Nutrition, Gut Health & Beauty Hacks for High-Achieving Women with Jennifer Hanway Part 1

What are some of the biggest mistakes that you see high performers making when it comes to their health?

The biggest mistake people are making are underestimating how important it is. That's number one.

You guys, this affects your attitude. This affects what you believe is possible. Because I get a lot of people who are like, I just don't believe I have the energy for that. Some of you listening don't even understand that you have a completely different personality. That is probably very powerful.

It is such an undefined, utilized tool in high performance.

Hey, everyone, welcome back to the podcast. I'm really excited about these next few podcast episodes. And yes, I am doing a series. You'll be hearing these series off and on throughout the podcast because when I have somebody that I really want to go deep with, I want to do more than one podcast. So I just happened to do three with this next guest and her name is Jennifer Hanway. She's a board certified. Hello, Holistic nutrition professional, celebrity health coach. She's worked with Hollywood A listers, members of the British royal family, and Olympic athletes. You guys, we're talking about people who are at the top of their game and their jobs come with a high level of pressure. She specializes in metabolic health, hormone balance and gut healing for women over 40. You guys, I was so excited to sit down with her, especially right now this time of year. I know everybody's like doing all the things, wanting the resets, trying new things. So I wanted to ask her, like every single health and beauty question that I could so that you guys can have info, info on what's worth it and what's not. In this first episode, Jennifer and I talk about overlooked health habits that directly influence your confidence, your mood, your productivity and ability to think bigger. Your energy is the foundation of everything you create and achieve or not. So if you're looking for edge that's going to help you reach that next level, you're going to love this episode. So let's get into it. Jennifer, welcome to the earn your happy podcast. Thank you so much for coming on.

Thank you for having me. I'm excited to be here.

Okay. I am so excited for this conversation because number one, I like to consider myself a high achieving woman most of the time. Y but we're going to talk about nutrition supplements, fitness and lifestyle strategies for high achieving women. And you know, when I was telling you about coming on the podcast, because I'm very into all of this, lifestyle, nutrition, working out all the things, I recently kind of started talking about it a lot again and trying to Remind people of what an important foundation it is because I, I can't remember if I shared this with you, but I, you know, started in health, fitness, nutrition, had my own gym, had an online membership, was really, really into it for a long time, stayed into it, but publicly, because I was getting into entrepreneurship and business, I like completely detached my identity from it online because I went through a phase of feeling like I wanted to be taken more serious instead of just for body.

Right.

And, you know, nutrition tips, which is great, but I wanted to be talking about business. And so what happened is I went so far away from it that now I'm at a place where I get a ton of questions of like, how do you have the energy to do it? Where do you get the ideas? Where do you, you know, how are you able to do all of this? And I'm like, well, because I have such a solid foundation on like fitness nutrition supplements. I have been on this journey for so long that I just realized, wait a minute, I need to start getting people back on the podcast, right. Who not only talk about, you know, health, fitness, nutrition, but also what that does for your business and for your energy. So today I'm so excited to have you on because we're not going to talk about that, but I'm super into skin, I'm into beauty, I'm into all the things. Because, you know, you hit 40 and you're like, what else can we do to like preserve, enhance, do all the things? Because it is real. And by the way, you look incredible.

Thank you very much.

And I. We're the same age. I think you're 44.

We're literally the same age.

Yes, yes, I love that. Okay, so two 44 year old, high achieving women talking to you about all of the things. Beauty, skin, nutrition, health supplement, high achieving and energy, which is so huge. So I'm so excited you're here. You have, I just read your bio, but you have an incredible bio. You're a board certified nutrition, nutrition professional, a certified personal trainer, a clinical weight management practitioner, beauty nutrition expert. You're on the medical advisory board for l' Oreal Paris and what's the other name?

And Johnson Johnson.

Okay, amazing. So partner with a bunch of dermatologists, you write for a ton of famous magazines. You're, you have celebrity clients, Olympic athletes, a list, celebs.

Yeah.

Music stars, all of the things. So I was excited to be able to sit here with you because you are kind of the person who is helping these people that we look at and go, what in the world are they doing? You're helping them optimize their nutrition, beauty, skin, energy, all of the things. So I would love to hear a little bit about your personal journey because I haven't met a person who's this passionate about fitness, health, beauty, energy, all of the things who does not have their own personal journey to getting to this place.

Yeah, we, I think so many practitioners, so many of us have. It's a deep, it's a deep seated thing, it's for us, but then it's also, we know what that transformation in our lives is like and then we want to give it to other people. So very long story short, because I mentioned with, you know, mid-40s, I am a ex professional dancer turned fitness instructor turned nutritionist. So I was, I was doing all of the things. I was teaching the fitness classes, I was doing the dance performance, the dance, teaching the dance choreography and I was a mess. I was physically a mess. I had really poor gut health. I'd had gut health issues really from my teens onwards through to when I was about 30. And that showed up in the digestive things, obviously, but also anxiety, depression, all of the things I was not healthy. Weight when I was a teenager, was a very unhealthy vegetarian. Not the vegetarian diets are unhealthy. I just didn't know how to do it myself.

Right.

Living in London, working as a dance teacher, teaching fitness, all of the things. And my digestive system just said, hang on, Nope, I've had enough, this is it. So I was hospitalized. Morphine drip, the whole like my digestive system just stopped working.

And how did you know that? Like, what happened?

