Feel Good in Your Body (with Laura Conley)

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I have a super exciting episode for you today working moms. I’m diving into a powerful and much-needed conversation with fellow coach and friend, Laura Conley, who helps moms lose weight for the last time - without dieting, calorie counting, or excessive workouts. 

We’re not just talking about how to fit health into your busy life, but more importantly, what it takes to feel good in your body. 

If you've ever had a running mental dialogue about your weight, what you're eating, or how your clothes fit, this episode is for you. We’re unpacking the mindset, the body connection, and the real reasons behind your health goals - so you can break free from diet drama and finally feel amazing. Trust me, you don’t want to miss this one! 

Topics in this episode:

  • The exhausting mental chatter around food, weight, and body image 

  • Why feeling good in your body is key to creating a balanced life 

  • How to actually listen to your body and trust its wisdom 

  • Why restriction isn’t the enemy—but how to do it in a way that works 

  • Practical ways to start feeling good in your body today 

Show Notes & References:

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Transcript

Intro

I have a very special treat for you working moms. Today on the podcast, I have fellow coach and friend Laura Conley. Now she is a coach that helps women lose weight for the last time. And today on the podcast, we're not only talking about the little shifts that you can make to prioritize your health and how to fit that into your already busy life. More importantly, we're talking about what it takes to feel good in your body and the importance of feeling good in your body if you really want to create a life that feels balanced. If you're someone that has a constant talk track in their head around what they're eating, how they look, how their clothes fit, just generally their weight, then this is the podcast for you. Are you ready? Let's get to it.

Welcome to the Ambitious and Balanced Working Moms Podcast, your go to resource for integrating your career ambitions with life as a mom. I'm distilling down thousands of coaching conversations I've had with working moms just like you, along with my own personal experience as a mom of two and sharing the most effective tools and strategies to help you quickly feel calm, confident, and in control of your ambitious working mom life. You ready? Let's get to it.

Freeing Moms from Diet Drama and Body Shame

Rebecca: Hello. Hello, working moms. Thank you for being here. I am so excited because today on the podcast, I have another coach with me, somebody that we've been in masterminds together and we reconnected recently and have just had some of the greatest conversations. So I'm so excited to bring her expertise here. Thanks, Laura, for being here.

Laura Conley: Yeah, thanks for having me. I love it.

Rebecca: So can you give us, like, a little intro here into, like, who you are, what you do, you know, life?

Laura Conley: Yeah, totally. My name is Laura Conley, and I help moms lose weight for the last time from a place of fun. I live in Colorado with my daughter, who's 7, and my son, who is 5, and my husband, who's 42. And I'm obsessed with being a coach, and the whole why is to free the moms.

The entire point of my business is to free the mom. All the traps—but primarily diet drama, our f’ed up relationships with food and our bodies.

The Turning Point: “This Stops Now”

Laura Conley: This is something that I struggled with for what felt like forever, almost 20 years. And then when I had my daughter, I mean, the story goes, I was six weeks postpartum and I was beating myself up for not bouncing back into my pre-baby jeans, quote unquote, fast enough.

She was literally cooing up at me, and I'm sitting there not even able to enjoy the moment because I'm like, why can't you get yourself together and get in the pre-baby jeans? What's wrong with you? You're so disgusting.

And I was like, this stops now. Like, this ends now. Because if I don't heal my relationship with my body and with food, I'm going to pass it down to her. I knew in that moment she would inherit it just from my behavior—me trying on 17 different outfits or me turning away from my husband when he inevitably went to grab my ass in the kitchen.

I knew it. Prior to that, I had really accepted defeat. I was like, this is just gonna be my thing. I'm always gonna yo-yo. I'm always gonna be on a green juice cleanse or eating my face off with pizza and wine.

And I just thought: I have to stop this. Because I don't want her sitting in the high school cafeteria counting calories with her friends. I cannot have that.

Kids Are the Greatest Motivators

Rebecca: So, I mean, our kids are the greatest motivators.

Laura Conley: Oh my God.

Rebecca: I mean, I think it's a motivator for me, for most of my listeners too. It's like, I just don't want my kids to think that work is life. I want it to be an important part of life and I want you to choose what you do really intentionally. I want you to love the heck out of everything that you do in your work life.

