Get answers to your questions about marriage, parenting and family life from experts and parents of 7 children!

Rachel Denning (00:10.638)
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Extraordinary Family Life podcast. I gotta make sure which podcast I'm doing here. Not to be the man. Not to be the man. This is be the woman and the man. Thanks for being here, you guys. Thanks for listening. We want to sincerely want to honor you and praise you and...

give you total kudos for the good things you're doing. I hope you celebrate that. Most people don't celebrate enough. They're constantly looking at their weaknesses, where they're coming up short. So even if they do something well, they're like, yeah, but I'm still not doing that. And we struggle pausing, looking back, seeing how far we've come, and celebrating the wins. And even if we haven't come that far, and even if we're really struggling, just limping along, crawling, stop. And if you did anything good, celebrate that because.

then you're telling your brain with lots of emotion, like, hey, this is good, do more of that. Which was happening in our brains is we're giving tons of emotion to the negative side, and the brain says, oh, that's important, let's do more of that. And it's not logical, it's just reactionary. The brain just responds. We're going to talk about it today, this neuroassociative conditioning. So I do want to honor you and praise you. And please celebrate, and please acknowledge those things.

say it to yourself, acknowledge to yourself, hey, good job, you did that well. And ideally, I think we'll get to a healthy place where in our minds we can acknowledge what we're doing well and we can simultaneously acknowledge the things where we need to work on and still totally love ourselves and be comfortable in our own skin and be comfortable where we are. Well, maybe not comfortable where we are, but. Grateful. Grateful where we are and acknowledge like, hey.

I got some work to do, let's go. And it's, you're not disliking yourself. You're not tearing yourself down. You're not saying you're a despicable human being. You're just saying, I'm doing this well, I need to do that better, let's go. And keep moving onward and upward. So on that note, we're gonna move onward and upward to eliminating sugar. Well, let's read this question specifically. Got a really great question came in and it's very thoughtful. It's very open, it's very personal.

Rachel Denning (02:30.702)
And I think articulates well the struggle many of us are having. And so I want to read this and then let's address specifically, try to give you more tools and strategy around. And again, some of you might be listening like, oh, I'm already off sugar and everything's good and go on, don't do that. Because there's a lot more to this. There's layers here that apply across so many areas of our lives. And again, we're taking these principles and practices and putting them in your unique situation where you need them.

So it's actually as part of the 28 day challenge that we're doing and we meet live every week and answer questions which we're going to do. We decided we would also do a podcast about it because we know that when we do it live it can take a different route depending on the questions that come up and the clarification and all of that. So we don't feel like it'll be overdone here by talking about it in the podcast. But they're reporting on the first week of the challenge. It went pretty well. However, the sweet tooth got the best of me.

Because as part of the challenge, one of the things they're doing is eliminating one food from their diet. And this person picked sugar. I don't drink soda. I haven't had a donut in two years. Those are out. OK, let's stop there. Man, there's already so much I want to hit. So number one, fantastic. Just totally get rid of soda. And I say that for all of you, cut soda. It is just liquid poison. And I know it's like, oh, it's a little extreme. You're a little hardcore. Just try it. Trust me. Just.

Say, okay, I'm going to full month without soda. And the first couple of days it'll get to you, especially if they're caffeinated and you've kind of been dependent on them or your body gets addicted to them, cut out soda. Do yourself a gigantic favor. Just remove that from your life and from your family's life. So it's super good. And then what was it? Donuts? I haven't eaten a donut in two years. In two years. Nice, no donuts. Fantastic. Cause that's just a grease bomb with dough and sugars and all kinds of garbage.

And then she says, I don't eat things with corn syrup, which is fantastic. Get rid of anything, any, read the ingredients all the time. You guys, we've talked about this. If it has corn syrup in it, don't go there. Mostly use olive and coconut oil. I think the absolute best thing we use is butter and ghee and tallow. Those are the absolute best. And then coconut oil, which is excellent. And then olive oil in that order. I want to jump back to the very top.

Rachel Denning (04:50.446)
So it was going well, the sweet tooth got the best of me. So that's a really interesting statement and I've been guilty of using it too, but now I've realized like, wait a minute, that's a form of victimism. There's no such thing as a sweet tooth. Like it's not like one of your teeth is the dominating, like, oh, it's the sweet tooth. And it's like controlling your brain and your life. There's a tooth in there.

So, but it's a form. We all use that. We all use that. I did too. I'm like, oh man, I get it. You have a sweet tooth, don't you? I'm like, but that's, it's wrong. And actually we need to be more responsible with our language. So if I'm being very responsible with my language, I'm not going to say that anymore because there's no such thing. And when we talk about things that actually don't exist, like getting on the wrong side of your bed, that there's no such thing as the wrong side of the bed, but we personify something or we.

We're attaching culpability and responsibility to something that doesn't exist. It's a really weird, subtle form of victimism. Well, it's a subtle form of blame and of eliminating personal responsibility. Exactly. Because it's more painful to say, I messed up or I was weak than to say, oh, it's kind of your, well, the idea of personifying. You're taking it from yourself to something else.

It's really subtle and it's almost subconscious. It's like the sweet tooth got the best of me. No. Something else was going on inside of you. And again, you have control of you. You're not a victim here. And I'm not talking specifically to this woman. I'm talking to you and me and all of us. You are in control of you. You don't have a tooth that somehow takes over and controls you and dominates you.

