What’s holding you back from getting what you want?
Embracing Nelson Mandela's “I never lose, I either win or I learn,” we celebrate what we can control, and seize the opportunities (rather than see the obstacles) in what we can’t control.
In this episode, we look at our relationships with change. When we recognize that the outcome will serve us no matter what it looks like, the effort is worth it! Welcoming change becomes the key to going after what we want.
Let’s empower ourselves to leverage those “It has to be me” moments into proactive choices that align with our values and missions.
Tess’s Takeaways:
Meet Tess Masters:
Tess Masters is an actor, presenter, health coach, cook, and author of The Blender Girl, The Blender Girl Smoothies, and The Perfect Blend, published by Penguin Random House. She is also the creator of The Decadent Detox® and Skinny60® health programs.
Health tips and recipes by Tess have been featured in the LA Times, Washington Post, InStyle, Prevention, Shape, Glamour, Real Simple, Yoga Journal, Yahoo Health, Hallmark Channel, The Today Show, and many others.
Tess’s magnetic personality, infectious enthusiasm, and down-to-earth approach have made her a go-to personality for people of all dietary stripes who share her conviction that healthy living can be easy and fun. Get delicious recipes at TheBlenderGirl.com.
Connect With Tess:
Website: https://tessmasters.com/
Podcast Website: https://ithastobeme.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/theblendergirl/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theblendergirl/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/theblendergirl
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/theblendergirl
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tessmasters/
Get Healthy With Tess
Skinny60®: https://www.skinny60.com/
Join the 60-Day Reset: https://www.skinny60.com/60-day-reset/
The Decadent Detox®: https://www.thedecadentdetox.com/
Join the 14-Day Cleanse: https://www.thedecadentdetox.com/14-day-guided-cleanses/
The Blender Girl: https://www.theblendergirl.com/
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Thank you for being with me today. So we talked in episode one about, it has to be me moments and life being a collection of it has to be me moments and then episode two. We talked about it being your yes and your know. And noticing and empowering yourself to be ready to take action on your it has to be the moment. So today I want to talk about what holds you back from taking action from claiming and giving yourself permission to go after what you want. And I think that that's a number of things. Or at least that's what I've experienced in my own personal life. And throughout my work as a coach, and as a speaker and a strategist and all of the different things that I do. So I want to ask you, what is your vision for your life? And what is holding you back from going after some of it, you're probably going after some of it, but maybe not some other things.
Tess Masters:So I talked about my favorite quote, you know, with Nelson Mandela in episode one and episode do, yes, I'm a bit of a groupie, about there, this concept of not losing, I never lose, I either win or I learn. So if we buy into that, that there is no losing, there's only winning and learning. I think the next step of taking action and feeling good about the choices that we make is recognizing what is within our control. And what is not within our control and knowing what is yours to hold and what's not yours to hold. So what's what's in your control? It's your thoughts and your actions. Right, which is a lot. It's a lot that's what makes up a life. Right? We are the some of our choices, whether some of our actions, whether some of our thoughts, thoughts become things all the stuff we could say, right? What's not within our control the thoughts and actions of others, period, right now, that's a lot, right? Because there's billions of people on planet Earth, and everyone's exerting their freewill and doing what they're going to do. Right, we can't control that. What I think is really important within the context of the it has to be me conversation is, do you see what is not within your control as a barrier to you getting what you want? Oh, that was a big one. For me. Were when I was much younger, I definitely had a propensity to see all the things put my magnifying glass on all of the things that were not within my control and be terrified of them, because I couldn't control them. And then, when I took up the invitation through friends, through family members, through experiences, through therapy through all of it, right, I was constantly being being invited to, to put the magnifying glass over on the things that I could control, because that's the only way that I was going to change my life. So, you know, I talked in episode one about some of the experiences, you know, with death, you know, with my marriage with there were a lot of people making choices and dying. And you know, I talked about some stories about things that were not within my control. But what was within my control was how I received that information, how I interpreted that information, and how I took action on that information. And that's where I really started to empower myself. And I invite myself and I invite you to do the same, you know, so what about this idea, if we accepted that we are the we are the solution always. And if you throw enough time and thought and resource yourself into really figuring out something you will figure it out, even if you need help to do it, which we all do.
