o – own the present moment · based upon your research and in partnership with a qualified health...

© Copyright 2013 Cynthia Pasquella. All Rights Reserved.www.hungryhottie.com The information in this document is not intended to replace a one on one relationship with a qualified health care professional and is not intended as medical advice. Cynthia encourages you to make your own health care decisions based upon your research and in partnership with a qualified health care professional.

O – Own The Present Moment Week 2 - Part 2: I really want to talk about detoxifying your mind and of course, your spirit. This is so essential to maintaining a happy, healthy life and achieving your ideal weight. You’ve got to change the way you think and feel about yourself and also your surroundings if you want to improve them. Cleansing your mind of negative thoughts and emotions that you have been holding on to for years will allow you to realize your potential and to make the decision that nothing…and I mean nothing, is going to hold you back from living your life to the fullest. From achieving your goal weight, from being your authentic self – not the person you feel you have to be for other people, and from allowing yourself to finally be free and be happy. Your thoughts can change your life. You’ve probably heard that before. A lot of the spiritual gurus like to quote that and I really, really believe that. I’ve seen that happen in my own life and with so many clients, so you want to make sure you’re letting go of all the negative thoughts and replace them with positive ones as well. I think this is so interesting by the way…do you know we have approximately 60,000 thoughts a day? That’s a lot of chances to change your life! You may not realize how many negative thoughts enter your mind every day so just start being aware of them this week. When one comes up and it will, I promise you… don’t beat yourself up (because that kind of defeats the process, right? We’re trying to think positive thoughts here)! Instead, you want to just observe it, let it go then immediately think of a positive thought. This way you’re retraining your mind. You’re actually creating new neurological pathways and that’s going to help you experience that radical permanent change that you’ve been looking for. Take some time this week and really start focusing on what you’re thinking about. What are those 60,000 thoughts a day for you? Let’s look at switching those around. I think we all kind of fall into this here. We’re judging or thinking something negative about ourselves or someone else…let’s really try to switch that up a little bit this week. I want you to understand that your outer manifestation (your outer self and the world you live in) is a direct reflection of your inner reality. Does that make sense? I want to really talk about this

© Copyright 2013 Cynthia Pasquella. All Rights Reserved.www.hungryhottie.com The information in this document is not intended to replace a one on one relationship with a qualified health care professional and is not intended as medical advice. Cynthia encourages you to make your own health care decisions © Copyright 2013 Cynthia Pasquella. All Rights Reserved.www.hungryhottie.com The information in this document is not intended to replace a one on one relationship with a qualified health care professional and is not intended as medical advice. Cynthia encourages you to make your own health care decisions based upon your research and in partnership with a qualified health care professional.

for a minute because I found this to be so important. I’m telling you people have huge breakthroughs around this. The pain you’ve stuffed away over the years and the thoughts you’re thinking every day, that becomes your reality. And for many people, maybe you that reality isn’t a pleasant place to be. The words we speak and the beliefs that we hold shape every single experience of our lives because the universe is listening and what’s more… it’s responding. When you say negative things like “I’m never going to lose this weight” or “I’m such a failure” the universe takes note, your mind hears your words, and that thought becomes your reality. So, if you’re always saying, “gosh, I have a big fat butt” guess what… you’ll probably always have a big fat butt because that’s what you’re focusing on! Really watch that and start to be aware of those thoughts. You may have heard of the saying, “What we resist, persist!” – because that’s what we’re focusing on. That’s what’s creating our reality. It doesn’t matter where our thoughts and beliefs come from. It could be from a childhood experience, it could be from a bad relationship, at some point something or many things happened to you to bring you to where you are right now in this place in time. I know that many people have gone through lots of intense pain and suffering and had to deal with things that no one should ever have to deal with. I also know that your past is creating your present and will create your future unless you change it. Now you might say, “Well, how do I start to change this pattern? I don’t want my future to be like my past and my present. That’s why I’m here, Cynthia.” The answer is actually very simple. Now, notice I didn’t say “easy”, I said “simple”. You make the conscious decision about how you are going to live every single day of the rest of your life. You decide that a week, month, 5 years or on your deathbed you will look back and have zero regrets. It’s up to you to make that decision. If you do make that decision, this can be one of, if not the most, liberating experiences of your life. All you have to do is make the choice. You have to know really deep inside. I mean you got to know this! You’ve got to know that you are worthy, that you are precious, that you’re special, that there’s no one else like you and will never be anyone who has the wisdom and the gifts that you have to offer to this world. You deserve this change. The problem that I find, is most of us don’t know this. We may want to know it, right? We may want to believe that way. You say,