So if we're just being super responsible with our language and our words, we say, no, I was feeling a real temptation to eat sugar after a few days without it. That's responsible language and we can address that. Well, and I think because what we're trying to do is point out a mindset that's very key in creating lasting change, which at the end of her question is what she's saying. She wants to create lasting change. This is one of the key mindsets that helps us to do that because when we accept

Rachel Denning (07:09.773)
100 % personal responsibility and don't subtly blame other things again subconsciously We're not saying this is a conscious thing that's going on. It's subconscious, but when you Take on that responsibility you then have the power to do something to actually do something about it And you start to have a lot more awareness because I know for me when you're trying to change something like Eliminating sugar from your diet, which is a big deal. It's a big thing

it requires a lot of awareness and some of that awareness means looking at why are you eating sugar? And some of the reasons that we're eating sugar are mental, emotional, social, spiritual, right? Like we have to be aware of what's causing those things and that gives us more power rather than oh, it's just my sweet tooth. If you recognize that you are eating sugar when you're stressed or when your kids do something,

or when this happens or that. Like you get very specific, then that's actually when you have power to change. Because you can now do something about those things instead of just saying, oh it's a sweet tooth. See how that's a lot more generic? It's a lot more generic to just say, oh it's a sweet tooth and it's all blamed on the sweet tooth instead of, well it happens when these certain conditions occur. Or when I am, you know, I'm overwhelmed. Or when this happens.

So there's more specificity, which gives you more power, which then allows you to actually create real change. So by changing the wording, it's a technique to move from the subconscious to the conscious. Yes, exactly. I love what you just screamed there. So I'm going to say, instead of saying, oh man, I got a sweet tooth and it just got me, we're going to stop saying that, be responsible, and we're going to move away from that and go.

I'm feeling really like my mind it's either my mind or my body can it because it can be psychological or Physiological is craving something sweet that gives us responsibility that gives us power because now we can address it But if I'm like man, I just have a sweet tooth Then you just think huh? Well, I just what can I do about that except eat sweets? Yeah I just have a sweet tooth right or I have to use or I have to use insane amounts of willpower to overcome that

Rachel Denning (09:28.877)
Flaw or weakness, right? Which is another. It's like something I have. It's just this part of me. And now I just got to exercise all this self -control, self -discipline. Which is another reason why people are often failing when they're trying to create a change like this is that they're trying to use willpower to do it instead of actual strategies that work. When you use awareness, when you use environment design, when you take.

responsibility for your thoughts and your actions, that's a lot easier to create change than it is to have willpower. Because the fascinating thing about willpower is that willpower is actually a resource that can be used up. Now it's renewable, but you actually only have a limited amount of willpower. And you can use it up through the day. And so by the end of the day, you're out of willpower and now you're trying to rely on willpower to not succumb to your sweet tooth.

That just doesn't work. You've run out of gas. Especially if, yeah, again, believing you have a sweet tooth, not like, oh, you do have one and good luck with that, because now you're tired. Yes, exactly. But I guess the point is, like, you can't just rely on willpower to try to make this change here. You have to use other strategies, because willpower, you run out of it, and then you're in trouble if that's your only course of action. Yeah. So we can dive into, actually, I'll just touch on it really quickly.

The reason we feel like we have a sweet tooth or we feel like, man, gosh, I'm really craving sweets is, well, there's many reasons. Well, let me read this first and then we'll, I think I know where you're going, hopefully. Well, I was gonna touch on the physiology of it. Well, right, I think this applies here because she says, every time I decide no more sugar,

So she decided they're not gonna do any more sugar. I can almost feel my brain go into panic mode. Yeah, that's important. And it's like a wave. That's the psychology. Right, it's like a, and it's psychology and physiology there, I think. Yep. It's like a wave of dessert ideas come in and the ability to resist, which is your willpower, seems impaired. I wanna lose weight, but it feels like now Everest is in front of me. Okay. This is so good. I love, love, love that you articulated this. Like you put, you put your experience into words here.

Rachel Denning (11:46.157)
in your own words and so we can relate to it and go, oh, OK, yeah, I've experienced that too. I can relate. And this is super, super powerful. So your brain goes into panic mode, which is really awesome. The brain does that. Especially, I like to refer to that as the survival brain. The survival brain panics. And what's interesting, you guys, it doesn't panic because it wants what's best for you. It panics because it has a modus operandi.

It just has a way of doing things. It has been conditioned, it has been trained to do things a certain way. And when you change it up or shift it or do whatever, it, and then the body kind of as a cascade effect goes, whoa, uh -uh, we need to get back to what we know. We've got to get back to the status quo. The survival brain loves, loves, loves status quo, even if it's not healthy.

Even if it's not good, if it's not in your best benefit, it loves status quo. So it's been conditioned to be there. And you say, I'm not doing it. And it goes, no, we've got to remedy this. And so it literally starts generating ideas to get back to status quo. And it starts cranking out recipes for desserts. That's what it does. And so what you're describing is this beautiful psychological and physiological phenomenon that starts happening in your brain and body.

Well, and I think a part of this which is applicable is that, and maybe it's a little geeking out on the science here, but every one of your cells in your body actually has these receptors that can be quote unquote turned on or turned off. And when we eat sugar and sweet things, that produces like a dopamine hit in our body. And so the cells have these receptors for dopamine hits and essentially means that they want and need.

those dopamine hits, which is true. They do need them. Now you can change those cells and those receptors over time, but part of what's happening, you have to give it time to actually change. But it does have those receptors. And so your cells in your body are literally saying, we need that dopamine. We need that hit. And I know where to get it. It's from these desserts. And so like you're describing what is actually going on. Your brain is going into panic mode because it's saying, I have all these receptors that need.