And I don't want your identity to be wrapped up in it. Like, it matters so much to me to instill in my daughter in particular—believing at the core of who she is, her enoughness, and all the things that we talk about. I love that that's part of your story too.

Laura Conley: Well, it's so good. And to go back to your original question, like, you're freeing the moms as well, because that's another trap that we fall into—really because of our culture. So yeah, we're just over here freeing the moms.

Rebecca: Oh my God, go us. And to the listeners who are here to try to glean that energy and that knowledge and all the stuff too—you are badasses that are trying to figure it out. And so I admire you as well.

And I told you this before when I asked you to come on the podcast, I said I've literally never had a conversation around dieting or body almost ever on this podcast. Not almost ever—I haven’t. I just haven't really dove into this topic, probably for lots of reasons.

So I just love that we're actually having a really honest conversation around this, because it is something that takes up so much mental space. Tell me all about the mental fatigue and the stuff that goes on in our mind when it comes to our bodies and diet.

The Mental Fatigue of Diet Culture

Laura Conley: Oh my gosh, yeah. The mental fatigue, the food noise, the love-hate relationship with our bodies, the picking ourselves apart—all of it.

For me, I was constantly calculating: Okay, how many calories did I just have? Am I gonna have to do another workout tomorrow to make up for that? I was constantly either earning my treat or punishing myself for it.

I remember going to the gym one night at like 10:30pm to work off a dessert that I had eaten—or probably like three desserts I had eaten. But that kind of behavior was normal for me.

And I think we all feel this, or most of us have gotten trapped by this trap. It can happen in the morning, too. We wake up and we're like, oh, I said I wasn’t gonna eat the ice cream and I just went to town on the ice cream.

We wake up with regret. Then the chatter comes in when we're getting dressed: I don’t want to put on anything except these old, worn-out Lulu Lemons. We go downstairs with this feeling of shame. Then we eat the leftover French toast sticks, trying to shove the shame down.

It’s just this cycle. We sit at our desk, don’t feel good in our pants, and it just goes on and on and on.

Why Healing Your Body Image Matters for Work-Life Balance

Rebecca: And on and on and on. You're giving us our inner dialogue, right? And that's just a snippet of it. There's so much more—every time we look in the mirror too.

I think about it while I sit and pee. I think about this flab thing, and while I’m peeing I’m thinking about what’s going on with my stomach. It is a constant conversation.

And I wanted to frame this conversation within the idea of work-life balance, since that's what we're all about here on the podcast. Why is this important? Why is it important to put some attention to the way we're thinking about our body and healing our experience with our body if we want to create a balanced life?

I'm curious your thoughts on that.

Laura Conley: Yeah, because it's impossible to create work-life balance if you feel like—can we swear on here?—if you feel like crap. If you don’t feel good in your body, it is inevitably going to bleed into all other areas of your life because your body is your home. You can’t escape it.

A lot of us try to live neck up, but it’s so important to feel good in your body. It makes it so much more likely that you will achieve work-life balance if it’s not the constant soundtrack or rhetoric.

Because then you can actually be present in the things that you want to be present.

Internal and External Must Match

Rebecca: Yeah, yeah. One of the things I teach on this is like the internals has gotta match the external, right? You could, you could have the house and the spa and the kids and the money and even the body. Like you could literally have it all, as we like to talk about it, and everything you've ever dreamed of.

But if your internal dialogue is constantly shaming yourself and telling yourself that you're not good enough and beating yourself up for what you just ate and what you look like in the mirror—no matter what you look like in the mirror—like if that's your internal experience telling you you're not doing good enough and you should be doing more, all the things… you won't experience work-life balance.

You can't just change the external and feel a life of balance. Right. The internal and external have to match.

And so, and what you're saying is, and what we're talking about here is like one of those kind of constant chatter, chat pop-up boxes, whatever you want to call it in your head, is one that has to do with your image essentially and your weight and what you're thinking about in yourself.

How Food and Energy Affect Balance

Laura Conley: And also just how you feel energetically, like how you feel in your body, like emotionally, energetically, like I think that plays a role too.

If you genuinely feel hungover from the sugar from last night or you have a lunch that maybe doesn't love you back, then you're also not going to feel good in your body.

