Not All Sugar is Bad (It Helped Me Heal)

Today I'm going to give you the raw truth about how Sugar healed my body. And you heard that right, sugar actually healed my A1C levels, improved my blood sugar numbers, helped my thyroid, my energy, my stress levels, and even gave me brain power. I know you could be wondering how that's possible, but I'm going to talk to you about that today. And I wouldn't tell you this if it weren't true. And so I want to share a little bit about my story and be as transparent as possible so you can understand how to leverage sugar. And again, you heard that right. I'm going to help you to understand what sugar can do for your body if it's done in the right way. And so you want to stick with me because there is a right and a wrong way to leverage sugar for your overall well-being. And trust me, I have been someone who have tried every single diet that you can imagine, and I have come to understand how the body works, how sugar works, and how you can optimize it for your health. Now, make sure that you subscribe to my page so that you can get notifications, and please like this video. I'm going to talk about some amazing things that you may have never heard of, but I think you're going to absolutely enjoy it because this is a game changer for you and your health and your future and your overall well-being. And we're going to talk through some stuff that is mind-blowing. And trust me, if I didn't bump into this myself through my own experience and then solidify it by doing a bunch of research to see what others had to say, I wouldn't have known it to be true either. But a lot of times you can suffer just from not knowing the right information, and that's why I want to share this with you. Now let me just prompt by saying this: I have tried so many different diets, and I recommend a lot of different diets. And really, I'm coming to the place where I don't even like the term diet. I just think people need to eat what they need to eat for the moment they're in, the season they're in, and try to improve their health with whatever nutritional approach is necessary for that moment, because it can actually change, believe it or not. And so I really just like the idea of nutrition being a lifestyle approach. And there are times that you may be, uh, restricted in what you should eat, or there's times that you may want to eat different things. And so I'm really trying to get out of this whole idea of, you know, dieting, because it has caused so much harm to people's bodies. And I have tried the Mediterranean diet, I've tried paleo, I've tried keto, I've tried the carnivore diet, I have tried a vegan diet, I've tried the high-fat diet, low-fat diet, alkaline diet, um, I've tried kind of things. I've tried the I don't care what I eat diet. I've tried calorie restrictions. Listen, if you are somebody who understands and values health and experience and, you know, research and all of that, you're going to try different things. And sometimes you just really want to try things on yourself because you want to know what works for you. And what works for me may not work for you. And if you stick around, I'm going to tell you exactly how I eat now as opposed to how I used to eat. And it can be very beneficial. Now, I'm not saying that you have to follow my guideline for how I eat, because honestly, even with a lot of the clients that I work with, I've often put them on different eating regimens that doesn't align with what I personally eat. And that's because what I eat is not probably going to be beneficial to them at that moment. And so it's not a one shoe fits all type of thing, like, and it's never been. And that's one thing I've always shared is that there is what you call bio-individuality, which is everybody is so different. They're uniquely made. There's susceptibilities and dispositions, and people have different stress levels and different lives and different environments that they live in and different ages and different muscle mass and different fat on their body. And, you know, it's different for people. And so this can be different for everyone because everyone has uniquely, uh, different design of how they are and how they process foods. You got some people who have gut issues that can't tolerate certain foods. And honestly, that's why sometimes diets work. And that's because when you go on a diet, sometimes you're restricting certain foods that have been causing harm to that person's body. And you may think it's the restriction that's working, but it's just the fact that they were eating harmful things and restricting themselves of eating harmful things is what's really getting them the results. And sometimes you can misunderstand and misread that and think that, oh, this particular diet works, and what I'm eating on this diet work, and it should work for the rest of my life. But you're not taking into consideration everything that's happening, um, with your body when you eliminate other foods that you may not have known is bothering you. So when you're on a diet, even if, for example, you restrict the diet and let's say you, you're eating all of one thing, whether it's all meat or all vegetables and all fruit or whatever, say you restrict that, um, diet. Well, you have also restricted all of the other junk that you were eating too. So it may not be that you're eating all of this and all of that is healing your body, but it could just be that because you're eating that you're not eating all of this other stuff, all of this other processed junk that was harming your body. So it becomes a bit complicated at times, and you have to understand what it looks like for you. But I can tell you what it looks like for me and exactly what happened with me. And I understand now— this is my approach— that I understand that there's not really a such thing as what's healthy or not in a black and white sense. And here's what I mean when I say that. What I mean is that what is healthy for you could be damaging to someone else, and what is damaging to someone else can be a miracle for you, right? So my daughter, she's allergic to kiwi and, um, she can't eat kiwi, so kiwi is not healthy for her. Right? And so there are certain things that do very well for one person and just does not do well for another person. For example, dairy. Dairy can do really well for someone else, and it could be a problem for you. Or check this out, dairy could be very bad for you in one moment of life and be very good for you in another moment of life. Why? Because the environment has changed. And what I mean by the environment is your gut. So what I'm saying is that not only do you have to