Why 98% of Diets Fail: Breaking Free from Diet Culture with Weight Loss Therapist Dr. Candice Seti

In this week's episode of Thursday Tea with Sami, Dr. Samia Estrada sits down with Dr. Candice Seti — licensed clinical psychologist and founder of The Weight Loss Therapist — for an eye-opening conversation about why dieting is failing us and what to do instead.

Did you know that 98% of diets fail? If you've ever felt stuck in the cycle of losing weight and gaining it back, this episode is for you.

Dr. Seti brings her unique blend of psychology, nutrition, fitness, and sleep expertise to break down the real reasons behind our complicated relationship with food — and how to finally change it for good.

In this episode, we cover:

• Why diet culture is designed to keep you stuck in the yo-yo cycle
• The emotional and psychological cost of chronic dieting
• How stress and cortisol silently sabotage your weight management goals
• The surprising connection between sleep quality and cravings, metabolism, and hunger hormones
• What mindful eating actually looks like in everyday life
• How to shift from a weight loss mindset to a sustainable health mindset
• Practical tips for building self-compassion and a healthier body image

Key takeaway: You are not stuck. Whether you've been yo-yo dieting for 2 years or 20, long-term sustainable change is always possible — and it starts with understanding yourself.

🔗 Connect with Dr. Candice Seti:

• Website: meonlybetter.com | theweightlosstherapist.com
• Free Sleep Tips Guide: available on her website

⭐ If this episode resonated with you, please share it with someone who needs it and leave us a review — it helps more people find the show!

Disclaimer: This podcast is for educational and informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical or psychological care.

Transcript

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SPEAKER_00 0:00

The data shows us 98% of diets fail, right? It's startling. 2% of people who lose weight on a diet are actually able to maintain it. Yet it's a billion-dollar industry, right?

SPEAKER_01 0:22

Welcome to Thursday Tea with Sammy, your sip of wellness and mental health. I'm your host, Dr. Samia Estrada. Every week we gather here for thoughtful conversations about mental health, well-being, and what it really means to live well in everyday life. Before we begin, a quick note. This podcast is for educational and informational purposes only, and is not a substitute for medical or psychological care. Listening does not create a therapeutic relationship, and the views shared by my guests are their own and everyone's experience is different. Please seek personalized care from a qualified professional. Now grab your favorite cup of tea or whatever brings you comfort and let's get into today's conversation. Hi everyone, welcome back to Thursday Tea with Sammy, your ship of wellness and mental health. I'm your host, Dr. Sammy Estrata, and today's conversation is one I've really been looking forward to. My guest today is Dr. Candace Seti, also known as the weight loss therapist. Dr. Setti is a licensed clinical psychologist with specialized training in weight management, nutrition, fitness, and insomnia treatment. Candace, welcome to Thursday T with Sammy. I'm so glad that you're here. So glad to be here. Thank you for having me. So happy to have you. For listeners who are meeting you for the first time, can you share a little bit about your journey into becoming the weight loss therapist and what drew you to this work?

SPEAKER_00 2:11

Sure. Well, I mean, when I first started out as a clinical psychologist in private practice, I specialized in self-esteem, body image issues, and eating disorders. And then concurrently, as a result of my own experiences with weight loss, weight management, diet dependence, I shifted my focus to include this as a specialization because I realized that one, the dieting world sets us up for failure and there needs to be another way. And two, almost everybody I was working with was already struggling with this same thing. And so, you know, it became a realization that so many of these individuals that I worked with with body image issues, with self-esteem issues, with eating disorders, were also chronic dieters, chronic yo-yo dieters that were looking to break their dependence on diets and learn how to manage their weights sustainably, but just didn't know how to do it because there is nothing out there or was nothing out there that said, this is how you do it. All there was was diets. So it was a little bit of the fact that I was, I was already working with people who, whether I realized it or not, had these struggles, but then going through it on my own and kind of opening my eyes to all of it was sort of what moved me into that direction.

SPEAKER_01 3:31

Yes. But I love how you used something from your own life to recognize a need that people that you were working with already had, and then use that as sort of your emphasis. Yeah. Yeah. And you have a unique blend of psychology, weight management, fitness, nutrition, and sleep expertise. How did those pieces come together for you?

SPEAKER_00 3:56

Well, I mean, all of those things are crucial parts of behavior change around weight management. So, I mean, as you know, I started to dig into it, I really wanted to kind of advance my knowledge and education in those areas. So within that pivot, I first got certifications in fitness and nutrition, because that I guess seemed like the obvious thing at the time. Right. But then in realizing how pivotal sleep and stress management are to health and weight management, I realized I needed to go much more in depth on that as well. So I became a certified insomnia treatment clinician and a certified stress management specialist, because those things are so important to weight management and so overlooked in most weight management plans. So I really wanted to have kind of a holistic approach where I was touching on everything that was relevant.

SPEAKER_01 4:49

Yes, that makes so much sense because there are so many things that go hand in hand together. And if if we're only addressing one piece of it, we're really ignoring a lot of other really important pieces, right? And yeah. Sometimes if we ignore those other pieces, it's really hard to make movement in that one area that we're focusing on.

SPEAKER_00 5:09

Yeah, which is exactly what most of diet culture does, right? Focuses on the case. Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 5:14

That's what I was gonna ask next. Is what do you think that the diet culture gets wrong? And I think definitely it's ignoring some of those parts, but is there anything else that you think, you know, when we think about like that dieting culture?

