30. Finding Food Freedom and Cultivating Self-Worth with Kim Basler

Have you ever felt trapped by society's expectations, or found yourself on the brink of burnout? This episode's guest, Kim Basler, a food freedom and mindset coach, opens up about her own turning point—a 'spiritual awakening' during Thanksgiving of 2016—that propelled her from the depths of burnout to a profound self-discovery journey. Together, we navigate the challenging terrain of asking for help, the significance of nurturing influences, and the power of stepping away from toxic environments. It's a tale that resonates with anyone who's longed to tune into their inner voice and champion their growth towards becoming their best self.  Kim and I delve into the pivotal steps she took to reclaim her self-worth, highlighting the liberating journey of intuitive eating and self-care.

Connect with Kim
www.kimbasler.com
IG @kimbasler_foodfreedom
Bloom Event Tickets: www.thebloomevent.com

Connect with Heidi
Work with Heidi
IG @realheidisawyer

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Transcript

Heidi: 0:34

As you listen to my conversation with Kim Basler, consider the following questions. Is it often hard for you to ask for help or support when you need it, and could your environment, your circle of influence or the information that you're taking in be holding you back from stepping into the highest inversion of yourself? Consider these questions as you listen to my conversation with Kim Hi Kim.

Kim: 0:57

Welcome to the show. Hey, heidi, nice to be here with you. I'm looking forward to our conversation for sure. Could you give?

Heidi: 1:04

everybody, just about you before we dive in.

Kim: 1:08

Yeah, absolutely so. My name is Kim Basler, living just outside of Toronto, canada. I call myself a food freedom and mindset coach, supporting women with their relationships with food and body image and just their overall mindset to really seek that full potential that they're available to. So this is what I do I'm a speaker, I'm also a co-author in a book and I'm a mom and you know it's a lover of life, essentially.

Heidi: 1:36

I love that. So you know, this show is all about reinvention Love for you. Just to take our listeners to that awakening moment for you. When was it in your life that you decided something has to change?

Kim: 1:49

Yeah, this is such an important question because we have these moments that really shift the trajectory of our life. For me, it was 2016. And that exact moment was Thanksgiving. I was at my family's and, of course, lots of happiness, lots of gratitude, lots of celebration, and at that point I had covered myself in a lot of armor. I wasn't well. I wasn't well physically, emotionally, mentally. I hadn't been well for a really long time. But we tend to keep ourselves in an identity and we wear the smile and we just keep moving on.

Kim: 2:26

And that day, you know, I would like to say that I made the decision to pivot my life, to make these changes, but it wasn't that for me.

Kim: 2:36

I call it a spiritual awakening because it wasn't a choice.

Kim: 2:40

But I remember saying to my husband I just broke down in tears in his arms and I just said I can't do it.

Kim: 2:45

At that point I had been working in the fitness industry for over 25 years and just really struggling with my own identity, my own body issues and the stress that I had carried for so very long just had me feeling like I can't do this anymore and my mind was taking me into places that were really dark. And I told my husband I just I can't do this anymore and I went on a leave of absence and that was the turning point for me and I don't know how much you want me to share here, but you know it was a really scary time of my life. I literally it was almost like an out of body experience. But I knew I had to do it because there was too many times I had already pushed through burnout and just kept going and I knew I couldn't do that anymore and I had to remove myself from the environment that was keeping me, keeping me on well in order for me to be able to take those next steps.

Heidi: 3:41

So what were those next steps for you at that point? Because it sounds like you had tried to go on as long as you could. I think a lot of people listening can relate to that. You know, putting on this happy face, acting like everything's fine, but inside there's there's a bit of a war going on.

Kim: 4:01

Yeah, and we're a lot of us are overachievers and we're just afraid to ask for help, right? So we isolate ourselves. So the turning point for that at that point was I went on a leave of absence and I truly believed that I just needed some time. I don't think that you don't. We don't realize how much support we need until we actually pause our lives and actually look in. And it got harder before it got easier, because I had isolated myself.

Kim: 4:31

For you know, over a month I isolated myself in my house because I felt like a failure. But I needed that time. I needed to feel those emotions in order for me to know what I didn't want to feel anymore. See, I didn't know. I didn't know the way out, I didn't know where the next door was for me. I just knew that I couldn't stay in that place any longer, and I'm grateful that I had a lot of support. My children were really small at the time and so that was probably the hardest part, because I wasn't able to parent them and I just drowned myself in a lot of self pity and shame and isolation that way. But I was able to one day allow somebody like my husband was always there to support me. But I was one day able to let a friend invite me out for a walk, you know, and that's where that first walk outside, being outside, feeling the air and having somebody who actually cared about me. Let me have a safe space to start talking, and from there I began my healing journey.