Tess Masters:So it's a perspective shift, isn't it? Right? So if we choose to put more weight on the things that we can control, which is a lot if you think about it, your thoughts and your actions, how you interpret the world and how you take action on it. It's huge. We have infinite power. And when we believe that we have infinite power, that's where the magic happens. So you get to choose whether you get what you want, period. And so even if something's really really hard, and you can't control some elements of it, you control what you learn from it. You control how much you participate in it, you know, and then whether you choose to stay in it or get out and take the lesson and move on to the next thing right. I think part of it has to be me as recognizing what does not have to be me. And I think often we stay too long at the party because we're attached to one particular outcome. I have certainly done that many, many, many times in my life where I will push and push and push. Because I'm invested in one outcome. And I want to make that outcome happen no matter what. Sometimes, it's just not what's going to serve me. So in episode one, I talked about my marriage, for example, where that relationship was not healthy for me, or for him. We needed to get out, you know, and actually, he had the courage to end it, I didn't write. So that was a situation where I should have taken my chips off the table much sooner. And I chose not to write because I was hiding in something because I was afraid of what was coming next. So often, we stay with comfy slippers on when they're actually moldy. They're comfortable, because it's what we know, but they're actually making us sick, right? I've certainly done that in my life. So I invite you to look at how you have done that in your life and how you might still be doing that right now. Right? So I think, you know, the biggest thing is the fear of failing, the fear of failing the fear of being humiliated, the fear of being embarrassed, the fear of people judging us the fear of getting it wrong, just getting it wrong, right, we want to get it right. You know, you know, it's often the fear is not, it's often not the doing, it's not the it's not the acting, it's not the thing that we've got to do. It's the fear of the outcome. It's the fear of the result, right. So the if it's not what we're afraid of, often, it's the outcome. So if we accept the premise that there is no losing, there's only winning and learning, then the outcome can't be wrong. So then the effort is worth whatever the outcome is. Suddenly, we're in this really empowering place, right? So I don't know about you. I used to be a chronic worrier. So years ago, I would worry, worry, worry, worry. And I would expend all this time and energy worrying about all the terrible things that could happen if I did XYZ. And none of it ever happened, or very, very little of it. Or even if it did kind of happen. It didn't happen in exactly the way that I thought it was gonna happen. So I was literally expending so much energy worrying. And it was keeping me disconnected. Right, that fear that analysis, paralysis of all of the things was keeping me disconnected for being engaged in the thing, you know? So I talked about this in episode one didn't know about this relationship between disconnection and connection? Are we seeking out connection? Or are we seeking our disconnection? So I asked you that again? Where do you seek our connection? And where do you seek out disconnection? You know, if we thread the needle a bit further beyond that fear of failing fear of not being enough, fear, fear, fear, right? If we think about, you know, I talked about this in episode one write about this idea that fear and excitement, they're activated in the same place in the body, right. And it's really intense feeling, right. And really, the difference between the two is the fear is that we're attached or we choose to buy in or believe that the outcome will be negative and bad for us and will hurt us and excitement, we choose to believe that the outcome will be really, really good and feel really good and be amazing, and be everything that we want or whatever. So they get activated in this really similar place. So I think often that the, the fear of failing, the fear of not being enough is that we are buying into a narrative that has been installed by somebody else for that. So there's that old adage of our family knows how to press our buttons, P cars, they installed them, right? And, gosh, I found that to be true in my life. So I want to ask you who the dominant voice in your head is that that you listen to the most or engaged with the most that informs how you feel about yourself and and your value and your worth and what you are capable of doing. So what I found as a coach in during my office hours during the video calls in my program with the 1000s of people that I touch every year is that it's typically a parent. It's typically your mother or your father. And so we can't we can't get rid of that voice. And why would we want to I mean for me, I have amazing parents. But even if you had an abusive parent It's still constructive, to engage with that, learn from it, listen to what it's triggering in you, and how you can find your way through that work with that in order to get to a better place. learning and growing.
Tess Masters:So part of it has to be me recognizing it has to be me taking action on it has to be me, is learning to engage with that voice, that dominant voice in a way that serves you expanding into the better parts of yourself instead of contracting, connecting instead of disconnecting. So an exercise that I give people during office hours a lot, because this comes up a ton, every single week, this comes up about the dominant voice about a parent is you can't drown it out. It's part of your history. It's part of your DNA. So what about this idea of of saying, I hear you, I hear you. Yeah.
Tess Masters:But I don't agree with you today. I don't believe you today, because I've grown. And I'm capable of so many things beyond what you believe that I'm capable of. And that's what I choose to expand into today. You know, because that, who you choose to spend time with, you know, the people that you choose to spend time with the people you choose to be in communication or in relationship with, even if they're not alive anymore, we are still in communication with them, you know, we talk to them, we hear the voice where we're hearing the mantra over and over and over, we're playing that tape over and over, right? You become like the people that you listen to spend time with, you look into the mirrors of those people, and often those mirrors are distorted, plain and simple. Right? And it may not be mirrors that are serving you, right? So what are the limiting beliefs about your potential about what you are capable of that you are choosing to listen to and buy in to write about, you know, holding on to stories that don't serve you, you're not enough, you're trash, you're not smart enough? You're fat, you're ugly. Nobody's gonna listen to you. I'm just trying to think of some things that have come up in my office hours, right? No one would love you. And can you imagine but people do say this to their children, right? Or partners say this, you know? Who can you be listening to being staying close to? That is going to help you see that you are incredible, and you are capable of anything? Who are those people in your life? And can you keep them close to you? Can you keep asking questions and listening and looking