Rachel Denning (14:09.517)
little things to come connect to them, need those dopamines to come and connect to these cells, you've got to get those dopamines and that comes in the form of sugar. Now this is exactly how a literal addiction works. Well, that's what I was going to say. It's addiction at a cellular level. And it's the same, like this is the same way any addiction works. It can be with cocaine, it could be with pornography, it can be with whatever. All addictions work the same way. Now it doesn't mean that this is a bad thing. It can become a very bad thing.

but you can also change. You can use it as a positive addiction. Yeah, you can use it as a positive addiction. Which is ideally what you want. We want to get ourselves to a level where they're craving really good things for us. Right. And so part of what I, unless you have something else, I want to go into this next thing about part of the idea or what the strategy we need to have here when you're trying to say give up sugar is not necessarily to totally eliminate all sweet things from your life.

And the reason why I'm saying that is because we are as humans, I made or evolved to seek out sweet things. Like, you know, say when we were hunter gatherers, if you found a fruit, you were gonna eat that. Your brain was like, ooh, this is good. I need this, I want this. So it's part of our biology that we want sweet things. Now the problem that comes in here is, here comes the industrial revolution.

And instead of getting your dopamine hit from fruit, which was what was happening before, or say a natural source like honey, or even maple syrup or whatever, now you've got the industrial revolution taking sugar cane, which is a natural plant and you can't actually eat it, and turning it into raw.

unrefined sugar, which is practically like a drug in a lot of ways. So this is where the problem is. It's not that the... Well, then it goes through refining processes, and then they're making syrups and corn syrups. I mean, they've just manipulated this and...what's the word? It's exacerbated the problem. Yeah, but there's a strong word of they just have really mutilated all this to an extreme. Right. And so the addiction to this, these receptors are off the...

Rachel Denning (16:31.405)
hearts now, starting with little kids, that our bodies are so, I mean we're getting these hits that are just not found in nature. Yeah, exactly. So it is essentially in some ways like a drug, and so what we're trying to do is not necessarily totally eliminate that because your body is going to revolt against that. For one, here's a quick example from my own life. I...

I think it is good to go completely off of all sweet things for a time because it can help resell your body. It can help flush out all of these receptors and well, yeah, the receptors and all kinds of cravings and all that. So at one time, well, I've done it a couple of times, but recently within the last year or two, I went off of everything sweet for, I think it was a week or 10 days, no fruit, no honey, obviously no sugar. I'd already been off sugar, but you know, nothing sweet at all.

And it was just kind of this, it was an experiment for me, it was a reset, although I had already done that so it wasn't like super necessary, but I just wanted to do it. And it was very fascinating actually because I found myself feeling depressed, which is fascinating. I literally kind of had this sense of like, what's the point of eating?

there's gonna be no sweetness to it. There's gonna be no sweetness in my life. So it was very strange and like I was aware of how I was feeling. That's what I'm saying, it's so cool, because if you go into it with awareness, you start, you're just observing what your brain, the tricks your brain plays on you, what your body starts to, and you're just an, you're an observer of yourself. And you're like, wow, my brain's telling me what's the point. Exactly. It's so sad.

playing all these games and you're just sitting there watching it and say, this is interesting. This is fascinating. And watch it. You learn a lot about yourself and about the body and about all kinds of things. But so my takeaway from it was it's not my goal to eliminate all sweet things from my life. That's not the point. I wouldn't say that's even healthy, but. Well, that too. Like, I don't think it's healthy because I think our bodies are back to this idea. Like, we're evolved, we're biologically created.

Rachel Denning (18:49.293)
to want to have sweet things in our life. And that's okay. That's kind of the point is that's okay. What's not okay is the industrialized sugar, which is not normal and natural and is causing damage to our body, which we're gonna talk about with the insulin and everything in a minute. Where there's a scale of all this, there's actually a really cool glucose scale and a glycemic, there's a glycemic.

index which is helpful, there's a glycemic load index which is even more helpful. Which you can give a little bit more information about that if you want in a minute. Okay. But so the idea... Yes dear. Yes dear. Sorry. I'm just like, wait, I want to finish the thought for a minute. I guess what I'm trying to say here is if you say in this scenario, oh, I decide no more sugar and then my brain goes into panic mode, well, we're not saying give up the desserts per se.

We're saying find healthy replacements. In fact, that's the key to success. Exactly. Before you say no sugar, you strategically set up a system so you don't sabotage your success. Exactly. You say, hmm, I know I'm going to crave some sweet things. Let's line up some healthy replacements. Let's look through for some healthy desserts. Let's get some good things like raw honey and let's get a bunch of fruit and some maple syrup.

and let's set some parameters and some systems in place. So then when you go, okay, no sugar, and the body goes, ah, then you're like, hey, I'll just put some honey here in some organic unsweetened Greek yogurt with some strawberries and blueberries. Boom, that's amazing, right? Right. Well, and I would even say, so if I was gonna do this, if I was on sugar and I wanted to get off, the approach I probably would take was, first of all, I would do a sugar fast. Now, the...

benefit of this is that it's temporary. So your brain doesn't freak out as much because you're just like, it's just for a week or 10 days. And so when your brain has an ending point, they feel a little safer there. So I would do that because that resets your taste buds. I might even also this in there. I would start with a two to three day full fast where the only thing I consume is water. That's a full reset. You get your whole intestines, your stomach cleared out, everything cleared out. And it's just two to three days only water.

