Taking Up Space in Midlife with Lise Thorne

Have you ever talked yourself out of wearing something, going somewhere, or simply being seen because of what your body looks like? This episode is one you're going to want to save and share!

I sat down with Lise Thorne, who you might know as @walking_this_way on Instagram, after one of her reels stopped me mid-scroll. In it, she walked into the ocean in a bikini on a family vacation, no filter, no preparation, no waiting for a "better" version of herself. That video went around the world because women everywhere saw themselves in it.

Lise is 49, a mum, a triathlete, and she is loudly on a mission for women to take up space. We talk about the moment she looked at a photo of her 16-year-old self and realized her body was never the problem, it was the story she was telling herself. We get into how our Gen X generation was taught there was one right way to have a body, why the critical voice in our heads isn't protecting us anymore, and why tiny steps toward being seen are where the real magic happens.

This is one of those conversations that will leave you feeling like you just got a pep talk from a friend who truly gets it.

Connect with Lise: Instagram: @walking_this_way

Related Episodes You'll Love:

• Ep 190: Menopause and Body Image: How to Feel Like Yourself Again
• Ep 141: Navigating Body Grief in Midlife with Nina Manolson
• Ep 182: Visibility as Generosity: Rethinking Photos, Aging & Confidence with Kristen Vallejo

➡️ Join The Midlife Body Image Lab here: https://www.menopausenutritionist.ca/bodyimagelab 

📚 I wrote a book! Eat To Thrive During Menopause is out now!  Order your copy today and start thriving in midlife.

Looking for more about midlife,  menopause nutrition, and intuitive eating? Click here to grab one of my free guides and learn what I've got "on the menu" including my 1:1 and group programs. https://www.easy.link/menopause.nutritionist

Transcript

The Cost Of Body Criticism

Speaker 0:49

We're like so mean to our body all the time. Or and say negative words about it. Whenever we look back on it, we're like that body, that body, that body, that body. And I thought that is gonna continue to happen. So how am I gonna stop that process?

Why Midlife Visibility Feels Hard

Jenn Salib Huber 1:07

Welcome to the Midlife Feast, the podcast that helps you make sense of your body, your health, and menopause in the messy middle of midlife. I'm Dr. Jen Sally Puber, intuitive eating dietitian and naturopathic doctor, and author of Eat to Thrive During Menopause. Around here, we don't see midlife and menopause as problems to solve, but as invitations to live with more freedom, trust, and joy. Each week you'll hear real conversations and practical strategies to help you feel like yourself again. Eat without guilt and turn midlife from a season of survival into a season of thriving. I'm so glad you're here. Let's dig in. As we go through midlife and maybe advance it in our years, whether you want to call that aging or leveling up, whatever it is, one of the hardest things to do is to be seen and to take up space. And maybe especially to do it with confidence, grace, humor, all the things. And so when I see somebody that I think does that really well, that might be able to inspire us in some way to feel more comfortable just showing up as we are, I like to talk to them about that. And so that's why Lise Thorne, who you might know as walking this way on Instagram, is my guest on the podcast this week. And Lise has shared a few things on her social media that are particularly inspiring about just showing up in the body that you have today and that you don't have to like it, you don't have to love it, but you're the only one who's missing out when you don't show up. So I think you're gonna enjoy this conversation. Uh, I really did, and as always, I would love to hear what you think.

Speaker 1 2:59

Hi, Leeds. Welcome to the Midlife Feast.

The Bikini Reel That Went Global

Jenn Salib Huber 3:08

So I want to tell the story about how um how it came to be that I invited you on this podcast. So it was about a month ago, I think, that maybe two months ago, I don't know, you probably know when this real went viral, but you know, I always find it funny that there can be these amazing people who uh, you know, create content that I immediately love and and resonate with, but I never see them. And by the time that I find them, um, or the algorithm serves them to me, um, I feel like I'm so behind. And it's like, oh my gosh, this person says all these amazing things and I'm so inspired. Why haven't I seen her sooner? But that was really kind of how I found your account. And um I just I just wanted to bring you on because I think your story is so relatable, but also inspiring in a way that is authentic to use that word um somewhat ironically, because it's you know overused these days.