Oh, I won't go into too many details, but everything stopped working.

Wow.

And solids were coming out both ends. Yeah, super fun. Not what you want. Scary, scary and not what you want. Living your best life in your late 20s and early 30s. In London, conventional medicine didn't hold a lot of answers for me. That was just, oh, it's ibs, which we know is a collection of symptoms, not really a diagnosis. I was offered anti anxiety medication. All of the things I was like, this is not the route for me. I am, you know, young. I want everything out of my life. Let me find some answers for myself now because the universe works in wonderful ways. I was also teaching at a bar studio at the time who had a holistic nutritionist. And she gave me just a couple of tiny tips. I think it was like, give up gluten, give up dairy and take a probiotic. Like nothing major, nothing you Know, hugely scientific. And that changed my life. And I was like, oh, I didn't realize how good. I didn't realize how good I could feel. I think that's a big part of the journey is you don't realize how good you can feel until you feel good. So I was like, okay, well, selfishly, I want more for myself. And I know there's so many other young women out there not feeling their best, struggling with gut health, struggling with bloating, struggling with the anxiety and depression. So that's when I went back to take some certifications. And then eventually I realized that certifications weren't enough. So then I went back to school to study to become a nutritionist. And fast forward now, 14 years. Yeah, brings me to where I, where I am now, which is working with high achieving women, be that celebrities, be that CEOs, and really teaching them that everything high to do, everything high achieving. Your health and physical health, your mental health, your gut health, your emotional health, your strength, your energy, it's not just the foundations, it really is the key tool in your toolbox. Like, we spend, so we spend so much money on optimizing our teams, optimizing our AI, optimizing our routines, ordering our, like, there's so much optimization. But I think the thing that makes the biggest change is our physical and mental health.

Oh, my goodness. When you're talking about depression and anxiety and how you felt like in your 20s. I think back to pretty much my especially my younger years, teens, 20s, even somewhat into my 30s, even when I sort of thought I started to understand nutrition, but I was lacking in so many things that you're still feeling so much of the mental, emotional side of it. And I remember thinking growing up, like, oh my God, I'm a depressed, anxious person. And my whole family is too. And my whole family was on medication. I hadn't started medication yet. I started it in my 20s. And I was just convinced that that is who I was. And it's not that some people don't need it, they absolutely do. But what ended up happening is when I started to understand nutrition, I was like, wait a minute, I'm actually a really happy person who doesn't have anxiety all the time. Yeah, like, you know, I'm drinking a ton of coffee, I'm eating bad. Maybe I was drinking too much at the time. Like, it just flares up. Like it makes your brain not your own. So much inflammation in your brain and in your body. So I, you know, whether you're listening to this and you're Thinking that you need it or not. There's probably some things that are going to get dialed in through this that you don't even understand are going to open up. Whether it's ideas or making you just feel so much better or unlocking energy like these. I, I just had a dinner with a bunch of high performing and let me tell you, they have their shit dialed in like, like physical wise I actually like far more than I even have. And I was like, whoa, okay, maybe that's why you're making that much more money than me right now. And it's crazy. So this is why I love this conversation. It's very timely. So when a new client comes to you, let's just talk about where do you start when a new client comes to you?

Yeah, so I always say test, don't guess. So this is, I think we should talk about this more. In health and wellness in general, but especially for high achievers, we are probably spending the time, the money, the energy, we're buying the groceries, we're getting the organic food, we're taking all of the supplements. But is that optimized for us? So I love to have as much data as I can on somebody. So that's going to be their lab work that might be functional, testing things like saliva and urine, hair tests that might be looking at a food diary and analyzing that to see where certain deficiencies are. So as much information as possible on that person. Because you can then tailor everything, every bite that they're taking, every workout that they do, every stress relieving supplement they take, we can tailor it to their biology. So that's number one. So they're getting that data. Number two is learning as much as they can about that client. So a lot of my clients, they travel, their CEOs, they're celebrities, they are in hotels or they're on the road or they have to show up to red carpet events. And I have to make my recommendations fit into their lifestyle because I could give you the perfect food supplement, fitness lifestyle protocol. If you're not going to do it, it's not going to work. And I don't want a client of mine to see the recommendations that I give them and they're just going to be like, no, that's not going to work for me, I'm not going to do it. So I have to fit in with their lifestyle. I have to know if they're cooking, if their chef is cooking. Do they eat out a lot with clients? What are their non negotiables? I had really Fun client. I can't name names. They've done an incredible turnaround with her health. But she was on the road a lot. She was still at school. She was amazing, and she wanted to clear up her skin. She's on camera a lot, but she wouldn't give up her fried chicken. So I had to find some way of like. I'm like, okay, we have the fried chicken, but let's have the green juice as well. Here's, you know, every hotel that you're staying. Let me know the name of every hotel you're staying in, and I will find a juice bar that's near you, and we'll get them to make your juice menu, your juice recipe. So really, it has to fit in with our lifestyle as well. And then really, once we've kind of got those pieces of the puzzle, the data there, then 99% of the time, I'm working on gut health, so that is going to be the first thing. And sometimes I have to get to that in a roundabout way. So they might be like, oh, no, I only want to work on my energy, or I only want to work on losing ten pounds. And I'm like, okay, great. And I kind of give them a little bit of what they need. But then we're going to loop back to looking at the gut health as well, because that really is the foundation of everything. And that doesn't have to be. You're cutting out all of your favorite foods and giving up alcohol. It might just be some simple things like, okay, we're going to add in some bone broth here. Let's add in some collagen in your shake. Let's add in a probiotic that we can take on a daily basis. And so slowly, we're kind of getting them to the gut health piece of the puzzle. So really, data lifestyle and then getting in that little bit of gut health to start them off.