“Cynthia, God that would be so great if I really felt that way. It would be so awesome! I really think I could change everything if I just felt like I was worth it.” We kind of been conditioned. We’ve been conditioned to be “good girls”, to do for other people. We’re always putting others first. Whatever their needs are we’ll take care of it and if there’s any time or energy left, maybe we’ll apply some of that to ourselves – unless, of course, someone else needs something too... then we’ll go help them and put ourselves completely dead last. One of the most important messages I have to share with you today, it revolves around our most basic need as people, as human beings. I’m always telling people, if nothing else that I say sticks with you - nothing else, like nothing - if everything else goes completely over your head, make sure THIS does. And that is this message… “You are seen. You are heard. You matter.” I want to say that again because I want to make sure that you are 100% clear with this: “You are seen. You are heard. You matter.” For so long we’ve been looking for that acceptance from others. We always want to hear we’re a “good daughter” a “good wife” a “good mother” “a good friend” “a good person”. We want to hear that we’re seen; we want to hear that people see us for who we are. We want to know that they hear us and we want to know that to some person, or hopefully to lots of people, that we matter! So, what we end up doing is doing for others to a fault. This ends up in us not doing for ourselves, we tend to have low self-esteem and we base our entire self-worth on the thoughts of others. On the others saying that we’re seen, that we’re heard, that we matter - instead of knowing that deep within ourselves and not needing anyone to tell us that. You know what happens? That creates fear. We fear not being “good” and if we’re not good then that means we’re a failure. Right? We live in fear of being successful. We don’t believe we deserve to feel good or look good or be successful. We don’t feel worthy or deserving and you fear what would actually happen if you did get the things that you are wishing for – whether it’s a slimmer body, better health, or a higher level of happiness and peace.


I remember I had a client who…she came to me and we kind of worked through some things. I put her on this great structured meal plan, all the work was done for her. She wasn’t losing any weight, like none! Then one week she came in and she had gained like three pounds. I said, “You know, there’s really something deeper here. There’s something going on and it’s got nothing to do with food”. So we started diving in a little bit to her history. I said, “Do you really want to lose weight?” She’s like, “Of course, why would I keep coming here? Why would I keep eating all these foods and investing so much in this if I didn’t want to lose weight?” I said, “I don’t know, why wouldn’t you? Why wouldn’t you want to lose weight.” She’s like, “I do.” So we went through this whole step-by-step thing and I said, “What would you get, what would losing weight give you?” She said, “Well first of all I’d look better, right? I’d feel better in my own skin. I’d have more confidence. I said, “That’s good, what else?” She said, “Well more energy…I always want more energy. I want to go out dancing and have fun. I love to dance and I haven’t been able to do it in years!” I said, “Great! We’re onto something, what else?” She said, “I’d probably meet a nice man.” I said, “Okay awesome, how would that be?” She said, “Well, I don’t know.” I said, “What do you mean you don’t know?” She said, “Well, you know… like “men”.” I said, “No, tell me. Tell me about these men.” She said, “Well, I just don’t ever have good relationships with men. Gosh, probably like my last - all of my relationships now that I think about it, have been really bad. I’ve been verbally abused, used and taken advantage of and I just keep finding men like this.” I said, “Okay, so let me get this straight. If you lose the weight, you can find another man like that, who’s going to use and abuse you. That doesn’t scare you?” She said, “Yeah, no. It does. You’re right, it does scare me.” So, she was afraid. She had this huge fear of losing weight because of what could happen. We also have these limits on ourselves. I see so many people that will be like, “Man if I could just lose 50 pounds but I can’t get past that” or “I can lose 10 pounds or man that’s it”. It’s almost as if we set these limits for ourselves. Like, this is as good as it’s getting. It’s not getting any better than this level right here. When we get to that level or get close to that level, we’ll sabotage ourselves every single time to go back to that place of being comfortable because we’re too afraid of what’s on the other side. This happens all the time, not only with weight loss. You’ll see businessmen who had the biggest earning quarter of their entire career and then they’ll go cheat on their wives. There


always has to be something to bring it back down. You’ll see couples that are getting along great, they’ll take this family vacation and things are just awesome. They fall in love all over again, get back home and pick a huge fight over nothing and everything just completely blows up. It’s like we have these upper limits. There’s a great book by Gay Hendricks who talks about this. It’s called The Big Leap. He talks about leaping over these upper limits that we set for ourselves. It’s really a great, great book. If you’re a reader, I would highly recommend that you pick it up. I have to tell you, I’m a big fan of words, yes, words! I just love to read and we are so blessed to live amongst people who have such a talent for putting together common words in such a way that they totally change your life. One of my favorite quotes around fear comes from my dear colleague, coach and friend, Marianne Williamson. And if you’ve heard this quote, act like you haven’t. Turn off that filter and hear it for the first time right here and now. The quote says, “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.” I just think this sums it up so well. There’s no doubt that there’s certain fear. Maybe it’s not fear of success, maybe it’s fear of failure. Maybe it’s fear that you’ll try this diet program or that you’ll try this new job or that you’ll try dating this new dude and he won’t be the right dude or the job won’t be the right job or you’ll fail at the diet and then everybody is going to judge you. You’re afraid of failing. You can be afraid of failing or succeeding, but I really do believe our deepest fear comes from fearing that we’re powerful beyond measure. Marianne talks in this passage about God, whatever you believe, plug that in - the universe, the divine mother, the source energy - whatever that is for you, Buddha, use that. The key is to know that life and the universe is here to support you. It will support you completely, totally in every single way, but you have to trust it too. You have to know that