Speaker 4:03

But um all that to say welcome to the So when they were really young they had a lot of freedom. You know, yeah and we're parents who give our children quite freedom as well anyway. So my husband and I were in this beach hut, beautiful, absolutely beautiful. Sandy beaches on either side. And I just had this idea, I said to my husband, Oh, just record me going into the water. Like you do sometimes, whether it would be B roll footage or I don't know, whatever it was, and the because the setting was beautiful. And I'm a larger woman. I don't know how you I talk about my weight as 2020 stone. Um, don't ask me in kilograms.

Jenn Salib Huber 6:09

Maybe So that's gonna say we don't talk about weight here a lot anyway, so that doesn't matter.

Speaker 6:13

No, and the reason why I talk about it is not because and actually I've decided to myself I'm gonna stop saying it because I've just remembered. I say it because I'm a bigger lady, right? And that number, it it has no emotional effect on me. And I say it because I know that some women are sitting there like, oh, this is what the scale says. Yeah. They hold that number like it's like in in a negative way, like it defines them, or they should be less than in some way, because there's a number on the scale. So I tell everyone, because I do not care. I don't care in the size. Anyway, so I was wearing a bikini, I'm a larger lady, the scenery was beautiful, and I said to myself, oh, just sell me, just sell me. And then we were gonna leave the stuff on the beach, and I was like, oh no, give me the phone, give me the phone, we'll go in the water together. And we went in the water anyway. And then I came back and I was in this beach hut with very little Wi-Fi, almost none. Like there was a tiny scrap of it if you held your phone, you know, in one corner. And I did it and I said to my husband, Shh, I'm gonna do a voiceover, I'm gonna do a voiceover. And as I was doing the voiceover, I realized that the reel that I'd kind of cut, and I've been on Instagram now for about eight years, so I can cut quite quickly. I'm I'm all you discuss authentic or real, like raw. So I'm like it's just that I haven't got time, I haven't got time. And so I cut it and I said to my husband, shh, I'm just doing this thing. And as I was doing the voiceover, I realized it was really quite long. And I was voiceovering in real time. And then I was like, oh my goodness, more words, four words, what am I gonna say now? No planning. Did it, then thought, oh, that's too long, and I haven't in the Instagram way that we know, you know, I haven't perfected it, haven't I just thought, I don't care. Hit the send button, like held the phone above my head that it might or might not find Wi-Fi. And then I thought, oh, was that terrible? And at the time, I can't when I sent it, I probably had 4,000, 5,000 followers. Um quite a small account. Hit said, didn't think anything of it, didn't really have Wi-Fi, didn't have the and then suddenly the numbers started creeping, but not immediately, and they were creeping, and then this wonderful thing happened that kind of entirely changed my Instagram account, actually. The I could see the reel going around the world. Like suddenly it kind of started off in Europe, and people in Germany and Holland were like tagging, tagging, tagging, and then it went to and it then it was in America, and then it was in Canada, and then Australia, and then New Zealand. So I could just see how, and it was an amazing thing to watch and all these wonderful women. And before that, I was definitely, you know, British, not British only, but you know, I was definitely UK-based women. And that's when I it really connected that it wasn't in my head, it I hadn't really given it any thought, but it was like this is we all feel this way. Yeah. We're all worried that people are judging us, or we feel fear, or we feel shame in some way. Just because of the way we look number one, I mean there's hundreds of other reasons, but just starting with the way we look that we were brought up, and I'm 49 years old, and it was definitely a thing in the magazines and culture.

Jenn Salib Huber 9:41

And oh yeah, I'm about to turn 49, so we're the same age. Yeah. Um, you know, and I think I think that's what really resonated with me, and what obviously resonated with people around the world. It was just here's a real person in a real body, just living life. And and not waiting to have the right kind of body, not waiting or trying to have an Instagram-worthy bikini picture, beat shot. Like, you know, it was just the realness that we all need. Because, you know, everything on social media is curated. And so when we see real life, we relate to it instantly because that is the only part that we recognize is the real lifeness. It's not the curated stuff. Um, you know, it's the highlight reel that people usually see. So I I know that I have appreciated, and I love your morning chats. For anybody who's listening, you do these morning chats, and I'm always like, oh, what's Lee's gonna say today? I love it because they're real, you know. Um, so let's get into a little bit about your mission because you you shared uh, you know, recently a few things about kind of what your mission is. And I'm gonna quote you here and saying, I'm loudly on a mission for women to take up space. I want to hear all about that.

