Let me ask you something: How do you feel? Do you feel strong, confident, well rested, and ready to tackle any challenge? Or do you feel fatigued, out of shape, overwhelmed, irritable, and dissatisfied with your body . . . even your life?
If you’re like most women I work with, you feel the latter. You’re unhappy with yourself and hope that losing weight, reaching a specific number on the scale, and getting smaller will make you happier, sexier, more successful, more satisfied—fill in the blank. But if reaching your goals has meant getting on a diet, the only other option you have is to be off the diet, and so begins the cycle of misery, frustration, and, eventually, another diet.
Whenever I hear or see diet commercials or ads online, I can’t help but pick up on the snarky, condescending subtexts and the undertone of guilt and shame. Movies and television love to reduce women to simplistic stereotypes obsessed with pushing salad around on our plates. The messages to shrink are everywhere. It’s no wonder the average woman who diets internalizes these messages until literally her own voice says the same things.
Deep down, we know dieting doesn’t work, but when there isn’t an alternative and losing weight feels like a lifelong ritual, it’s easy to feel alone, overwhelmed, and disempowered. Everything we’ve been sold is that changing our health has to suck. Why do we keep swallowing this bullshit? (Rhetorical question.)
Embarking on your Core 4 journey means thinking about what you’ve internalized, peeling back the layers, and realizing that you get to rewrite the story. In short, it’s time to redefine your relationship with food.
Diets promise that if you change your weight—your outside appearance—you will finally be happy inside. But it’s not that simple. In fact, that’s completely backward. I’m here to show you how to build lasting, sustainable inside-out health while treating yourself with kindness. The women I’ve worked with feel more energetic, vibrant, powerful, content, comfortable, confident in—even proud of—their bodies, and themselves, than they have in years . . . sometimes ever. And they do this without counting calories, restricting food, or using exercise as punishment.
How is this possible? By focusing on gaining health. Everything you’re likely to read about dieting concentrates on losing weight, cutting back, depriving yourself, and shrinking your body. (Those don’t even feel good when you read them, do they?) It’s time to move on to a new way of thinking. You’ll gain health by eating foods that nourish and satisfy you because you respect your body. You’ll also build strength, recharge your batteries, and examine how you see the world . . . all components of the Core 4 pillars. And as you do this, you’ll build your health from the inside out, live bigger, and expand your possibilities. How good will it feel to free yourself from a lifetime of micromanaging your body?
Allow me to point out a truth about bodyweight that nobody wants to admit: weight loss doesn’t automatically equal better health. Some women need to gain muscle to be healthier. Some need to improve their blood sugar. Some need to fix their digestion. Some need to reduce their stress level. If you separate yourself from the number on the scale, I bet you can think of some things besides your weight that you’d like to improve. Better sleep? Clearer skin? More energy? Positive attitude? Greater sex drive? As you gain health, over time your body comes to an optimal, healthy weight for you. In other words, weight loss is often an outcome of better health, not the cause. Another unpopular truth? Even if you dramatically improve your health for the better in every way, the scale still may not show you what you expect to see. In the immortal words of Frozen’s Elsa, “Let it go!” And I’ll add my corollary: If weighing yourself causes you more stress than peace of mind, stop using the scale. It’s not a required tool for improving your health. If it isn’t working for you, you have permission to get rid of it! You don’t have any more time or energy to waste playing mental gymnastics with the scale. It measures how much gravity is pulling down on your body. It doesn’t always show you an accurate picture about health, and it certainly doesn’t tell you your worth. The world is waiting for your powerful self to show up with all your gifts.
Typical diets come with a long list of foods to never eat again—usually all the really fun ones, right?! The Core 4 program isn’t a diet, and while it comes with what I call a “Nourishing Foods Framework” to achieve the best results, which you’ll find later in this chapter (here), there will be no calorie counting, macronutrient logging, freaking out about fats and carbs, or starting the whole program over again if you ate something “off limits.” This isn’t a test of will. It’s not a measure of how “good” you are because you followed some rules. There are no rewards for adhering to the most restrictive diet possible.
Let’s pause, take a deep breath, and feel the burden of every insane diet rule you’ve ever followed melt away.
This first pillar in the Core 4 program is all about eating nourishing foods. That means eating
nutrient-dense, real, whole foods;
a balance of macronutrients in amounts that leave you feeling satisfied and energized;
foods rich in vitamins, minerals, and fiber that look like they came from nature, not a factory;
and the best quality foods within your means.
It also means honoring your unique needs, goals, and taste buds. It doesn’t mean eating perfectly, but it does mean eating like you give a damn.
Eating nourishing foods means taking an additive, not a restrictive, approach. Elimination diets—in which you remove problematic foods for a few weeks, then reintroduce them to test how they affect you—have their merits. In fact, doing an elimination was how I discovered that cow dairy and I aren’t friends. However, when I talk about a “restrictive” approach, I mean the common diets that tell you to take away all “bad” things—fat, salt, sugar, meat—and never eat them again. As if getting healthier means eating as little as possible with as little enjoyment as possible. In this restriction mode, you muscle through for a week or two and then give up when willpower disappears. With the Core 4, you’ll take an additive approach instead, focusing on adding nutrient-dense, satiating, and—dare I say—delicious foods. The idea is that by adding nutrient-dense foods, you’ll begin to crowd out some of the less nutritious ones over time. Healthier eating is sustainable when you have the most flexibility and options, not the least. For example, maybe you decide to add a veggie to your breakfast plate each day. That’s very different from avoiding all carbs.
Dieting by the Numbers
Dieting is big business in the United States—to the tune of more than $60 billion every year. And yet consider these statistics:
» More than 100 million people launch at least one diet every year.
» The average dieter starts a new diet four to five times a year.
» On any given day, 45 percent of women and 25 percent of men are dieting.
» Eighty-five percent of dieters and those who buy weight-loss products and services are women.
» Ninety-five percent of diets fail.
» Most dieters will regain any lost weight within the next one to five years.
» Seventy-five percent of women have unhealthy thoughts, feelings, or behaviors related to food and/or their bodies.
Sources: ABC News, Council on Size and Weight Discrimination, and ScienceDaily.
Even the words you use may change: “I get to eat avocado with my eggs” instead of “I can’t have sugar.” Which feels better to you? This additive approach lets you play, experiment, and learn how to eat better—while eating foods you actually enjoy. Sure, there are some processed foods you’ll be better off without, but you’ll be so busy focusing on all the delectable foods you get to eat that you won’t miss them all that much. And on the random occasion when you do eat that donut, you’re going to choose it, savor it, own the outcomes (if any), and move the hell on with your life instead of drowning in food guilt. This approach empowers you with regard to your food choices and allows you to flex your intuition muscle and start listening to your body.
It’s worth noting that there’s no one definitive list of foods that will work for everyone. A bioindividual approach to nutrition means valuing your unique needs, likes and dislikes, and even culture when it comes to food. Maybe you hate the taste of kale, you’re allergic to eggs, or rice is a staple food in your culture. Honor those things. Take them into consideration as you move through the program, and look for an opportunity to add color, variety, and quality to your food when possible.
