Cut The Crap! Eat Like This and Feel Incredible Featuring Toni Julian

###### Toni Julian: [00:00:00]
My big thing is where is my higher path? What are my gifts? Am I using my gifts? Can I share them with the world if I'm not the top of my game? No, I can't. And I've proven that to myself many, many times.
So if I want to be on that path, if I want to be successful, I have to look at What is my big dream? If you have a big dream and even if you think it's not realistic, it doesn't matter.
Have a big dream set that intention. Beat up person at the top of your game, don't be afraid to be that person. Be that person who says this is what I want to be and be fearless about it.
###### Kevin Chang: [00:00:36]
Hello and welcome to the RaceMob podcast. This is episode number 33.
I'm Kevin entrepreneur technology and fitness nerd, and the founder of race mob. I'm joined by master motivator, founder of two legit fitness co-chair of the Taji 100. RRC a certified coach USA track and field certified official. The incomparable Bertrand Newson.
Toni is such a fun and inspirational human being. She is an author, sports nutritionist, athlete, figure competitor, certified personal trainer, six time entrepreneur, and was recognized with a women of influence award from the Silicon Valley business journal.
More than just the budding accolades or the successful protein foods business that she runs. Toni is genuinely amazing, warm and incredible. She's also very in-tune with her mind, body and spirit.
In this episode, you'll learn the disheartening events that influenced Toni's transition into a healthy lifestyle. And you'll learn how she got ready to compete in a figure competition, beating out competitors 20 years, her junior at the age of 48.
You'll learn. Toni's take on spirituality and why it's an important part of her wellness routine. We dive deep into Toni's philosophy on nutrition. Including why you should eat like a diabetic, the foods you should try to eliminate. And the macro nutrient ratio that Toni recommends.
This episode is brought to you by our free 14 day. Cut the Crap Challenge with Toni Julian. It runs February 1st through the 14th. And we're challenging you to cut the sugar, alcohol, simple carbs and saturated fats from your diet for 14 days.
Get access to a shopping list, recipes and a motivated community. Plus access to Toni who normally charges thousands of dollars for consultations.
You'll be able to post an emoji every day. You're successful in cutting the crap and you'll be entered to win some prizes worth over a hundred dollars.
Just visit race. mob.com/cut-the-crap, all hyphenated.
All of the show notes are available online at race mob.com/podcast.
And without further ado, here's our conversation.
###### Bertrand Newson: [00:02:48]
Hello, race mob family. You were in for real treat today. We have a entrepreneur business woman and someone who has. And expertise in nutrition and the ability to move the human spirit. Toni Julian
###### Toni Julian: [00:03:03]
thank you so much. That was just an amazing intro. Thank you.
###### Kevin Chang: [00:03:09]
Well, I mean, Toni, you and Burchard have known each other for a couple of years now. Right? Can you dive into how you guys met first time?
###### Toni Julian: [00:03:15]
Yeah, absolutely. I think. It's probably been five or six years through a mutual friend, Bob Anderson, who's the founder of runner's world magazine.
And it got to know Bertrand there and then started doing a performance trials. And that that's when we really got to know each other was through a performance trial with, uh, one of my products through a Stanford physician. And. It's just kind of unfolded. That was about six years ago now, Bertrand,
###### Kevin Chang: [00:03:43]
they had you going through trials, eating nutrition, figuring out how the nutrition affects your performance ?
###### Bertrand Newson: [00:03:49]
I felt like a world-class athlete because one, the professionalism of the trial, it was, I mean, Toni's. Performance protein. And it was based at a local, uh, high school Valley, Christian. There were multiple subjects or people participating in this study. There was an oxygen test and taking your blood pressure.
There were prescribed distances on the track, it was like, wow, this is super cool. And it was multiple weeks, I think, four weeks, Toni thereabouts. You would know better than me. And it worked. I mean, the before and after being able to measure someone's baseline, the questionnaire for the participants was very, very good. And it gave you the opportunity to really look and see what your food consumption was pre-workout post-workout.
And, you know, utilizing the old mill pre-workout and then seeing if it did have some level of improvement and being able to sustain your energy, because there's some foods you can take that where you, maybe it spikes your energy and there's a big crash, but the ability to sustain energy and the related impact on performance is profound.
