has a lot of additives is so important for everybody, and the neat thing is that it doesn’t have to taste bad at all.
I hope you have some more fun with the bundle! The book on chocolate recipes is really good. 🙂
I have struggled with weight gain for awhile. I have been to fitness geuros for a couple years, doctors, etc looking for answers and having no success. I track everything I eat and workout cardio and weights almost daily. I eat very little processed foods, maybe a tortilla every once in awhile. I eat meat, lots of veggies, and a little fruit. Will this bundle you are selling help me? I have gained 15 pounds since my gall bladder removal. I have not changed my eating habits at all, other than I try to eat less so I can start losing.
Hi Tiffinie! That must be so frustrating! I do know that there’s a lot in there about WHEN to eat what, which can really help. And sometimes what we’re told about food isn’t always right–like we do need healthy fats, for instance, and a lot of the oils we use aren’t good for us. Sometimes, too, it can be about other toxic things in our environment. I know that for me changing deodorants and changing cleaning products did a lot to help with some of the problems I was having. What I’ve realized, though, is that there isn’t a “quick fix”. It really is a whole lifestyle change to try to get fewer chemicals in our lives and more “real” stuff. I hope that helps!
Hey I would also recommend looking into a “registered dietitian” (this term is protected in the US compared to “nutritionist”). These are the ones who have gone through at least a bachelor’s in nutrition plus an internship and formal exam. I’m in the internship stage currently and already have a masters degree in nutrition! Doctors are wonderful but we (RDs) are the nutrition experts that can work with your Healthcare team and know what is best for you when knowing all medical conditions.
Hope you can find one near you! God made science and He made food to be beneficial to us — that’s my philosophy 🙂
Tiffinie – please check out an eating plan called Trim Healthy Mama. YOu can find groups on Facebook, and the books are available in libraries or from Amazon. It’s a low-glycemic eating plan, and my husband and I have both lost 40 pounds (and are easily maintaining).
I really love how my readers help each other! 🙂
I love that you’re encouraging over-all health rather than just weight here. That’s important. But… this is NOT science. Calories ARE the primary factor in weight (not necessarily for health, though weight and health are correlated). So-called “processed foods” are not simply stored as fat because they “can’t be broken down by the body.” If this were true, the body would be unable to extract any calories from them and they would be eliminated, like unsoluble fiber.
I spoke with someone about this, who had this to say:
” Let’s apply some logic to this assertion. Let’s presume you’re eating in a calorie deficit, as she claims she was doing Weight Watchers and you are eating foods with preservatives.
So, according to what she’s saying, your body breaks down food and there’s part that doesn’t get processed. Well, that’s not unusual. There are things that don’t usually get processed normally, like some kinds of fiber. What happens to them? The body eliminates them as waste. It doesn’t get stored as fat.
Fat storage happens in a caloric surplus with food that the body processes.
Additionally, if the body can’t process it, how is it converting it from preservative to fat? Wouldn’t that imply that it is doing some form of processing?
I’ll take this one step further. Consider the case of malabsorptive diseases where people aren’t digesting foods properly. What happens in those cases? Food passes through their digestive systems quickly, often rather undigested, and they lose weight. This is regardless of caloric consumption. I have experienced this myself.
The whole assertion doesn’t stand up to logical scrutiny. Sorry this post is a bit jumbled. I’m piecing together random thoughts as they come to me. I see these types of assertions often, and they leave me scratching my head. I don’t know how people can believe them. I think they sound good until you let yourself think about them a little.”
I also found this write-up of “clean eating diets that contains good info running counter to some of these claims:
https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/should-you-be-eating-clean/
I’m not trying to pick on you. I’m so happy you have found success on your health journey. But posts like these (which I notice are becoming more frequent here, unfortunately) are misleading people trying to discern the truth from the fiction about diets and health.
You are correct that calories ARE a factor in excess body fat. The current trend is to pretend they aren’t. And this misinformation has bad results going both ways.
I personally know people who eat a 100% unprocessed diet (no kidding, they don’t cheat EVER) and exercise regularly and are 50+ pounds overweight. All of the paleo blogs and books love to show people with low body fat but plenty of people who eat paleo or other unprocessed diets have excessive body fat. If you eat more food than your body needs, you will store it as fat, no matter how pristine that food is. Different people metabolize differently, so it’s notgoing to be equal across the board.
And then there are those who pretend that as long as you’re eating nutrient dense foods, it doesn’t matter how little you eat. I remember a blog post showing a plate with 1 egg, some kale, and a tomato and stating that this meal had enough nutrients for an active woman. It may have had enough MICROnutrients but it was severely deficient in MACROnutrients. Carbohydrates are not evil. Jesus ate bread. (Not Wonder bread, obviously.)
What is generally (but not always) true is that unprocessed foods are more satisfying and people are less likely to overeat on a whole foods diet. But overeating whole foods will make you fat. There were fat people in Biblical times and their food was pristine.
You are correct. Preservatives definitely are not stored as fat.
I think the take-away message is that it is complicated. The body is incredibly complex and there is no silver bullet. The super simplified version is calories in < calories out = weight loss. But that is not the whole story. And where you get those calories really do matter. Your body needs a whole lot more than just sugar, refined starches and corn syrup to run properly. A bunch of your enzymes *need* minerals and vitamins to perform vital functions. Many of the vitamins and necessary co-enzymes. We actually have to get 5/6 of the amino acids from our diets. Our bodies cannot make them, and we need them to live. No-one actually knows what everything in your body does and how it all works together (except God of course. But he isn't writing the latest diet books/ blogs).
Luckily, you don't really need to understand all these things to eat healthily. What you should understand is that anyone telling you do this one thing (cut out carbs, eat organic, go vegan take your pick) and you will magically lose weight and look like a 19 year old model is lying. Most nutritional advice (especially from fitness guru's, personal trainers and random people on the internet) should be taken with a huge pinch of salt. Some doctors really aren't clued into nutrition either.
You need to move. At least 30 min every day. Try not to eat a lot of things with refined carbs and added sugar. Learn to actually read the food labels. As a chemist, I kind of hate the "don't buy anything with ingredients you can't pronounce" or "anything with chemicals" band wagon. Everything in the world is literally chemicals.
However, there is something to trying to buy things with as few ingredients as possible.
Cooking from scratch really is healthier and cheaper.
Organic or gluten free =/ healthy. Organic foods have not been demonstrated to be nutritionally superior to regular foods in any way. That being said; if you feel better from eating organic, go for it. Probably safer and cheaper than drugs.
Basically, try and eat lots of fruits and veggies. Don't cut out fat. Bread isn't evil. Meat and dairy isn't evil either. Just do things in moderation. Try to eat fresh. Cut back on sugar. Move more. And if paleo/ gluten free/ raw/ vegan/ vegetarian makes you feel healthier and helps you manage symptoms or your weight, by all means do it.
In conclusion. Don't focus on the weight; focus on health. And any diet/ lifestyle change you make needs to be sustainable.