everything is well in your world, that you are safe, so that you can lean back into life’s arms and say, “Where are we going next?” Right? How good would that feel if you could do that? I’m here to tell you, it’s not easy. But it is doable. I know because I’ve been there and I’ve coached thousands of women through this process too. I know you can do it as well, more than that I know that you deserve to do it. Once you start trusting and stepping out of your fear into greatness, you are going to be so surprised at the changes you start to see. When you start to see those changes, be grateful. Recognize how luck you are to have what you have, beyond the physical goods that you’ve acquired. Be grateful for your relationships, for the fact that you have a strong capable body (many don’t) and for the fact that you’re in this game of life giving it all you got. Even when things aren’t perfect and they won’t always be, be grateful for that too and find a lesson that you can take away from it. Sometimes it is only in our darkest hours that we finally see the light. Know that at any given moment you are exactly where you need to be and everything is perfect. Oh, and about that fear thing, it’s not real. Yes, I get that you’re afraid and that you feel fear and I know that your fear is your reality. You’re saying, “I’m totally confused, because you just said I was so afraid and our fear drives us and we have these upper limits.” I’m not saying that the fear isn’t your reality. I get that it is. But the reality that I see when I look at you, when I talk to you, when I’m seeing the things that you’re opposing. And I see this for so many people out there; it’s like this x-ray vision. It’s not the reality that I see for you and it’s not anyone else’s reality either. You see, you’ve created this reality for yourself but nobody else thinks that about you, nobody else thinks you’re limited. Nobody thinks that maybe you won’t make it, nobody else thinks that maybe you’re not good enough. Look, if you ever do have those random people in your lives who ever say those things to you, you should probably get rid of those people. One of my favorite quotes is by Eleanor Roosevelt…I love this. She says, “You wouldn't worry so much about what others think of you if you realized how seldom they do”. Isn’t that interesting? I want to go back to this whole thing not being real, this fear not being real and kind of elaborate on what I mean there. One of the most renowned psychologists of all time, Carl Jung, he was speaking to one of his colleagues one day. Then he told this story… he had been working with this lady for, I forget now, months and months and months. They were having lunch and his colleague said, “Well, how’s your work with Suzie going?” I forget her name. Dr. Carl Jung said,


“It’s good. She went to the moon last night”. So the colleague proceeds to just belly laugh at this, right? It’s the funniest thing he’s heard all day. Carl Jung said, “Why are you laughing? What is so funny?” He said, “Well listen to what you said. You said she went to the moon.” He said, “Yes.” So his colleague said, “Well of course she didn’t go to the moon, I just think that’s absurd and she’s totally gone off the deep end if she thinks she went to the moon.” Carl Jung said, “No, she doesn’t think. She knows she went to the moon. You may laugh at this, but this is her reality, for her it’s very, very real. It’s no different than the fact that you went to bed last night. She just happened to go to the moon.” I hear that story and I just think, “God, that’s so true!”, because this lady, her reality was she went to the moon. Your reality is that maybe you’re not good enough or maybe that you might fail or that you’re afraid of what might come with success or failure. Here’s the thing, that’s just your story - just like it was just this lady’s story that she went to the moon. Now did she go to the moon? Of course not, but did she feel like she did? Was that her reality? Absolutely. Absolutely. It’s just realizing that while you have this fear, it’s yours and you can get past that. So let’s take a look at 5 awesome actions that we can start taking immediately to detox our minds and start paving the way for our success. I really want to make sure that you have some great tools to get through this week. 1. Start where you are – The Present Moment The Hungry Hottie Manifesto says, “A Hungry Hottie embraces where she is right now on her journey. She seeks to understand her choices so that she can make permanent changes and not just implement quick fixes.” One way to embrace where you are at this very moment is to start being really present so that you can understand those choices that you’re making. Embrace where you are right now on your journey and get comfortable in this place. I want to talk about that just a little bit. When you begin the process of detoxing your body and mind and your spirit, “stuff comes up”. There’s really just no other way to put it. Stuff comes up. As you evolve on this journey, all of the things you’ve covered up with food and body weight


