And one of the things that we do in our community is every Wednesday we have what are called check-ins and they’re those old weigh-ins, but people aren’t coming in to weigh in or to report their weight. They’re coming in to say what’s working well? What needs work? They get three minutes to just share whatever’s on their brain. 

We do these check-ins early morning, midday in the evening, you pick a time. And what’s so great is these women just get a look inside each other’s lives and they just leave so encouraged. And it’s that vibe and that energy that I want you to hear this podcast where you get a look inside the other women who are walking on this earth with you, they’re just like you,  and I hope that you can glean something from the process that they’re going through. That will be inspiring and encouraging to you. And I just ask that you pray that the Holy Spirit will reveal something to you in their story that will bring you hope today, that will give you direction, that will progress you forward, bring you closer to him, make your life feel lighter.

Make this food and weight journey feel less burdensome. And when I was going through our community and looking at all the wins and what stories I would share with this podcast there were so many, there were so many. And so I chose these because I thought they would resonate with someone who maybe wasn’t already in our community. Maybe someone who just is trying weight loss on their own. And so you would be able to identify with their stories. And so I hope this brings you hope, enjoy. The other thing that I want to encourage you is that if you don’t have someone to check-in weekly about what you’re doing, find a friend, find someone, you need someone to celebrate with you.

That’s one of the best things that you can do for yourself is to find other weight loss friends who understand and who will really lift you up. Okay. If nothing you get out of this podcast is to just find a community or is to just find a friend that you can celebrate with, that you can call every week and be like, oh my gosh, I am so amazing look at what happened to me. And that you can do the same for. This podcast has been very fruitful for you. 

Okay, so first, this is a woman that I want you to hear how much progress that you can make without perfection. She’s still learning, you guys, this is still learning and she’s made massive progress and hint hint, you guys are going to be learning for the rest of your lives. Here’s what she says. She says things that are working. I made my food plans. So this is one of those check ins. She was not able to be live, so she just wrote her check in our community’s Slack group. And Slack is like a Facebook group, but it’s just our online community where we can message each other without being distracted by anything other than this work. 

Okay. She says things that are working. Making a food plan with the Holy Spirit, my morning reflection, and reviewing my calm eating plans, such as no nibbling or eating in the kitchen while preparing food or preparing my meal plate. Other things that are working, she says, I’ve lost 20 pounds. I’ve weighed myself three times since I started at the beginning of May.

So when she wrote this, it was eight weeks after that. I’ve lost 20 pounds. She said, okay, isn’t that great? So she’s lost 20 pounds. Yay. And then she goes on to say, and things that need work because we’re always learning. So we’re going to continue to progress.

We’re going to celebrate what’s going well. We’re going to celebrate weight loss. And then we’re going to say, Lord,  how do you want to continue to refine me? And she said, things that I need to work on are portion sizes. Do you guys hear that? She’s lost 20 pounds in eight weeks. And still the Lord is revealing things that he wants for her. 

She says, I think I’ll start using a smaller plate. See, she’s problem solving. I love that she’s willing to experiment. So then I asked her, Oh my gosh, so you lost 20 pounds. What made that possible? It’s one of my favorite questions to ask in our community. What made that possible is when people have when celebrate wins, she said, I set a goal, a bold goal of losing 20 pounds by July 4th.

Okay. So I want you guys to notice how she set a bold goal. She just said, I’m just going to set a goal. I love how she’s future focused. One of the things that you need to do is to pretend and start living like you are your future you. I help you develop that vision of your future you. And you can just do this right now. 

Where do you want to be? And just start believing it, start changing your brain and start believing that you can do that. If you want help with that, then I want you to go back to, I think it was the very first podcast of 2024 where I talk about how to be your own weight loss coach  and you can get that future focus. You can see that future focus and her keeping that goal in her brain got her the results of getting very close to that. She said, I felt really determined and excited and I really stuck with it. Do you see how she said, I felt determined and excited? Determined and excited are the feelings that led to her staying focused on her goal. So if you guys aren’t feeling focused on your goal, it’s because you aren’t cultivating the feeling that needs to get you there. 