SPEAKER_00 5:27

Oh God, so much. I don't even know how much time we have. I could talk about that all day, what diet where diet culture goes wrong. I mean, uh, there's so many things, but when you look at most diets, what what most of them have in common is some type of restriction, right? I mean, it's low carb, it's low fat, it's low sodium, it's gluten-free, it's no soy, it's whatever it may be. It goes on and on. And what this this tends to do a lot of different things, but really it creates like a disconnection from your body, either in the form of, you know, not listening to your body's hunger cues or not feeding your body what it's asking for or what it's needing and ignoring kind of nutritional needs. You know, it's for for decades, we've seen that it's not about health and wellness and longevity, it's about weight loss, period. Uh a number on the scale. That's it. And it's why we have all these lose weight fat, fast promises, fad diets that are hard to resist, and they don't focus on wellness. They don't focus on the whole person. And again, they focus on restrictions. So they leave us often in an unhealthy, healthy place and in a place where we've even further distorted our relationship with food through the restriction, right? And it's it's why diets fail. I mean, the data shows us 98% of diets fail, right? Yeah, it's startling. 2% of people who lose weight on a diet are actually able to maintain it.

SPEAKER_02 6:54

Right.

SPEAKER_00 6:55

Yet, yet it's a billion-dollar industry, right? It's it's you know, it's flawed in so many ways, but those are are kind of the biggest ones that jump out at me.

SPEAKER_01 7:06

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And given that there's such a high failure rate, why do you think there's so many people that get stuck in that yo-yo cycle?

SPEAKER_00 7:18

Well, I mean, a couple of reasons, but you know, the the long and short of it is they make it look easy. Yeah, and they give us short-term results, right? So most diets are these, you know, well-packaged, easy to follow, clear cut, right? And they show us results quickly, and that's what we want, and that's what we buy into. We we jump on board, we love it because we have success at first. Yes. And so it becomes what we know. And of course, the problem is that it's a short-term result. So, you know, we do the thing, we lose weight, we feel good, we stop doing the thing, and then what happens is we gain the weight back. And at some point we say, Oh no, I need to lose weight again. And then where does our brain go? It goes to that thing that we did before that helped us lose weight, and now here we are, right? Yeah, that yo-yo dieting cycle.

SPEAKER_01 8:09

Yep. Yeah, yeah. And you know, when you were talking earlier, and this is not my area of expertise, so this is me just kind of thinking about it. When you were talking earlier about how a diet can be really restrictive, and then we're not listening to what our body really needs, it made me think about when as kids were told things like, you know, finish everything that's on your plate, or you can't have dessert until you finish all your food, for example, right? Yeah, and those things, as well intentioned as they are, because obviously our parents did not want us to be malnourished, uh-huh, you know, and they they did not do that with the intent to hurt us. But when we get those messages, we start to disregard our internal cues. So if my cue says that I'm full, but there's still food in my plate, and I have to finish the food in my plate, then I'm not paying attention to that cue, right? And then same, if I'm in a restrictive diet, then I think about, you know, I have to only eat these things, even though maybe what I'm craving is an apple or a cucumber or whatever. But if I'm in this restrictive diet that says I can only eat these specific things, I'm also ignoring those cues, right?

SPEAKER_00 9:30

Does that make sense to you? I mean, you're absolutely, absolutely right on. There are there are so many of these food-related messages that we get at a young age, often from our parents. And like you said, not with malintent on their part. They're almost always meant to be positive, but most parents don't have education in this area either. And that's exactly what it does. It sets us up to disconnect from our hunger and our satiety cues in our body and to eat for external reasons, right? Or eating because that's how much food is on our plate, or we're eating because it's going to get us dessert, or whatever it may be. And we're not, we're taught not to listen to our body at a very young age, and that can definitely set us up for disordered eating.

SPEAKER_01 10:12

Yes, yeah. So, from your point of view, from a psychological point of view, what is that? What's the emotional cost of chronic dieting? God, it's massive.

SPEAKER_00 10:24

Um, another thing that we could talk about for hours and hours. Well, it definitely can have an impact on our self-perception and our feelings towards our body, right? Creating very negative feelings towards our body. We know, and there's a ton of research showing that frequent yo-yo dieting can lead to chronic sadness, depression, negative self-concept, emotional instability, right? This idea that we are not capable or that we are dependent or that we're trapped and we don't have any other options. I mean, very clearly you can see how it sets us up to have a very unhealthy relationship with food. Yeah. Where, you know, we either start to view food in this black and white all or nothing context. Food is good or food is bad, food has control over you, you feel less than, you know, people who don't have these struggles. So, I mean, there are there are so many ways that it impacts our mental health, our perception of self, our self-concept, our self-confidence. And it gets worse and worse the longer we do it. So I tell people all the time, even if you have been yo-yo dieting for some time, it's never too late to break the cycle. And as the sooner you break the cycle, the more positive that impact will be.

SPEAKER_01 11:36

Yes, yes. Sometimes we get in our own way of our own progress, right? You've written about self-sabotage. How does stress show up in eating behaviors and in weight regulations?

SPEAKER_00 11:50

Um, again, also so many ways. I mean, there's there's kind of a chicken and egg relationship between stress and eating and weight, right? Because stress and experiencing stress can cause us to overeat, and overeating can cause us stress. And so these things definitely play into each other, but stress can actually cause your body to hold on to weight, primarily because of the impact on our endocrine system and our hormone cortisol. Cortisol, which is our stress hormone. Um, and it's released when we experience stress as a way to help our body regulate that reaction, which is in and of itself not a bad thing. But when stress becomes prolonged, or when stress becomes chronic, or when stress is particularly intense and our cortisol levels stay elevated for a very long time, then we start to see all these negative impacts on our body, where our body starts to basically shut down things that it doesn't need to be able to manage the stress. One of those things is our metabolism. So our metabolism slows down considerably, your body stops burning calories, and your body starts holding on to fat to keep you safe, right? It's it's doing it again for good reasons, but it's a pretty negative consequence that most people don't want. And it all comes from this chronic stress, which is why stress management is so key to healthy weight management.

