Denise:
One of the reasons I invited you in particular is because we share a similar philosophy in how we approach, let’s just say, problems, problem solving. I like to help women with their health, get to a healthy weight, and to stop stress eating, and you like to help them with time management.

And the truth is that both of us agree that there’s not a one size fits all,  and that no one ever taught us how to do this, and that we get the opportunity to just find what uniquely works for us. So I’m hoping that you could just share with me a little bit about your work that you do with women and what got you started.

Yeah, absolutely. So I’m a time freedom coach and I call it being a time freedom coach, because what I really like to do is help women, especially Catholic moms, figure out how to find more time in their life for the things that matter most to them, especially when they’re just caught in overwhelm and burnout and the hamster wheel.

And they feel like they’re spending all their time on things that are lower value to them or, and just being reactive, moving to a place of being proactive and intentional with their time. 

Denise:
I just love that. We call it in the weight loss of the Holy spirit program, living on autopilot. 

Kelsey:
Yeah. 

Denise:
We’ve always done and then we think, but why am I not getting what I want?  

Kelsey:
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And so the place that I really got started from, it’s actually interesting, Denise, I spent the first half of my career building productivity systems in the nonprofit world. But, when I became a stay at home mom for a couple years when my daughter was little, it was actually because of her health issues that I decided to do that.

So much of that was around the fact that she didn’t eat very much. She had a number of disabilities. And so a lot of my time was actually spent in making sure that she was getting really good quality, nutritious food. It reframed a lot for our family around how we ended up thinking about food, how we ended up thinking about being intentional with our food and making sure that  every bite she got was the highest quality, the best nutrition, if she wasn’t going to be able to eat very much of it. 

And so interestingly enough, after that, I actually started helping a lot of other moms with things like meal planning and the reason that I started doing this coaching was I just realized there was such a bigger picture challenge that a lot of them were facing around meal planning. Because they would say things like I’d like to meal plan, but I don’t have time for that.

Or I’d like to cook more, but I don’t have time for that. And my family, the stakes felt so high around food, being good food. And so to me, it was very surprising.  You don’t have time for food, but food is so important. Food is what fuels us in our life. And I realized there was this huge need. For the bigger picture, thinking around the way we spend our time.

And that’s how I ended up actually diving into coaching other moms with their time management can really was the marriage of those experiences in my life as someone who’d been a productivity expert. And then someone who really wanted to make sure that I was using my time that it was going towards those higher impact things in life and helping other moms to do that too. 

Denise:
Yeah. I like how you said that. So you’re a productivity expert and what you’re helping moms do is to increase their productivity on the things that matter most to them. 

Kelsey:
Yes. Yes, absolutely. Yeah. And so that’s actually one thing I don’t really call myself a productivity coach because productivity is something that sometimes we get a little bit caught up in as being something that is where our worth comes from. Which isn’t true,  but I say I’m a time freedom coach  because what really matters is are we being good stewards of our time? Are we using our time the way the Lord wants us to? And the way he wants us to use it for our unique families. And that looks so custom. Productivity is a tool that serves toward that higher end.

It’s like when we’re, when our rockets pointed in the right direction and we’ve got, and we’re actually like hitting the gas on that’s what productivity is useful for, but productivity is never an end in and of itself.

Denise:
I love that. I like how you said “are we being good stewards of our time?”

And when we’re living on autopilot, we just never take the time to examine that. So I was hoping that today that you would be able to take that philosophy And apply it to two of the most common obstacles that I hear in our community. Number one is just finding the time to work on overcoming stress eating or what’s standing in the way of someone losing weight.

They’ll say, I just don’t have time to focus on me. And so I’m hoping that you can talk about that, about focusing our time on the things that really matter to us and priority; and then also talking to us a little bit about your meal planning techniques.  

Kelsey:
So one of the things that I like to teach my clients is this concept of high impact planning. And so high impact planning is where we begin with the end in mind. And one of the things that we can do when we’re doing that is we actually have to work backwards from the goals that we have in our life. And I think, all of us can agree that our highest goals come along the lines of loving the Lord, our God, with all our heart, soul, and mind and loving our neighbor as ourselves  and working backwards from that to the smaller goals that fit within that, like, how does God really specifically want me to do that.

