Did you know that consuming alcohol, even casually, is classified in the same cancer risk category as tobacco and asbestos? Today’s conversation is all about the alcohol-cancer connection, the sober curious movement, and how we can make informed choices about our health.

On Salad With a Side of Fries, Jenn Trepeck welcomes Cecily Mak, a former Silicon Valley attorney, breast cancer survivor, and author of Undimmed, for a conversation that is equal parts eye-opening science and deeply personal storytelling. Cecily shares how losing her mother to esophageal cancer and later facing her own breast cancer diagnosis led her to uncover this critical, under-discussed connection between alcohol and cancer risk, and what all of us can do with that information today.

What You Will Learn in This Episode:

✅ The five distinct biological mechanisms that directly link alcohol and cancer.

✅ How the alcohol industry has followed a playbook similar to Big Tobacco, suppressing updates to alcohol labeling laws and lobbying against stronger public health disclosures for decades.

✅ What the sober curious movement looks like beyond the AA model and how alcohol moderation rather than full abstinence can still make a meaningful, measurable difference in your long-term health.

✅ How Cecily Mak's Eight Awarenesses framework helps individuals break free from unwanted habits by building agency, self-compassion, and intentional choice rather than relying on willpower or labels.

The Salad With a Side of Fries podcast, hosted by Jenn Trepeck, explores real-life wellness and weight-loss topics, debunking myths, misinformation, and flawed science surrounding nutrition and the food industry. Let’s dive into wellness and weight loss for real life, including drinking, eating out, and skipping the grocery store.

TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 The truth about alcohol and cancer risk, why metabolizing alcohol releases a DNA-damaging carcinogen

04:34 Cecily's mother's cancer diagnosis and how years of alcohol dependency shaped her path forward

06:31 A 30-day experiment of an alcohol-free lifestyle reveals transformative benefits on sleep and relationships

08:29 Cecily's breast cancer diagnosis and the discovery linking her drinking history to breast cancer risk factors

12:40 Removing the dimmers and dependence on alcohol, and Cecily shares her journey of writing Undimmed: The Eight Awarenesses for Freedom from Unwanted Habits

17:55 Alcohol classified as a group one carcinogen and how it ranks alongside tobacco, asbestos, and UV radiation

20:14 A discussion on the fight to update the outdated alcohol labeling laws

25:54 The five biological pathways: acetaldehyde, elevated estrogen, oxidative stress, impaired DNA repair, and increased permeability

32:55 Choosing clarity and alcohol-free living as the foundation for personal agency

40:26 Releasing judgment and cultivating self-compassion as tools for sustainable habit change

45:39 Cecily's one most important takeaway: learning to listen to ourselves as the most powerful tool in breaking unwanted habits

KEY TAKEAWAYS:

💎 The link between alcohol and cancer is not theoretical. Alcohol is a proven group one carcinogen that produces acetaldehyde and DNA damage with every single drink, regardless of amount.

💎 The big alcohol industry has spent millions lobbying against updated alcohol labeling laws, keeping the majority of Americans uninformed about risks that many doctors rarely discuss.

💎 You do not need to commit to a lifetime of sobriety for alcohol moderation to matter. Choosing two glasses of wine per week over seven creates a meaningful, cumulative shift in your breast cancer risk factors.

💎 True freedom from unwanted habits comes not from willpower or labels, but from awareness and agency, the foundation of Cecily Mak's Eight Awarenesses in Undimmed.

ABOUT THE GUEST:

Cecily Mak is a mom, entrepreneur, investor, and author of Undimmed. Former tech executive (GC, CRO, COO) at Silicon Valley tech startups, she is a co-founding General Partner at Wisdom Ventures, where she backs founders and their companies focused on human connection and wellbeing. Her work centers on helping people and leaders operate with greater clarity, agency, and presence in a culture full of “dimmers,” the habits and norms that quietly dilute our attention and impact. She lives in Mill Valley, CA.

