Right. So before I take you into today's episode, we need to talk about what this actually is because, um, this isn't just episode one. This isn't just another podcast launch. This is a bloody rebirth. It's a rebirth. I think it's been over a year, maybe two. Um, since I last, I last recorded something for the podcast, and, and this time it's different. I've grown, the team's grown, so you now have, I believe, a better version of me. Um, you know. Such as life. You go through hell and back a few times and you learn a thing or two. So you got a few extras this time. So if you are new here, or if you have followed me for a while and you are wondering why is it now called, it was never about the food here. Here is why. Because this. It is an extension of how we coach and how we coach is an extension of my own journey to sobriety. What never, ever sat right with me was the idea that, um, it was about the alcohol and I had this hold. Because it was about alcohol and I just wasn't strong enough.'cause alcohol was stronger than me. Like, it just never sat right with me. I never accepted it. Well, I did it first, but then it just, it, it just didn't sit right. Um, because it wasn't about the alcohol for the drug addicts. It was never about the drugs. And for you, it was never about the food for, for every single woman that I have ever coached, it was never about the food. It wasn't about carbs, it wasn't about cravings. It wasn't about lack of willpower power. It was, um, it was about pain. It was about control. It was about protection. It was about this shame that we carry in silence and the, the beliefs that we learned during that survival, that, that fucking war zone. And I am not here to slap a motivational quote on top of that and call it healing. Um. Here's what I am here to say, and not everyone's gonna like it. If you don't, no issues. Press stop. Go somewhere else. Go somewhere fancier. Because the self-development world, it's become so fucking pretentious. It, it, it, it's, it's created this. This notion that if you just write three things that you are grateful for per day and you listen to a podcast on your hot girl walk, that you will suddenly become healed. You'll become whole, and you'll become all high vibe as hell. And this is what pisses me off so much is that then when inevitably. You do hit a roadblock. If you do still struggle, if you still have a binge, if you still break down or if you get stuck in self-sabotage, then you must be doing it wrong. It's bullshit. That's, that's not healing, that spiritual bypassing dressed up in a fucking. Pastoral Fonted Canva, quote, and it leaves women, real women, real people feeling like failures as though they're broken because gratitude journaling didn't fix 20, 30, 40 plus years of trauma. So let me be clear right from the get go, if you are here for something cute, easy, quick fix, aesthetic that you can slap on Instagram, this is not the podcast for you. But if you want raw, if you want truth, if you want to actually understand what drives your behavior and finally lead yourself through it, then you're exactly where you need to be. Let me take you back to one of the hardest moments of my life. I, I remember it like it was yesterday and it was the day I stood outside my first AA meeting. I was shaking, not metaphorically. I was literally shaking full-blown. Body tremors. And I'd love to tell you it was just anxiety. It wasn't, it was withdrawal as well. So physical withdrawal, uh, terrified that I'm gonna have a seizure in front of people. Panic. Um, and that's the scary part about those situations, right? You literally do not know what's on the other side of this. All you've ever known is a panic attack or having to go back to food or it not working. That's all our experience is up until that point. And a lifetime of I'll, I'll fix it myself. It's fine. Just building up to this moment. Everything inside me said don't go in. You are not like them. Just come back tomorrow, it'll be fine. No, just walking here. You've taken a step. It's okay. Um. You'll, you'll be okay. Just, just try again on your own and then if that doesn't work, just come back tomorrow when the reality is, is that in some different masqueraded way, I'd been saying that repeatedly. I just slapped a different label on it and that was the thing. So tomorrow had been my survival strategy, but I knew in that moment that this idea of tomorrow had nearly destroyed me. I knew that the voice saying not today was the same voice that had lied to me every time I tried to get outta the mess I was in. So even though I was just ju just petrified, I walked in. Why? Why, why did I do that? It wasn't because I was ready. It wasn't because I felt brave. It's because not going in that was worse. And that's where people get it wrong. I subliminally, we all kind wait until every, every box has got a nice green tick in it. There's no anxiety. We're ready. Life is set up. Uh, now it's time. It just feels like the right time. And guess what? Why do you think nothing's changing? You just have to compare the two. It's just about whether or not doing something is worse. And that was the beginning of real change for me. And this is the thing, right? I didn't even continue with aa, rightly or wrongly. I didn't like it. I didn't like the message, at least for where I was. Um, but guess what? It started something. That's the point. It's not about having just a little conversation or buying a book. Okay, sure, we've gotta take some baby steps, but at some point, at some kind of a leap has to be made. It doesn't even have to end up being the right leap. It just has to give you this, um. There's evidence that you can do it and survive. It's messy, it's uncertain. It's very surrendered, but it's real. We've been sold this lie. That change starts with confidence that you'll feel aligned and you'll feel in flow, and then you'll take action. That's not how it works. That's not how it works. You don't, um, you don't become confident and then act, you act scared, messy, uncomfortable, and confidence is what gets, gets, um, gets built along the way. How many books have you bought on bloody confidence? It. Confidence isn't complicated. It's not. It's just about taking action. The difference between anyone you look up to, any level of success, whether it's financial success, spiritual success, this, uh, family success, whatever it is, the difference between you and that person is not that they're smarter than you. Trust me, it's not. The difference is that they did it anyway. They took a leap at some point towards a future that they wanted. That's the only difference. So if you are listening to this today, thinking, well, maybe I just need a bit more, more clarity first, or I'll do it once I feel less anxious, I want you to hear me like really hear this. This is coming from a place of having been there. Having made the same