With that in mind, consider the framework in this chapter as a guide, not an exact prescription. Your best mix will be different from anyone else’s. Because it’s impossible to give an exact list of foods that works for all people, I’ll be sticking to general recommendations instead of taking nerdy deep dives into specific topics like lectins, FODMAPs, and autoimmune protocols. Above all, if you continue to struggle with specific nutrition issues, consider working one-on-one with a qualified professional.
A talk about nourishing foods wouldn’t be complete without considering how you best deal with change. You might be someone who thrives on gradual change that happens slowly over time. On the flip side, you might be a rip-off-the-Band-Aid kind of person who would rather get change over with and start with a clean slate. Neither method is wrong. If you’re more comfortable with small chunks of change, commit to that. Swap out sweet potato noodles for pasta. Add egg yolks back into your omelets. Those small changes add up!
What makes a food nourishing? Every food can be broken down into several components, such as its calorie content; its macronutrient content (whether it has protein, carbs, fats, or a combination of these); its micronutrient content (the vitamins and minerals it contains); and other elements like water and fiber content. When I consider the nourishing value of a food, I look at the big picture of all of these parts. Most diets consider calorie counting or removing an entire food group as the be-all and end-all. There’s a tendency to want to align with one camp and be dogmatic about how to eat. I want you to leave rigidity behind and instead consider all the criteria I just mentioned when moving forward.
MACRONUTRIENTS
The idea behind the following sections is to add to your knowledge base so you can build awareness when putting meals together. Let’s start with a closer look at macronutrients—protein, carbohydrates, and fats—which are the building blocks of food. We’ll kick off this conversation with protein.
Protein
While you may think of protein as coming from animal sources (meat, fish, eggs, and dairy products), plants contain protein too. Animal-based proteins contain a complete array of essential and nonessential amino acids, which are the basic components of all protein. There are nine essential amino acids, which your body can’t make, so they must be supplied by the food you eat. If you eat a diet that’s low in animal protein sources, it’s important to combine specific plant protein sources when you eat—such as pairing rice with beans—to ensure you get all nine essential amino acids. The other eleven amino acids your body needs are nonessential, which means that while you can get them from food, your body can also make them from other amino acids.
Protein plays many roles in your body. In fact, your body uses and makes more than fifty thousand different proteins. Astonishing! It forms your muscles and helps them recover when you exercise; it is in your cell membranes and is important for cellular integrity; it forms hormones, like the blood sugar regulator insulin, and neurotransmitters, like the mood regulator serotonin. It’s also found in the structural components of skin, hair, and nails, in things like collagen and keratin. The enzymes that speed up every chemical reaction in your body are made of proteins too, as are the antibodies that fight infection and the hemoglobin that carries oxygen in your blood.
Besides its role in maintaining and repairing different tissues of your body, protein is the most satiating food macronutrient and contains four calories per gram. It keeps your appetite in check, and studies have shown that it may affect whether you snack at night. People who take in less protein early in the day are more likely to snack later on—especially when willpower is low. If you’ve got the evening munchies, check in with your protein intake throughout the day.
Many of the women I’ve worked with over the years overestimate the amount of protein they actually eat. Some are afraid to eat protein because they think it will damage their kidneys or make them get bulky. A good many others simply don’t realize. You don’t know what you don’t know! That means they miss out on protein’s building blocks for recovery, satiety, hormone production, and more. If you’re unsure how much protein you’re getting, now might be a good time to keep a food journal for a week to get a better picture of what you’re eating.
Let’s talk sourcing. The most nutrient-dense sources of protein with complete amino acid profiles are meat, fish, shellfish, eggs, and dairy products. Plant foods like nuts, seeds, legumes, beans, grains, and vegetables contain protein but in much smaller amounts. If you’re a vegetarian or don’t consume a lot of animal protein, be sure you’re properly combining foods for a full spectrum of amino acids, and consider supplementing with crucial vitamins like B12. You may have to work a little harder to obtain adequate protein intake, especially if you’re physically active. It’s doable as long as you’re mindful.
Before we go any further, I want to address the elephant in the room: when we think about protein, we may think only about meat, and eating meat has become more controversial in recent years. Plant-based diets are more popular than ever thanks to documentaries, social media, and even some studies that could be interpreted as concluding that meat is unhealthy. But a lot of the messaging about meat is sensationalized and divisive. It pits omnivores and herbivores against each other. In reality, we are more similar than we are different.
If my clients have reservations about eating meat, these are the points I share:
If your body doesn’t digest meat well, work with a practitioner who can help you figure out why.
Most people could stand to eat more plants.
Highly processed foods—animal- and plant-based—aren’t health promoting.
The factory farming of animals is cruel and results in lower-quality meat.
The world would be a better place if we bought from and supported local farmers.
Sustainability and soil health are a concern in all types of farming, including mono-crop plant agriculture.
Whether or not you eat meat is up to you, and I’m not here to force you to do anything you’re not into. Take what you want and leave the rest. (Not exactly the norm when it comes to health guidance, I know . . . everyone’s always arguing and pointing fingers at each other. I don’t have time for that.)
The nutrition framework of the Core 4 is flexible and adaptable to your preferences. Remember that you can be paleo, gluten-free, primal, vegetarian, vegan, or whatever dietary flavor you lean toward and do it poorly. I once worked with a vegetarian whose diet consisted mostly of cheese, tortillas, coffee, and beer. Seriously, he didn’t eat any vegetables! You could be paleo and eat paleo cookies all day. I know vegans who eat mostly processed food. The point is not to get super stuck on the label you slap on your eating patterns but instead to prioritize quality and what works for you. Whatever you choose, strive for a well-rounded diet with as much variety as possible, a balance of macronutrients, a full spectrum of vitamins and minerals, and plenty of fiber. If you can’t get the vitamins and minerals you need because you’re avoiding certain foods, it’s important to supplement.
Digestion
Keep in mind that you can only assimilate and use the nutrients you can digest. Protein digestion begins in the stomach thanks to hydrochloric acid (HCl). This acid activates the enzyme pepsin, which is like a knife that chops long proteins into smaller chunks called peptides. From there, these peptides move to the small intestine, where they’re further broken down by pancreatic enzymes and absorbed into the bloodstream. If you’re struggling to put on muscle mass or recover after exercise despite adequate protein intake, or you feel like you can’t digest protein—that is, it sits in your gut—it’s worth checking with a professional to make sure all the parts of your digestive system are functioning optimally.
So how much protein do you need? It varies from person to person. The recommended daily allowance, or RDA, is often cited as the amount of protein to eat in a day. However, RDA represents a minimum protein intake, the quantity for basic survival, not for thriving, so I typically suggest more for my clients. Unless you’re lying on the couch all day, you probably need more protein than the RDA. A good starting point for active women is 4 to 6 ounces of protein per meal, or 0.8 grams per pound of bodyweight.
Carbohydrates
Fat used to be the scary macronutrient. Luckily that’s changing. Sadly, now it’s carbs. Yikes! Let’s take a closer look.