What does he want that to look like in my life? And why, really, why did he create me? Because he created all of us so differently. He gave us all these different strengths. He gave us these different families. He gave us these different talents and he gave us even different passions, things that really drive us, each of us were so unique in that. But when we’re doing high impact planning or working not backwards, not just to the smaller goals, but also what do we need  to hit those goals? Like just when we’re planning a road trip, we’re not planning just how are we going to get there, what stops are we taking along the way, what route are we going to take, we have to plan other things like what are the inputs, what do we need to pack, what do we need to do do we need gas in our car, we need fuel, we’re not going to get very far on the trip without a good vehicle, without a good without putting the gas in the engine. And when we’re thinking about our time management, we have to think about that too, with ourselves, like what do I need in order to accomplish my goals? What are the tools? What does my body need?

What does my soul need? What does my mind need? And so when we’re thinking about our time management, when we’re setting up our routines, it’s not just about productivity. It’s not just about what we’re accomplishing each day, but what are those inputs and where are we going to not just fit them in, but prioritize them so that we can have a greater impact. 

Denise:
Yeah. I like how you started with the whole concept of high impact planning starting with what does the Lord want for me? And when I look at women in their struggle with food and weight, so many of them haven’t even considered that the Lord wants to be part of this journey with them.  And so I think that’s a huge difference between the work that I do in our community and traditional weight loss is to say, wait, let’s surrender this area to the Lord as well and let him guide us. And once we do that, we get so much more clarity on the priorities, if you will, and get real clarity that he does want to be part of this. And that if we are going to invite the Lord into this area of food and weight, we’re going to change some things. 

We’re going to have to implement some new practices and those practices are laid out in the Weight Loss of the Holy Spirit program. I love that whole concept of when we let him drive the bus, we can work our way back to the smaller things that are needed. So that we can glorify him in every area of our life. 

Kelsey:
Yeah. I think it was St. Thomas Moore. He said, take care of your body that it may serve you to serve God.  And that’s always struck with me as something like my body is meant for a higher purpose. And when I’m purpose centered. And the way I think about how I’m going to be spending my time when I think about how I’m caring for my body, it just becomes so much clearer what are the steps I need to be taking each day? What are the actions that matter? What my priorities are.

Denise:
I just want to say for all of you who are listening to Kelsey talk and you’re thinking yeah, that makes sense. But I don’t even know how to do that. I’ll tell you, I heard so many beautifully stated philosophical things about my body. And we all know that our bodies are a temple of the Holy spirit. And we all know that we are made in the image and likeness of the Lord. And for my audience, I just want to give them permission to hear that in their head and just not be able to internalize it yet.

Cause we’ve just had so many wounds and so many body image issues and so much healing that needs to be done in our relationship with our bodies. And so for all of you who hear this, I just want to let you know that you just might be able to totally academically understand it and it just isn’t in your soul yet, that’s totally fine. Repairing that relationship and healing is part of the work that we do in Weight Loss with the Holy Spirit program. 

Kelsey:
Denise, I think you’re so right. I think it’s just one of those things where we really do need to start where we are. And then that has a snowball effect. We can add the layers one bit at a time as we’re moving forward. But if we try to start too big, it doesn’t stick. It doesn’t pack in well and whatever point we are on our healing journeys is where God wants us to be. Letting him in working right now and not always looking at trying to shift that internal work too quickly at the pace that we’re going at

Denise:
The Lord never rushes us or criticizes us or condemns us or says you’re in the wrong place. He’s always just very soft and gentle and accepting and warm..

Kelsey:
Who loves you so tenderly.

Denise:
Again It’s just permission to be where you are and start where you are. So we have high impact planning. Realizing that we want to glorify the Lord in every area of our life, which will help us  look at what the priorities are, look at what will get us closer to our goal. And essentially our goal is to not live on autopilot, to actually be the ones who are in charge of our lives.

Kelsey:
When we’re on autopilot, we’re really not, I’m not sure if control is the world word I would give, but I like the word intentionality because I think we want to be  not reacting to everything, but knowing what’s most important and then choosing from among those choices, given our options. And That’s where we get to actually, shall we say, co-pilot with the Holy Spirit or really cooperate with the Holy Spirit and be constantly aligning our will to His. Because that’s really the heart of intentionality there is to have our will aligned with the Holy Spirit, with our Heavenly Father’s will.

And so how do we know when we’re cooperating with the Holy Spirit? The way we’re going to know that is when we’re starting to see the fruits of the Spirit in our life, in our day to day action. And those are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control. And as we see those unfolding in our life, that’s how we know we’ve started to move to a place of intentionality. That’s how we know that we’re starting to use our lives and our time and making decisions that are fruitful. 

Denise: 
And I would suggest that we probably know a little bit more immediate than having to wait for, looking in hindsight or noticing, Oh wait, I am more patient if we just really encourage women to find peace with their food choices. And if you’re feeling peace, then you know, the Lord is present. 

