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Hello. Welcome to the lovely self healthy broadcast. I am Melanie Lillis. Eating psychology, courage and nutritional therapist way are going to be diving into the realm of all things health, yet talking about them from the mind body, nutrition dimensions. Welcome back to the podcast, everyone. If you follow me on social media, either my business Instagram, which is bear expert rave or my personal instagram, which is Melanie Lillis. You would have seen that I put up a kind of question pole the other day asking you guys questions that you want to meet. Answer throughout the focus. So this is going to be a little bit of a different podcast from what I usually do. But it's really exciting because I feel like I can speak a little bit more freely and it's answering the questions that you guys want to know. So I hand picked a few questions that came through that I think are kind of good topics to go over. And, yeah, I'm going to go through them today. So the first question that I want to discuss it is how do you begin with the whole self love routine? So in a lot of my podcast. I talk about self love, and I talk about creating a routine that is going to work for your lifestyle and for a lot of people they don't actually know what that means or how to begin. So the first thing that I would do personally if I was someone who really wanted to work on myself, love. But you know where to start is with journaling, sir, I would sit down, grab a journal or diary or a notebook, and pretty much write down all the concerns or issues that you think you might have. So whether that is you always thinking negative thoughts. You don't like what you see in the mirror. Your life is killed. It constructs ful. You are disconnected from yourself emotionally, physically. You don't have time for things like exercise and nutrition and and all of that kind of stuff. And I guess when you put words down to paper can really highlight thie key areas that you need to work on and that you may not even realise you need to work on. So yes, that's the first thing I would do is just kind of get all of my thoughts onto paper. Write down how you're feeling in this present time and write down also what you want to achieve. So unless you know what you want to achieve, you can't really put those steps in place to achieve them. So let's just say for May, back in the day when I had really bad body image issues, if I was starting from there, sit down and I would write down. My biggest concerns are that I can't go an hour throughout the day without having really negative body image thoughts, putting myself down all the time and feeling extremely insecure, and where do I want to be? A. I want to be able to achieve a sense of freedom and what that meant for me was being able to wear anything, really that I put on and not care or not worry about what other people would think about what I was wearing or going down to the beach and being able to go for a swim and that walk from getting up from hotel and going down to the beach. Back in the day, I would be my heart would have been racing because I would have thought Every single person is staring at me and judging me, and I think about that now. And I'm like everyone else is thinking about themselves. No one else cares. Don't get me wrong when you're laying on the beach and see some of what passed you. Yeah, you might glance, but you really don't sit there and judge every single person that walks past. And if you are someone who does do that, that just reinforces how much you need to work on yourself. Because I truly believe that people who criticise other people and people who judge other people's bodies, of the people who need to work on the subs and most because that's just coming through their own insecurities. So for me, I wanted to achieve freedom in the sense of not caring about other people and not thinking that other people were thinking negative thoughts about me, which was created in my own mind anyway. Like I was tiny. I was never big. I'd never had any body issues. When you looked at me, I was normal in quotation marks, normal size. But that was just something that I created in my head. So if I was wanting to begin with the whole self love routine. Back then, I would have sat down there going. Okay, I know that a lot of my issues come from my mind. So what is something that I can do for my mind that is going to help create more positive thoughts and that might be meditation. So you pick one thing to trial and you pick one part of the day to do that so that it's not overwhelming in the beginning. So, for example, if I wake up at six o'clock every morning, I'm going to wake up at 5 45 every morning, and I'm going to spend the 1st 15 minutes of my day doing a guided meditation. So if you know how to do meditation yourself, go for it. If you don't, there are so many resources out there on YouTube on Google on Instagram, like every there is so much that you can just go and find and research yourself. So go to YouTube guided meditation. You can even get guided meditations for self love, which was my latest podcast, which is actually really good. I'm gonna do a little storey time right now. and I'm a little bit embarrassed, but so whatever I create these podcasts, I listen to them when I am obviously editing them. But then I don't really go back in this interview because I find it. That's a little bit weird. But the other day I was just feeling a little bit overwhelmed, and I wanted to do some meditation as I was down on the beach and I thought, You know, I'm just getting my guide