Heidi: 5:36

Yeah, I can picture you and your friend walking and what sounds like your relationship with exercise prior to that was a lot different, and so being there, having someone holding this space for you and being able to actually let out some of what you had been holding in for so long, I can see that as a powerful catalyst for continued healing and growth and moving into where you are today.

Kim: 6:06

Yeah, absolutely, and it's not like it's. For some people it might be one big turning point, but for my me my turning point was giving myself the space to come out of the industry. There was a lot of the industry that I loved, but the industry also was continuing to give me an environment that I felt like I needed to keep up a facade of who I thought I had to be. I had to be perfect. I had to be the people pleaser. I had to weigh my body every single day and control everything I ate and over exercise, like all the things that I had been doing for so very long. I knew that I had to come out of that environment because everybody that recorded to me, everybody that I was in front of, all of the peers that I supported, they only knew me to be one way, and so if I can't be that person anymore, then I needed to create a space for me to begin. I mean for me.

Kim: 6:57

I could talk about all the things that I had to do and I don't know how much detail you want me to go into, but I had to really start to recognize the thought patterns of who I thought I needed to be and really start to look at those belief systems and then recognize well, if those are not working for me anymore, there has to be another way, and there always is another way. We're told in this world that there's only one way to be as a woman, one way to look, one way to work, one way to parent with a type of job whatever, and the fact is it's a lie. And once we start to learn that, we can really change the trajectory of our life at any point. Right, but we have to be able to start saying yes to ourselves instead of putting everybody else before us. I love that.

Heidi: 7:48

One thing that I heard was you said you felt the weight of other people's expectations of how you should be showing up in that role. It's like, okay, I'm in the fitness industry, I need to be the most ultra fit, ultra disciplined person ever. And another thing that I picked up on that you said is and I love this differentiation that you made here I had to weigh my body. You didn't say I have to weigh myself. You said I have to weigh my body every day. I think that's a really beautiful thing to point out that probably where you were at that point that you were weighing yourself, yeah, and now you see it, as I was weighing my body because, you see it, you're more than that.

Kim: 8:31

That's a really amazing distinction. Thank you for pulling that out. That's a big ah-ha that I'm walking away with right, Because exactly I saw all of me as my body. One of the things that I really love to speak about is that we are so much more than our bodies as women. At that time and ever since I started dieting when I was 12 years old, so I only knew this lifestyle and I believed my entire worth was attached to that, and so to be able to recognize that my body is one part of me, our bodies are one part of us, but they are not everything. So that's an important distinction. Thank you for that.

Heidi: 9:09

Yeah, I mean, you said it.

Kim: 9:12

So I pointed out what you said. I know I said it, I said it, but you pulled it out right. So these are the powerful moments that we all have. This is why it's so important to talk with people, right? So I loved it.

Heidi: 9:23

What are some of the things that you needed to do? What were the steps that you took along the way? You mentioned reaching out. You reached out to someone you started sharing and opening up. I mean, that's huge, so important to take some of that layer of shame, that shield and armor that you had, letting that down and start talking to someone about it. What else?

Kim: 9:46

Yeah, I mean, ultimately, what I had to do is I had to start to recognize the things that weren't working for me. And I remember I mean there's many things that I did but I remember a pivotal moment where which is where I started my training where I found out about this institute that was talking about all of this. I didn't know about intuitive eating, which is I didn't know about these things. I only knew what I knew growing up around diet culture and the fitness industry. So I had to start to learn how to detach from all of the rules that were taught around what we're supposed to look like, how we're supposed to eat, the moral value attached to food, how my exercise was supposed to look. Like I had been covered in chronic body hives for a year and a half, like there were a lot of things going on with my system. And as soon as I started to pull back and slow down and create space for myself, my body started to heal and it didn't take like it didn't happen overnight, but I had to learn how to prioritize my sleep and start to seek the help. I've become a big reader, like I love reading, I love learning. I had to open up my mind to a new way of thinking so that I could see other opportunities and, of course, coaches and mentors and therapy, and just truly as much as we need things outside of us sometimes to help us. Ultimately, I knew I knew what I needed.

