The Mind Body Project
The Mind Body Project
Healthy Huddle: The Energy Budget - Spend Calories Like Money
We frame food as money and the body as a bank, then show how balanced meals, sleep, movement, and hydration create steady energy instead of spikes and crashes. Practical steps help you audit deposits and withdrawals so your plan fits your real life.
• body as bank and energy as currency
• energy givers: protein, fiber, complex carbs, colorful plates
• energy drainers: sugar, ultra-processed foods, unplanned skipped meals
• ROI mindset: quick spikes versus sustained fuel
• carb loading timing and steady deposits
• hidden fees: stress, poor sleep, late-night snacking
• reinvesting through movement, hydration, and rest
• personalized budgets and a weekly energy audit
Spend your food energy wisely and plan ahead so you can give all you have and everything you want to do, so you can be rich with energy
Thank you for taking time today to join us on Healthy Huddle. If this is your first time to Healthy Huddle, thank you for joining us. Healthy Huddle is just where we talk about a dietary, food, nutrition uh topic, and then we talk about how we put that into action. Just like any huddle in a football game, a huddle, um, they huddle up and they come up with a plan. That's exactly what we do in our healthy huddle is we just huddle up and we talk about a plan of action, a topic, and then we decide how we're gonna go out and do that along with the challenge. So thank you for joining us today as we're about to start our live healthy huddle.
SPEAKER_01:All right, so we will get that's why it's nice to do it like this.
SPEAKER_00:Huh?
SPEAKER_01:That's why it's nice to do it like this.
SPEAKER_00:Yes, yes, and and we have a lot more participation than when we're in person, when there's just one person or it's just me talking to myself. So and this works out good because everybody gets to do their thing, I get to record it, and then I kill two birds with one stone, so everything works out. All right, so we're gonna talk about the energy budget. If we spent calories like we did money, I bet if we spent calories like we did money, we'd probably be a little more careful with our calories, and we'd be a little more cautious with them if we think about our uh bank of calories that we had. Um so um, so if if we if we think about food as being money, um would your meals make you rich in energy or would they make you broke by mid-afternoon?
SPEAKER_01:So rich in energy.
SPEAKER_00:Rich in energy. Would anybody make their make their uh would they be broke by noon, by two o'clock?
SPEAKER_01:Sometimes. Yeah, sometimes. Yeah, yeah, it depends on the day.
SPEAKER_00:It it depends on the day.
SPEAKER_01:Um so I didn't do it until two o'clock, and then I run it all in the evening.
SPEAKER_00:Then what?
SPEAKER_01:Then you then I run it all in the evening.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. So what what if so think about that? What if two o'clock rolled around and you were broke by two o'clock when it came to energy? And um and think of energy as you needed gas money. Um, you needed gas in your vehicle to go um do some things with your family, uh, meet them in certain places, and you had absolutely zero money to do it. And the same thing is true with our food. Um, if we are out of energy by two o'clock, then it, you know, you might still be able to do the thing, so you might still be able to get to whatever you were gonna do if you ran out of gas, but what would you probably have to do? Walk. Or you might have to borrow a ride. Um, but it's not gonna be it's gonna be more energy, it's gonna take a lot more energy. Um, and not gonna be quite as happy, it's gonna be more challenging because you've got to figure things out. Um, so we have to think about that as if it was money, um, how would it last us through the day? Um, you know, when you're a kid, maybe in high school, you got lunch money. And sometimes you might go, man, I can save up this lunch money and buy beer on the weekend.
SPEAKER_01:So you got that.