Okay, so just for people who maybe don't understand, because I. Gut health was, like, such a hot word. It was. It's trendy. It was very trendy. It's still trendy.

Yeah.

But when you say, let's focus on your gut health, like, why? What does that mean? Just for anyone who has not started to understand what gut health does for people.

Yeah, And I think you make a really good point there of it was trendy. And sometimes when something's trendy, we lose the science behind it. So your gut health is not drinking celery juice every day. Your gut health is not going on crazy fast or taking a Million one supplements. What we're really thinking about is you are. You aren't what you eat, you are what you absorb. So even if you're having the most perfect diet, if you're not absorbing it at the gut level, we're not getting all of those nutrients. So we're really talking about gut health. We're talking about two things. Intestinal permeability, or the integrity of your cellular lining, and the health of microbiome. And those two things go hand in hand. So are the right things going in and the wrong things staying out? And are we really looking after that microbiome, that population of all of those wonderful bacteria in there? And we use the words good and bad. That's a little bit simplified. But really, do we have more good bacteria than bad bacteria? And is that bacteria diverse? And that's really what we're talking about when we're talking about gut health. So it's. Are we absorbing the nutrients from our food? But we also have to think about that nervous system that's in our gut. So our gut has its own nervous system. We have a nervous system in there. We make hormones in there, we detoxify hormones there. So that's one of the reasons why our gut health has such a huge impact on our mental health and our anxiety and our mood, because all of those neurotransmitters and that constant communication between your gut and your brain.

Okay, explain that a little bit deeper because they say, you know, gut affects your brain, your mood, your energy, your skin, and especially, you know, with my company that I have, glossy, just talking about the skin and gut connection, too. Can you explain just the impact of all of that?

Yeah. So really, you think of your gut as that is your processing plant, your factory, your detoxifying plant. It is. It's the gateway to the health for the rest of your body. So, for example, if we have what we call leaky gut or impaired intestinal permeability, we know that things are going into the bloodstream that shouldn't be there. And then our body's going to set off an inflammatory response. Now, that inflammatory response can be everything from joint pain to brain fog to breakouts or redness in the skin. So really, it's. What are we thinking about on that inflammatory level? What are we thinking about on the neurotransmitter level? So 70 to 80% of serotonin, that's our feel good, feel calm hormone is made in the gut. Now, I really struggle with, like, anxiety is my flavor of mental health.

I feel you.

Yeah. You know, I think, you know, you have to limit the coffees, limit the True Crime podcast. But anxiety, you know, if it's a flare up for me, I know that that's probably coming from somewhere or at least a part, a good part of it is coming from somewhere in my digestion because my body's not able to make those neurotransmitters that allow me to kind of feel calm and resilient. So that's a big part of it. And then hormone balance as well. Hormones are made and detoxified in the gut, so we see so much on social media about hormone balance. But unless you have good gut health, you're not going to be able to get optimal hormones.

Okay, so when people think about good gut health, because this is so interesting, if you're not able to make those chemicals, what are some of the main things that when clients come to you, like low hanging fruit, you're like, oh, honey, like this is. You are blocking the ability to make serotonin because you're eating or drinking this or you're, you know, because clearly it sounds like for gut health, it's like, what is going in? Or I mean, pretty much that's all of it.

Yeah.

What you're consuming.

Yeah.

And how to heal that gut. Okay, so I want to know, okay, what's the low hanging fruit that you're always like for anyone? It doesn't matter who you are. Let's get this out.

Yeah.

And then what are some non negotiables for getting it in?

No one loves this answer. But the two non negotiables for taking out sugar and alcohol. So with alcohol, we are causing inflammation in the body. We are killing off some of that good gut bacteria. We are then making our livers work even harder. I mean, you know, we can't separate gut health from liver health. That might be a whole other conversation. So eliminating, reducing alcohol, that's always going to be a big one. And then sugar, sugar is going to mess up that microbiome. It's going to feed those bad bacteria. It's going to mean that the good bacteria don't have a chance to flourish. It's going to cause bloating, it's going to affect our brain, it's going to cause brain fog, joint pain, messing up our metabolism. I nearly swore. Then all of the things. So people don't like to hear it, but sugar and alcohol are probably going to be those things where I'm going to say, let's reduce or ideally eliminate.

Yeah, we hate that answer. But we also love that answer because it is clear. Like, there is a clear difference when I am, like, not drinking as much or not eating as much sugar. But let me. Let me. Let's get clear on sugar, because I think there's this whole world, you know, where I was doing fitness competitions where they were like, okay, no bananas, no strawberries, no blueberries. And it was, like, so intense that it. It caused a major binge cycle in my life because I was, like, not getting any sugar, which actually made me feel awful. So even if it looked like I was eating healthy to other people, vegetables, lean meats, things like that, I was miserable.

Yeah.

So can we kind of talk about a balance of what that looks like for sugar?