SPEAKER_01 13:13

Yes, absolutely. And you know, I think about people who are under stress, and I talk about this with my clients as well, because when we're under stress, I think most of the time we crave things that only make things worse, you know, like the sugary or the salty or the fried foods, right? Yeah, and those increase inflammation in our body and they increase the cortisol in our body. And so we can very easily get stuck in that loop, can't we?

SPEAKER_00 13:44

Mm-hmm. Absolutely. I mean, and your body is craving those things for a reason, right? We crave sugar oftentimes when we need energy because it's the most quick release form of energy. We crave that that combo of salt, sugar, and fat because of the dopamine release we get from it, which is a way that our brain can help combat stress short term, though. Right. So there's a reason why all that happens, which is why it's so important to pay attention to it and to to pivot your response a little bit.

SPEAKER_01 14:14

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 14:14

Because that can also be key to ultimately decreasing your stress levels.

SPEAKER_01 14:19

Yes, yes. So, what would be some ways that you would recommend for listeners to then work on their stress level without automatically turning to food or or to self-criticism?

SPEAKER_00 14:32

Well, the first step always is to pay attention. I mean, when we're talking about how our body responds to something, when we're talking about self-sabotage, you need to know how it's happening and what you do. You need to understand it in order to know how to respond to it and how to address it.

SPEAKER_02 14:48

Right.

SPEAKER_00 14:48

If you're always craving sugar in those situations, then you need to look at your carbohydrate intake overall and say, you know, how can I pivot and adjust? And, you know, when I'm craving a candy bar, can I have a piece of whole wheat toast instead? And will I get the same calming response without setting myself up for this negative relationship with food? But also there's so many thought patterns that go into this, especially when we're talking about self-sabotage, right? And our self-sabotage voice that often comes from these negative thoughts in our head of, you know, you can't do it or put it off or you'll never succeed, or you're no good. And then how we respond to those, you know, when when we give in to those, we give them power. When we fight them, you know, we're able to kind of feel stronger and feel more capable. But again, we need to know what they are. So I usually tell people to just listen and track, right? What is your head saying to you? What is it, what is your brain saying to you? What are your emotions saying to you? And, you know, when you can start to understand this, then you can start to look at, okay, now how do I fight back? How do I respond to this? How do I shut these thoughts down and and take the power away from them? But it has to start with paying attention.

SPEAKER_01 16:00

Okay. Everything starts with paying attention. It makes sense. Mm-hmm. If we think about a healthy relationship with food, what would that look like? What does a healthy relationship with food actually look like in everyday life?

SPEAKER_00 16:15

I mean, it's a hard one because very few people have one, but it certainly can look like a lot of different things, like understanding and respecting your hunger cues, but also noticing and responding to your society satiety, right? The idea of saying, you know, I'm hungry, my body needs fuel, I'm going to eat, but also my body is content and I can stop eating.

SPEAKER_02 16:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:38

It can look like breaking up with dieting rules and eating what you want when you want, and giving your body what it needs. It can look like, you know, understanding how food makes you feel and making eating choices based on that, saying this is something that makes me feel strong and energized and capable versus this is something that makes me feel sluggish and tired and inflamed. It can look like understanding your cravings from a nutritional standpoint as well as a behavioral standpoint and responding to them. Am I craving this because I have a nutritional need? Am I craving this because I have an emotional need? And responding to emotions without using food. I mean, ultimately, what all of that stuff has in common is it looks like taking the power away from food and feeling like you are in control.

SPEAKER_01 17:22

Got it. Yes, that makes so much sense. I know there's been uh a lot of um talk about mindfulness in our in our everyday life, especially lately. Where does mindfulness have a place when it comes to eating? Because I know, you know, you're you're talking about really thinking about the food that we're putting into our body. And I certainly think that that is in itself mindfulness, you know, being mindful of what we're putting in our body and what makes us feel good and not, you know, being aware of that present moment feeling. If I eat this, how do I feel right now? And if I eat this other thing, then how do I feel? I know, for example, that if I eat something sweet, that that tends to make me have more pain if I if I um, you know, if I'm working out my body or if I'm going for a hike or something like that, I start to feel the little creaks here and there in my body, right? Or all of a sudden my knee is bothering me as I'm, you know, hiking uphill. And and it's like, oh, okay, I can see the connection between that sugary item that I ate and how I feel going up. What about like as we're having the meal? Can you talk a little bit about that mindful eating?

SPEAKER_00 18:34

Yes, absolutely. Mindful eating is is kind of a very big area that has a lot of different components. And, you know, it it some people can get overwhelmed by the idea of mindful eating because it is there are so many pieces to it. But I always tell people you don't need to do all of them. You certainly don't need to start with all of them. Um, you can pick any piece of it and jump in. And it can be as simple as, for example, removing distractions from your eating environment. So many people eat with a screen in front of them, right? They eat in front of the TV, they eat with their phone, they eat with their computer, they eat with their tablet, whatever it may be. And what that means is the thing that your brain is primarily focused on is what's on your screen. And your food and your eating become secondary no matter what. And so you're not really present with your food. And so it becomes much harder to one, really enjoy your food and get that whole experience from it, but also to connect with your satiety and your fullness because you're not really present.