at yourself through those people's eyes? The people that want to elevate and celebrate you, lift you up, help you expand, help you learn help you grow, right. You know, what all successful people have in common. They believe that they're successful. They believe that they can be successful, they believe that they can do it, they decide it has to be me. It's the only difference right? And then they go off and do the work and if they can't do it on their own, they resource themselves and they connect with people that are going to help them get there. That's what all successful people do. Right? But it starts with your yes and your no your belief in yourself. I can do it. It has to be me. One of the big things that holds us back hold me back. And I wonder if I'm going to ask you does this hold you back is I'm not ready. It's not the right time. I can't do this right now. Because Baba Baba oh, gosh, I can certainly do that. Like I was saying in episode two, we get addicted to our excuses. Right because they're comfortable. It's what we know. It gives us an out. I don't like the word try. I I've given myself permission to remove it from my lexicon. Remove it from my vocabulary. And I invite everyone in my CCA Raisa to do the same thing during office hours because to me try immediately gives us an out that we're not quite gonna get there. Why is the Nike slogan one of the most famous, most empowering slogans just do it, just do it. And then clean up the mess later. Just do it. Give it a go do it. So when people say well, I'm trying to be this way, I'm trying to eat better. We're What did you do today? Did you eat? Did you eat something better? Yeah. Well, you're not trying you're doing it. You're doing it. You just want to do it more. And you know it's on a continuum. We just want to be better and better and better where you can't get better without practicing without giving it a go. Right? So you're ready when you decide that you're ready. Eat. And nobody can decide it for you. Nobody gets to decide that for you. You get to decide if you're ready. You get to decide if you're ready. And I'm a big fan now of doing things before I'm ready, doing things that scare me. Just doing it, doing it. When I've got the urge, yeah, I'm doing it. And you know what, I'm not going to do it perfectly. I'm not going to do it right all the time. I'm going to mess up, I'm going to make mistakes, but I'm going to figure it out. So okay, what's the worst thing that's going to happen? I play that game with myself a lot. I don't know if you play that game, but what's the worst thing is going to happen. And, you know, Lisa, in my office hours last week, gave this to everybody on office hours, and I'm gonna steal it from her, and I'm gonna give it to you, which is I play out the movie till the very end. I don't just sit in one scene in the movie, is what she said. I play it out. So she was using it as an she was talking about a food choice about somebody, Debbie Debbie. That's what it was, Debbie was on office hours talking about, Am I ever not going to feel deprived, like I went, you know, at my office, and they had all these doughnuts on a plate. And everybody else was eating the donuts. And I couldn't have the doughnuts. And I just went home. And I just the whole day I was dreaming about having the donuts and why I couldn't have the donut, am I ever not going to feel like that. And I gave her something that that I got from another member in in my sister reset brandy. So brandy was a member of the beta group of my program. And she wanted to lose all of this weight. And she did it was spectacular. But she told this story about how she went to the fair. And everybody else was eating funnel cakes and having soda pop and fairy floss and all the things right. And she was with a group of friends. And they were just looking at her and sort of feeling kind of sorry for her. And they turned to and said, Brandy, it was so sorry that you're on that weird thing and that we had died and you can't have this. We're so sorry for you. And she turned to them. And oh, man, I'm gonna give this to you. Because this is this is a pearl. This is gold. Thank you. Oh, I can have it whenever I want to. I just choose not to today. Is that not just fabulous? I have given that to so many people now and taking it out in my own life that I can have it whenever I want it. I just choose not to. Oh, gosh, it's so empowering, isn't it? It takes you from this reactionary victim, something's happening to me, as opposed to No, this is something I'm choosing, I'm proactively choosing this, it is an empowering choice that I'm making, right? Because I kind of know that food makes you sick, right? So and I'm not gonna feel good from it. So going back to what Lisa was saying was, was she plays at the movies, she was giving this to Debbie plays at the movie The whole time of, okay, so I eat the doughnut, and I feel really good in the moment. But then I drive home and I start to feel really grumbling in my tummy. And I start to not feel so good. And then I get really tired, and I want to take a nap. And then I wake up the next morning and I've got a headache and I feel really heavy. And then I've put on some weight, she plays at the movie till the end. And we all sat there in office hours. And we just went yeah, and it was such a beautiful example of even though I'm holding space and facilitating those meetings, we are all teaching each other. And we are all learning from each other and every single person has something to contribute, you have something to contribute. Even if you don't feel ready, you're not you're not being ready is someone else's fault. You know, caning it, like just being so successful, right? So we're all hanging our lanterns, and leading people into the promised land of what we know and what we've experienced. So you have something to say, and people want to hear what you have to say. So even if you don't feel ready, decide that you're ready decide that you're showing up. And again, it has to be your yes, right or your no. So I want to ask you what the rules are in your family. Because going back to this idea before that I was talking about, about how we often get our ideas and the stories that we play out have come from parents, family members, our partner, co workers, friends, whatever, right? So one of the things that comes up in my 60 Day reset a lot and in my 14 day cleanse in the Darknet detox, this comes up a lot is well, if I go against what my family do, it's a betrayal. Like it that's not what's done in my family. So this comes up a lot in terms of Okay, so let me let me tell you a story about about Kim. There's this lovely woman in our Community Kim. And she talked about, she came to office hours and we were talking about, she said, I want to know why I keep sabotaging myself, I know that those foods aren't good for me, why do I keep grabbing for them and doing something I know is going to make me sick. When when I mean, I have a history of diabetes and cancer and heart disease in my family. And all of these people in my family have died in their 40s and 50s. Like, way sooner than they should. And I don't I know that I don't want to end up that way. That's why I'm here. That's why I'm in this program. I desperately don't want that. I want to have a big beautiful life. I want to be strong and healthy, I want to be better. Why do I keep doing this? And everybody stopped putting in the chat. I feel the same way. I do the same way. My my sister's got cancer right now. And I whatever. I mean, we could all relate to this.