Rachel Denning (21:14.701)
Then go a few more days then start eating but do no sugars. Well, and I would do no sweetness for like seven days Just because you're literally resetting your taste buds because I think we all know this But we don't realize how badly we have it when you're used to eating very sweet things and then you go to eat Some strawberries and you think oh

These aren't even sweet, they need like sugar. And we see, we kind of laugh about it because we see it happen all the time. I don't laugh anymore, I cringe. People put sugar all over sweet fruit. I'm like, what in the? And the reason they do that is because their taste buds have been warped by the intense amounts of industrialized sugar. So by going off all sweetness, then you're kind of resetting your taste buds so that things that currently seem less sweet to you now.

seem sweeter because you've gone with that. Go seven days without sweets and then have a strawberry and you'll be like, dang, a raspberry, a grape, a grape will blow your mind. Like you'll get that huge sensation. You're like, this is amazing. And so then you'll get the hit you're kind of going after. You can get it from very healthy sources. Grapes are candy to me. They are so sweet. They are so sweet. You can only have a few of them. You're like, man, that's a bit much. So I would do that.

And then probably if I was leveling into this, I wouldn't even necessarily give up the desserts I was used to. I would find a way to make them with honey or maple syrup instead of sugar. That would be a step I would take. And then from there I would kind of, you know, I would keep ratcheting that up and improving it to where, you know, my desserts are now different, much healthier things. But even...

Making homemade ice cream is a great source. If you can make it with, you know, we love to make it with honey or, you know, making your own desserts like that is a fantastic way to still satisfy the desires of the brain and the body, but not with this unnatural source, which is basically processed sugar. And you could even, you could even make an argument for using something like urethra tall, which is sugar alcohol and doesn't spike your blood sugar or the problems there, or even like a monk fruit.

Rachel Denning (23:32.333)
And you could also make an argument for drastically less sugars or sweeteners than what recipes call for. Most recipes in the United States call for stupid amounts of sweetener. And we do a quarter of what's called for. Especially, right, when we were making a transition, before we fully gave up sugar, that's what we would do. We would always cut the sugar that called for in half. Especially because we had lived in Europe as well. And...

desserts in Europe are just less sweet and that's what is natural. And when you get your body, you come over, you're like, ooh, this is sweet, it's wonderful. But when you come from a US diet to European dessert, most Americans are like, eww. Not even dessert. Their desserts aren't very good. I'm like, these are some of the best on the planet. So you could start by, that's another strategy, you can start just by reducing the amount of sugar in the desserts you make. That's one way.

Or just simply replacing it, finding, and nowadays it's so easy because everybody's experimenting with all these things. So you just, you know, whatever your favorite dessert is, type it up, made with honey, right? Honey instead of sugar, and you'll find recipes. So that would be the approach I would take.

Rachel Denning (24:47.405)
that you want to talk about insulin? I'll go into a little bit of that and then I want to hit some other things in the question. So I read this phenomenal book, I think I mentioned already, it's Why We Get Sick by Bickman. Phenomenal, talks about insulin resistance and how our body processes glucose and it talks about the effect of fructose. And here's what, and there's a whole scale you guys, so you know, a spoonful of refined white sugar, just terrible. And you go up the scale from there, but.

And again, honey will have that effect too on that and as well may pursue it, but they're pure sources. So even a, you know, spoonful of raw honey in the afternoon where you're kind of feeling a little bit of a lag or kind of tired. Um, but, but even like straight fruit juice, if you, if you just juice it, like straight apple juice or grape juice is terrible, terrible, terrible when, especially in reference to, uh, you know, insulin resistance and, and.

glucose because it's just straight fruit toast where eating the fruit whole has the fibers with it and doesn't have near the effect. And what's interesting, what I learned in this book is that in the morning, our bodies are really susceptible to that. So a bagel with a glass of orange juice is a train wreck to your health in the morning. And that seems like a healthy breakfast. It's really not. It's actually really, really bad. So.

The better thing to do is have a very late breakfast or skip breakfast and get lots of water in there. But then go into things that aren't going to spike that at all with fructose or the sugar. So again, there's little strategies like this as you go along that are going to help a ton. And the reason why, because you know, she says in here, I want to lose weight and that's definitely a great goal. But for us, the even bigger picture goal.

is the long -term health and wellness. Because the reality is the weight is just a symptom of the future potential for disease. That's all it is. Extra weight just means you have the potential to have one of these diseases down the road. Heart disease, diabetes. And it's also just a symptom that something's off. Right. Because when the body's just operating as it should be, it's going to be at its own ideal weight. So if you're overweight from your ideal...

Rachel Denning (27:10.413)
body frame and type and whatever, it's just saying, hey, something's off here. You're either eating the wrong things or you're eating too much or even in some cases you're holding on to something mentally and emotionally. That's kind of another level there. But the point being from this book that Greg is referencing is that most of those problems, if not all of them, are caused by insulin resistance, which is ultimately affected by...

glycemic load and just the index. If the food is high glycemic, so like something like, okay, let's just pick even it seems healthy, apple juice, right? That seems healthy, but man, that's just crazy, crazy high. It's like eating a whole bunch of apples. Well, but without the fiber. Without the fiber. So even apples. That's just not normal for your body. Right. So.