and self love meditation because I wanted to relax, but I also wanted to see if it would actually relax me and I fell asleep. So I feel like that's a pretty good podcast. I was feeling super Zen, and I felt like the message that I was trying to share. You got out there a little bit and created nice, positive, mindful thoughts, and it really relaxed me so tooting my own horn. If you are looking to start meditation, please listen to my last podcast. So I truly believe that meditation is probably the best place to start, or anything that creates a meditative state. So whether that is going for a walk on listening to calming music or you know if you if you really love drawing than selling your day by spending 15 minutes drawing or colouring in anything that calms the mind, I find that that's probably the best place to start. But every we disconnect from the body and have thes poll body image kind of issues or its neglect. The need Teo practise self love. It's all because the mind is kind of racing and it can't focus. It can't stop and settle. It's That's step One. Okay, so another area that I would probably begin with is the practise of mirror work. So I'll fly in a little bit more on mirror work as time goes on. But just to give you a really quick run down, essentially, you stare at yourself in the mirror naked, trying your hardest to really let go off any negative thoughts that may come to mind. Obviously, negative thoughts are going to come into your mind, but you just don't want to humour them. You just want to let them go, and the more that you stare it yourself so I would do this for about 10 minutes a day in the morning, maybe after your shower or at night time after your shower, onda more that you stare at yourself in the more that you just kind of get used to seeing your body and accepting your body for what it is. You're some conscious thoughts start to change, and that's the goal off. Creating a good body image is you have drilled into your mind that you are ugly, that you are fat, that you were worthless and you are not enough. And it's no wonder we have those thoughts because we're constantly being judged by society, were constantly seeing these perfect models on instagram and kind of comparing ourselves to other people's lives, which is such a dangerous thing, because why are we comparing ourselves to someone who is completely different to us? It's so silly, but it happens to the best of us, and we just have to figure out howto push past that and realise really, what's important. So when you're staring at yourself in the mirror eventually, if you can really stick to it and make this a daily ritual, your brain will start to see yourself in. A different weighing of thoughts will start to change into positive thoughts, so the more that you can stare at yourself in, the more that you can really appreciate respect and understand what your body does for you, the more your mind is going to change to constantly see yourself in that positive life. So that's another place that I would start. And just lastly, to answer this question nutrition and exercise. They are probably the key components to feeling so good. If you're not fuelling your body in the right way, you're going to create nutritional imbalances. And when you have international imbalances, you're going to be moody. You're going to be grumpy. You're going to put on weight. Your skin's going to break out. You're gonna have a nice clothes. Your hair is not going to grow, you know, lusciously and voluptuously not that mind grows that luscious off. But everything else is working pretty good from malnutrition perspective, But exercises well, Thie Other day I went for a run, and I have not felt a release of endorphins like that in a very long time. It was the best feeling, and I just thought to myself, how good is exercise just from going for a run for like 20 minutes to 1/2 a. Now, er I came back feeling so good. I had a little bit of confidence When I looked at myself in the mirror, I felt healthy and, you know, obviously not much changed in my body in a 30 minute run. But just the whole increase of endorphins and serotonin and just getting out. Being active and being outdoors creates such a better frame of mind. And I also feel like the days where my diet is on point and my exercises on point. I just feel overall so much better about myself. I know this is not news that you haven't heard before, but a lot of people do forget how good you can feel from any clean diet and exercising. So they are the thirst strategies that I would do so just to recap that Number one, I would start doing daily meditative practises again. Whether that is guided meditation, whether there is just going for a nice peaceful walk, doing a drawing or just listening to really calming music in the morning, whatever helps to settle your mind. Number two is the practise of mirror work again, looking yourself in the mirror without any clothes on and just trying to create more positive thoughts and accepting how you are right now. You cannot hate yourself into a new body, and you cannot hate yourself toe love. It just makes no sense, right? So if you want to love yourself and if you want to be the best version of you, convey and have the body that you're proud off, you need to love your body first, and then you can achieve the results that you want. And the number three is to just cheque out your exercise and nutrition routine. Are eating healthy? Are you hydrated? Are you exercising? Or have just forgotten all about those things moving on to the next question, which can kind of be integrated into the question