In this episode of Get Your Shit Together we chat about:
🧡 Getting addicted to HIIT classes
🧡 Rethinking workout recovery and ab training
🧡 The journey from barbell to kettlebell
🧡 How our approach with lab testing has evolved
🧡 ”Clean beauty” drama, Beautycounter products we still love
Episode Show Notes: www.getyourshittogetherpod.com/podcast/episode94
Follow us on Instagram @getyourshittogetherpod
Connect with Diane:
Instagram: @dianeteall
Website: www.diteawellness.com
Enroll in Root Cause Reset (self-study): www.rcrprogram.com
Connect with Adina:
Instagram: @adinarubin_
Website: www.adinarubincoaching.com
Sign up for STHH and use the code “LASTCHANCE” for $150 off through Tuesday July 25th
In this episode of Get Your Shit Together we chat about:
🧡 Getting addicted to HIIT classes
🧡 Rethinking workout recovery and ab training
🧡 The journey from barbell to kettlebell
🧡 How our approach with lab testing has evolved
🧡 ”Clean beauty” drama, Beautycounter products we still love
Episode Show Notes: www.getyourshittogetherpod.com/podcast/episode94
Follow us on Instagram @getyourshittogetherpod
Connect with Diane:
Instagram: @dianeteall
Website: www.diteawellness.com
Enroll in Root Cause Reset (self-study): www.rcrprogram.com
Connect with Adina:
Instagram: @adinarubin_
Website: www.adinarubincoaching.com
Sign up for STHH and use the code “LASTCHANCE” for $150 off through Tuesday July 25th
Hello.
Diane:Hi. It's a part two
Adina:It's a part two.
Diane:different day, same stuff.
Adina:Same shirt
Diane:Is it? Is that the same shirt that you threw on right before last time,
Adina:It's not the same shirt from last time, but maybe two times ago. I was thinking about how like when we record, it's morning for Diane or early afternoon,
Diane:right?
Adina:so she is just like fresh, starting her day, putting on a cute fit and it's nighttime for me. I have already come back from the beach showered, put on my PJs, so like every single video is going to be me in this black t-shirt or otherwise baggy tea and usually a bun. I deliberately took my hair down right before we hit record'cause I was
Diane:curls.
Adina:I need to make it look slightly different than the last four videos, but also, Ovulation station humidity. It's gonna make those curls pop.
Diane:Yeah, look at that curl definition.
Adina:Look at it. Nothing in here. This was fresh from a shower last night.
Diane:I love it. I love when the humidity strikes and makes you feel dewy.
Adina:It definitely strikes here.
Diane:Mm-hmm. Yeah. Hard. Yeah. I will be feeling all the humidity because I'm actually going to Virginia Beach. If y'all don't know that is where I grew up. That's where most of my family is. I stuck around here in Michigan, the mitten state after college, after I was booed up with Neil. That was my reason to stay.
Adina:up.
Diane:But yeah, my family went all back to Virginia and it is, the humidity there is so thick, like you can't comfortably go outside until the late afternoon evening, and I'll be wearing something I haven't been wearing in a while, black. Black Friday, Saturday, because I'm actually going home for unfortunate circumstances. My grandpa passed away, so not the circumstances in which I want to see my family and a bunch of extended family that's coming in, but I am looking forward to seeing some of them that we haven't seen in a long time.
Adina:Yeah, we're very sorry for your loss. I always loved seeing your grandpa and your stories. He's just the sweetest, cutest man.
Diane:Wasn't he so cute? I, he was going to be 98 next month, and I might've shared a bit about him. I know I certainly did in my newsletter because I was sharing some gut health tips from PopPop, my Lolo, my grandpa, that's who I'm talking about over the years. And he had, he wasn't doing well in November, but he rallied, and this has happened for like the last. Six to eight years, something will happen and he just bounces back. And I think that's in big part too, just his attitude. He was one of the most kind and generous people and definitely a very positive father figure in my life. Whereas my Lola, my grandma, you might have heard me imitate her here in the past. She had so much love. Both of my grandparents did. They immigrated here from the Philippines and I wanna say like 1966. Very, very hardworking and very generous. They both put some of our extended family, like cousins, aunties through school and helped them come to the States. So they were very loved. And I know we have a lot of people coming out for them. But my grandpa was just so kind and generous and he always believed in me. And if he saw my story this past week, he was such a great cheerleader. I had this video, it was from September, 2019, right after I first launched Root Cause, reset my program, like as a group. And I was telling him about it and he said that he was so proud of me. And he goes, pretty soon you'll have a thousand clients or a million. And he said, I was so clever on the phone. I had showed him a cat filter on
Adina:You are so
Diane:And he's like, you're so talented. Like, how did you do this? And don't tell him it was just a filter. But he, every time I spoke with him on the phone or we would FaceTime, he would say, how is your business? How are your clients? You're doing so great. I'm so proud of you. And he was just, yeah, just such a big cheerleader and. Very, very important to me. I think all summers through childhood, I would be in the pool at his house or you know, around their kitchen table, eating Olympia, eating Filipino food, and he's just jolly and also loved a good fart joke.
Adina:Aw, it sounds like we all need a pop pop in our lives.
Diane:he also cracked my crab legs. He may have seen that on my story too. So thanks for giving me some space to talk about him here. I was telling Adina before we started recording, like of course once we start recording video, I've had two of like the most profound losses and a lot of heavy grief in the last couple months between losing our Huey, our, our dog Huey, and my PopPop. So it's, I have a heavy heart, not gonna lie, but I'm also, um, you know, taking a lot of time to rest and I'm really appreciative of clients who, uh, are understanding of that too. So lots of extra rest, time to process and time to be with family. That's been really nice this past week.
Adina:Yeah, it's been quite a month over there.
Diane:Yeah,
Adina:putting that eye makeup up to the test.
Diane:yeah, I do have mascara on today. Um, and you know, some days that's just how grief goes. I think I was very fortunate to not have experienced much grief until, um, this year, or it had been a while. It's been like, I wanna say over 10 years since my grandmother passed away and we were very close. But sometimes it can really surprise you. Like I'll, you'll text me and ask me how I'm doing, how I'm taking care of myself, and I'll feel fine, and then I'll go pick up sourdough and some song or something will trigger me and I'll cry in a parking lot. So it really can vary. And that's all the more reason to, to be gentle with yourself. Or maybe someone starts mowing their lawn and I get really aggressive out of nowhere.
Adina:Oh man. Yeah. Summer has uh, been a time over here too. Like we're having a lot of fun, but the schedule has shifted considerably.
Diane:Mm-hmm.
Adina:kids' day is shorter. Like their camp day is shorter than their school day was. It's only an hour, but it's making a huge difference in my life because the day wasn't that long to begin with and I had gotten into this rhythm of like I knew when I trained in the mornings and I still had time to get my work done that day, even if I trained and still had time to get some stuff done around the house, like that extra hour. I mean, you know, like being a mom business owner, you've watched me through this for the last six years, like it is a real exercise in essentialism and like that hour I did not realize how crucial it was to the structure of my business and life and training. So it's taken a toll. I've been training at night some days,
Diane:that. I saw those dark videos.