Okay? So that’s part of our program is cultivating the feelings that will get you to the results. And when she was cultivating the feelings of being determined and excited, it led to the actions of sticking with it. She says, now I’ve set more monthly goals of five pounds per month for another 30 pounds by the end of the year.

She says, I know it’s a lot, but I’m determined to get close to it. Yeah and I would question what does that mean by a lot brain? Why do you feel like that’s a lot?  Because you guys can achieve anything. You don’t need to limit anything our goals. The only thing we’re limited by is our beliefs. If you look at what you weigh today,  the only thing that  is keeping you at that weight are your beliefs. 

You believe you can’t lose weight. You believe it’ll be too hard. You believe the only way that will get you there is through deprivation. You believe that you don’t want to endure deprivation. I say that to you because I want to give you hope that the only thing standing in the way between where you are today and the healthy weight  that the Lord has in store for you and that you want to be at is just your thoughts, it’s just your beliefs. It’s just believing that what will get you there is a food plan.  

And you guys know that what will get you there is not a food plan because you can eat any food at all. Food does not keep you overweight. I’m gonna say that again. Eating food does not keep you overweight. Eating food when you are stressed, when you’re pushing down feelings, when you are trying to escape uncomfortable emotions is what keeps you overweight. 

Believing that a food plan is going to help you lose weight is not the answer. If you find that you’re thrown off by stress eating. And I know I just diverted there, but I say all of that because I want you to start believing that it’s not the food. Often I talk to women who say, Denise, I can’t keep an easy to stick to meal plan.

Because I don’t know what my husband’s going to cook for dinner. It doesn’t matter what he cooks for dinner. You can sit down and eat what he cooks for dinner, and it will not keep you overweight. What will keep you overweight is the food that you consume out of stress, anxiety,  and beyond fullness.

And the reason we eat beyond fullness is because we’re seeking something other than nourishment. We’re seeking something other than fuel. We’re seeking something other than food, like actual food. We’re seeking comfort. We’re seeking warmness. We’re seeking connection. We’re seeking a reprieve from life. I was talking with a woman yesterday. She said, I just want to escape the tedium. Yeah,  that’s what we’re seeking.

I know I digressed there, but I want you to know that what is keeping you overweight is not about the magic food plan. What’s keeping you overweight is the stress and the emotions and all you’re doing is coping with food. Hey, guess what? I have a solution for that. It’s very simple.  It’s a very simple process. 

But your brain thinks it’s hard because no one’s ever held your hand through the process. And that’s all it takes. That’s all it takes is someone to hold your hand and say, hey, this is how you feel an emotion, you’re not going to die. This is how you increase your window of tolerance for being uncomfortable. 

See, we’re all doing it. Ooh, it’s itchy. No human brain likes it. No one’s ever taught you how to do this. No one’s ever taught you how to get through the ups and downs of life without stress eating. It’s totally fine you don’t know how to do that. It’s a very simple process though and we’re all doing it and that simple process is exactly what our friend here who lost 20 pounds in eight weeks did, 20 pounds.

She goes on to say this week I’m going to schedule a check in  and watch last week’s coaching call and watch video number seven. What that means, and I want you to hear this, is she’s saying, how do I show up for me this week? These are my goals. This is how I’m going to stay in the work. This is how I’m going to take full advantage of the weight loss with the Holy Spirit program.

And you don’t have to be in the Weight Loss with the Holy Spirit program to take full advantage of whatever the heck you’re doing. You just decide how you’re going to take advantage of whatever you’re doing. What are the action items? 