I just answered. But it was, How do you learn to love your body? I could never imagine looking at myself and seeing anything positive. Now when I've read this question, it actually brought tears to my eyes because I have Bean and probably said that exact same thing to myself at one point in my life. Yes, they're back in the day. I had a really bad eating disorder, and I'll touch on that later because there was a question about that next. But I just remember being in that part of my life and saying to myself, I don't think I will ever be able Teo feel good about myself because my natural body shape isn't meant to bay that sexy body shape that you see, you know, on Instagram. And yes, my natural body shape is I hold my way on my legs and my bum in my hips, and then I'm really small at the top. So I've got a big booty and absolutely no boobs. And I used to think it was a super awkward body shape, and I never thought I could look like other people do. But at the end of the day again, I know that you have all probably heard this before, but I really want you to just think about what I'm saying. For a second, you were born with the shape that you a ball with your bomb with the body. Your bomb with you hold. Wait where you hold. Wait. You physically cannot change that. You cannot change your body shape. You cannot change where you hold your fat and Why do you want Teo? We have such a massive, massive issue with, I'm going to call it a materialistic image. Who cares if you don't have a box gap? Who cares if you don't have double D boobs? Who cares if you don't have a really small waist and a big bum? I shared a storey about this girl before. Her name is M. Carey, and she is a girl who went skydiving and she essentially, when the parachute got pulled, it didn't release, probably got wrapped around her instructor's neck, and he passed out and they free fell to the ground and just hit the ground. Now they both should have died, and it's a miracle that they're alive. But she became a paraplegic from the waist down. But the thing is, I don't really understand how she explained it. But there's two different parts of your spinal cord, maybe one that is like the movement and one that is feeling maybe so. She lost feeling from the waist down, but she didn't lose movement, so she was told that she'd never walk again. But after I think it around six months her, I guess the brain and muscle. Connexion was still coming there on the muscle memory, so she taught herself how to walk again. And now she's up and walking and against You still didn't have feeling from the waist down, but she talks all the time about how, before her accident she would think, I don't want to wear these shorts because I look, you know, I'm not happy with how I look, why she didn't appreciate what her legs could do for her and now that she can't feel them and she still got so many issues like, Yes, you can't feel him. But she also can't feel her blood are so she can control which needs to go to the toilet. And she can't tell if she's got a cut, says you get really bad infections. She doesn't know what she's got a broken bone. So all of that process that even though she's up walking, she took all of this for granted. And that's something that you know, I have been instilling in my brain ever since I recovered from an eating disorder, and it's that every day you should appreciate the fact that you can wake up and step out of it that you can walk downstairs that you can sit on the toilet and set up in the toilet and go freely when you want to go. And we are so caught up with the fact that oh, I don't look like that girl on Instagram or I'm not happy because, you know, I don't have that perfect box scout. I think that we all just need to take a step back and be like, Wow, look at my body, Khun do it regenerates all the time and I can go outside and go for a run if I want Teo, my legs hold me up every day. My arms can pick up things my brain works, but we really need to just take it back to basics and be like what is really important in this life when we get older, when you become a grandma, is it really going to be worth spending your entire life worrying about what size you were, rather than creating amazing experiences and working on yourself and your personality? Because I truly believe that our personality and the way we treat other people and the things that we are trying to achieve in the world. Are we making a difference? They are the most important things. People are not going to remember you by your size. They're going to remember you by the impact that you made in their lives. And if you are constantly worrying about what you're eating and what you're wearing and how you look, you're not going to be the best version of yourself, and you're not going to give other people the best versions of themselves. So you need to learn to love what you have, just as you are now. I'm not saying that you shouldn't go and try, and you work on being your fit itself or being as healthy as you can be or trying to get down a dress size. If you feel like you want Teo, it's fine. I mean, go and do all of those things right now. I am at the demon. I'm trying to reach fitness goals and health goals and body goals. But at the same time, I am so happy that my body works and I'm so happy with where I am right now. And even though I still want to achieve goals, I'm separating that from hating my body okay to achieve those goals, and I think that's something that we all need to learn how to do. Yes, you can achieve fitness, health, body weight goals. But are you doing it the right way? And are you