Adina:it's not for me. Oh man. It from the moment, oh my God, from the moment I put Ori down for to bed, till I like hype myself up and convince myself to go train it's touch and go, it really, it's
Diane:I finish this workout? Who
Adina:will I even make my butt upstairs? Like, Hmm. It's really tough. So if you're in a season where you're having a hard time fitting or training in, I see you. I just have to keep reminding myself of my goals of the type of person I am and want to be the progress I wanna make and the consistency I need in order to make that happen. So
Diane:Yeah. And the beautiful thing about your programming though is that you can split things up. Like I think I logged a workout last week where something came up, or I procrastinated. I started later and I was faced with, okay, either I don't do this workout at all. Or I had a really stressful week. I'm at least going to commit to my, my warmup, my breath work and see how far I make it. And I made it halfway through and that's still, still something. So yeah,
Adina:I know it's been like, maybe I'll just do the strength lifts and we will just see about that last circuit. Um, but yeah, it's still going well. I got, I had a really nice press PR yesterday on my Seesaw press, which I barely even thought I was gonna end up training. So it was fun and exciting to see that progress, even though it's been interesting
Diane:those seesaw presses are fun,
Adina:they
Diane:Looking up at it. It feels so good on that upper back.
Adina:I need to do a post about that on Instagram because many a trainer out there think that Seesaw Press means that you press one and then press the other. That's just a alternating press. It's a seesaw because
Diane:See, because I see it and I saw it.
Adina:it. Um, yeah, I gotta make that content.
Diane:Yeah, please do. I see it. I saw it. So other things over here as far as what we're consuming, I didn't put really anything of note in here because I just haven't been craving many things. I'm doing What I did, what I said I did last month when Huey passed away is setting reminders to eat and just trying to get fun with the seasoning I'm using, like I made a bunch of chicken with the last of my Zatar from The Shook. I'll miss it. I'll just have to go pick up some more. But other things that I'm consuming lots of books and it's time for a so and tell if you're watching The last time I
Adina:pause. So, and tell how cute.
Diane:Yes, it's a summer of creating and community. I've been talking about abstract art classes. I think I mentioned that last week. So that was the last week of that class. But last we picked, we left off, I was decorating my Kindle. We got a pop socket on here. We got some stickers, woman owned, business owner, you know, looking like a snack. So I can hold my Kindle. Got a decal on it. But then I made a G Y S T themed Kindle sleeve on accident. I mean, look at it, it's just missing the blue and the red. It's got a cute little polka dot liner so I can tuck her in in here. So we got that one. Oh my gosh. My neighbor is now mowing their front lawn after a little break. That's great. So we got that one, and then we have this one with some gold metallic thread. So that one's like on brand for me, but they're super easy to make. I'm trying to figure out magnets. So that's my next step.
Adina:It, there's just no closure on it right now. I.
Diane:No, because I underestimated how much this quilting would shrink my finished product. So I had to innovate instead of scrapping it, I was like, it still works. Just maybe don't turn it upside down. So I need more space for a magnet and then I'm going to close it with a magnet. But it's like a little protection. Wear protection. Mm-hmm.
Adina:Welcome to our sewing podcast.
Diane:Yeah. So I spent a lot of time sewing and playing and reading this weekend, sewing with my mother-in-law. I have plans to make Doug a quilted dog bed. We'll see how that goes this fall. But he deserves it.
Adina:he deserves the best.
Diane:Mm-hmm. Um, and as far as media, really not much. I've been reading, I might've mentioned this before, fourth Wing, it is like the new popular fantasy book. I don't know if it's ya, because there's a lot of swearing, but it is being called like the next Harry Potter level. In popularity book, but words, words are hard. It is supposed to be as popular as Harry Potter.
Adina:I think that the, ya could handle the swearing these days.
Diane:Yeah. I'm like halfway through. It's like dark academia. These kids are, it go into college to possibly bond with dragons, get paired up with a dragon. Neil sat down and let me tell him like five minutes worth of the plot so far before he was like, okay, I think I've had enough. But it's really good. It's really good. It's would be a good fall book, like a back to school, back to Dragon's book.
Adina:Back to Dragon's
Diane:Mm-hmm.
Adina:Okay. I am Of note eating. I've been making this fig jam. Did I talk about this yet?
Diane:No.
Adina:Oh, it's very yearMy. The figs here have been amazing, but we've been ordering a bunch of them, like where we order our fruit from. The figs have been so good, but the thing that happens is we order them. Sometimes you don't realize that some of them are gonna be mushy when you order your fruit or we order too much. And then some of them end up in the back of the fridge and they kinda like freeze and then they unfreeze and like they're just not a good texture for eating. So I've been jamming'em and I just do figs, sugar and lemon juice, fresh squeezed lemon, cook it down. So jammy, so sweet. It's like the best flavor ever. I feel like it needs an herb, like maybe like a cardamom or something like that.
Diane:I still have some cardamon from the Shook. That would be yummy.
Adina:Something spicy or herb or, I don't
Diane:are you doing with it? Are you putting it on with some cheese
Adina:Mm-hmm. Cheese. I've been eating it just with like my eggs in the morning and sometimes on bread with butter. It's just delicious.
Diane:Yeah. That sounds yummy. I feel like, no, that was an onion jam. I'm thinking of something that you made for
Adina:My brisket onion jam.
Diane:mm-hmm. All the jams. We like those. It is. We just finished strawberry season here in Michigan, so I know a lot of that was happening. Next it'll be peach season, I believe. Mm.
Adina:our, our stone fruit are in season right now and they're crazy good. Um, and then on the media front, I'm not watching anything new. We're still getting through the bear, but we did just watch this very stressy episode. That was amazing. There's an episode that's an hour long, it's kinda like a mini movie and I don't wanna ruin it,
Diane:two. Yeah.
Adina:yes, it's basically like a Christmas dinner with the whole family. It's a flashback and the cast is Banana Town. It's like Bob Odenkirk, Jamie Lee Curtis plays the mom and she like, will win an Oscar for this episode. Like it was so good. Uh, it feels like an Oscar'cause it's a movie, but it'll be up in the Emmys next year.
Diane:Yeah.
Adina:It was John Delaney is in it, and it's like, yeah, it's crazy. Also, um, Gillian Jacobs from Community The Blonde one that you hate. Oh, you love her. I thought you hated her.
Diane:Oh, she was in love.
Adina:Oh. And love. Do you hate her? Did I, I feel like we
Diane:I don't hate her. She's not my favorite. I think it was her voice was a little grading, but
Adina:Yeah. Um, anyways, it is crazy. Good episode. Like crazy good. And so if you're not watching Season Two of The Bear, or if you never watched Season one, highly recommend
Diane:I am in season one, but I put a pause, put a pin in that for things like fantasy books that involve going to Dragon School instead.
Adina:less stress.
Diane:Yeah. Although there's a lot of stress that happens in the book, but it's, I mean, not too, not too bad. And now I think my standards for fictional protagonist men have really been raised, like if he can't wield shadows or like speak to me through his mind. Don't want him, don't want him, that those are my standards now. They're high. Um,
Adina:Keep those standards high.