SPEAKER_02 19:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:37

So removing some of those distractions from your environment and sitting down with a meal and just the meal and having that meal can be really powerful. It also can be very scary for a lot of people because people are not used to it. And there's a discomfort that comes from that, especially when people are so used to having a screen in front of front of them. But you know, it it takes a little bit of practice, but that can be a way that you can really jump in and kind of be present. Another thing you can do is slow down your eating. I mean, so many of us are very, very fast eaters, and you know, we do this and we we put a bite of food in our mouth, and then we immediately go and make our next bite, and it kind of sits in front of us, telling us hurry up and swallows you can take this next bite in. And when we slow it down, um, and maybe even keep our fork down until we're done with our bite, then we get to again be present with our food. And we get to actually pay attention to the bite that we're eating and am I enjoying this? And how does this taste and how does this feel? And and what's the texture and what are the aromas and and having the experience of being present with your food, which most people don't get when they're fast eaters, and it can change things. I I've had people tell me all sorts of things when they start doing this about how they realize things that they liked that they didn't realize or things that they didn't like that they've been eating, because now all of a sudden they're paying attention. So there are there are a lot of different things. I mean, these are just a couple of examples, but there are a lot of different things that you can do to just start becoming just a slightly more mindful eater, and it can dramatically improve your relationship with food.

SPEAKER_01 21:10

Yes. I remember I did an exercise once with a Mandarin Orange, and we were to look at it first, you know. Um, so you would look at the skin and notice any imperfections in it and the the shine or the dullness of the skin and and the divots and all that, and then you would open it and smell it and feel it and then put it in your mouth. But I think the part that was really key for me was they said, take a segment of the mandarin orange and put it in your mouth. And so I did, and they said, Don't chew on it yet, just feel it, right? And so I felt it and I kind of tasted it. And then they said, Okay, now chew it, but pay attention to the sensations, right? And in that moment, when you bite down on the segment and all the juices come out, and it's like the fragrance and the flavor and and just the juices and everything. When you pay attention with that level of detail, that food just becomes something completely different from nothing you've ever tasted before. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:15

Yeah. I teach uh I teach a workshop on mindful eating and I use a grape when I do that. And the process of eating that single grape takes over a minute, which is kind of shocking to people. It's really, really, you know, when people finally, but because you put the grape in your mouth to kind of roll it on. And when you finally bite into it, you know, I see the expression on people's faces change when they do that. And then I have them not swallow it immediately. I have them chew on it for a little while, which is also a struggle for people. Right. Because, you know, we kind of have this thing in our brain that immediately says swallow and have the next one. And when you have to sit with it and kind of go through that experience of of chewing it and continuing to chew it, it can be equally as eye-opening. So yeah, it can be really, really powerful in in kind of changing your awareness around food.

SPEAKER_01 23:08

Yes. I think those exercises are excellent. Yeah, I agree. And I think I've also heard that we don't chew our food as much as we should, correct?

SPEAKER_00 23:18

Yes. And mindful eating can definitely help with that. But um and it has other benefits. It has significant digestive benefits too, right? I mean chewing is a is a part of our digestive process. And you know the saliva that we release in our mouth is part of the digestive process because it has enzymes that help break down our food before it gets into the rest of our GR and you know when we start chewing more, it's amazing how people notice all these benefits in their digestion.

SPEAKER_02 23:44

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 23:45

And you know there's there's all these things about how many bites you should take and counting your bites and all that. But really I I think the more mindful you are and the more focused you are on what you're chewing presently as opposed to what you're going to be chewing in 30 seconds. Naturally your eating speed starts to slow down.

SPEAKER_01 24:02

Yes, yes. And there's another thing that I've heard and I want to check in with you about what you think about this, but that our brain doesn't recognize as quickly as our stomach that we have had enough to eat. Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 24:17

Yeah I mean it's talk you know that whole adage is about like the connection between brain and body and all of that but really you know we generally don't stop to check in with ourselves on that. Right? You know we we have a plate of food in front of us and something in our brain says this is our portion this is what I need this is what I'm going to eat. And most of us don't stop periodically throughout that meal to say and how about now? Am I am I good now? Have I had enough to eat now? Am I am I satiated and able to walk away? We just eat right we eat what's on our plate. And when we take those breaks I call them mini breaks in our meal where for maybe 15 20 seconds we stop and say how do I feel now I know I was hungry when I started this meal am I still hungry? Yeah. Do I feel good now? Am I content? Am I satiated? Could I walk away and be good? Do I need to finish this? And if if I feel full, why am I continuing to eat? And can I save this for later? Or you know whatever it may be. But again it's it's just that peace of mindfulness that we're often lacking in that situation where we're able to say what is going on with my body right now and what do I need? Right.

SPEAKER_01 25:28

So what would you say is one small shift that listeners can make today or this week to feel more at ease around food?

SPEAKER_00 25:37

Well I would say it's again going back to the idea of paying attention but also self-questioning right when you're when you're eating when you're craving when you're planning ask yourself you know why do I want this? Am I am I hungry? Am I avoiding something? Am I bored? Am I sad? Am I deprived nutritionally? Am I sleep deprived? Right? I mean so much of that can tie into it. And also you know when we're talking about self-questioning going back to the idea of how will you used an example of at the gym like how will I feel after I eat it right am I going to feel energized? Am I going to feel tired? Am I going to feel guilty? Am I going to feel angry? Am I going to feel satiated and content and happy right? How am I going to feel after I eat that is just as important as you know why am I wanting this? What's going on right now that's telling me I I need to eat something is it actual hunger or is it more emotional? So I think just that self-questioning and gaining awareness of that can be really powerful.