Yes. And I was listening to a podcast this morning, and someone was talking about a balanced breakfast and making a smoothie. And then they said, you know, oh, but don't put the. Don't put any fruit in there because there's too much sugar. And I'm literally, like, banging my head against a wall because this is where this misinformation comes in. And there's a huge difference of how our body processes the sugar in Skittles or M M's versus how we process the sugar, the fructose, in fruit. So we've got to think about what it comes wrapped in. So it's a naturally occurring sugar, and it comes wrapped in fiber, so it's much, much slower to get into our bloodstream, so we don't get that blood sugar spike. And then it comes with all of those wonderful antioxidants, polyphenols, all of those things that are so good for us that we don't have enough of in our American diet. So please don't be scared of the banana, the berries, the strawberries. These are things that our bodies need, and they're wonderful for so many aspects of our health as well. Okay.

So I want to throw a curveball, too. So Blue Zone chats, because blue zones are places in the world where people live, like, past 100, and there's a large collection of them. So they go and study these places in the world of, like, okay, these people are, like, thriving now. A few of those blue zones, a lot of them drink alcohol every single day.

Yeah.

So let's talk about kind of, like, offsetting what that looks like for people who are maybe like, okay, well, I'm not gonna stop drinking my wine.

Yeah.

You know, I am going to have my pasta. So give me a little bit of info around what you think that is and what that Looks like.

So we have to think about, and this is one of the challenging things with nutrition science and health science is what else are all of those other variable factors in the Blue Zone? So those people living to 100 are probably not stressing out that their latest Instagram post and get a lot of likes. Yeah, they're probably not staying up all night watching zombie apocalypse dramas. They're probably not stressing out about the things that we stress out about all of the time. They're probably not eating as much processed food as we are. So there's lots of other variable factors in there. That means that their bodies can probably handle a little bit of red wine every day, you know. Now, red wine, yes, it has resveratrol, it has antioxidants, has all of those things, but they're probably not putting their livers under as much pressure as we do with all of the processed foods and environmental toxins. And there are so many other parts of Blue Zone living, being in community, being outside fitness, circadian rhythms, that I think to make that argument, we're losing a lot of the other variables. But if we do want to drink alcohol. So I gave up drinking about two and a half years ago, and I'm always very honest. It's still really hard. And I still miss a great glass of red wine and a glass of champagne. Not gonna lie. I think I always will. But for me, the health benefits outweighed the negative effects. But if we do want to drink, we want to think low sugar, we want to think organic, we want to think, what else can we do whilst we're drinking? So for most people, I'd say two to three drinks a week at the most. And if you can put those two days in a row, so like a Friday and a Saturday and a Sunday, like, done. I can do this. She's like, she's telling me to drink two days in a row.

Jenny.

I can do that.

That is how we do it, though. Like, if we're gonna have a cocktail, we have a cocktail cocktail on Friday, we have a cocktail on Saturday, and we try our best to limit it to one and be done for the week. Okay, Taking a moment for a rich girl tip for you. If you're somewhere between 500k and a million and trying to scale beyond that and feeling weirdly stuck right now, I'm going to tell you something that no one in your circle is going to ever tell you. You're not stuck. You're just surrounded by people who can't take you where you want to Go. So we need to be honest. You've outgrown your current circle. You've outgrown the rooms that you're in. And probably a whole lot of the advice that you have been getting is only going to have you regress or keep you stuck exactly where you are. So rich girl rule number one, proximity is a power move, you guys. You can't scale from asking people who haven't built what you want. And number two, if you're the one mentoring everyone, you're in the wrong room. So trust me, Chris and I have learned this the very expensive way. I have to tell you, this is going to hurt. We once paid 75k each for a mastermind where we were the most successful people in the room. Cute for our ego, terrible for our business and our pocketbooks. That was one of the most expensive, expensive lessons we've ever had to learn. No one was stretching us. No one had the answers that we really needed to scale. No one was playing much bigger than us. And we will never do that again. You guys. Everything changed when we finally got into the spaces where people talked. Investments, systems, scale and hiring like CEOs, not just hustling more rooms where conversations literally collapse. Timelines, you guys. And that's why we created the Elite Entrepreneur Mastermind. It is two, three and a half day luxury in person retreats with incredible experiences and it's monthly challenge solving calls. It's direct access to Chris and myself. It's a curated high level network where money moves faster because everyone is thinking so much bigger. Thinking big and making millions of dollars is the baseline in this room. So if you're ready for that type of room that finally matches your ambition, if you're done being the biggest thinker and pouring into everyone in your space and not getting poured into, just go to Instagram and DM me the word apply. Or you can go to show notes and you can click on the link below that says Elite Entrepreneur Mastermind. I will send you all of the details and from there we can book a call if you have more questions. You guys, don't forget about rule number three is to not wait for your circle to elevate you. Get in the room that literally upgrades your entire identity. And we also have the mentor collective Mastermind. If you have not hit over 500k yet, so go and check that out. And I am so excited to spend time with you in these incredible in person rooms next year.

As long as you're having, you know you're having, I say have waters your wingman so we have waters our wingman, we have glossy as our wingman. We want to make sure that we're diluting. That's my. As much as we can, giving our liver a chance. And then what else are we having in there? You know, it's not just alcohol that our liver has to detoxify. It's all of the junk from processed foods. So if we're eating a pretty clean diet and having a cocktail once or twice a week, then we're not putting that much pressure on our liver. So really choose your alcohol drinks wisely. You know, we don't want the, you know, same as you. You know, I grew up drinking in the 90s and the noughties and it was the sugary alcohol pops and, you know, awful, awful things. So Red Bull vodka. Red Bull vodka, Long island iced teas.