Diane:Which can I give props to Neil? We were at this, A Friend's get together this past weekend, we're all talking about movies and film, and somehow people started talking about their celebrity crushes. Their celebrity hall passes, and they get to kneel and they go, who's your celebrity hall pass? And he goes, I have a beautiful wife who I think about all the time, so I don't have one. I was like, you're so sweet. And I think somewhere in there I said, Brad Pitt in any era, but Sweet, sweet Neil.
Adina:do you take it back now?
Diane:Send me, I gotta take it back.
Adina:um,
Diane:He, he's a handsome
Adina:yeah. We didn't even talk about Barb Heimer weekend.
Diane:Oh yeah. I might see it this week. So both of them? Yeah. Barb Inheimer, it's them. Do you think, okay. A lot of people here are Cosplaying Coplay, dressing up as Barbie. I saw some really fantastic outfits this week at a weekend, at a vintage flea market. But I don't see anyone in Fedoras. Or dressing up for Oppenheimer.
Adina:Interesting. Very interesting.
Diane:different crowd. Um, before we get into the meat and the potatoes, I have to share with you a few stories that people sent into the dms after this last, last week's episode where I wore my seafood pajamas and said that I had crabs. I had crabs in my pajamas, and so I invited you to share with us some accidental flus, slips of tongue, and you delivered. These are so good, and a few of them were from chef friends, which I thought was really funny. So let's see what we've got before I lose my shit on. Oh, the neighbor is like right between our two houses right now. This first one is from our friend. Well, I don't want to name them. It was from a friend of the podcast and she said, literally one of my favorite stories ever. A friend of mine had to give her boss her login info for something for work, and she had to proceed to tell him over the phone that her password was poop in my butt, six, nine. And as soon as I heard that, I thought, why didn't they just say, oh, you know what? I forgot my password. I'm gonna have to go look it up. They go change their password and then give it to their boss. But she said, uh, no. It is poop in my butt. Six, nine. That's my, that's my password.
Adina:Mm-hmm. Good,
Diane:That one made me itch. Um, this next one also made me laugh and itch the same time. Okay. And this is from a friend of the pod who is a chef, teaches some cooking classes. She said one time I said smegma instead of schmutz while teaching a cooking class. Yikes. I just said, just wipe the smm the counter. It's fine. And a student was like, um, I wanted to die. Worst slip of tongue ever.
Adina:How do you confuse those two?
Diane:Schmutz, sch, sch magma. They both, yeah, they both, um, sound icky, but one is much ickier than the other.
Adina:Well, schmutz could kind of be describing anything, I guess.
Diane:Not necessarily something from your underpants another one from another chef friend recording an educational video from my community. I said, do you pound your meat? That's a personal question. And then finally, someone said that they work at Wilson, like tennis balls. Wilson had said there's often talk about balls. So much ball talk.
Adina:I feel like I'm in like grade.
Diane:Yes. And that was our explicit, those are our explicit funnies. I was expecting maybe some like PG slip of tongue. They're just something silly. But yeah, everybody delivered on that one.
Adina:That's good. Oh, that is loud.
Diane:you, can you see her while she walked by? There she is.
Adina:I can't see her'cause of the glare, but I can hear her.
Diane:yeah, she just walked by. We have like 10 feet between these two houses, so
Adina:All right.
Diane:walk back in a second.
Adina:Diane's neighbor is mowing the lawn very loud and she's gonna do her best to get it out of her audio. But if you hear some ambient noise in the background, excuse us, because it is past my bedtime and we can't wait any longer to continue this episode.
Diane:quite literally must go on.
Adina:must go on. So we're gonna get back into the meat, the potatoes. And this is a part two of the episode we did last week, which was all about things we've changed our mind about. And just a reminder, if you didn't listen to that one, we'll go back and listen to that one.'cause this is part two, but we always reserve the rights to change our minds
Diane:And to party.
Adina:Anything and everything and the right to party, we reserve the right to party. So just letting you know that important piece of information. Um, again, like the big picture, things are not changing, but details change along the way. Our approach changes a little bit. We are always evolving as we are working with clients. We are always seeing what's working, seeing what's not working, researching, learning, re-implementing, and then adjusting accordingly.
Diane:That's growth baby.
Adina:that is growth. Um, I didn't say this last week, but one of my favorite parts of bridesmaids is, you know, when Maya Rudolph and I mean, when Rose Byrne and Kristen Wig are like getting catty with each other about like, who's better friends with Maya Rudolph and they do that whole thing at the tennis court. She's like, well, She's changed. So, know, and then they
Diane:they're like one-upping each other.
Adina:yeah, well, you know, we're, we're, we're always growing, so we're changing. But, you know, we, we stay the same. Ultimately, we always stay the same. Like they just keep going back and forth. Nothing. Donna and I do that all the time. I find it very funny.
Diane:Such a good movie.
Adina:all good
Diane:Yeah. So last episode, we covered food stuffs and some overlap with some of the content here, but we just realized we had so much to say about how our approach. As nutritional therapists, um, as a strength coach have evolved in regards to how we see food and how we create protocols with our clients. So we're gonna start this episode off talking about something else that we love so much, and that is fitness. Fitness and how more specifically a Dino's approach has changed over the years, over this 10 years that she's been doing this whole strength coaching thing. So yeah, what are some things that have evolved over that time?
Adina:Yeah, I think it also will be interesting to hear your perspective as like a trainee, just like things you've done throughout the years and what changed and how you feel. Um, but yeah, it's been a journey. I mean, I've been in this industry for over a decade and as I mentioned on the last episode, it's a pretty young field. Like it's a young industry and so things are changing all the time. There's not a whole lot of great research out there, especially when it comes to women in
Diane:prove that training is good for you, or what do we need to study?
Adina:methodology, modalities, like that kind of stuff. And if you're new here, Diane and I don't care very much about the studies. Like sure, studies can be great and helpful, but when it comes to things like women training for hormone health, I. I'm not gonna wait around forever to see that study. Like I'm going to implement with my clients and see what makes them feel better.
Diane:We're gonna move now.
Adina:yeah, we're gonna move now and make those shifts and feel better, not wait for a paper 20 years from now to come out and give us permission, like, no, thank you. Um, so that's important to note, but that being said, things are changing all the time. New information is coming out all the time. And so as a person in this industry, it's important to think critically and to implement what feels like it should be implemented and to shift away from what feels very fatty and like it's not accomplishing anything. And so it can get really confusing in there because some things feel good and we may not understand why, or they may not feel good in the long run, but we don't know that yet. So.
Diane:Mm-hmm.
Adina:It's hard to base things off that, for example, high intensity workouts can feel really good until they vary. Don't, because stress hormones feel really good until they vary. Don't like the nature of stress hormones is that we're supposed to feel good from those endorphins. For example, if you are trying to run away from a bear, it's very important that you don't feel the nail that got stuck in your foot while you are trying to run away from a bear. Like
Diane:you've gotta get big and yell at the bear,
Adina:that's true.