RESOURCES:

Become a Happy Healthy Hub Member

Jenn’s Free Menu Plan

A Salad With a Side of Fries

A Salad With A Side Of Fries Merch

A Salad With a Side of Fries Instagram

About Uncomplicating Wellness

Text ‘Book’ to 833-801-0500

Dry Beyond January - Part One

Dry Beyond January - Part Two

Never a Great Time, Always a Perfect Time

GUEST RESOURCES:

Cecily Mak - Website

Cecily Mak - LinkedIn

Cecily Mak - Instagram

Undimmed, a ClearLife Podcast

Cecily Mak | Substack

QUOTES:

00:22 "Just by having alcohol in our systems, we are releasing a carcinogen into our bodies that harms our DNA." Cecily Mak

11:26 "I think it is helpful for people to hear that it is the antithesis of how we would approach something." Jenn Trepeck

17:49 "I believe the difference between knowing what to do and actually doing it is understanding the why. This cancer connection may be the piece of the why that's missing." Jenn Trepeck

19:34 "Only one in four women in America today are aware of the link between alcohol and breast cancer, a proven causational link, and it is not coming through our expected channels." Cecily Mak

30:47 "It is all about informed choice, even if that choice is two glasses of wine a week versus seven." Jenn Trepeck

37:48 "It is ownership of your choices." Jenn Trepeck

SEO KEYWORDS:

Jenn Trepeck, Salad With A Side Of Fries, Nutrition Nugget, Health Coach, Weight Loss For Real Life, Alcohol And Cancer Risk, Breast Cancer Risk Factors, Alcohol Carcinogen, Acetaldehyde And Dna Damage, Estrogen And Breast Cancer, Alcohol Use And Health, Quitting Alcohol Benefits, Sober Curious Movement, Alcohol-Free Lifestyle, Reducing Alcohol Intake, Oxidative Stress And Alcohol, Alcohol And Hormones, Cancer Prevention Lifestyle, Alcohol Policy Reform, Surgeon General Warning Alcohol, Big Alcohol Industry, Alcohol Labeling Laws, Unwanted Habits, Dimmer Habits, Habit Change Framework, Eight Awarenesses, Undimmed Book, Alcohol Awareness, Health And Wellness Podcast, Jenn Trepeck, Cecily Mak, Esophageal Cancer, Group One Carcinogen, Alcohol And Estrogen Levels, Informed Choice, Alcohol Moderation, Drinking Less, Breast Cancer Awareness, Us Alcohol Policy Alliance, Silicon Valley, Health Coaching, Salad With A Side Of Fries, Sober Living, Clarity And Alcohol, Alcohol Dependency, How Does Alcohol Increase Breast Cancer Risk, What Happens To Your Body When You Stop Drinking Alcohol

[00:00:22] So just by having alcohol in our systems, we're releasing. A carcinogen into our bodies that harms our DNA.

[00:00:47] Are you ready? I'm having salad with a side of fries.

[00:01:13] Today is one of those episodes because someone recently said to me. It was something along the lines of no one talks about the connection between alcohol and cancer. Well, we did mention it in our episode January, 2025. We did dry beyond January for two episodes. And if you're a long time listener, certainly if you've worked with me, you have heard me say, we get healthier each day.

[00:02:06] She's a co-founding general partner at Wisdom Ventures, where she backs founders and their companies focused on human connection and wellbeing. Her work centers on helping people and leaders operate with greater clarity. Agency and presence in a culture full of dimmers, the habits and norms that quietly dilute our attention and impact.

[00:02:38] Cecily Mak: So good to be here. Thank you for having me. What a treat.

[00:02:53] Cecily Mak: Yeah.

[00:03:19] All of this, by the way, is yours for just $12 a month, or if you pay for a year upfront, you get two months free. So a year for 120 bucks. Amazing. So your recipe this week is for hot pink coconut slaw, so it's beautifully seasonal. You could certainly leave out the coconut if that's not your jam. This is a great one to start, now, take you into spring, pair it with your favorite protein.

[00:04:04] Remember, you're going to a salad to the side of fries.com/membership. This supports your health and this show, so we can keep doing this together every week.

[00:04:15] Jenn Trepeck: The work you do now was not your original plan in life. No. You were an attorney.

[00:04:22] Jenn Trepeck: And tech startups at that. And then your mom passed away in 2011.

[00:04:34] Cecily Mak: Yeah. Thank you so much. It's funny, I've written about this, I talk about it. It's a big theme in our family and it's always very moving to have an opportunity to speak to it from a place where it might be supportive of other people.