Okay,  That is how you get to your healthy weight. Okay, I want to go on. What I want you to hear in this, is that she is willing to feel those uncomfortable feelings that I just talked to you about. She has taught herself what to do when she has those feelings and how to find comfort  and turn to the Lord to see his truth. 

And what you’ll also hear in her story is the result of that, which is when you balance your emotion, you’re eating balances out and returns to the way the Lord really designed for us to consume fuel or food. He wants us to enjoy our food, right? That’s why he gave us taste buds, but he wants us to do it in a way  that is ordered and balanced and gives us nourishment as well as tons of enjoyment. 

And when you have that, your weight balances out and you naturally get to a healthy weight.  So this is her story.  She said, this past week has been a roller coaster of emotions and changes in my daily life. And it all hit me Sunday morning. I did not overeat, but I did get sad and angry. And when I sat and modeled it, and asked why. 

Okay, so you guys do you notice she didn’t eat? She felt her feelings and modeling is a simple process that we do so that we can get clarity on our feelings. Okay, she said, I sat and I modeled it and I asked why she said I was mad that I had let other people’s words affect how I was feeling and thinking and I didn’t agree with their words, but I let it affect me anyway.

Okay, she’s just getting clarity. So I’m having these feelings, what’s underneath of them? Let me sit down with a pen and paper and Get some clarity on them. She goes on to say I went to church and spoke with the Lord and felt so much better when I came home. I Also talked about how the week went With Weight Loss with the Holy Spirit with my husband and the insights I got on myself, and he’s so great.

I love him. He helped me see that there are so many other ways that I’m growing that are leading to a better life and a way of living that’s okay if the weight hasn’t come off yet. Just keep plugging along. I love that you guys so often we come into this program and the Lord wants to heal us emotionally and mentally. And that’s where our focus needs to be.

And we may not see the weight come off right away. I don’t think this is everyone’s story, but sometimes when we have the stress and overwhelm of life, and our body is used to running on high cortisol levels and high stress levels our bandwidth to learn new skills to handle stress is where our focus needs to be. And once we create that foundation, then our cortisol levels can come down, our stress levels come down, and our body is willing to release the weight. Now, that said, this woman did not take before pictures. This woman also did not take measurements. 

And that is where many women will start to see a change before they see a change on the scale. They will see that their body is changing shape. They will be able to see the change or they may choose one pair of pants to continue to put on. So since this woman did not do any of those before sort of baseline measurements, her brain believes that she is not losing weight.

I’m not so sure a hundred percent that actually is the case. I’m guessing that her body is releasing some of the excess, but she doesn’t see it. So that’s my plug for finding some baseline measurements, whether it is the scale, whether it is measurements, pictures, or a pair of pants.  Some women have scale drama and, or what I like to call scale trauma, and they don’t want to get on the scale, and I think that’s totally fine. 

But let’s have some sort of baseline, and your brain will not want to do that. Your brain just wants to get out of wherever you are as fast as possible, and I can tell you over and over and over,  take before pictures, take before measurements.  It will just bring you so much  excitement when you start to see your body change. 

Okay, but I just wanted to say this woman is still making lots of progress, even though her brain thinks that her body isn’t changing. Okay, so I want to go on with her story. So her husband was supportive  and he said, Hey, you are really seeing lots of other, what we call non scale victories. Your life is growing in so many other ways. 

Leading you to a better life  and a better way of living.  So then she goes on to say, We went out on a day date.  He surprised me with this gift for our anniversary.  And we had a great time, just the two of us. We don’t do this often. She said we had lunch out and I ate what I liked and felt great about my eating. 

It was a great beet salad with goat cheese and greens and tenderloin tips and was so good, she says.  She said, I’m heading into this new week of adventure with a happy heart and positive vibes.  Oh, a happy heart and positive vibes.  You guys, I remember when I was coaching a woman, not this woman, a different woman about going on her anniversary weekend with her husband and she was so worried. 

