How Your Food is Affecting Your Mood - A Guide to Improve Your Mood, Energy and Focus Through Your Meals

Is your comfort food really comforting you?

We often turn to our favorite snacks and meals in times of stress or sadness, seeking solace in the familiar tastes and textures. But have you ever wondered if these foods are truly comforting your mind and body, or if they might be doing more harm than good?

In this week’s episode, we’ll dive into the fascinating relationship between what we eat and how we feel, uncovering the hidden impacts of our dietary choices on our emotional well-being. 

We’ll also explore mindful eating practices, the wisdom of Ayurveda, and the transformative power of nourishing your body, mind, and soul. 

Discover how small changes in your diet can lead to profound shifts in your mood and overall health.

What We Discuss:

• 00:00 Intro
• 01:10 Food can be medicine
• 02:39 Association of comfort with food
• 04:31 Feel what your body is feeling
• 05:52 Change how you view comfort foods
• 09:04 Control what you eat, don’t let food control you
• 11:45 Stop labeling food as good and bad
• 13:24 The Four Pillars of Health
• 16:46 The categories of food in Ayurveda
• 32:19 Adaptogens and spices
• 35:50 Get your blood tested
• 38:05 The nutrients you need to boost your mood
• 41:14 Anti-inflammatory foods
• 44:06 Invest in your health
• 53:36 Relationship between our gut and brain
• 56:16 Glucose spikes in our body

 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
I've really stopped trying to label foods as being this
is good food and this is bad food. And if
this is bad food, then that means when I eat it,
I should be feeling bad. But actually, I think the
way that we need to see things is if we
are choosing to eat something, let's eat it with joy.
Let's eat it with happiness, so that every single thing
that I'm putting into my body is fueling me in

(00:21):
that way and believing that it is. And if we
do have that feeling that we know this may not
be right for me and this doesn't make me feel
good when I eat it, and your body's telling you that,
then we have to learn to listen to that before
we put it into our mouths. I'm rather Wukiah and
on my podcast A Really Good Cry, we embrace the
messy and the beautiful, providing a space for raw, unfiltered

(00:41):
conversations that celebrate vulnerability and allow you to tune in
to learn, connect and find comfort.

Speaker 2 (00:47):
Together.

Speaker 1 (00:48):
Hi, everyone, this week's episode, we are going to be
exploring and focusing on mood foods, foods to boost your mood,
mood boosting foods, moodbusters, whatever you want to call them.
We're going to find out what foods are bringing you
down and which foods are lifting you up. I love
doing research on these topics. I actually whether I don't
know whether you know this about me, but I studied

(01:09):
as a dietitian and nutritionist.

Speaker 2 (01:11):
It was what I graduated in.

Speaker 1 (01:13):
I was a dietitian in a hospital for a few years,
and it is something that I.

Speaker 2 (01:20):
Just have always loved. I've loved the.

Speaker 1 (01:21):
Association between food and how it affects your body, down
to each ingredient, what I can add into my food
to make me feel different types of ways. And I've
really been experimenting with that through my life and it's
been something I have been fascinated by, and I just
learned more and more with the more ingredients that I
incorporate into my life. And so this makes me so

(01:43):
happy to share it with you because I really do think,
and it's been something that I've been testing through my life,
that food can be medicine in so many different ways.
And I don't necessarily mean for the chronic conditions in
your life, even though I really believe that can be
possible too.

Speaker 2 (02:00):
I mean as a preventative.

Speaker 1 (02:01):
Every single day, there are so many things that we
do in our life that can be tiny, tiny things
in your days where you probably don't even realize you're
doing them, but actually are making such a huge impact
to your future selves, your future wellness, your future lives.
And I think when you understand food a lot better,
when you understand the qualities that they have, when you

(02:22):
understand how they affect your body, it can have a.

Speaker 2 (02:26):
Huge impact in your future.

Speaker 1 (02:28):
And so every single day when you're looking at your
spice store, which by the way, I think spices are
the key to the secret ingredient to living a really healthy, vibrant,
optimal life. Spices can help in so many different ways
to heal your body, to prevent illnesses like just your
day to day colds, or even be used to patch

(02:50):
up things on your body whenever you hit your leg
or whenever you've got a cut or.

Speaker 2 (02:54):
A bruise leg.

Speaker 1 (02:55):
There's just so much magic to spices, and in the
same way, so much magic to herbs and fruits and
vegetables and grains that we eat if we know how
to use them. And so I love this phrase of
it's not what you eat, it's how you're eating it.
And I think that is a key in what we're
going to be talking about today. I would like a
virtual hands up to anybody else who can relate to this,

(03:17):
because I have been a comfort eater for sure my
whole life. It's the thing that I have gone to
for my comfort. Food has always been my comfort and
I actually have never drunk alcohol. I've never done any drugs.
I rarely drink coffees or take a lot of caffeine
in my life. But food has been my go to,
whether it's occasion or for pretty much every single emotion.

(03:40):
So let's imagine it's a Friday night and I'm like, hey,
let's go to eat at this new place and get
every single thing on the menu because.

Speaker 2 (03:47):
It's a Friday.

Speaker 1 (03:48):
Or I had a really hard day, I need to
eat some cake, or I had a great day.

Speaker 2 (03:52):
Let's celebrate with pizza. We're having friends over.

Speaker 1 (03:56):
Let's get ten different desserts and every single food that
I can get from four different places.

Speaker 2 (04:01):
Way too much for anybody to eat, but hey.

Speaker 1 (04:03):
It's a celebration. We're having friends over. Let's all celebrate
together by eating. And I think that's been something I've
been used to from a young age. It's the culture
that I'm from. It's like my mum, if people were
coming over, it wouldn't be just like you can never
just have one starter, you can never just have one
main dish, you can never just have one dessert.

Speaker 2 (04:22):
Was it was like.

Speaker 1 (04:23):
Pouring your love and your heart into something that you
can give to someone.

Speaker 2 (04:28):
And that for us was always food.

Speaker 1 (04:30):
And as much as I love that so much and
I think it is such a beautiful way to express love,
it's definitely my love language. One thing I realize is
it's often not my love language for myself because I
don't necessarily choose the things that.

Speaker 2 (04:42):
Actually make me feel good.

Speaker 1 (04:44):
And so I've really been working on my association to
food is comfort, and it's something I've been trying to
dissociate from more so because I don't want anything to
control me. It's also the reason I chose not to
drink in my life, or chose not to take any
drugs in my life even experiment or try them, because
I maybe I'm a bit of a control freak. It

(05:04):
could be that, but also I just like feeling what
my body's feeling. I like knowing what's going on in
my body. That's also why I try and avoid taking
any medication. When I'm on my period and I have
cramps or when I have a headache, I have tried
to find things that actually solve it rather than hide
or put a band aid on it or temporarily solve it.

(05:26):
And so if I have a headache, I'll try and
use peppermint oil instead. If I have cramps, honestly, I'll
just I love writing the feeling out of like, this
is what my body's feeling right now, let me embrace it,
let me understand it. And the pain is obviously there
for a reason. There's something going on, and so I
want to know what's happening. And so as much as
I appreciate that, I yeah, I just didn't want to

(05:49):
lose control of any part of my body. And that
also means my ability to abstain my ability to have
control over my senses. When it comes to food, and
you know, every single thing there is no good or bad,
like food can be just as bad as smoking cigarettes
depending on what you're eating. And that's why I just, yeah,
I really do love the phrase of it's not what

(06:11):
you eat, it's how you eat it. And that's really
what we're going to go through, Like what are we having,
how much of it, how we having to what extent
is it good for us? It's so nice to have
an understanding of that, so we know how we are
fueling our bodies and what it can.

