Hello. Hello. Welcome back to the Be About Being Better podcast. So happy that you're here today. We're gonna be talking about the seven health hacks that busy AF people need. So if you are super busy, if you are a busy, high achieving person, if you feel like you're always putting your health to the back burner, if you feel like you don't have time to be healthy, this is the episode for you, because it is possible to be healthy. It's really a matter of your priorities, cuz we always have time for what we make a priority. And I know this is kind of a grotesque example, but I feel like we always say that, but it's like, yeah, well, but I have other priorities and, but this really put it in perspective for me.
Like imagine if you wake up late and. You're rushing to get ready. And you're like, oh my God. And you're getting outta bed and you know, you have to prioritize. So you're already running late. You already have limited time. What do you choose to do? And one of the things that you choose to do, I can pretty much guarantee it is still brush your teeth.
Now you might not have time to brush your teeth for a full two minutes like you normally do, but you're still gonna do a little something, something. You prioritize it. So even though you have little time, you always have time for what you make a priority. And so that's what we're gonna be talking about today is like, when you have little time, what are some things that you can start to prioritize?
And how can we weave those things into your busy schedule? Cuz it's not realistic to do everything for your health all the time, but we can always do something. And you'll start to realize that once you start doing something for your health, when typically you would do nothing, you'll start to show up for your busy lifestyle, feeling so much better.
You'll have more mental clarity, you'll have more energy. You'll feel more confident. You won't have this hurried frantic energy. But you'll be calm. You'll have more of an inner peace, even though you might be in the middle of a chaotic season or have a really packed schedule or have a lot of kids to take care of and a lot of responsibilities on your plate, you can still show up for those things with less stress and less of a frantic energy. When you really have a routine for healthy habits that are supporting your goals. So that's what we're gonna be talking about today, but before we dive in , , I have to give a few Nashville updates.
So y'all know that I recently moved here cause I'm starting my dietetic internship and I moved from New York city.
Nashville and New York are very different. New York, as we know, is the dirtiest city in the United States. It's what it is. It's what it is. I mean, I have seen people urinating on the street. I have lived in an apartment where roaches are falling from the ceiling. It smells, there's garbage everywhere. It's truly grotesque.
It really is disgusting. But what I love about New York. Is the water. I mean, the water is pristine. I mean, that's why our bagels are so good. That's why the pizza allegedly is so good. Y’all know I don't like pizza. I don't really eat it that much, but apparently it's amazing. I really miss the water and I, I have really struggled to hit my water goal here in Tennessee, cuz there's something that I'm tasting in the Tennessee water that's just not right. It's not what I'm used to. but I guess if that's my, my one gripe with Tennessee then I think I'm doing okay.
Everything else has been fabulous. Now to get back into our health hacks for busy people, definitely take notes for this. If you're driving, uh, be, be careful, but make sure to come back to this episode and start taking notes on what resonates with you so that you really have. These quick, simple tips that you can easily weave into any busy schedule.
So you can do something for your health when previously, right now, you're probably putting your health on the back burner. When you get stressed, busy, when you have a family emergency or, you know, or you're sick or whatever comes up. But the reality is. Regardless of what's going on in your life.
Your health is still continuing. Your health is still going on. So we need to do something for it. Can't always be our top priority, but it needs to, you know, at least be in the top three so that your healthy habits can support you in the season that you're going through. So, our first health tip is that the MRS has to come first.
M R S. And Mrs is an acronym that stands for me first, responsibility second and serving others third. So if this is really a mindset shift, cuz a lot of people believe that self care is selfish and that we shouldn't be prioritizing ourselves because we should be put, we should be putting other people.
First, but you know, if you really care about your responsibilities, if you really care about your job, if you really care about the people that you need to show up for and care for in your life, then you will take the time to prioritize yourself and care for yourself, because that will allow you to get your mindset, right.
Your energy, right. Your health, right? So that you can show up for those roles and responsibilities in people in your life, like your best self. And you'll be showing up like those people on the other end. So it's so important that the MRS comes first. MRS - serve yourself first, respond, then deal with your own responsibility second, and then serve others third.
So how do we start to prioritize ourselves? That's where we get into step two, uh, or health hack number two. And that is you need to set up a morning and evening routine. Now stress tends to fester and starts to build up over time until we've reached a breaking point. And then we're forced to take a break, but that's because we've just reached complete burnout or we get sick, but, you know, we can't let ourselves and let our stress bottle up and really reach the top of the thermostat where then everything just, you know, all hell breaks loose. So we need to have morning and evening routines every single day, so that we have an outlet for our stress. We have something that grounds us it's morning and evening. Routines are something that are within your control, which is really great because there's so much about our lives that we can't control.