Kim: 11:12

I always talked about the fact that my soul had been whispering to me for a really long time. It's just that I wasn't listening to those whispers because of all the reasons why I felt I couldn't. But our soul knows right. So the wisdom is within us. We sometimes need people outside of us to help us because, of course, it takes time to change our thought patterns and it helps when somebody else can ask us the questions that will help us get to the destination we're wanting. But ultimately, we have a lot of the wisdom that we need and I had to pull myself away. I guess the other thing that I did, too, was really separating myself from some of the conversations, the things that I typically did in my free time. I needed to pull back because that again, wasn't necessarily an environment that I was going to be able to heal in.

Heidi: 12:00

Yeah, one of the things I heard creating space. We have to create space for transformation. We can't keep doing the same things and showing up in the same places and expect for things to change. So I love that you did that, that you gave yourself that space to be able to be self-reflective and to start studying new things. And then you looked at the inputs that you had going on. What were the conversations you were in? Did you also have to look at what you might have been consuming as far as, maybe, facebook or Instagram people that you followed or videos that you watched, that type of thing, newsletters that you were part of?

Kim: 12:39

Yeah, 100%, because that all you know, whether we're with the people or we're consuming it, it's still becoming a part of us. The other things I had to do and this one took a while, but I had to stop standing on the scale. That's a huge part of my journey. I stood on the scale every day from the age of 12 until I was 41 years old.

Kim: 12:56

Wow, yeah, and you don't just you can yeah, so many can and you don't just. I mean, some people can just stop that, but I couldn't. That was a slow weaning away from it, and a huge step, though, for me, because otherwise we continue to stay in the numbers. We get caught up in what I call the masculine energy, and we need to. I need a to get into my feminine, and I needed to step away from those things that were constantly being a measurement of why I wasn't good enough.

Heidi: 13:28

Yeah, and isn't it crazy, as women, to be weighing ourselves on a consistent basis? Anyways, when you think about the fluctuations that the female body goes through in the course of a month, I mean to think that it's not going to go up and down and you know all. Every which way is totally crazy, right, but we bought into that so many times because that's what we hear is like you need to be in control. You need to be in control of it, and the body is an ever changing thing. It's not something to control.

Kim: 14:03

No, and you know we giggle about it now, right, but like I mean I'm close to 50 and I mean it was not. It was like measure your food, weigh yourself. You can't be trusted, your appetite can't be trusted. This is what we were taught and bottom line is we're taught as women that to you know, hide yourself, keep yourself small. And we're doing that, unfortunately, and it's coming at a cost to people. So I mean that was a huge thing for me. Even you know heart rate monitors, like all of the things that I use to measure myself, measure my exercise, measure my performance, again had to release them and I have to say, like some of those things were like when it was gone, it was like this is the best feeling ever. We don't recognize how much these things are consuming us until we actually can breathe without them.

Heidi: 14:58

Yeah, absolutely how much we're. You know, I'm not trying to have a pun here, but weighing our worthiness depending on these outside numbers, you know, which mean nothing. It's the your body and the gravitational pull of the earth.

Kim: 15:16

That's it, yeah, and you know, like all of these because of again, like, if we're talking about women and all of the hats we have to wear and the stress that people feel, I mean, again, if we're using devices to tell us whether or not we're good enough, we're then going to be coming farther and farther away from potentially what our body needs to feel.

Heidi: 15:36

Well, yeah, and I agree with you. We need more women to show up in their power and from a place of wholeness, and that's what we're doing here. Having these conversations is hopefully inspiring people to go. You know, what if I just took the batteries out of the scale? What if I just started there? And then maybe what if I just threw it in the garbage one day? You know and it's not saying you can never weigh yourself again but if that's a problem for you, if that's something you acknowledge is okay, if you're getting on there and the self-talk is so negative and then it's impacting the entire rest of your day and dictating how you show up in the world, because the number wasn't what you know, the ideal that you had in your head, that's a problem.

Heidi: 16:22

Yeah, that's affecting you negatively.

Kim: 16:24

It is, and that's why this is a personal journey. I always will say to people like what would it feel like to actually just put a pause? Put a pause on dieting, put a pause on, you know, not weighing yourself for 30 days and just let's just see what that might feel like for you. Let's just see, let's make this an experiment. Yeah, we're not here to tell people what to do, that's right, but we're here to show them that there is other ways and you just might find a lot of beauty on the other side.