It's horrible, horrible.

Like they. And we would drink them because they're sweet and they tasted nice. Yeah, all of those things. So let's not drink those.

Blue lagoon, like, I don't even know what that was.

The color served in a fishbowl.

I don't know.

Yeah. And then you see it come up the next day.

Exactly. Certainly out of anything. Out of a fishbowl. Absolutely.

Just, just, just know. But yeah, Good organic red wine. One really nice cocktail that you're really going to enjoy, that you're going to savor. And then the next day, lots of water, lots of fiber. Just give your liver a little bit of a helping hand and so we can include it in there. Don't drink on an empty stomach. Make sure you're having some protein, some fiber, some healthy fats so we don't get that crazy sugar craving. Try and drink a little bit earlier in the day so we have time to metabolize it so it's not affecting our sleep. So there are ways of making it healthier.

I knew I was onto something earlier. Earlier cocktails, then my day is great. I don't even notice I had one now. To everyone. Just because I know some people can actually be so put off by, like, well, I'm not going to be able to do all of the things. So I love that we're having this conversation. And it is for, like, there's something different for everyone. I have friends who absolutely will not drink because they're so affected by it. And then friends who are like, if I can't drink, like, I'd rather just, you know, like, I'm good. Like, I want to make sure I can do that. So for me, some things that have really changed because I used to just have such a. I mean, honestly, like, not a great relationship with alcohol because it was like, like it was with food as well. It was like all or nothing. So I was like all in or all out? And I had to start looking at it like, okay, what I'm gonna do is if I have a cocktail, I'm not gonna have a dessert. Like, I'm truly gonna view that cocktail as like, this is my dessert, this is what I'm gonna get to enjoy. This is like the little sugary portion I'm gonna have for the evening. And then it made me slow down, savor. Be a lot more present.

Yeah.

My husband and I also try to create rituals around our cocktail where, like, instead of just drinking mindlessly, it'll be like, you know, we're at dinner, it'll be okay. What were the wins of the week? Let's like have our cocktail and really talk about like the wins and enjoy. And enjoy this time. Then when the food comes, we're done.

Yeah.

You know, and then maybe we get sparkling water or a non alcoholic beer or something for the rest of the meal. So this has been. I'm sharing this because this has been such a journey of like trying to learn how to trade joys in your life.

Yeah.

Because essentially at the end of the day, that's kind of what we're doing. We're learning how to replace these joys that feel like without them, we don't know who we are. Like, their, their identity. Sugar and desserts are an identity. Cocktails are an identity. Like, it is a hard joy cycle to break, to just be like, oh my God, now what do I do? What do I feel? These things that I looked all, you know, we forward to. So for you, what's something that helped you replace that, like when you quit?

Yeah. And it's really interesting, that identity piece, because that was huge for me as well. So growing up, the drinking culture in the UK is different to here. So we drink a lot earlier. And drinking was my way of connecting with my girlfriends. So I have great girlfriends who we've all been friends since we were 12. So very, very long relationships. And then as I was growing up in my teen, you know, as a teens and my 20s and in my 30s, somehow managed to always live within like 10 minutes of my best friend, wherever we were. So our Friday nights would be. Friday nights we would drink. We used to meet for dinner on a Friday night. Dinner and wine. And then we'd have cheese and wine afterwards and Then we kind of skipped the dinner part because we love the cheese and the wine. So that would always be when I moved to the US And I miss my friends. I would find myself drinking on a Friday night because I was like, oh, this still connects me back to my friends back home. Yeah. So even though I wasn't doing it with them, it was still like, oh, this is still a little bit of.

Nostalgia, a little joy.

Exactly. I was, I felt connected to, to them through it. And then, you know, I think we probably all drank a little bit too much during the pandemic and coping mechanisms and fine, we needed to do what we had to do. But for me, I was preparing for surgery and then recovering for surgery and I wanted to do everything I could to be optimized for that surgery. So it's like, okay, I'm going to give alcohol a little break. So I had the surgery in November and then I didn't drink until Christmas Eve. Now Christmas Eve, we do a zoom call with all of my friends. So Christmas Eve in the UK is lunchtime in, you know, on the east coast. So I swear I had like half a glass of Prosecco, like nothing at all. And a couple of hours afterwards I felt terrible. I was like, I have a hangover already. But I knew I couldn't go cold turkey. So again, it was that ritual piece of the puzzle. So for me, Friday, 4 o', clock, kind of, I would down tools and that's when I would have a drink. So I had to replace that with I did a non alcoholic gin and tonic to start with. And so that would be like my little ritual. Okay, this is it. I can cut like I can feel the stress leaving my body. And then that changed to a herbal tea or something similar. And now I don't even think about it. But I had to do that stair step to get to where I am now. And I think that can be a really great way for, you know, we're talking about optimization. And yeah, for optimization we absolutely want to do the pinnacle of what's best, but we have to get there first. So maybe for someone that is, they don't want to give up sodas. Okay, so we're going to go and do a Lacroix or we're going to do some sparkling water with some fruit juice. I'm not going to make you give that up. Or maybe it's even just you go from full fat coke to Diet Coke to start with, then we go down another level. So I think the identity pieces are really big piece of that. And then you mentioned something about what I call the either or method. So no, we don't have to give up every glass of wine, every dessert, every fries, every bread basket. But it's finding that either or. So what's the thing that feels the best to you? Is that another cocktail or is that dessert? Is that the bread basket or is that fries? And I think that way we can still feel like we're having a treat but not feel terrible the next day. And that's something I use a lot if people are traveling or traveling for business, is that they don't want to be that person. But if they have a cocktail or they're sharing fries with the table, then they're still getting a little bit of something, but they're still going to be able to form the next day.