loving your body? How it is now, or are you hating your body trying to achieve those goals? There's a different balance, and that is something I just want to quickly touch on because a lot of people are jumping on this body image, movement bandwagon, the self love bandwagon and then starting to diss people who want to be healthy and exercise and lose weight and look there for yourself. You need Teo be accepting of both sides and you need to have that balance. And if that's what you want to achieve, awesome. But you also need to achieve it through a healthy and loving way. Let's move onto the next question, and I touched on this already. The next question I got asked was, How did you develop your eating disorder? So if you don't know from the ages of about 20 to 24 I had pretty bad bulimia. It started off with food restrictions so I would try to keep my calories, like around 800 calories a day on DH. Then it kind of once on my body became a little bit nine attrition and I wasn't getting, you know, a balance of macronutrients. I started to really create food, and I guess I just gave in and I would start to binge eat. And then after I binged a I binged eight, I would feel so guilty. And I can't even explain this feeling to you. If you have ever had bulimia, then you'll understand that for someone. Okay, I'm rambling on. I'm not making much sense. I'm going to paint a little bit of a picture. So you're trying, Teo, restrict your calories, right, And that is a form off control. And you feel a CZ Though you are in control of your way, you're in control of your life. You're in control of how you look. So I was stuck at this point where I really wanted to be in control of how I looked. But then I couldn't seem Teo B. I guess strict enough and I would give in an hour binge ate. Now I'll touch on this in a second, but I'm needed to be in control of what I was doing. So when I've been a had probably consumed, maybe, like 400 calories in my binge eating session, which really is not that much food. But for Mei, who was trying to keep under 800 calories, eating for 100 calories and once sitting I was just anxiety was through the roof, so I then was like, Okay, how can I fix this situation? I know how I can fix the situation. I'll just vomited up, and that's how the intense cycle happens. So I would eat. I would feel bad. I was vomited up, and this became a positive thing to me in my mind because I was like, Hang on a second. I don't actually have to starve myself or restrict myself. I can eat whatever I want and then just throw it straight back up, whatever. No harm done, even though deep, deep down, I knew very much harm would come off this. For some reason, I just cared so much about being a certain weight that I did not care. Now at the time and even a couple of years after that maybe a year after my eating disorder, I thought that it was all due to the sport that I was in the people that I was around when I was going out. So I used to compete in an Australian sport aerobics team and we would compute it well, titles. And we essentially had to kind of be a certain weight look a certain way. We really fit looking because a lot of it was about how you looked. And even though I was naturally a small frame, I just for some reason got caught up in the hole. Okay, How I am right now isn't good enough. I really need Teo. Decrease my size at the same time, I was going out clubbing maybe once a fortnight or once a month. And the girls that I would always be not so much hanging around, but they would be at the same club always went Tio. They were borderline anorexic. And this is actually at a time when people being anorexic was in. And that's really bad to say. But the more bones that you showed the cooler you looked and I even remember I got down to my lightest weight. So I'm naturally about 55 kilos and I got down to about 48 killers, which was pretty small for May. But it wasn't small enough for people to go war. You look anorexic. I never looked anorexic. I just was small. But I remember going out one night to a nightclub and my friend's boyfriend was there and I was walking towards them and my friend was like, You look amazing. You're so skinny and her boyfriend was like, Yeah, you look so much better now on DH. My friend was like And look, you've got such a flat chest was like, Yeah, good, doesn't look, you know, having your room's out in a flat chest. And for some reason, having a flat chest back in the day was really in a swell, which joking, Your Honour, I was happy about that because I didn't have boobs. But that just stuck into my head and I was like, Oh, okay, people lack this. This is a good look. I'm going to keep doing what I'm doing. And it just was such ah, hard cycle Teo really overcome. I didn't want to overcome it for a very long time but trying to compete in an Australian team and in the late athletic level. I was absolutely ruined. I could not get through my routine. I was getting sick. I had really bad, irritable bowel syndrome. I also got diagnosed with fatty liver disease. I wass unable Tio do a lot of the training at times when my eating disorder would flare up and be extremely bad. Andi, I also got glandular fever at one point and literally couldn't stand up for like a long within 15 minutes. And I was just absolutely struggling and hid it from absolutely everyone. I think there was only one person in my life who knew what I was going through, and that person also happened to have an eating disorder at the same time. So we, in a sense we kind of egged each other on on DH, helped each other restrict our calories, and it wasn't really