Speaker 2 (06:24):
Do to it.

Speaker 1 (06:25):
And the first thing is really changing what we see
as comfort food, because look, we all have those days
where we come back home and we just feel like
we need that thing, like whether it's a home comfort,
whether it's the thing that your mum makes you that
makes you feel so much better from a young age,
whether it's food that makes your mind feel better but

(06:45):
doesn't necessarily make your body feel better.

Speaker 2 (06:47):
There are lots of foods like that. So for me,
my go to.

Speaker 1 (06:49):
Our fries and pizza and sometimes a deep fried goodness
or really sugar, like I really find if I have
a low day, what I'm really wanting is it pick
me up from sugar, And a lot of that has
very little nutritional value, and it's usually considered inverted commas
junk food, and I don't often like using that term

(07:10):
because I don't think any food is necessarily junk, depending
on how much of it I'm having, Like having something
here and there makes it is fine, but it really
depends on how much we're having that thing and how
often do we turn to it for our comfort. And
it's those things where in the moment it brings so
much comfort i'm eating, I'm like, oh God, this is
exactly what I needed. It's hitting the spot. I needed

(07:31):
that sugar rush. But I actually doesn't feel that great
after the next morning. I have a stomach ache, or
I feel heavy and lethargic and a bit groggy in
the morning. Like there is that thing of when you
have too many carbs or too much sugar the night
before or heavy foods. You wake up and even though
I don't know what a hangover feels like, it's almost

(07:52):
like a food hangover, like your body's really feeling the
effects of what you've ingested the night before. And so
I started switching. Like when I started learning about IV
that and the effects that food can have on the
body and the different ingredients, I really started to shift
my mindset on what does comfort food really mean? And actually,
if you start tuning into your body and you love

(08:12):
your body, and you start to understand your body and
you really want to value it, comfort food should actually
be the food that gives me energy. It uplifts me,
it makes my body feel appreciated and valued. It's food
that gives me nutrients and actually soothes my nervous system
rather than stimulates it. It supports my brain and my
body functions. And basically what that means is a balanced meal, right,

(08:35):
a balanced meal with vegetables, with protein, with carbohydrates, with
healthy fat, which makes a lot of sense because balance
breeds balance. If we take food that is balanced on
our plate and we put it into our body, it's
most likely going to create more balance in our body.
And so if we are feeling lethargic and lo and

(08:55):
you know what the thing is, if you think about it,
like increases like And so if you're feeling lethal and
low and heavy in the mind and the body, you
want to eat foods that feel uplifting and light and fresh.
And so all of those actually scientifically makes sense in
my mind. It's just a matter of relearning and a
matter of reconditioning, and a matter of really thinking what

(09:16):
does our body need versus what does it want? Because
often we give into what it wants and what our
senses wants, those temporary desires, those temporary fixes. But it
takes patience and time and love to actually think about. No,
this isn't necessarily what I want, but it is what
I need and what's going to make me feel better
the day after and the day after that and the
day after that. And I have to tell you, and

(09:38):
I'm being completely honest when I say this, when I
decide to make that choice, when I make that conscious decision,
when I'm in my fields and I want to grab
a pot of ice cream, which is also very good,
But when I think about doing that and instead or
I think about getting takeout, and I instead decide, let
me just chop up some vegetables, put in a simple pasta,

(09:59):
and I you know, it can still be simple, but
it's got this balance, this like underlying balance of the foods.

Speaker 2 (10:05):
It's got freshness to it.

Speaker 1 (10:06):
There is not one time where I've woken I've been like,
I wish I had got those greasy fries and that
really really delicious cheesy pizza.

Speaker 2 (10:15):
Pizza so good.

Speaker 1 (10:16):
But what I'm trying to tell you is my body
has never regretted that. And it doesn't mean that I
never have it, but it does mean that I'm slowly
changing and breaking the patterns that don't serve me long term,
and I'm breaking away from the control that food has
over me versus me being able to control what I
decide to ingest and what goes into my body. And also,

(10:36):
on that note, when you do end up having those
days where you get food that you know you don't
really want or maybe at the time you want, and
feels terrible after, there's this extreme guilt that we tend
to have. And I think from many people I've spoken to,
it's a common fact. I'll have friends saying I wish
I didn't have that glass of wine, I wish I
didn't like the next morning, I wish I hadn't had

(10:58):
that second helping of chocolate cake. And we have so
much guilt associated with food because of how we're trained
to seafood, how we're trained to understand this is good
and this is bad, and when you have lots of
the bad, you have to feel bad about eating it.
And actually, in our Vada, it talks about how the
mindset with which you eat food, the mindset with which

(11:20):
you digest food, actually impacts how your body digests it.
And so you can imagine if your body is in
stress or you're in anxiety even while you're eating the food,
which often happens because your subconscious kind of knows you
shouldn't be having it.

Speaker 2 (11:34):
It actually ends up.

Speaker 1 (11:35):
Being so focused on trying to get your body out
of stress or that kind of stress mode that you're in,
it puts your digestion on the back burner, which means
that your digestion is just not happening optimally, and that
then ends up impacting so much it prevents the food
from being digested. If the food's not digested well, then
you don't absorb the right nutrients you need. And often

(11:56):
you get that kind of thing like where you get
indigestion or.

Speaker 2 (11:59):
You or pooh.

Speaker 1 (12:01):
The next day may not actually end up, you know,
being as good as you want it to be or
how it normally is, because you've kind of distracted your
whole body from doing that function optimally. And so I've
really stopped trying to like label foods as being this
is good food and this is bad food. And if
this is bad food, then that means when I eat it,

(12:23):
I should be feeling bad. But actually, I think the
way that we need to see things is if we
are choosing to eat something, let's eat it with joy,
let's eat it with happiness, so that every single thing
that I'm putting into my body is fueling me in
that way and believing that it is. And if we
do have that feeling that we know this may not
be right for me and this doesn't make me feel
good when I eat it, and your body's telling you that,

(12:44):
then we have to learn to listen to that before
we put it into our mouths. But whatever your choices are,
whatever you end up choosing to eat, just be kinder
to yourself and your body. Like I really think labeling
foods is being good or bad can be so detrimental
to our own men mental health and to our relationship
with food and the way that we end up treating

(13:05):
our body after eating it, or the way that we
end up treating ourselves and the language that we use
with ourselves like it can become such a toxic environment
within us. And so yes, it's great to know the
foods that you can eat more of and the ones
that you should try and eat less of, but really
base that off how does it make me feel nutritionally?
How dense are these foods? How do I feel? How

(13:25):
does it affect my body? How does it affect my digestion,
how does it affect my mind? And based on those
things is how we should be determining I should be
eating this or shouldn't be eating this, not because it
makes me feel guilty, or because it's related to my weight,
or because it's related to you know, all the things
that we're told. I think it just has to be
such an intrinsic internal feeling that you're going off and

(13:48):
listening to your body versus what anybody else is telling you.
And so when I started learning about Ariveda, everything just
kind of clicked into place, like the meaning behind things,
how it related things. And every single time that it
talked about food, it would never speak about it is
this is how it just affects your body. It's always
a holistic approach. It always talks about how food affects

(14:09):
your mind and your body together. It sees it as
one thing. It never sees it as being separate, so
both the mind and the body are both equally accounted
for when speaking about the effects that food can have
to you, your whole self and inner. Veda actually breaks
down health into four pillars. It says that there are
four of these main pillars, and it says that when

(14:30):
you have balance in these four areas, it can actually
create harmony and peace in our mind and body. Like
that's when you can live optimally when you have balance
in these four areas of your life. And so the
first thing is eating foods that nourish our bodies and minds,
and that is aha. Aha means to eat bodies that
nourish both our mind and our body equally. And then
there's vihar, which is living in alignment with nature's rhythms.