SPEAKER_01 26:35

Yes yes I love that and you mentioned sleep. I know sleep is often overlooked in weight management.

SPEAKER_00 26:42

How does sleep quality affect hunger, cravings, metabolism, all that all of the above and then some we see a very significant impact on all of those things with poor sleep or sleep deprivation, not sleeping enough or low quality sleep. We see impact on appetite regulation. When we sleep well we have less impulsivity in our food choices. We have less drive to snack we have a perception of more willpower we have reduced cravings we have less draw to some of these high calorie carb fat foods that we were talking about earlier. We have more satiety and more connection to our satiety. We also see you know physical benefits, we have better energy levels. So we're more inclined to exercise we're more inclined to move more which has an impact on our overall wellness and our drive for food. We know that when we have good quality sleep it maintains our gut microbiome, which is when we have a healthy gut microbiome, we generally see a lot of things change in a healthier way with our relationship with food. We see when we sleep better that our pleasure and reward centers in our brain are less stimulated, which means we're less stimulated by some of these high sugar, high fat foods. And so we see all of these things change, you know, when people are sleeping well, which suggests and my my hypothesis is always that getting good sleep is equally as important as diet and exercise in regulating our weight. And this is primarily due to all of the hormonal impacts of sleep you know on hormones like leptin and ghrelin or hunger and satiety hormones on insulin, on cortisol, which we talked about on HGH hormone, on endo, right? All of these different hormones get impacted by our sleep. So when we're sleeping well, our body is functioning optimally and when our body is functioning optimally we're generally not craving things that are unhealthy and we're responding to our body in appropriate ways.

SPEAKER_01 28:43

Okay that makes a lot of sense and once again all those things that go hand in hand together that we don't all always take into consideration. If somebody's not sleeping well, what would be some simple nighttime tweaks that they can make that would meaningfully impact their sleep well there's a lot of things around this concept of sleep hygiene which is like you know kind of making your your sleep environment and your sleep plan as as you know appropriate as it can be for good sleep.

SPEAKER_00 29:17

And there are some basic things like you know sleeping in a cool environment sleeping in a dark environment sleeping in a quiet environment or a white noise filled environment where it's not disruptive sound. And so those are some really simple basic things that people can look at. Is your environment that you're sleeping in cool right our body temperature rises all day and drops at night which triggers sleep and a cool temperature kind of aids this signal for our body is what it's used to. So can you be sleeping in a cooler environment is your sleep environment dark right is there is there light around you is there blue light around you blue light in particular which suppresses melatonin which is our sleep hormone and if you are in a lighted environment you know can you control that? Can you wear uh an eye shade, an eye mask, something like that to block it out is your sleep environment noisy? Is there inconsistent noise like TV noise or anything like that or outdoor noise? And if so can you use white noise to drown some of that out and creating some of those environmental impacts um and then some of the things that can potentially work with your body and your body's circadian rhythm like you know being consistent in your sleep schedule waking up at the same time every day going to bed at the same time every day getting sun exposure early in the morning to set your melatonin clock moving your body in certain ways throughout the day you know particularly you know later afternoon, early evening to play with this sort of temperature rise and drop that triggers sleep. So there's all sorts of tips and tricks you can do. I have a free sleep guide actually a sleep tips guide that people can download that kind of walk through all of these different steps that can be really powerful despite the fact that they are very simple. Okay. And so there are some very simple changes that you can make that can help your body just sleep better consistently. Perfect.

SPEAKER_01 31:09

Yeah and if you're willing to share I can put that in the show notes so that if people want to download that. Yeah really yeah and I was thinking about you know we were talking about hormones and things like that when you sleep and I I imagine that stress and sleep reinforce each other, you know, in both ways that if you have more stress you're probably having a harder time sleeping and vice versa if you're having a harder time sleeping you're probably more stressed. But also when you're sleeping better your stress level is also better. Is that correct?

SPEAKER_00 31:40

Another chicken and egg relationship right there. Yes. Yeah when we sleep better we tend to have a healthier stress response and we tend not to get as stressed in certain situations. And when we're stressed we definitely don't sleep as well. You know our brain and our body are kind of on on hyperdrive so to speak and so that that tends to get in the way and I talk about sleep and sleep improvement sleep quality sleep duration all of that as being stress protective right and you know almost preventative in terms of you know how your body responds to stress because we can't stop stressful things from happening in our life and our environment but we can change how we respond to them. And when we're proactively doing things to take care of ourselves like putting time and effort into sleep quality we have a significantly reduced stress response. Wonderful.

SPEAKER_01 32:34

The other thing that I was thinking about is body image because I imagine that body image can also contribute to stress in a certain way and and that sometimes those body image struggles can interfere with just that sustainable behavior change, right?

SPEAKER_00 32:50

Absolutely what does it mean um to approach your health goals maybe with more compassion rather than with punishment or with judgment um and and you know toward yourself basically I mean I love that question because you know I I I talk to people all the time particularly women I think are are more prone to this than men and what I've seen anecdotally but in general we we are not so good at being nice to ourselves. We seem to have a much easier time being nice to everyone else and we don't really treat ourselves like a friend. And you know people have heard me say this a million times over I say it all the time you know we can we can go through the day and do a hundred things arbitrarily and do 99 of them right and one of them wrong. And at the end of the day the only thing we're focused on is the one thing we did wrong.