Carbs are a quick-burning energy source, containing four calories per gram. They’re the main source of fuel for your mitochondria, the power plants in your body’s cells. They’re also the primary source of energy for your brain, which uses about 20 percent of your daily fuel.
Ideally, your body flexibly uses carbs and fats for energy, like a hybrid car. (Protein also can be used, but that’s not a great thing for day-to-day living because it means breaking down precious muscle tissue. It could help you in a pinch, but it’s far from optimal.) At any one time, your body stores about 500 grams’ worth of carbs in your tissues, mostly in your muscle and a small amount in your liver. It’s what you dip into during a hard workout session and at night while you sleep. Contrast that with tens of thousands of calories in stored body fat that we have hanging around at any given time. We rely on that stored energy during periods when we’re at rest or when we’ve sapped our glycogen—stored glucose—during physical exertion.
Question: Is it better to be a sugar burner, relying on carbohydrates, or a fat burner, able to flexibly use carbs and fats? The modern world makes it so easy to overeat refined carbs, which causes your blood sugar to spike and then crash. (Ever feel hangry—hungry + angry? Crashing blood sugar is the culprit.) The only way to counteract the crash is to eat more carbs to prop up your energy level, because the body prefers to use glucose. Instead, let’s transform you from a sugar burner, chasing the next hit of fast-acting carbs, into a fat burner with stable energy levels. Avoiding all carbs isn’t necessary to become a fat burner. You’ll get there by focusing on real, whole-food carb sources balanced with protein and fats.
Carbs can be either sugars or starches. The single sugars, monosaccharides, include glucose, fructose, and galactose. The disaccharides—literally double sugars—include sucrose (table sugar), lactose (milk sugar), and maltose (malt, or grain, sugar). These single and double sugars are very quickly broken down and absorbed by the body and are found in whole foods like fruits, some veggies, and sweeteners like honey and maple syrup.
Longer chains of sugars, or polysaccharides, are the starches. They store larger amounts of energy and generally take longer to digest. Nutrient-dense starches are found in foods like white potatoes, sweet potatoes, plantains, winter squashes, taro root, cassava root (yuca), rice, quinoa, legumes, and other grains.
These foods have key vitamins and minerals plus soluble fiber, which helps slow down the digestion of these foods, preventing massive blood sugar spikes. They also contain insoluble fiber, which your body can’t digest. Fiber keeps you regular, and some fibers feed your gut bacteria. These are all reasons to not be afraid of foods like apples, carrots, or sweet potatoes even though they contain “sugar.”
Just like with protein, being able to digest the carbs you eat matters. Technically, you start digesting carbs in your mouth thanks to the enzyme called salivary amylase. (There’s also a type of amylase that comes from your pancreas when your food is farther down the line.) If carbs hang around too long in the stomach, they can start to ferment, producing gas and making you bloated. If you’re always joking about your food baby, it’s probably a sign that your digestion needs support.
Once carbs leave the stomach, they’re further broken down into simple sugars in your small intestine and absorbed into the bloodstream, causing blood sugar levels to rise. The pancreas releases insulin to move extra blood out of your bloodstream. It’s stored for later use in your muscles and liver as a large molecule made of glucose called glycogen.
Not all carbs are created equal. When comparing them, consider how quickly each food makes your blood sugar spike and then fall. If you eat a teaspoon of table sugar (about 4 grams of carbs), your blood sugar will quickly spike and then drop. You may get a burst of energy, but it’s short-lived. However, if you eat a small carrot (about 5 grams of carbs), your blood sugar won’t rise as quickly. You’ll get fiber, water, vitamins, and minerals along with the sugar the carrot contains, and it takes longer for your body to digest it, so your blood sugar is unlikely to soar as high and plummet so low.
While your cells can store glucose at any time, they’re really good at doing it after exercise. The more muscle fibers you use during a workout, the more sensitive your body is to the signal of insulin and the easier it is to store glucose in your muscles. When you eat a chunk of carbs after a workout, your cells are better at refueling your muscle “tank” and not sending carbs to be stored away as body fat.
That’s how your body should work. However, if you overeat carbohydrates for a long period of time, your cells may stop hearing the insulin signal, which can lead to insulin resistance.
Inflammation
Some kinds of systemic inflammation—like when you have a fever—are normal healing responses. The immune system kicks in to fight the virus or bacteria that’s taking over, and then the body goes to work to stop the inflammation once you’re healed. On the other hand, chronic systemic inflammation can occur on a low-grade, body-wide level. This type of inflammation can happen because of the foods you eat, like crappy oils or too much sugar.
Often this kind of chronic systemic inflammation is rooted in your gut. If the lining of your small intestine is too porous, bits of undigested food particles get through the membrane and kick your immune system into gear. After all, the immune system recognizes substances as “you” and “not you.” Those partially undigested bits of food are “not you” and shouldn’t be in your bloodstream. Unlike fighting a very short-term virus, though, chronic systemic inflammation due to increased gut permeability is ongoing.
In short, chronic systemic inflammation puts a burden on your body’s tissues and organs and makes you feel pretty darn crappy even though you may not realize why. It can manifest in different ways, such as fatigue; gut problems like diarrhea, constipation, and bloating; allergies; puffy eyes; brain fog; and aching joints. Insulin resistance can also contribute to this type of inflammation, which increases the risk of conditions like heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and cancer.
Get the idea? Eating an excessive amount of carbs probably isn’t good for you, but you shouldn’t fear them either. Eat enough carbs to support your energy needs throughout the day, and choose nourishing sources—like starchy vegetables, fruits, and gluten-free grains—as much as you can. The quality of the carbs you choose matters, so save the refined carbs and sugary treats for special occasions, if at all.
If your carb intake has been low for a while and you aren’t feeling so great, you may need to tinker with it. For example, many of my clients used to eat very few carbs even though they worked out several days a week. After a while, many noticed they were tired, sluggish, and irritable, and gaining body fat around the belly. They couldn’t recover from workouts and their performance wasn’t what it used to be.
One possible cause is a change in thyroid function, which can occur when carbs are too low. Your body needs insulin to convert the inactive T4 hormone to the active form, T3. Going too low-carb can decrease your body’s T3 levels. And T3 is well known for its role in controlling functions like metabolism, body temperature, and heart rate.
Eating a lower-carb diet and ditching refined sugars can help your body become more insulin sensitive (that’s good!), but for some people, going too low-carb for a long period—especially if they’re stressed or they work out hard—starts to produce negative effects. In other words, cutting carbs too much for too long can make it harder to feel your best.
The last piece of the carbohydrate picture is stress. Stress is going to happen. It’s not “bad” per se. But it’s all about the dose and recovery. Short bursts of stress followed by enough recovery are what your body is meant to handle. If a bear is chasing you, your adrenal glands release hormones like adrenaline (epinephrine), noradrenaline (norepinephrine), and cortisol. Why? You’re gonna need as much energy (glucose) in your bloodstream as possible to fuel your muscles as you run like hell. Thankfully, your body has that system in place to help keep you alive. (See the sidebar “The Cortisol Connection.”)