If you’re feeling unsettled or agitated,  that needs to be addressed. 

Kelsey:
Yeah, absolutely. And I’ve always really loved that kind of philosophy, like the idea of food. We have complicated relationships with it, but when it really comes down to the heart of it, food’s a gift from God. Food is something that he has given us because he loves us, because he wants it to serve us so that we can serve him. 

Denise:
Yeah, I like to say that food has three different functions. And this is not like theologically sound this is just in my own brain. Of course we know it nourishes us and you have experienced that with your daughter. And both of my boys were adopted internationally. So their nutrition, they were very malnourished coming to the U S.

So I get that. I get how important the nutrients in food are, and especially we could go on and on about how it cures a variety of diseases or helps. So we know it is nature’s pharmacy. Okay. But aside from that, the other two things is I think it alleviates our belly from rumbling, and then of course it’s to enjoy. That’s why the Lord gave us taste buds. And to your point, it is a gift in so many ways, in so many functions, not only for us physically, emotionally, mentally. It’s just when it starts to get a little out of order that it then becomes a source of injury, of unsettledness, of agitation, where it steals our peace. 

Kelsey:
Definitely.  

Denise:
And so our community is just working on reordering, healing, and getting things back to the way the Lord created them in a really simple, gentle way that works for every woman’s life. Let us know what you think. Dive into a little bit of what you have learned and that you’ve been teaching women about meal planning. And again, everybody, we’re just going to encourage you to take what you like, implement what seems like a cool idea for you. But we’re not using any awesome ideas that Kelsey shares with us to criticize ourself or believe that we have been bad at doing it.

We’re all learning.  So I’m personally very excited to hear all of this.  

Kelsey:
I’m so happy to talk about it. So Denise, I think there’s really, there’s two main obstacles that  a lot of us encounter when we start thinking about things like meal planning and cooking, and those are first, I don’t have time, and second, What if I’m not good at it? And they can be real barriers to even getting started on giving it a try, because it just feels, it feels high pressure. It feels like one of those things where it’s a really big project, especially if we’re not used to doing a lot of cooking, we think there’s all the prep. There’s all the learning to do it. It takes a long time for me to cook even that lasagna. I did that one time, the cleanup afterward, and it can be  something that we start thinking is a really big project. But one of the things that I really want your audience to take away from this is that cooking doesn’t have to be complicated meal planning, it doesn’t have to be time consuming. It can be absolutely delicious without being fancy and taking an hour to do. And you can make some really high quality food. But one of the real secrets to that, and this is going to simplify everything about the way you think about cooking and meal planning, is that quality ingredients make your life easier with it.

When we’re trying to make something like one of those Depression era casseroles, they just require so much extra to be put in to make it taste good, because they’re made out of a lot of ingredients that aren’t the highest of quality and they’re not usually very fresh. And so when we’re thinking about cooking and we start thinking, okay, what could I do that just uses simple but nice ingredients?

That’s when you come up with really tasty meals that are really easy. And I’ll give you like one example. I don’t know if you’ve ever had a caprese salad. It can be one of the tastiest foods is just sliced mozzarella, sliced tomato. Little bit of basil and maybe some vinaigrette on top.

It’s absolutely delicious. But how much prep time does something like that take?  It’s two minutes. So when we’re starting to think about our meal planning, when we start with ingredients instead of with recipes, It makes it a lot easier and it also makes it easier because then we can also be more efficient with the ingredients that we already have on hand. We can, we can shop our pantry and see what we have. What can we make with it? There’s a few different ways that we can make a meal plan, but I think one of the simplest ones is just a plate formula. So when you think about picturing a plate, you want to have something that’s going to be like your protein. 

Then you want to have something that’s like your vegetables and then a base of some sort and a sauce of some sort. And the cool thing about this is that you can mix and match almost anything when you do that. You can say, I want to work with what’s in season. If it’s fall, maybe I want to have that vegetable be something like sweet potatoes or squash. And you can just rotate out the pieces. This doesn’t require a ton of planning ahead or anything. It doesn’t require a ton of knowing a specific recipe. It just requires learning how each ingredient tastes good. And it simplifies the whole concept of meal planning.

We can also meal plan, the second method that a lot of people do is to keep what’s a library of favorites. So as you go through and you discover recipes that you love, keeping track of them, and starting small and just adding them in one at a time, and then being able to pull from your favorites. These are the two main methods that I think are the simplest ones to start with when it comes to meal planning. 

