You are listening to the Drink Less Lifestyle podcast with Dr. Sherry Price, episode number 161.

Welcome to Drink Less Lifestyle, a podcast for successful women who want to change their relationship with alcohol. If you want to drink less, feel healthier and start loving life again you’re in the right place. Please remember that the information in this podcast does not constitute medical advice. Now, here’s your host, Dr. Sherry Price.

Hello, my beautiful and epic friend. I am so excited this week because it’s our Halloween week. Yes, our big epic party bash is this Saturday. We’ve got so much going on. Our house is looking better and better each day. It’s looking less from chaos to more spookiness and ready for a spooktacular event. We actually start putting up the haunted tunnel today and we have about 72 hours to decorate it. No stress. But seriously, we have a lot of fun. A lot of times my husband and I will joke that it takes way more planning to put on this epic Halloween bash every year than it did for our own wedding.

And no joke, we have a master spreadsheet. We have little spreadsheets. We have a master to-do list and a vendor list and little lists to do. And the biggest list is Saturday’s list, the actual day because there are some things you just can’t do too much in advance. So Saturday becomes oh my gosh, let’s get it all done. And I really love how just the two of us can organize such a big event.

Now, I know we have help from vendors and stuff, but how much we put this together and make it even more epic each year. It’s something we really enjoy. It’s an event that we love putting on. We love the community. We love the connections. We love the people, the costumes and all the fun and all the kids, seeing them grow throughout the years. And now my daughter loves to help decorate and gets all excited for it. It’s just such a fun time. And I have to say, once it’s all together, I’m really impressed.

I’m really impressed by what we can pull off. And I have to say, I’m impressed with myself and my capabilities. And that’s what I want to talk about on today’s podcast is, do you like to impress yourself? Do you oftentimes put yourself in challenging ways or challenging events or do challenging things so that you can impress yourself? Because to me, it sure beats to impress yourself than the alternative, which is to disappoint yourself. And I really like to think about that.

Think about, you want an impressive relationship, you want an impressive relationship with alcohol. How does that sound? My relationship with alcohol is impressive. My relationship with my health is more impressive now than it was even six months ago. And when I talk about myself and I’m showing you how I give permission to go all in on what I want and to create the experiences I want in my life, like the Halloween party, like travel events.

And when I execute on those big levers that really move my health, my wellness, my longevity for my life, all of these things, which I find impressive. I share them because that means I’m making space for you and showing you that you can give yourself permission to go all in on the life that you want and give yourself permission to actually do it. Think about how awesome it feels when you are impressed by yourself in the areas of your life that matter. Maybe you’re rocking it at work. Maybe you’re rocking it at home. Maybe you’re rocking it as a parent right now.

Maybe you’re rocking it in your health or your yoga practice or your running practice or your CrossFit practice. And just think of the positive ramifications that has on your mental health and your spiritual health and your emotional health. Spiritually because you’re connected, you’re connected to something outside of you. I often give thanks to my higher power.

I often give thanks to God for allowing me to have this amazing life and have this amazing brain that I can do so many amazing things with. And it’s important to me to feel amazing, to be amazing, not just for myself, but to be a light for others to see as well. Because in this dark world, oh my gosh, so many things that we are going through right now globally we need more people shining. We need more people showing up with more love, more care and that means you have to start with you. And I want to have impressive health.

I want to take care of my body instead of abuse it with alcohol or food that doesn’t serve it or doesn’t make me feel good that day or the next day, which is why I don’t drink much anymore. I’ve really curtailed that. I mean, just think about when you overdo it one time, you feel like you’ve let yourself down. You feel disappointed in yourself. You know you don’t act your best. You don’t parent that well from that space when you’re hungover the next day and it’s really heartbreaking to yourself.

How many times have I said to myself, “That’s it, I’m done, I’m never going back to drinking again?” Years ago, I’d be like, “I’m just done with this drinking thing. I’ve reeled it in and then I’ve let it go and then I’ve reeled it in and I’ve let it go.” And that’s truly showing up disappointing myself, maybe not every time I touched alcohol, but enough times to say, “I’m done. I’m disappointing myself too much. I want to learn how to impress myself.” And the relationship I want to have with alcohol, what would that look like so that I can feel impressed by myself for adhering to that and doing that?