figure out what is healthy for me, but you have to also give it a time span and say, what is healthy for me right now? Right? So something could be like, if someone thrives off of oatmeal in the morning and they eat oatmeal every day, and there are people who are in their 90s who say they live by oatmeal and they eat it every day. Okay, but what if somebody woke up at 2 in the morning out of their sleep to run to the bathroom? Is oatmeal healthy for them at that moment? Maybe not. I'm sure it isn't. It's in the middle of the night, first of all. So you have to understand that there's also a timing to when you eat that matters. The same meal at one time could affect you differently at another time, or there's times that you can optimize certain foods better than others, like after workouts or before workouts and things like that. So that's what I mean about health, is it's time to take a different approach and start really becoming very creative with what you think. And understanding yourself is the best thing that you can do. I started to understand myself when I bumped into some problems, right? And so there's times that I would go on and off low carb, and I would cycle back and forth between carbs. And sometimes hitting the low-carb moments of my life were great, refreshing. They had benefits for me. And some things work until they don't work, right? And so I'm not trying to discredit any of this stuff because there are moments in life where people can benefit from different ways of eating in that moment, but they work until they don't. And if they don't, you cannot be stoic. You have to have some level of adaptability to be able to change. And in the diet world, there are so many people who are just stoic. They're so strict. This is how you do it. This is what I think. But what happens if you have a problem with your body and it's calling out for something else to happen? Like, are you going to stick to what's, you know, what you believe is true And most of the time, it's not that what we believe is true, it's just that we think it's the truth because we believe it. So we gotta understand that it's time to open up our minds a little bit more and be in tune with thyself. Know thyself is what you have to do in order to live a healthy life for the rest of your life. And you got to be like an awareness of this, right? And so, um, a little bit about, again, my story is that, yeah, I, I was trying some low carbs, I was cycling, I was doing some restrictions. And let me tell you, I've done a lot of restrictions in the past. Um, I used to, when I was younger, fast a lot. Like, I would— there was a year I fasted 3 days out of each week. Um, so just to add up a certain amount of days throughout the year, over 50 days or whatever. And so I would fast Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, and then I would eat Thursday through Sunday. I did this in my younger years. I was in my 20s, and then even in my 30s, I would just fast a lot. Uh, you know, 10-day fast. I would break them up. I never went, I don't think, on like a 30-day fast or anything like that, but I would break them up. And so sometimes I would even fast Well, let's say 5 to 7 days may have been the longest. 10 or 10 days straight may have been the longest, but they were always broken up. And so, but definitely a couple of days out of each week. Uh, and then it got to the point where it was like, okay, every month I would fast, you know, 3 to 5 days a month. And then when I would travel, I would always fast a few days before I traveled and then a few days when I got back. And I thrived at times when I was fasting, like I really did. Um, my brain was able to think clear, you know. I was, I was good. I was very sharp. And I really didn't like to eat. And I guess my body got adjusted to that. And so, um, that's all I knew. And I felt great and everything. But then I hit a period of time, and, and I think I know why this happened, and I'll share that also. I hit a period of time where my energy was very, very drained and I don't know if my brain capacity was as drained as just my physical energy. And then I started to feel like I didn't want to work out anymore, which was really odd because it's hard for me not to work out. And just because of willpower, I would continue doing it because that's kind of what kicked in when I felt like I wasn't enjoying it anymore, is my willpower kicked in because it's such a habit and it's such deeply instilled in me that I still continue to work out. But I felt drained is the best word I could describe. And even though I was eating this particular diet, like a low-carb type of diet, I felt like I no longer wanted to work out. It was so hard. And I'm like, why is it hard for me to work out? Then I started noticing throughout the day I was just really tired, and I was getting enough sleep. It wasn't like my sleep was bad or anything. I just was tired all the time. And I remember for about 6 months wondering, why am I so tired when I'm eating quote-unquote healthy? And it was just mind-boggling to me. Like, it was, it was crazy to think that I was tired so much, and I just could not understand it. And I tried everything, you know, um, to help the situation, but it just would not work, right? And so that is when I started to think back and I was like, okay, when did I have the most energy and how did I feel and what was I eating in my life? And so I kind of went back to my 20s and I was like, okay, I was eating a lot of carbs and— but I was eating high quality carbs. They weren't like junk all the time. And I'm like, I remember like killing it at the gym. I mean, I could go forever. Then I started thinking you know, I wonder if I need my body to have more sugar so that I could use the sugar for fuel in my workouts. Because I knew that endogenously my body was making sugar, and I was probably using that as fuel from my protein, right? And so the body will take protein and make sugar from the protein because that's how important sugar is to the body, right? And so you know, and I would tell people, hey, you don't necessarily need sugar to live, but you really do, because honestly, if your blood sugar drops too low, then you die, right? And so then I understood, no, what it is is that maybe the body does not need dietary sugar, but the body needs sugar. So much so, until the point where the body will break down muscles and tissues and protein to get that sugar. And that was the sugar that my body is using for fuel, right? And so then I'm like, well, what if I fed my body a little bit more external sugar? Which of course a lot of people are afraid to do because sugar is the devil. I