Denise:
Yeah, I love that. Let me just follow up. When you said the plate formula, you said a protein, a vegetable, a base, and a sauce. What do you mean by a base? 

Kelsey:
So by a base, it would be more like a carb. It would be something like rice or it would be pasta or quinoa. It adds a little bit of texture. It adds a little bit of filling and you can mix and match all of these. What I love about that method is that you can serve the same ingredients in so many different ways, even within a week, just by changing out what kind of sauce you’re using. If you’re serving rice, chicken, and broccoli, you can do that with a cream sauce or a cheese sauce or a teriyaki sauce, same ingredients, different sauce. And it tastes like a completely different meal. 

Denise:
Yeah. And it’s marinara salsa. Both of these approaches, I absolutely love because I am not complicated. If it’s complicated, I’m not doing it. Love the plate formula. It feels like a real fun puzzle. It feels like a grid that you could make a little chart and then you just decide what protein we have, what vegetable, what base or starch, and then what sauce. And I bet you could come up with,  gosh, several different sauces. So I love that. That is so fun. And you guys, if you just make yourself a chart.

Kelsey:
Denise, I actually have one that I’d be happy to send to you to send. It’s one of the resources that I offer in my membership. But it’s just, it tells you a lot of the different ways that you can mix and match things and simple ways to cook each ingredient. It tells you what sauces are complementary to which vegetables, to which meats, to which flavors. And  it’s a really good starting point. As you get more familiar with it, you’ll start coming up with your own and noticing the things you like.

But there is a pattern to this, and there’s so many things that really are interchangeable.  

Denise:
Oh, thank you.  And then, your second one, which was your library of favorites. One of the things that I would recommend to women is  go to the people that you’re cooking for and ask them what their two to three faves are. And, sometimes coming up with the ideas is really the most challenging part. It’s like we, we think we need to have so many different recipes that we’re going through. But I found if you just have a two week rotation. 

Kelsey:
Even that, especially if you’ve got little kids, they like familiarity. They don’t want something new every time. And two weeks seems to be a good amount of time that no one gets actually tired of something, but that you’ve only really got to come up with 14 dinners. 14 dinners is a very manageable number. 

Denise:
And I also want to remind people that in our house, I cook night one, cook night two, I have two meals, and then we do leftovers from night one on day three, leftovers from night two on day four. That’s a great idea to clean out the fridge day five, and then of course we have just random stuff. Leftovers if your family eats them, go for it.  

Kelsey:
I don’t know about you. My husband’s a big fan. He takes them for lunch leftovers. 

Denise:
Kelsey, I like how you give us permission to do things that are easy. And I like these two simple techniques and to even, it’s just brilliant to think of, start with the ingredients first and high.

Flavor, high quality ingredients make a difference. I’d never considered or heard that before. That’s totally unique. Thank you for that.  

Kelsey:
It really does simplify things. And I think too, it just helps us to enjoy our food more, which matters. It really does when we’re trying to keep that perspective of it as a gift from God, that, it’s just one of those things where we can say, oh, you made this really special food for us. 

And we can savor it to its fullest. 

Denise:
Yeah, I love that. Thank you so much for your time for your passion for the new concepts that you’ve shared with us that really help us draws closer to understanding the way the Lord created just this life that we’ve been given at this specific time and the specific challenges that we have around being busy women, moms, who  Are trying to eat well and take care of ourselves.

Thank you so much for that.  

Kelsey:
Oh, thanks so much for having me, Denise. 

Denise:
How can women find you? 

Kelsey:
Oh you guys, I have a podcast. It’s called “True Presence for Catholic Moms”. And that’s a really, just awesome resource that’s out there for you guys. The other thing is you can head to my website and if you feel like your to-do list is too long. You don’t know where to start, just go to truepresence.life, and you can access my unstuck and on task program. That’s just a work mini workbook right there to help you get unstuck on the days when you feel like you’ve got too much to do.

Denise:
Oh, thank you for that. What would you like to leave our listeners with? 

Kelsey:
If there were one takeaway from this and I didn’t really talk too much about this. I would just say have a growth mindset with yourself when it comes to this. We all start From the beginning and  I know  the first thing I ever cooked from scratch was rock solid, hard as a rock, can’t bite through it, meatballs with spaghetti. And we often go through that first early stage of not really being the best cook and then we get better as we go, but, be okay with that. Start where you are, build up, and just have fun on the way.  

Denise:
Thank you. And I will link to  the chart of creating the plate formula in the show notes.

Thank you so much, Kelsey Pasquerelle, for being with us and sharing your wisdom. 

Kelsey:
Thanks for having me, Denise.