And saying what I’m going to do and not just saying it, but actually doing it. Now, when you overdo it, you may justify that. You may say, “Well, nothing bad really happened. I didn’t really hurt anybody. I may have said something in a weird way or somebody took it in a way I didn’t really mean or it came out weird, but hey, all is well, I didn’t really hurt anybody. I’m just a little sick today. I’m just not feeling myself today, but that’s okay.” But really, is it?

I did a podcast on this about justifying your drinking and how justifying things doesn’t help. Justifying your drinking doesn’t happen and particularly justifying the hangover doesn’t happen. And I’ve seen many people do this, justify the drinking and then justify how they feel afterwards. And it’s not that bad. It’s just one time this month, but I’m really good otherwise. And I want to tell you that when I see people do this and they keep justifying, what I find is that they don’t make further progress. They change up to a point but then they stop changing because they start making peace with justifying.

And when you make peace with justifying, you know what happens? It keeps you stuck. And then the same old song starts singing in your head. It’s another trip around the merry go round, nothing really changes. The weekend comes and you overdo it. It’s a different weekend but it’s the same story. Does this happen to you? Do you get stuck in your same old story to the point we’re like, “Here I am again. I said this wouldn’t happen, but here I am again?”

And do you want to know why this happens? Because I’ve been there. I know this does not feel good. I feel like I’m an expert in that because I spent years saying, “Why do I keep doing this to myself? Why does this keep happening?” And I kept justifying the hangover and justifying the drinking but it wasn’t till I really understood why this happens. And I’ll tell you, it’s a simple answer. It happens to all of us at some point in our lives, actually, because we get stuck with our fear.

We start identifying with the fear, fear of breaking up with the alcohol. Fear of what others will think. Fear of missing out. Fear of what else will I drink. Fear of what will I say. Fear, fear, fear, fear all the way down the road, kicking that can of fear. Fear that you can’t do it. Fear that it won’t happen. Fear that you’re stuck like this forever. Which none of those, by the way, are true. It’s just fear. It’s your brain having you believe thoughts that necessarily aren’t true. And I would say that they are actually false. They’re just deeply rooted that they don’t feel false, they feel true.

So one thing I learned from a coach and a mentor of mine is that you’ve got to go for playing big. And what playing big is, is not some ways people think about it, putting yourself out there and maybe it’s about money or about power. It’s none of that. Playing big is just saying I’m, “Going to be more loyal to my dreams than I am to my fears.” That’s playing big.

Playing big is meaning you’re going all in on what you want, the life you want, the dreams you have, the person you want to be rather than the fears of becoming that person. As I’m playing bigger in my own life, I am stretching myself to be more of myself and to expand my capabilities as well as my capacity for certain things in my life. I want to expand my capacity for service. I want to expand my capacity for love. I want to expand my capacity for understanding others.

And I want to expand my capabilities and that means I am playing loyal to my dreams, where I want to go, where I want my life to get better and improve. Not because I’m defective here, but because I can simply just improve. And not because I have to, but because I want to because I get to. And just like you, you can play big or you can stay small. And stay small means you are just listening to your fears, which keep you stuck.

Now, talking about dreams, some people don’t even know what it’s like to dream. In fact, if you look at the scientific literature, it will say that a lot of people, once they hit adulthood around 35 to 40 years of age, they stop dreaming, their goals become smaller. And some of the evidence around this is that they get just used to the status quo. They get used to the way things are. And for a lot of people, the way things are is just good enough. And I put that word in ‘just’ good enough because good enough is good but good could be the antithesis of being great.

Sure, good enough is fine, but ultimately it can become a trap. It’s a trap because if you feel fine, life is fine, everything’s fine. But you’re not doing anything differently, but yet you want something differently. You want a different result or you want a different relationship or you want to improve in a certain way or break a bad habit. If you keep telling yourself that everything’s fine, then actually you become stuck not because you’re really stuck, but just because your brain believes and grooved to these certain patterns in your life.

So your brain’s grooved in this deep pattern of this is the way it is. This is status quo, this is what I do and ultimately that’s what keeps you stuck. So it comes back to that subconscious programming I talk about so many times in this podcast. And I see this all the time with relationships around food, with relationships around alcohol, how people say, “It’s not really that bad. It’s fine.”