What little things like that have been huge for me. Like what feels really indulgent for me is with girlfriends, instead of going out all night long, it'll be like, you know what, let's actually meet for like a later lunch. So we have one glass of wine. You don't really want to. A lot of times I don't want to drink a ton if I know I have to like still walk my dogs or go home in the evening, you know, so it'll be like a glass of truffle fries and maybe we order a salad as well, you know. And it's like that feels so indulgent and soul nurturing to me actually, that it's like, whoa, this is so different.

Than what I used to do.

Like huge dinner, bread basket, appetizers, cocktails.

Like the whole thing.

And now it still feels that, that same way, but completely different. Like I can move on from that.

And still feel great, but it felt.

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Yeah.

That you have.

So really, I see blood sugar balance and protein optimization kind of going hand in hand. So we can't have good blood sugar balance without protein. So really what we're taking out, I call it the five to full and the five to fail framework. So the five to fail are the things that we're going to be taking out on an everyday basis. So it's going to be our sugar, it's going to be our refined carbohydrates, it's going to be our inflammatory fats, it's going to be our alcohol, and then the five to four. So if we're thinking about blood sugar balance, then number one, we're going to be thinking protein, we're going to be thinking fiber, we're going to be thinking healthy fats, we're going to be thinking polyphenols. So lots of things have their moment in the spotlight. So proteins having a moment in the spotlight. Five is having a moment in the spotlight. Mark my words. Next year, polyphenols will be the, the go to word and then probiotics as well. So really making sure that we've got our blood sugar balance, we're not having that sugar in there to spike things to get those dips and spikes, to get that hangry feeling we're having protein for. You know, it's funny, we were talking about protein in the functional medicine world 15, 20 years ago and just wishing it would have its moment. And now it's having its moment. And unfortunately, when anything has a moment, there is always a backlash to it. But protein, really, if you've got that protein in there, that's going to be the foundation of your blood sugar balance. It's almost most satiating nutrient. It turns on our satiety hormones, it turns off our hunger hormones and just keeps us feeling nice and full, satiated, level, calm, grounded. I always feel more grounded when I've got more protein. Now that's apart from its wonderful benefits for our metabolism, for our lean muscle mass, for our skin, for our brain health, for all of those things. But blood sugar balance, really, we want to be taking out those ultra processed foods, making sure that we've got enough protein in there. Lots of fruits and vegetables. People always say to me, should I take a fiber supplement? I'm like, let's hit our 8 to 9 servings of fruits and veggies a day. Then we can add a fiber supplement. We're having eight to nine servings of fruits and veggies. Let's make sure there's lots of brightly colors in there because then we're going to get those polyphenols in there and then probiotic foods, maybe not at every meal, but certainly at least once a day. And that's a really, really great framework. Once we get to that. Now that's going to be a nutrient dense diet anyway. Now once we get to that part, then we can get into the fun part, which is really optimizing for that person or for an event or for a big conference or a keynote, or then it's like once we've got this really good foundation, we've got blood sugar balance, we've got our protein going in there, we've got nutrient dense foods, Then we can get to the fun part, which is where I come in, which is what is that smoothie that we can give you before you have to do a keynote so you hit all of your marks. What is that soup that we can give you that is full of bone broth and things are going to make your skin glowing before you have a photo shoot? So that's really where I come in. That's where I think it's really fun because we can really optimize every single meal that you're eating for whatever You've got coming up in your schedule.

I can imagine for people who get to that place, which we'll talk about, you're like, okay, well now I look this good and feel this good. How do I do this every day?

Yeah.

Okay, so let's go back a little bit to why poly?

Why polyphenols? Phenols. Okay. So polyphenols are plant compounds that give plants their, that richly color. So we have polyphenols in red wine, we have polyphenols and coffee and dark chocolate. Those are two of my favorite sources. We have them in berries, we have them in red cabbage. So they are, they're antioxidants, they're polyphenols. They are wonderful for our brain health, they're wonderful for our skin health. They also help to produce GLP1 hormone. So again, very hot topic, a whole other conversation. So what a lot of people don't understand is that GLP1 is a hormone that we make naturally.

Naturally.

And polyphenols are one of the food compounds that we can eat more of to help us make more GLP1. So we're seeing a lot of supplements these days rebrand as natural GLP1s enhances. And one of the things that they're going to have in there is polyphenol derived ingredients. So polyphenols, I really think they're going to have their moment in the sun, but really we just want to think about to get those into our diet. How many different plant based foods can we have of different colors? And again, organic coffee, dark chocolate berries, extra virgin olive oil, matcha green tea. You know, just having a couple of servings of those a day, which we probably are anyway. But just being a little bit more deliberate about it can be a huge, huge difference, especially for skin health. So I see it huge amounts for skin health and then also for our gut health as well, because they help to feed our good bacteria.