Diane:Right?
Adina:But in our physiology built in because of our history and our evolution, things that might hurt while we were in a stressful situation, we don't feel the hurt. We just are riding this high of these stress hormones so that we can do what we gotta do and run away. Um, so that's why many of you who think that your high intensity workouts are working for you just have not crashed and burned yet.
Diane:Yeah. It might appear to work for a while. And I have, I as an athlete, as someone who used to do. Some kind of bootcamp and hit for a short period of time. I wanna say that season lasted a few months. I had partnered briefly with a local gym that did bootcamp style classes, and I thought, look at me. I'm getting up early. I'm going to this class, and the music was intense, and the circuits that we would do would feel short enough like, I'm on a treadmill, okay, now I'm on a bike, and now we are doing lunges that I was telling myself like, I'm getting through this faster, and then I go on with my day. The first couple times I felt okay. I think if I was really honest with myself looking at the recovery or lack of recovery I had when I was going a few times a week or maybe late in my cycle, it really wasn't serving me. I've seen this in clients too, where they're like, I've been, I go regularly. I am someone who's very driven and committed. I work out hard, but I'm not seeing results. So you might see some. Weight change, some fat loss upfront. But let's say you're doing this for weeks, for months, like some people do with Orange Theory, Peloton, they start to notice like results plateau. They feel exhausted and laid out like the next day. It takes them a while to recover. And yeah, then the moment the stress hormones can feel good, but on the opposite end of that, your minerals go, bye-bye. Your recovery sucks. You're fatigued. I would also bet that your cycle is not hitting the mark as far as like regular, easy, painless, yeah.
Adina:Yeah, my like entrance into the fitness industry was like, these classes I used to take in college and I would take like two of them a day. They were so high intensity, low weight, high rep, and I was seriously undereating at the time. I started birth control at the time too, and I like looking back on it, I was running on fumes, you know, like my anxiety was through the roof. I've, I don't like, have anxiety, but I struggled with anxious feelings, depressive feelings at that time. And man was that not serving me. Like it's, I love that it's a part of my story because it helps me help more women and it got me interested in the gym. It got me interested in fitness. It was fun for a time and I think it was important for me in that season. But boy have I learned a lot since then.
Diane:Yeah, I think they old me told myself that I was getting my money's worth by working out so hard for that 45 to 55 minutes. And I remember going to Chicago and a friend and I signed up for a class like this and we're like, well, let's fit in a good workout. We're exhausted. And we went to brunch afterwards, but I remember being so tired the rest of the day. And for what? So now it's really evolved to how can I get the most out of the least? As as you always like to remind your athletes and it a good workout doesn't mean that you feel so sore. You can't walk for a few days after, or you are so tired by that afternoon that all you wanna do is lay on the couch.
Adina:Yeah, this is actually, it just reminded me, so thinking of that evolution, so like I was doing those classes, I started to get interested in like human movement form, all that stuff. So that was great. Then I went to school for personal training and when I started working as a trainer at that school, I was coaching like 6:00 AM bootcamp style classes in the heart of Manhattan. Very high stress clients and like you said, like getting the most out of it at the time. I would program these like great classes. I worked with some other great trainers there and we would program some really wonderful classes. We were really focused on form and strength, but like it was not strength training. It was still very much this high intensity style class, so much so that there were rest periods programmed in, but we had optional core exercises for the rest periods that like all of these high stress, high achiever clients would do.
Diane:Because they want more and more and more,
Adina:Yeah, and as a service provider in Manhattan at the time, a young new trainer, I was like, Oh, I have to give these clients what they want. Like this is what we have to do. And now if you see me on my live calls in the club, I'm like, stand still. What are you doing? Like you need to rest. Like, know, it's like much more of me giving everyone what they need as opposed to what they think they want. Um, so it's just interesting to see how I've come into my own as an authority and being able to tell someone like, pay me or don't stick with me, or don't, but this is how we're doing things.
Diane:Right. And that, that comes with that. I mean, over time you, you build that confidence that you know that for the results they say they want, this is the way to get there. And you're, you've also spoken before about not entertaining your clients. Right. So that sounds like that is also very much a part of your new approach, your current approach.
Adina:Yeah. So, okay, continuing on with the evolution, then I was teaching these classes, then I started hanging out with some other trainers who were all training for a power lifting meet, and they were like, Hey, you're strong. You should train with us. So that was like my first entrance into the real strength world, the real power lifting world. And the lens that these guys were working through was the Starting Strength programming. So I've spoken about that a little bit here, but, oh no, there's a mosquito next to me. This is gonna distract me. Let me see if I can deal
Diane:bite him before? He bites you?
Adina:I'm gonna have to side eye it and make sure I don't lose track of it. Um, otherwise I'm gonna end this recording with like
Diane:A big old
Adina:SC bites, many bites. Okay. So they were all very much through the lens of starting strength, which is. A very well known powerlifting programming style, and it was really great for me at the time. I think that it taught me how to be strong. It's amazing programming for just strict strength in the barbell powerlifting world. I competed in my first power lifting meet and it was so much fun and I was very strong for my body weight at the time, and it was great, but it was missing a lot. Like I think that at that time it changed my life so much. Shifting my perspective from do the most to simple three by five programming, lots of rest, same lifts, adding load every week, like it really taught me how to program for strength. It taught me how to get strong. It helped me to unlock my own strength. It changed so much about. The way I viewed myself, the way I viewed my body, the way I celebrated my strength, it just like helped me step into my personality and like the stuff that I care about and preach and help women with now. So it was like a huge piece in my origin story, but in my mind at the time, that was strength. Like you had to be lifting, you had to be squatting 200 pounds. You had to be bench pressing X, you know you had to
Diane:goal was more and more and more.
Adina:Yeah. And I used to think that everyone needed to follow a barbell power lifting program. And looking back on it now, I was so creaky, my shoulders, my neck, my back, like just cre, my neck, my back just creaky. My hips were so creaky, I just didn't feel athletic, you know? And what really got me was if I couldn't get to the gym for like an hour and a half, I didn't train. I needed to have access to a barbell. I needed to have access to at least an hour because I had three to five minute rest periods and I was trying to do all my big lifts on the same day. And it just, there was a few things there. Number one, I was not a good role model for people on the internet who had never, ever trained before. And I was sending this message that like, if you're not squatting 200 pounds, you're not strong
Diane:Or that strength training has to look that way. I mean, you said an hour, hour and a half in the gym, but then you also have to factor in your commute and if you're waiting for a rack, and that just evolves into a much longer time period. Imagine.
Adina:Yeah, I think like my training videos like sure, they may have been empowering to some people, but they were probably pretty intimidating. Like it, it happened in a gym. It happened with a barbell. It was a lot of load and it was very regimented. And after exposing myself to a lot of different modalities, becoming a mom, working with women, I just love kettlebells for their approachability, sustainability, athletic development, just the ability to fit this thing in, no matter where you are, how little time you have available. And they're so fun too. Like
Diane:Much smaller footprint also.