over the years will start to rise to the surface. The pain, grief and suffering will come flooding back. And this is ok. As a matter of fact, it’s perfect! We aren’t meant to hide these feelings away, to ignore them, to just refuse to feel them. We are meant to embrace them. To let our hearts break wide open and invite all of the pain and suffering back in. When we do this, miracles start to happen. We begin to heal. We begin to learn the most important lessons of our lives – they’ve hidden away in the shadows of our pain all this time and we didn’t even know it. You are meant to experience and embrace pain to uncover a deeper truth or set of instructions beneath it. You were meant to struggle and to feel, so you could come out on the other side a warrior! THAT is the true essence of being alive! THAT is what this journey that all of us is on - that’s what it’s all about. But the problem is most of us don’t do that. Most of us don’t see pain and go, “Yeah! Bring it on pain! Let my heart break wide open and let me just sit here and suffer with this for a little bit!” We don’t do that so we miss those messages, we miss uncovering that truth. Because what we do is eat our pain, our suffering, instead of just being with it. Instead of sitting with the lesson and hearing the message we’re supposed to hear to go to that next level, to grow stronger in our journey, to get prepared for the next thing that is coming right up around the bend. People also use drugs, alcohol and sex to deal with these things. And some people use a combination of these things and more. It’s important that when these things come up during this detox that you embrace them and just sit there with them in the stillness. Put your arm around them and embrace them. I talked about Carl Jung earlier, as I said he was one of the most renowned psychologists that has ever graced the profession and he said (I love this quote by him), “All neurosis is a substitute for legitimate suffering.” Any mental disorder or conflict that we might have, (a lot of people are on medication for those things) it stems from unprocessed pain. Think about that for just a minute, because we all have it. I guarantee it! When you allow yourself to process this pain, you’re going to receive support and grace from the Divine. For some people, the “Divine” means God, for others, it represents the Divine


Mother, Divine Father or Source Energy, Buddha whatever it is. You are welcome to call it whatever suits your personal beliefs. Whatever you call it, know that it’s here to help you. Some people thing that embracing pain or suffering makes them this really weak person who’s sniffling over their past and a victim, but it actually empowers you more than anything else ever could. I love this quote by Marianne Williamson, she says, “Your suffering does not make you weak; only your avoidance of suffering makes you weak.” She’s so right on here! When you allow yourself to feel pain and suffering, you will emerge a warrior. You will be able to do, be, have anything you want but ONLY because you allowed yourself to get stronger by learning the lessons behind the pain. A lot of times we don’t that. You don’t have to run to food, sex, drugs, alcohol or anything else any longer to cope with your pain – past or present. Instead, let pain become your friend. Have the conversation it’s been waiting for years, maybe for decades to have with you. Allow that pain to finally transform into peace. You don’t have to know exactly how to do this. Sometimes, people say, “What do you mean, sometimes I just sit there and feel like what do I do with this?” And the thing is, only you know. Whether your realize it or not, you know what do and you know how to process this pain. It could just be that your ego or the pain itself is blocking you from hearing the instructions. The great thing is, and I love this, you don’t have to know how to do it. You don’t have to know how to feel pain. You don’t have to know how to surrender. You don’t have to know how to heal. It’s this amazing, really beautiful thing! Like the acorn doesn’t have to know how to grow into an oak tree – it doesn’t freak out saying, “I don’t know how to do this! I’ve got to be this big tree and I’m just this little dude, but I somehow got to get roots and somehow I got to get like ten million times bigger. I got to get like 20 feet tall, I got to grow leaves and stems and branches. I’m freaking out here! It’s too much pressure!” Acorns don’t do that, right? Instead, it surrenders to the Divine knowing that the Universe always controls things in perfect order.


Doesn’t that take the biggest load off? Like for me, the first time I heard that I was like, “Wait! Hold up…you mean I ain’t in this all by myself?” That’s what I’ve been stressed about. I’ve been stressing thinking that I’m holding the world up all by myself, when in reality the Universe controls and supports all of these things just like it controls and supports the acorn who has no clue how to make that big, big tree. Now, I want to be really honest with you and let you know that this process isn’t fun or easy but it is necessary. And it is uncomfortable. The best advice I can give you is to get comfortable being uncomfortable. It’s the only place that true healing occurs. You may end up going through a complete dark night of the soul but this is actually a great thing. It’s the first step on your spiritual awakening and surrendering to a higher power than food. Doesn’t that sound nice? To not to have to be obsessed with turning to food for everything and then worrying about our weight and beating ourselves up because we can’t stay on a diet and get back into our skinny jeans? Instead we just relax, we turn all this over, we feel all that pain, we really kind of sit with it, we learn these amazing messages from it that go to the next level. Man, like sign me up, alright? I really hope you’re feeling that way as well. Now there’s this really great exercise. I want to talk about this really quickly. When it comes to embracing the present moment and being where you are right now, there are two important exercises for this week. The first one is called Start to Feel, Start to Heal. It works like this. You find a comfortable place where you’re not going to be disturbed. Light a candle, maybe play some soft music that you really enjoy. Take three deep breaths in and out (those good, nice deep belly breaths) and then close your eyes. Allow any pain, sadness, regrets, grief or fear to come up. Don’t try to “fix” them or figure them out or solve anything. You just allow those thoughts and those feelings and those moments to just pass through you. Open your heart fully to experiencing the sensations. Don’t block anything out. It if comes up naturally, just be with it. You don’t have to do anything, you just have to be and listen. Sometimes great messages will come, sometimes peace will come and sometimes this exercise just brings a really nice, tearful release. Crying, and those tears, is so cleansing to the body and the soul. You really want to experience that. I am such a crier by the way, I love to cry. It