So there's so much at play here. Right—from body image to actually the way that the food affects us.

And I love what you're talking about too, because, again, it bleeds into every other area of your life. It's impossible for it not to be, because it is your home. And it's like, can you imagine if you hated the home that you lived in or that you didn't take care of your home? Like, I know how it feels when, like, my junk drawer.

The Messy House Analogy

Rebecca: I'm going to come home to a really messy house and it's going to be awful inside and you're like, already stressed out just walking into the door.

Laura Conley: Yeah, yeah. Like, I know how I feel in my closets, like disorganized and messy. I'm not taking care of my home. That bleeds into so many other areas.

You know, like when you clean out your kitchen cabinets and you're like skipping around, like so light and free. I feel like it's the same as when you really feel good in your skin. It bleeds—again, it bleeds into every other area of your life.

Permission to Want Change

Rebecca: Yeah. So I think this is a really important distinction though to make because I have a feeling, I mean, we're talking about feeling good in your body and most women probably equate losing weight, exercise or diet as what we mean. You know, like, that's kind of synonymous and I don't think that's what you mean—the difference here.

Laura Conley: So number one, you can have it all. Like, we talked about this when you came on my podcast too. Like, I used to get mad at myself when I wanted to have it all.

So, like that moment that I described to you when I was like butt naked out of the shower and I was beating myself up for not bouncing back into my pre-baby jeans fast enough, quote unquote, I really had this conviction that I had to heal my relationship with my body and food.

But also I knew I did want to lose the excess baby weight because I didn't feel like me. So I want to give people permission to want to lose weight if you want to. And it's coming from you, it's coming from inside, not from society. Not from like, oh, I have to weigh this so that I can—going back to your verbiage and all of our verbiage—good enough.

Like, I don't want that to be your reason. I really don't.

But I do think this like 90s heroine chic swung a little too far to the other end of the spectrum because for me, I was a yoga teacher and a coach before I was a weight-loss coach. And I felt so much shame for wanting to lose weight because…

And I'll get into feeling good in your body like today without having to lose any weight at all because there's that as well, and that's a huge piece of it.

But I do want to give people the permission slip that if you genuinely want that, you are allowed to have that. And it doesn't mean you don't love your body. And in fact, it could mean that you do love your body. Just because you want to change something doesn't mean you don't love it.

Right. Like your clients. Right. It doesn't. They probably love their jobs, their careers, they probably love their families. They just want an upgrade.

The Reasons Matter

Laura Conley: So that can be true for—yeah, that can be true for my clients too. And I felt so much shame for wanting to lose weight because I was a yoga teacher and I should want to be evolved and like, I should be spiritual AF.

But then on the flip side of that, there was also like. But you should also be a waif because you're a yoga teacher in. So what I'm getting at here…

The wind. Yes, exactly. What I'm getting at here is like going inward and figuring out what it is that you want without the external noise. And if that does mean that you want to lose some weight, fine.

But I want to give you guys the gift, if you want it, of the ability to feel good in your body today. And there's so many things that we can do.

Rebecca: I want to go into that in just a second, but I just want to highlight this because I think it's—because what I heard, as you were describing that, is… it's like the reasons matter.

Laura Conley: Yes.

The Reasons Behind Dieting or Exercise Really Matter

Rebecca: Why you're going to choose to diet or why you're going to choose to lose weight or start exercising. Whatever it is, the reasons matter.

The drive that, you know, if it comes from a place of shame, guilt, inadequacy, not feeling good enough… you know, if it's coming from that place, then it's not gonna be sustainable. It's going to be—I don't know—it's probably gonna be lots of other things. It's gonna feel terrible while you do it.

Laura Conley: Yeah. It's not gonna work. It's not gonna… well, sustainable. Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly.

Choosing from Self-Love vs. Shame

Rebecca: Versus coming from a place of like, I love myself so much and I have such a strong vision of what I want my life to be. And it's so good now, and I want more, and I want to move in that direction.

And I love who I am, and I want more. And like that kind of compassion, love, worthiness, that type of energy and drive is still going to drive you toward losing weight or exercising, whatever. It's gonna feel totally different while you're doing it, and it's going to be more sustainable.