The problem is that in this modern day, longer-term stress without recovery is how many women live without even realizing it. Maybe the bear is something like your jerkface boss, money worries, undereating, the morning commute, relationship problems, toxins in your environment, or any of a host of real or perceived stressors. Your body may ramp up your blood sugar to prepare to run or fight . . . but then it doesn’t happen. Often my clients see huge improvements to body composition not by continuing to push their carbs lower and lower but by dealing with their stress levels (see more about stress in the Pillar 3 chapter).
Bottom line? Include a modest amount of nourishing, whole-food carbs daily to support your energy level, workout regimen, and metabolism.
Fats
Fats are dense energy sources—they provide nine calories per gram, more than twice that of protein and carbs. And while that’s fantastic in a camping situation, where you’re trying to carry many calories in a small amount of space, it’s easy to over-consume them in modern life. Fats are yummy, and our brains are wired to seek them out. Great when it’s an avocado, maybe not when it’s a monster basket of fries cooked in crappy vegetable oils and topped off with “cheez.”
Though a lot of people fear fat, it’s essential to your body. It’s an important energy source; it forms the membranes of every one of the more than 30 trillion cells in your body; it cushions your internal organs; and it helps you absorb fat-soluble vitamins A, D, E, and K. Even cholesterol, one of the most vilified substances in history, is the precursor to many of your body’s hormones, including estrogen and progesterone, two key female hormones.
The Cortisol Connection
Let’s imagine our bear is back and chasing you down. It takes just fractions of a second for your brain to kick your body into gear with the fight-or-flight response. Sugar is yanked out of storage and new glucose is made, thanks to adrenaline (epinephrine), noradrenaline (norepinephrine), and cortisol.
Cortisol, in particular, is considered a master stress hormone. In addition to blood sugar, cortisol plays important roles in inflammation, blood pressure, and sleep/wake cycles. Though its jobs are necessary, when it’s constantly called on due to chronic stress, things can get wacky.
Now, if there’s an actual bear chasing you, great—you’ll make use of that blood sugar flood, and insulin will be around after you’ve escaped to safety to mop up the rest. But what happens when there’s no bear—no actual threat, nothing to run from, no need for a higher level of blood sugar? Over time your cells can become deaf to the signal of insulin, a state called insulin resistance. The problem isn’t with these mechanisms that help keep you alive in times of threat. It’s that this fight-or-flight response has been used over and over again simply to keep up with the strains of modern life—many of us live with chronic physical, emotional, and mental stress that is both real and perceived.
How do you keep cortisol in check? Eat nourishing foods. Get plenty of sleep. Work out—without overexercising. Use techniques to help you chill, something we’ll talk more about in the “Get Ready” chapter.
This cortisol connection is an example of how the Core 4 pillars interrelate. You can eat a “perfect” diet as far as nutrition goes and eat an optimal amount of high-quality carbs, but if you’re always feeling pressured, anxious, or under the gun, you may find it harder for you to improve your health and feel better. That interrelationship between your mind and body is one reason why it’s so important to address all four pillars, together.
Your digestive system must be able to break down and absorb the fats you eat as it does protein and carbs. Your gallbladder plays an important role in this process, releasing bile to emulsify the fats you’ve eaten and get them ready for absorption. The pancreas gets involved too, sending special enzymes that break down fats. Essential fatty acid deficiency is common among my clients, even when they appear to be eating enough. When they start supporting their liver and gallbladder, fat digestion often improves. One way to tell whether you’re digesting fats well is to check out your poop. Seriously. A little gross? Nah. It’ll tell you a lot about your gut health. If it’s greasy and leaves an oily slick in the bowl, something may not be right with fat digestion.
Fats are primarily made of fatty acid chains of varying lengths and are grouped into two families: saturated and unsaturated. Saturated fats generally come from animal sources, for example, butter, lard, tallow, and duck fat, with the notable exceptions of coconut and palm kernel oils, plant-based fats that contain a higher percentage of saturated fat. Unsaturated fats include canola, olive, safflower, and sesame oils. Nuts and seeds also contain unsaturated fat.
Let’s get science-y for a moment and explore how these fats differ. Saturated fats have long chains of single-bonded fatty acids. They lie straight and cluster close together like a bunch of straws. Since they pack so closely together, they’re usually solid at room temperature. Unsaturated fats, however, have some double bonds in their chains, and wherever there is a double bond, the chain bends. Imagine a pile of bendy straws. Monounsaturated fats (“mono” means “one”) have one bend in the chain. Polyunsaturated fats (“poly” means “many”) have more than one bend in the chain. That’s why these fats are usually liquid at room temperature. The more bends, or kinks, in the chain the fatty acid has, the more fragile and “breakable” it tends to be.
Monounsaturated fats are more stable than their polyunsaturated cousins. When the latter is exposed to heat or light, they tend to break down or oxidize and release cell-damaging free radicals. Think of free radicals as bad guys that float around the body—they’re formed when oxygen interacts with certain atoms or molecules, making them negatively charged and looking for trouble. Free radicals are problematic because they can cause chain reactions that damage important cellular bits like DNA. Left unchecked, free radicals can cause disease and accelerate aging. Luckily, antioxidants—like the ones found in veggies and fruit—are like the cops that stop free-radical baddies in their tracks. Another reason to eat your broccoli!
We’re still dealing with fat phobia from the last few decades of the twentieth century. So many of the women I work with still avoid egg yolks, swap out butter for margarine, and opt for nonfat dairy products. Let’s all take a moment of silence for the death of flavor, satisfaction, and health benefits. Like a game of Telephone, the message continues to get twisted, leaving the average consumer confused and unsure. Consider this: even the US government—(in)famous for advocating low-fat diets—changed its stance on dietary cholesterol in 2016, calling it no longer “a nutrient of concern.”
Omega-3 and Omega-6 Fatty Acids
There are two special classes of polyunsaturated fatty acids: linoleic acid (LA), also called omega-6 fatty acid, and alpha-linolenic acid (ALA), also called omega-3 fatty acid. Eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) are two types of omega-3 fatty acids well known for their anti-inflammatory effect in the body. Though omega-6 fatty acids play an important role in the inflammatory process, a significant imbalance between them and omega-3 fatty acids is thought to be a growing problem.
Inflammation isn’t bad per se. If you get a cut, your body mounts a rapid inflammatory response to help the area heal. It gets red and hot from increased blood flow, and you might even notice some swelling. Your immune system kicks in to prevent infection. Cool, right? We need this acute inflammatory response to heal. On the other hand, long-term, low-grade inflammation sucks. This type of system-wide inflammation may go on for weeks, months, or possibly years. There’s evidence that this type of inflammation puts you at higher risk for chronic disease.
Both omega-3 and omega-6 are essential fatty acids, which means—as it does with amino acids—that your body can’t make them, so you have to get them through food.