makes me feel so much better, just kind of cleansing. The most important thing is to just trust this process and know that what comes up for you is exactly what was supposed to come up. Again, we’re not trying to sit down and heal all of our pains or all of our wounds from the past in just this one exercise. We’re just going to be and see what starts to present itself. The more we can surrender, the stronger we get and the more empowered we get. I want you to do this several times over the course of this week, including during your meditations – which we’re actually going to discuss a little bit later – and again, just allow yourself to get comfortable being uncomfortable. Now, let’s move on to the second exercise for embracing the present moment. Last week, you wrote a “Dear Me” Letter (and if you didn’t do that, stop this video or audio now and go back and make sure that you write that. It’s really, very important). This week, what I want you to do is I want you to write a response to that letter. Here’s what I mean… In your “Dear Me” Letter, you imagined that it was 90 days from now – or actually 90 days from last week – and you wrote a letter to your self explaining how much you had changed and how your different your life was. Do you remember this? You talked about how you looked, you talked about the weight that you lost, you talked about the way you feel, you talked about your successes and about how amazing everything in your life was. Remember writing that letter? And this was that you in 90 days. This week, we’re going to time travel a bit. We’re going to take a peek back at that letter, and you’re going to tell her - you’re going to write a different letter. You’re going to write a response to that letter, to that lady who wrote those things to that newer version of you and you’re going to tell her that you get it and you’re excited about who you know you are going to be. You are going to let her know that while you love that you were able to make all those changes in just 90 days that there was a reason it took you so long to get started. You’re going to let her know that you’ve been wanting to change so badly and then you’re going to tell her why you haven’t been able to. You’re going to let her know what kept getting in your way and you’re going to tell her where you are right now on your journey. What you’re struggling with. What your fears are. Tell her what freaks you out and scares you to death! Tell her everything that has held you back.


Then, let her know that you’re not that person anymore. You’re closer to being her. That you’re closer to being you. And let her know what you’re going to do to meet her where she is in 90 days (actually 83 days now). Take some time and write that letter. Be really, really clear. This can be a page. It can be 20 pages. I have seen these letters be almost close to a book and that’s great! This is all part of cleansing, really cleansing the soul and being present right here, right now. Now, that was a lot so take a deep breath and let’s move onto the next thing. 2. Eat Mindfully For most of my adult life I ate food with no real enjoyment or comprehension of what I had even eaten. I can remember sitting down and polishing off entire bags of chips or cookies and never even tasting them. I remember looking over like, “Wow, I totally just ate all those cookies. That’s awesome and I don’t even remember what they taste like.” Not only was I hurting my body, I was crushing my spirit and I was feeling so much guilt and beating myself up. I was also missing out on one of life’s greatest joys - the present moment. And that was a real shame for lots reasons. One of them being food is one of life's simple pleasures and we need to get away from eating being something else on our “To Do List”. Something that we do while you're watching TV or working on the computer. It's time to make eating an experience! Being present and acknowledging what you’re putting in your mouth and why is the first step toward healing your relationship with food forever. When we’re aware of our actions we are able to look closer and investigate why we’re doing them. We can take a step back and observe the action, without criticizing, figure out what we’re truly hungry for, and actively seek out a different solution – preferably one that doesn’t have to do with food. Only by being fully aware can we come into the present moment and open ourselves up to change. We will begin to build up a resistance to food that harm our bodies and spirits and instead start choosing the foods that nourish and support us. I also strongly encourage you to begin the practice of mindful eating. This may sound daunting and your immediate reaction might be, “Nope, I’m busy! That will take way too long!” But it really doesn’t have to. It turns out…I want to talk to you about a few things and tell you why this is so


important, obviously lots of reasons in terms of healing your relationship with food, but it also turns out that when our mind is tuned out during mealtime, the digestive process may be 30% to 40% less effective. That’s insane! We were talking earlier about digestive distress such as gas, bloating and bowel irregularities. All of those things could be in partially due to the fact that you tune out during meals and that you’re just not present. So, let me give you seven ways to begin to eat mindfully today. I’m going to go through these, I won’t take too long on them because they’re pretty simple to implement.