Adina:Oh yeah. Oh, there's that bug. Um, did you see it go by my screen? I'm like, Ooh. Um, and so I noticed for myself and my athletes, like my joints are just juicier. The springs are springier. The workouts can be more consistent and playful. I think I've seen such an uptick in consistency and community with my clients around our training.'cause it's just fun and it's just easy to access and it makes strength so much more approachable to so many people. So I've said this before when people ask me why kettlebells, it's not that I think they're the best modality in the whole wide world. Like I do think barbells have a place. I think cable machines have a place. I think if you're really trying to, if you have access to everything in the whole wide world and you have all the time in the world, You can go into like an amazing facility that has turf and a track and cable machines and a ski er, and you know, I could put together the best program on earth that would actually be the most well-rounded thing in the whole wide world to develop all athletic attributes, you know, but the reality is that's not the reality. And so working virtually and trying to help as many women as possible, many of whom have never accessed strength before, have never viewed themselves as an athlete or a strong person. I have found kettlebells to be the answer they have. I just love when someone asks me, what do I need for your program? And I just say, two kettlebells. We just order them. Leave them under your desk. Two kettlebells. You know, like it's such, it's so, I'm so happy to be able to give that answer. I think. It just makes this so doable for so many people and I've seen that like the uptick in women that I've been able to help over the last couple of years since I've leaned into this has just been amazing.
Diane:Yeah, it is so much more approachable. I mean, I've worked with you, when did I start working with you? Because I started one-on-one, I wanna say 2018. 2018?
Adina:been, I was def, I know which apartment I was living in when I was reviewing your videos.'cause on like such a visual memory, it may have been 2017.
Diane:Yeah. It might have maybe right a, it might have been after I got married. And I remember buying a band, and I think you did have me buy one kettlebell at that point, but at that point I was working out from home. We were doing something with a 26 pound kettlebell. Eventually that progressed to me in the gym and I was recording barbell videos for you. I did then work with an in-person trainer, and that was very heavily focused around barbell. And I got to achieve some goals that I personally had set out for myself with pull-ups and, and with the barbell that I'm really proud of. But in this season, and definitely through the panini, when I couldn't get into a gym so dumb for a long time, kettlebells was a great way for me to carve out some space and time in my house. Small footprint, versatile and strength training for happy hormones really helped with getting through a lot of like shoulder pain and creakiness. I actually bought a barbell and some plates at the beginning of the pandemic, and it's in my basement collecting dust. And now those two kettlebells that I purchased for S G H H has grown into a little family of kettlebells because I wanna collect more as I work on new skills as I move up in weight. But there's still so much that I've been able to do with the couple that I started out with, so that's been really nice. And yeah, definitely a lot less creaky. I carry a lot of stress in my neck and shoulders. I know when we've worked together, I'm working through some old patterns of how I would tense up, but it's also nice to be able to do this from home because I can look at a big library of videos or drop into the club and ask you, or V you're a co-coach. Questions. So, Maybe some people have a hesitation of, well, I need to be in person, and I think there is value. It's having someone look at you in person too, but I think you underestimate how much a good coach can see on video and how much you can learn about yourself and your body by watching a good coach on video or recording your own lifts. That's been really, really helpful for me. Ever since I started working with you was recording myself, because I might think it looks a certain way and then you see it from the side, you're like, oh, didn't know I was doing that with my back or that with my elbows, and it's great feedback that is right there for you to refer back to.
Adina:Yeah, I've joked about this one with my postpartum athletes too. When we first started introducing jumps into the program. It's so funny when you do your first couple of jumps and you think you're jumping to the moon and then you watch back the video and you're like, oh, we got long way to go.
Diane:Yeah. I wonder, I want to send you some bloopers. Perhaps there was, I was practicing, is it a reverse snatch? The one where you go overhead like this
Adina:Yeah. The dead snatched to reverse
Diane:Yes. Where I almost threw my shoulder back and the bell through a window and just the panic I saw in my face for a second in that video. That was my cardio.
Adina:Yeah. But what's nice about that is when we build these resilient shoulders, like it's okay to put ourselves in a dicey position like that sometimes. It's not like we're gonna rip out our rotator cuff when
Diane:it was
Adina:our should. Yeah. So that's really nice. Um, a note on recovery, because I think this is another really interesting one.
Diane:Mm-hmm.
Adina:I used to focus so heavily on recovery tools, like foam rolling specifically and
Diane:We've done an episode on it. I think it under our big stretch episode.
Adina:Yeah. Good one. I used to think that you had to foam roll for like 10 minutes before your workout in order to feel good, in order to access the ranges of motion that you wanted to access. Now I know that my barbell program just had me all locked up and I wasn't like using my joints to their. Full potential. But when you came out as a trainer, fresh trainer in 2012, 2013, like foam rolling was all the rage. And first of all, we like thought it was actually breaking up muscle adhesions, which like, you need surgery to do that. It's, that's not what it's doing. Um,
Diane:good.
Adina:yes, that's a great point. So now that I understand way more about the body, I know that what feels good about it and why it helps you to access better range of motion for some people is probably nervous system related. And so we could accomplish the same thing with a few deep breaths. Probably for most of my athletes, that's the case. And so this isn't to shame anyone that enjoys foam rolling like. Loving on your nervous system is important. Doing things that feel good and help you feel like you're ready for your workout or ready to recover from your workout are important. It's just to offer the reframe that if you need, if you require so much recovery and the tools and the, the guns and the scrapers and the, you know,
Diane:That's new.
Adina:yeah. I mean that's, that's more of like a manual therapy, like physical therapy tool. But perhaps if you need all that, your workouts just aren't working for you. Or maybe you need some more recovery from things like sleep, nutrition, minerals, stress is something you need to address. Um, I think that, It's one of those things, maybe you are, maybe you need to implement some more full range of motion, kettlebell lifts or loaded mobility, things that just get you into better positions. Maybe you need to take your main lifts through better ranges of motion. Like maybe you've been in a power lifting program and you're sole focused on adding load, adding load, adding load that you haven't really focused on, like breathing through the lift and getting full range of motion and taking your shoes off. Ooh, that's another one I didn't add, um, about my perspective on shoes and training.
Diane:Yes. We'll come to her next,
Adina:should we do that next?
Diane:So, okay, so foam rolling a second on that. So I still sometimes like to do it like, but I, when I feel myself feeling like. I need it more. I think, did I sleep on some of the mobility, some of the breath work? And I've definitely been doubling down on that heavier Doug mama is talking. I don't know if you can hear him. I mean, this is just a day for background noise, but everyone can see if they're watching on YouTube. There's Doug. It is 3:01 PM and Doug is always on time for his lunch. He knows at 2 55, 2:50 PM he starts whining like, it's time for me to eat and now it's three and he's over here telling
Adina:Well shut up
Diane:shut up, Doug. Mom's talking. Anyway, um, I wonder like folks who feel like they need to foam roll the aun stretch
Adina:Ice Baths.