Tess Masters:So I asked her, What, what would it feel like if you got healthy and well, when the rest of your family members have not been able to? What does that feel like for you? What would what would everybody in your family think? And she said I would feel like I was leaving them behind? Hmm. This is such a really juicy place to swim around in is it isn't it right? Where, where when we dare to dream beyond what our family members have dreamed for us or dreamed for themselves, or been willing to do for themselves. We feel like it's a betrayal that we're letting them down. And we're going beyond like, it's it's kind of like when when people are the first people to go to college. There is this pride in it, I was the first person to go to college and my family. But there's also this weird feeling of I've left them behind I'm other now I don't belong to my family, I am somehow other and some people run towards that and other people, there's always this weird thing where you where you feel like you've betrayed your family. You're actually honoring them, honoring them by being better by being more than they ever could have possibly dreamed for you by being strong and healthy by hanging a shiny land and, and being the example of what someone in this family can do. And sometimes the people in your family are not able to see that in the moment, because of their stuff, their internal monologues there because that's what their parents taught them. Right. And it's just this sort of perpetuating cycle. But if we choose if you choose to decide what is your yes and your No, and you give yourself permission to hold that, regardless of what anybody else says or does. And it is hard. I'm not saying it's not hard when you've got a whole family saying you're crazy to to, you know, be eating those vegetables, or I'm just trying to think of an example or be going to go and live in that country or going to do that job or go to college or whatever it might be right. homeschool your kids that's come up in our office hours before when you they should be in a regular school or whatever it is, right? Well, okay, thank you for your opinion. But it has to be me, it has to be my decision my life, right? And you get to decide, right? This is, again, why I keep coming back to this place of for me food is such a powerful portal of discoverability. For what makes us tick, how we make the choices that we make. And I talked about this in episode one, I talked about this in episode two, where for me how you choose to nourish yourself or not, is a direct reflection of how you treat yourself in the rest of your life, the amount of self love the regard that you have for yourself. And I have never in the 1000s of people that I've coached seen an example where that is not true. Just never. And so I feel like it's just a really powerful thing to keep looking at. So I'm going to ask you again, are the food choices and the lifestyle choices that you are making? getting you closer to the life that you want and all that you want to have in your life or is it taking away from that? So I talked in Episode One and Two about how the downloads come quicker and faster and you can tap into your intuition when you've got clean pathways and you're eating really well. Right? You just have more choices. I talked in episode two about how I don't want my physical health my physical Hate to be a barrier for me doing anything. I don't want to not be able to climb that mountain or go waterskiing or travel and walk around Paris all day long and not feel exhausted. Because of my physical health. I don't want to miss out on doing things with my friends and family because I don't have a body that's able to do it. I just don't want that to ever be a reason why I say no. So I asked you, what are the reasons you're saying no, to your dreams to the it has to be made? What's holding you back from taking action? Right? So the other thing I want to ask you is, do you make proactive decisions or reactive decisions? And I think that we're a mixture of both right? But what is the What's your dominant way of making choices? So do you do you make choices when your backs against the wall, and that's the only choice you can make when it's forced upon you. And I've told stories in this podcast so far about when I've had to make reactionary choices when someone's like, I don't want to be married to you anymore. You know, there's lots of examples of this, right? A choice would be when my father called and told me, he had cancer. And I mean, I needed to get home ASAP, right. So that obviously, there's situations like that, but the nuances of how you navigate your way through those things, that those situations that are thrust upon you. There's a lot of choices in there, right. And so, for me, I want to see if you can relate to this for me, I make the best choices, my best choices, my most empowered choices, when I've got time to make them. When I've really thought about it, I've weighed up all the options, I've really thought something through I've gotten strategic, I've really gone, okay, I've talked it through with friends and family members, I've gone and spoken to my counselor about it or whatever it might be. And I've really weighed it up, and then right boom, I'm ready to go. When something starts to upon me, and I wait until I don't have any other choices, and it's the only choice I can make, it doesn't feel empowered, and it's often a knee jerk. Last option, I made this choice, because I didn't have any other choices. Right? So an example of that, I'm gonna go back to health again, right? Because, you know, we can all relate to this. And it's what I know. Do you want to wait until you get the disease diagnosis? Where your only option is some pretty fast intervention, medical treatment or death? Or do you want to be proactive about it, and make better choices along the way, so that you can make room for these bigger choices. So I was really inspired again, I just get so inspired by people in my community and my program. So Stephanie came into the community. She's also a dear friend of mine, she came into the community and she she decided to, to be mindful about her health, her health and her food choices and her lifestyle choices because a friend got diagnosed with cancer. And so this friend was going into treatment and making all these these changes to the food and the exercise and doing the treatment. And it made her think why is it that we only make these changes when we get the diagnosis when we get the disease diagnosis and our backs against the wall and we absolutely have to or die. It's literally take action or die. Why? Why don't we just make it make make changes and make make these decisions because we want to be better and we want to we want to just expand. So she had just started menopause and was not sleeping well was not was didn't have energy, had put on extra weight wasn't feeling good in herself and she just didn't feel good. And she decided I want to see I'm going to use this. I'm going to take up this invitation. From you know, this friend's diagnosis this mirror I'm looking into right now and going okay, how can I be better I want to be proactive rather than reactive. I'm not waiting until I get the diagnosis. I'm doing it now. So that I don't get the diagnosis. It's inspiring. And so she just went all in and she's like, I'm going to learn I'm going to grow and figure this out and I want to see how good I can feel it 54