An apple is way better than apple juice, but then even an apple is not that great. It's still good. We eat the apples here. But you go down to watermelon, right? Now watermelon is high on the glycemic index, but it's actually really low on the glycemic load. And again, he'll go into this. It's really cool. It's fascinating. You should go through the book because it helps you understand your whole body and why all these problems are popping up. But then you eat that, right? And so you get watermelon, super sweet, man. If I have a, like, I was going to say a sweet tooth.

If I have a craving for sweet, wow, watermelon's awesome. That is a really great solution because it's hydrating, it's boom. And it actually is high in the glycemic index, right? So it's like, well, there's spike of sugars, so to speak, but the overall glycemic load is very low. So I can pound a whole bunch of watermelon and assuage that sweet craving, but I haven't wrecked my insulin.

Or my body so that's a great way to respond to that So she continues here and this is important because she's talking about improving the environment Which is one of the things we really emphasize in the 20 day 28 day challenge and that's the idea of environment design, but Obviously it's challenging to environment design just means you set up your environment environment, so you're not tempted to Do the thing that you've committed to not do like for example eat sweets?

Rachel Denning (29:33.581)
But if you have a family and a spouse and children. Because when we did the 28 day challenge before, we did the same thing. Said, hey, the easiest way to not eat sweets is to remove the sweets from your home. And we had this awesome lady in the in the group with us and she lived in like rural Alaska. And I think she loved I think it was Oreos she loved cookies or Oreos or something. So I'm like just eliminate get it out of the house. And so she did.

And so then she was having this craving one day, like, oh my gosh, this is insane. I got to have, so she's like, that's it. I'm getting in the car. She gets in the car. She starts driving to town, but it was like a 20 or 30 minute drive. And she like, she starts driving. She's like, what am I doing? Like, this is so retarded. I'm going to drive like 40 minutes or 60 minutes to go get cookies. No. And she turned around and went back, right? And I'm like, yes, that was awesome. Make it hard, you guys, make it harder to violate your standards and make it easy to keep them.

So that's what you're doing with your environment. So that's the premise behind environment design. Well, she's saying the rest of the family. I want to rant here on this one. So read this sentence. Rant warning. The rest of the family is not ready or willing to go drastic. Did you want me to keep going? No, this is where I want to rant right here. Whoa. So when I read this, I was like, OK, totally makes sense. And then the other side of me is like, are you kidding me? Like, you.

I know this awesome woman and I'm speaking to all of you. So I say this with love. Who is running your house, man? Who's in charge? Gentlemen, you are the king in your kingdom. Ladies, you are the queen in your kingdom. Lead. Queendom. Your queendom, man. Lead out. It's so funny, our kids are like, oh.

I know, what? And they throw their little tantrum and you just look at them and be like, well, that's the little ugly little tantrum you're throwing there. No, right? And now I'm not saying be a dictator or a tyrant or some crazy psychotic ruler. I'm saying be the leader. Lead out, man. And of course they're gonna resist, because they're addicted to sugar too.

Rachel Denning (31:52.429)
Even if they don't know they're addicted. If you set out fruit and a candy on the table and say, kids, I know you'll make the right choice. Yeah, right. It's like setting out spinach and a plate of raw beef for your dog and say, I hope you'll be vegetarian, puppy. Give me a break. Come on, lead out, you guys. Lead. Be the king, be the queen. And so, yeah, you're right, because...

I do get it, the kids put up a stink and we've had that too, but for me, if I don't hold those boundaries, who is? They won't, they're kids. And I feel that this is an ongoing thing. I think the kids will constantly try to push those boundaries, they still do. This morning, we're in a hotel in Cappadocia, Turkey and...

They serve this Turkish breakfast that's honestly terrible. I'm so sick of the Turkish breakfast. But they also had cereal. And my son, who's 12, wanted cereal.

And it's easy, it could be very easy to just say, whatever, just get the cereal. Because he has plenty of reasons, like I'm tired of the Turkish breakfast. I'm like, yeah, I'm tired of the Turkish breakfast. It's just something else to eat, it's different, can I get the cereal? Now if he went over and got the cereal, fine, he does it. But if he's gonna ask me, I'm not gonna give him permission. I'm not gonna say, yes, go ahead son and get the cereal. Because we don't do cereal, we don't. Cereal's not good for you, it's toxic.

I'm not going to give him the permission. Now I will allow him to choose and if he goes and gets it, I'm not going to say anything really. Greg will say something, but I don't. And what I'll say is like, dude, that's, you know, that's not good for your body and it's on you. Like it doesn't harm me, but buddy, if you eat that crap, like it will have a negative effect on your body. We just constantly re -emphasize the things we've taught them, but I'm not going to be the one that gives the permission.

Rachel Denning (33:50.285)
Now the same goes in our home, wherever that happens to be, which is currently this hotel room, but everywhere that's our home, we don't allow the garbage into our home and our space. And our kids know that. If they wanna buy that stuff, if they wanna eat that stuff, and this is what I would tell my kids, and this is what I would tell your kids, you get to buy it. But with my money, I'm not buying it. Now, obviously if the spouse is the problem, that's a whole nother issue.

which is easily overcome. Is it? Yeah. How? Hold your dadgum standards. Like, okay, if, if I want to eat healthy and you're like, no, let's be unhealthy. I'm like, Hmm. Okay. How about in this issue and every issue we go with the higher road. If you want to work out and I don't guess what we're doing. We're working out. If I want to eat healthy and we don't guess what we're doing. We're eating healthy. We're going the higher road. Like you really want to.