know it, I said it before, you know. And, and I don't know if I always equated sugar to just like healthier sugars, like, you know. But there were times that I did feel like all sugar is all sugar, don't eat it. Is bad, it's killing you, and things like that. But that's because it kind of looks that way, because a lot of people who are unhealthy do eat a lot of sugar in the form of processed foods. And so I'm like, wait a minute, let me step back, because have I taken the instances where people are eating a really highly processed diet? And of course You know, when you're thinking of donuts and potato chips and all of this processed food, fried chicken, and you know, you're eating out a lot, and is, you know, french fries and all of these other things that's cooked with seed oils. Like, have I looked at processed foods and just said, okay, the sugar from the processed foods is bad? Have I not analyzed, you know, everything else that's involved in processed food and, and felt like maybe that's what's harming people. Now if I fast forward into what I started to talk about, and I've been talking about this for years, which is seed oils, because I really do think that that's the culprit. Then I started to understand that like a lot of these foods that people eat is also high in fat. And, and I'm not talking about healthy fat, I'm talking about like seed oils and processed fats, trans fats, and unhealthy you know, fats, unsaturated fats, I would say also. And so I started to wonder, hmm, I know independently I've been talking about seed oils, get rid of the oils, get rid of the canola oil and the sunflower oil and all of these different oils. But then I'm thinking about a donut, and then I'm thinking about the fact that people are overeating calories. And I'm not into like calorie in, calorie out, but I am into understanding that usually when people eat processed foods, they overeat. And so yes, it's a lot of calories. And I started putting these individual pieces of the puzzle together that fats have way more calories than sugar. So like, technically, if someone did decide to come off of the unhealthy fats— when I say fats, I'm saying unhealthy fats— when people come off the unhealthy fats, they don't eat as many, as many calories. And so A lot of times they will lose weight even if they're eating sugar because fats have more calories than sugar. Anyway, all of this stuff that I've been doing in my life, I started putting pieces of the puzzle together and then I said, let me test out my blood sugar levels, right? And so I started to test out my blood sugar levels and what I noticed, because I was always checking for my blood sugar levels even when I was doing low carb or if anytime I was doing keto or I've even tried carnivore. And what I noticed was that my blood sugar levels were going up, and I'm like, this is weird. Why are my blood sugar levels going up and I'm not putting sugar in my body? Well, that sent me down an entire field of investigation. Dun, dun, dun, dun, dun. Because I am Investigator Kamilah Stevenson, right? And so, so I love research. Um, and so I committed myself, uh, to so much research in this area, and I started to learn a lot about the body, a lot about how the body processes sugar and fats, and how the body cannot burn both at the same time for fuel. It, it's going to choose one or the other, and you give your body the ability to be empowered by which one it would choose. And my body was good at using fat for a fuel source, and you hear like get the body to burn fat, get the body to burn fat. Yes, in a sense, but you want your body to be able to use glucose, also sugar, um, for fuel. And if your body cannot be metabolically flexible enough to use glucose as sugar, then it's going to be hard for your body, even when you put a little bit of sugar in it, even on a low-carb diet, for your body to utilize it because it's preferring to use fat for fuel. And if it's preferring to use fat for fuel, then what happens to the sugar? It usually turns to lactic acid, or it gets, you know, stored as fat often, but it will linger around in the blood and it can cause your blood sugar levels to increase. And so that's why somebody can be on a ketogenic diet or not have sugar in their diet and their blood sugar levels can creep up. Now, this is not against necessarily the ketogenic diet, as it has proven— and I've talked about it before— to help a lot of people with their blood sugar numbers and their A1C numbers. However, one thing I've always said in the past— and again, hindsight is 20/20 because I have all of these independent things that I think about health, but putting them all together is— has to be done in a masterful way. And I think that's where I am now, is putting everything together that I understand. And so I've always said in the past, I don't understand how anybody could stay on the ketogenic diet for the rest of their life, because there's like this draining kind of point that happens where I just feel like I need carbs, you know. And I've always felt that way about the ketogenic diet just because of, I guess, my personal feelings with the carbs and knowing that they did give me energy when I felt like drained where, you know, I had low amounts of sugar in my diet. And so I've always wondered how people can do it for a long time. But hey, if something is working for you, it's working for you. And that's, that's what matters. But however, what I started to understand is that even if someone do have the approach of a low-carb diet or some kind of restriction or any type of diet, whether it's paleo, Mediterranean, or whatever, that can give you that, that short burst of wind and just kind of clean you out and really limit you from eating foods that are damaging your body. I don't think it's a good idea at this point to make your body almost have to deal with the fact that you don't feed it any level of dietary sugar because then your body does not become really good and efficient at using glucose for fuel. And if your body again is turning to using fat, then your blood sugar levels are going to increase and your body's not going to be efficient at creating ATP, which is how our bodies make energy in the mitochondria. And you really want your body to be able to be efficient at producing ATP and energy for body. And to do that, your body has to know how to efficiently utilize glucose for this. So my numbers started to creep up 10 points, and I'm like, what is happening? And so just out of instinct and understanding all of these different principles, I decided it's time for me to increase my sugar. Now, when I say increase my sugar, I was always over 50 