Diane:baths. I wonder, have you ever had someone walk you through load and mobility and breath work the way Adina has because. I would hazard a guess that No, no, no, you have not. Because once I started implementing that more, it did feel a lot better When I was doing the barbell work, I think a couple of things were happening there. I was more stressed. I was trying to go for more and more load. Like even when, if I was really honest with myself, maybe that day I shouldn't have gone as heavy as I did, and so I would feel really tight and locked up in my upper back, and at that time loved my coach, but I don't think he was as familiar with things like ways to open up my back more the loaded mobility that we do in SS D H H, and if I were to incorporate barbell again, then that would have to be alongside it as well as not
Adina:It would look different. Yeah. Um, yeah, but that's like you, we were talking about the Seesaw Press earlier. Like I pick something like that and put it in a program now. When I know my athletes need more rotation in their upper back, like maybe the previous block had us doing a lot of strict pressing where we weren't getting that full range of motion at the shoulder. We weren't opening up the back in that way. Or maybe this is for my postpartum athletes who I know are hunched over a baby nursing all day and just locked up not getting the sleep they need. Sleeping in weird positions.'cause maybe their baby's in bed with them and they have to like curl around them a certain way and we can see you scolding him in the background. Diane,
Diane:It is taken to pacing. Sorry to interrupt you, Edina. And I'm waiting for a new rug to arrive, so I put blankets on the floor. So it helped with the sound today. And where is he? He is like, I turned off the air purifier. Where did he go? It's probably right under my desk. Pouting.
Adina:he's gonna like jump scare us.
Diane:He might.
Adina:Um, yeah, but what I was saying is that, I think now I look at a program in a much more well-rounded way and think about these things of like giving the athletes what they need and how can we accomplish that, whether it's through breath work, through load mobility, or even through our main strength lifts. Like what are the lifts we can choose that will help them get into that deeper hinge that will help them access X, Y, Z connection with their pelvic floor that will help them get rotating more with that upper back that will help them to feel less, like they have to pin their shoulder blades to their back and just like getting things to move better. And I get the feedback from my athletes all the time that like they've just never felt so mobile or juicy or strong through these ranges of motion that they thought they were limited in because of their mobility. When in the end it was a strength issue and we just unlocked it with a different lift. So
Diane:Yeah, my shoulders feel way better. And a lot of that too is from the live feedback from V or you like. As far as getting that shoulder to stay put and then doing a lot of moves to build up that strength took my goodness, he's crazy. Um, sometimes, I mean, my foam roller is dusty, but do you ever just wanna crack your back? But now I know it's not the, it's not the move that I need. It's just a, sometimes I'll pull it out when I remember I have it and I'm watching TV kind of thing, and then I'll go into an arm bar for a while.
Adina:it feels very nice.
Diane:Yeah. So, okay, so the way you viewed recovery has changed. So tell us a little bit about training Barefoot that you
Adina:Yeah.
Diane:ago.
Adina:Okay, so first it started. I started training in those like Lucille Roberts high intensity classes in just like sneaky, you know, just like whatever Nike said was the best high intensity training sneaker, you know? And then I started power lifting and I wore like a boot, like a full on power lifting boot with the heel. With the stiff toe. Yeah. And it helped me be very good at power lifting, you know, but it probably effed up my pelvic floor because my feet were so stiff and didn't move. And if you have never thought about the connection between your feet and your pelvic floor, we definitely talked about that on our foot episode. So go back and listen to that one if this conversation is in interesting to you. But since then, I have taken my shoes off. I have encouraged all of my athletes to take their shoes off, and we spend a lot of time working on those feet, mobilizing those arches, learning how to pronate, learning how to spread your toes, use your toes, get extension through that big toe, like our feet are the base of it all. And so when we have strong feet, we have mobile feet, we have feet that can do the stuff we need them to do. It's great and it's helped so many of cl my clients with their foot pain, but more than that, ankle stability, knee pain, hip pain, stability, back pain, pelvic floor issues. So if you're sleeping on those feet, don't
Diane:spread those toes and unquenched that butt.
Adina:amen to that.
Diane:I think that I texted you, um, sometime in S D H H and I was like, my toes spread.
Adina:Ta-da
Diane:I never thought that I would be saying or caring about.
Adina:celebrating those toes.
Diane:Wow. So I learned a lot about your fitness evolution. Excited to see where things go next. Something tells me that you won't be, um, down the line having people train for marathons.
Adina:You just never know. Um, a note on pelvic floor AB stuff, just real quick. I think the most recent thing I've been thinking about is how I view ABS core training and the like. We've done an episode about this, you can go back and listen to that one, but I think when I first got started, I used to go hard on AB training for everyone.'cause it's very satisfying. Everyone wants it in their programs. They love it. They think they just like need all the ab exercises
Diane:Gotta feel the burn.
Adina:Yeah. Teaching bootcamps in Manhattan, 6:00 AM like it had to be a lot of abs, but. At a point I was like, okay, well if you're doing the big functional lifts, you don't need core training. Like that was kind of the perspective of that power lifting world. I was like, if you're squatting 200 pounds, your core is so strong, you don't need ab exercises. And then after having my babies and working with hundreds of women in S C H H, many of them postpartum or had other pelvic floor dysfunction. I've been leaning on a lot more core work lately, especially in the movement prep for specific exercises, things like the Turkish getup presses, front squats, like things that we really have a large demand on the core. I've been using the movement prep to make sure that we have that connection and we have that endurance there. And we've been doing a lot of this in the S D H H club and the club members have been loving having this in their prep. And Veronica and I have been noticing. A lot of great progress in the strength lifts as we've been doing this more, um, you know, a lot less pelvic floor dysfunction and things like that. So we are currently in the process of updating the original S D H H program. The entire program is getting a refresh and something that we're doing in that is adding some more core work to the prep. So that's kind of where I stand on core work right now.
Diane:Somewhere in the middle. It's nuanced. Surprise.
Adina:great. It's been great to be adding more of that back into the repertoire.