You really want to go there. You really want to be unhealthy. You want to just go down this road of disease and early death. You're willing to totally be irresponsible for your grandkids and great grandkids. You want to go there? This is ridiculous. This sounds drastic, but this is literally the way we talk. And these are the types of conversations we have. And so in a lot of ways, that is the conversation you need to have. If you sincerely believe,

which obviously you're listening to this, so you're gonna be convinced, or if you continue studying about it, for sure you're gonna be convinced, it's just not healthy. And if you then can have that conversation with your spouse again and again and again, and say, you know what, spouse, fine, if you do want to get it or eat it, I'm not buying it. I'm the one that does the shopping, a lot of, you know, especially a lot of times it's the wife that's doing that. If you're doing the shopping, don't buy it.

and then have the conversation saying, this isn't good. I want to be there for our grandkids. I want to be healthy. I want to be able to run and play and be active and not end up with diabetes or heart disease or all of this. I care about us. I care about our future. This is what matters to me. And this is what we need to change. Yes. It means so much to me. And ladies play that card like, I want to lose weight. I want to be sexy. I want to look better. I want to be attractive way into our old age so we can still be.

Rachel Denning (36:16.909)
getting it on. Like I don't know any man that'd be like, nah, I'm going to go buy some donuts. Just play all your cards and say like this matters. And then if they persist, I have done this with coaching clients. I would totally do this. If they're like, no, I'm going to kill it. Keep eating it. I would just straight up say, why do you hate yourself so much?

I'm dead serious because every time you put that crap in your mouth, it is an act of disrespect and disregard for your body, which is the only vehicle you get for this life. And you're purposely, willfully putting trash in it. Like, why do you hate your life? Why do you hate yourself? And like, in addition to that,

Why do you have zero respect or love for me and our children and our grandchildren? Now that's hard, that's hardcore. I'm going, I went all the way with that one. I realized that I went all the way, but that is the truth of it. Well, that's what I did want to emphasize that while this does sound very harsh and hard on a psychological subconscious level, a lot of times that is what is actually happening. People are.

eating things that they know are bad for them because in a way they have given up on life. It might be in a small way. Maybe they just feel like they've lost a dream or they're not the person they wanted to be. I just hate my job. I hate stress. So I stop at 7 -Eleven and I get 48 and up. It's their way of coping. It's their way of making it through, of buffering. And so on a psychological level, that is actually true. There is some disgust of their life.

that's causing them to want to intentionally partake of things that are damaging to their body. And so, yeah, it seems extreme, but when you really have these types of conversations, and they're not gonna be pleasant or easy, this is how you actually create the lasting change. Because you're willing to address the hard subjects and the deeper underlying meanings for why...

Rachel Denning (38:32.877)
you still continue to do these things when you quote unquote, no, you shouldn't. There's so many approaches to this. I mean, just take it straight up like animal world. Go to biology. Like, find an animal that goes around eating things that are bad for it. Just seeks it out. Like, this makes me so sick. I'm going to keep finding some of that.

It's crazy. So take lead. Back to this idea here, you can't control what other people can do, but you do have a lot more control over your environment than I think you realize or are often willing to exert. And I know from the perspective of being a mom, I like to be more, not that I'm a people pleaser, but when it comes to my kids, I'm more interested in pleasing them than say maybe Greg is.

He's more willing to be harsh, but I've learned that I have to have those boundaries. And so when we're at the grocery store and they're like, hey, can I get this thing? No, no, we don't buy that. And I have to say it again. I can't even tell you how many times I've said no to the things they wanna get at the grocery store, even though I've taught them, even though. They keep trying it until.

in their early teens and then finally it clicks and they're like, I'm done. And then they tell their siblings like, don't put that crap in your mouth. And then they become an advocate. It's awesome. It is awesome. It works. It takes time. It takes consistency. It takes tons and tons and tons of repetition. But if I don't hold that boundary, who will? If I allow them to push and they push and push and push, then we all suffer.

We have to be the leaders in our own homes and we have to hold the standards and the boundaries and then actually live by them day after day after day until they can plainly see the results. And our kids, back to the teenagers, they are noticing. They are noticing that Greg and I are in our 40s and we look great and are healthy. We have no diseases, no issues, no problems, like nothing.

Rachel Denning (40:45.229)
We have nothing wrong. And they notice that. And what's fun, I'll give a specific example. So my 17 year old, he's almost 18 now, and he's a big kid. He's a big, strong kid. He has been for a long time. We are hitting the weights. The kid loves the weight room like nobody's business. And again, he's got the body of an 18 year old boy, eats like crazy, exercises with insanity, and he is strong. And yet I still work him. I worked him this morning.