grams of carbs per day, so that was low still to me. So some people may look at low carb as, you know, all the way down to 10 grams, and it is for some people because it's hard for some people to get in ketosis unless their grams of carbs are very, very low. But for me, low is 50 grams. And so what I was saying is that I started to eat a lot more than that, and so I started to test this out, and within a few weeks my blood sugar levels had started to decrease. But not only that, I noticed a few things about my body, and that's number one, I had way more energy. I'm talking about my life was restored back to normal. And if you know me, you understand that energy means everything, and a good life has to be a life where you are energy rich. And so I don't, you know, want myself or others to have to drag themselves to the gym, drag themselves throughout the day, drag themselves to be productive. If you have the energy levels to do that, it is so much easier. And I want to feel like I want to go to the gym, right? You want to feel like you want to get out of bed and conquer the day. You don't want to have to use willpower every day to do that because you know it's the right thing to do. And that's what's happening to a lot of people because they are so drained and their, their energy is drained and they're energy deficient. Now, um, I'm going to talk about a few things, 3 things that you can do to get your energy back up, and 3 things that are really just draining your energy, like making you not as productive or as healthy as you need to be, because it's impossible to be at optimal levels if you don't have the energy that, you know, that demand requires for you to have. And so, um, so that was a huge thing for me, is that all of a sudden I have energy now. I'm getting up, I'm not tired, I'm sleeping better. I'm sleeping like a baby. I forgot to mention that my thyroid has improved because I'm not as cold now. I'm a person who generally gets cold pretty quick. I don't know if it's because I'm kind of on the thin side or whatever. I need a little more, you know, fat and, and cushion in my body, but I do tend to get cold quick, but I'm not as cold as I used to be. And I noticed that— that was another independent thing— is that I noticed that when I would do carbs, I wouldn't be as cold. That's just something I observed about myself. And so now I realize, like, I'm not as cold. So that means, you know, that my temperature regulation is a lot better. And man, my— like I said, my fasted glucose levels started to decrease. And even the average glucose throughout the day was lower than what it used to be. So imagine if you were at a place where you could do, you know, 300 grams of carbs a day. I said that right, 300. I was testing 300 grams, 400 grams. I was testing it out because that's how you learn, that's how you know either, either this gonna work or it's not. But for me it's not a disaster, you know, even if it didn't work, because I'm just testing it out. It's an experiment. And so I was testing out 300 grams, 400 grams of carbs a day, and my averages for the day were low. Like, when you can average— and, and other people who I'm looking at who doesn't— who don't eat any carbs, their averages was like 125, and, you know, mine is in the 80s. And it's like, how is your average that, that low? Well, because my body was becoming better at utilizing sugar. And of course, if you work out and if you're very active, you can handle a little bit more because you're using that as fuel, you know, to energize you for the things that you are doing, right? And so, and then you have the energy to do it, so it's not like a dread or anything. And that's how people can do a lot of stuff and not be as exhausted, um, like athletes and kids. Think about it. This is how you have to understand what wellness and healthy looks like. Looking at kids, everything about a child shows you what an optimal level of energy looks like, or just certain things. For example, I love hanging from bars and stuff like that because it helps with your grip, and your grip is associated with longevity, how long you'll live, right? And but when— what you do notice um, is that with kids, like even babies, they have a very strong grip. They might not even have as many muscles in their body, but their grip is strong. Have you ever tried pulling something from a baby that really wants what you trying to pull from their hands? I'm talking about babies, like you pulling in it and they holding on, you know, for dear life, and you like, this baby's strong. And we say that with all babies, that's because their grip is strong. So a strong grip is equivalent to health. And so, uh, same thing with energy is that, as you know, kids, they will outpace you with— in every way. You playing with them and it's like, whoa, they don't get tired, you know. They have all the energy in the world. They run around, they eat, their bodies take that food, burn it off as energy. They almost could eat whatever they want to eat. They, you know, and I'm talking about a healthy child. Um, they don't really gain a lot of weight even though they eating a lot, and then they sleep like a baby. Well, how is that? They are energized during the day and then they sleep like a baby at night, whereas we tired during the day and wired at night. Something's off. And so we have to look at, at children to understand what energy should look like. And so, um, I I started to realize that, you know, as I started to, yeah, take in the sugar, get more energy, levels are lower. And look at other people whose, again, levels are higher, they're tired, cholesterol levels increased, and like all of this stuff— overweight, can't lose weight, belly fat, you know. And they're on ketogenic diets or they're not even doing any sugar. And it's like, what is happening? What's happening is that their body is not good at utilizing glucose. And if you want to heal your body on an energy level, because again, health is about energy. If you don't have energy, you're not well, right? And so prioritizing energy is the key. And so, um, I do want to also say this: when I'm talking about carbs or sugar, I am talking about high-quality carbs and sugar. I am not talking about junk food. Hear me and hear me clear. It's not about eating a bunch of junk. That's not going to get it. You're going to be tired. And yeah, it's just— it's going to add some deterioration to your body, quite frankly, and inflammation to your body if you are eating processed junk food. So I'm talking about high-quality food. And I'll again share with you in a minute what that looks like for me. And you can resonate or not. You