(14:53):
And there's nidra, which is appropriate sleep or getting good
quality sleep. And then there's brahmacharia, which is management of
our energy and particularly our sexual energy, both in physical
actions and in our minds. And so that is what
they say the four pillars are. And so eating foods
that nourish your body and your mind is one of
those four pillars that allow your body and your mind

(15:15):
to be optimal, that allow you to live within this
world optimally. And the second one, I just want to
highlight the vihar, the living in alignment with nature's rhythms.
It also talks about how actually a lot of our
disease and a lot of our health conditions come when
we separate ourselves from nature when we believe we live
in nature and that we are not part of nature.

(15:38):
When we separate ourselves from that, we don't see the
rhythm of being in tune and understanding that how our
body is actually relates so much to how the world
around us is, how nature is, how plants are, how
animals are, And so when we start separating ourselves from
that and we believe we're not part of it, and
that we're not contributing and we're not receiving from nature,

(15:59):
and so many ways, that mental or physical block actually
stops us from living harmoniously, because to live harmoniously, you
need to live harmoniously with everything external around you and internal.

Speaker 2 (16:12):
And so it's such.

Speaker 1 (16:13):
A big miss when we don't end up seeing ourselves
as being part of this whole beautiful cycle of nature,
and instead we see ourselves as people that are taking
from it, or it's not a symbiotic relationship. And by that,
I mean it's not a give and take and a cycle.
It's actually just I live here, I get to take
from here. This is what I deserve, this is what's

(16:35):
owed to me because I have a human life, or
whatever it is that we think it's almost like our
ego taking ego taking over, saying that we are superior
to the rest of the things around us. So I
therefore am allowed to take, but I don't also have
to give back. And sometimes that mindset and having that
thought process actually creates such disconnect to everything around us,

(16:57):
and therefore we're not able to live as optimally as
we can could be if we were to understand that
we were actually part of nature and we were living
within it and with it, and it is part of
us and we are part of it. And so further
to that, in our Veda, when it comes to ahar
that eating foods that nourish our bodies and minds, there

(17:17):
are different categories in our Evada that they break food
down into and these categories are known as gunnahs or modes,
and there's three of them. There's setvik, which is mode
of goodness, There's rajsick which is mode of passion, and
thumbsick which is mode of ignorance. So Sethvic is goodness,
raj sick is passion, and thumbsick is ignorance.

Speaker 2 (17:39):
And again I just want to reiterate.

Speaker 1 (17:41):
You don't have to remember all these names, but to
learn the essence of it is what's really important. And
these qualities exist not only in food, but in nature
all around us and within our body and mind too.
So when we choose foods within each of these categories,
it increases that same quality within us. So if you
eat foods that that are in the mode of goodness,
and we'll go on to what that means, but you'll

(18:03):
increase goodness in your body. Passion foods which are in
the category of passion, it will increase those qualities. And
the same with ignorance, which usually comes with dullness and
lethargy and the feelings that we're.

Speaker 2 (18:14):
Trying to avoid.

Speaker 1 (18:15):
And in the same way, what we have to remember
is actually when we're feeling a bit low and down
and lethargic and dull, which are usually the qualities that
are described when we're feeling a low mood. You know,
you don't often say, oh, I'm feeling really bad, but
I also feel light and airy and happy in my mind, Like,
there's certain qualities that are attributed to feeling down and

(18:36):
having low energy or having a mood which doesn't feel uplifting.
And with those with those qualities you do usually do
get that dullness, that heaviness in the mind and the body,
and so like increases. Like so we want goodness in
our body, we have to eat good things.

Speaker 2 (18:51):
And in the.

Speaker 1 (18:52):
Same way, when we're feeling bad about ourselves, if we
want to take ourselves out of that, we're going to
have to eat those foods that are opposite to that.
And so I'm going to take you through all three
of these modes, what foods they are, and how to
identify them. So cetific foods are those that can be
easily digested, bring balance and peace to your mind and body,

(19:13):
and strength and vitality to your body. And these are
foods that are your nutritionally dense foods, the foods which
are organic, not genetically modified, the fresh foods essentially, And
you know, ideally having a situation where we're able to
grow our food at home is such a beautiful way
to live. It really is to have the skills where

(19:35):
you know that you are able to feed yourself, You're
able to grow food yourself, you know exactly where it's
come from. That is living in the ultimate mode of suffer,
like to be living in the mode of goodness, eating
in the mode of goodness, but sometimes that's not possible,
and sometimes we just really we don't have the time
for it. Even though we could make the time for it,
sometimes we just don't. And let's be real, like we're

(19:57):
not all going to be able to have our allotments.
And before you start planning all of that out, what
I will say to you is you can start little
by little, even if it's just by growing herbs. You know,
when you go to the store and you can get
herbs that you or herbs if you're in America, that
you can buy.

Speaker 2 (20:11):
You can buy.

Speaker 1 (20:11):
Basil and parsley and cilantro, and you can buy it
in little packets, or you can buy the putt and
you can grow that at home.

Speaker 2 (20:18):
And so it can be in small quantities.

Speaker 1 (20:21):
You don't have to go to the extent of starting
to have a huge allotment in your garden, but start
with the small things. And herbs have such incredible nutritional benefits,
especially when picked fresh. You can start with that simply
by having that.

Speaker 2 (20:34):
And I had a dream.

Speaker 1 (20:35):
I still have a dream to have it allotment and
a place where I can grow lots of my own
fruits and my own vegetables and spices and everything but
I had to be realistic. I travel a lot for work.
I'm not often in the same place, and so I
actually just to fulfill that one in my life. I
actually got this hydroponic system. I can't remember what it's called,
but it's essentially a vertical hydroponic like vegetable and herb

(20:59):
growing thing, and it was so great for the time
that I had it. I was growing everything from tomatoes
to chili's to all the herbs that I was using
in my week. Would I would get peppers from it,
and it was such an amazing process to go through
from a seed to seeing it grow in And also
you get this deep appreciation for food when you have

(21:19):
it in that way versus it just being put onto
your plate. When you understand the process that it's gone
through and you see the fruit growing, it's like having
a little baby. It's just you see how it changes
and how much time it takes to actually grow, even
just this one little apple, and then when you eat it,
there's so much gratitude with it. And so I guess
that also goes back to that feeling of when you

(21:40):
are feeling good when you're eating something naturally, your body
feels better when you're eating it and your body digests
it so much better and you get everything you need
out of that food because you are appreciating it and
valuing it and telling your body that it's going to
nourish you so deeply. I would recommend if you can
and then try and try and do that, Try and
have something that you are growing and nurturing a home

(22:01):
that you are eating also, and you'll see what a
difference it actually makes. And so what types of foods
are they are coming to the subtic category. It's fresh foods,
fresh vegetables, whole grains, legomes, herbal teas, nuts, and also honey,
like natural forms of all the closest you can get
to the natural forms of sugar, so not processed foods,

(22:24):
but something like jaggery or like coconut sugar. Jaggery is
amazing because it's actually I think the most like natural
form of sugar that you can buy. It comes in
this big block. We use it in a lot of
Indian foods.