And sure it’s fine but is it exactly what you want? Because if you’re still having a bender a couple of times a month or a couple of times a week and you’re getting upset with yourself and it’s not who you want to be. Then maybe we should really admit that it’s not fine. And that here is one starting point, but where you want to be is actually over there. But over there requires you to play big. It requires you to be more loyal to your dreams than your fears.

Because if you don’t go in on playing big and I don’t go in on playing big, then what is now becomes the norm and doesn’t change. And the pattern that’s already grooved gets deeper in the subconscious. Just think about the people who have an ideal relationship around alcohol. They don’t care about it. It doesn’t impact their fun, doesn’t impact their level of happiness. It’s just there or not. It just really doesn’t matter to them. It doesn’t control them in any way. They don’t have to control it in any way, there’s complete freedom. The same thing can happen around food or similarly. We still need it in our lives.

With alcohol, we actually don’t need it in our lives, but with food we need it, our cells need it. We need energy that we get from food and the nutrients. We couldn’t live without food. But how many of us have a really amazing relationship with food where we know what to eat that fuels our body, that nourishes our cells, that improves our health, that improves our longevity, that improves our mitochondrial status, that lengthens our telomeres, that’s doing all the things that keeps us alive, well, flexible, agile, healthy and strong?

And I’ll tell you what, not many people have that information. Not many people seek out that information or if they’re seeking it out, maybe they’re not getting it from trusted sources. So they’re not even getting the right information. So as we’re talking about impressing yourself, think about that for you. Are you letting fear keep you small? Because I’ll tell you what, keeping your fear alive slowly kills the mojo for your dreams.

You’ll know if you are keeping your fear alive if you have the, yeah, but it’s Friday night, yeah, but. Oftentimes those can be sentences that might be signaling that there’s fear. And that’s okay, I’m not saying you will be fearless. I’m not saying that. But we have to look at are we more attached to our fear or are we more attached to our dreams? And I want to be more loyal to my dreams and more attached to my dreams than my fear. So how do you want to impress yourself?

We’ve got two months left of the year. How do you want to end this year? Do you want to end it strong? In what ways do you want to impress yourself by the end of 2023? It’s a lot of time. It’s a whole eight weeks we have. And there’s so much you can accomplish in eight weeks. And as I think about just the last 10 months of this year, how much progress I’ve made in terms of how much I’ve impressed myself this year.

I started out the year with my word ‘connection’. I can’t tell you how many opportunities that I’ve embarked upon that has grown my connection. I did new things. I held a retreat at my house. I participated in a retreat with ladies I didn’t know. I said yes to some networking events that I usually say no to. I have connected more deeply with close friends and my family and I’ve made some new friends and joined new groups and joined new programs expanding me on a health level and an emotional level as well. How else did I impress myself?

I created two extraordinary programs this year to help women learn how to eat healthy, banish the diet culture and also how to get toned, fit and metabolically strong, two programs. I created IF:45 for Women, which is a shorter program for those looking to understand and change their relationship with food and how to eat for a healthy body in midlife and beyond. Because how we metabolize food and what is good for our bodies at 40 and above, changes because of our hormonal fluctuations. And I want women to be empowered with this information.

I’ve also created my epic Tone in 10 program that teaches 10 key habits for an active, strong and healthy vibrant life. It’s totally comprehensive. We talk about hormones and supplements and cortisol and how that affects weight. And how that keeps weight on and how to get weight off if it’s cortisol based. And what is right forms of exercise for you in this phase of your life. Each individual in the program gets dedicated time with me so we can tailor things to meet your specific needs. And let me tell you, there’s no program out there like it.

And the amount of educational content in these programs is a lot, worksheets and workbooks and scorecards. There is so much that I offer in these programs. And I am so impressed by the ladies in the program utilizing this information to transform their life. I’m also impressed by myself because I helped my daughter create deeper grooves in her brain about her worth in this world. What an honor it is to do that. What a skill to have that as a parent. I don’t think many parents have that as a skill.