a very good time in my life. So as I was going to the eating disorder and even the year after, I always thought it was just because I wanted to look a certain way and the only way I knew how Teo was through restricting my eating and binge eating. But after doing a lot of reflection and journaling and trying to understand myself a little bit more, I realised that it was purely through the need to be able to control everything in my life. So I'm not going to go into detail about this on the podcast, maybe in the future sometime. But I wasn't a really abusive relationship when I was 15 and throughout this relationship, I wass pretty much manipulated to the highest degree, and I had zero control of my life. Everything was falling apart around me. My parents split up their back to you now, but at this time they did split up. A lot of stuff was going wrong and I had no control. This guy was just the worst person I think I could have ever I had in my life, but at the same time, now look back at it and I've learned a lot from it. But I think through this relationship I developed this personality trait which made me want Teo control. Every single thing that I did, I didn't have control. I don't want to be in that situation so when it comes to my body. When I was in this aerobics team and when I I was going out and seeing all these girls really skinny and I was a normal size and I wanted to be the skinny size, I was like, Well, I am in control off what I'm doing, So I'm going to control you know what happens. And deep down, I think this was because I didn't actually deal with what I went through when I was 15 and never went and saw a psychologist. I didn't get any professional help. I just pushed it down and got on with my life. And that's why, a few years later, I developed this really bad habit. I guess you could say that ruined a lot of my life Now in saying that if I didn't go through everything that I went through s so far in my life, I would not be where I am today. I would not. Who knows? I don't think I would have this passion for body image and self love. I probably wouldn't be here podcasting. I wouldn't have gone and studied the psychology of eating. I wouldn't have gone and studied nutritional therapy. I wouldn't have created all of these programmes for people to try and help them. And if you know me, you'll know that I am truly so passionate about helping other people. And I truly believe that this is my calling in life. Listen to this other podcasts all the time And one of her questions is if money and time were no issue. So if you had all the money and all the time in the world, would you still be doing what you're doing now? I don't do this. I don't work on Bear Brave all my love yourself, Healthy podcast 24 7 This is my side. Possible job. But if I had all the money in the world and no time restraints, all my money and time will be going to doing this. This is exactly what I want to be doing. So to wrap up that question, how I developed my eating disorder wass through a need to control everything in my life. And I didn't have control of how my body looked. So I created a way that I had control over it and I don't regret it. I'm glad I went through it because I wouldn't be here today, would be here today, but I before casting more than likely. All right, so let's move on to a less intense question. S Owen asked, What does a day on your plate look lax? So I thought I'd just quickly brush over this because I've had a couple people asked me this before. And a day of my plate is a very routine, So I'm a Christian habit. I'd like to eat the same things. Even though dinner time and sometimes lunch time, I tried to mix it up a cz, much as I can to get as many nutrients in as I can. I do like eating the same thing. So breakfast is usually either tofu scramble with avocado and toast, or I'll make a protein smoothie. And in my proteins, maybe they'll be like Berries, banana protein powder, spirulina powder, kale chia seeds, peanut butter, almond milk and what? I saw a guy like half milk, half water and then blended up, and it's absolutely delicious. Sometimes if I have a K a powder, I'll chuck that in there as well, and then usually I'll have a pint of raspberries or blueberries, all strawberries, whatever. Grab on the day for a snack and then lunch time. Lately, it's been really up and down because I just moved to a new apartment. At the moment I'm in school holidays, so I'm doing a random, different job. S O. If I am in my proper routine work, I'll usually make like a tofu stir fry dish. So it'll have, like beans, rice, tofu and a bunch of vegetables. And then I'll just create a source to go over top of it. I'm really loving using tahini honey peanut butter on. Then you just put hot water mixed together, squirt a little bit of lemon. It's such a good dressing. And then in the afternoon I might make like a fresh juice or yeah, and after it was a bit of a weird one. Sometimes I like sometimes they won't. Sometimes I just have some chocolate. I love Doctor. That's my weakness. And then dinner time is very similar to lunchtime, so I'm other making a stir fry type dish, a salad like a big kind of salad or yeah, it's kind of very much stick to the same thing, so I am a plant based either. I don't eat meat. I sometimes eat eggs, and I sometimes ate fish, but that's kind of a rare occurrence. I eat a lot ofthe tofu, lots of Baines and lentils and all of that kind of fun stuff. Tryto have lots of leafy greens are trying to make a deuce once a day, sometimes in the morning before have my Brockie. I'll just do like celery, lemon, carrot and