But our morning and evening routines are something that we can control to give us something that we. Can depend on and it just creates regularity in our lives. And when we're always going through so much change and there's so much that can happen, that's unexpected. It's really nice to have something that you can depend on.
Something that you can keep coming back to. And if you structure your morning and evening routines, right, it can really. To just rejuvenate your energy and actually be something that you look forward to, not something that you have to do, or it feels like an obligation or a chore. These should be fun.
Like right now, if you're not excited to wake up in the morning, if you're not excited to stop, work and get ready for bed, like if your routines don't excite you. You need to make a change. This is your call to make a change because it's very easy. Y'all for me to get up in the morning. Like I'm not snoozing for days.
And the only days that I do end up snoozing a lot is when I didn't get enough sleep. And I really didn't prioritize my evening routine. So if you're having problems being motivated to get up in the morning, you don't have enough drive to get up in the morning because you're probably just getting up in the morning, rushing to get ready and running out the door and maybe getting something for breakfast on the go or getting an ice coffee to go and like rushing to work. And that's it. You're not doing anything else that you're actually looking forward to. That's starting your day, right. You're just jumping into work. And it's like, what fun is that? I wouldn't wanna show up for that. Of course I'd wanna keep sleeping. So it's important that you structure a morning and evening routine that actually lights you up and gives you joy. It will help you prioritize winding down and unplugging so that you get good quality and quantity sleep. And if you do that, you'll wake up feeling rested.
And if you pair that with having a morning routine, that you're excited to get outta bed for, you're gonna get outta bed for it. And you're gonna start your day so much stronger. So, where do we start with the morning and evening routine? I'm probably gonna do a whole episode just talking about morning and evening routines.
Cause it's a huge thing that I work on with clients and I customize this for them. So I do have my method for structuring a morning and evening routine, which I'll go over now. But, you know, it's also so personalized, so I'll give you the framework, but it's really on you to do some kind of trial and correction and try some different things out and see what works for you.
See what lights you up. And I'll tell you what works for me, but what works for me and what works for my clients might not work for you. All of my clients have different routines themselves. It's definitely important that you take this framework and start to try it out and definitely send me a DM and let me know how your morning and evening routines are going and what's working and what's not, and what's lighting you up and where you're feeling stuck.
Cause I love talking morning and evening routines with people. So definitely let me know once you start this process, how it's going. So when you're structuring a morning and evening routine it should not look like a checklist - should not look like a CVS receipt. It should not be a bunch of boxes that you're checking off.
It needs to be a few very intentional things that are going to allow you to generate the energy, generate the feelings that you want to feel walking into your first commitment of the day. So first you need to figure out, well, how do I want to show up walking into my first commitment of the day? So, you know, and then that looks different for everyone. That could be, you wanna feel confident. You wanna feel energized, you wanna feel empowered. You wanna feel at peace, you wanna feel ready to go. You wanna feel prepared. You wanna feel calm.
I don't know exactly what it is for you, but you have to pick maybe two to three emotions or adjectives that you wanna cultivate every single. And then you have to start to think, then we start working backwards. What can you do in your morning that would actually generate those feelings and in what order?
So first you have to start, you know, what would energize me in the morning? Is that a workout? Is that journaling? Is it looking at my calendar and not just looking at what appointments I have for today, not just looking at your meetings and getting anxiety, but then taking it one step further and asking yourself, how would my best self show up for that meeting? What can I do to leave that meeting with a positive mindset or with a more positive outcome?
What can I do beforehand for that meeting to show up like my best self. So already starting to anticipate the needs of your day and maybe it's doing yoga, getting outside, having a cup of coffee. For me, It's some sort of movement and journal. I have been so loyal to my five minute journal for over four years.
I am absolutely obsessed with it. I love that the five minute journal gives me a list of prompts every single day. I write down what I'm grateful for. I write down three things that would make today great. Or by three priorities for the day I write down a daily affirmation statement, things that I'm trying to kind of manifest or cultivate more in my life and it really, they really should call it the two minute journal because it really doesn't take that much time. There is an evening portion too. There's two questions in the evening. Like what are three things that went well today? And what's something that you could correct for tomorrow or kind of an opportunity for growth.
And I, you know, even though it has the morning and evening portion, I just like to journal in the morning. So. I just do both sections. Like I start with the evening portion and I do it based on the last day. Like what went well yesterday? What is something that I could have done differently? And then I start with today.
Okay. What am I grateful for today? What's on my plate for today. And, and what am I trying to affirm for myself today? So that's how I set it up. And I've been doing the five minute journal, been consistent with it for over four years. It's made a huge impact on my life in less than five minutes. So, you know, I have it linked up in the show notes, so you can definitely get your own copy and see if it works for you.