Diane:Yeah. And the core work that you prescribe, that you suggest is a lot different than what I might've thought of five years ago when I was trying to get that ab roller to work, or doing a bunch of twists with a medicine ball. So I like that the core work that you have now is so much more, so intentional, and I like it in the front end before we're working on something more complex like a Turkish getup, like, oh, I didn't realize I could feel those lower abs like that. So it's just enough. Not a lot, baby girl, just the little bits. So loving that. Good stuff. Yeah, so over here things have definitely evolved as far as how I work. Work with clients, especially one-on-one clients. So wanna talk a little bit about testing, functional testing. So a few years ago, I can't believe it's a few years ago now, I wanna say in 2020, most of my one-on-one clients would begin their program one-on-one with gut testing. So GI map stool testing. Yeah, I remember we both went through that continuing ed the same time and came out swinging with so many amazing things that we learned. Through that ongoing education and so many tools that we still use, that I definitely still use with one-on-one clients, but not necessarily with testing as the first step, as the first step part of that. So these days I don't necessarily start with testing one-on-one as the first bit, or if I do, I am having most people start with something a little bit more easy to do. I'm thinking, I think we've talked about the, uh, the stool test You have to shit in a french fry container on a recent episode
Adina:put it
Diane:to put it lightly. I, I was thinking about how else to put it lightly, but it's a lot more approachable now in that if we are starting with something like the hair and tissue mineral analysis, the H T M A, we're taking a very small amount of hair and I am really liking that test as a first step for people who wanna dive deeper into one-on-one versus. The GI Map stool test, I still maintain that digestion in your gut health is a very important and overlooked pillar of health. But the protocol, the process of gathering your shit, getting your shit together for that test upfront is just a big undertaking. And through the pandemic, I noticed a lot of people were, they're already stressed. They are going through a lot and yes, a lot of them are dealing with acute or chronic gut stuff. But using the tools that I learned from the ongoing ED and through practice with several hundred women now I men, men and women, I know that there are other things that we can work on before we use something like the GI Map or use something like GI Map and food sensitivity testing. So it is still something that I can draw on, but it's more. On the back burner or more for more intense cases because the H T M A, as we detailed in our recent episode about that test, there are so many things that we can learn from it. It's like a great overview. We're able to see not only what might be going on with your metabolism, with your sex hormones, but also how are you detoxifying? Are you eating enough protein? What's your digestion like? What's your stress response? And what kind of inflammation are we working with? So as Edina and I mentioned at the beginning of these episodes, we are always going to commit to learning and to evolving, to changing our processes when we find things that work better and that serve our clients better. So we don't need to go in swinging for most folks with a GI map or gut stool test.
Adina:Yeah. And when we were running those tests regularly, like they were making clients feel a lot better, which is why we did it. And those tools are amazing, but ultimately we found we could get the same result. With less stress on the process and less stress for the client coming at it from a different angle. And like Diane was saying, like Diane still reserves the right to run a GI map for an intense case. And another thing I wanna say here is like, it's for Diane to decide if you are an intense case. Not you. You know, like some people come and they're like, I want a GI map. And you're like,
Diane:But why
Adina:need to eat breakfast.
Diane:Yes. Or, but you're not eating enough or you told me that you're in the midst of switching your job or moving or getting married and the protocols associated with it can be quite undertaking. And so I referenced, uh, the panini, the panorama, the p demi earlier because. So many people just did not have capacity for that in that season. And I was just talking to someone recently in dms who I think is a good candidate for the GI map and the stool testing and diving deeper one-on-one because they have done so much. They really are what I'd consider more intermediate to advance. And there's just some things that aren't adding up. And I know the GI map would give us a lot more answers into what's insight into what's going on in their gut. But something like the hair and tissue mineral analysis, a heaping teaspoon of hair, and that combined with this is the key part, combined with a consultation one-on-one, working with a coach, one-on-one who can look at your routine, your health history, what you're eating day to day and your goals. That allows us to really make for them an approachable plan that isn't so intense and going to exhaust them, their time, their energy, their resources, you know,
Adina:Yeah, totally. Wait, you said back burner before and it just made me giggle because in the apartment we're living in now, our back burner is one of those like power burners and like
Diane:I think it's extra
Adina:it on, it immediately burns all the food. So Donny and I joke about it all the time because we're like, oh, put that on the back burner. It's really important that this happens right away.
Diane:Is it one of those like quick boils? I think we have one on one of our back burners is a hotter, quick boil burner. Yeah,
Adina:Yeah, it's like the three rings, like giant three rings of fire and it just like immediately torches everything.
Diane:Yes, totally. Yeah. I think that, I think it's easy to think I need to go for the biggest, baddest test. Like my diarrhea, my constipation is different. And if you're someone who's feeling that way, like, let's chat first because I will be honest with you and let you know. Like it probably, we don't, we probably don't have to go that hard for most. People. So yeah, always open to chatting in the dms if they're, if you're not sure about what route is right for you, whether it's to do my self-study root cause reset, or to do one-on-one at the time of this recording, I have a few spots left for a week of one-on-one coaching, which is something new that I am offering, especially in the summer because I'm hearing from folks that yes, I want to work on my digestion or my cycle or my, my, my metabolism, but I'm feeling like I need to put that on hold until the fall because summer is crazy or I'm feeling zoomed out and don't wanna hop on a call. I get it. And so through a week of coaching, we really get to jump in and work out approachable steps for you, because I don't want for people to white knuckle it through that vacation or sit out at restaurants and feel like they can't order things like their p m s is going to have to cancel their plans and wait until fall. To start feeling better in a week of coaching text and audio messaging, we can get through so much together. So it's like having on-demand support and coaching in your back pocket. So I'll put some details in the show notes, uh, but we can certainly talk via DMM if you're not sure which route is right for you.
Adina:That sounds wonderful.
Diane:Uh, yeah. So that's testing in a nutshell. We have, we will link some related episodes for you. I know we talked about gut testing and our, I'm friends with the monsters inside of my gut episode. We have an H T M A episode that we did recently, but all the secrets in your hair, so definitely check those out if you haven't listened to them already.
Adina:Yeah.
Diane:Yeah. Finally, to round out this episode, we're going to talk about evolutions to things about the way we think of things in our home, in our routine, in our environment. So just a couple of things here. We also did an episode recently called Wellness Products Worth the Hype, I believe. So you can also check that one out. So for me, this first one, there's some tea here. Um, beauty Counter, beauty Counter and Clean Beauty in general. So I know it had a big moment. That's how we met. Adina and I met at a beauty counter conference a few years ago. Yes. So that was forever grateful, grateful for our meet. Cute happening at Beauty Counter. There's still a lot of products that I love, and I think that they really paved the way for a lot of brands to think about making products that are very effective, science driven, and a bit more responsibly made. But sometimes I think that this falls a beauty counter and other companies can fall into this greenwashing category where it just is marketing dressed up in a different way. So I like their mineral products. I like some of their skincare. I am bummed that they did away with some of the color cosmetics that I loved so much. Um, but over the last few years, I've sort of come towards the middle. I still like to be mindful of fragrances. Um, we don't need a bunch of fragrances. We don't need dyes and a bunch of junk like that, but, Going back to some of my roots of implementing some science driven, um, really effective skincare products. Some under the guidance of medical aestheticians because like many things that we talk about here, I appreciate nuance and I don't like what I've seen from a lot of the clean beauty and natural beauty skincare and beauty space where there's a lot of fear-mongering in terms of ingredients, a lot of attitude of, oh, if you're using anything that has LK in it, oh, that's terrible. And I don't like seeing women fear that if they have an eyeshadow that they occasionally use that has some to in it, that they are fucking up their hormones. And I don't think that's healthy. So I like to come more towards the middle. And I also feel like my attor attitudes towards Beauty Counter has changed a bit. Um, I didn't share this back in 2020. It was pre podcasts, right? But. I worked with them a couple of
Adina:the podcast Girlies only.