SPEAKER_02 33:44

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 33:45

And you know we're beating ourselves up for that thing you know saying I'm such an idiot I can't believe I screwed that up and I'm terrible and all of this. And the reality is we did 99% of things right, which is kind of amazing. And if it were a friend, that's exactly what we'd be we'd be saying to them we'd be saying you are amazing. You did 99% of things right. You should be so proud of yourself. You are killing it and we don't treat ourselves that way. We don't talk to ourselves that way. You know learning how to do that and and really working on talking to ourselves and treating ourselves like a friend can be really powerful because you know we have this very strong misconception that focusing on the negative you know is as a form of self-punishment is is motivating and can help us grow. But it does the exact opposite it keeps us stuck in that mindset and it has us buy in to that belief that we we are no good, we are not capable, we cannot do and it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. So you know the idea of really working on treating yourself kindly, treating yourself like a friend talking to yourself like you would to your best friend in the exact same situation and realizing how different that self-talk is can be really powerful in changing how you treat yourself, how you see yourself.

SPEAKER_01 35:01

Yes, absolutely I think sometimes we even treat strangers better than we treat ourselves. You know we could be walking down the street and be completely nice to the person that's on the street or or maybe at a coffee shop or somebody who's bringing us up at the grocery store you know but but then we turn around and and we're really critical of ourselves and judgmental and mean and so yes I agree that's definitely something to change. Do you have any simple tips that people can do if they're not used to treating themselves well or with compassion some ways in which maybe they can start to head in that direction.

SPEAKER_00 35:42

Yeah absolutely I I always do the exercise of talking to yourself like a friend, right? I mean let's imagine your friend was in the exact same situation and they told you this what would you say to them? How would you respond to them? And that can be eye-opening for a lot of people I also talk to people about the idea of identifying your wins which is a really simple strategy that you can engage in daily where at the end of the day you just kind of look back on your day and say, what did I do well? What do I feel proud of? What felt good? Right. And it's it's not saying that nothing went wrong. It's not saying that you're perfect. It's not any of that kind of stuff. Just focusing your attention here instead of here right and we go to the 10% instead of the 99% and it's just about focusing yourself on the 99% so that you even have just a few moments where you can kind of pat yourself on the back and say I I did good. There are things I'm proud of there are things I feel good about. And doing that over time repeatedly starts to make you see that there are so many things that you can feel good about.

SPEAKER_01 36:47

Yeah that's such wonderful advice. Thank you for that. I think about people who are on their health journey or maybe they start off on a weight loss journey. Maybe they haven't gotten to the part where they're really focusing on health instead of weight loss. How can people move from that weight loss journey where they're really focused on that number on the scale to then moving more toward a goal where they can be healthy instead of looking at that number as their self-worth, right? If if that number goes to a certain point then I feel good about myself but if it's above that point I don't feel good about myself at all.

SPEAKER_00 37:27

Yeah. Well I mean it's it's really about reframing this in terms of how you feel right I've talked to people a lot who you know the example you gave who have this this number goal and maybe they're making change they're they're starting to feel better they're starting to feel good they're feeling good in their bodies they're feeling more confident and then they step on the scale and they don't see the number they wanted and all of a sudden all this stuff goes away and it's like wait a minute you were you were feeling amazing. You were confident you were happy you were liking the way you looked why does the number change that and you know that's that's very historical and it's based on an idea that we have to have that as a goal. But then the question becomes what are the actual goals so I talk to people all the time about the goals of their goals right what are they trying to achieve when somebody wants to achieve weight loss or certain number that's not the goal. The goal is what they get as a result of that. So I like to have people dig in a little deeper to figure out what it is they're actually trying to achieve is it something physical in terms of how they feel or energy level or sleep? Is it something emotional in terms of how they see themselves is it confidence? Is it you know the security to go out? Is it is it health related? Is it something where they want to increase their life longevity or want to be able to physically get up and down off the floor with their child or something along those lines and when they start to identify those goals then those become the things that they start to work towards because those things are really the more powerful things because those are here right they're not external and so a lot of times we just need to shift what it is we realize that we're trying to achieve what it is that we actually want.

SPEAKER_01 39:13

Yes yes I love that idea to really focus on on the ultimate goal which is what you want do you want that confidence? Do you want something else? When I think about people's struggles I think about um you know we just talked about how sleep can affect our our lifestyle and stress can affect our lifestyle and not being mindful with our food can affect our lifestyle. And I think that sometimes people feel overwhelmed like there's too many things to focus on.

SPEAKER_00 39:44

Where do you usually suggest that they start I suggest they start with any one thing. Okay. Because like you said, yes overwhelming I mean it's I I always call it the New Year's resolution problem, right? Yes where people decide on January 1st they're gonna do a hundred things different. Yes I'm going to oh I have never go to the gym at all and now I'm gonna go seven days a week and I never track my food and I want to track all my food and I never meal prep and I'm gonna meal prep all my food and you want to do a hundred different things and I'm sure you want all of that but it's it's too much all at once and it becomes overwhelming. And so we respond in an all or nothing way where we go 180 degrees in the other direction.

SPEAKER_02 40:23

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 40:23

So the better route tends to be pick one thing start with one thing any one thing whatever you relate to and start getting that down and then add one more thing and then start getting that down and then gradually you can add in you never lose the ability to keep adding in but you don't need to start with all of it because starting with all of it absolutely is overwhelming. So pick something that you feel you can do a place that you feel you can start and then keep building on.