And I said, okay what’s the concern? And she’s I just really want to celebrate. I want to have a nice dinner and celebrate with them.  And I said, okay, what’s, what does your brain think is the problem with that?  And where we ended up getting to was her brain was telling her that to celebrate her anniversary dinner, she would have to be stuffed and over consume food. 

Isn’t that interesting?   Where we ended up getting to with that coaching was, Hey, it is totally cool to order whatever you want,  order what you want,  enjoy it.  But that doesn’t mean you have to get stuffed.  And I think that’s what  this most recent story that I told you also illustrates. 

Go into these celebratory dinners, gang.  Order the food that’s fun.  That you love, that’s so good.  And that doesn’t mean we need to gorge ourselves.  It just means we get to have special dinners. Special foods, special tastes.  It’s not about the amount.  I was recently doing a check in with a woman and she said the coolest thing, she said what she’s learning is that when she has the sensation of hunger,  it means I need to eat relatively soon. 

What it does not mean is that I need to consume a lot.  I was like, Oh my gosh, that is so brilliant.

I need to eat relatively soon.  But I don’t need to consume a lot.  What wisdom she is learning. Her body is revealing. The Lord is revealing to her  as she tunes into herself and starts taking care of herself.  It’s just crazy.

Guys, this podcast is getting a little long, but I want to keep going.  Another woman says, I did my evening reflection last night instead of grabbing a snack to eat. I didn’t feel the need to eat something.  She said, I printed five days of my daily sheets to make it easier to do my reflections and menu plan while my husband is taking off time from work.  And what she’s saying there is, Hey, my schedule is going to be interrupted because my husband’s going to be around more.

And so I went ahead and made it easier for me to stick to what I know that I need to do for me and that I want to do for me. So I went ahead and printed five sheets out.  Isn’t that cool? I love that she’s looking ahead. I love that she’s noticing, Oh wait, husband being home might feel a little odd in my brain.

Might feel like it needs to interrupt my.  My routine.  This is just another illustration of  looking ahead, taking care of yourself  and having a place to come and celebrate. That is a huge win.  Another woman says, I felt a big breakthrough after today’s check in. Remember I told you every week, of course we have group coaching, but every week we have these moments these scheduled times, early morning, midday evening, where women just come in, pick one of those times.

They come in, they say what’s working, what needs work. And then they get to hear everybody else’s stories.  If you just check in and you need to leave, that’s cool, but they do last 30 minutes and you can stay in here. Everybody else’s story. She said, I felt a big breakthrough after today’s check in. 

I’m not here to worry about the scale. I’m here to practice detachment from food so I can do the work God has for me.  She said, this was so clarifying for me. Okay. She said, thank you, Denise. Denise didn’t do anything. That’s her showing up at the check in,  her  being open to what the Lord reveals. 

And during that check in, we were able to talk about how the scale was actually distracting her from the work.  How she was using the scale to mean way more than just information.  And you guys are like, I don’t even know what that means.  Because what we do is reframe our brains to recognize  This scale is just information.

And if we’re not there quite yet, that’s cool. Then we, maybe we just don’t use the scale for information. If we can’t do that, she was making the scale mean a lot. And I’m going to tell you, this is a woman who has been in weight watchers since she was 14 years old. 14, she’s in her forties now.  And we’re just helping her see the truth. 

What is the truth? The truth is what the Lord wants us to see.  What his truth is. And he was saying to her,  and clarifying with her that the scale is distracting, my love. 

He said, what I want for you is to detach from food. Let’s cut those strings.

She says, it doesn’t mean that weight loss isn’t important.  But for this woman in this stage of her life,  it doesn’t mean that weight loss isn’t important, but what he needs her to focus on is being detached from using food to cope with life.  The other thing I didn’t mention is that this woman is healing from a miscarriage. 

And God just had something else in store for her right now.  He says, come to me.  I want to heal you. I want to comfort you.  Let’s stay away from the scale. The scale won’t bring you comfort.  The food won’t bring you comfort. Come to me.  He just wants her attention somewhere else. 