And through that process, I mean, Toni has become a great friend. I've utilized her product on multiple races. That is fueled me to multiple PRs and I'm not a paid endorsed athlete and the rest is history. So big fan of Toni's in general is used to putting out so much grace, as we're all fortunate to hear her story today during our podcast.
###### Kevin Chang: [00:05:14]
Yeah. So we'll get into the product, in a little bit, but I mean, Toni, you have such a profound introduction into the fitness world in general. Can you dive into that initial story and how you found fitness?
###### Toni Julian: [00:05:26]
Sure, absolutely. Well, I've always been. Very interested in health and nutrition. And I grew up in a family where nobody really exercised and my mom didn't eat well and she drank too much and she never exercised.
I remember saying, I think I was about 10 and I said, mom, I said, why don't you exercise? And she said, I do I vacuum. And even at 10, I knew that that just really wasn't good. A good answer. And so, uh, I was raised in a fairly troubled environment. Our family was terrorized, victims of domestic, domestic terrorism.
We had neighbors that threw tear gas bomb in my bedroom window. There was just all this chaos in my life. And we can go into that later. If you like. but I really was just in this situation where health wasn't a priority or there was chaos in my life. So I started getting into gymnastics and gymnastics in seventh grade, and then it took me all through high school was discipline and you go and you work and you feel good.
And so you could take yourself out of emotionally charged, potentially negative or damaging or deconstructive situations through, through fitness. And then our also new, just kind of being a, having a sensitive body type. As I knew that when I ate well, I felt good and that also can help elevate oneself through life.
So, you know, just kind of clipping along through life. And I started several businesses and I, I get to this point in my life where I started getting sick and friends started getting sick. When I was about 48 years old, I was diagnosed with early stage pre cervical cancer.
And I thought, well, wait a minute. I'm thin I'm a size four. What's the deal. And I really had to take a close look at why that was. And my diet. Wasn't good. So this whole thing about being thin and being healthy is really a falsity. You know, a person can be of any size in any body shape, and I believe that, and still be healthy through nourishment through movement and things like that.
So that was a big wake up call for me. I went through surgery. And then at that same time, I had a girlfriend. We were best friends since, since the seventh grade. And I had moved to Morgan Hill from San Jose in the seventh grade and she had pancreatic cancer. And as you know, that is not something really, it's not very survivable.
And so. She was just one of these people in my life. When I moved to Morgan Hill, I just wasn't popular, had all this curly hair, people had straight hair and I just, just didn't feel like I fit in very well in any environment. And she just loved me unconditional. And I just thought, well, what a, what a wonderful person.
So she ended up passing and I decided at that point it was just so tragic to me. Here's this beautiful person and I was sick too, but I couldn't even tell her that I was sick because she had something far worse. So how, how could I, so I was with her and with her children and with her family and, as she passed, it was a little unexpected in terms of the timing.
But, you know, I found myself the very next day on a plane to Italy. We had a trip that we had planned prior to that. And I thought, what can I do to take this situation in this experience and turn it into something positive? And so I never really went to church, but I went to, into all of these amazing churches in Italy.
I mean, you... I'm sure you've seen them amazing, powerful places. And hardly anyone went in there to pray. They went in to look at all the beautiful art and do, but I went into these little names for prayer and I just put my intention out there. It was like, what can I do to help people? And I knew that I had to make some big shift in my life and not only for her to find some purpose and some meaning out of this, but for myself as well.
So I went on this quest to basically change my life, reinvent myself. And I love that word reinvention because we can all do it at any time. Today is a new day. We are in the now and you can make your future, literally, whatever you want. So even if people aren't healthy now, or even if they're not runners now, They can be by perseverance and setting that intention to do it.
You know, my diet was really not good. It was, you know, coffee in the morning, no breakfast, lean cuisine at lunch, 300 calories, high sodium, no nutritional value diet Cokes in the afternoon, one at night and I'd come home and I was nutritionally starved by 6:00 PM. I like. What is already, I was ravenous, you know, not only from a caloric standpoint, but from a nutritional standpoint.