SPEAKER_01 40:52

Yes. I think like with anything you know when we can make small sustainable changes it's easier to grow those small sustainable changes than to try to change something really big overnight. Yeah I think I don't know if you've ever seen this but there's a TED talk by BJ Fogg he talks about small changes for happiness. And he said that you know making big changes was too difficult. So he started to make small changes and one thing that he talked about was he decided that he was going to tie it to things he was already doing. So for example anytime he would go to the bathroom he would do you know and it's been a while since I heard this so I I might be mismisaying what what actually what he actually said but something like I'm gonna do three squats every time I go to the bathroom you know and so you think about you know how many times do we go to the bathroom maybe four five six times a day you know and so every time he went he would do three squats and that doesn't seem like a lot and it's definitely doable you know somebody can do three squats every time you go to the bathroom but over the course of a day you've done maybe 15 18 squats right and so as he did more and more of that he started to think to himself I can do more than three you know I'm gonna do five now and so when we pick something small like that it's easier to make that grow and then and to start making that a habit because it's so easy to do it so small that it feels like there's no way I can't not do this right of course I'm gonna do it. So I love what you're saying about starting small and then you know slowly adding to that.

SPEAKER_00 42:35

Yeah. Well and tied to that I mean the example you just gave which is called habit stacking is you know the idea of tying something you want to do into something that's already a habit, right? And I always use the example of either brushing your teeth which most people do on autopilot or you know making your coffee in the morning which most people tend to do on autopilot. And you know can you tie something into that and it becomes a little bit easier because there's something you're already doing. But also when you start small and you start attainable you kind of start to feel good and more confident and more capable. Yeah and you have this better perspective when you go and add in kind of the next thing this you know I can do this. Look at me I I have been doing three squats every time I go to the bathroom and so I can do more and I am capable and I can take it on. And we start to have a more confident perspective on our abilities moving forward which makes it that much easier to take on the next thing.

SPEAKER_01 43:31

Yes, absolutely. And as you mentioned the things that we do on autopilot I don't know if this is something that you share with your clients but I often encourage my clients when they practice mindfulness to use those things that they do on autopilot because those are the things that we don't even think about you know like when we get in to take a shower, you know, we just start washing our hair and our face and our body we don't even think about it. When we drive sometimes you know if it's driving to work or somewhere That we go really often, we often don't even think about it. We break our teeth. And those are all the moments in which we can bring in that mindfulness and really change that perspective.

SPEAKER_00 44:11

Yeah. Absolutely. I think that's a great way to approach it because it does really kind of teach what mindfulness is because those are completely mindless tasks. Yes. Right. Where we are not present at all with that. We're just doing on autopilot. And mindfulness really is about turning off autopilot. Right. And taking the helm yourself.

SPEAKER_01 44:33

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 44:33

And doing it with things like that can be really powerful to help people see, you know, what how different that can be, especially when they start to realize, oh, I've been doing that with eating. Right. Like that same thing that I'm doing with brushing my teeth. I've been doing that with eating and and and really gaining awareness of that. So yeah, I love that.

SPEAKER_01 44:50

Yes, yes. And I know we touched a little bit on body image and and and then we quickly moved to self-compassion. Do you think that self-compassion is the thing that helps people with their body image? Or would you say there are other things that people should be on the lookout for if they want to improve their own body image?

SPEAKER_00 45:11

I think self-compassion is key, absolutely. I mean, being kind to ourselves, being gentle with ourselves, being being warm with ourselves. But, you know, self-love is another piece of that. I mean, they're they're very interconnected, but certainly not the same thing. Okay. Um, and you know, the idea of, you know, looking at yourself as something worthy of love, you know, and again, tying into the idea of not being so hard on ourselves, but you know, I you don't have to do something to earn love, to earn that. You know, I the example I give a lot is, you know, a newborn infant, you know, and and their parents look at them and immediately say, I love you. Did that infant have to do something to earn that love? No, it's just natural and innate. And why is that infant deserving of love? What have they done? You know, they haven't done anything. Right. And just like you do not need to do anything to be deserving of self-love. You don't need to win your own love. You just need to decide that you have inherent value, that you are worth it. And when we truly can believe that we are worth it, we are valuable, we are enough, right? All of these things, our perspective can change, our self-compassion can change, our self-concept and our self-confidence, all of these things are impacted by that. The idea of, you know, taking the space to decide you can love yourself, that you can care for yourself, that you are worthy of all of these things can be equally as powerful as self-compassion.

SPEAKER_01 46:47

That sounds so beautiful as I'm listening to it. And I'm also thinking about some of the clients that I see, and I'm sure some of the clients that you've seen that feel like they've never had that self-love. Or it's been a long time since they felt that self-love. And that maybe they didn't even feel a hundred percent loved as a child either. You know, they felt like maybe, you know, that just wasn't in the cards for them or whatever. What would be some practical takeaways that they could, you know, something that they could start thinking about today or that they could start doing today that would help to move them in that direction of recognizing that they are worthy of that love and that they don't have to do anything for that love?

SPEAKER_00 47:32

Well, I mean, I think it's a lot of the stuff we talked about, right, which is just kind of this this awareness of, you know, simply being as enough, right? And the idea of not having to prove yourself, prove your worth, prove your value, right? And, you know, when you look at who you love or why you love them, is it because of something they did or who they are?