And finally, I think what is going to be really fantastic, gang, is for you to see the food that actually people eat.  We make plans. There’s no guilt in the food that we plan. Sometimes the plan doesn’t go as we  expected.  And that’s okay. We gain information.  So this woman says, I planned. My favorite drink every day this week.

Normally I only plan it two times this week.  But she said I really wanted to up my self care.  Does that mean a drink is self care? No, but to her brain it felt like a treat. I wanted to do something, but it worked for her. This is what she wanted to try. She wanted to experiment with giving herself more fun and more fun.

More self care.  So she upped her favorite drink to two times a week, and I think it was like a Diet Coke, maybe. She said, I also plan TV time for myself again out of the normal pattern. I’m taking care of my needs first and not feeling guilty about it.  Isn’t that fun?  I just love that. It’s like we get to add fun activities into our life, our adult fun activities that are our favorite drinks. 

More TV.  Another thing she says. I planned a very small serving of Blue Bunny soft serve ice cream after dinner and it was the best. Guilt free treat, especially since it was like 110 degrees here yesterday. She said no guilt because I planned it and my menu for the day allowed for a few extra carbs. She says I call that a win. 

Do we count carbs in this program? No. Did this work for this woman? Yeah, you guys you just get to decide.  A small bowl of ice cream worked for her. This was perfect for her. Some women a small bowl of ice cream does not work for  and they put in three or four scoops. Whatever you feel good about, meet yourself where you are and  we just make those plans.

So for the woman who maybe three to four scoops is where she is,  how she’s actually progressing is not eating out of the carton,  right? She feels good about not eating out of the carton.  That doesn’t mean she’s gonna have three to four scoops for the rest of her life. Your brain might say, that’ll never lead to weight loss. 

Definitely not eating out of the carton. That is not a good practice.  That is a chaotic practice. So how can we make you feel good about that? Let’s step it up. Let’s move it to a bowl. And then we just slowly, by slowly,  keep asking your brain what feels good. What feels good?

What feels good?  What I want you to hear from this podcast is,  number one, have someone to celebrate with you. Number two, you can make progress. This is not about perfection. And number three. Your work, my friends, is to discover what works for you in this season of your life.  I think every time I talk to a woman, they tell me all the things that worked for them in their past. 

And how they didn’t keep working.  And the first thing I tell them is that’s because it was never meant to work for you. It wasn’t about your life. So I want you to discover what works for you in your life.  And the other thing that the other piece of that is in this season of your life,  you guys, you have never lived this season, whether it’s this day,  I want you to look around.

You’ve never been this age. You’ve never lived this day. You’ve never lived with the circumstances that you have in your life right now in the rhythms that you have with your life, whether you are engaged, newly married,  pregnant, postpartum. 

Trying to get pregnant, grown children, kids in high school,  starting school, ending school. Whenever you’re listening to this podcast, I have women in our community who are on the verge of retirement, who are transitioning into retirement, who are in retirement, who are taking care of Older parents who are taking care of ailing siblings.

Just whatever your circumstances are, you have never lived this time in your life. And so just recognize, whoa, hey, my life is so different here.  What does work for me? What are my tastes now? What are my rhythms now?  Discover what works for you in this season of your life. And so I’m going to wrap up this podcast simply by saying, Hey,  you can win.

You can make progress. You’re not in a hole that is so far down.

And if you want help  and if you are ready  to try something new,  go to Weight Loss with the Holy Spirit.  Check it out. See what we have to offer. I will tell you, go to weight loss with the Holy spirit.com and you’ll see exactly what the Lord wants you to see.  Weight loss with the Holy spirit.com.  I have no idea what he wants to reveal to you, but I do know that you are feeling hope now. 

And while you feel hope, go there, see what he wants your eyes to land on.  All right, everybody have a blessed day.