And so I wasn't really functioning my best and I was lean and I was pretty fit looking. You'd never ever know, but clearly if you know, you're going to be 48 years old and get cancer something's wrong. And that was a big wake up call. So I just started working with people. I decided to change my life. I decided after I did all the nutrition, I'd start a fitness program for women.
I did that for 11 years, three days a week. I totally dialed in my nutrition. I cut out all the crap. I nourished myself with foods that would keep my body healthy and strong. And literally at 48, I decided I hired a personal trainer and he encouraged me to do a figure competition. And I just had what, like, no way I am so shy.
I can not get into a little Husky, crystal blinged out bikini still. I was like, no way, but I decided, you know, some people might think about that for a few minutes. Or weeks I thought about it, about 30 seconds. I said, okay, I'll take that challenge. And I said, what better than to push myself out of my comfort zone than to do something like that.
And it wasn't at all for being on stage. It wasn't for attention. It was if I can improve my body composition to find, get as healthy as I can be. And if I could accomplish this and it, you know, 48, almost 50. Do well in this and lose fat gain muscle, be strong. That's just icing for what I want to do in life.
So it just set me on a journey. And then I started helping people and building a business and my books and everything started focusing around this philosophy around nutrition. And it's kind of a unique one. I have to say it isn't, it isn't it to me. It should be common sense. But it really is based on the last 12, 13, 14 years of doing research of reading of a science-based information experience with myself experience with other people.
So I've gotten to really know a connect with people on... it's not just the body, you know, it's not just the nutrition. But I became a certified personal trainer. It's the nutrition, it's the fitness, it's the spirit. It's our mind. It's our, it's our thoughts, our thoughts, our things. It's all of that. So it's, it's led me to, that's a very encapsulated, but I've owned six businesses, but that's a very quick overview into how I got from not being well to being where I am now.
###### Kevin Chang: [00:12:15]
And I love what you talked about around spirituality. You know, that it sounds like started a lot of the re-invention. That you mentioned going into churches, putting it out there, putting it out into the world. and the podcast itself, you host a podcast as well, and it's, it talks about humanity. It's not just about the body and you know, just what you eat and the fitness aspects of it.
It talks about spirituality. So. Can you talk to us a little bit about what spirituality means to you? What you seem like a very soulful person as well. So talk to us about that.
###### Toni Julian: [00:12:47]
Oh, I would so love to! Thank you for asking me that question. Some people are a little intimidated about going there. You know, it's like because it can be sensitive.
I think spirituality is different for every person. We all have different. Ways of being in touch with that. And for some people it's religion. To me, it's not religious. Although I do have religious beliefs in certain aspects, but I think spirituality crosses all people. It crosses all purposes.
It just, for me is really being in touch with what our gifts are. It's being in touch with our purpose. And it is living in a space where your head is connected to your heart at all times. So, you're not just thinking about things. You're not just feeling things, but you're connecting those two together. And so what I found is my ability to really appreciate people has become so elevated. The ability to intuitively understand people has just exploded. The ability to connect with people, to help heal people. Like when people have issues.
So many people have come to me with depression and anxiety, and I am not a psychologist and I'm not a doctor and I'm not a counselor, but I think there are healing aspects to spirituality when you can connect with people and you can listen to them and understand them and show them that there's a better way beyond what is happening right now that there's a path forward and there's a hopeful path.
And so what is interesting is about, let's see, it was probably about five, six, six years ago. I just became very interested in spirituality and I decided to sign up for meditation class. And I've been told Toni, you should meditate. And I'm like, what is this thing, meditation?
I mean, I kind of knew what it was, but, but not really it a lot. There can be a lot to that. And so I took a meditation class. And then I took a healing class and it was kind of more of a spiritual healing class and then a physical healing class. And then I took a clairvoyant class and I just started kind of delving more and more.
And I was spending four evenings a week for three hours a night while I was taking care of a terminally sick parent. My father was sick. I was spending every day, all day with him helping him through multiple myeloma. And that's. Just, if you haven't heard of it really quickly, it's a serious blood cancer where you develop tumors and all of your bones in the marrow and it fractures your bones. You actually lose the calcium out of them.
So everything was fractured in his body. He was in horrible pain. He was given just a couple of months. To live if that, and through nutrition and support and love and unconditional love, he survived five years to the day. So that was really huge. And it was a gift and I was doing these classes around spirituality and helping him at the same time.