Heidi: 16:53

So much, and that's why I like hearing you know from you what has worked for you in your journey, because, even though it's maybe not identical to someone else's, they can find inspiration in that. I'd love to hear from you, kim, when you're working with clients because you're working in this space now you're helping other women to overcome some of these things and to have a better relationship with food and their body. What types of things are people coming to you with? Is it really similar to your story or is there a lot of nuance there? What are people coming in? And just so people listening can kind of maybe there's something that might trigger something to go. Yeah, I didn't realize that that was something that I was experiencing until I heard Kim say these are some of the things to look for.

Kim: 17:37

Yeah, thanks for that question. So a lot of people are coming to me because they have been following a lot of the beliefs that come from diet culture, so when they are experiencing any challenges with food, it could look like and I'm going to phrase it as excessive emotional eating. So emotional eating is normal. We will always have emotions when we eat, because we're human. Excessive emotional eating, binge eating so any relations with food that way.

Kim: 18:04

But then on the other side also, where there is a disordered relationship with food, in that there's fear of food, or there's using food and exercise as a way to control one's body size, and a lot of this is coming from trauma, which is another reason why I certified as a trauma informed coach, because there's reasons why we have these challenges and they've come into our life. These coping skills have come into our life as a way of helping us regulate our nervous system. Our world has shamed us for that, though, and so, to me, I support these women with learning. Well, maybe, why are you seeking food at the end of your day? Why are you hiding when you're eating? Why are these things happening?

Kim: 18:58

And that's where we can start to create a conversation to see what this food, food or exercise, or whatever it is that they might be doing that is hurting them, why they're doing it, what's the outcome? What is it doing to protect them? So these are some of the things that people come to me for Do a lot of mindset work, though, too. So even outside of the food in the body, we all know, unfortunately, women are struggling with seeing their worth. They're struggling with prioritizing their needs, having healthy relationships and boundaries, and so a lot of this comes down to healing as well. It's recognizing the behaviors and the relationships that we've had that have led us to believe that we don't deserve anything more than that.

Kim: 19:42

So I do a lot of that work too.

Heidi: 19:44

Yeah, I think you hit it right on the head. There, too, is that it's not necessarily a food problem. That's how it's manifested. It's showing up in this way because of other things that have led up to that, that have led to beliefs about either yourself or food, those you know, your worthiness, all of that, and a lot of times we can be doing behaviors like that and, depending on our circle of influence and what type of inputs we have coming in, we may think that those behaviors are the norm and not even really recognize that we're doing things that are not self-honoring.

Kim: 20:32

That's exactly right. It's. It's a sad world to know that most women do not like their bodies or have any respect for their bodies, and it's just not okay. It can't be the norm. And when it comes to body image work, I'm the first one to say that having a healthy body image doesn't mean that you love every part of your body, but you have love for your body, right, and you know, I think ultimately we all, we all know what consumes our thoughts, right, we all know the things that are in our head on a regular basis and when it starts to become a problem and it's holding us back, it's impacting our relationships, it's impacting our way of parenting. Whatever it it, we deserve. We deserve that support, right, because this is not a journey that we can sort of Just ignore and hope that it goes away, because often it gets worse before it goes away.

Heidi: 21:31

Yeah, and it amplifies as well, because when we let's just use the example of the person hiding to eat, there's a lot of shame there, mm-hmm. And so that's happening there in the pantry eating the chocolate chips or whatever. You know, we've all done that and then their shame associated with that because, oh, this is wrong. And then they take that shame into other areas of their life and it really really impacts the way that people show up or don't show up. And this is much bigger than just the one conversation, right, it's impacting everything. It's impacting how they show up in their relationship, it's impacting how they parent, it's impacting their career and the contributions that they have to give there as well.

Kim: 22:15

Yeah, and that's exactly the point here, heidi, is that we as women have so much ability to impact and to serve and to to really bring our gifts out into the world, and if we are feeling that, the relationship we have with our body, the secrets that we don't tell anybody about, those are the things that are holding us back and then that eventually Causes us to feel like we have no contribution to the world anymore. I I really want to highlight the fact. About what you said about the food. There's a beautiful thing that I love to say is our world wants to fix food issues through food. So you just need to not bring the food into the house and you just need to track everything that you eat, etc. But we don't fix Food problems with food. They are the symptom to something underneath that right, yeah, so it's a. It's a short-term solution that really doesn't work and often will bring in more challenges. You know, the more we restrict will now and becoming a binge eater, you know like these are the things that start to happen.