can start to create Some things are not, but there is a right and a wrong way to do this. So, um, if you are struggling with a chronic condition or anything like that, you definitely want to get help because, you know, I'm, I'm laying out to you the basics, but of course there is an entire life overhaul that needs to take place. And when you're dealing, um, with stress and things like that, you have to understand how to tap into what we call the parasympathetic system, the rest and digest system, and get out of that sympathetic system. And there's tons of strategies for that, lifestyle habits and practices, um, that, you know, experts can really, really help, um, you know, walk you through. And so I do want to say that as a caveat because it's not just always as simple as like, well, let me go and eat more sugar. And again, if you do this the wrong way, you'll add more devastation to your body. And so, and, and besides the fact that I still believe in bio-individuality, which is like everybody is different, and so there's a different route to get to the place where your body can utilize more sugar. And some people may take one route and another person may take another route. And here's what's interesting is that I always say you should take the route of your psychology. What is easiest to you? What is more doable to you? Because if you can take a first step in that direction, then it's like a domino effect, and then you can get to another direction. Where somebody else, they may say, hey, that's not easy for me, that's actually hard and exhausting, so I would rather do it this way. Well, then you do it that way. But psychology and biology and physiology, like, they all matter, you know what I mean? So psychology is part of the— of your health and well-being. And if somebody don't take that into consideration, they'll put you down a path that seems very, very hard, and you'll be discouraged and you won't want to finish. And so definitely seek extra help for that if you are battling a chronic condition. But here's my discovery. My discovery was this, that optimizing your health means that you have to get your mitochondria to be well, and your mitochondria is what produces ATP. And so it's not just about what you're putting in your body, it's about the engine. And it's just like if you look at a car, the car has an engine. If something starts happening with the car and you think it's the gas, and then you pull over to the gas station and you put gas in the car, you could put the most premium gas in the car, but if the engine is broke, then it doesn't matter what kind of fuel you put in that car. When you get to trying to take off and, uh, allow the car to use the fuel for energy, it's not going to work because you have an engine problem and you got to get the engine fixed before you can utilize the fuel. Right? And so that is the problem with a lot of people, is that the engine is broke, the mitochondria is broke. And how you get that to be fixed, again, you go different routes for that, all right? And so it could look different for everybody because, you know, there could be certain things that are contributing to your mitochondria being messed up, like stress, for example, and you have to address that, right? So, um, here's another thing is that sugar does tend to turn off stress hormones. And so, um, the body is constantly trying to make sure that it conserves energy, right? And so if you're overly stressed, then your body's going to utilize energy where it needs to go. You got to keep your heart pumping, right? You gotta— there's certain things that your body needs. Your body needs to pump blood to other extremities, right? And so, but if you have an energy deficit, it's going to start conserving in some places to be able to feed other places because you don't have enough. You're in a deficit. And so, like, if you see certain things happening with you, say your hair starts falling out or you start gaining weight, that means your metabolism is slowing down. Like, your body's trying to conserve energy if your metabolism is slowing down to give it where it needs to give it to. So, um, even if someone is— you know, you've ever known somebody who may have been really, really sick and their organs start to shut down one at a time, there's a certain even order of when the— how the organs start to shut down. Because it's like, okay, we don't have enough energy for all of these organs to work, so we're gonna put it to the most important organ, okay? We like the heart, or— because if the heart stops you're dead, right? And so you will notice, okay, maybe the heart is beating, but with these other organs start to shut down, the kidneys and all of this other stuff. And then the last to go is that heart rate starts to drop, drop, drop into, you know, a flatline, right? And so energy needs to be in abundance in your body for you to thrive, and you have to take the, the necessary steps to make sure that you get your, your energy in abundance. And that is how you feel great, you can keep going. And then your body knows how to switch back and forth between the two systems of the sympathetic and the parasympathetic, where, you know, you, you have the adrenaline, you have the energy that you need, um, and, and your body will produce energy for— from different ways. When I say adrenaline, actually those are stress hormones. And so if you don't have enough energy, your body will turn on those stress hormones to give you the energy. But that's not good because eventually, um, your body is going to suffer in that way because you don't want to be living off of stress hormones. Remember, cortisol is the reason why a lot of people have belly fat even. So if you got too much cortisol going in your body, you're going to have some problems if your body is just running off of stress hormones. But you want your body to have the energy, and then you want it to be able to switch at nighttime to when you're able to rest. And that is the, the order of a very healthy functioning body. And so you could tell by how well people sleep is and how much energy they have during the day, how tired they are, their temperature, how many calories they can eat, like how many calories is your body burning per day. All of those things are metrics to be able to know how well your body is utilizing energy and creating ATP. And of course, fasted blood sugar levels, A1C levels, cholesterol, all of those different things. Can kind of help you to understand how well your body is doing. And so that, that was the discovery, is that I understood that I have to turn my stress hormones off. And there's a lot of things that people