And I playfully say, like, who's your daddy? Right? He goes and he's like, check this out, daddy throws around the weights, right? He's like, rawr. I'm like, that's great, buddy. I'm like, let me try a set. And I just smoke him. I'm like, hey, throw an extra 50 pounds on there and help me out here. And I'm not, I'm not boasting. I'm not putting his face and he just, I can see him there processing like, holy crap. My 45 year old dad just smoked me. And I did this morning, we were running up this hill and I saw he was just like,

Oh, he was gassing, he was gassing, I was too, and I'm like, I still got more in the tank. And so we kept going, he was gonna stop, and we did stop, and I just kept going, he was like, oh! And so I can do that, I can still, I can outrun, I can out wrestle him, I can whoop him. And these kids are tough. And I'm not saying that to boast, I'm saying I've set the example, so there's proof in the pudding. I'm telling them not to eat that crap, and they're looking at me going, hmm. There must be something to that, because he's not gassed out.

fat, bald, unhealthy, like, oh, kids shouldn't eat that crap. So you can be like me. Like I'm, there's, there's proof here. So lead out, lead out, get the results and help them. And then I'm going to say this too, always, always, always, always remind them that this is on them. So don't make the decisions for them. I mean, you do when they're little.

Well, and when it comes to buying the groceries, for example. I don't buy them, they're not allowed in the house. If you go out and eat that crap, that's on you. But remember, you're hurting your body. It's not mine. It's not somebody else's, it's yours. So you own that. You put that in your body, it is having an effect. You may not feel it immediately, you may not sense it. But I guarantee you it's having an effect. And we'll point it out. We'll point it out and we'll do the research and cancer research and people just die from all this stuff. Like that's...

Rachel Denning (43:06.381)
It'll catch up to you. It always does. It always does, but it's in a lag. So keep teasing that. Say it's your choice, but there are consequences and that consequence will come in a lag. It may catch you and it will catch you at some point. Do you want to have that? Right. And as I'm thinking about this, because I, you know, I, I get it. I used to quote, be the one that had the sweet tooth. Um, but I think for me, when I finally was able to make a switch was when I realized,

I think I realized that I was actually providing an excuse for my kids to eat the sweets. Because I would eat the sweets. And it was, you know, I had eliminated it from my home, but when I went out or whatever, and so I became the excuse. And so when I realized that it was having that generational impact on my family, that's when I tightened up the borders and the boundaries. And again, well, for me, well.

for both of us. We're not talking about 100%. This is 80, at least 80 to 90 % of the time. Greg and I will still go out to nice restaurants and especially in Europe where the desserts are less sweet, we get desserts. So we're not saying 100 % you totally eliminate. But if you do this 80 to 90 % of the time, you're going to have significantly better health. And and have a really hard line on a few things that is 100%. Like,

Like soda, soda is 100%. If it's just toxic, just straight up like vegetable oil, never. That stuff is not going in my body. So pick some things and you can be 100%. But then other stuff, yeah, 80 or 90. Shoot for 90. If you're 80, great. You're going to feel a difference and you're going to see the results. Right. But you have to realize that the choices you are making about this are impacting.

the choices your children are not just making now, but will make as adults. Usually with compounded interest. Exactly. So the little bit you allow now, kids will be like, sweet, and they'll run with it and double it. Or more. Super good. Well, yeah, keep going here. Because it said, boom, boom, boom, boom. OK. No, there was.

Rachel Denning (45:21.069)
So at some point I finally get mad enough and then I'm strong enough to resist sugar for a good few months. And again, like if anger works, go for it. Any of you, all of you can do something for a month. So if you just go for a month.

Then you're like, man, I did it for a month. I can go for another month or two. Then you get up to three months and then you've reset your body. And then after that, your body won't want it. It won't crave it like it used to. It's reset. So as long as you stay the course in a sustainable way, you can do this for the rest of your life. Yeah, because she says, but I want to make it a lasting change and train my brain to love not getting the sugar fix. Perfect. So that's good. And...

but it does need to be taken in the context of everything we've discussed, which one, you don't necessarily need to eliminate all sweetness from your life. That's not necessarily sustainable. It's going to want sweetness, so just train it to love something else, something better. Exactly, a different sweetness, a healthier sweetness, and creating the sustainable system and using the anger thing, because that can drive you, especially when you think about what effect it's having on your children.

What choices are they going to make? Where are the choices they're making now going to lead them when they become adults? If your children already have eating problems or overweight or whatever, that's not going to get any better when they get into an adult, when they become an adult, unless you start making changes now and setting the example and creating those boundaries. Now, ideally that would happen from a young age, but...

It's better to do it now than not do it and to just start teaching what you're learning and saying, oh gosh, I read this or I learned this about sugar. I learned this and that and start sharing it. And it doesn't have to be in a manipulative way. It doesn't have to be in a angry, upset way or a controlling way. You're just leading.

Rachel Denning (47:26.381)
you're just sharing and you're leading and you're talking about it. I think, especially if you talk about it from your own perspective, like I want this for me. Yes. And that inspires people. Do it in a positive way. If you're like, this is so terrible. I miss my sweets. This is so bad. Oh, I'm just craving. You guys want to do this with me? They're like, no way. You look miserable. Exactly. Like, are you joyfully manifesting this journey? I do have to make one point here.

because sometimes it won't work. Some spouses are super resistant, some kids are too. So with my clients, they come to me and they're like, no way my spouse is on board, no way my kids are on board. I'm like, okay, they don't have to be, but you are in control of you. And if you sit down and every single person in your family is gorging on your favorite junk food, just sit there joyfully with them and do not touch it. Like I don't.

If they eat that garbage every day for the rest of your life, you don't have to touch it. You don't have to want it. You can sit there, you can be engaged, you can join the party. Everything's fantastic. Not a single bite goes in your mouth. And what happens is you start getting all these incredible results. And after a few weeks or a few months in some cases, they're all like, dang, I want some of that. And they start following. And I've seen it. It's taken way longer for some of my clients.

but it works every stinkin' time. Finally, spouse is like, hey, do you think I could do one of those challenges with you? You think I could eat like that too? Don't try it for a week or something. Can I do one of those workouts? Like, what's that little thing you're doing again? I'm gonna do it. Or if they don't wanna swallow their pride, they just secretly start watching and following, right? But they start getting results too, and then all of a sudden, my clients come back and they're like, guess what, man?