1. Stop multitasking. I know you think you’re getting stuff done – I used to too! I use to think I was one of the world’s best! I would’ve entered a contest if there had been one but when I really started looking at my eating habits and the productivity I realized that I wasn’t quite as good as I thought I was. Then, I started looking at studies that showed when we multitask we actually take more time to do things AND we make more mistakes. When it comes to eating, your brain needs to be able to register when you’re full. If you’re doing 15 other things while eating (it’s all good, we’ve all been there) then your brain won’t be able to fully acknowledge this. You’re going to overeat and you’re not going to enjoy your food. By the way, studies also show (and I love these studies) that people who eat mindfully actually eat less food but end up being more satisfied. Isn’t that awesome? It’s truly a win/win. So stop multitasking. That’s the first tip.

2. Chew Patiently. It’s not easy, but try to slow down, aiming for 25 to 30 chews for each mouthful.

3. Start with just 1 meal a day. Again, simple shifts that are really going to add up. Start being mindful. The more you do it, the easier it will become and finally it will be second nature. After that one meal, you can start adding in two and then three and then every day at every meal, you’ll start being mindful of what you’re putting in your mouth.

4. Eat with your non-dominant hand. You know why? Because, it takes longer! It takes you longer to eat and you have to really focus getting the food on the fork and to your mouth. So it requires you - it demands that you - be more mindful.


5. Make each meal last at least 20 minutes. You think, “20 minutes”? But that’s not that long. It’s really not. Most of our meals on average last 7 minutes. Seven minutes! That’s crazy! Right? We’re averaging out your breakfast, lunch and dinner there, but 7 minutes is nothing. Really aim for 20 minutes, so that you requiring yourself to slow down. I promise you your waistline and your digestion will thank you for it.

6. Give thanks. Gratitude actually stops addictive patterns in the brain. Isn’t that interesting? So if you’re giving thanks before the meal, after the meal, then those addictive patterns of overeating are going to start to slow down. It’s really, really cool.

7. Stop Talking. When we’re eating and we’re talking through the meal, we are more focused on being present for the conversation and we don’t pay any attention at all to what we’re putting in our mouth.

Again, these are all tips to help you start to take back the present moment, honor your body and of course, feed your soul. Pick one and start working on it - again simple, simple shifts. There’s a great guide in this week’s Resources called “Eating as an Experience”. I highly recommend that you read through that for more information on how to take back your meal times, eat less and be completely nourished and satisfied. It’s completely amazing stuff! Now the third way we’re going to look at detoxifying our mind and spirit is called The Mirror Exercise. I love this exercise and it is one of my favorites, I’ve used it for years because it is so simple yet so profound. I’m going to tell you how to do it and then I’ll share with you why this simple exercise is so important - really, really simple. What happens is you wake up first thing in the morning, you go to the mirror and you say…

“_Your name, I love you. I am beginning to make positive changes in my life right now and every day I will improve the quality of my life. It is safe for me to be happy and filled with joy.” – You’re focused, you’re looking yourself in the eye and you’re saying that to yourself, so that’s part one of this exercise.


Part two of that exercise is every time you pass by a mirror that day, you’re going to stop and say, “Name, I love you.” So you stop, look yourself dead in the eye, connect and then just say “Cynthia, I love you.” Of course you will say your name, unless you want to say “Cynthia, I love you”, then I’ll take all the love I can get. This exercise seems really simple and it is, but it’s also really, really profound. I had a client - I will never forget this. She said to me, “You know, I’ll do this exercise. I’ll try it and let you know.” So she came back the next week and I said, “How did it go?” She said, “Well, the first time I did it I just laughed. I just laughed out loud, like I felt so silly and I didn’t believe what I was saying. It just felt so silly.” I said, “Okay, did you try it again?” She said, “Yeah, I did. The second time I tried it, I couldn’t stop crying.” I said, “Wow, really? Tell me about that. She said, “Well I was crying because I knew it wasn’t true. I knew that I didn’t love myself and I knew that I wasn’t making positive changes and I didn’t feel safe.” I said, “Well, have you kept doing it?” She said, “Absolutely and I’m starting to get it. I’m starting to feel better. I’m starting to love me again.” I just thought it was so, so cool. Don’t discount the power of these simple exercises that we’re doing. I have to tell you that we talk about love a lot and you hear a lot about it, but love is really the alchemy of transformation. Love will give you comfort in times of darkness and be a reassuring voice in the silence. If you open yourself up to truly loving yourself for who you are right at this moment – not who you want to be – it can forever change you and give you the peace and life you have always wanted. I don’t mean for you to be happy and love yourself for being overweight and think you should just live your life like that. I’m talking about you truly being madly, and deeply loving the real you – the you that’s on the inside – your authentic self. The woman who loves to laugh, help others, and have abundant joy in their lives and those around them. The woman who squeals when she talks to her pets or babies. You know the woman I’m talking about. Right? That’s the woman I want you to really focus on loving. Let’s talk about this depth of love just for a second. I really want to explore this a little bit. Think about someone that you love. Maybe it’s your kid, it could totally be a pet, that’s okay too.