And I know for me, my parenting used to be so far off base. It was about what I wanted, what I thought she should be doing, following certain rules that didn’t make sense to her. And I wasn’t considering what her innate capabilities and abilities were and the way her brain works and the way her brain learns and the way her body works and the way her body learns. And how I had the opportunity to learn somatic techniques to help her with life skills. And to really see her take hold this year and handle her schoolwork, handle her emotional regulation.

I was just bragging about her the other day in EpicYOU. I had to stop the call and I said, “I have to tell you what my daughter is doing and it is so impressive.” And one of the ladies even said, “Wow, yes, I have to learn that skill. I forgot about that skill.” And most recently I’m impressed with myself for following that detox diet. Man, that protocol asked a lot of me and challenged me really to my core.

I thought before doing that detox program that I was eating healthy, I really did. I really thought I was nailing it. But then when I saw and I understood all of the ingredients, how to read labels at a deeper level, how to really understand what I was putting in my body and how to navigate grocery shopping in a different way and how to structure my meals differently. Man, I was not eating as healthy as I thought. Yes, truth be told, before that program, I would have told you I was eating healthy, but in fact I really wasn’t.

And that program really woke me up to exactly what I was putting inside my body. Because I had to track, I had to read and I had to learn. And the biggest part, I had to stop making excuses because I was making excuses saying, “I already know how to eat healthy. This is healthy.” But then you turn it around and you actually read the ingredients. Yes, I couldn’t even have that dill sauce on that salmon because it wasn’t healthy. It didn’t meet the standards of the protocol.

So I’m so thankful that I saw that I had so much more to learn. And I’m so thankful that I did it. I impressed myself. I impressed myself going on vacation with friends and still adhering to the protocol. So taking on that challenge was just what I needed to better understand my body and to make health a bigger priority for me in my life. So let me be clear on something. When I’m talking about impressing yourself, I’m saying you’re doing this for you because what you want matters.

This is not about showing yourself off to the world. This is not about anyone else and what they think. I’m sure my husband thought I was whacky for doing that detox protocol. He didn’t say it, but I’m sure deep down he was like, “Wow, I can’t believe you’re going to do that.” He supported me every step of the way, which I’m grateful for.

But when you’re answering that question, how am I impressing myself, this is about you. This is not about putting it on display for others to see. It’s really about your journey and how, by you accomplishing something, you are going to impress yourself. Whether you apply that to having an impressive relationship with alcohol, one where you can trust yourself every single time or one where you just don’t want it at all. So maybe alcohol just goes bye bye in your life. Maybe that would be impressive for you.

Or it could be the way you want to show up as a mom for your children. You want to really understand them and guide them in a way that’s not criticizing, tearing them down, putting them on defense. But really about empowering, lifting them up and letting them see that they are the amazing human that they were created to be. Or maybe now for you, health is your north star, just like it is my north star.

Maybe you really want to dial in how to eat to feel better, to reduce joint pain, to reduce your risk of dementia and chronic disease and inflammation. And if you’re on my email list, you may have seen the reasons that I’m so passionate about health. I got really raw and vulnerable in one of my emails talking about the struggles my parents have with their health. And how they were misguided by many healthcare practitioners in their life and on the advice that they got on how to improve their health. And unfortunately, now that they suffer from that and the consequences that came from that advice.

And I’m not just blaming the healthcare practitioners, I’m also saying that they just didn’t have the right tools and the right information. I know that we are all trying to do the best that we can, but we also have to recognize when we’re settling for good and we’re not happy there because we want more. We want things to improve. We want things to get better. We want to be great. We want to feel great.

So with that, my friend, I invite you to do this exercise about impressing yourself. What would be impressive for yourself if you were to conquer it by the end of 2023? And if you’d like some help with that, come join us over in EpicYOU as we’ll be working on this topic for the rest of the year. Because I’m a firm believer that if you want an epic life and epic health it starts with being an epic version of you. Alright, my beautiful friend have an epic week and I’ll see you on next week’s episode.

If you want to change your relationship with alcohol and with yourself then come check out EpicYOU. It’s where you get individualized help mastering the tools so you can become a woman who can take it or leave it and be in control around alcohol in any situation. EpicYOU is the place for women who want to be healthy, confident and empowered to accomplish their goals and live their best life. Come join us over at epicyou.com/epicyou. That’s epicyou.com/ E-P-I-C-Y-O-U. I can’t wait to see you there.