[00:05:09] My mother passed away in 2011 of stage four esophageal cancer. She was diagnosed with just a mere 30 days before she died. She declined all treatment and frankly, we all know she probably had a lot of awareness around this illness and symptoms for many months, possibly years before seeking medical care.

[00:06:00] Four in one at the time commuting. Not only into the city, you're into Silicon Valley, but often traveling a lot for business and living this very fun, vibrant, demanding social life. I was married to a DJ at the time. We were out every weekend. We took the kids to Burning Man later. I mean, we were very socially active and I carried on that treadmill for another five or six years until I had my own little wake up call.

[00:07:00] My relationship started shifting, and that was really the beginning of the path that I'm on now, because I got curious, what is this about? Why have we never talked about this in my family? Why did I never consider that alcohol was maybe playing a big role in some of the struggles I had been facing?

[00:07:45] That sparked years of getting to where we are now. So that was about eight years ago. I stayed on the path of living alcohol free and I did all kinds of research and experimentation around how and why [00:08:00] people stop or not, or slow down or pause, and health benefits and mental, social, physical, all of it, and.

[00:08:29] Again, it wasn't in 2011 when I lost my mother to. Cancer that was likely attributable to her decades of alcohol use. It was in 2023 when I myself was treating breast cancer. Five years after stopping drinking and I was trying to understand why I had breast cancer. There wasn't any in my family. I didn't have a lot of the, you know, likely risk factors, none of the genetics, et cetera, [00:09:00] and to my absolute shock and awe, it was in that process that I really grokked and discovered this clear link between alcohol and cancer.

[00:09:16] Jenn Trepeck: Right? So, okay, I wanna back up for a second because this is so not the point of our conversation, but I would be remiss if I didn't go back to ask you this. So even with your mom's story and her choice to decline treatment and then thinking about your own experience and treatment, and so at the time.

[00:09:43] Cecily Mak: Well, frankly, it was at the end of many, many years of my family and myself trying to help her live a healthier life, and she had made it very clear, both with her communications, but also her actions that [00:10:00] extending her life or living a healthier life were not.

[00:10:28] And frankly, just practically speaking, there's not a ton you can do with a stage four esophageal cancer diagnosis, any treatment in that area of your body. Is going to materially diminish the quality of life you have remaining. And so she just opted to ride it out and, and I respect her decision, but it was hard.

[00:11:24] Jenn Trepeck: Yeah. So thank you for that. I think it's super helpful for people to hear. I think especially for salad with the side of fries listeners, that's probably the antithesis of how we would approach something,

[00:11:44] Jenn Trepeck: sure.

[00:11:50] Jenn Trepeck: Yeah.

[00:12:04] So, makes a lot of sense.

[00:12:25] Sherry Price, you know, just tremendous. And Cecily and Dr. Sherry Price have resources for that Cecily's book. Do you wanna just share a little bit about the book and maybe how that plays into what happened with your cancer diagnosis and learning about this connection?

[00:12:50] I love one of the comments that Dr. Price made on your episode where she said part of her work as a coach now is helping people [00:13:00] feel their feelings.

[00:13:02] Cecily Mak: after so many years of not because we go to these things to soften the edges of life, and when we remove those, I refer to them as dimmers. When we remove our dimmers, and it could be alcohol, it could be Netflix, it could be food, it could be your email, workaholism, generosity, perfectionism.

[00:13:56] I'd start with the moment in the car in front of Safeway, getting [00:14:00] her, depends, diapers, a handle of vodka, a can of peaches, and cottage cheese. Which are the only foods she could get down. That's the opening of that memoir. It goes all the way into 10 years later in this completely rewritten life that I live now.

[00:14:33] Jenn Trepeck: least, right?

[00:14:55] I mean, one wanted to shop it and sell it quickly too. [00:15:00] Didn't really engage. And two said, there's something really interesting here, but no one really cares about you. You're sort of a nobody. And memoir only works for people who are well known and people wanna read their story.

[00:15:13] Cecily Mak: I had in parallel been crafting what I had envisioned being a second book, which was a capture of how I did what I did, the framework that I developed to break up with alcohol, my primary dimmer. That wasn't dependent upon an initial label or diagnosis or commitment to a lifetime of sobriety or recovery, which is what everything I found out there seemed to hinge on.