Speaker 2 (22:35):
But it has this amazing caramelized color.

Speaker 1 (22:37):
It's like this light brown and it's rich and it's
got still got a lot of the nutrients in it
because it hasn't been you know, the sugar hasn't been extracted.

Speaker 2 (22:44):
It's actually very nutrient dense. And so even when.

Speaker 1 (22:46):
You're thinking about the sugars that you're having, you can
pick the sugars which are have higher nutrients, higher vitamins
and minerals in them, which also helps with the way
that it digests. To go along with that, the way
that food is prepared also determines what category it sits in.
And so let's say you have a carrot, and a
carrot you've just picked it fresh from the garden. The
nutritional value, the how much nutrients are actually packed into that,

(23:09):
the amount of life that it still has in it
is so high, and we call that actually prana. So
prana in English means life force and it's basically the
underlying energy that keeps us vibrant and healthy in our body.
And there are certain foods that are hiring prana and
certain foods that don't have as much prana. And high

(23:30):
pranic foods or foods which are rich in this life
force include fresh foods, basically everything that comes into sectic
food category. So the ones that are optimal in this
are the foods that you grow yourself, because as soon
as you pick the food, it's when it's got the
most amount of value to it. And so let's say
you take this carra and then you leave it in
your fridge for a little bit. You leave it in

(23:51):
there for maybe a week or two, and you see
when you pick it up, it's become limp and a
little bit of ring cord, and it just doesn't look
very attractive, does it. But at the same time, and
what's happened there is the nutrients have seeped out of it.
It's become duller and duller. And so a beautiful fresh
carrot can go from being in the mode of goodness
and being a food that uplifts you, brings you great energy,

(24:11):
to being a food that when you eat it two
weeks later won't have that effect. And it can move
down the modes towards mode of passion, or it can
be categorized further down. And so how we keep it,
how we cook it as well. So when you end
up cooking foods in the mode of goodness, it's lightly seasoned,
not over stimulating, freshly cooked so not too overcooked, not

(24:33):
deep frying it, not cooking in a lot of oil
where it kind of kills a lot of the nutrients
and not under cooking it where it sometimes can be
difficult to digest, like sometimes salads, even though they're so
rich in nutrients, sometimes it can be quite difficult to
digest these because your stomach's having to break down. And
if you have a weak digestion, you will find your
stomach gets upset from eating a lot of raw foods.

(24:55):
And so having it in a form which is easy
to digest, easy to absorb all the nutrients from is better.
So the fresher and the closest to its original form,
the better essentially. And then when we get to rajsick,
which is the mode of passion foods. Honestly, this is
the category I tend to live in a lot when
it comes to food because I love my over spicy foods.

(25:17):
I like things which are salty and sour, and like
you know, it's a little bit more of the extremes
when it comes to your taste buds. And what does
it end up doing to your body? So it looks
like stimulation in your body. It's stress over excitement, all
this kind of extreme emotions of agitation, irritation, stimulation, all
the shins that is essentially what the foods in the

(25:40):
mode of passion do to our body when we have
too much of them. And so having some of these
foods is fine in smaller proportions, and it's totally fine
to have it in certain amounts, but having a diet
which is made up of too many of these foods
actually overstimulates the body and the mind and can lead
to circulatory issues nervous system disorders. That's where a lot

(26:00):
of anxiety can root from. When you have too many
foods in this category, it can imbalance the body and
the mind, and it leads to anxiety, disturbs sleep, and
over indulgence because there's just so much stimulation.

Speaker 2 (26:13):
And so foods that you get into this category are.

Speaker 1 (26:16):
Deep, oily foods, extreme aromatic foods, spicy, salty, or the
sensory overload yeasts, vinegars, sugars, pickles and garlic and onion.
And garlic and onion is always one that surprises people
because everyone always says to me, you don't eat onion
and garlic, which so I do eat it when I
go out and about, but I avoid cooking with onion

(26:39):
and garlic on a daily basis because it is said
in yoga that these foods in the mode of passion,
the raj sik foods, all the foods that sit in
this category actually agitate the mind. And so if you
are someone who likes to practice yoga or you're someone
who wants to practice meditation, a lot of yogis avoid
eating onion and garlic. Yes, have medicinal benefits. They really do.

(27:02):
When you're eating them in small potent quantities for a
specific need. They have incredible health benefits. But just like
everything else in this world, when you end up eating
excess of it, it can cause the opposite effects. So
it causes inflammation in the body, it causes irritation to
the stomach. And that's why a lot of people, you know,
if you think about ibs or anything to do with

(27:22):
the gut, like any issues, people have irritable bowel syndrome.
Most doctors, even Western doctors, will recommend there's certain you know,
the FODMAP diet, which tells you the foods that you
should cut out if you have a sensitive stomach or
you get irritation in the stomach, and garlic and onion
are definitely two of the ones that rank higher in
that list because they do cause that and so surprise, surprise.

(27:45):
But let me tell you, I cut onion and garlic,
and I was like, this is going to be the
hardest thing I've ever done in my whole entire life.
And now, I kid you not when people come over
and they eat my food, and it's not just because
I think I'm a good cook. What I have learned, though,
is how to balance and spices, and how to utilize spices,
and how to how there's so many other flavors in

(28:05):
the world except for onion and garlic. So if anything,
if you reduce the amount of onion and garlic, start
exploring spices because they are not only so medicinally beneficial,
but just create a whole different flavor profile to your meals.
Next category is thumbsticks. So these are the foods which
are in the mode of ignorance, and these are the
ones that you should eat.

Speaker 2 (28:22):
As little of as possible.

Speaker 1 (28:24):
They're the ones that really can bring your energy levels down,
bring your mood down, put you into this state of
ignorance in the mind where it's dull and lethargic and
heavy and physically, mentally and emotionally just a little bit.
What's the word for it like numb. You feel this
kind of I don't know where the inertia is the word.
Maybe I've used using in the wrong context, but you

(28:46):
kind of feel this just numbness constantly going through your
mind and your body. And when you have that for
long periods of time, it could be attributed to the
foods that you're eating. Sometimes it can be lack of
motivation or purpose and negativity tea in your mind and
the types of foods that are categorized in here. Now,
I just want to preface this or do a little

(29:07):
note before I say this. Yes, I'm vegan. I really
do love animals. It's something which I am extremely passionate
about being vegetarian from birth and then I turn vegan
over ten years ago, and so yes, I do love
promoting a plant based lifestyle. I do fight for the
animals because I've seen the suffering and it makes me
very sad. But at the same time, when I do

(29:28):
talk about things like this, I say it with absolutely
no judgment and instead I say it just to have
information that I can share with you. So as long
as you are making informed decisions for me, I've done
my job. But when I talk about eating animal products
or anything. It is really not coming from a place
of judgment. I think everybody is where there are, and
everybody's growing in different ways and has different opinions. But

(29:49):
it is just me sharing it so that you know
and telling you facts. And so foods that sit in
this category of ignorance are impure foods, rotten foods, animal flesh,
foods that require a lot of energy to digest, deep
fried foods, burnt foods, you know, when you end up
getting like that charred look on food that actually is

(30:10):
also known to be carcinogenic, but also creates these qualities
in our body because you kind of essentially just burn
all the nutrients out of it, Foods that are more
than a year old, So you know, we end up
having like lots of dried foods that stay in our
cupboards for a long time and jars that stay in
our cupbos for a long time. Honestly, the longer something says,
even though it's been preserved and all of this stuff,

(30:31):
slowly the nutrients do really seep out of it. And
so the longer you end up leaving things, you know,
just the fresher the better. Having oils that are very
old actually oils go very rancid easily, especially if they're
not oils that are used to a high heat tolerance.
And so you know, think about constantly replenishing the foods
that you're eating. Don't buy things in bulk, buy things

(30:52):
fresh as you can go along for if you can.
I know there's a benefit financially to buy things in bulk,
which I completely understand, where possible buy things in smaller quantities,
so you're constantly replenishing and you're getting fresher versions of it.
Artificial things like all the artificial sweeteners and stuff foods
which overcooked, stale bread, stale foods, processed, and also microwave food.