Laura Conley: That's what I… that's exactly right. And that's what I coach all of my clients to get to—to get to that clean place and to find the reasons that feel really aligned and truthful for them.

But I also want to call out that if you still feel like you have a desire and it's coming from the external, you're not wrong or bad. Because we have been so hyper-socialized and programmed to look a certain way. We have.

So if you're like, you know what, I just want to lose weight because I want to look hot in a bikini—you don't have to make yourself wrong or bad for that. You are not wrong or bad for wanting that. That is the way that you've been programmed. It's literally the air that you breathe. But eventually, yes, we want to untangle it. We want to untangle it. But again…

Loving Your Reasons for Change

Rebecca: It's because you want it. Right? Like that's different than saying it's because I should have it or society tells me that that's what my body is supposed to look like.

Like, you could still want to look hot. If you wanna look hot, you wanna look hot. Just like again, it just is—like, where is that motivation coming from? Is that from you? Is it because your husband wants that on you? I mean, is that because whatever, you know? Why do you want it? That is exactly why. That's where it all comes down to.

Laura Conley: Yes. And not shaming yourself for any of your whys. Because I'll get a lot of clients that are like, “Oh God, it's so vain.” And I'm like, is it though? Like, you know, “I'm so vain to like, wanna wear my beautiful clothes.” And I'm like, is it?

Because to me, wearing beautiful clothes is like an expression of who I am. And it's like an art form. And it's also… okay, so I know we're getting like away from your question.

Vanity, Intentionality, and Loving Your Choices

Rebecca: I mean, actually that just sparked something for me. I had a conversation many years ago with a really close friend of mine who talked about how she was vain and she had no problem with it. She's like, “I'm totally vain and it's totally fine.”

And I have never been able to reconcile that. Like, the conversation comes up in my mind every once in a while and I'm like, I just don't know if I agree with that—until maybe now. We're having this conversation around vanity and it's like, you know what, that's totally okay if she wants to be vain based on her reasons.

Like, it is always about: Do you love your reasons?

And we talk about this when it comes to anything. You know, if you decide to work tonight to get more done, or you don't and you decide to shut down and be done—there's no right or wrong to that. I'm not going to tell you one is better than the other or you're going to feel more balanced one way or the other.

I just want you to love your reasons for it. I want you to feel the energy behind your reasons and make sure that they are… you're really grounded in them. Then nobody can argue with you. I can't argue with you.

It just is—you decided to work late tonight and you love your reasons for it. Great. That's it. That's all we want to get to. We want to get to a place of real intentionality, and like, you've made decisions based on desire and goals and vision and, you know, all that stuff.

Laura Conley: Oh, yeah. Perfectly said. Exactly.

Feeling Good in Your Body Today

Rebecca: So, okay, I wanna hear all the things about what it takes to… what we were going to start talking about. We were going to start talking about what?

Laura Conley: Feeling good in your body. I think feeling good in your body.

Rebecca: Doing that. Yeah. Ways of doing that. That's what.

Laura Conley: Okay.

Rebecca: Yeah.

Nothing Has to Change for You to Feel Good in Your Body

Laura Conley: So nothing has to change for you to feel good in your body. And I would also put it on you, the listener, to explore. Like, what does that mean for me? When is the last time that I felt good in my body?

Do you know? It could be when you were six years old. It could have been two weeks ago when you were in a spinning class. Or it could have been, you know, last night when you were having a little—oh God, this is like a G-rated podcast over here—like you know, a little foot rub session we'll call it.

Anyways, so find out: when was the last time you felt good in your body? And some of you might be like, I don’t… like never. I don’t know. That’s okay too. Right? So like, what does you feeling good in your body feel like? Can we describe that for you? Because it’s gonna be individual.

I’ll give you some more general, like, tips and tricks as well. But I would love for your listeners to really go inside and be like: What does that feel like? What does that mean to feel good in my body? When’s the last time I felt like that? And how would I describe that? And how can I create more of that now?

Small, Practical Shifts That Make a Difference

Laura Conley: So those are some questions you can ask yourself. But some of the things that I think is, like—like having… okay, so say you do wanna lose weight and you don’t wanna buy a bunch of new clothes. I would say have two outfits that you feel amazing in.