And I love that it has little inspirational quotes every day. It's just a really inspiring message and it's a really aesthetically pleasing book, and what I love about it, I travel with it. It's small. It's not super bulky. I like that it gives you the prompts because a lot of people, when they start a journaling practice or a gratitude practice, they don't know where to start. And, you know, looking at a blank page is really intimidating. So to have the questions and the lines there and have it not take so much time makes the barrier for entry smaller. You're more likely to follow through on it. So definitely recommend the five minute journal. I mean, like I said, I have never gotten negative feedback. My clients love it. I've been using it personally over the last four years. Definitely. You know, check out the show notes. I have it linked up there. If you wanna grab your copy and start to see if it's gonna work for your morning routine. So that's what I do.
And I incorporate some sort of movement, whether that's going on a hot girl walk or going to the gym or doing a yoga video, I actually recently just got a trampoline. So sometimes I'll just jump on my trampoline for a little bit. And I always have to incorporate some sort of music.
Sometimes I listen to podcasts, but I'm more of a music person in the morning because music is so linked to our mood. And for me, that just lights me up and, and makes me feel like a boss. So the first things that I do, because I said that the order of your morning routine is really important. So I ramp up my energy. I work out and I listen to music and get ready. And I'm feeling on top of the world and I'm just in a high vibe.
And then when I'm all ready, I've had my breakfast. I sit down at my desk and that's when I journal. That's when I spend time writing out gratitudes with time in the five minute journal, and read my Bible for a bit. And that harnesses my energy. So it's like I build myself up and then I harness it. So the order of things is really important.
But for you, maybe you do need to just leave your journal by your bedside. And as you're waking up, write down a few things that you're grateful for, that you're slowly starting to wake up and then. You go get movement in, or then you go have breakfast or then you do a quick meditation. So, you know, you have to figure out what's going to actually be the most effective for you, and then trying things out and seeing what order allows you to feel how you wanna feel walking into your first commitment of the day, then walking it back to your evening routine.
What do you need to prepare in the evening to make the morning seamless, to make it easier for you to follow through? So do you need to lay out your clothes? Do you need to pack your lunch the next day? Do you need to prep breakfast? Do you need to fill up your water bottle and put it in the fridge?
Do you need to pack your bag? You know, really preparing things for, for the next day. And then that's when I would say it's a good time to unplug once you've organized yourself for the next day, time to unplug. Now it's time to do something else that winds you down in order to get good quality and quantity sleep.
So this is probably a time maybe, you know, 30 to 60 minutes before bed. We probably don't wanna be eating anything because that, you know, when you have food at night, It likely has calories and calories or energy. That's going to be waking your system up when really we wanna be winding our system down.
So I wouldn't be eating or drinking during this time, unless maybe it's a little water I, you know, would unplug from electronics and I would stop working at this time. If you are going right from working to falling asleep, you're likely just not sleeping and staring up at the ceiling. Wondering why you're not sleeping.
You didn't allow yourself to wind. So for me, I have to take a shower in the evening because you know, the steam and the water, it really winds me down. And I start reading a book. I recently have gotten into fiction. I love reading fiction. I love reading personal development and self-help books as well, but it just gets my mind to awaken whenever I read personal development, if I do it would be tacked onto my journaling in the morning. And I just either read 10 minutes where I read 10 pages. I keep that small, but I put my personal development in the morning, as my mind is already up. Now I'm trying to wind my mind down. So I'm just gonna read something mindless like fiction and that's it very simple.
I journal, I get some sort of movement in, in the morning. And in the evening I take a shower, do my skincare care and other hygiene things. And I read. And that's it, very simple. It does not need to be a whole long CVS, long receipt checklist of things for your morning and evening routine. But I hope that helps.
So definitely send me a DM with your morning and evening routine, and let me know how your morning and evening routine is going.
Okay, next, we're gonna kind of run through the next few very quickly. Number three, the health hack that you need, if you are super, super busy, is that you need to be drinking more water.
You need to be drinking water. Like it is your job. Even if it's the water in Tennessee, that's probably laced with heavy metals. You need to be drinking the water. I mean, obviously that's a joke, but I'm not actually serious. I'm sure the water's fine here. About 60% of our population in the United States is chronically dehydrated.