(31:15):
It says that when you're using a microwave, it really
does up a lot of the nutrients out of it.

Speaker 2 (31:20):
Those are the three categories.

Speaker 1 (31:22):
And oh, I will also say that, you know, when
I was talking about the fresh fresh foods, you know,
people ask about frozen foods a lot, and I will
say that they actually can live in the Stovik food category.
I'll tell you why, because sometimes they end up being fresher.
And my dad talks about this a lot because he
used to My dad used to own or still does own.
I don't know, but they used to have a fresh

(31:44):
fruit and vegetable company and also freeze dried company where
they would take the vegetables freeze them from the moment
they were basically picked, and it retains the nutritional value
of the food. So sometimes we're eating foods that have
travelers on a plane and then another van, and then
by the time it gets to us, it's already so old.
And so actually eating foods that have been frozen at

(32:05):
the point of being picked is actually going to be
way far more nutritionally valuable than the banana that's come
all the way from I don't know, India. I don't
know whther the bananas are going to come from India,
but that's come all the way from India and it
has basically getting to me like five days after it's
actually been picked, or even sometimes two weeks after, depending
on how it's been preserved. And so just wanted to
add that because I sometimes get questions about frozen food

(32:27):
versus versus fresh foods, and so so I mentioned spices earlier.
I will continue to mention spices for the rest of
my life because that is my agenda to help people
figure out and get happy and excited about using spices
in their life because of how much it can heal
your body. Let's talk about adaptagens and spices. If you

(32:48):
have heard of adaptagens, which in case you weren't aware
of what they are, adaptagens are any plant compounds that
can help your body adapt to stress. They support your
immune system, they support your digestive system.

Speaker 2 (32:59):
There are lots of.

Speaker 1 (32:59):
Different adaptagens that specifically do different things, but essentially they'll
help your body adapt to the stresses of life, essentially
hopefully bring you to a point of balance.

Speaker 2 (33:08):
And so I'm just gonna speak about a few.

Speaker 1 (33:10):
There are so many, and I'm going to put adaptations
and spices into the same category. I feel like I
could probably do a whole other podcast on this which
I will really breaking down spices and adaptagens that are
incredible for the body. But I'll start off with a
few which are a little bit more common. So there's
Ushwa gunda. Ushwa Gunda helps to support the body's natural
stress balancing processes. You can get it in powder form,

(33:31):
you can get it in pills. I really believe that
with adaptagens, it's something which you don't necessarily have to
have your whole life. I think there are phases of
like you kind of have can do them in phases
where you take them for six months to help rebalance,
and then you take a break, you take them again
for another six months, and then you take a break.
I think our bodies change and adapt so much that

(33:51):
we have to be so much more aware of of
like how much our body changes and whether we still
need what we're taking. And that's the same with medication.
To be honest, you should really reevaluate what your body
needs so regularly. Same with food, same with everything. Really,
just we change so much and so we should always
be so aware of how is our body feeling? Now
do I still feel like I need this? Am I

(34:13):
taking these anti acid tablets? But do I still even
have acid issues six months later? So anyway, Yeah, that's
ashua gunda. So the next one is elthenine, and it's
actually naturally found in things like tea, So grab yourself
a cup of tea and essentially it really supports the
serotonin and dopamine release in our body, and both of

(34:33):
those are our happy hormones. The serotonin is like a
longer term happy hormone that releases slowly and has a
longer happy effect, and dopamine is more of an instant hit,
like when we get that instant feeling of goodness, and
so it helps to support that the production of both
of them and therefore obviously decrease stress and anxiety felt

(34:56):
in the body. Tumoric, let's get into the spices, reduces
inflammation in the body and boost your brain function. It's
an antioxidant and anti inflammatory, which are two terms we're
going to go on to a little bit later. And
it can stimulate again the release of serotonin, which is
your natural mood enhancer.

Speaker 2 (35:13):
And then cinnamon.

Speaker 1 (35:15):
So cinnamon is something which is so cool because you
can stimulate the brain just by smelling cinnamon. I don't
know whether you knew that about cinnamon, but cinnamon is
a spice where just by smelling it, it actually stimulates
the brain. And so just adding a little bit of
cinnamon to your diet here and there and your milk
and your teas can actually help increase attention cognitive processing,

(35:37):
and both of which end up being moodlifters. When your
brain is functioning better and it feels like there's more focus,
you naturally feel better.

Speaker 2 (35:45):
And your mood is lifted.

Speaker 1 (35:47):
So I'm going to actually only talk about those four
spices and the adaptogens right now, just because it's a
whole topic in itself.

Speaker 2 (35:53):
But look into them.

Speaker 1 (35:54):
Do a little research yourself, and we're going to go
on to the chunkiest part of this, which is the
nutrients you need to boost your mood, like the deficiencies.

Speaker 2 (36:05):
Because you know, what I really have realized is.

Speaker 1 (36:10):
A lot of the time we think we have something
physically wrong with us, and we believe that it is
in our mind, and that we have something going on
in our mind, and there's something wrong with us, and why.

Speaker 2 (36:19):
Am I feeling so upset?

Speaker 1 (36:20):
Why am I feeling so sad? And why do I
have so many ups and downs in my moods? And
we really are so hard on ourselves when we're talking
to ourselves about it, and we don't realize that actually,
there could be an easy fix, there could be something
that I could be easily doing to figure out what's
going on. And so first and foremost, get your blood tested.

(36:41):
I will say that before I even go into the nutrients.
Get your full bloods done regularly, and I actually think
doing it every six months every year. It's so unbelievably beneficial.
The amount of times I have woken up where I'm
still feeling so tired after.

Speaker 2 (36:57):
A good night of sleep, or when I just feel really.

Speaker 1 (37:00):
Low in my mood and my energy and I can't
explain why, and everything just feels a little bit dull.

Speaker 2 (37:05):
That's the any way I can explain it.

Speaker 1 (37:06):
I've gone through weeks where everything just feels a bit
numb and dull, and then I get my blood work
done and I realize, oh my gosh, I've been I'm
so drastically low in vitamin D, I'm so drastically low
in my eye and levels. And suddenly I start taking
shots for them. And suddenly I start taking my supplements properly,
and I start eating the foods that are rich in

(37:27):
these things, and my mood suddenly changes. It feels like
a cloud is lifted off my off, like off from
on top of me. And so, you know, do all
the practical things you can do before you start being
too hard on yourself. Do all the tests, Do all
the experiments that you need to do with your body
to understand it better so that you don't just sit

(37:47):
in it for too long. We end up living with
things thinking it's normality. We end up sitting in it thinking, oh,
this is just how my body feels. It's just so
normal for it to feel like that. But something becomes
normal when we leave it for too long. It becomes
normality in our ordinary when we leave it for too long.
And so don't settle for like what your normal is.
Your normal should be feeling optimal. That's actually what a

(38:09):
normality should be. So let's start off with protein. Now.
Amino Acids are the building blocks for protein. When you
eat foods with amino acids in them, it actually is
what creates the protein in our body. And protein is
required and necessary for the messenger signals within our brain,
which when your brain is functioning right naturally, your mood

(38:31):
is better because you're just functioning well and it creates
more balance in the body, and so proteins. Look, you
can get protein from so many places. You've got quinoa,
you've got your pulses, your nuts, your seeds, tofu. There's
small amounts of protein in so many different foods. But
essentially making sure you've got a good amount of protein

(38:53):
in your body and in your diet is going to
really help to keep your mood going.