SPEAKER_00:I mean, I don't know. I probably probably nobody did that, but you might have been able to save the money, the lunch money during the week to get beer money on the weekend. You might. So it's kind of the same way. Sometimes we might we would budget it out. How we're gonna use it to the best of our ability, what serves us the most, what we want to do. So when we think about our energy budget, we think about the body. So our body is the bank, and we're always making withdrawals or deposits all the time. The food is the deposits and withdrawals, because we're gonna talk about how they can also be with a withdrawal, but also be a deposit, they're both the same, and then our daily habits is our energy spending plan. So, how are we gonna spend that energy throughout the day? Do you ever plan your budget according to your spending plan? Uh financially, money-wise. Sometimes, probably, maybe so. Maybe if you want to go on a vacation, then you you budget and you plan your spending, your deposits, withdrawals accordingly to make your plan. So, do any of you get up in the morning and go, I have all these things to do, physically active things. I'm gonna budget my food as according to energy. Does anybody really think that far ahead? No, no, no, and that and that's and that's realistic. But sometimes it also gets you in trouble, right? Because maybe you skip breakfast, maybe you skip lunch because you're super busy, and then you're doing some things in the afternoon that require some energy, require some effort, and you realize, oh, I should have ate. I know this is weird, but there are some people in this world that will forget to eat. I don't understand that. I don't understand those people.
SPEAKER_01:I mean, not me.
SPEAKER_00:It is not me. I've never once gone, oh man, I forgot to eat lunch. And that might be some of you, you know, but to me, food is pretty important. So I have to, you know, I always want to plan. And Kim and I'll tell you this all the time. When we go anywhere, our trip, our time we leave, or we anything we do is revolved around food. When we're gonna eat, whether it's lunchtime, supper time, breakfast, it's all revolves around when we're gonna eat. It's super important. So we think about that. We think about our body is our bank, our food are our deposits and withdrawals, and then our habits are our energy spending plan. So we have to plan for that. So we're gonna talk a little bit about energy in versus energy out. So when we deposit, isn't that we're gonna call that energy givers? Because when you deposit money in the bank, it makes your bank account go up, right? So that's our energy, that's our spending power, we might say. So that few that food, it fuels us, it helps us focus, and it sustains us. Just think about deposit. When you put that money in, it fuels whatever you want to do. Um, then also sustains you to do those things. Um, you make deposits, you go on vacation, it sustains you throughout that vacation, it sustains you throughout the week. You know, you put lunch money in, and it helps sustain you through the week. So, what what are those deposits? Some of those deposits are, as we all as we talk about often, it sold whole foods with nutrients and fiber. What kind of good deposits are we making? And they're balanced meals. So they're protein with fiber, with fat. How many of you eat? And I don't do this, so I'm just asking, how many of you eat a colorful plate?
SPEAKER_01:Every meal?
SPEAKER_00:Every meal.
SPEAKER_01:Not every meal.
SPEAKER_00:No. Not every meal, just just just sometimes.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, at least once a day, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:At least once a day, that's good. How many, how many do it at least once a day? Renee. How many people do it twice a day? Okay, so we got, you know, we have what eight, twelve, fifteen, one out of two out of fifteen. That's uh, that's not bad. But really, if we think about that, if we have lots of colors on our plate, we're getting a lot of variety, but those are deposits. You know, we have eggs, oatmeal, brown rice, avocado, all that good stuff, veggies, fruits, nuts. We're all we're given the deposits. And as well, and those are energy givers because we deposit it because we want to have enough money in the bank to go do the things we want. We want to go buy some clothes, buy some running shoes. We put money in the bank to do that. So the same thing is true with the deposits we make with food. There's things that we want to do, so we deposit that good food, that good energy for the things that we want to do later in the day. It's always funny when you hear about car bloating. If you ever run and you hear about carbloating, when when do most people, if they're gonna car bloat, when do they do it? When the night before. But really is when carbloating is supposed to start happening, if it's a big race that you're gonna need extended energy for, is really about two to three days out to be able to make enough deposits. It's like because you have so much money, you know, you gotta posit a little bit at a time. And as what happens with that is then it gives you that sustained energy because you deposited several days a little bit at a time. So carbloading is a real thing. And typically people say, Well, I'm gonna have a big old, big old meal before the evening before. And so you eat it at seven o'clock at night, you have all these carbs, and then the next morning at five o'clock in the morning, you get up and you're nervous anyhow, and then you gotta find the porta potty, and then there's a long line, and you have to find it five different times, not only because you're nervous, but also you had those all those carbs the night before that you're not used to eating, and you still feel bloated and yucky from it. So that's what that's what typically happens, and and so that's why a little bit at time is good. Um so what what are the withdrawals? What are the energy energy drainers? What would anybody what would an energy drainer be? Uh food-wise.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, you're probably gonna say caffeine.