like spinach that were like that and just have a glass of that before I have my food. I just like to get in a high nutrient value, especially because I know I am a creature of habit, so I don't actually eat as many nutrients is. I know I could. So getting the juices in is getting me a higher dose of nutrients. Okay, next question. How many's homes a week Do you exercise again? I really listen to my body, and I do what I'm feeling. So every single morning I get up and I go for a walk along the beach. That's just my way of study. My day. Good. I usually have meditation music or a podcast on, and I just go for a walk. It's a really honest way to start my day, and that's probably about like 1/2 an hour walk. And then in the afternoons, I will do either, so I'll go to the gym five times. Well, not the gym, but I'll do a workout at least five times a week, sometimes six, and that'll just be a mixture. I might go for a run. I might do a hit workouts, A high intensity interval training. That's my favourite style of workouts. Andi, I might do a strength session. I haven't been doing as many strengths sessions. I usually like to do cardio, but I do try and do some strength sessions and, yeah, lots and lots of walking. I'm also a circus crew, so it coach flying trapeze twice a week at the moment because the school holidays and, yeah, it's very, very, very fun. So let's move on. What do you do for work? So I thought it was a very funny question because, yeah, I've got a few jobs. So this is my passion job, and I wanted to be my only job so so much. But I don't really have control over that you guys have control over that by leaving me reviews and following me and supporting me S O okay, I am a teacher, So I have a batch of education. I'm a PT HPD teachers. So usually I just went casually around schools, different high schools. I am also a circus coach, So I coach at the moment in school holidays in the Thursday and Friday. But when the school holidays are over, I don't do that. But I am an acrobatics coach as well as every Wednesday afternoon, a coach at my friend's studio, which is Synergy Dance Studio. I'd do that just once a week, and yet at the moment, because it's school holidays, I am doing three times a week working in admin just to get some money. And then, as I said before two days, a big circus scratching. So I am just trying to make means oven end. I'm just trying to get money, but I don't work full time at the moment purely because I think I'm in denial. I want their brave to be my number one job, and if I have a full time job, I feel like I won't have the time to put into this as much so year. That's work. All right, I have one more question and it is something I was going to touch on today anyway. And it is I used to occurred in the self love programme, and the necklace is Yes, yes, yes, I can confirm I am definitely still creating all of the above. It's taking me a little bit longer than expected, and I really don't have an excuse other than I get lost sometimes when creating. So as I said, because this isn't my full time job, first of all, life can get in the way. So I'm at work, usually every day on DH. Then when I come home, I still want to make sure I'm getting my workouts in and doing things that make me happy, because if I'm not following my advice than you know, I feel a little bit like a fraud and it also makes me happy and that's what I want to do. And by the time everything's done in my day it can be eight or nine o'clock at night, and I just don't feel like doing work at that time. So that's a pretty bad excuse, I know, but it is taking me a little bit longer than expected and also there's been a few hiccups along the way and just trying to figure out how Teo Yes, I said I had to get a little bit lost in how to structure things and what's the best way to create something that's going to be the most beneficial for people. So I don't want to put out a programme or start selling a necklace that I don't feel 100% happy with. And I just want to make sure everything is perfect and things are going to work well before I release anything. So it was supposed to be finished for side of the year. It will be done soon. I will release the date when I know what it's going to be done. So if you have listened this far in the podcast, thank you on Daz, I said, because this is a passion project of mine. I really do need the support for it to become my only project, so leaving reviews on my podcast and following me on my social media and commenting and just being there for me is so appreciated and it's really what I do need to be able to get ahead. So I'm going to wrap this podcast up because I don't know if actually covered very much in this podcast. I think I just move rambled than anything, Which is, if you know me, that's all I do majority of the time. But if you did listen this far thank you so much. And again, if you can please leave her a few and subscribe to my podcast, I would just be so, so so forever grateful. And if you have any questions at all, you can contact me on any of my social media's. You're here in the AP true, coming up soon. If you have any requests for podcast can you please please please Please send them to me email or even to my bear? Brave instagrams of email. L hate underscored podcast Out looked up. Come and then my instagram is bare ex brave. Don't have a good rest of your day. Thank you very much for listening. Please be sure to subscribe and follow me on Instagram at Melanie Willis. Or you can email me at l a wage. Underscore podcast at outlook dot com. I look forward to chatting with your next week. Bye bye