My spouse did this and I did this and the kids were like, we're on board, let's do it. It's incredible. It transforms the whole stinking family. Well, because results don't lie, man. When you get results, people start paying attention. They start noticing. Now, many of you are probably sitting there thinking, well, how do you do that? It's so hard when they're sitting there eating your favorite dessert. To which I respond, hard would be walking across the Sahara Desert in the summer barefoot. That's hard.

Rachel Denning (49:47.501)
Okay, walking across Siberia in winter barefoot, that's hard. Get a hold of your perspective. That is a strategy we regularly use to make, keep ourselves, keep perspective about what is hard. Now that's one way. Well, and I think tied into that is you do have to reframe.

the story you're telling yourself. Because very often the reason we give in is because we're sitting there thinking like, oh, that looks so good. Oh, I want some. Oh, we're so focused on the actual thing, the temptation, that that leads to giving into it. And what we have to do is switch in our mind the story we're telling ourselves and we have to focus on, well, what is it I actually want? Why am I not doing this? Why do I not want to eat it? And you have to tell yourself all the reasons you don't want to.

And that takes some practice, it takes some training, it takes, you know, you've gotta learn the reasons. If you don't know the reason, if you don't have a good, if you don't have a big enough why, then yeah, that's gonna be really hard. But if you can find your big why.

then it becomes easy because you're motivated by that. You're motivated by actually getting the results and that long -term vision of who you want to be. One thing that motivates me is thinking about being this old lady who's like 90 and can still move and like I'm active. I'm an active person when I'm old. I don't want to be some little vegetable in a wheelchair. That's what motivates me.

So keep that vision in your head of who you wanna be, the person playing with your grandkids or your great grandkids. Not staring at the wall playing with the fair. Right, because insulin, all of this leads to dementia. It leads to all of these problems and we can avoid them by avoiding the things that cause those problems. That's the bigger picture.

Rachel Denning (51:53.389)
That's the bigger why. And we have to tap into that so we have the power. And it's not even willpower at this point, because what you're describing kind of makes it sound like willpower. I don't think it's that. I think it's just a reframing of what you really want. Absolutely. Because if you just focus on the fact that you want the dessert, well, you're going to get the dessert. But if you focus on the fact that you want to be an active grandparent instead of one with dementia,

That's a whole different ballgame. And that choice isn't even hard anymore. You take some, because you reframe it, you're like, this is going to take a lot of willpower because it's so hard. And you reframe it like, dude, that's not hard at all. In fact, it doesn't even touch my willpower because I don't want that at all. So you see the difference there? Instead of a big draw on your willpower, it's like nothing. Right. It's so important to do that. Now there was also a comment in here about being careful about, you know, body shaming and

Make sure our kids don't get into like eating disorders or, or insecurities around their bodies and all those things. And we did that podcast on that already. It's super important, but remember frame it up for health, frame it up for just good health. Let's be healthy. And if you get healthy, the body will respond and it'll be in a healthy state. And, and you can just approach it by like, let's eat well and let's move our bodies. Let's exercise. Let's be active, healthy people. And so you don't have to talk about.

shape or weight, you can, that can be done in a very healthy way. We can talk to our families about, hey, let's not carry around any extra weight and let's look our best. Especially because that can be a precursor for future disease. That's the emphasis. It's how you talk about it. But if you're like, hey, you don't look like that girl on Instagram.

Well, okay, even that because there's tons of like super fit girls on Instagram. You're like, wow, that's that's inspiring. That's amazing. Like she has paid a price to get ripped. Like if you want to look like that, fantastic. Go for it. Right. But it's not there's no shame in it. There's no there's no like, I don't know. We did the whole podcast on it, but just approach it in a very healthy way and lead out. Be the leader. Okay. Anything else? That's it.

Rachel Denning (54:10.701)
Good, get after it you guys and make it fun. Again, make it enjoyable, make it an awesome journey. Be excited about your results, celebrate like crazy. If one of your goals is to drop some extra weight, if you're carrying around an extra 20 pounds or whatever, or whatever it is, like every time you lose a pound, like, whoa, celebrate like crazy and keep losing until you're getting down. Celebrate, if you can do two pushups and you could only do one and you can finally do a pull -up or a sit -up or whatever it is, just start celebrating those things, get your kids involved.

and you get kids to work out with you, you can help you make healthy food, and you're just involving them in this whole fun, engaging journey, they're gonna want to participate, and it's gonna change generations, generations of family. Really, really awesome. One of my clients, he had lost a lot of weight, and he picked up his five -year -old and jumped on the scale, and with his five -year -old in his arms, he weighed,

with her, he weighed as much as he was when he was overweight, right? And he's like, I can't believe I was carrying around that much extra weight on my own person. And so he got off the scale, put her on his back and started doing pushups, right? And he knocked out as many as he could. And then when she got off, he knocked out a bunch more. And he's just like, and they're doing pushups with him, working out. It's like a total transformation and it's generational. And it's so awesome.

So focus on what you want most and put the systems in place to make it happen. Okay. Love you guys. Thanks for listening. Reach out for.