Tess Masters:And because she decided she made it happen. So she was sleeping through the night she was waking up with energy she lost over 17 pounds and could have lost more she just decided that's the weight she wanted to be at. She learned how to fuel her body efficiently. She learned how to use too you know food as a tool. to control how she was feeling in her body when all of her friends around her were struggling through menopause, and were not sleeping through the night didn't have energy didn't think they could lose weight and weren't. Because they weren't deciding it has to be me to arm myself with knowledge to make the changes that are necessary. Oh, I'm sorry that you're not not gonna have that glass of wine she has no, I've realized that it's kind of a trigger for my hot flashes. Not going to have it. Thank you. Oh, wait, sorry. No, actually, I'm really not. Because I'm going to feel really, really great. Tonight. I'm going to sleep through the night, and I'm going to feel really great tomorrow. Right? So we are making choices all the time. Right? So are you proactive? Or are you reactive? Are you waiting for the big diagnosis? Or the big tragedy? Or the big opportunity? Or are you just deciding I'm doing it now? Whether it's the right time? I'm doing it now? Right? So I think, you know, with health with a job opportunity, am I moving to this country? I'm gonna, am I going to get pregnant now? Whatever the whatever the decision might be? Do I walk away? Do I get out of this relationship? When is it gonna be the right time? So it's, it's, it's about deciding, right? So I think what I've discovered through my office hours is that so often this health piece is about not believing that you deserve it. And that comes from your family, right? So why don't you feel like you're good enough to feel good? Right? It's kind of an interesting one, right? It's a conversation that comes up over and over and over this self worth is self love, peace. I'm not enough, I'm not strong enough. I don't have what it takes to make that happen. I don't have what it takes, well, you decide if you have what it takes. And, and if there's certain actual tangible skills that you need to make it happen, like, like, I want to be an electrician where you gotta go, and you gotta go and do an apprenticeship and learn about this stuff in order to be an amazing electrician. If that's one of your dreams. Of course, you have to do that. But it starts with you deciding, I have what it takes to even go and finish the training, do the training, learn it, right. And it's a process of all these it has to be me moments along the way that lead you to the place where you actually get the dream, you become the dream, you're living the dream, right of being the electrician or being strong and healthy, of climbing Mount Everest, or, you know, running the Boston Marathon. I'm just trying to think of examples of things that people want to do right in my program. Another thing that comes up a lot is, well, it works for everybody else, but I'm an anomaly. It's not going to work for me. Nothing ever works out for me, everybody else that works out for but it doesn't work out for me. Well, I'm gonna say that probably comes from your family, too, right? That's a button that got installed. This belief that it can't work out for you. Well, if you buy into the belief that it can't work out for you, then it's not going to work out for you. Because that's what you've already decided. We make it work out for ourselves. You make it work out for yourself, because you just figure it out along the way. And sometimes life is a cha-cha, right? We don't just go forward in life we you know, we tend to only value forward more money, prestige, power, success, fame, whatever it is, right? Well, I don't know about you. But I have learned my most potent powerful lessons from the messiest, most painful, embarrassing, humiliating, I'm brought to my needs, I can't go through breath. I almost die situations. However you interpret that, because here's the great thing about those lessons, you do not forget them. You do not forget them. And you don't want them to happen again. They are gifts, albeit excuse my language gifts wrapped in dogshit, but their gifts, glorious gifts, when you choose to see them that way and you choose to learn from them. Right? So this comes up a lot, this comes up a lot in my program, well, well, this won't work for me. I've tried every diet on Earth, this might work for me. Like if I have pre calls with people leading into my program, or they're on a webinar with me, or I might meet them in an event I might be speaking at something. Then in office hours, you know, even in the first couple of weeks before you start to really feel that yeah, it's gonna work for you if you if you you know, start being strategic. And I always say the same thing, which is, first of all, what we're doing is not a diet, right? Because I don't believe in diets, right? We're just eating beautiful healthy food and you're learning how to put it together in combinations that work for you and your body. Right? But if we look at any situation, it's about making it work for you. And if you need help to do that you get help right now So, like I said, before we we can get addicted to our excuses, because it's what we know. Like, I feel like for me, often I'm not a fear of afraid of failure, I'm afraid of success. What happens if I actually get that thing that I want? My it has to be me. And then I don't have what it takes. I'm a fraud, the imposter syndrome, everyone's gonna, everyone might be ready to do it. We'll worry about that when you get to it. And you'll just decide to step up and resource yourself and go and study and learn and prepare for that meeting, read what you need to read, go and learn the skill that you need to learn to keep being it has to be me being ready for it, right. So we put we often you can put all this time and energy into all the reasons why it won't work out, instead of throwing all of your energy into all the reasons why you're gonna make sure it works out. Right. And if it doesn't work out, then you're gonna switch course and go, Wow, okay, well, I learned from that. Sometimes, it has to be me comes wrapped in a whole lot of what does not have to be me, right? And this is actually why I like okay, this is an example when somebody when somebody, let's say, we're like in week one, we're in week three, we're in week six of the program, whatever it is, in my office hours, and someone says, Test, you know, I know I wasn't supposed to, but I had a glass of wine and had a piece of pizza. You know, we had some cake at this party. And I just feel I just I can't believe it. I just, I just feel like I've set myself back like three weeks. I can't believe I did this. Did you enjoy the cake? Did you enjoy the pizza? Did you enjoy the glass of wine? Did you make a beautiful memory with your friends? Yes. Well, what fabulous reasons to eat the pizza and drink the wine and have the cake. Right? And it's about balance. Yeah, but I don't feel good today. I feel so sick. Well, that's data, isn't it. Because a few weeks ago, you may not have noticed that you felt so terrible. And now you are aware. So I get this a lot. I never knew how bad I felt until I felt this good. I've never felt this could in my entire life before. I've never slept through the night had energy like this. I've never felt like this. I didn't know that this is how I could feel in my body. Well, you don't know until you know, right? And and when when, when someone's this was Jenny saying this to me. I just why would I do that to myself, I've sabotage myself well, but hang on a second, you've learned, right? You've learned and you feel it in your body and that knowing in your body, we cannot. We can't replace that knowing, right? Like we can read something we can hear rendition of someone else's version of what they learned. But until you experience it yourself in your body, then you're really no right. And so often, we got to learn lessons many times before we we start to hold it right and make different choices. And so I think that's what makes life exciting, right is that we get to keep learning, we get to keep learning, and growing. And so again, going back to that idea of there can't be you can't fail. It's just winning and learning, right? Even if you eat the cake, you eat the pizza, you drink the wine. But then you go, Whoa, okay, and then the more you practice, and the more you learn, you start to really pick and choose your moments from an empowered place. Well, I'm going to drink the wine and eat the pizza tonight, because we're all celebrating that mom got a new job or the you know, or just because I'm laughing and we're sharing memories and haven't seen these people for a week, or whatever it is, you pick and choose those empowered moments where you do that, knowing that you're not gonna feel so great, but you're gonna feel really great in other ways, right? And then you eat a salad, you eat some sauerkraut you stay hydrated, you know, you balance it out, right? It's about balance. One of the other big barriers to taking action on it has to be me as I don't have the time. I don't have time, I don't have time for that. I'm already so overwhelmed with all the things that I've got to do. I don't have time for that. So I'll give you an example in my program, so it will be I don't have time to cook, I don't have time to eat healthy.