[00:16:04] And so in January, Flatiron of McMillan published Undimmed the Eight Awarenesses for Freedom from Unwanted Habits. And it is a book that exists because I've had to write my memoir first. The memoir project of four years, 5:00 AM to 7:00 AM most days writing birthed this book. The memoir will probably never see the light of day, and I'm absolutely great with that.

[00:17:01] And I went to a number of AA meetings early on just to kind of understand what was out there and get some support from that community. And I have most certainly benefited from Al-Anon meetings over the years as well, supporting the family members around somebody who has an alcohol use disorder. The system didn't match my experience, which still felt like choice.

[00:17:39] Jenn Trepeck: Please. Yes. Thank you. And so, you know, and we'll come back 'cause I wanna highlight a couple of the tools in your book.

[00:17:49] Cecily Mak: yeah,

[00:17:55] Cecily Mak: Yes. And

[00:18:16] Carcinogens. And by the way, according to the International Agency for Research on Cancer, there's over 130 agents in that list. But others that we know already, that we've talked about for million, like tobacco, UV radiation, like the sun or X-rays, certain HPV infections, asbestos, you know, that's just naming a few that I think people are very familiar with.

[00:19:02] So I'm curious in your opinion, like based on all of your research and your experience. Why isn't there more conversation about alcohol being on this list?

[00:19:24] We should be getting this from our doctor's offices and public announcements and other things that support healthy policy in the United States and beyond. Only one in four women. Today in America are aware of the link between alcohol and breast cancer, a proven CAUSATIONAL link, and the reasons for this.

[00:20:14] The one that I am pursuing now, which I think we should all be paying some attention to, is if in fact the big alcohol industry has been following a playbook similar to the one that Big Tobacco did for decades. There is ample science and research. That directly links alcohol with deadly diseases and other disorders.

[00:21:09] America has some of the most liberal laws in the world around alcohol. We permit alcohol advertising. In sports, in parks, in public places, and public transportation. If you go to Europe, for example, you won't see the absolute vodka or beer ads in public transportation or anywhere near where children might be.

[00:22:07] For marketing to reach the young impressionable minds of the next generation. And this isn't a culture that in some ways celebrates wine. So I think it's fair to say that there has been a reasonable amount of effort and most certainly a significant amount of spending in lobbying and other efforts to limit labels.

[00:22:35] Jenn Trepeck: like the Surgeon General's warning that.

[00:22:48] Jenn Trepeck: Right?

[00:23:16] Battle those efforts to bring more accurate, updated disclosures to the American population. So this is an area that that is going to be getting a lot more attention both. For me. I work with a nonprofit, the United States Alcohol Policy Alliance. On the board, we are exclusively dedicated to limiting harms, attributable to alcohol with national policy, state policy, local policy changes.

[00:24:02] But I don't like hearing that people wish they knew and they didn't. I was at an event a couple months ago, I was actually at Breast Cancer Awareness Event down in Silicon Valley, and, uh, a woman came up to our table, our, our United States Alcohol Policy Alliance table, and she was in her, I think mid sixties or so, and she said, I wish I knew.

[00:24:43] It's not going well. It's an aggressive cancer, and I have three little grandchildren. I really think that if I knew about the link between alcohol and cancer, I would've stopped more easily than I did. I think it would've accelerated my journey to health. And so that's [00:25:00] what we can do is just help people know, like, you don't have to go to zero.

[00:25:22] Jenn Trepeck: Yeah, and I appreciate that two versus seven is a meaningful difference and it doesn't have to be zero or.

[00:25:54] Cecily Mak: So there are really five primary things, and I'm not a physician, but I [00:26:00] have done a fair amount of research on this. 'cause I think it's important for us to have kind of basic level knowledge, even if we are not in the medical profession, right? Yes. We wanna get to that gritty why

[00:26:13] Cecily Mak: Exactly. And you know, luckily we have so much information available at our fingertips and you know, I think there is a lot of misinformation and misunderstanding about alcohol just burdens the liver. It goes way beyond that. So alcohol in the process of metabolism in the body, it produces acetaldehyde. I'm pronouncing that wrong for sure.