So protein, obviously, protein's having a moment. I have a really great friend who I feel like helped make protein a moment, Dr. Gabrielle Lyon. And yeah, just like, I, I don't know, you made protein a star. Like, yeah, it already was starting and she just like amplified it, which I, I love. But for people who, thankfully in the fitness world, I'd gotten so used to like working in protein in my diet, but I know it's a huge struggle for people. Like, is there certain proteins that people should avoid? How do you feel about, you know, whey protein, vegan protein? I'd love to hear that.

Yeah. So it, it's a, it's a very interesting conversation. And a lot of the time with social media noise, there's, you know, a black and a white, and the answer is usually somewhere in a gray area. But that's always hard to communicate through social media. And it's, people don't want to hear a gray area. They want to hear, oh, I'm right. Oh, that person's wrong.

People also want to create. And I know we'll talk about this throughout the podcast that we're doing together. You guys were doing a couple podcasts together. But also, people want to be controversial online so that they get comments and views. So, like, they, they may even know while they're talking about it that there is the answer is found in the gray. But they need to be polarizing.

100, 100 and I had a crazy, crazy situation the other day where I just, I commented on someone in a very famous functional medicine doctor commented on the post, and so much vitriol came at me from both sides of it, and so many did. Like, I looked away from my phone and there was 10 different comments. And I was like, you realize that this is the whole point of what this post is about, is that we want to create more engagement. Boost engagement, boost engagement. So that's the crazy part. But going back to protein. Yes, not all proteins are created equal. And Dr. Gabrielle Lyon, she's a mutual friend of ours, I learn a lot from her and her mentor, Dr. Donald Layman. If you ever want to know anything about protein science, he is the go to for it. But not all proteins are created equal. So plant proteins versus animal proteins, our animal proteins have, well, let's say we talk about protein as if it was all one thing. Different proteins, different types of proteins have different amino acids. Different amino acids do different things in the body. So we should be talking about amino acids, not about protein, as if it were all one thing. Different amino acids do different things in the body, just like different vitamins and minerals do different things in the body, just like different strains of probiotics do different things in the body. So we need to kind of take a step back and look at amino acids rather than proteins. Now, our animal proteins have a lot of different amino acids compared to our plant proteins or in different amounts. One of the big differences is that animal protein has something called leucine in it. Now, leucine is the amino acid that, that turns on our switch to make lean muscle mass. So this is one of the reasons why it can be harder to make or to build lean muscle mass on a vegan or vegetarian diet, it's not impossible, but it just takes a little bit more thought. So really if someone is an omnivore so they eat everything, then we should be prioritizing animal protein in there. We can up that with some of our plant proteins. I'm not anti plant proteins. We do find that, that some of the rice, the pea, those proteins can be a little bit more pro inflammatory and they're not as easily absorbed by the body as something like a whey or even a grass fed beef protein. Now a lot of people come to me and they say I have real issues with whey protein, I'm not great with dairy. That's a whole other piece of the puzzle. Because really if you're not being able to digest dairy, we need to look at gut health first. So we have to take a step back because we want you to be able to have dairy because dairy has some really, really great gut great benefits to it. But if they can't do a whey protein, I might do a grass fed beef protein which is exactly as it sounds. It's like a grass fed steak but made into a whey protein. Everyone's like, does it taste like beef? I'm like, no, it tastes like vanilla milkshake. So I think if you are eating everything, if you're an omnivore prioritizing your animal proteins, it's just going to make it a little bit easier for you to get those amino acids that are going to help you build that lean muscle mass.

Okay, so I've heard recently because so many people aminos were really hot to take steak for a long time and then people are like, these don't do anything.

Yes, tell me, tell me what's they do do things. So we have to think about them again. It's never an all or nothing. Okay, so if I'm eating a really low protein diet but taking an amino acid supplement, is that optimal? Absolutely not. But they are going to help you get those amino acids, especially if you're on a vegan or vegetarian diet or you know, you're running around, maybe you're working out fasted, they are going to give you those what we call branch chain amino acids which can help you spark that lean muscle mass.

So do we need to be taking those while eating protein? Like if you're not eating protein, does it really work or not?

Good question. So no, it's still going to work if you're not eating protein. So where I typically use amino acids is if someone really wants to put on lean muscle mass. So we know that women over 40, our ability to make lean muscle mass declines. Our muscle mass is declining also as our estrogen levels are coming down, it's harder for our body to make that lean muscle mass. So women over 40 might want to think about putting an amino acid supplement in there. I don't like my women to train fasted. It can be really, really stressful on the body. And if we're trying, if our goal is to put on lean muscle mass, but we're going in there in a depleted state, that's not always a good option. So at any age, at any age, at any age, but especially over 40. So a lot of my women are training first thing in the morning and they're going to a Barry's boot camp or something crazy and they're going fasted and they're wondering why they feel depleted and exhausted and starving afterwards. But they're like, well, I'm not going to drink a smoothie or eat some eggs before I go work out. So I'm like, okay, let me take your water bottle. In that water bottle, we're going to do our amino acids, we're going to do our creatine, we're going to do our glossy, and then we might do some collagen in there as well. So we're getting those amino acids, they're already broken down so they're easy for the body to digest. So it's not going to, you're not going to feel sick or heavy when you're doing your workout out, but you're giving your body the raw materials it needs to go, oh, I know what you want me to do. You want me to put on lean.

Muscle mass here and using any age, like for fasting, for working out. But then on other days, I'm so curious what you think of like fasted, like fasted mornings. Like, you know, up until a certain.

Time it's going to be. It depends.

Okay?