SPEAKER_00:Uh well, not not necessarily caffeine.
SPEAKER_01:Sugars, sugar, sugars, sugars, yeah, those are a big ones.
SPEAKER_00:Because what happens with sugars? We take them, we have them, and what happens?
SPEAKER_01:We're hungry again.
SPEAKER_00:We what?
SPEAKER_01:We're hungry again.
SPEAKER_00:We're hungry again. Or we have that spike of energy, like, whoo, I can do it. And then within just a short time, you're worn out again. Like that didn't do much. That's an energy drainer. All of our ultra-processed foods, energy drainers. They're with they're taking, they're withdrawing. Now, here's one that people do often and think they're doing really good, and that's skipping meals. Now, if it's part of a planned, it's it's kind of like any budget. If it's part of a planned budget, then it's okay. But the problem is, is when it's not a planned budget. So a planned budget would be I skip this meal, but I'm still getting in all my caloric intake or all my macrobes. I'm still getting those in. The skip meals happen when I'm too busy, I forgot, I just don't feel like fixing anything, I don't know what to have. Um that's when they start to be given, be an energy drainer when we skip those. And just the same as skipping them, the overeating is too, because sometimes what happens, you skip lunch and you get to dinner, and what happens at dinner time?
SPEAKER_01:You eat everything.
SPEAKER_00:You eat again. Yeah. And and then what do you do? Do you justify it? Because, well, I skip lunch, and so I'm gonna go ahead and have 2,000 calories, even though you know I already had a you know 700 calories for breakfast, but I figure I skip lunch so I can have a lot. And then chances are you might have been real busy and you didn't eat that until eight, nine o'clock at night. And so now you feel yucky the next day. When then again, you can wake up and it can then drain your energy because now you feel yucky. And sometimes those energy drainers are those light night snacks, and we're not talking about the healthier ones, we're talking about the ones again that are processed that are not doing you any good. Again, they they drain your energy, they're withdrawals. So, has anybody ever heard of an ROI? An ROI is a return on investment. So if I put this in, what is my return? If I put this in a C D, what is my return? If I put this in crypto, what is my return? Now, if you've had if if you bought gold last year, if you haven't seen the price of an ounce of gold, it has gone up drastically. So your ROI on that ounce of gold has gone up. So your return on investment, you typically want a gain, you want to get something back um from that investment. It's a return on investment. Um, so you know, we have quick energy versus uh sustained energy. So our quick energy, um, you think of it's not a really good ROI, it's not a really good return on investment because our quick energy is our sugar, um, our caffeine, our refined carbs. Um, and that really equals a quick spike. Um, so it's a quick spike, fast cash, but that's gonna eventually go away. So our ROI is not gonna sustain us long term. Where our sustainable energy is our protein, our fiber, our complex carbs. That's a steady release. So so think about it is if like you're in a Ponzi scheme, so you get a lot of money back really quick, and within six months, you're not getting that money back anymore. Um, they used to call them also pyramid schemes. You know, if you know, five, you know, you send ten dollars to five people, then ten people send you five dollars, and and and you get money really quick. And they also do it with wine and gifts and different things, but it's really a pyramid scheme. But eventually that stops. You're not you're gonna run out of people. So you think of an ROI as in if you put money in a CD and you hold it there for a long term, for a long time, you're gonna get a return on that. You're gonna be able to take, you know, think of a 401k. You know, you put all that money into it over the years, and then when you retire, you can take from it every month. It's long term, so your ROI for the amounts that you put in it is much greater because it grew over the years, and so it can sustain you well into retirement. And where if you're just making the quick cash, you know, what is that? You see those memes that say something about I can retire, you know, tomorrow, but I can I can make it an hour or something like that because you don't have much money. The retirement, the amount of money you have isn't very long. But anyhow, so we want to look for sustainable energy. What can we put in our bank and get a better ROI out? Again, when we talked about food and self-care, that's the same thing. You know, we want to take care of our family financially, we want to take care of ourselves financially. So, what do we do? We make the smart choices, man. Our body's no different. We make the smart choices so we get that long-term ROI back because it makes a difference. If you think of a donut, that's a quick five-dollar thrill. You know, you spend five bucks, and what do you have to show for it?