Tess Masters:Well, okay, so let's let's think about this. We all have ideas about what is worth spending our time on in these areas our time, right, and there's only so many hours in the day. And there's only so many hours that we're going to have in a lifetime on this planet. All right. So I don't know about you, but I like quality over quantity. So I'll give you what I tell people in my office hours. A minute takes 60 seconds to pass no matter what we do, right? But we get to control how we experience those 60 seconds. And if we're going to go with the quality versus quantity and we're going for quality. I would rather spend a little bit of time now To get time later to, to enjoy fully and be fully present with a healthy strong body and a sharp wit and have mental clarity and enjoying my life and having energy, right? So the time that I spend on making that salad for 10 minutes, rather than going through the drive thru where I mindlessly put it into my mouth, you either get the hard now or the hard later, right? So this whole, it's just too hard. It's too hard. I just want easy. Okay, so that that kind of dovetails into the time thing for me, right, where everything is easy, and everything is hard. It just depends on our perspective, right? And it can be easy and hard the same things right. So here's an example. I'll use a food example again. Let's say I'm just mindlessly I'm rushing the kids to soccer and I'm driving around, and I just don't have a lot of time. So I'm going to drive into the McDonald's drive thru. And it's it's easy, I can eat while I'm driving along. I can multitask. It takes me three seconds. I don't have to think about it. It's easy. But then it becomes really hard. Because it's really hard to digest poor quality food. We know this science tells us this anecdotal feeling in our body tells us this bloating, gas, farting, feeling tired, feeling lethargic? And then you get sick, right? If you eat that every single day, like that supersize documentary taught us that right? Well, I think his name was Jordan, right? Where he, he was really healthy. He ate McDonald's all day, every day, for all of that time. And he got very, very sick, right? So we know, we just know, I mean, we don't need that documentary to tell us that we just know from science, right? We can do it a little bit, we just can't do it every day, or we're gonna get really sick. So you either you get the hard or the easy. And you get to decide, right? So going back to the time thing I would prefer to spend the time investing in my mental capacity, my good emotions, my healthy, strong body so that I'm making use of that time, right? So think about it this way, too. When you make decisions. You're spending time either way. Right? Like you got to spend some time. So you spend more time feeling shitty and awful in your body and less time feeling great, or you spend more time feeling great and less time feeling bad, right? And then you get to decide how what the path to that looks like, right? So another thing that comes up a lot in my community is I can't do that. I can't do what you're doing. I can't do what these other people in the group and they're posting their pictures of their food and their cooking. I don't cook I can't cook. Well, my friend Lynn, dear, dear friend of mine says, can you read what cooking is reading? And she's quite opinionated about this. But she's right, right. Like if you can read you can cook. Now of course, if you want to become a Michelin starred chef, of course, there's some minutia involved in the sense of flavors and some great skill involved. But if you just want to be a home cook, and you want to nourish yourself, cooking is reading and you can follow a recipe. Right? And so I hate to cook. Well, when I hear that from somebody I hear I don't love myself. Because unless you're going to hire a private chef, and you've got all the money in the world, you have to at least pick up some foods or you got to prepare some foods, how else you're going to feed yourself, right or somebody else in your family is doing it right, maybe. But to me, again, this is about perspective, right? So someone else might say I hate to exercise, I hate to do my homework. Well, there's certain things that we have to do to get ahead right to be able to function in the world. And the reason why I keep using this food analogy is because we all have to do it every day, right? So we have to eat regularly, in order to fuel our brain in order to function in order to stay alive. To me cooking is an act of self love. And besides what we think and how we act, I think it is the greatest act of self love, right? Where it is a gift that we give our present self are feeling good and our future self, right that I'm going to It's a promise that we make to ourselves and our loved ones I am going to show up as the best version of myself. I'm going to be strong and healthy. I'm going to be ready for whatever comes our way. I mean, I'm in with you and I'm present as the whole me not the muted dulled down version. I mean, not the sick me that healthy vibrant me, right. I mean, what you put love and care and attention into expands right and think of it this way. We're consuming all the time. We consuming information all the time. We're consuming the world around us. How much are we creating? Now I'm a creative person. I'm an actor presenter A voice actor or an author or a cook, or you know, a program creator, or whatever. But so are you. So what are you creating in your life? I feel like cooking is one way of creating, it's a really powerful way of putting something really beautiful out into the world and you feed yourself. And by extension, you feed others, right? Whether you're feeding them with the food that you're making today, or by showing up as your whole self to feed and nourish them, right. So, yeah, because I know you have to eat all the time, like I do. What is your relationship with food? What is your relationship with cooking? What is your relationship with that look like? And how is that serving you? Or is it detracting from the life that you want to live? Another way that we don't take action, and we say no, to our dreams, or we don't take up the invitation for it has to be me, is I don't want to spend the money, I don't have the money. I don't have the money. And listen, how much money we have is a real thing. And we need money in the world to buy food to go places to eat effect, it absolutely affects our choices, right? And we all have a different amount of money in our bank account right now. 100%. That is a reality. And we've all got different ideas about how we want to spend our money. Right? So how are you spending your money? So are you spending it in places that are helping you expand into your better, better, better self? Or are you spending money on things that detract from that that are distractions from that? So here's an example. Well, I don't have time to buy healthy food. You know, it's actually cheaper to buy fast food and in many places, that is true. Hmm, yes, I take your point is what I would say to somebody in office hours. She says that to me. How much money did you spend on takeout this year? How much money did you spend on doctor's visits? How much money did you spend on medications? On supplements? How much medic? How much money did you spend on covering up or making up for the fact that you were not spending money on healthy food? How much money did you spend? Where Where does that? Where does that work for you? And 99% of the time, we sort of work out the 10s of 1000s of dollars have been spent on these other things. And when you're healthy and strong, you start to spend very little on medication very little, like, you know, you go to your annual doctor's visit, you're not on medications. And that investment in that healthy food is starting to look really, really cheap, right, like really inexpensive, and a really smart use of your money. Right? So it's like, I like to think about money in those terms. Because it empowers me to think about where I want to spend my time and money, right? Like, it's an opportunity to get really clear about what your priorities are this money thing because we've all got a different money template, don't we? Right? Like you, you think about what's important to you, right? So Gina is someone who is another friend of mine. She they're all friends of mine now. Right? But but she came into the program and she had she has a loop she has lupus and had spent her life feeling really, really, really awful. And I had watched her really struggle like really struggle with her health and you know, any eat fast food and eat poorly and it was really starting to become a real problem. It was really affecting her quality of life and as she moved into her 50s Things were really starting to progress and get worse and she was starting to get all these other issues and aches and pains and you know just really getting in the way of the magic.