Diane:This is for podcast Girlies only. So this happened summer of 2020. I had already done a Instagram story takeover with them. I love their marketing team at the time. And leadership or their marketing team reached out to me to do another kind of collaboration and they wanted to do little interview with, um, one of their, I think it was a VP of marketing. She's no longer there anymore. The name doesn't matter so much, but it was basically going to be, we couldn't, we couldn't meet in person, so we were doing little video interview. They were going to record it and use it for marketing materials and they positioned this as, this is a great way to show how you use Beauty Counter as kind of like an affiliate relationship with your nutritional therapy practice and it's going to be great for your business. I thought, okay, it's the panini, like also I do love this brand and the products. And so the first meeting I had with them was great. We recorded some video. They had me record on my own device. And then it evolved somehow into, they sent me this p d f of all this background footage. They wanted me to record, they wanted me to send a bunch of photos and capture video, um, per their request for this project. And I kind of hit pause and the former project manager and me, it was like, this is beyond the scope of what we talked about for exposure, right?'cause they weren't paying me, but I agreed to this brief interview for the exposure. And then it just grew into this thing. And they're like, oh yeah, no, we are, we don't pay in any product. This is just for exposure. And it just didn't sit well with me because
Adina:Wait, pause.
Diane:Yeah.
Adina:I need to back it up for everyone and also give the caveat that the brand was under a lot of scrutiny at the time for how white they are and how white everyone that works for them is, and how white
Diane:Important detail that I
Adina:many of their affiliates are. And I think they reached out to Diane because she is ethnically ambiguous.
Diane:That part. Yes, that's exactly why. And so this was, this happened at the beginning of June, and then while all of this was going down suddenly, there was a lot of, this is when there were many conversations that were starting to happen about inclusivity, diversity. And so I didn't want to air this, um, on Instagram for a number of reasons. And I just felt like it wasn't my, it wasn't for me to start talking about this. Um, but yeah, they chose me, I think because I was ethnically ambiguous business owner. I spoke with a couple of business owners who dropped out of the project. One who was, I believe a military wife, um, and a black woman who felt like she was being taken advantage of for this campaign. And the whole campaign was about, you know, empowering women and empowering them to work with Beautycounter. And as they sent me this long document of all the shots that they wanted me to put together. I was, and they told me they wouldn't even give me product or product credit for my effort. I was like, are you kidding me? And I know, I wonder where I was in my cycle. I know you saw the full rundown in all of the drafts, but I rolled my sleeve sub. I said, I'm no longer participating in this. I wrote a very, very strongly worded, but professionally worded email. And I copied the c e o of the company. I found her email address, the time, copied her on it. And I had mail track. I think I still have this. It's a plugin for Gmail where you can see how many times your email has been open, viewed or forwarded. And I got this notification. It said, this has been forwarded or opened many times.
Adina:Many, many
Diane:But in short, it was something to the effect of how can you say that you are about empowering women? When this has gone well beyond the scope of what we've discussed and you are not even willing to offer someone a product credit, and I cannot continue with this project. I should dig it up somewhere. It felt really good to send. But after that, so after that, I just quietly stopped talking about it as much and I feel like mixed feelings about Beautycounter, I still love so much of the attention that they have brought to this movement of being cognizant of what you're putting in your body. They are very good at product development and I still love some of their products, still use some of their things like sunscreens, their vitamin Cs lovely, their um, their deep moisturizers, they're heavy ceramide cream, the supreme cream. But I've moved more towards a nuanced approach in terms of the products that I choose and use. And I also never really believe that one brand has the solution for all of your makeup, skincare, haircare, body care. Issues, you know,
Adina:yeah. And I kind of watched Diane walk through this whole thing. I still very much love beauty counter products. I. I still recommend them very highly. And I am forever, forever grateful to this brand, for bringing us together, for bringing some incredible women into my life, for teaching me how to speak loudly about something I care about for teaching me how to market things like I think I learned so much from all the professional development and my mentors there and some of the early beauty counter relationships that I created, like people who were buying beauty counter products through my affiliate links. Those women have become like near and dear ss, T H H, athletes Club members. Like the relationship has kind of continued from there. So at the start of my business, it was such an important, important brand to me and still a very important movement that I love to be a part of. And like Diane said, like they paved the way, they made it sexy to care about what you put on your skin. And I think that was like, Extremely important and some of their products are still amazing, but it's been a colored history
Diane:yeah. Mixed
Adina:Yes.
Diane:finally a mixed history for them in some shape or form. But yeah, after that experience, it kind, it definitely colored the way that I, I think of them and also as a business owner and someone who is so, I'm so passionate about what I do. I'm always going to talk about my services more. Um, and that is like, you know, some icing on top. It was never, my relationship with Beautycounter was never going to be to make that my full-time, my full-time gig. Um, I'm grateful to a lot of things I've done and the connections I've made, like this one with Adina so amazing. Um, but yeah, giving myself space to. Move away with it, move away from it in some capacity. And, um, also explore other brands because, so like we said, they paved the way for so many brands to come out. And I just, I'm also more aware of greenwashing or claims that may just be marketing dressed up in a different way versus something that you have to really spiral about, you know?
Adina:Yeah. Again, a lot of their products are still the cat's pajamas and like those are still the only products I use mostly'cause they work great for my skin and I'm lazy. Like I don't care to try other brands if I have stuff that works for me. So,
Diane:soft cream.
Adina:lurk, lurk,
Diane:The Supreme cream and soft cream, I still like a lot. And they did, they got rid of their eyeshadows, which were so good, like the 2020 palettes that I got, or 20. I think I got them back in 2019. So Good. And they did away with those, so I was bummed about that. But yeah, I won't be doing any sort of free campaign. And if any coaches are listening to this too, or you are maybe dabbling in influencer space, don't work for free. Like these big brands, they have the coin. They have the coin, and they are just used to people climbing over themselves to work for free. But know your value and don't. Yeah. And this economy working for free. Come
Adina:No. You know, my friend Sam, she has a blog frosting and fettuccine. She's really funny. She is like the champion of this, but she like recently had something on her stories where someone sent her like another, a company using one of her photos without like credit or whatever. So she reached out to them through a million different channels before they finally saw her message and she was like, where can I send an invoice? You're using my phone. But they ended up taking it down. But
Diane:that are like, can we send you product and you create a 10 minute video for us and post on your feed 10 times? And you're like, no,
Adina:no, I cannot.
Diane:no. Yeah. So
Adina:Anyways, we went on a journey.
Diane:yeah. Long journey. But clean beauty isn't always so clean and it is important to take the expectation of perfect off of you if you feel like you've seen some of this marketing, just not just beauty, counter clean beauty in general. And if you're worried about like random, sometimes using talc in an eyeshadow or, um,
Adina:PHAs Diane.
Diane:some makeup you love from Sephora ruining your life and your health, like, you know, perfection is, is silly. So.
Adina:The enemy of good. Some might
Diane:Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. So, wow. We covered a lot. Fitness testing, lifestyle, some, uh, some tea in there too. What have you changed your minds about? Let us know how things have evolved. I'm, I'm curious. Drop it in our dms.
Adina:it. Um, my brain just shut off'cause it's 10 30, so we're gonna have to call it a night.
Diane:Yes.
Adina:Um, we love you. Just remember to stay hydrated out there. It's a Scorcher and, uh, Unc
Diane:Unclench your butt hole.
Adina:Till next week,
Diane:Bye.
Adina:bye.