Think about someone that you just truly, madly cannot get enough of - maybe a spouse? Would you do something intentionally to hurt that person? Would you do something that was really harmful to them? Would you do things that would endanger their lives and jeopardize their happiness? Of course you wouldn’t, right? That’s just the craziest thing you’ve ever heard! For me, that’s my daughter. I would never, never… I can’t even process that thought to be quite honest with you. I can’t even go there. When you love yourself in this way, when you love your authentic self in the same way, you won’t do those things to you either. You will want to eat healthy, you will want to get moving, you will make better choices because you love yourself and you know you are worth it. You know that you’re seen. You know that you’re heard and you know that you matter. And when times get difficult – and they will – you can turn to the inner love your have for yourself instead of turning to that pint of ice cream. We’ve been talking about love for a while, I want to touch really quickly on hate for just a minute - because I don’t like talking about this. If I had a nickel for every time I heard someone say “I hate my body”, “I hate what I’ve become”, “I hate the way these clothes look on me”, “I hate the way being overweight makes me feel”, “I hate stepping on the scale because I hate that I weigh so much and that’s why I want to lose weight”, I would have so much money and I’d invite you to come to my private island and we’d chill out with some really cool fruity healthy drink all day long! That’s what we would do. It’s amazing how many people feel this way, how much hate there is! These thoughts, just like all the other thoughts that we’ve been talking about, they become reality. They only serve to take that love that you so desperately need to change your life and then they smother it. Let’s try approaching these thoughts differently. Let’s eliminate them altogether; let’s not have these thoughts. Instead, let’s focus on love. Let’s lose weight and change our lives because we love ourselves, because we love who we are. You don’t have to love your thighs if they’re a little heavier than you want them to be. That’s not what I’m asking you to do. I’m asking you to love that little kid inside of you, to love who you really are. Who, at your deepest core, who you are. Before all of these expectations and before you became who other people said you should be. Start getting back to that authentic self and we’ll work more on that in the coming weeks.


The next exercise I have for you, I love this one! It’s called Reverse Breathing. When’s the last time you took a really deep breath? It’s probably been a while, right? Deep Breathing is super cleansing for the body but we don’t always stop and remind ourselves to do it. Try it now. Take a minute and breathe in very deeply, into your tummy, and then exhale really deeply. Do it again. Take that good deep breath in and exhale. And then one more time - deep breath in, deep belly breath, and then exhale fully and completely. Don’t you feel better? Breathing is amazing for cleansing the body but it’s also great for cleansing your mind. Anytime you need to cleanse your mind, maybe you’ve caught yourself in a pattern of negative thoughts or stress and you just need to reboot, reverse breathing is a perfect solution. So, what is Reverse Breathing exactly? "Taoist Breathing" as it’s also known, is meant to center and calm the mind while drawing energy deep into the tissues and bones. It's called "Reverse Breathing" because instead of breathing in through your nose and out through your mouth like a lot of fitness gurus and people say that you should do, you’re be doing just the opposite, or the reverse! I’m going to show you how to do this. There’s a document you can find in the Resources Section for this week that is a detailed guide that will walk you through all of this, but let me out line it for you really quickly here: 1. Breathe in deeply through your mouth, counting to five. (So breathe in for five counts) 2. Hold your breath for one count. 3. Exhale through your nose, counting to five. 4. Pause for two counts. 5. Repeat. 6. Continue for at least 7 breaths, in and out. Do not practice for longer than 3 minutes. The only thing you'll be focusing on when you do this, by the way, is your breathing. If thoughts drift into your mind, be aware of them and then let them pass on through. Some people close


their eyes as this helps to close out any distractions around them and you just breathe. Simple, right? Simple, yet again, so powerful! Now, the fifth one… the fifth and final one for cleansing the mind and the spirit just so happens to be the Hottie Habit for the week and it is “meditate”! All too often we look outside ourselves for the answers. We follow all the latest advice, try different diets, different forms of spirituality, all in an effort to find the answers that we are seeking that will make us healthy and truly happy. Because we’re always saying we want to be happy. What we don’t realize is that we have all the answers we need inside ourselves. We have just lost or maybe temporarily misplaced our ability to go inside. Meditation makes that possible. It quiets our thoughts so that our inner voice, the one that has all the answers that you’re looking for, so it can speak up. In order to change your life, you have to change your thinking and the way you change your thinking is to go within yourself and listen to your inner voice has to say. One of my favorite quotes and you know I love quotes because I’ve so many of them for this week is, “I shut my eyes in order to see”, by a famous artist named Paul Gaugin. I love this quote and I love his work. I want you to know too meditation doesn’t have to be this crazy, difficult practice. Some people say, “I don’t know how to meditate, it freaks me out that you’re even talking about it. I can’t do this whole sit still and not think about anything.” I can’t either so you don’t have to do it that way. There’s a lot of misconceptions about meditation so that’s one of the reasons I wanted to make it the Hungry Hottie Habit for this week, because it’s so beneficial but it’s so misunderstood. You can’t do it wrong, first of all. It doesn’t have to be difficult and you shouldn’t expect for something to happen – as a matter of fact, you shouldn’t have any expectations at all. You just want to be. You just want to be there now. You start by relaxing in a comfortable position, close your eyes and breathe. Focus on your breathing, in and out. Don’t try to change it, make it faster, slower or deeper, nothing crazy like that, just observe the way it naturally is, just flowing in and just flowing out. As thoughts enter your mind and they will, because we all have this monkey mind going on all the time, you just let