do to turn on or off their stress hormones, but you want to be able to turn them off. You don't want to live off of stress hormones. And if you are eating a diet that's high in PUFAs or, you know, and the seed oils and processed foods and not getting enough sleep at night, like, um, even restriction and fasting and working out a whole lot. Like, you got to have the abundance of energy to do that, because if you don't, again, your body's going to switch to, okay, this person doesn't have enough energy to work out or to be doing this high-intensity interval training, and so now we're going to turn on stress hormones because we got to give the body energy to finish this workout. But then that can cause other things to happen within your body because you don't have enough energy other places. And so it just becomes a domino effect that's not good overall for your longevity. And you have to start paying attention to that, of how much compounding stress on top of stress is happening for you. So if you're already stressed out, you're at a stressful job, you're, you know, in the middle of grieving, you got a relationship that is toxic, um, your boss gets on your nerves, you're financially fighting to pay bills, your kids is running crazy, you got a really crazy schedule, and then you're like doing high-intensity interval training and you're fasting, and then you're not eating sugar, so you're on a ketogenic diet. Like, all of those could be things that compound stress to the body. So it's nothing necessarily wrong with one or this one or that one in and of itself, but it just depends on you and where your body is. Like, a lot of people in their early years can handle a little bit more stress, um, you know, because you're younger and your body is in a different place. But as you start to get older, you want to be more cautious about this. Like, when you're younger, you can go without sleeping good, you know, for a while. I'm sure you remember your college years, not sleeping a lot, but you can still get up and make it work or whatever. But when you get a little older, that starts to affect you a little more. And so you have to be more cognitive of things like that and make sure that you are prioritizing your energy levels and prioritizing making sure that you're not overly stressed. Because this is why people are struggling with mental illness and mental problems and having breakdowns and can't function right. You know, brain capacity is really restricted with the creativity and the ideas and the intuition and the solutions that they're supposed to have for life. And people are just finding themselves stuck because of an energy deficit. And so, um, That is important, right? And so then also we talked about, you know, again, gut issues, you know. So there are certain things you may be able to eat or may not be able to eat because of gut issues. How's your microbiome? Is your, is your digestive system well? Because really, when you start to transition, you want to make sure if you are eating sugar that you're eating digestible foods. So digestible sugars, right? And so as I promised, I would share mainly what kind of foods I eat in the form of sugar. And no, it's not Twinkies and and, you know, muffins and bagels in the morning. Okay, and I'm not against like sourdough bread. Like, I love a piece of sourdough bread every once in a while, homemade. Uh, I get Amish bread sometimes, um, and the sourdough bread that they cook or that they make fresh at the Amish, uh, food market— markets. And I love going to them, but I don't— I don't eat a lot of bread. I'm gonna be honest, you know. And it's okay if some people do. Maybe their bodies can take grains a little bit better. And I know there's some people who swear by grains, but everybody's body is different, okay? So just understand that there's some people who can do it and some people who may not be able to do it as much. For me, I find that fruit, honey, maple syrup, dried fruit, a little bit of fruit juice here and there, um, works good for me. Sometimes I'm testing out oatmeal um, high-quality oatmeal, like gluten-free organic oatmeal. But I am being careful because I can find that, you know, sometimes maybe when I would eat it, I might get a little tired. So maybe that's too much fiber sometimes for my stomach. Not sure, I'm still trying to figure that out. A little bit of rice from time to time, but not a whole lot. But really, the majority really do come from fruit honey, maple syrup, and sometimes a little bit of actual raw sugar, like actual sugar, like a spoonful of sugar in my tea or something like that. And that's where most of my carbs come from. Most. Now there's a few days that there's a little— oh, and dairy, you know, dairy and cheese. I get my sugar from there a little bit too, my carbs from there. So that's, that's the majority of where I get my carbs from. So no, I'm not eating a bunch of like pancakes and stuff. Again, I'm not saying that that's bad. Some people might love buckwheat pancakes and things like that. Um, they can— you can test out whatever works for you, but I find that those type of sugars work good on a digestible level. Like, most people don't have problems digesting, you know, certain fruits, especially with the, uh, the fiber with them, you know, or, you know, some, you know. And now, yeah, fruit juice can can spike glucose, um, really quick. But again, if your body becomes flexible, it'll just come back down. And that's the point, is that when it goes up and then it lingers around, that's when the problem comes. So if you're having spikes but you're coming back down, then you're still going to average lower than somebody who's having a little bit of spikes because of stress. Because stress will cause— and cortisol will cause your blood sugar levels to spike. And that's why, like, even when you work out— so even on low carb, when I would work out, I wore a glucose monitor, um, for at least 6 months or more, maybe 8 months. And so again, that's how I got a chance to see how this works. But every time I would work out, any type of stress, um, that was put to the body, my body would say, okay, you're working out you need to now create— get some sugar, you need some energy. And so, um, my blood sugar levels would actually increase while I was working out because that's a stressor, right? And so— and I was working out fasted, right? So the body is not running off of stress hormones at this point because I, I don't even have, um, food or sugar in my system to be able to utilize this. So I started to watch the patterns of it. And so your blood sugar level can go up even if you're not eating sugar. Don't, don't