Rich food sources of omega-3s include salmon, sardines, and other fatty, cold-water fish; grass-fed meats; ground flaxseed or cold-pressed flax oil; chia seeds; nuts like walnuts and pecans; and egg yolks. Omega-6 fatty acids can be found in plant oils, such as the oils of peanuts, black currant seeds, evening primrose seeds, and borage seeds, plus in some meats, but—and this is a big but—the bulk of omega-6s in the modern diet come from crappy industrial seed oils that are often degraded and oxidized by the time they are consumed. Because these cheap, low-quality oils—such as corn, cottonseed, safflower, sunflower, and soybean—are ubiquitous in packaged and processed foods, it’s easy to overdo it.
Including some omega-6 in your diet is important because it does have benefits, such as supporting bone health and helping with the inflammatory process, but be mindful of the source. In our modern diet, the current ratio of omega-6s to omega-3s is somewhere in the neighborhood of forty to one, hugely unbalanced; instead, it should be between one to one and four to one. Avoiding processed foods and industrial seed oils is the simplest way to reduce your omega-6 intake and get your ratio within a better range.
But the damage is done and there’s still a lot of fear about eating animal fats, which are saturated and contain cholesterol, with people opting instead for cheaper unsaturated vegetable oils like corn, canola, sunflower, and soybean. However, not only is much of the concern about saturated fat overblown and frankly unfounded, unsaturated fats aren’t completely innocent. They’re far more fragile than saturated fats, which means they break down easily, especially during high-temperature cooking and even during the process of oil extraction itself. When they break down, they release free radicals. So when you opt for french fries cooked in highly processed, oxidized oil that has been heated and reheated for days, that “heart-healthy” unsaturated fat loses its luster!
You don’t have to avoid fried foods forever, but you’ll want to limit these cheap oils and aim for a combination of healthy saturated and unsaturated fats from a variety of sources. Stick to real, whole-food sources of fats and oils from high-quality, cold-pressed, and grass-fed sources. Mix a variety of animal and plant fats into your routine, but don’t go nuts (no pun intended). That means half a jar of almond butter isn’t a snack. My favorite fat sources are grass-fed butter and ghee, coconut products, olives, nuts, and seeds. (See the Nourishing Foods Framework coming up soon.)
MICRONUTRIENTS
Eating a variety of different proteins, carbohydrates, and fats—macronutrients—makes it more likely you’ll also get a wide spectrum of micronutrients, vitamins and minerals. It can be convenient to prepare the same dishes all the time, but that’s a surefire way to end up lacking in certain nutrients. Make it fun: trying one new fruit or veggie each week is a good way to break out of a food rut.
Vitamins
Our bodies can’t make most vitamins, which assist with hundreds of important functions, so we have to get them from our food or take supplements. Fortunately, nutrient-dense real foods have vitamins packaged together in the way nature intended—many work in conjunction with other vitamins, vitamin cofactors, and minerals.
Vitamins are either fat-soluble or water-soluble. Fat-soluble vitamins include A, D, E, and K and are found in full-fat dairy, meat, organ meat, fish, eggs, nuts, seeds, and dark leafy greens. As the name implies, they’re stored in our fat tissue. Water-soluble vitamins include the B vitamins and C, and they are found in vegetables, fruits, legumes, nuts, seeds, whole grains, egg yolks, dairy, meat, organ meat, and fish. These vitamins are water soluble, so you must have a fairly regular supply through your diet. A note about vitamin B12: it’s found in sufficient amounts only in animal products (meat, organ meat, fish, eggs), so vegans may need to supplement.
Minerals
We must get minerals, like vitamins, from what we eat. They play many different roles in our health, including helping muscle contraction and nerve impulses, moving substances across cell membranes, assisting as coenzymes, and maintaining bone structure. You’ve probably heard of calcium, magnesium, sodium, potassium, iron, zinc, and iodine—but there are many more.
One of the most commonly deficient minerals in the body is magnesium—it’s estimated that nearly half of adults don’t get enough. Lack of this mineral may affect everything from how well your cells produce energy to the strength of your immune system and even your food cravings. In fact, if you crave chocolate, you may be low in magnesium! Other magnesium-rich foods include dark leafy greens, avocados, nuts, and seeds.
FERMENTED FOODS
Beyond all the rich macro- and micronutrients the recipes in this program will provide, your body will also benefit from fermented foods. These have been part of human food preservation for thousands of years and are well loved by cultures all around the world. They typically contain probiotic bacteria to help support the gut, and since they’re raw, they contain beneficial enzymes and acids.
Since incorporating fermented foods into my daily routine years ago, I have seen huge improvements in my digestion, skin quality, and immunity, just to name a few. It’s estimated that 70 to 80 percent of your immune system is in your gut, so supporting it with the right flora helps keep everything working correctly. I started by making my own sauerkraut and branched out into drinks like kombucha and beet kvass in addition to kimchi and other fermented veggies.
Sometimes I buy my fermented foods—there’s nothing wrong with that if you’re too busy! You’ll want to look for products that are refrigerated and raw, not pasteurized. Aim for a couple of forkfuls of fermented veggies with breakfast or about 4 ounces of a fermented beverage like kombucha or water kefir, to start.
NOURISHING FOODS FRAMEWORK: AN OVERVIEW
The foods you’ll eat during the Core 4 program will make you feel more energized, clear minded, and stronger. Along with needed macronutrients, they contain lots of vitamins, minerals, soluble and insoluble fiber, and antioxidants. They’re also minimally processed, colorful, and encourage stable blood sugar levels.
A clear framework may make it easier for you to get started, but remember that no two people will settle on the same exact mix of foods that makes them feel their best. For a quick reference chart, see the Nourishing Foods Framework.
Tier 1 Foods
Tier 1 foods are your go-tos, the foods you’ll focus on adding to your routine. They’re dense in nutrients and naturally make you feel full and content. In other words, these foods contain a combination of calories, macronutrients, and satiety factors that tell your brain to stop eating when your body has had enough. For the duration of the 30-day Core 4 program, you’ll be focusing mostly on Tier 1 foods.
Note that if you know a Tier 1 food doesn’t work for your body, you should leave it out or make a substitution.
Tier 1 foods are
- meat, seafood, and eggs for protein;
- veggies, fruits, and good-for-you starches, like winter squashes and sweet potatoes, for carbohydrates;
- healthy fats and oils, like avocado, butter (yes, butter!), coconut oil, and olive oil; and
- fermented veggies and bone broth as boosters. (Bone broth is rich in collagen—your grandma was on to something!)
Shopping for Tier 1 Foods
You can find the vast majority of the ingredients you’ll need during the program in a regular supermarket, natural grocer, or local supplier. If you can’t, check with an online retailer like Thrive Market. Since these foods are your nutritional powerhouses, try to include protein, carbs, and healthy fats at each meal for a wide array of macronutrients, micronutrients, antioxidants, and fiber.
For proteins, opt for grass-fed, pastured, free-range, and/or organic options when you can. These options may not always be available or in your budget, and some of these labels can mean vastly different things. However, higher-quality proteins typically contain more nutrients and in many cases mean the animals had a better quality of life. If that’s out of budget, trim or drain excess fat off the meat you buy, or opt for leaner meats. If you can, get to know a local organic farmer or rancher.