And we had some great conversations. So dad, do you believe you go somewhere after you die? Nope. Nope, Nope, Nope. And I said, well, you might want to think about that. You know, so without inflicting any of my beliefs on him, we just had some great conversations.
And it came to a point now where I am actually clear audience. I can. Communicate a little bit with people who have passed. I can, um, uh, here I actually can get downloads about things and directions in my life. Things to be watchful of. Sometimes I've received visions.
Like I received one time, a vision of my father. Like, don't get into the car with your father. If he's driving, like I would drove everywhere and I was able to forewarn my sister the next day, because she was taking him to appointment that I would normally, but I had a business conflict.
And I said, Diane do not get into the car with dad. If he wants to drive, let him drive, but say, Hey dad, I'll meet you there. You know, at the doctors and he went off the road, he was going down the freeway. He did all this. If she had been in that car with him, it would have had dire consequences.
So I have been able to tap into more than what we can see into this world of energy and you know, it, it has helped me to understand that we are all connected. We are all together.
And so it brings me to this space of really wanting to help unify people, to help people connect their hearts to their heads, to have compassion for people, regardless, politically of all the unrest that's going on.
All the civil unrest is we need to come together and it, all of this has got to just. Completely stopped. So I am on that mission to do that and the health and nutrition tie into that. But it's interesting. I never knew it would just be a component of this huge picture that really focuses on spiritual.
###### Kevin Chang: [00:17:30]
That's incredible. You summed it up, I mean, there is the mind, the body and the spirit. So you've, you have to think of the whole body holistically.
You touched on a subject real quick there at the end. And today we're actually recording this on Martin Luther King day. We had a little bit of pre-conversation before we got on air. And you had talked about a vision that you had a dream that you had, do you want to share with our audience a little bit about that?
###### Toni Julian: [00:17:55]
Oh, I'd love to, you know, you can't ask any question of me.
That's too personal.
I am very, very open. Yeah. So w I was so excited this morning because when we had scheduled this podcast for a trend and I had a conversation and, you know, when do we do this? And I looked at MLK day and I thought, well, it is a really wonderful day, and I will celebrate that. And being able to celebrate that means kind of moving forward.
But I did, I had this, dream, I thought the way of celebrating would be to share a dream because I have a dream and I, everybody has a dream in their life that they want to accomplish. And some people think it's not accomplishable, but I thought, why not just go out there and be big? So my dream is twofold.
One is a prayer of togetherness and peace. And forgiveness. And then the other part of that is about two or three years ago. I had a dream where Michelle Obama came to me and we were just riding along in a car and I'm driving and she's in the passenger seat. And I just looked over at her like, Hey Michelle, like, Oh yeah.
It's every day that Michelle Obama was in her car and I'm like, Hey Michelle. And she said, you know, we need to work together. I said, I would love to do that. And she said, but not for two years, it's kind of like, maybe I wasn't ready for two years. And I, and I wasn't. And she said, yeah, let's, let's connect in a couple of years.
I said, great. So this morning I woke up and I went on my Facebook page. I have a page called Toni Julian's group hug, and I posted, you know, MLK day on. And what is your dream? And I posted my dream that I wanted to actually, my dream is I want to work with Michelle Obama.
And so today I'm going to email on her foundation website, I'm going to email her and I'm going to let her know that. And I think that there are just so many ways to do that. I know she's been involved in helping communities that are food deprived, food challenged, and here I have a food business. With a long shelf life that's inexpensive.
What a, great way to perhaps connect and also elevate people and educate. And so that's my dream. I'll put that out there. I'm going to do that today.
###### Kevin Chang: [00:20:00]
Incredible. , I think it's such an amazing dream and why not? I mean, six time entrepreneur, one of the most influential women in Silicon Valley, there's no reason why they wouldn't be extremely lucky to have you contribute. And I mean, what a noble and amazing cause. I love that.
And I love how, you know, you're visualizing and then going and getting it. You know, we, we talk a lot. Coach B talks all the time about two things, one finding your why, which I think the spirituality really ties into finding your why, but then also a visualization, you know, visualizing for a lot of our athletes.