Don't be fooled about that. And so, but you got to understand how the body is working. And so, um, so that's good, you know, you need to understand. And when I say that's good, I mean it's good for you to know this, all right? And that's good for you to know. So what is healthy for me right now is the question. If you are to increase a little bit of sugar, do it in the most digestible form. Pay attention to your body. See, do I get tired after I I, um, eat this, or do I get energized? And this is for those who may be on a restrictive diet but they don't quite know why they're still having problems, right? And so if you are thriving, hey, just take the information, know it, um, watch out for somebody else who's struggling, and keep doing what works for you. You should always do what works for you and make you feel good. But if you are struggling a bit, you know, in your health, and you're trying to figure out what is going on— I'm doing everything I need to do— if you are doing a lot of fasting and restriction and stuff like that, maybe your body's overstressed. Who knows? You know, um, pay attention to yourself. Open your eyes and understand that you want to try to do whatever it takes to get the energy that you need, because that's a good sign. And drained energy um, in the form of having health problems is a sign that something's not quite optimal, and you want it to be much better than what it is. You want it to be improving, and you have to make those adjustments. Um, and then you'll find out again that maybe right now you can't eat certain things, but later on when your microbiome is a lot better, your gut is better, your digestive system is better and more healed, um, that you can tolerate more foods. And sometimes it actually is healthy to restrict yourself of certain foods just to get your gut back healthy. If for that reason alone, this is why I do sometimes recommend some of these ways of eating. So when I recommend them, they are for whoever feels like this could work for them, and they have good statistics to back up these particular diets. But just be aware that if it doesn't work, even if it once worked, then there's other things that you can do to continually evolve in the, the understanding of your health, your energy levels. All right, so with that being said, I want to share with you 3 things that kill energy. These are things that you really want to pay attention to, right? Because I'm telling you, if your energy is revived and you learn how to be energy rich, you will just live a different life that you never could imagine. You will have the greatest experiences in life when your energy is where it needs to be. Number one, people. People kill energy. People kill energy. And what I notice is that I talk to a lot of people that are people pleasers. They're doing things because people want them to do it, or they feel a sense of obligation and all of that, and they don't really want to do it, right? And I have to tell people all the time, stop doing what you don't want to do for people. All right, now there's some things that you may not want to do that you should do, but stop living for people and learn how to tap into doing things that you really love, you really enjoy, and living the life that you're designed to live. And you know, especially if you're over 40, like I, I really often say, like, when you get over 40, you too old to be living for other people. Your time is limited. And I don't mean that like you about to check out of here right away. Like, you still got a lot of time left. But don't you want the rest of your 50 years or 60 years— because I bring it all the way to 100. Nah, no, don't get it twisted. I want people to be able to live as long as they can. I know everybody won't make it there, let's just be honest. But you may have another 50, 60 years left, and guess what? You want to live those years in a way that is fulfilling and delightful as possible. And you don't need people in your way. Making you live a miserable life. Most people are miserable because of people. You got to learn how to have boundaries, get rid of toxic people and people that's draining your energy. You don't have time. Time is invaluable in the sense that it is limited, and you don't want to give your time to people that's draining you. I'm very passionate about this, y'all, because I see too many people that are unfulfilled, sad, depressed, full of anxiety, and all of that because of toxicity in relationships. And so you have to start managing your time well and get rid of the people that are draining your energy, because there is no greater thing to me that takes away people's energy. Um, so just be mindful of that and start to address that. And the second thing is sitting too much. And they're doing research now, and it's showing that if you sit more than 3 hours a day— I know, I know, you like, 3 hours? I'm sitting like 10 hours a day. If you sit more than 3 hours a day, you're taking away 2 hours of your life. And this is important, um, because we're not designed to be sitting all day. Of course, you got to sit when you're driving and things like that, but you're not designed to be sitting all day. Like there's really enough research to just show how even someone who is overweight who moves more and exercises more, just have basically a, a moving type of lifestyle, they have an advantage even over someone who's thin who does not move a lot, who's, you know, glued to a chair all day. And so there's no real benefit of being thin if you're not— unless you're exercising, unless you're moving. I want to say moving. Exercising is a part of moving, but I want to say unless you're moving— and I've known this even in my own, um, life where there were times I would exercise and then sit around all day, and that just doesn't cut it. Exercise does not make up for a sedentary lifestyle. It just doesn't. You're still going to be at risk for a lot of different things, and you want to make sure that you are getting up and moving around. Even if you have a job that sits, you got to come up with creative ways. People didn't sit around as, as much, even if you look back decades ago, you know, people were more in, you know, um, doing labor and farming and factory work and cooking and, you know, moving around more. You know, especially COVID, it really restricted us with making us like have to be sitting around all day, and you have to be extra cautious about— or, um, you had to be, uh, conscious about, you know, sitting down too much. I mean, we sat around and watched TV, right? So um, or some, some of us, you know, I did a little bit, but you know, I was still exercising