Tess Masters:And a lot of the excuses right have I don't have the time I don't have the money. I'm going to feel deprived. I'm going to feel miserable. I like my burger and fries. I don't want to give that up but and so I said to her well, at the moment, you've got your burger and fries and yeah, they're delicious, but you're giving up your dreams. And I think that's a lot more painful doesn't mean you can't have the burger and fries. I'm just inviting you to have them less and to put some of these other foods into the mix as well. And you know what happened? She has not had a Lupus flare up in two years. She is off most of her medications. She has energy she sleeps through the night she lost almost 40 pounds and counting she feels good about herself. She's learned to value cooking and preparing food as a form of self love. And she feels better than she ever has before. And she still eats the burger and fries every once in a while, but again, chooses to do it from a place of empowerment. So this whole I don't have the money, I don't have the time I'm not ready. It's not the right time. There's kind of like a, like a, a real flow on and snowball effect, a domino effect that that happens with this stuff. Right? And, and I want to address this little treat culture. Right? Well, I deserve this. I deserve that piece of cake. I deserve that donut have had a horrible day, right? Like so. And we conditioned in society about this, right? Like, what happens when when when it's somebody's birthday, when it's somebody's graduation, when something great happens when something terrible happens when a death happens. We all show up and we've baked a cake right? Or we've baked you know, we show with sugar basically right? Like, let me give you a little sugar. Because that is the that's the antidote for anything terrible is that it just makes us feel good. And let's be honest, sweet things are delicious. Like there's a reason why sugar is a drug and we want more of it right? It just is delicious. But again, when things are not in balance, they don't serve us anymore. So eating one piece of cake might make us feel great. And we're having a lovely memory and a beautiful celebration with friends and family. But when we start to do it every single day, it starts to remember that that formula I gave in episode one or two was where I said sugar creates acid acid creates inflammation and inflammation is at the root of all disease and when left unattended to that those little niggly forms of disease progressed to chronic disease. It's just how it works, right? So sugar is the enemy of better health. Now we're going to eat it sometimes because it's fun. But when we start to eat it every single day, it just causes chronic inflammation in our body and leads to all kinds of health issues. Right? So we know this in society, but we still do it right. So you know, it's kind of like sugar is an addiction, right? comfort eating is an addiction. It's a way that we help ourselves feel better, or at least that's what we think we're doing. But then we feel a whole lot worse, right? Because physically, we start to feel really bad. It kind of is like alcoholism in a way, right? Where if you can do one or two drinks, and then put it aside, that can be a lovely thing you do with friends, but then when you need it and you have to do it all the time. Then it becomes an addiction that doesn't serve you right. So Liz, another lovely person in our community. She told a really great story about how she just would drink her her coke every single day and would would eat sugary, you know fast food whenever she felt like it and just would aimlessly put it into her mouth because she wanted to give give herself pleasure wanted to, to feel good, right? And she would just be shoveling things out with it without even thinking about it, which I think you know, happens a lot. I can even do that, too. We often do we often eat as a secondary activity when I think about it, right? So before she started the program, and she decided I'm going to come in her agency was really elevated. She had high blood pressure and cholesterol. She was overweight, she wasn't sleeping through night. She didn't have energy, she had chronic inflammation, aches and pains. She was you know, would bend over and would would take five minutes to get back up again. She'd be lightheaded. I mean, there were all kinds of signs that her body was giving her that she needed desperately to make some changes. And she knew it and her doctor told her she had to do it right or she was going to really be in some trouble. So to her credit, she decided it has to be made. She came into the program, and in anticipation of giving up all of her favorite things. She binge, she binge ate everything in her house, basically. And she came in and she was very, very, very sick for the first few weeks because she was going through massive detox symptoms, right? And she was she was very generous in sharing with everybody what was happening for her. I'm talking diarrhea, like really not feeling good. And she said, well as this has been a powerful lesson for me. You know, again, what I was saying before, if I didn't know how bad I felt until I felt really, really good. I just cannot believe that I can feel as good as I felt. She got the most extraordinary results regulated her blood pressure and cholesterol. All her numbers came back into acceptable ranges. She lost over 30 pounds in 60 days. I mean, it was just it was extraordinary. But it was due to her commitment. She decided it has to be me to make these changes. It has to be me and I'm going to do what it takes and I'm going to keep reaching out and asking for help. Right and she did and we were delighted to provide that support. So again, I'm going to ask you what Is your relationship with food like and how does that correlate to your relationship with other things? Do you binge other things in your life? Is it an all or nothing thing in other parts of your life? Do you do things that that you use to comfort you, but actually aren't really doing that they're helping you stay disconnected and hiding, right? This? You know. And again, I'm going to say, I think it often comes back to the expectations and beliefs that other people have for us, not necessarily what we're holding for ourselves. Right. You know, that's another thing. It's another thing. Yeah, I want to talk about that for a second. Then another thing that comes up is these beliefs that we also hold about the other people in our lives, like I've been talking about the beliefs that our friends and family members have about us, we also hold limiting beliefs about the other people in our lives, what they're capable of and, and how they're going to be able to meet us or not, in our lives. Like when I say it has to be me, what's that going to mean for the rest of the people in my life? And are they going to be able to step up? So let me think about it. Okay, here's an example. So this happens a lot in my program, again, I'll use a food example where, where somebody will come in, and, okay, I'm gonna use Jan as an example. This is another lovely person in our community, where she just went, my husband not gonna eat this food, he's just not