SPEAKER_01:And it's a good tasty donut.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, a good tasty donut. But what's probably gonna happen five minutes later?
SPEAKER_01:I'm gonna need something else.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, you're gonna need something else. You start to have a crash. I mean, it just you don't have anything to show for it. Whereas oatmeal with nuts and fruit for breakfast is that's your steady paycheck all morning. It's always like somebody giving you a dollar bill every little bit. Here's your dollar, here's your some more energy. Hey, here's some more energy, here's your more energy. So your ROI, your return on investment, is greater. You might only you know spent two dollars, let's say, energy-wise, on that, but you keep getting money back, you keep getting dividends back from that, and that's really those we're and if we look at it as money, we want that steady long-term benefit, and then we have aren't there always those hidden fees? Something might be really look really cheap, and then there's that hidden fee that after you hit buy, oh, we forgot to tell you that that there's a handling fee, there's a shipping fee, there's a processing fee, there's a packaging fee, there's all there's a fuel fee, there's and they tipped ourselves, yeah. And we tipped ourselves, thank you very much. Yeah, yes, so there's all these different fees, so those are those hidden fees. Well, sometimes there's hidden energy fees. Could be because you think about those would look like processed foods, they're your service charges on your energy account, they're adding to that, they're they're taking away from your account because don't service fees eat a little bit at a time. It's two dollars here, it's ten dollars there, it's five dollars here. I mean, generally, do we notice those right away? It might be a while before we look and go, man, look at all those fees I've been paying. And you don't notice them, but you go, man, where's the money going? And then you look at those, go, oh, those little things are taken away. And the same thing is true with our energy. We go, I don't know why I'm so tired. I just had this bag of snacks. I mean, it was just a 150-calorie bag, but that is a processed food. So it took a little bit of a withdrawal. Later in the day, you got snacky, you went by somebody's desk and you grabbed, you know, a couple chocolates, a couple of a cookie. That's your that's a service charge. It's taking out of your energy account. It's pulling out of your account that you want to use later that day. So when you want to go out and have that big fancy meal, you've already you're broke because of all the service charges. And some of those things sometimes aren't even food. Sometimes it's sleep, poor sleep, sometimes it's stress, and those can be they can drain your energy because we know when we get stressed, doesn't that wear us out physically, even though maybe mentally, it still physically wears us out. What happens when we don't get good sleep? One, we're probably grumpy the next day, we don't really have enough energy, and when we don't get enough sleep, do we make the best food choices always? Especially if we're stressed and poor sleep. And stress can make bad food choices, whether it's overeating or skipping tons of meals because you're stressed. We know people that if they're and you may be one of them, if you're super stressed, you're gonna not eat and lose weight. If you're and you may be one of these people, if you're stressed, you're gonna eat everything in sight, and and so it affects people different ways, but stress can either undereating, overeating, it's still gonna drain your balance, it's gonna drain your energy. And so some of the ways we can reinvest weekly and really daily is we move our body. So think of moving your body as if it's exercise, it's interest earned, it's interest earned on that food you're putting in. So when we earn interest, what does that mean? We get a bigger ROI. So when we we pick something that we're investing in and it has a higher interest rate, we get a bigger ROI which will sustain us later in life. So it can help us live longer, it can help us not worry about money longer. And exercise does the same thing, we're gaining interest. You know, uh there's this meme too that says there's been no fat, no fatalities or no something like that eating donuts. So it says eat the donut. I think it says there's more uh gym fatalities than there