So anytime someone asks me a question like that, my answer is always going to be it depends. It depends on your goals, it depends on your health status and it depends on, on, on who you are and what your day has. I honestly believe that breakfast is the most important meal of the day. Now a lot of women are fasting in the morning and they're missing that window to make lean muscle mass. So we fast maybe 12 hours overnight. When we wake up, our body is primed to make that lean muscle. So we want to get in about 30 grams of protein really within about an hour of waking up because that's the time that our body is optimized for lean muscle synthesis.

This.

So for most people, I'm going to say we want to have breakfast now if we're fasting. The best time to fast is actually have an early bird special. Like I love a five o', clock, five o' clock dinner, 5:30 dinner. Give yourself at least 12 hours overnight. Everybody should be doing 12 hours overnight. But then you can push maybe 14 hours, you know, 13 to 14 hours. And then when you wake up, have that protein rich breakfast within an hour of waking up up. That's going to do your body so much better than eating at 10 o' clock at night and then skipping breakfast in the morning.

So I want to know about. Now we're on the, you know, the topic of protein and making sure we're eating and all of the things, does protein impact, like beauty, face, skin? Tell me about it. Because I'm like, okay, if you're losing muscle on your body, we're losing probably muscle in our face too. Even though I know we're losing fat and volume. Yeah. Are we losing muscle too?

Yeah.

Yes.

Yeah, we're absolutely losing muscle. So part of the work that I do with l' Oreal is how are we. And, and a lot of what I'm talking about these days. And actually there's a book in the works about this. But how do we prevent the muscle loss, volume loss, fat loss, collagen loss, elastin loss from our face when we have weight loss? Now we see this with not just GLPs, but also with rapid weight loss diets. And we see it with aging as well. So collagen and elastin, those are proteins in the skin. So again, they're made of amino acids. So if we're not eating a high protein diet, we're not going to be giving our skin what it needs to build this elastin and build this collagen, which is what keeps our face youthful and lifted and glowing. So, yes, protein intake in the diet is so important for our skin health because it really is those building blocks of feeling lifted and young and youthful.

All right, so what are some of the biggest mistakes that you see high performers making when it comes to their health? I know we just talked about diet and we'll probably talk a lot more about that, but what are some of the big mistakes you see for high performers?

Yeah, I think the biggest one is probably not understanding what a huge tool it can be for high performance. You Know, I think high performers, we're so keen to find the best AI tool, we're so keen to optimize our funnels, we're so keen to, you know, all of these things, find the best team members. But we're missing the biggest piece of the puzzle, which is our physical and mental health. So I think the biggest mistake people are making are underestimating how important it is. That's number one. Number two is following generalized advice. Now, generalized advice will get you so far. So generalized advice, eat more protein, Fantastic. Eat more vegetables, fantastic. Go to the gym, great. And you do those things for a certain amount of time and you're like, okay, I've got somewhere, but I'm not seeing optimal results. And this is where, following precision protocols, looking at your data. So really the two things that we're looking at is where are you starting from? So do you have issues if you're tired and sluggish? Do we need to look at your thyroid function? Do we need to make sure that you're having more iron in your diet? If you're taking an iron supplement, is it the right type of iron supplement? Is your gut health good enough for you to be able to absorb the iron? So really, getting detailed can mean such a huge difference for how you show up, how you stand on a stage, how you get through a long travel day. So the following, the generalized advice will get someone. Same with business, it's the same with anything. Generalise will only get you so far. It's a great foundation, but there's so much more to be had, which is where I get excited because then we can get down to the nitty gritty.

I cannot stress enough how important I feel that this is because I think so many people in business, we get in these, you know, we have our, our masterminds, we have an elite mastermind and then we have like a mid tier mastermind. So people who are just starting and I can literally spot people who I know have, like, should be working on this far more than they should be working on their business because there is a, like, you guys, this affects your attitude, this affects what you believe is possible. Because I. Of people who are like, I just don't have the ener. I just don't believe I have the energy for that. Yeah, I'm not a good sleeper, so I don't know how much energy I'm going to have for this business. I'm not like the, the endless things that I hear that I believe if they really put more focus on their health, their Food, their sleep, who they're around, what they're thinking. I know we're going to talk a little bit about that too. Like they are probably not probably. I believe they're a totally different person. Yeah. Like you got some of you listening, don't even understand that you have a completely different personality that is probably very powerful.

Yeah.

Very positive. Maybe even not as introverted as you thought.

Yeah.

And maybe you're like even more excited to connect with people and get out there and you feel more courage. Like this can all be related to how you feel in certain situations. If you go into a social situation feeling tired, lethargic, little foggy, maybe not quick with your thinking, like that's gonna really affect how you show up majorly. You know, and how confident you feel in your skin is a very different ballgame when you start to, when we start to like tweak those things 100%.

And it's even, it gives you more hours in the day.

It does.

If you have better energy, if you're not bloated, if you don't have joint pain, if you don't have that brain fog, if you've got more energy, if you've got more cognitive function and you can get way more done in an hour than you know, trying to slog through three hours of something when you might not have slept well the night before. You've had a quick grab, you've grabbed your breakfast from Panera or Starbucks. Like I do think it is such an underutilized tool in high performance.

That's why when you really look at these high performing athletes like they won't, they won't mess with their, their protocol during, especially like during the season. They just will not mess with it because they know that, that they need every ounce of edge that they can get if they want to win against other people who are doing the same types of methods.