I mean, it's finding that marathon and, you know, visualizing yourself at the finish line for you. Sometimes it's visualizing working with Michelle Obama and that foundation and what that means. And putting it out there in the world, and sometimes it's putting it out there for, you know, somebody higher up to answer, and sometimes it's putting it out there so that people hold you accountable and hold you responsible.
So I just, I love that story.
###### Toni Julian: [00:20:56]
Thank you. And if I can add to that, you know, finding that why, when you visualize. You're actually creating that to happen. And whether you are spiritual or not, you know, visualizing setting intention, people have different words for it. But there was some research that I saw that I was reading just last night, where there was a study where they took two different groups of cohorts and one group had to do some weight training.
Right. So, okay. Lift these dumbbells. We're going to work out that bicep. And in X number of weeks, we're going to test your muscle strength. And then they had a group, a kind of a placebo group where they were told don't do that. I want you to lay still for 10 minutes, and I want you to visualize and use all of your senses and make it a very highly emotive, you know, strong feelings around it. You know what you're doing and visualize working that bicep.
The people that worked at that bicep. Improved to the same degree as actually doing it. So when you're thinking about something, your, your mind, your body doesn't know the difference between you actually envisioning it and it actually happening. And so it prepares your body to be able to move forward.
So if you can picture yourself like this morning, I woke up, I was thinking, okay, I'm going to picture myself running, gliding, like effortlessly and picking up speed and building this muscle. I just pictured myself doing this. And if you can picture it, your body is preparing your mind to perform.
###### Bertrand Newson: [00:22:20]
I mean, the power of visualization, being able to take yourself there to that finish line, and then being able to draw on the cause you can kind of feel the elation, you know, you can feel the sense of pride and accomplishment. If you take yourself to that. While I just completed in my mind, my very first half marathon or my very first race.
I never thought this was possible. And being able to channel and repurpose that energy to a calendar or your support group, or see working out some mentoring to help you get on that journey. But to, to channel again, putting yourself there in the moment and feeling it. Can can be life-changing. It really can.
###### Kevin Chang: [00:22:58]
Two things. One, I mean, I want to dive in at some other point about the meditative experience, especially while running. Cause I think a lot of us use running for therapy and. If there's any takeaways or anything that we can learn from that, but I really want to dive into, and maybe that's a whole nother podcast in and of itself because what I really want to dive into his nutrition during this episode.
And you talked about back before your 48 eating lean cuisines. Drinking diet sodas, , drinking glass of wine or two. And so what I took away from that is a calorie. Isn't always a calorie, right? Your lean cuisine is 238 calories, but the sodium, the, you know, the, the other macros that are part of that doesn't really nourish your body.
So can you talk to us about your philosophy around nutrition,
###### Toni Julian: [00:23:47]
oh, yes. I'd love to. Right. You know, calories, not a calorie. When you take in food, it breaks down into chemical messengers, which tell your body what to do. So a calorie is not fuel calories are the food breaks down into chemicals in our body and it burns an Ash and it, and it affects our pH balance.
Just like a pool, right? Our bodies are so complex. And so, you know, you could take in the right amount of calories. I mean, we've all seen programs about that. You take in number of calories and people get sick and they're almost dying because they're just eating fast food.
So we know that a calorie is not a calorie. We can see a person that eats the same amount of calories. That is healthy diet and a person who eats the same amount of calories within an unhealthy diet.
I actually have a photo of one of my presentations and it's a woman in her eighties and she's like looking to sunshine and she's vibrant. She's just thriving. And then there's another photo of a woman she's on oxygen. She's frail. Her skin is gray. She was with a Walker and these women are the same age.
And so, you know, the quality of our food is probably the most important thing that we can do for ourselves. Portion control is next. Right? So food quality, and there've been so many false assumptions in food.
So many people tend to listen to whatever's out there. Carbs are bad. Well, carbs are not bad, you know, the right carbohydrates. So anything white is not good, but. You get into Brown rice and you get into keenwah and you get into some of the starchy carbohydrates and you know, the good carbs of course are also include vegetables and fruits.