[00:27:03] Second alcohol increases the estrogen levels in our systems. Now, that might not seem like a problem, particularly for those of us who are in midlife and navigating estrogen drops. However, the vast majority of breast cancers in the United States are estrogen positive. Breast cancer, meaning the food for the cancer cells is estrogen.

[00:27:49] But if we're drinking something on a regular basis that's creating food for them, the likelihood that those cells are gonna bundle and grow and become a tumor and more problematic are higher. [00:28:00] Overall alcohol also generates meaningful amount of oxidative stress, which as you know, just further burdens the body and can cause all kinds of other systemic issues.

[00:28:36] So. We might be doing a good job of managing our exposure to a range of carcinogens on a, you know, daily, monthly, weekly basis. We're keeping plastics out of our systems. We're thoughtful about, you know, what chemicals we allow in our homes, but it's impossible to do it all. Alcohol just kind of further weakens our natural barriers.

[00:29:24] To alcohol, and I can tell you not a single doctor or nurse. In 25, 30 years of regular check-ins and doctor's appointments asked me about alcohol as a potential contributing factor to high estrogen levels. Remarkably, when I was going through my breast cancer treatment, I just gave a talk on this recently at the Ignite Conference.

[00:30:12] And because I was aware of this, I was waiting for somebody to ask me about alcohol. It's like right being crystal clear sober on a Saturday night at 11 o'clock and being pulled over by a cop and just waiting for them to ask you, have you been drinking? So you can say no, I'm crystal clear, sober. There's something kind of victorious and fun about that little lap, and I was waiting for one of these physicians to ask me about alcohol.

[00:30:40] Jenn Trepeck: Yeah. Well, I hope that's what we're creating here. And as you were saying before with this woman's story, like it's all about informed consent, making an informed choice, even if that choice is two glasses of wine, making that choice.

[00:31:30] So that stuck feeling, it's not a motivation problem. It's certainly not a willpower issue. It is what happens when health is built on rules instead of understanding, and that's why I wrote Uncomplicating Wellness, not to tell you what to eat or how to move or what to eliminate. Rather to help you understand how to think about wellness for yourself, what matters, what doesn't.

[00:32:18] Again, text the word book, BOOK to 8 3 3 8 0 1 0 5, 0, 0. Cecily, so your book, the Eight Awarenesses of Freedom from Unwanted Habits. I love the idea of unwanted habits. I think it's so relatable something many of us can identify with. You know, whether that's alcohol or anything else, but I think oftentimes when we hear that the first step to something is awareness.

[00:32:48] Cecily Mak: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

[00:32:55] Cecily Mak: Yeah, sure. I think it's really a way to [00:33:00] invite, just like turning the lens a little bit from outward facing to inward facing. Honestly. We spend so much of our lives and orientations focused on external stimulation, external input.

[00:33:42] And I chose this word because it, it really reflected how I felt about this shift when I was trying to figure it all out on my own. I saw the AA model, I saw the 12 steps, and it was very prescriptive and there were a lot of, it felt like a lot of rigidity to me. And I wanted something [00:34:00] that was much more flexible and fluid and committing to an awareness as opposed to committing to a step felt very liberating and safe and adaptable to my experience.

[00:34:16] Jenn Trepeck: Yeah. And I love when you talk about one of the awarenesses being choice and choosing what you consume. You talk about it, you know, things, products, people are all part of that consumption. Practically speaking, like how does that show up every day? How do we help people with that choice piece?

[00:34:47] Jenn Trepeck: Mm-hmm.

[00:34:54] And so this invitation would not. Necessarily be something I would want to [00:35:00] impose on her. It's not a fit for somebody who's not curious about living with more clarity. So that's the first awareness. The second one is choice As you call out, and this one is so juicy and so fun to play with. The awareness statement itself is, I choose what I consume.

[00:35:32] So. Thank you for helping me nourish myself with something that's not that. So I choose what I consume. It also could be what people were around. It could be how we spend our discretionary time to a degree. And the awareness is realizing that we're not actually victims of most of our consumption. Right, and it's so easy to feel that way.

[00:36:16] And if I did choose to have a drink, how many micro decisions there were in between the moment of the idea and the actual having something enter my body. Right is go get the thing, bring it home, open it, prepare something, or go to the restaurant or the bar or the house or whatever. And there are all these moments that we have where we can decide, is this actually in alignment with how I want to feel later today or tomorrow or this week?