and things like that and on the go. But you got to be mindful of your sitting time. I find myself standing up a lot to work on my laptop and stuff because yes, it can be restrictive if you are working from a laptop and things like that, but you got to be creative. And, um, and then of course, you know, Instacart and, and DoorDash and Grubhub, I mean, we just sitting around like like, like living high off the hog, just sitting around letting people serve and bringing stuff to our door, and Amazon delivering every 5 minutes while we clicking a TV channel and just watching TV and letting time go away. Nope, we got to get up, move around, uh, find something to do, clean your house, you know, go for a walk, because you are killing yourself if you are sitting too much. So this is killing your energy. And then, uh, the third thing is you have to get enough food. Like, people are experiencing malnutrition, they are experiencing nutritional deficiencies because they're not eating enough real food. You might be eating, but is it food? Because if you're eating processed foods and fast foods and junk and things like that all day, that's not food. We talking about food. And it doesn't matter how much you're eating, you're still going to have nutritional deficiencies if you're not eating food. So you could be eating all the junk all you want, and you could be eating 3,000 calories a day, and still it's not food. So now you're not getting your vitamins, you're not getting your minerals, you're not getting your nutritional value that your body needs to have energy to thrive off of. So if you are not eating properly, then yes, I feel like restriction and fasting could benefit you a bit because you stop yourself from like overeating on all of these other bad things that is very detrimental to your health, right? And so, uh, that's where intermittent fasting could come in. Now, I'm not talking about spiritual, um, fasting because there's a different agenda for spiritual fasting, and I believe in that because it's in the Bible, um, and but what's also in the Bible is that you need to have an abundant life, you know what I mean? So we want the things that we're supposed to have in abundance, which is energy. And so make sure that you are eating real food, because if you're not, you are going to destroy your body and you are going to deteriorate, because you need nutrition to synergize and to allow your body to make ATP, which is energy. Okay, and so now if you are one of those people that do eat real food but you're fasting a lot, you still might have nutritional deficiency because you're too restrictive. Restriction doesn't need to be for people who eat real food and who have good— a good relationship with food. It needs to be for people who need to be restrictive. So you might be somebody who's like, I fast all the time, but I eat real food, and, and I'm, I'm, you know, I have a good relationship with food, but you're still wondering, you know, why maybe you're not losing weight or why things are happening to you um, in your body? Well, it's because you're starving yourself. And so if you're starving yourself, then your body is conserving itself. So that means you are running off of stress hormones. And on top of that, you don't have enough nutrients for your body to properly, you know, um, burn fat. And in a sense of like, um, if you are overweight, or build muscle, you know, or, or just thrive. Like, you're in conservation mode, you're in survival mode. And if you're in survival mode, you cannot be in thriving mode at the same time as you're in survival mode. You are conserving your energy for what it needs. The fact that you are fasting means your body is saying, this body is starving, and we need to, um, make sure that the energy goes where it needs to, uh, keep this person, you know, running where this person needs to run, like keep this person's body running and moving along. But your body is thinking that you're somewhere off in a wood somewhere with no access to food. And so it's now slowing down your metabolism and conserving your thyroid and, you know, conserving things as much as possible, which means something else is going to go, um, undone as far as where energy is needed somewhere else, because your body is saying this person is in need of survival. And that is a really, really good thing if you're out in a jungle somewhere with no access to food. I love it. Our bodies can now kick in to living off of stress hormones to survive the situation. But what if it's not a situation and your body is still in survival mode, like you're somewhere in a wood— in the woods being chased by lions with no food? You don't want that. Why? Because your digestive system is going to shut down. There are things that are going to go without when you are trying to conserve. Your body needs to be in abundance. Nutritional abundance, right? And so when people feed themselves real food, it helps with their metabolism. And, and I'm not talking about overeating. As a matter of fact, most people don't overeat when they eat real food because their hormones will operate right and their body will tell them when they're satisfied or when they're hungry and things like that. So things get a little bit more regulated and you stop binge eating because you don't have the same cravings for like sugar and stuff because you are being fed. People have cravings for sugar when there's an energy deficit. Your body will crave sugar when you have an energy deficit. That's why people run to sugar when they are stressed. The problem is they're running to the wrong sugar. They run into sugar mixed with a bunch of seed oils and unhealthy fats and corn fructose syrup and processed stuff and chemicals all in there, and it's just going to destroy your body. But your body really is saying, I need energy, bring me energy. You must know this. And if you learn the art of being able to utilize sugar for your energy, you will live a spectacular life. Now make sure that you subscribe to this podcast and please send it and share to someone who needs to hear this message. Don't listen and not respond and not subscribe. It's a lot of people who do that and they exit off the page and they still don't subscribe. Make sure that you do that for me and make sure you also put in the comments, what are your thoughts? What would you like me to talk about? What would you like me to expound on? I'd love to hear from you because that's the direction I want to go. I'm here to serve you and I want to make sure that you are headed in the right direction. With your health. This has been another episode of Health Goat. I'll see you next time. I'm scared.