If you don’t want to lose weight, have seven outfits or fourteen outfits or ten, whatever. Whatever is right for you. The number doesn’t matter. Every single body can find some clothes that they feel amazing in—amazing in.

And then also the practice of getting into your body. So many of us are living from the neck up. We don’t even, like, really know what it’s like to be in our bodies and to feel good in our bodies.

Your Body Is Your Truth Teller

Laura Conley: Some of the easiest ways you can do that—and you can explore, like, maybe it feels good, maybe it doesn’t feel good—it’s really cultivating your relationship with your body, which is your home.

Which, don’t even get me started on how amazing your body is. Yes, because it births kids, and it can walk up a mountain. But also, you guys, it’s amazing because it is a truth teller. Your body speaks in a language, and if you can listen to that language, you have access to your intuition, to your gut.

Oh God, I’m getting all passionate over here. But your body will. You know how you were just saying, like, your reasons? Know your reasons. Like, if you want to work late, you can even test that against your body. Like: body, do I want to work late? Am I supposed to work late? And your gut will be like, “No, you’re supposed to snuggle your kids tonight.” Or your gut will be like, “Yep, we’re supposed to work.”

So cultivating the relationship—yeah, like feeling good in your body so you can rock a bathing suit and go down the waterslide with your kids for sure. But also so that you can tune back into the innate intelligence that lives within all of us, which I think in our culture we are missing out on.

Practices to Reconnect With Your Body

Laura Conley: And I cannot tell you, when I get quiet and I’m willing to go below the neckline—yes, that’s G-rated—I can find so much information. My body always knows, and it never lies.

So practices that can help you do that: breathing practices, yoga practices, going to a dance class, like just moving your body. And not to burn calories, but to cultivate a relationship with your body.

We aren’t taught how to do this. We’re not taught how to be in our bodies. And so, how to feel good in your body—that’s going to be something that you’re going to discover.

And again, I can be like, buy two outfits, three outfits, seven outfits—that’s good advice, not to toot my own horn. But the awesome advice is: let your body speak to you. Let your body tell you how.

Dropping From the Neck Into the Body

Rebecca: Yeah, how do you tune into that if you’re really not? I mean, because so many of my listeners—me too, you know, I’ve had to do a lot of work in this area as well—it’s like we’re very in tune with what goes on above our neck, right? And like, we get up there and that is very disconnected sometimes from what’s going on below our neck. And—

Laura Conley: Okay, Rebecca, do you want to go a little woo with me right now? Just like, like one minute. Come on, Rebecca.

Okay, so you guys, I really want to encourage you guys to just do this. Do not turn this off. This is gonna be the greatest gift you’re gonna give yourself today. A pinky promise.

A Quick Guided Body Awareness Practice

Laura Conley: Okay, so I want you guys—if you’re driving, obviously you’re not gonna close your eyes. Or if you’re walking and you don’t know your route, don’t close your eyes. But it doesn’t matter, you don’t have to close your eyes. If you can close your eyes, if you feel safe to close your eyes, close your eyes.

And then I want you to bring your hands to your heart, like in a little prayer pose. And I want you to rub your palms together. Like, really go fast and hard and create some heat. Okay?

And then I want you to bring one hand onto your heart and one hand onto your belly. And like, some of you are gonna be like, “Oh, I don’t want to put my hand on my belly.” Like, get in there. Like, that’s your beautiful belly. And if you don’t think so, it’s okay.

And then all I want you to do is take a giant inhale and feel your hands lift, your palms lift—so big inhale. Feel your chest and your belly lift into your palms. And then I want you to hold the breath in at the top. And then I want you to sip in even more breath. And then I want you to sigh out your mouth. Exhale.

And then I want you to do just one more time. Stay with me. Inhale super deep. Feel your belly fill. Feel the back kidney band. Feel the back of your heart, all the way up under your collarbones. Sip in a little bit more.

Trusting the Wisdom of Your Body

Rebecca: I can’t, sorry.

Laura Conley: And then just exhale loudly if you can—be kind of a creep. Good. You are in your body. You have dropped down simply by feeling your heart and your solar plexus.