[00:37:11] We could take a little personal responsibility also with a lot of self grace and compassion and say. Hey, like that's what felt like the right thing to do in that moment and onward we go. Now I'm aware of how it made me feel afterwards, whatever it might be. And so it's really important I think, for us to all just at least at minimum, be reminded of how much agency we do have if we're in this group.

[00:37:47] Jenn Trepeck: I love that because again, it's that ownership of the choices.

[00:37:59] One was telling me [00:38:00] about how furious and enraged and disappointed she was with herself for having a glass of red wine on Saturday night. My whole conversation with her was just get off the cliff girl. Like, it's okay. You're fine. Right? You chose in that moment with what you had available to you, given the context and circumstances to have a glass of wine, like, it's okay, nobody's gonna die.

[00:38:39] The other one was this wonderful woman in her seventies who approached me at one of my events recently and, and she said, I just. I'm so sad because I stopped drinking, you know, five or six years ago, and I feel so great and I've lost weight and my skin looks awesome and I'm more fun and blah, blah, blah.

[00:39:17] Is this like a big medical issue for you? She said, no, I just know I'm, I'm happier without it. And so I've been five or six years without it. I said, oh, please go have that glass of rose. Like really just enjoy yourself. Let that be a conscious choice in the moment because it's aligned with what. Makes you feel alive and connected and in community and you're not doing it three times a night, seven nights a week.

[00:39:53] Jenn Trepeck: Yeah. Well, and that makes me think of number six, judgment. And so I wanna ask this question both in the context of.[00:40:00]

[00:40:26] Cecily Mak: I think that there are, you mentioned it's important to be aware of both judgment of others and judgment of self. Right. And sometimes we have to get really familiar with mastering, overcoming one before we can even access the other. My experience in Gring, this one and this, this awareness, was originally called do you, which I love was I was driving my little kid around.

[00:41:09] And then I dropped him off and he went to practice and I sat there and I thought, oh man, I am really, I am really making a monster here. I was in that similar encampment around alcohol. And had a lot of judgment around people in my life who were, and I'll use this word consciously, still drinking, meaning I already had the assumption that they would stop someday, which is also super judgmental in and of itself.

[00:41:58] And I really think that [00:42:00] that's super important when we get into this exploration around healthfulness or alcohol or, you know, I love the work you do around helping people eat better, be more conscious generally, while also giving a little bit of space just for the colors of life, have the fries sometimes, that we just really have no idea where anybody else is.

[00:42:50] That's where really beautiful healing happens for people who've been using dimmers for one reason or another. We can kind of resolve with our external relationships and our [00:43:00] external choices, but there's something very beautiful that happens if enough time passes and you stay with it and you realize we actually deserve that same unconditional.

[00:43:29] The most beautiful thing we can give our loved ones is our presence, and I was not present. That same kind of non-judgment that I learned to extend to other people, I was then able to kind of pull that into myself and see, look, doing the best you can under the circumstances. Like I didn't know how to handle the level of stress and pressure I was living with at that time.

[00:44:05] Jenn Trepeck: Yeah. I appreciate your stories. I remember having my own moment of that, of recognizing other people, judging someone, and how I looked at that and was like, you have no idea.

[00:44:21] Cecily Mak: yeah. And then we're judging the judger, by the way. Right.

[00:44:24] Cecily Mak: You see that?

[00:44:25] Cecily Mak: Like I'm judging you for judging someone. Yeah. Right. It's like such a vicious cycle we can get ourselves in and then Yes. That's why the word awareness is so wonderful.

[00:44:49] Like there are a thousand reasons do meditation. It's the hardest thing ever. And I'm sure you've had this conversation. Yeah. But. Watching something bad happen in my life now, it's silly. It could be dropping [00:45:00] an avocado in the driveway and it rolling under the car and I can't get to it. Watching my mind go to whose fault is it that the avocado just fell?

[00:45:22] Jenn Trepeck: Yeah, I love this. Well, I'm super excited 'cause all of that, by the way, even reminded me your story of number seven in your book of time.

[00:45:38] Cecily Mak: Oh yeah, sure. I am often asked if there's, you know, one kind of takeaway from some of this work that I've done. I think that the most important and potent nugget is to listen to ourselves.