gonna He's not, he's not going to do it. He's not going to eat it. My children are gonna eat this food. They're just not. And I said, really? So would you like to give them an opportunity. So empower them, show them you know, the food, what you're going to be making invite them to pick something that they liked the look or the sound of or whatever. And just give everybody a chance, a chance of trying this? Well, you know what happened? I'm this happens a job. She comes into office hours the following week, and said, well, thanks a lot. Dez I'm loving you. But I'm hating you right now. Because not only did it work, and everybody loved the Polonaise and what in more of a but now I don't have any leftovers this week, because the whole family or Adel, like, away from my food. So, you know, it's really interesting how Gosh, allow, allow people to surprise you, allow them to step up, make room for them to step up. And that's not always the story. Sometimes it happens very gradually, right. But I get occur really loudly, I have made many a husband of women in my program, become a vegetable lover and be able to eat vegetables, right? And listen, most of the people that into my community are actually omnivores, right. They eat meat, they eat fish, they eat chicken or whatever. Were just teaching everybody to eat more vegetables, and then you decide what else you're going to be supplementing that with you can be vegan, vegetarian, omnivore, whatever labels you want to choose, but we all should be eating a lot of plants, right? We just know that that that that helps the human body function better, right? So you know, another actually, I'm going to tell you that story as well. Another example is Tony, another fantastic woman in our community. She really decided she was going to find solutions for at least right she's got a an absolute carnivore, omnivore husband, who loves his meat and potatoes loves loves the fatty fried food thinks healthy food is ridiculous that that's for chumps, that's for sissies, like I'm a man, I'm eating my meat, you know, and eat very few vegetables.
Tess Masters:And she just decided to do it the really gentle way. And I'm a really big fan of buffet style eating like we've got a one family one meal philosophy in our community where you literally make the base recipe and then you, you put different kinds of protein on the table. And you might put pasta and bread on the table for the rest of your family. And you might sit there with yours and have your vegetables with yours or something like that. But you will sit in communion with each other and celebrate the day together eating a version of the same thing. And then everybody feels in control over their choices. And it's very empowering for children in particular, that they have control over some aspects of what they're doing. I found it to be very six, a very successful strategy. And so she really ran with that strategy. And she literally would make the base recipe and put you know, some some other things on the table that she knew both of her children would love and eat a little bit of bread, little bit of pasta, maybe some rice. You know, her husband had a steak, you know, her daughter loved chicken, you know, and she just made it work for every person, right? And it was something that succeeded so spectacularly where they started to really commune around the table and really talk about the different things that were on the table and it was a source of discussion. You know, instead of being on devices and being disconnected food became this point of connection for that family, right, and how they could empower themselves how they could make sense of a commune participate in it together their way there, each of them was doing it a slightly different way. But they could come to a point of intersection and communion. And I think that's what food does. I think it brings people together just like sports do, right? Like, you know, when you go to an amazing sports game, you're at the Super Bowl, or you're in an NBA final or whatever, you're at the 10 a tennis match. It just brings strangers together, you know, with with our common shared experience of tastes and smells and flavors and satiation satisfaction, Joy. It's how we, I mean, if we think about so many things in life, we're eating and drinking together, right in celebration, and food just must be joyful. It's one of the great pleasures of life, right. So I do want to challenge a view that you might hold that healthy eating has to be miserable and torturous, it can be fun, and it can be so glorious, and be full of flavor and delight, you know, and that's, I think, that, you know, I leave a lot of the nutrition counseling to my dieticians, because they're medical practitioners. That's really what I bring to it is, is the the coaching and the mindset piece. But also, you know, I just love making you know, healthy food that people are excited to eat again, right, that just gets me jazzed up, right, I want I want better nutrition to be delicious, right? And fun, because that's what makes it stick. When you are excited about the food that you're eating, you want to eat it again. So healthy food actually has to be even more delicious than unhealthy food, it just has to be, we're not going to want to eat it. We're going to want to eat the pizza and the donor, we're going to want to eat the candy bar, we're going to want to eat the takeout right all the time. Because the naked piece of broccoli on the plate tastes bland and disgusting. Well, I don't eat plain broccoli, right? I mean, I love broccoli, but I'm gonna put some olive oil and lemon juice on it. That's a quick, easy thing. Or I'm gonna put some spices on it and make it really smoky. Right. So this is again, the stuff that you learn with practice. So just keep practicing. So going back to this, this idea of what's holding you back, I want to close with this today. I'm gonna give you an acting analogy, right, because I'm an actor, when you're learning improvisation, and you're in an improv class, or your ad libbing a scene and sort of like trying to dissect what the author might mean in a text and you're kind of putting it into your own words or whatever it might be. Right. So the golden rule of improvisation is yes. And the idea that, you know, let's say no, that you don't block any opportunities or any possibilities you remain open to absolutely all offers. All offers. Yes. And okay, hmm. What's your for me? What's here for me today? What's here for me? I don't know about that. And that might be the answer. In the end, it might lead you to the no, that leads you to your next Yes. Right.
Tess Masters:So I would encourage you to think about about what you're mulling over in your life today and those terms in the Yes. And write. remaining open to all possibilities for you and for your life. But going back to what I was saying before it has to be your yes and your no. Right. Thank you for joining me next week. I want to button this little four episode solo arc with me before we start interviewing some fabulous people. I want to talk about taking action, what we got to do to really take action and feel good about it. So join me next week and we'll dive into that together.