For the veggies and fruits, aim for organic, seasonal, and/or locally grown when possible. Produce in season is more affordable (it’s all about supply and demand!), and local produce is typically fresher and therefore higher in nutrients. Buying local produce also supports the economy in your area and cuts down on transportation time—those strawberries you buy in January probably got to you via airplane or long-distance trucking. If organic isn’t in your budget, consult the Environmental Working Group’s Dirty Dozen, the Shopper’s Guide to Pesticide in Produce (EWG.org/foodnews/dirty-dozen.php), to prioritize your dollars.
For fats and oils, opt for high-quality animal fats from pastured and/or grass-fed animals and cold-pressed oils. Better-quality animal fats will be richer in nutrients. Cold-pressed plant oils aren’t produced with gnarly chemicals or heat, which can damage the more fragile unsaturated fats.
Tier 2 Foods
After the 30-day Core 4 program, you may want to experiment with these foods and see how they affect your body. Though I’ve included a few Tier 2 foods in the recipes you’ll find later in the book, remember that your bioindividuality—your current health status and genetics—means certain foods may work for you while others won’t. These foods, though nutrient-dense and staples of many cultures, may cause digestive problems, skin irritation, joint inflammation, and other issues in some people. In other people, these foods are tolerated just fine. It may be worth doing a short elimination to gather some observations. On the other hand, you may already know that some of these foods work well for you because you’ve experimented before. In that case, feel free to include them right away. Some whole grains are included in this group, and I recommend sticking to unrefined, gluten-free whole grains most of the time. Many of my clients feel better when they avoid gluten-containing whole grains such as wheat, barley, and rye, as well as gluten-containing refined-grain products like most pasta and bread, so I’ve left those out of the framework. If you’re unsure, follow the recommended framework for thirty days and see how you feel. Just because a food is gluten-free doesn’t mean it’s minimally processed or good for your blood sugar! Some gluten-free packaged foods may cause blood sugar to spike more than their gluten-filled counterparts.
Note any negative changes in your energy level, mood, and digestion if you include these foods. You may decide to further experiment with a food, keep a food journal, or talk to your health-care provider for more guidance.
Tier 2 foods are
- full-fat dairy products, like milk, cheese, yogurt, and cream;
- properly soaked and sprouted whole grains and grain-like foods, like rice, quinoa, and oats;
- properly soaked and sprouted legumes, like beans and lentils;
- unrefined sweeteners, like honey and maple syrup (they’re still sugar so you’ll want to use them judiciously); and
- alcohol.
Shopping for Tier 2 Foods
If during the Core 4 program you decide to remove even the few Tier 2 foods I’ve included in the recipes and afterward you’d like to reintroduce them, do so by adding one category at a time for three days, and note any differences. Remember, the goal is to include as wide a variety of real, whole, properly prepared, nutrient-dense foods in your routine as possible!
What About Alcohol?
Wondering about alcohol? Alcohol contains 7 calories per gram, and the wine, beer, or spirits you may enjoy contain primarily carbs. And despite what people may say, no one’s really drinking wine for the antioxidants—am I right?!
So let’s talk about this straight. Some people can easily moderate alcohol with no issues. Others don’t like how they feel after drinking, or they use alcohol to unwind or fall asleep (which causes a whole host of problems we’ll discuss in the Pillar 4 chapter), or it opens the gateway to poor food choices.
If that sounds like you, I recommend you try some of the habit-change work you’ll learn about in the “Get Ready” chapter. And if you feel adamant you will fight anyone who tries to take away your wine, maybe that’s a sign something deeper is going on.
Also, I suggest taking a break if you’re aiming for body recomposition (alcohol is high in calories with low nutritive value), if you’re in perimenopause or menopause (the body has a harder time processing alcohol), or you have sleep problems (alcohol is a sleep disruptor). At the end of the day, if you suspect alcohol isn’t working for you, remove it for a month and see what happens. Sparkling flavored water and herbal tea are my two favorite alcohol substitutes.
Tier 3 Foods
Finally, let’s look at the Tier 3 foods, the ones to minimize, both during the Core 4 program and in the future. These foods don’t have a place in a daily nourishing dietary routine and are the opposite of health promoting. They’re highly refined and stripped of their vitamins, minerals, and fiber. In fact, vitamins and minerals may be added back in afterward in an attempt to make these foods appear healthier than they are. Some of these foods spawn free radicals that damage cells, and others totally whack out your blood sugar. Nobody’s perfect, though! If you do eat these foods from time to time, make the next meal better and move on. No need to punish yourself or play the “I’ll start again on Monday” game.
Tier 3 foods are
- refined grain products (including refined corn and rice products, plus barley, rye, wheat, etc.);
- processed soy, unless it’s been traditionally fermented;
- refined and artificial sugars;
- industrial vegetable oils (corn, canola, cottonseed, grapeseed, peanut, safflower, soybean, sunflower, etc.); and
- hydrogenated oils and other trans fats (margarine and other butter substitutes).
At least for the duration of the Core 4 program, I highly recommend you eliminate these foods and see how you feel.
General Eating Guidelines for the Program (and Beyond)
If your eating schedule is erratic or inconsistent, try switching to a regular schedule. You’ll be more satiated and experience fewer cravings. Over time, as you start listening to your body and eating more intuitively, you may discover you do better with two big meals and a snack, four smaller meals, of some other combination. Customizing for your own needs and preferences takes experimentation. If you’re not sure how to start, begin with three meals to establish a routine and go from there. Get comfortable with the basics before you try anything fancy.
If you’re still hungry after a meal, have a small snack with protein, carbs, and fat to tide you over till the next meal.
If you’re constantly hungry, slowly increase the amount of protein and/or fat at each meal.
Relax before you eat. Chew your food and eat with as few distractions as possible.
Aim to feel comfortably full, not stuffed. It takes a while for your brain to get the signal that your stomach is full.
THE BATTLE AGAINST YOUR ENVIRONMENT
Now that you have a better understanding of all the goodness in the nutrient-dense foods you’ll soon be eating on this program, let’s consider why it’s so challenging to eat enough of these foods each day.
Nutrient-dense foods are sort of self-limiting in the amount you can eat. Imagine sitting down to a juicy chicken breast. The first few bites taste insanely good, but you start to get filled up quickly. By the time you’re halfway through your chicken, it’s not as exciting as it was at the start. Foods like sweet potatoes or salmon or carrots or quinoa fill you up faster because of their protein, fiber, and nutrient content. On the other hand, how easy is it to polish off an entire bag of chips in one sitting?
Our modern environment sets us up for challenges. We’re surrounded by a plethora of easily available, very yummy foods that are engineered to taste better than anything found in nature. When these sugary, fatty, salty, crunchy foods ping your brain’s reward center, you typically choose the path of least resistance. That’s just human nature. It’s not just you. You’re not crazy or weak or lacking willpower. Couple that with how easy it is to be sedentary and stressed, and you’ve got quite the situation on your hands.
But giving in doesn’t have to be your fate. The Core 4 will be your guide with simple—though let’s be real, not always easy—changes that make it possible to navigate this tricky modern life. Making better choices, being consistent, and going against the grain is key. Just because everyone else is doing it doesn’t make it right. So fly that little revolutionary flag because you’re winning the battle with this program.