Speaker 2 (38:59):
You know, and then the next thing is fat.

Speaker 1 (39:01):
So fats are actually so essential to the nervous system.
They're exactly what you think they would be. They really
help to support and narrash nurture our nervous system. It's
like a big hug for your nerves. And our brains
are actually sixty percent fat, and so we really do
need to make sure we're eating these good fats every
single day to help support our brain function and the

(39:23):
integrity and the quality of how it's functioning. And they
also help with the messenger system in our brain. But
even more importantly, they reduce inflammation in the body, which
is so important when it comes to our mood.

Speaker 2 (39:37):
And I'll go on to.

Speaker 1 (39:38):
Why it's important, but inflammation is a huge part of
mood balancing in the body. And so your healthy fats
are things like avocados and your good quality olive oils.
And I say good quality because good quality is essential
the extraversion olive oils and ideally not ones mixed from
lots of different places, like sometimes you'll see on the

(39:59):
back olive oils or different oils. They've sourced the olives
or the olive oil from so many different places and
they've put them together. Ideally, try and find somewhere where
there's just one source of the olives. It makes a
difference to the quality of it. Your nuts, your seeds,
your cheer seeds, all of that. It's just all the
good stuff that have all those healthy, wonderful fats that

(40:19):
your body needs. And then we've got our antioxidants. Antioxidants
like vitamins A, C, and E. They're needed to fight
oxidative stress, which is basically inflammation in the body. And
we can get inflammation in the body from everything from
the pollution outside, the foods that we eat, the environment
that we live in. There's just so much of it

(40:40):
based on just the world that we live in, and
so really thinking about the foods that help to reduce
that within our body is so important. Then you can
get them from berries, citrus, fruits, avocados, egg plants, grapes, pumpkins, mangoes, apricots, carrots, spinach, parsley.

Speaker 2 (40:57):
Basically most of your fruits and your.

Speaker 1 (40:58):
Vegetables are going to have some sort of antioxidants in
that and they really do help to protect you against
the build up of the stress that comes with pollution
and all the things that we get from the environment,
all the stresses that come into our life. It helps
to fight that off. So antioxidants are really important. It
helps your cells thrive, It keeps them fresh, it keeps
them renewed. Okay, so let's get onto anti inflammatory foods.

(41:21):
And I'm going to redo something that I recently read
and it was just there's just such a crazy link
between inflammation and mood. And I think it's something that's
probably not as well known as other things, but there
is such a big link between inflammation in the.

Speaker 2 (41:37):
Body and depression.

Speaker 1 (41:38):
And I read this it says inflammation is the response
produced by the immune system to protect the body from
different pathogens, which are basically like things attacking your body,
your injuries, and your toxins. But chronic inflammation, which can
be caused by stress, poor diet, and an unhealthy lifestyle,
can damage cells and organs and increase the risk of

(42:00):
a lot of health problems. It appears that inflammatory agents
in the blood can break down the barrier between the
body and the brain, causing newer inflammation and altering the
key circuits in the mind. And that's what causes people
to be more at risk of depression. So the more
inflammatory foods that we have the bigger risk of our

(42:23):
mind and the mechanical processes and the chemical processes in
our mind being altered. And it says that people at
risk of depression inflammation can actually be the cause for that.
It's one of those things where we don't often realize,
and it's usually those things that we don't realize are
actually happening inside of our body slowly, and it's the thing.

(42:43):
It's like silent killer, and I don't want to make
it seem so dramatic.

Speaker 2 (42:46):
But it is.

Speaker 1 (42:47):
That is those things that we don't actually realize every
single day that we're doing, but that have such a
big impact in the future or like it's slowly wearing
away at things in our body. And so an anti
inflammatory diet or at least increasing the amount of anti
inflammatory foods in our body is just so important. And
you know, it's actually very easy to get them. So

(43:08):
there's something called phyto nutrients, the compounds that give plants
these like rich colors, and they are rich in anti
inflammatory compounds, and so most fruits and vegetables are full
of them. Deep colors of reds, oranges, yellows, blues, and
greens all of this. I think the best way to
think about it is when you're having a you've got
a plate of food in front of you, making sure

(43:29):
that you've got an array of different colors of vegetables
and pulses and grains and all those things can really
help to give you an indication of this is a
balanced meal.

Speaker 2 (43:38):
That I'm eating.

Speaker 1 (43:39):
And it's such a simple way to identify that. But actually,
if you start looking at your meals, you'll probably notice, Oh,
I'm missing this color today, I'm missing this color today.
Haven't eaten enough of this color? This plate today is
full of just browns and white foods. And so it's
a really good way to start without having to be
too calculative, to just start seeing your plate and saying, hey, like,

(44:01):
how much variety and how much color do I have
on my plate? So leafy greens, blueberries, strawberries, carrots, sweet potatoes, blackberries,
beat trooths. I was reading somewhere like how long does
it actually take to notice a change to actually create
change in your body when you have a lot of inflammation,
And it says incorporating these foods into your diet for

(44:21):
a minimum of a month, Within a month, you will
start to notice the changes that your body is feeling,
like you will start feeling changes in your body. So
give it a go for a month. I feel like
there is no time like the present, and no matter
how much wealth you have, it makes no difference. Without health,
you can't fulfill your purpose, you can't fulfill your dreams,
Like health is the core part for us to be

(44:43):
able to fulfill every single part of our other life,
whether it's with our family, our friends, our work, our joy,
our fun that we have in our life, Like if
we don't have health, it's so hard to do any
of those other things. And so if you're going to
invest in anything, then health is probably the place. Actually,
in my thirties, like when I hit my thirties, I
made such a conscious decision to start prioritizing where I

(45:07):
was spending my money, and that was towards health. So
I could go out to eat a meal, or I
could go to do a cold plunge and spend my
money on that. I could go to a sauna and
spend my money on that. And so I really think
it's we shouldn't see health shouldn't be a luxury, and unfortunately,
in a lot of countries, healthcare is a luxury, and
that's extremely sad. But in the ways where if we

(45:30):
do have a choice where I'm going to be spending
a little bit on myself, let me try and invest
that in my health and you will see the repercussions
of that are just so abundant. They just reflect in
so many different areas of your life. And the next
one is iron. Now, iron deficiency leads to poor oxygen uptakes.
So the less iron that you have in the body,
the less blood cells that are being produced, the less

(45:52):
oxygen that's traveling around your body and up to your brain,
and the less oxygen you have. I mean, look, we
all know you need oxygen to literally live, like you
can't live life without oxygen, and so the less oxygen
you have, the lower your mood is and.

Speaker 2 (46:08):
Your brain is just not functioning as well.