And so some people will stray away from those because they think they shouldn't eat them. My philosophy toward healthy eating is common sense to me. And that is all of the food groups, all of the whole healthy, natural foods, but combined in a way where all the macronutrients are balanced. And when I say macronutrients, I mean, for people who may not understand the terminology just yet, macronutrients are the macros are lean protein, complex carbohydrates, and healthy fats. All right. Then you have micros, which are, you know, some of your vitamins and zinc and things like that.
So when you look at the macros. In the food group. So it's the lean proteins would, could be like, you know, chicken and Turkey and seafood and that kind of thing. And we talked about the complex carbs. So it's oats and grains and fruits and vegetables and healthy fats, things like avocado and flax seed oil, ground flaxseed meal, uh, those types of things.
So, my philosophy has been is that if you can balance out your macros and every single meal, what that will do for you is it will metabolize slowly so that you don't have spikes in your blood sugar and it will keep you fuller longer.
So what happens with people is they tend to graze. Sometimes I was like, I'm hungry. I'm gonna eat an Apple. Great. You eat that Apple you're hungry and hour, hour and a half later, you have to eat again. And what happens in your body is that even though an Apple is a complex carbohydrate and it's healthy, it elevates your blood sugar, it digest quickly. And then your blood sugar drops again. And so you don't stay satiated.
So people that tend to like in our lifestyle, it's so grab and go, people grab things quickly and, and eat them. They don't always prepare or what I call assemble the foods properly together, and then they're hungry again and they don't know why they're hungry and they don't know why they have cravings.
And those cravings happen because our blood sugar is out of balance. Right? So when you eat something, you don't need enough calories or you're eating foods that are processed or foods that digest really quickly. You get hungry, you run out of steam. You can't think properly and Bertrand, you know, when you're running, you have to have that fuel and that energy that is sustainable.
So not only does your energy need to be sustainable, whatever diet you're on needs to be sustainable. It needs to be easy to be able to implement. So my philosophy is eat like a diabetic, so you don't become one and you won't believe how many pre-diabetic people come to me. People that are pre-diabetic or have diabetes.
And so if you also look at another component of it, it's people that have health issues or weight issues, or even just energy issues. If you go to different doctors, if you go to a doctor because you have heart issues, they're going to say, go on a heart healthy diet, eat lots of whole grains. Do this, do this, the healthy fats, high cholesterol.
Okay, you need to eat more fats that are high in Omega threes, like flax seed and cut out the saturated fats. And no trans fats. And so anyway, you know, if you go to all these different doctors for different health problems, they'll tell you to eat a certain way. So what I've done is I've taken all of that advice and all boils down to whole healthy food in the right proportion at the right time. So you give your body, the nourishment, you regulate your blood sugar, you keep yourself satiated, so you don't have cravings.
And that applies to a person that is an athlete or the everyday walking around person who just wants to feel good and be healthy. So it's a whole approach and I've taken it down from the performance trial that we talked to initially, that was to prove my theory of, if you can balance your macronutrients. Then you can not only get sustained energy. We can get it at the end.
And that's where that performance trial really kicked in. It was at that end, where everybody ran out of energy until they ate my food product, which was balanced macros. And that's where they were able to sustain it at the end where most people would just fall apart.
So I just take that with whole foods. And now I'm writing two books about what people can do to use foods in their homes, not my products. I'm not here to sell products. That's a tool for people who don't have the time is that they can take these whole foods. They can cook them a certain way, portion them a certain way, make it easy they could cook, or they could assemble.
And that lifestyle, that way of eating needs to be not a diet, but a sustainable lifestyle choice that makes you feel good. It makes you want to repeat that over and over again. Right. So that's my philosophy.
###### Kevin Chang: [00:29:51]
I love it. I mean, and you touched on a subject in there about so many people being pre-diabetic . And I think a lot of that comes down to insulin resistance.
You talked about blood sugar and keeping that constant and not having these giant spikes where, your body's trying to release insulin into the bloodstream and your body starts becoming resistant to that insulin.
And your body has to produce more and more and more, and eventually your pancreas can't produce. It as efficiently anymore.
And that's where you become, , diabetic. Can you talk a little bit about the body's processes and Things that we can cut out of our diet as well.
###### Toni Julian: [00:30:28]
Yeah. I love that question and I am so pleased that you have that level of knowledge to be able to talk about that. That that's uncommon.
