Hello there. I'd like to share a story about a big change that happened in my life some years ago.

Ten years ago, after 15 years of work in academic research and policy, I did a big pivot: I left my university management job to start a tiny online business as a content creator. My education and project management skills would now be applied to deciding what's for dinner for people.

Big change!

Spoiler alert: my business doesn't pay as much as my previous job! But the downshift allowed me to make space and time in my life for what mattered most during that decade: my children's early years.

Unexpected bonus: from a professional perspective, it's been immensely satisfying.

Previously, my work's impact was in the foggy future: I could only hope that some grant I helped write would lead to useful research getting published and improving policy or practice, eventually making some people's lives better. A bit vague and, frankly, a long shot.

Now, I change lives every day: there's hundreds of folks out there who might have had boxed mac & cheese for dinner who instead enjoy a meal based on my meal plans, like veggie-rich burrito bowls and flavorful vegan Bolognese sauce over roasted portobello mushrooms.

This career change has been very rewarding, and yet...

There's often sadness, too.

I know that a bunch of people sign up for my meal plans with the hope of better dinners and really good food but... they don't use them. Same for my courses about meal planning and improv cooking. There's always members who sign up and don't follow through with the program.

Sometimes it's just because the meal plans or programs weren't a great fit, that's ok! They get a refund and sometimes I'm even able to recommend a solution that will better fit their needs.

But often when clients don't follow through with their intention there's deeper reasons.

Despite many supports being available, including instant support via text messaging (not by an AI bot! by me!), Cooking Club for batch cooking in good company, and 1-on-1 calls to troubleshoot issues, they just can't get started.

Nutrition and cooking habits are a struggle, and not the only one. Those same clients maybe can't keep up with a regular exercise routine, go to sleep at the time they find optimal, or reduce their stress. Many of them are overwhelmed.

So many of us simply are stuck with habit patterns that don't serve us, and can't find or make the time and space to interrupt them.

That's why meditation and journaling show up on the Healthy Lifestyle Bingo card.

Even starting in tiny spurts, like 3 minutes of breathing quietly or journaling about big and small emotions, can make a difference.

Why?

• Meditation slows down our world and creates a space where we can pay attention and see our thoughts and feelings as something in us but that is not us.
• Journaling externalizes those same thoughts and emotions, making them clearly visible on the page as being outside of us. We can reflect on the impact that they have on us, and decide whether we want that impact to continue.

Both meditation and journaling are great, especially combined with each other, but the best path is just to start with the easiest one for you, in tiny doses.

The lesson I have learned from 10 years of deciding what's for dinner is that knowing what to eat and how to cook is important, but not sufficient.

We live in an culture where profit comes from the sale of unhealthy foods, media, and other objects of consumption. Those sales are driven by marketing that manipulates our thoughts and feelings to keep on consuming them. Those foods, media, and objects make us sick and numb, which conveniently leads to more consumption, and fattens up corporations' bottom line.

Health of any kind can only start when we interrupt that cycle of manipulation. It can happen when we see the thoughts and feelings that we experience in response to the stimuli of marketing and culture as being in us but not us. From there, we can start a virtuous cycle where we support ourselves with wholesome nourishments.

If you struggle with adopting sound cooking and eating habits, then maybe it's time to experiment with... meditating and journaling.

I'd love to read your thoughts about this. Please hit reply and share with me!

Healthy Summer Bingo

Just a reminder that, if you haven't already, you are invited to send me a picture of your at-least-partially-completed Healthy Summer Bingo card to be entered to win draw prizes in early-September! No cash value, this is just for fun.

What, you haven't started yet? You still have plenty of time to complete several "bingo" lines and, most importantly, discover new wholesome habits that may work for you.

With love,

Brigitte

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