That's a problem because as soon as you feel thirsty, you are 2% dehydrated. And to put that in perspective, 15% dehydration is fatal. So we shouldn't be letting ourselves get to the point where we are absolutely parched. So the way to drink more water. Get a cute water bottle. Something that you actually will want to take around with you and that you like. You don't wanna just keep it in your backpack, where you forget about it. You want to be having a water bottle that's in your line of vision that you remember, and then, you know, maybe setting alarms on your phone with the water emoji or a few blue hearts that goes off randomly every couple hours, you know, every few hours throughout the day so that you are remembering too. And having that push notification to remember to hydrate yourself, that's going to decrease floating, clear up your skin and give you that natural energy and you know, just better cognition. , if you, if you were actually hydrated, so. Definitely. Definitely, definitely, definitely drink water. Like it is your job.
The next health hack for really, really busy people is to start to heal your relationship with food. Now, this is a big one. We are going to be talking about this a lot on your podcast, especially because I coach clients on this every single day. And it's a huge part of living a better life. And also because I just became a certified, intuitive eating counselor. So I'm very proficient and passionate about this topic. So I'll just, you know, introduce it. But this is something that you can easily start to do that will make you feel better throughout the day and allow you to meet your nutrition needs.
Because when we're dieting, when we're restricting ourselves, When we don't have a good relationship with food, it takes away from us being able to live our best life and be fully focused and present with the people that we're with, the projects that we're working on. So it really holds us back from reaching our full potential.
So some quick things that you can do to start to heal your relationship with food is start to label foods differently. You need to get away from labeling foods as good or bad because you feel like a good person when you eat. When you eat quote unquote good foods, but you feel like a bad person.
You feel like a failure when you eat “bad foods.” So we need to start to take the morality outta food, and very quick way to do that is by changing how you label foods. So instead of labeling foods as good or bad, or even healthy or unhealthy. Because it's the same connotation when you eat something healthy, you feel good, but if you eat something unhealthy, it's like, oh, like you just, you feel bad about yourself.
And there's nothing inherently bad about eating those things. Especially in moderation, we wanna be able to cultivate balance. So instead it's better to label foods as this is a frequent food. This is a less frequent food. This food is nutrient dense and this is calorie. This is a treat meal. I'm not cheating on myself. It's not a cheat meal. I'm treating myself. This is a fun meal, right? Not a cheat meal. So I wanna change how we label foods. And that can be a really quick way to start to heal your relationship with food. And. You know, recognize that all foods have a place in our diet. They just have a different place and they have different goals.
Not everything that we eat needs to be super, super nutrient dense because there is a time and place for those calorically dense items. Another thing that you can do to start to heal your relationship with food is to start to be more in tune with your hunger cues. You know, a lot of people. Ass e that they are hungry when their stomach starts to growl.
But if you're waiting to eat until your stomach growls, you've waited too long. There are other more subtle signs that you've missed that were your body was trying to tell you that you were hungry. So you need to listen for those subtle cues, whether that's fatigue, a headache, a little bit of, you know, pain in your throat or a little bit of a stomach. Fatigue and lightheadedness, being distracted, not being able to focus, not being able to concentrate, feeling weak when you're really low blood sugar. Being super irritable. That's another one when we're angry, right. A change in mood. Being cold.
That's another. So those are some subtle signs that your body's looking for more food. And it's trying to send you some cues that it needs some nutrients, it needs more energy. And by the time your stomach is growling, that's when your body's screaming at you. So it was asking you politely before, but now it's starting to scream at you.
So we don't want your body to be angry with you. You don't want to wait until your body is screaming at you to give it nutrients. So that's another quick way to start healing your relationship with food. And that's gonna allow you to live a better, more successful, vibrant life because you actually have the energy and the mental clarity, and you're in a good mood when you're showing up for these other things in your life by adequately fueling yourself.
Number five, this is the fifth health hack for really, really busy people. It is you, you want to move your body in a way that feels good. You wanna focus less on exercise and more on movement. because when we focus on exercise, we tend to pigeonhole ourselves. Like, oh, if I don't have time to go to the gym and do a hiit workout, or go to that class, or be able to sweat that much or work out for that long, then it's not worth it.
And I'm not gonna do anything. When in reality, if you say, oh, I'm just gonna move my body today, versus I need to exercise. It opens your mind up to all the different possibilities and all the different ways that you could move your body. So it's important to focus on movement because if you say, oh, I'm just gonna move my body today.
It's like, well, that could be stretching. That could be going for a walk during my lunch break. That could be, you know, a three to five minute dance party. As I, you know, pick my favorite song to dance to, or it could be j ping on my trampoline or doing a quick yoga, YouTube video, or just going to the gym for 10 minutes instead of feeling the pressure.
Do a whole workout for an hour when you might not have time for that. So saying movement is a little bit lighter and it opens your mind up to all the possibilities that you could move your body. When you're busy, it's a smaller barrier for entry for you to get some sort of movement in exercise.