Speaker 1 (46:10):
So a lot of this is to do with brain
function and actually feeding your brain, Like what am I
feeding my brain? So it's about brain food, which equals
mood food. The type of food you can get, you know,
iron from nuts, beans, pulses, legomes, leafy greens, so many
different places, B vitamins, you can take supplements for all
of these as well. By the way, iron and vitamin

(46:31):
D are ones that I know you can get shots for.
I get vitamin D shots, but you can also get
vitamin B twelve shots, I think, which is what I'm
going to start taking too, because I have low B twelve.
But B vitamins help to actually convert the food that
you're eating into the fuel in your body, and they
help your body stay energize and to repair any damage
that's done in the body. They also support your immune function,

(46:52):
your digestion, your circulation, your hormonal health, your sleep, your nerves.
So B vitamins are just so crucial for your mental health.
They help to reduce stress and also have been shown
to prevent memory loss, which is amazing. And there have
been plentiful studies done to show that deficiency in vitamin
B is actually linked to depression, anxiety, and lots of

(47:13):
other mood disorders. And so you can get all your
BE vitamins from leafy greens, root vegetables, fresh and dried fruits, avocados,
so many. Listen, you know what, That's why Google is
so amazing. You can google where you can get everything from,
print it out, stick it on your fridge so that
you know, you're like, oh, okay, I know that I've
checked off these bits I've had. If I'm low in
a certain thing, I'll usually do that. I'll look up

(47:34):
what I need to be having in the weekend. I'll
order that for my weekly shop to make sure that
I've got those ingredients so I know I'm getting them
in somewhere. We've got magnesium next. Now, magnesium is I've
known magnesium for sleep. I know that when there is
a lack of magnesium in the body, it can really
affect the way that your sleep cycle is and also
to help relax your body too. Magnesium can be used

(47:54):
at night, taken as a supplement to help relax the
body and help to promote sleep. Cortisol is the hormone
in your body that's produced during your stress response, and
magnesium actually helps your body to metabolize quartisol because if
there's too much of this stress hormone that's left in
your blood, that can cause a lot of stress in
your body and it's making you continually stay in that

(48:17):
fight or flight mode. And so magnesium is needed to
be able to digest the quartisol that's produced or to
actually get rid of the quartisol. That's produced and gone
into your bloodstream, and so it doesn't linger around your
body for too long, you don't feel on edge too
for too long. And you can get magnesium from cashews,
different nuts, and seas, leafy greens like spinach, your beans,

(48:39):
your almonds, your avocados, dark chocolate, which is a nice
one to know about.

Speaker 2 (48:43):
We've got a few more hair, I think only a
couple more.

Speaker 1 (48:45):
So. Vitimin D is our next one, and low vitamin
D levels have really been associated associated in many studies
with depression. I can completely relate in the sense that
whenever I have low vitamin D levels, I can really
feel it in my body so much. I wake up
and I don't feels enthusiastic about life. I just feel
really lethargic. I don't feel like I've had enough sleep,
and all of that really ends up affecting your mood

(49:06):
throughout your day. And so trying to increase your levels
of vitamin D, whether it is going outside in the
amazing sunshine or eating foods that are fortified with vitamin D,
or taking supplements as well, there's a few different ways
you can get it. I personally prefer with B twelve
with vitamin D and actually with most of my supplements,
I prefer getting them in liquid form because they absorb

(49:29):
into your bloodstream faster. Sometimes I find with a lot
of supplements when they're in pill form, it's hard for
your summer to digest, especially if it's got that kind
of clear jelly coating on the outside.

Speaker 2 (49:39):
It sometimes upsets my stomach, and.

Speaker 1 (49:41):
So I find the liquid forms a little bit easier
to absorb. And vitamin D actually helps the convert amino
acids into serotonin, which is the happy hormone in the body.
So essential for the production of your happy hormone, which.

Speaker 2 (49:55):
Makes you feel great.

Speaker 1 (49:56):
So we spoke about healthy fats earlier and just going
off that we need amigas in our life. Now.

Speaker 2 (50:01):
There are different types of amigas.

Speaker 1 (50:02):
There's a Mega six, Amiga nine, there are so many
different amigas. But a good source of amigas are ground
flax seeds actually, or even flax seeds. You can just
sprinkle them on top of your breakfast. That's usually how
I use them. I have a good nut and seed
mix that I actually use in the morning to sprinkle
over my protein, shake over my oatmeal, whatever I'm having
in the morning, just to make sure I'm getting that

(50:24):
mix of nuts and seas and it actually tastes so good.
You just can throw whatever nuts and seeds you have
in the house into a grinder, grind them up into
kind of like a coarse texture, and you can just
sprinkle them over everything. It's an easy way to just
get those nutrients in without you having to think about
it too much, and you can bulk make it too.
You also get your amigas in things like coliflower or

(50:45):
kidney beans, broccoli, and again just to remind you that
this links back to your brain being sixty percent fat,
and so these all feed into that healthy, nourished brain
cells in your body. And then last one I'm going
to actually share is there's a few other ones, but
I think I'm gonna cap it at.

Speaker 2 (51:02):
This is folic acid.

Speaker 1 (51:05):
Folic acid, and this is usually you can be I
think women are more deficient in folic acid or folate
than men, and low folic acid diets can also cause
low serotonin levels in our brains, and so taking supplements
or eating folia rich foods have been shown to help
people who suffer from depression. So foli rich foods are

(51:26):
things like spinach, asparagus, a lot of your greens, your
beans like pinto beans, black beans, navy beans, kidney beans, broccoli, beetroot, papaya,
Brussels sprouts. Honestly, every time I talk about vegetables that
get so excited, like my brain really gets like a
hit of dopamine every time I talk about them, because
just the colors and the vibrancy of them just make

(51:47):
me so happy.

Speaker 2 (51:48):
But I'm going to leave it at that.

Speaker 1 (51:49):
So the essential ones let me just because I know
it sounded like a lot, but it really wasn't. It's
your proteins, your fats, your antioxidants, your anti inflammatory foods,
your iron bea vitamin, magnesium, vitamin d amigas which plays
into fats, and your folic acid. And you know, if
you noticed, and I'm sure you did, most of the

(52:10):
things on each of those lists of where you can
get them were very similar.

Speaker 2 (52:14):
It was all based around.

Speaker 1 (52:16):
A variety of vegetables, fruits, proteins like beans, pulses, lentils, legomes,
and your healthy fats and that was and again a
lot of those were avocados and things that were already
included in those lists. So eating healthy and trying to
incorporate this. You might be thinking, oh my goshw am
I going to incorporate all of these things into my diet.
There's so many things, the proteins, the fats, that all

(52:38):
the different vitamins and minerals. But actually, even if you
pick one thing from each section to just add an
extra bit of into your life, that would make a difference.
And I really do think it's about planning. You have
to just print out everything that you want or write
down a list of the vegetables you're going to rotate
every single week, what you're gonna buy, and that can
help so much with getting in all the nutrients that

(52:59):
you need. But essentially, looking at your plate, it's a
bit of more of just common sense. Look at your
plate and see have I got a variety of colors,
a variety of textures, a variety of foods, vegetables, everything
that I need. Think about your meals throughout the day
and you should be able to hit those levels of
nutrients that you really need in your life. It's usually

(53:21):
when we have an imbalance, when we're having a lot
of processed foods, sugars, packaged foods, where we end up
missing out on these nutrients, and even if they are
in those foods, sometimes they're just cooked in the wrong
way or create or made in the wrong way, so
we're not actually getting the benefits of those wonderful fruits
and vegetables. There is a huge link between your gut