SPEAKER_02 47:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 47:56

And what does it mean to love somebody for who they are? And, you know, this kind of comes back to the idea of identifying your wins, but also kind of talking about, you know, the inherent qualities in you that are lovable because it doesn't mean that you have to love every single thing about yourself. It doesn't mean that you need to be perfect, but just embracing the fact that there are qualities about you. And I've been able to pull this out of everybody, regardless of what they think of themselves. There are qualities about you that are lovable. And we just need to give them again that time and attention. We just need to focus our brain on those instead of these things that are that are dominating our our brain space.

SPEAKER_01 48:40

Yeah, yeah. And I think the more we do that, the easier it gets, right? Because if you are not used to loving yourself or thinking of yourself in that way, it can be really difficult to start doing that. You know, it takes it takes work where it doesn't come naturally like other things might come naturally, especially I think somebody like that, self-criticism can come way more naturally than self-love, right? So so I think I would want to emphasize to people that it might not feel natural at first and that you have to put the work and and maybe even not believe it right away. But the more that you do that, the more that you do start to recognize that in yourself and the easier it becomes to do that.

SPEAKER_00 49:22

Yeah. I mean, it's change and change is awkward, change is uncomfortable, right? We need to spend time in it, yes, in the discomfort to build that comfort, right? All of these things we've talked about, right? All of these are changes, and they all feel uncomfortable at first, but we need to sit with that discomfort and live in it a little bit to create comfort in it.

SPEAKER_01 49:43

Yes, absolutely. When you talk to your clients when you have your sessions, is there a daily or weekly practice that you often recommend that has a big return on investment?

SPEAKER_00 49:56

I think the the daily practice, it's one we already talked about, which is the identifying your wins. I think that that's something that that always has value for everybody and something that's pretty easy to lose sight of. And as far as kind of other practices, because you know, I I am very much not one size fits all in regards to the work I do with my clients. So I tend to make it very specific to that person, you know, which may be spending more time in the self-love or self-compassion space, or maybe spending more time in the emotional awareness space, or maybe spending more time on behavioral change or behavioral cues. So it's it's very specific to the individual and where they're they are to kind of determine what has the most value for them to keep going with.

SPEAKER_01 50:47

Okay. Similar to what we were talking about earlier, when we kind of listen to our body for what we need as far as food intake and things like that, we also need to kind of listen to our body to see what we need emotionally. Yeah, absolutely. And to be able to ask for help when we need it, right? And that's where you come in. What would be a good fit for working with you if we if thinking of a listener who says, you know, maybe, maybe I could work with her, maybe she could help me. What would that look like?

SPEAKER_00 51:20

Who would you definitely not somebody who wants a quick fix? It's definitely not somebody who wants to just be on the next weight loss pad or lose weight quick for an event or something like that. Um, really, the people I work with are, you know, chronic yo-yo dieters or people with a history of an unhealthy relationship with food or their body or disordered eating diet history and looking to do something about it long-term, sustainably, not wanting to do anything temporarily, but really wanting to understand themselves, their thinking, their behavior, their lifestyle factors, all of the things that that play into this so that they can make, you know, true sustainable change and start to love themselves, love their bodies, feel good, feel like they've taken the power back from food and just kind of feel strong and confident and secure in who they are.

SPEAKER_01 52:17

Yeah. Yeah. Okay, perfect. And I want to ask you how how listeners can get a hold of you. But before I do that, do you have anything else that you want to leave our listeners with today? Anything else you want to say to them?

SPEAKER_00 52:32

Well, I mean, I I always tell people it doesn't matter how long you've been doing this, it doesn't matter how many diets you've been on, you are not stuck. Long-term change. If you're 20 years old or 80 years old, I still believe long-term change is possible and attainable. You just need to understand what you're doing, what you want, and what's standing in your way. And there is a way to combat all of that. So you are absolutely not stuck, and change is always possible.

SPEAKER_01 52:59

I love that you said that because we human beings are so resilient and so capable of change. And I think we forget that sometimes. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 53:08

Our self-sabotage sneaks in there and tells us we're not.

SPEAKER_01 53:12

Yes. Speaking of self-sabotage, because I know that's something that you talk about in your books. Where can listeners learn more about your work, your books, everything that you do if they want to uh learn more or even get a hold of you?

SPEAKER_00 53:27

Certainly on my websites, meonlybetter.com or theweightlostherapist.com, um, and on my socials as well. And there's links for all of that on there. There's links for my books, there's links for all my free downloads and all of those different things, and and a contact page too, where people can reach out to me.

SPEAKER_01 53:45

Perfect. And I'll make sure to put all that in the notes for today's episode so people can easily find that. Awesome. Thank you. Thank you so much for this conversation today, Candace. It has been so great to dig into this, you know, very difficult subject and to talk about things that I think a lot of people think about and they don't always talk about, right? And they don't always feel confident or ready to to talk about it with someone else. And maybe they've had questions for a long time. And I hope that if they're listening, this will give them a little bit of inspiration to put some of these things to work and to reach out for help if they need some help getting to their goals. Uh, I hope so too. Yeah. So thank you so much. It has been such a pleasure having this conversation with you and having you here on the show. Thank you so much. Of course. And I just want to say to everyone listening, I'll again make sure to include those links to the work and the books in the show notes so that you can learn more and connect directly. And of course, if this episode resonated with you, please feel free to share it with friends or with someone who might need it. And as always, thank you for spending part of your day with us. And until next time, stay well and keep being your best. Thank you so much for tuning in to Thursday Tea with Sammy, your sip of wellness and mental health. I hope that today's episode gave you a little inspiration in your journey. Remember, your journey to wellness starts here. I would love to hear from you. Drop me a comment letting me know how you like this episode or what topics you want to hear more about. Until next time, stay well and keep being your best.