And then you don’t have to get an answer here, but I want you to just ask your body, your heart, your gut: Hey body, what do I need to know today? What piece of wisdom do you have to share with me today?

Be willing to trust the answer you got. It’s the right answer. Do not negate it. Do not whack-a-mole it.

And then take one more inhale right into the back of your heart. Big breath in, sigh it out, exhale. And then release your hands.

So just three deep breaths—like, you guys did it. It’s not esoteric, it’s not hard. It’s three deep breaths. And just the question: Hey, what wisdom do you have for me today? What do I need to know that you know?

Did you get anything? Did your body tell you anything?

Rebecca: I started to think about, actually, the next thing I have to do, which is I take my daughter to piano lessons after this. And I want to take a walk while she is taking the piano. And I had… originally, I thought about that a while ago, and I was like, I can’t do that. I just… I got so many things to do. I gotta be on a different call.

I was like, I can take a call and walk at the same time.

Laura Conley: It’s like your body will always tell you its reasons.

Rebecca: But that came up again. It’s like, I just need to move my body.

Laura Conley: Yeah. And I bet you it will actually be easier for you to follow through on that wisdom, because it’s so truthful.

Learning to Tune Into Your Body’s Wisdom

Rebecca: Yeah. Wow. That's super powerful. And we didn’t—I mean, again, we’re not even talking about weight or anything. We’re just talking about like having a conversation with your body, the thing below your neck, and getting in tune with what they say and what their little groans sound like, if you will, their little whispers.

I mean, we can all… like, we all talked to our infants. You know, they didn’t say words, but we started to get to know what different cries meant. We started to be in tune with their natural rhythms and desires. We’re not talking about anything different. We’re just talking—it’s just with you, right? Taking the time to practice that with yourself. I love that.

Laura Conley: And it was so interesting. And like, the work that I do is like, we tune back into our hunger cues and our satiety cues, which we’ve all lost. A lot of us have lost. And it’s actually a spiritual experience. Like a lot of my clients just feel so much more whole and they love being able to hear, “Oh, I’m hungry. Oh, I’m full again.”

We started living so much from the neck up—of like, when should I eat? And planning and prepping. And I don’t know, I think our bodies just have so much wisdom. And what I wanted to say real quick is, you guys, be willing to trust the little whispers that your body gives you. You’re gonna want to be like, “Wait, really? Was that my body? Is that really what it said?” Just trust it.

And it’s going to whisper to you, and then it will get louder and louder the more you trust it and build the relationship. And then it will just be a very natural conversation that you’ll be having all the time.

Weight Loss for Busy Moms: Saving Time and Mental Energy

Rebecca: I love it. I love it. I love this conversation. And one of the realities is a lot of women do, in fact… they—“How do I fit in anything related? Yeah, related to losing weight and like focusing on my health. How do you tend to, like, work with that?”

Laura Conley: I mean, number one, like, my program is literally built for busy moms because I’m a busy mom and it has to work. So like, I do not meal prep, I do not track, I do not put anything in an app, nor do I teach any of this.

I actually don’t—working out is not a part of my program at all. Now personally, I work out every day because of mental health reasons and being in my body reasons. But it’s not something you have to do.

My program helps moms save time because they’re not dealing with excessive meal planning. Like, they figure out what matters and what doesn’t matter. And they also balance their hunger hormones. And when your hunger hormones are balanced, you’re not dealing with cravings. You learn to plan—it takes five minutes a day max—in a way that’s supportive for your present-day self and then your future self. So you’re not hungry, you’re not overly full.

The amount of times my clients have told me that living in this way saves them time is bananas. Yeah.

Why Dieting Wastes Time and Energy

Rebecca: Yeah. Because we waste so much time ruminating and thinking and worrying and second guessing and deciding and re-deciding and—

Laura Conley: And then doing things that don’t work too. Like, take me. I was doing two-a-days. I basically became a yoga teacher so I could work out more. Like, I was doing all this meal prep. I was putting everything in an app, I was counting every calorie, I was buying every cleanse—and none of it worked.

It was a waste of time. And so, yeah, you do not have to meal prep. You do not have to change your social life, your calendar, your work life, your family life. You don’t have to make your family cut their favorite things. You don’t have to cut your favorite things. Like, it actually sounds too good to be true sometimes when I’m talking about it.