is eating a donut fatality, so you're safer eating a donut. But if we exercise, we're we're we're earning that interest, we're getting ROI. What about hydration? So on the app, it just got added. You can go to the little uh plus sign, and if you want to keep track of your water, you can start keeping track of your water. You can hit plus and and then hit water, and then it'll pop up on your when you pull up your app, it'll be at the top, and so it's always there that you can keep track of it. Right now it says milliliters. I have to look to see how to change that. If you can change that from milliliters to something else, but you can keep track of that. But hydration is a reinvestment of energy because it it just keeps everything flowing. We've talked about hydration a lot, just because it is so important. Uh, we often think of food and processed, unprocessed, but hydration is super important, and then we think of rest and sleep as our overnight balance reset. So, what if you could reset everything back every day on your account at the bank? You could reset it all back, and that's really what rest and sleep does. So the next day we get up, we're looking to make our uh deposits for energy, and we keep reinvesting through our hydration, we exercise, we're we're having that sustainable energy because we want that roi all day long. So, how often do you do you let others or sometimes you rob your bank? Because if you rob your bank, what happens? If somebody robs your bank, what happens? They take all your money, they take all your money, and we said the money is energy, so sometimes if somebody's robbing your bank, your energy bank, they're taking all your energy, and we don't want any robbers, but sometimes we rob our own bank. And think about that. If you were to go in, you owned the bank, and you went and robbed the bank and took all the money out. Would the bank have any money left to give others? No, but we do that all the time. We go in and we rob our own bank, and we think we're doing good, but we're really harming ourselves, we're harming our ROI in the long run. So, so the challenge is really to kind of do an energy audit to audit your bank. You know, what foods are giving you lasting energy? What deposits are you making? What are your energy drainers? What are you withdrawing? And are you reinvesting on a daily and weekly basis? In other words, are you hydrating? Are you getting enough rest and sleep? Are you exercising? Because you know, we have a lot of virtual classes now that we can get stars, but movement is so important. Again, some people get perfect attendance, but you know what? Sometimes that's not somebody's budget. Somebody's budget is to move three days a week, and that budget works really good for them. Where somebody says, you know, I have this budget, and that's okay because everybody's, if you think about your household, everybody's financial household budget's gonna be different, but we expect everybody's exercise and nutrition budget to be the same, and it's not, it's different, just like we should look at somebody's financial budget, oh, you're gonna, man, that's gonna get you in trouble, or wow, I wish I had that. It works for them. So if it works for them, that's great. And if yours works for you, then that's great. And so that's what we have to think about when we think about our our energy budget, and we when we're spending calories like money, everybody's gonna view it a little bit different. And so, whatever works for your household, great, whatever works for somebody else, even though it doesn't look the same, that's totally okay because the goal is that it works. So that's the challenge, is kind of look over and see if there's anything that you need to change that you need to alter. Maybe how could you rebalance your energy spending along with your deposits and kind of look kind of start out the day going, do I have enough to make me through the day? Am I making wise choices to have enough money, have enough energy throughout the day? So any comments, thoughts, or questions? All right, well, spend your spend your food energy wisely and plan ahead so you can give all you have and everything you want to do, so you can be rich with energy. So, thank y'all. If you have any questions, comments, just let me know. Thank y'all. Thank you.
SPEAKER_01:Thank you.
SPEAKER_00:Thank you and thank you so much for joining us on Healthy Hudding. I look forward to seeing you here next time on Healthy Huddle.