So yeah, you absolutely. So, you know, what happens in our bodies and we've been talking about that first is when we take in food, especially if it's food that's processed or just a carbohydrate, something that breaks down quickly are circulating glucose in our blood gets too high and our bodies that's dangerous.
Right? That's inflammation. So our pancreas excretes insulin and that insulin, for lack of a better word, a lame, I put things in layman's terms, right? It grabs those sugars and it stores it as fat. So we actually have two hormones that are secreted by the pancreas, and they are designed to keep our body in balance.
So one is insulin that everybody's heard of and the other is glucagon and that's what keeps our blood sugar from going too low. So we want to stay in this. Really what I call it as the green zone, which is where your intake of food keeps you just kind of modulated in that. So you're not spiking up. You're not spiking down.
What happens when we have foods, say I'm just going to take 'em, you know, a donut. Let's just say, for example, so it's high fat, it's high sugar. It's highly processed, no redeeming nutritional value whatsoever. You eat that your glucose kicks in. It's going to spike. It's going to take all of that.
All those extra calories. And it's going to store it as fat really quickly. Cause you can't possibly burn them. Right. Then unless maybe you're running like... it's like, I need a spike of extra energy, you know?
So, but for the normal person, no, it doesn't really work that way. So it stores it as fat. And then what happens is because you have that high, then you have a low and that low is when a lot of people like three o'clock in the afternoon, they get that slump. Maybe they've had too big of a lunch or something.
They get that slump, their blood sugars low, and they feel like they need to have something quick again, which is self-medicating to bring them back up into that, that zone. And what happens is when our blood sugar is high, we store fat. When our blood sugar is low, we lose muscle.
And the reason we lose muscle is because our bodies are trying to find that sugar again, somewhere that glucose. And it's gone through the blood and it's not there. And so it's going to go to the muscle because it needs it somewhere. It's a survival thing because our brains have to have glucose to function.
You've probably not eaten for awhile and then gotten a headache. Maybe, maybe some of our listeners here today, I've gotten headaches. And usually it's because they have, it's kind of a low-glycemic response to not eating, right? Because our blood sugar is too low.
And so what happens is to protect our brains, our body's going to go after our muscle because that's the fastest source of finding that sugar to fuel our brains.
And so what happens with people and people that I've coached a lot is that, you know, if you look at that green zone of where you're supposed to be at, and that's, by the way where your blood sugar is between, I think it's 80 and one 20 milligrams per deciliter, all right.
It's a nice, safe blood sugar zone above that people will say you're pre-diabetic or diabetic and low people can become hypoglycemic instead of hyperglycemic.
So what happens though, is people, if they're not eating properly, if they are waiting too long between meals, if they're not eating the right foods that are keeping them satiated and break down slowly in their bodies, they're usually in the upper zone or the lower zone. And even like vacillating up and down in between.
What happens is we are destroying our metabolism because we're losing our muscle mass, right? So we're either storing fat, losing muscle, storing fat, losing muscle, and it's that cycle. So if you can get people to eat small meals, Of balanced macros. So lean protein, complex carbs, healthy fats, and you can do it every few hours.
Doesn't have to be three hours or four hours, but basically enough food. So the food has a chance to metabolize and break down. But then your body will tell you if you're in touch with it. If you start feeling hungry again, that's the time to eat again. Right?
The benefits of that is that we feel good. We have endurance, we have energy, we are maintaining our muscle, we're allowing our bodies to work optimally. We're allowing our hormones to function. And we feel good. And then we, and we have the energy to do our sports and our running and our weight training and our hiking and, and feeling good. So that's how the body responds. And it's ideal because if someone is pre-diabetic, they can totally reverse that.
It is totally doable. I have helped people bring their cholesterol levels down, reverse prediabetes, get back into the right zone and, and, you know, hopefully with that, their pancreas. Becomes healthier. It's not as taxed, right. It doesn't poop out and they're able to help regulate themselves. And our bodies are amazing.
You know what? Those two hormones, it wants to help us. But if we keep abusing our pancreas, then that's what happens is that that's the result of it.
And Kevin, you asked about what foods are healthy for us. if I can just go into that for a few minutes.