We just have so many connotations with it. We need to be sweating and it needs to be intense and it needs to be an hour, which isn't true. But when we have the barrier that high, the expectations that high, when we're busy, we're not gonna do that. We're not gonna follow through.
So just that simple change in language makes it a little bit lighter of a commitment and we're more likely to follow through. And when we follow through that allows us to be consistent. And when we're consistent, that compounds into larger shifts and results with time. So focus on movement versus exercise and just try to move your body in a way that feels good, because if it feels good, you're gonna want to show up for it.
And when you want to show up for it, you're going to be more consistent. Okay. The next one is really to just do something when you would do nothing. And this is a pretty simple one. This is something that I repeat to my clients all the time. We wanna get you out of this all or nothing thinking and all or nothing habit where you're doing all the things for your health.
And when you can't do that, or you miss one box and you don't check one box, then you automatically do nothing. So it's so important to. Kind of get out of that dichotomy and that black and white thinking and start living in the gray and realizing that, okay, I am in a really busy season. I'm gonna give myself grace.
I'm not going to expect that I'm gonna go to the gym five days a week for an hour, but I could, you know, take 10 minutes of my lunch break and walk around the building and move my body a little bit. All right. It might. You know, it's really difficult to drink a whole gallon of water, but I'm at least gonna have water at my three o'clock sl p when I would normally have another cup of coffee.
Right. So it's making these, it's doing something when you would previously do nothing or do something different. And then the last one, our last health hack is to align your lifestyle. When it comes to nutrition, exercise, and self care with your menstrual cycle. Now, a lot of people just think. They are either on their period or off their period.
But in reality, there are actually four distinct phases of the menstrual cycle that last over the course of 28 days. And throughout those 28 days throughout the four phases, our hormones. Change by 25%, which is significant. So it doesn't make sense that we would be exercising the same way, eating exactly the same way.
Catering, our self care exactly the same way when our hormones and how we are, how our body is functioning. Biologically, if that is so different every week of the month, why would we be doing the same things for our health every week of the month? By starting to shift what you eat and how you exercise and how you care for yourself to go with the grain of our menstrual cycle.
You'll realize that this will give you more energy, greater confidence. It will help clear up your skin, help clear up any period problems that you may have, especially if you have PCOS, PMDD, endometriosis or just irregular periods, or really adverse period symptoms like nausea, vomiting, you know, in irregular flow, heavy flow, painful periods, you know, cystic acne and just really painful cramps. You know, things like that. You know, obviously periods should be uncomfortable, but they shouldn't be unbearable. It shouldn't get to the point where you need to take a day off from work to recoup and rest. So once you start to align your life with the different phases of your menstrual cycle, you realize that.
You start to have more energy and confidence and you feel sexier and you start to be more creative. You feel more aligned with yourself cuz your body is functioning. Optimal. And a lot of people don't know this, but our menstrual cycle is our fifth vital sign. It's just as important as our blood pressure and just as important as an indicator of how your health is doing.
So if your menstrual cycle is optimized, if your period is regular, that is a sign that your body is functioning optimally. So it's so, so important to be focused on your period health, if, if you're menstruating in the next episode, we're gonna be talking more about how to align your life with the cycle.
So I won't get into specifics now because there's a whole lot that goes into that, but just know that that is a health hack that I recommend for really busy people, because it. Help give you more energy and you won't feel like your body is fighting against you, but your energy will actually support you.
And your body will actually be supporting you through the different phases and whatever you're going through at, at different times of the month. So those are our seven health hacks. Just review Mrs. Comes first, M R S me first responsibility, second, serving others. Third, You gotta make that mindset shift.
Next is you need to structure and start creating a morning and evening routine, something that gives you joy. But first start that process. You have to figure it out. What are the two to three things that I want to feel walking into my first commitment of the day and then working backwards. What can I do in the morning that would generate those feelings and what can I do in the evening to prepare myself for the morning for what I'm gonna do to generate those feelings.
And then next you wanna drink water. Like it's your job next? You wanna start to heal your relationship with food by labeling foods differently, not good or bad. Not healthy or unhealthy and start to be in tune with those very subtle initial hunger cues. So you're not waiting until your stomach grows to eat.
Then you wanna move your body in a way that feels good and focus on movement versus exercise. And you wanna do something when you would previously do nothing for your health and doing something for health could be as small as just drinking more water in the day. And lastly, you want to learn how to align.
Your lifestyle, your nutrition, exercise, self care to go with the grain of your menstrual cycle and be talking about that more in the next episode. Thanks so much for listening and I'll talk with you soon.