them go and return your focus to your breathing. It’s that simple. You cannot do it wrong. We’re just working to quiet our minds. That’s really it. As time goes on, your mind will stop wandering and you’ll find calm and peace. This may not happen the first time or the first 10 times but you will experience relaxation during those times and establish more control over your thoughts each time you practice. Start out with 5 or 10 minutes and work your way up to 20 minutes twice a day over time. Really simple, you cannot do it wrong. You’re just focusing on your breathing. There are a lot of different ways to meditate. Including looking into a candle, standing, walking (you can take a long walk and focus on your footsteps, that’s meditating), doing tai chi, practicing a certain form of meditation like Transcendental Meditation (or TM). This is the type of meditation I do and I absolutely love it. It totally changed me in so many ways and I highly recommend it. Just get started with something. For this week, I would love you to start incorporating just five minutes of meditation into your schedule. And, of course, continuing to do the Visualization Habit from Week 1. When you combine these two will be super powerful in reprogramming your mind and getting rid of triggers that may arise from stressful situations. You can also start with guided meditations to make the practice even easier. I’ve included some in the Resources section for this week. You’ll see that I’ve put two different guided meditations there. I think one is maybe five minutes and one is maybe seven minutes, so they’re really short. It’s really easy for you to fit into your schedule. It’s easier for you to start with guide meditations, as opposed to starting and finding your own way through it. And finally, let’s hop to this week’s meal plan! Once again, I’ve done all the work for you. When you download the meal plan, you’ll see exactly what to eat for each meal. You’ll also see a simple recipe for that meal, a recipe that can be found in the Recipes section of this program (can see those by clicking on Recipes button) or in The Hungry Hottie Cookbook. Since it’s your decision as to when you want to have your Hungry Hottie Smoothie and when you want to have it, feel free to substitute it for either breakfast, dinner or both. Breakfast is


great because you’re just waking, your body is still detoxifying from the night before, and you typically need a meal that’s fast and easy, right? My mornings are a little insane! Dinner is also a great time because your body is preparing for rest and cleansing and the less digestion and digestion functions it has to process the better! Again, I can’t stress enough that this meal plan is meant to be used as a guide only to help support you as you start to learn how to eat when you’re hungry and stop when you’re full and also as you’re learning how to identify and process emotional eating triggers. We talked about all of those last week. Please feel free to modify it as you wish. Switch meals, substitute things, do whatever you feel you need to do in order to have a meal plan that fully nourishes and detoxifies your body, your mind and your spirit. So download all of that, you’ll also see a shopping list there as well. I’m making it easy for ya! So, let’s take a look – finally - at this week’s Action Steps! And just as a quick reminder, please feel free to watch the video or listen to the audio recording again if you need to before you start taking any action at all.

1. Review Watch, Listen, Read and Repeat 2. Use tools – Mindful Eating Techniques, Eating as an Experience, I Love You Exercise, Reverse

Breathing (Week 2) 3. Pick up Necessary Supplements 4. Write your response to last week’s Dear Me Letter 5. Use the Weekly Meal Plan as a Guide 6. Meditate daily

Also, make sure you continue doing the Visualization Exercise from last week’s Action Guide. It’s going to be super, super powerful when you combine that with the meditation! We’re not going to, by the way, keep on adding on new things every week while we do the ones from the previous week. It’s just…these first two weeks are pretty in depth and I know those things work together really, really well together.


As always, If you have any questions, please email them to [email protected] and either myself or one of my amazing Transformational Nutrition Coaches will respond as quickly as possible and get you all the help that you need. Also, join the conversation happening in the Facebook group for this program. Simply click on the Community button on the right-hand side. The group is a Closed Group for your privacy but you will see a button to click to request to join us and we will get you approved and into the conversation as quickly as possible! There’s a beautiful community of women and some men there as well, who offer love, advice and support. Thanks so much for watching and listening and have a wonderful week. I’ll see you in 7 days when we start Week #3. So very exciting! Until then, remember...This is your body. This is your life. This is your time!

o – own the present moment · based upon your research and in partnership with a qualified health...

Documents