A big reason why it saves so much time is because we take away all of the chatter.

Balancing Hunger Hormones for Work-Life Balance

Rebecca: Interesting. Interesting. So what are some of those, like, little steps? I mean, join Laura’s program, everyone. Like, I think she’s got an enrollment happening soon. Like, no doubt. This feels like if this is one of your goals for 2025, you should definitely be thinking about this. And what are some of those little nuggets that people can do on their own moving toward that?

Laura Conley: It’s really hard to have balance in your life or work-life balance. It’s really hard to have health and well-being if your hunger hormones are not balanced.

Rebecca: But what the heck does that mean?

Laura Conley: Yeah, I have no idea. I’d never done it, honestly. It means moving towards eating whole foods. And a lot of my clients are like, “I eat whole foods, I eat healthy.” And it’s like, I know, that’s what I said too. And I did eat healthy like 80% of the time, but I was eating ultra-processed and processed foods here and there.

And so what I teach my clients to do is to move more towards whole foods and stop eating sugar and flour—are my big recommendations. And a lot of people kind of freak out about that. And a lot of people don’t freak out about that. But that is, like, one really easy way.

Now I also give my clients a huge platter from which they can pick. So all of my clients have different plans. And sometimes when I say the word plan, people freak out because they’re like, “Ooh, that sounds like a diet.” And I actually do teach healthy restriction.

We have, again, swung too far from one end of the pendulum to the other. There’s been a lot of us that have been in the land of over-restriction. And when we’re in over-restriction, like eating a thousand calories or whatever, what happens is we create an over-desire. The over-desire is insatiable and then we end up overeating. And it’s a cycle.

You realize you’ve overeaten, then you over-restrict, you create over-desire, you overeat again. So then we go to the other end and we’re like, “You know what, F this. This doesn’t work. You know what I’m going to do? I’m just going to eat whatever I want, whenever I want.”

Now this is the pendulum I lived in for almost 20 years. Hello, yo-yo dieting. The middle path is healthy, happy restriction.

Why Healthy Restriction Is the Key to Sustainable Change

Laura Conley: Like, think of anything in your life that you are proud of that you’ve created. There’s been healthy restriction there—in your parenting, in your marriage, in your sleep, in other healthy habits that you have, in the way that you talk to your boss. Like, they move up the deadline, you are not flipping out at them because you want a certain result.

Rebecca: I mean, you may internally, but you’ve learned how to have the restriction of what that looks like.

Laura Conley: Oh yeah, exactly. Totally. And so I do believe that if we want to create the health and well-being and longevity in the bodies that we need to balance our hunger hormones and move away from processed food like sugar and flour.

But again, all of my clients have a different plan because I don’t believe that one-size-fits-all works. I believe that everybody needs a custom approach for their bio-individuality and also for their lifestyle. So everybody’s different, and that’s part of the beauty of it.

How to Connect with Laura Conley and Get Her Free 3-Step Plan

Rebecca: So yeah, so good. We could just keep talking and talking and, and we had—I don’t know how many things interrupt our ability to have this conversation right now today—so robbed us of our time. But Laura, thank you for being here for your wisdom and everything. Tell us how listeners can connect with you.

Laura Conley: Yeah, well, Rebecca is just on my podcast. You should totally go listen to that if you’re a podcast person. My podcast is Lose Weight for the Last Time with Laura Conley. And there are so many nuggets. It’s really not just about weight loss, as you guys have gotten a taste—no pun intended here.

And then you can go to lauraconley.com if you want to learn a little bit more about how to work together. And my Instagram is aroley coaching. And I did bring you guys a gift. If you are curious about losing weight without counting calories and doing stuff that you hate, you can go to plan.lauraconley.com.

And I created—well, it usually costs money, but for you guys it’s free. So plan.lauraconley.com and you can get my three-step plan to losing weight without counting calories and doing other stuff that you don’t like doing. This is like what I created that I would have wanted so desperately. It’s literally made for busy moms.

Rebecca: Yeah. I love it. Thank you. So that—look at you, so good. Thank you. We will put all of the links to that in the show notes, of course.

All right, Working Moms, until next week, let’s get to it.

 

Rebecca Olson