[00:46:00] Yes.

[00:46:11] Or I know that my closest loved ones would be better off if this subtle shift was made in our lives. We tend to pile on all these ways to dim that out and not wanna hear or feel that discomfort or that signal. And I just invite us all, and I take this medicine myself every day. What is it that my true inner guidance is telling me to do?

[00:46:50] Jenn Trepeck: Alright, with that some sillier off topic questions.

[00:46:55] Jenn Trepeck: I

[00:46:56] Jenn Trepeck: Alright. What's the best thing you've done for your health this week? What's the naughtiest [00:47:00] thing you've done related to your health this week? So you know the salad and fries if you will.

[00:47:14] I was traveling too, but I just like decided no part of it's probably that I'm getting married soon and I'm like, I gotta be like in really good shape.

[00:47:27] Cecily Mak: Thank you. The naughtiest thing I did for myself this week. I mean this is a habit and I'm speaking to it consciously is probably a scrolling media before going to sleep.

[00:47:48] Jenn Trepeck: for sure. Alright, if you weren't a lawyer, author, an advocate and podcaster, what would you do?

[00:48:06] Today my work is around actually primarily helping startups in the tech and wellbeing space, and I really love that work. So kind of doing what I dreamed of doing, but I'm still missing on the, uh. Kind of having a hut in the woods somewhere with like unlimited art supplies and just being able to be expressive every day, maybe in another 10 or 20 years.

[00:48:39] Cecily Mak: I'm not gonna remember the author right now, so I apologize for that. But I read this book, loving Frank, which is historical fiction about Frank Lloyd Wright told from the perspective of his mistress, and it is a spec

[00:48:53] Cecily Mak: spectacular, spectacular read.

[00:49:01] Cecily Mak: mean Alzheimer's and dementia. And I can say that I haven't even had it affect my life personally, but it's affected people who I love, their loved ones lives. And that's gotta be one of the toughest things to be the end of your life when you're living in the joy and delight of your memory and your relationships, and that gets taken away and there's beautiful, beautiful research and medicine getting us in that direction.

[00:49:24] Jenn Trepeck: Yes. If you were a superhero, what would be your superpower?

[00:49:30] Jenn Trepeck: Ooh. I don't think anyone has said that.

[00:49:40] Jenn Trepeck: What's your biggest pet peeve?

[00:49:44] Jenn Trepeck: I totally get it. I think it's, I, I totally get it. I think it's part of my problem on dating apps.

[00:49:58] Jenn Trepeck: Exactly. Alright, [00:50:00] last one.

[00:50:04] Cecily Mak: So this is my area of work now. I love this question. I'll try to keep it tight. I think a lot of bespoke individual empowered healthcare has been in the category of wealth care. Yes. For the last five or 10 years. You know, here I'm with my aura ring and I get my function health tests and.

[00:50:44] The best decisions for our individual wellbeing in a very accessible language, specific level of sophistication, specific way, so that we can all make more informed choices about the lives we lead. [00:51:00] I love it.

[00:51:09] Cecily Mak: Oh, thank you. Probably the best and easiest stop is my website. It's cecilymak.com, C-E-C-I-L-Y-M-A-K. I link to my Substack, which is a biweekly. I link to my IG at Clear Life Journey and my podcast is und dimmed. My book is und dimmed and I love hearing from people. I try to respond to everything. So if any of this resonates and you have something to share, please don't hesitate to reach out.

[00:51:57] I did it again at Dunking. [00:52:00] So that's what I do for all of you. So we're gonna find out. Everything I learned on Friday and this week's bite-sized bonus episode. Be sure wherever you're listening, click the plus sign or the follow button and then your app will alert you when it goes live. Cecily, thank you again for being here.

[00:52:24] Jenn Trepeck: Well, likewise, I appreciate you and friends. If you are not already a member, join us in the Happy Healthy Hub. You'll go to a salad with the side of fries.com/membership.

[00:52:50] We keep alcohol away, and now we know even more about why and how. Well, friends. That's it for today's [00:53:00] episode of Salad with a side of Fries. Congratulations for making yourself and your health a priority. Thanks so much for joining us. Be sure to click subscribe or follow on your favorite podcast platform.