When you start adding more nourishing foods to your routine, you’ll find it easier to crowd out food that doesn’t make you feel as good. Just remember, dialing in your unique best nutrition doesn’t only mean adding things. You’re also taking care to avoid those nutrient-poor, inflammatory, craving-inducing Tier 3 foods because you’re putting most of your attention on all the tasty, nourishing, satisfying foods you get to eat. Same end result, different mindset.
Nourishing Foods Framework
TIER 1 NOURISHING FOODS 
These are your nutritional powerhouses. Include protein, carbs, and healthy fats at each meal for a full spectrum of macronutrients, vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, and fiber.
Proteins
Aim for grassfed, pastured, free-range, and/or organic whenever possible
Beef
Bison
Chicken
Duck
Eggs
Elk
Fish
Lamb
Organ meats
Pork
Seafood
Shellfish
Turkey
Venison
Carbs: Veggies
Aim for organic, in season, and/or local whenever possible
Artichokes
Arugula
Asparagus
Bok choy
Brussels
sprouts
Cabbage
Carrots
Cauliflower
Celery
Collard greens
Cucumber
Eggplant
Garlic
Green beans
Green onions
Jicama
Kale
Leeks
Lettuces
Mushrooms
Onions
Peppers
Radishes
Snap or snow peas
Spaghetti squash
Spinach
Sprouts
Summer squash
Swiss chard
Tomatoes
Turnips
Zucchini
Carbs: Starchy Veggies
Aim for organic, in season, and/or local whenever possible
Beets
Cassava root (or yuca)
Lotus root
Parsnips
Plantains
Rutabagas
Sweet potatoes
Taro root
White potatoes
Winter squash (acorn, delicata, butternut, kabocha, pumpkin, spaghetti, etc.)
Yams
Carbs: Fruit
Aim for organic, in season, and/or local whenever possible
Apples
Apricots
Bananas
Blackberries
Blueberries
Cherries
Grapefruits
Grapes
Kiwifruits
Lemons
Limes
Mangoes
Nectarines
Oranges
Papayas
Peaches
Pears
Pineapples
Plums
Pomegranates
Raspberries
Watermelons
Fats and Oils
Aim for high quality fats from pastured/grassfed animals and cold-pressed oils
Avocados and avocado oil
Bacon and bacon fat
Butter
Coconut flakes, milk, and oil
Duck fat
Egg yolks
Ghee (clarified butter)
Lard
Nuts (almonds, Brazil nuts, cashews, hazelnuts, walnuts, etc.)
Olives and olive oil
Red palm oil
Seeds (chia, flax, pumpkin, sesame, sunflower, etc.)
Tallow
Fermented Foods and Nourishment Boosters
Aim for high-quality store-bought or homemade
Bone broth
Kimchi
Kombucha
Kvass
Pickled veggies (low sugar)
Sauerkraut (raw)
Water kefir . . . and any other fermented veggies (raw)
TIER 2 TEST-IT-OUT FOODS
These are foods I highly recommend you eliminate for a month and see how you feel. They may cause sensitivities, allergies, and inflammation in many people. Afterward, if you’d like to reintroduce them, do so by adding one category at a time for three days. Note any differences.
Dairy
Full-fat, pastured/grass-fed, raw, and/or organic
Cheese
Cream
Milk
Yogurt
Legumes
Properly soaked and sprouted
Beans
Lentils
Gluten-free Whole Grains
Properly soaked and sprouted
Buckwheat
Corn
Gluten-free oats
Quinoa
Rice
Natural Sweeteners
Honey (raw and locally sourced)
Maple syrup
Alcohol
Beer
Cider
Gluten-free beer
Liquor
Spirits
Wine
TIER 3 AVOID-WHEN-POSSIBLE FOODS
These are foods I highly recommend you eliminate for a month and see how you feel. They may cause sensitivities, allergies, and inflammation in many people.
Hydrogenated fats (margarine and other butter substitutes)
Refined grains (refined rice or corn products, etc.)
Refined sugars
Soy (unless traditionally fermented)
Trans fats
Vegetable oils (corn, canola, cottonseed, grapeseed, safflower, soybean, sunflower, etc.)
Note About Portions
Inevitably, any conversation about nourishing foods eventually turns to portion size. A seven-day food journal and/or food tracking with an app may help you get a handle on portions, especially since it’s quite common to have portion distortion. However, if you have a history of disordered eating, exercise caution when logging or tracking food and consult a professional.
Instead of long-term tracking, I recommend a visual system. You may have to adjust this baseline depending on your body size and activity level, but here is a guide to eyeballing a single portion size per meal:
Avocado: ¼ to ½ of an avocado
Eggs: 2 to 4
Fermented drinks like kombucha or kefir: 4 to 8 ounces a day
Fermented veggies: a generous forkful
Fruits, starchy veggies, gluten-free grains, and legumes: 1 to 1.5 cupped open hand(s)
Meats and fish: palm-to-hand sized
Nuts, seeds, animal fats, and oils: 1 to 2 thumb-sized portions
Vegetables: 2+ cupped open hands . . . aim for at least half the plate
Satiety and Satiation
While we’re on the subject, let’s talk about the difference between satiety and satiation, which are two related but different concepts. Satiation is the more immediate feeling of fullness that occurs when you eat. Satiety, however, is the longer-term experience after eating—how long your hunger is satisfied.
Satiety is affected by how much fiber and protein is in food, for example. Satiety is complex and spans the time from when you put food into your mouth until long after its digested nutrients have been absorbed. One interesting way food affects satiety is by its texture; that is, liquid foods have a weaker effect on satiety than solids, which need to be chewed. That’s one of the reasons why I recommend limiting shakes, blended coffee drinks, and other calorie-dense, but lower satiety, liquids if you’re trying to improve your health.
When it comes to regulating appetite, the two main hunger hormones are leptin and ghrelin. Leptin is made by your fat cells. Higher leptin tells the body, “We have enough stored energy here,” so if you have adequate stores of body fat, it ratchets down your appetite. Ghrelin, made by the stomach when it’s empty, signals when it’s time to eat and returns to its baseline after you’ve had a meal. When you’re dieting and really cutting calories, the cruel irony is that ghrelin spikes, causing you to seek out food. This is why I don’t recommend drastic caloric restriction as a long-term weight-loss strategy.
When they work properly, leptin and ghrelin do a pretty good job of regulating appetite. But in recent years, there has been more research into whether these messengers work properly in some people. Is it possible that your cells can’t “hear” the leptin signal, for example, making you feel insatiably hungry? Hopefully more research will provide answers. One thing is clear: the regulation of appetite is complex. But when you eat high-satiety nutrient-dense foods, don’t overly restrict calories, build muscle, and get more sleep, you can make progress. And the nourishing foods you’ll eat on the Core 4 will keep you satiated.