mistake for years, almost dying because of it, I do not say this lightly, that weight is costing you more than you realize. Every time you wait until you are ready, you are reinforcing the belief that readiness is a requirement and it's not. You're already ready. Ready is nothing to do with how you feel. That's the mis, that's another mistake that people make. I loved, um, I loved a segment I saw of Robert Downey Jr. On, I think it was the Oprah Winfrey show. And, um, he described the healing journey maybe better than I've ever heard it before. And it's that when people kind of come up to you and they talk to you in hindsight and they're kind of like, yeah, well the withdrawal must have been hard. Or, or the, the thoughts about having to drink and the urges were hard. The only time they are hard, it's when you haven't actually decided yet. In other words, what's actually hard for people like you and me, it's not the withdrawals. It's not the urges, it's deciding. That's, that's the hard part. Once you've decided it doesn't matter'cause you've decided, like truly, truly decided, you are already ready. If you, if you work with us, we don't make you more worthy. We don't make you more lovable. You already are. You just can't see it. That's the issue. You just don't know how to access it yet. You're already ready. Not because you feel ready, but because something inside you is just done. You're done with the loop. You're done with trying to control everything before you take any kind of move. You're done with the guilt, you're done with the shame. The false starts, I'll start again on Monday. You are not stuck because you lack discipline. You are stuck because you have taught your system that safety means staying small, and that's not your fault. It's your coping mechanism. And it always has been. It always has been me. Ask yourself this though. Does coping lead to the life that that little 6-year-old girl, that little version of myself does coping lead to the life that she dreamt of? She doesn't need everything to be perfect. What she needs is someone to hold her hand and lead herself through the fear by waiting until there is no fear. We are sending her the message that she's not worthy of it. She's only worthy. She's only capable when there is nothing in the way. This is much less about the, the knowledge and the information, and it's all about that first step and what that represents. Let me tell you about the woman that I wanna introduce you to. She's not fearless, she's not perfect. She's not wearing beige active wear and drinking green juice at 6:00 AM She's just a little bit braver than yesterday. She hears the fear, she feels the resistance, and she still shows up. She hits publish video on Instagram. She feels the resistance. She walks into the room, she breaks the pattern. Not because it's easy, but because staying the same has just become crap. It's just become unbearable. And here's the part, most people miss that woman. She's already inside you. She's already there. So let's pause for a second. Take a breath wherever you are and check in if you're driving. Don't be a dickhead. Use some common sense and when it's right with that breath, just go through the following questions. Number one. Where are you waiting to feel ready before you move? Number two, what has that weight cost you emotionally, mentally, physically, spiritually? What has that weight cost you? And number three. This is gold man. Just let yourself sit and feel and be into this one right here. Number three, who would you become if you move today? Is that not powerful as fuck I? Who would you become if you moved today? Not just talked like moved, scared, but honest. You don't need to bulldoze your fear, man. You don't need to. You just need to stop bowing to it. And I think part of the issue is that nobody around you has ever let you feel accepted through that kind of messiness. And that's where the fear perpetuates somewhat. You gotta let yourself shake. You gotta let yourself cry. But move anyway. So let's stop romanticizing transformation because it's not soft lighting and sage bearing in mind. I'm saying that in a dark lit room with a candle next to me. But nonetheless, it's, it's not like that. Um, you know that friends episode where the girls. Burn all of the memorabilia they have of, um, their ex-boyfriends. It's, it's, it's not about that. That stuff's cool. Right? I get it. I do it. Um, but it's just that the industry is trying to sell you the idea that on its own, that's enough. It's powerful because those things are meant to be a representation of something deeper. But you still gotta go to the deeper place still. It's, it's about showing up for the version of you that's been ignored. That little girl that clearly needed something that she didn't get I, and digging through that stuff is gunky. It is. Um, I'm going to. I've had a video in my phone for the last two days that I recorded right before I walked into the gym, and I still haven't put it up yet. I'm going to gotta walk the walk, right. Um, because I, I was just in tears. I was at this very confusing, um. Step of the road where despite everything's going well, I had this urge to drink, one that I'd not really felt in all of my sobriety. When everything is finally better than it ever has been on the surface of things, it's, it's gunky man. It's, it's facing the fact that the food, it just wasn't the problem. It was just the only solution that you had at the time. It was the only thing that didn't judge you or contradict you or undermine you. It was just there and maybe more than any of those things. It just turned the noise down a little and when you finally stop trying to fix the food, I'm air quoting here. And start listening to what it's protecting you from. That is when the shift happens, not perfectly, but powerfully. So if something in you lit up during this episode, like even, even just a flicker. I am gonna invite you to take the smallest, bravest step today, and it doesn't have to lead to a thing, but I want you to take that step that I took into that AA meeting. It doesn't have to answer all the questions. It doesn't have to be the final solution. It just has to be a step. Message me on Instagram with the Word podcast and I'll know you've come from here so I know how brave you've been. It doesn't have to lead to a thing. It's not for a pitch. It's not for pressure. That's not how we do things. It's just for you to say to yourself like, I'm ready to do it differently this time. That's the work, man. That's it. One step at a time, and I'm here for it with you. So thank you for listening to. The first episode of this rebirth. This is, it was never about the food. We go deeper. Here we go. Real. We go where most people won't. So I'll see you next week. Until then, remember, you don't have to feel fearless to change your life. You just gotta move before you're ready.