(53:43):
and your mood and your brain. You know, there's always
this gut and brain link that is spoken about, and essentially,
when you have a healthy gut, it allows your body.
I'm just going to break it down so simply because
this is really all you need to know. When you
have a healthy gut, your gut is able to digest
the food properly. When your food is digested properly, it's

(54:03):
able to extract all the nutrients that the rest of
your body needs, including your brain, and including every single
part of your body that produces the happy hormones or
blocks the negative hormones. All the balancing of your hormones
that you need is going to be produced by having
the right amount of nutrients feeding into those parts of
your body. And so having a healthy gut is so

(54:26):
important because the weakier digestion, the more likely food will
not be digested properly. When food is not digested properly.
In Iraeta, it's called armor, which means toxins. Toxins build
up in the body. So the more toxins you have
in the body, the more undigested food you have in
the body. It also feels like, you know, your body
reacts to having toxins in the body, so it feels

(54:47):
like there's unwanted things in the body. That feels like
there's things in your body which should not be there.
And when your body feels like that, it can't function properly.
It cannot function optimally. And so simple things you can
do to try and help with your gut if you're
noticing your gut is not great, And there are so
many different ways of knowing that, Like one of them
is how are you pooping? Notice and take account of

(55:10):
what's happening with my body once I've eaten. How is
it reacting? Are you burping a lot? Are you bolting
a lot? Do you get acid reflux?

Speaker 2 (55:17):
Like?

Speaker 1 (55:18):
What is your system telling you after you're eating? And
that should give a good reflection of whether your gut
is healthy and strong and able to digest the foods
you're eating, and if not, try things like probiotics, prebiotics
it really helps to strengthen the.

Speaker 2 (55:30):
Guts of microbiome and the barrier.

Speaker 1 (55:33):
To make sure it's able to identify and notice when
there are things that your body's finding hard to digest
and know how to get rid of them. And also
the more variety of foods that you eat, by the way,
the more variety that you have, the more vary the
microbiome in your gut is. The microbiome is like all
the bacteria that helps it helps with the digestion that

(55:56):
that helps to provide that kind of feeds off the
food that you are putting into your stomach to extract
the nutrients. And so the wider variety of microbiome you have,
the healthier it's known your gut is known to be.
And having foods like sour kraut, kimchi, fermented foods, and
also those probiotic supplements that can really help to keep
your gut microbiome efficient. And the last thing I wanted

(56:20):
to share this is going to be the final topic
of mood foods is glucose spikes in the body. Glucose
is spiked through so many different foods that we eat,
but often we don't we feel it, but we don't
realize that that's why we're feeling that way, and simple
things like eating meals at regular times will help to
stabilize your blood sugar. Making sure you're having meals at

(56:41):
the same time every single day helps the regular your appetite,
your mood, your energy levels, and when you skip meals,
it actually leads to the reduced ability to control your
glucose spipes spikes, and therefore controlling your emotions. If you
think about it, whenever you feel like you're lower energy
or your blood, you feel like you're sugar levels have
dropped and you need a sudden surge of energy where

(57:03):
you go for your sugary foods or your chocolates or
whatever it is. You notice your mood drops, Like when
my sugar levels drop, I notice I'm like flat out,
I can't function, I can't talk. I'm like someone needs
to you just can't talk to me right now. I'm
just not in the right mindset. And at the same time,
when I feel my blood sugar suddenly like go up

(57:23):
really really fast after having something sweet, it feels good
for a second, but it really has a negative downtime
as I'm coming off that sugar high. Those foods are
everything that you already know. Okay, it's the refined grains,
the refined sugars. They all have the ability to create
these mood swings and sugar spikes, and the sugar crashes

(57:44):
actually are the symptoms of that are dull, foggy mind,
feeling lethargic after feeling extremely hyperactive, and furthers your kind
of cycle of unhealthy cravings. And it says sometimes when
you start off with the sugary meal at the beginning
of the day, it almost triggers your craving response, and

(58:04):
so you're wanting that throughout the whole day. And glucose
Goddess that I was telling you about, she actually speaks
about how and it.

Speaker 2 (58:12):
Was interesting when I was listening to her speak.

Speaker 1 (58:14):
I remember when I was a dietitian and I used
to have diabetes patients and I used to be part
of a diabetes clinic, and I would always tell them
about I learned about how you can have foods with
which are rich in carbohydrates, rich in sugar. You don't
have to cut them out, but it's about how you
eat them, not what you're eating. So what are you
supplementing them with? So Let's say you're having something which

(58:36):
is quite high in sugar, adding in fats and fiber
to that meal, or if you're having a white piece
of bread, one choose whole grain. But also which is
going to slow down how the food is broken into
your broken down into glucose in the body. Because you
have your healthy fats, you have your nuts, your seeds,
if you are having a piece of bread at avocado

(58:58):
to it, all of that helps to slow down the
release of glucose into your blood, and so it reduces
the crazy spike that ends up happening all the fluctuations.
And that's exactly what the Glucose Goddess was sharing when
I was listening to her. She says that you have
to eat your food in a specific order, and I
find this really interesting. I'm actually going to try to

(59:19):
do this, and you can reduce your glucose spikes by
seventy five percent just by changing the order in which
you eat your food. So she says, you should eat
your vegetables first, your proteins, your fat, and then last
you should eat your starches and your sugars.

Speaker 2 (59:34):
And apparently this really helps. It almost like lines.

Speaker 1 (59:37):
Your stomach and it lines your body with I think
she calls it like a mesh before you have your
starches and your sugars, and so it slows down the absorption.
It creates almost like a barrier before you have the
foods that will spike your blood sugar levels. And so, honestly,
all of this to say, do your blood tests, get

(59:59):
your body checked, find out what your deficiencies are, find
out if those are the causes of your mood swings,
your ups and downs, your low moods, if you've been
struggling with that for a long time. You don't have
to live like that, So try your best to find
out and explore and investigate what is happening in my
body and how can I resolve this. There's also something

(01:00:20):
if you are noticing it's you know you're having these
sugar spikes, you can do this thing. I think it's
like a continuous glucose monitor. I've never done it, but
I really want to. You wear it for a certain
period of time, for like a couple of weeks, and
it shows you what's spiking your blood sugar levels, and
you get to see how different foods are, how your

(01:00:41):
body's reacting to different foods, which you can give you
an idea of the foods that you should be eating
to help stay consistent. So that's another thing if you
want to experiment.

Speaker 2 (01:00:48):
A little bit further.

Speaker 1 (01:00:49):
But that is probably the end of this podcast, I
think it should be. I think it's been a long one,
but I hope that it was a whole podcast full
of useful information. Again, take what you want from it,
take what you need from it. Take one bite sized
piece of information that can you can carry on for
this week. Doesn't have to be everything all at once.

(01:01:11):
That is extremely overwhelming. And I also get a bit
oversaturated with information sometimes and I'm like, Okay, pick one
thing this week and next thing next week, and it's
so much more manageable that way. But thank you so
much for listening. If you've made it this far, I
appreciate you, and these podcasts hopefully will only get better
with time as I grow and you grow, and we

(01:01:33):
can create such a wonderful community this way. So thank
you again for listening. Whatever emotions you need to release
this week, whatever you need to let go of, whatever
you need to shed, make sure you do that keep
your emotional health strong. And it's okay to be vulnerable
sometimes so share your heart with someone.

Speaker 2 (01:01:54):
It'll make you feel so much lighter and so much better.
Sending you so much love. Thanks again for tuning in
and see you next week. Mm hmmm.

Speaker 1 (01:02:10):
Mm hmmm

Speaker 2 (01:02:18):
Hm