BEYOND THE “WHAT” OF NUTRITION
Eating nourishing foods is about what you eat. But how and when you eat are just as important. And that requires becoming more mindful—paying attention to your eating habits. As a society, we’re hyper-distracted and multitasking our faces off. We scroll social media while we eat. (My biggest challenge.) We eat in our cars, at our desks, in front of the TV. We’re often in a stressed-out state. We sit down with friends and loved ones less and less . . . the concept of gathering around a table to share nourishing food and conversation is all but disappearing. And we skip meals or try to graze every two hours to keep blood sugar from crashing and burning. All of this results in poor digestion, undernutrition, blood sugar problems, and disconnection—from each other and from our food.
Eating has been reduced to a chore instead of an occasion to connect with one another and with the food we’ve taken the time to prepare. When was the last time you sat down and tried to savor the taste of what you were eating? How you eat is important for more than just satiety. Your body has two branches—the sympathetic and the parasympathetic—within the autonomic nervous system, and they operate almost like yin and yang. The sympathetic arm is responsible for the fight-or-flight response when you’re stressed or threatened. Even low-level, everyday stressors, like someone cutting you off in traffic, can kick the sympathetic nervous system into high gear, and eating when you’re in that heightened state makes digestion more difficult.
Think of this from a threat point of view. If our bear popped out of the woods while you were hiking, your sympathetic nervous system would really kick in. Your heart rate and respiration would increase, thanks to adrenaline and noradrenaline. Blood would be diverted away from your internal organs to your arms and legs so you could fight or flee. That’s not an optimal situation in which to eat and digest food—your body isn’t primed to do it.
The parasympathetic system is the opposite: it’s the rest-and-digest part that takes over when you’re relaxed. You want the parasympathetic system at work when you’re eating. Yet most of us often eat on the go, when we’re distracted and stressed, which prevents the body from chilling out during mealtime. When you learn to eat mindfully, your body is better able to digest and assimilate the nutrients in the food you eat.
Turning on the Parasympathetic System
So how do you slide your system from sympathetic to parasympathetic at meal time? We’ve become so disconnected from what we’re eating. We don’t typically grow the food we eat; often we don’t even cook it ourselves. Food has become something we just shove into our mouths without thinking about it.
To turn on your parasympathetic system, you can start with something as simple as taking a few deep breaths and expressing gratitude for your food. Treat mealtime as its own occasion, not a nuisance. Bring attention to what you’re eating, whether that’s turning off your electronic devices or taking time to smell, savor, and enjoy your food.
When you eat while you’re doing something else, you’re not focusing on the flavors, textures, or satisfaction of the food. When your mind is distracted, you’re not associating eating with anything else—not with gratitude for the food itself or for the person who prepared it for you or even for the opportunity to nourish your body.
Yes, you’re busy and stressed and probably in a rush. But when you eat without slowing down and being mindful about what you’re eating, the process becomes a robotic task with little pleasure. Hey, I do this sometimes myself! I’m not perfect! But when you eat mindfully, you give your mind and body a much-needed break from the demands of your day.
Take these steps to eat more mindfully and engage your parasympathetic system:
SIT DOWN. Yes, start simple. And that means sitting at the dining table or, if you must, your desk—not behind the wheel of your car. (Eating and driving is a terrible combination. You’re distracted by your food as you drive and distracted by driving as you eat.) Take a couple of deep breaths and bring your attention to what you’re going to eat. You may want to think or say something you’re grateful for. Bonus points for sitting on the floor. There’s something so grounding about eating from that position.
TURN OFF YOUR ELECTRONICS. Remove all distractions, whether it’s television or social media. Start looking at eating as an opportunity to slow down and take a break.
USE YOUR SENSES. As the saying goes, you eat with your eyes first. How does the food look? How appealing is it? How does it smell? Is your mouth watering already? Anticipating what you’re about to eat makes the experience more pleasurable and jump-starts your digestive system.
TAKE SMALL BITES. Your mom was right—don’t wolf down your food. Smaller bites slow your pace and let you savor what you’re eating. Put your fork down between bites. Take small sips of water. Whatever slows down your eating.
CHEW WELL. Chewing is the start of mechanical digestion. The process of chewing tells your body, “Get ready to receive nutrients!” And as you saw a few pages ago, chewing introduces digestive enzymes into the mix and improves satiety.
INVITE SOMEONE TO JOIN YOU. When you eat with someone else, you increase your sense of community and connection. Sharing a meal or simply eating with a coworker can help you feel less isolated.
EATING ON THE GO: SIMPLE HACKS TO MAKE THE BEST CHOICES
It’s easier to choose nutritious foods when you’re eating at home—especially after you learn how to prepare meals in advance. But what about when you’re on the go? Use these simple hacks to make smart choices away from home.
AVOID FOOD WITH LABELS WHEN POSSIBLE. Whole, natural, nutritious foods usually come without labels—and you’re almost always better off choosing a food like this over a processed one. If you’re stuck and have to buy something prepackaged, choose an item that has fewer ingredients than more.
SHOP SMART. If you have time to grab something at the grocery store, stick to the outside edges of the market—that’s where you’ll find the fresh food sections. Processed and packaged foods are found in the aisles.
READ CAREFULLY. Eating out? Look for foods that are baked, roasted, steamed, or poached, and skip those that are fried, deep-fried, breaded, or “crispy.” Fried restaurant foods are cooked in low-quality vegetable oils that have been heated over and over again. Ask for oil and vinegar instead of dressings with dodgy oils, and request that condiments like mayonnaise be served on the side so you can control how much is added. If a dish is served with sauce, ask whether it has been thickened with flour if you’re sensitive to gluten.
ASK FOR SUBSTITUTIONS. Ask your server if you can swap something else in—a side salad or vegetable instead of a side of fries, for example. If you’re ordering an entrée salad, ask how much protein comes with it. I’ve ordered salads that came with only two dinky strips of chicken on top, and I was hungry an hour later. Ask to double the protein on the salad, swap in nuts or seeds for croutons, or add a hard-boiled egg or two, and leave off the cheese if dairy is an issue for you.
SNACK SMARTER. Whether you’re eating a meal or a snack, try to combine the three macronutrients—protein, carbs, and healthy fats—for better blood sugar control and satiety. Even at a quickie mart, you can probably find, say, a banana and some beef jerky—whole foods that keep you going for hours.
PLAN AHEAD. Having a go-to snack in your purse or bag can be a lifesaver when you’re hungry. Hard-boiled eggs, unsalted almonds, grain-free granola, jerky, dehydrated fruit chips, kale chips, veggies and hummus, and fresh fruit all make great portable snacks.
KEEP IT SIMPLE
Let me add one more thing here. As I mentioned at the beginning of this chapter, the problem with complex nutrition rules and super-restrictive diets is that they aren’t sustainable. The harder and more limiting a diet is, the less likely you are to stick to it . . . and that’s the enemy of consistency, the thing that helps you gain health.
Also, trying to make a fifteen-step healthy recipe you found on Pinterest on a frantically busy Tuesday night will leave you feeling stressed and resentful—not exactly the way to make progress. Stick with the basics, stay consistent over time, and watch how you start to look and feel better without all the hassle and heartbreak of diets.
In the next chapter, we’ll switch gears from what you feed your body to how you move it, in the second of the Core 4 pillars, “Move with Intention.”