Heidi: 23:22

Yeah, or you start to overly identify with this new Ultra healthy fitness lifestyle, like you experienced, where now it's my identity and I don't know who I am if I'm not doing these things, and and that's also a scary place to be, because we should have meaning in our life outside of. You know the physical Because, like you said, we're so much more than that. So I'd love to hear in your, in your Experience, through the story that you shared with us, what was your biggest lesson that you learned?

Kim: 23:56

Oh, my goodness, the biggest lesson I've learned so many lessons along the way, I guess I guess ultimately is that there wasn't anything wrong with me. You know, I had this belief system that that if I couldn't be all these things, that I wasn't going to be, wanted, loved, belong anywhere, and the lesson is is that I've been everything that I've needed to be all along, and the more I was able to shed the Beliefs about who I wasn't, the more I was able to actually identify with who I was, and we all have so many gifts. So, yeah, I mean, I've learned so many lessons along the way, and I guess the other thing is and that this one I'm working on constantly is trusting my intuition. This is a big one for me. Our intuition is always speaking to us and we are living from our minds and seeking everything from the outside world, whereby we have everything that's coming forward that we need. If we can pull it into our hearts and create some space to slow down and listen, the wisdom's there, that is beautiful.

Heidi: 25:04

That's exactly like conversation my husband and I just had today, because his new movement is called Heart First and he's like what makes us think when we're, even when we're doing vision work right, You're making a vision board or you're writing an experience statement what you want your life to be like, what makes us think that we know what's best for us? Truly, it's based on our own past. It's based on past experience and conditioning and beliefs around. Well, if I have this, I'll be happy and needing things to be a different way, and so I love what you said. It's about just having that moment by moment guidance and listening, but not getting so set in ideals that we confine ourselves to it.

Kim: 25:51

The heart knows right. It's like if we get stuck in our head, if we can find a way to pull it down into our heart, the heart's the way, love is the way. And if we can move from a place of love and the fear is in our head, right, the fear gets stuck up there, but the heart knows the way for sure.

Heidi: 26:10

What's one piece of advice you would give to your younger self?

Kim: 26:15

This to be yourself, be yourself, trust yourself and do what's right for you. Not everyone's gonna like us, not everyone's gonna understand us, but if you can follow your own wisdom and be your authentic self, the world is your oyster.

Heidi: 26:33

And what age did you need to hear that most Like four?

Kim: 26:38

Yeah, oh yeah. Yeah. Little me standing outside of school with no feeling, like nobody wanted to be my friend, you know.

Heidi: 26:45

Yeah, yeah. What are you reinventing in your life right now?

Kim: 26:49

Yeah, right now, myself and three other women have been working on a really big, big, big full day event that we're doing in March. We started planning it last May. It is the biggest experience, the biggest adventure that I've ever been on and it has continued to have me challenge my beliefs, my fears and to really step into potential. So that is what I'm constantly working through is stepping into that next level of me and having fun along the way and being willing to make mistakes, because that's how we're going to learn. So that event is called Bloom Go Figure right, yeah, yeah. So that would be my biggest reinvention right now is just seeing myself being able to do what we're doing.

Heidi: 27:37

Yeah, and it's stretching you and that's so awesome.

Kim: 27:41

Yeah.

Heidi: 27:42

Absolutely so. Where can people find you online? If they wanna connect with you, maybe get some help with some of these things that we've talked about today, or they just wanna connect and share their story.

Kim: 27:53

Appreciate that, thank you. So everything's pretty much under Kim Basler Kimbaslercom. So triple W is my website, and on Instagram I'm Kim Basler underscore foodfreedom, and I'm on Facebook, too. That's pretty much where I'm hanging out right now, and it is me I'm the one that's answering all the DMs. So anyone who listens to this podcast, I would love to hear your takeaways and I just appreciate these opportunities and thank you, heidi, for bringing me on. Thank you for what you're doing here, helping women reinvent themselves at any stage of our life. For me, I'm close to 50 and I'm just getting started.

Heidi: 28:38

That's really how I feel so many more chapters to write right, Absolutely. This is a turn of a new page. Thank you, Kim, so much for being here. I really enjoyed it.

Kim: 28:47

I'm very excited.