Permission To Take Up Space

Speaker 11:05

Well, it kind of comes back to the same thing. I think that women, midlife women, the response that post from all around the world was, I wish I could wear a bikini. I wish I could do that, I wish. And it's midlife women, right? I mean, the stats on my post I'm uh on my Instagram account are 98% women, and I and the largest amount somewhere between the 30s, 50s, 60s. You know, it's kind of and to take up spacing is and I know it was true of me, I started changing my life-changing journey started at 39 actually. So I'm I'd like to say I can do something celebratory when I turn, oh no, I'm at 750 am 49. Um just before I turn 40. I haven't got time. I'm too busy. But it's like because my because life is richer, that's that's what I'm gonna say. I started this change, I went on a journey to kind of really learn to love myself, which again is an overused phrase.

Jenn Salib Huber 12:12

Right, and that's what body neutrality is. I don't know if you've heard that term before, and I talk about it a lot. Body neutrality is being able to exist in a space where you don't have to love yourself every day. Um, you don't have to like and love what your body looks like in order to exist in it. Um, but the goal is to not hate it. And I think that that's a more realistic goal, I think for most of us. Um yeah, so 100%.

Speaker 12:40

And about acceptance, I was like, oh, if I do a triathlon, then I sh then surely I must lose weight. Or if I swim kilometers, then I surely must lose weight. I mean, I've done extraordinary things and not lost weight. But in the meantime, I've had this life where I've suddenly learned to take up space and and instead of like being talking all the time about, oh, I'm not this, I couldn't do this, I can't do that, I can't do that. I am not a runner, I am not this, I am not that, I'm not that. And I remember used to think, how do people climb mountains? Like that was so far from my mind, and now I know it's like a kind of walk up a hill. I mean, I haven't done everything wrong, but you know what I mean? It's like longer, and all the way, you know, on the way you go up and all the way you go down. And when you blow those myths, it's very rare I say I am a triathlete. I've done I've done a half iron and I've done about five or six triathlons. So I am actually a triathlete. Like even if I don't use it in everyday, you know, I don't introduce myself to people.

Speaker 1 13:51

If I had done five triathlons, I probably wouldn't have introduced myself as a triathlon.

Speaker 13:57

Um I do have a whole where the coats hang, they have like about I don't know, 30 medals, 40 medals. Because over the last ten years we were like, me and my friends, we kind of got into this kind of joke state where it was like, we'll do anything for a medal. If there was no medal at the end, we weren't doing it.

Speaker 1 14:16

But um, yeah, the whole take up face thing I think we're so that's the other thing. People I'm going back to the posts again.

Speaker 14:30

So many people said, Oh, I you know, I could never do that. People would snigger, people laugh, people comment, people this, people that, people that and so many women think that somehow other people are telling them that they can't do it, right? They don't have permission. And I am pretty bloody sure that 99.9% of the time they are telling themselves they can't do it. It isn't an external snigger, it isn't an external laugh. It very well might be and probably is what how what they were brought up with, the messages they received.

Speaker 1 15:11

Yeah. That's the other people.

Speaker 15:15

It's not the other people now. They they need to connect with what's going on, the words in their own heads.

The Gen X Script On Aging

Jenn Salib Huber 15:21

Um I think that comes back to like I really feel that our generation, this you know, Gen X generation, was brought up in a culture, let's say, that taught us that there was one way to have a body. There is a there was one right way to have a body. And that when you got to midlife and menopause, that you were irrelevant after that. That, you know, you're once you were no longer reproductive age, that everything after that was like granny perms and retirement homes.

Speaker 16:00

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Jenn Salib Huber 16:01

Um, you know, I always use the golden girls as like a reference point, you know, the golden girl show, which I don't know if you had that growing up in the UK, but growing I do know it.

Speaker 16:09

I didn't watch it, but I do know right.

Jenn Salib Huber 16:11

So it was these four divorced or widowed women and a mother who were living together. And I don't know why I loved it, but I just thought they were hilarious. There was definitely some like sarcastic characters on there. But the age of the women that they were portraying was women in their mid-50s. But if you were to look at them now, I thought, like at the time, I thought that they were like 70, 80-year-old women.

Speaker 16:38

Yeah, you know, 100%.

Jenn Salib Huber 16:39

And so we really just grew up with this cultural narrative about what aging was, and that we were not allowed to take up space after that, or that there was a very defined way that women of a certain age could take up space. And what I love about our generation is that we're saying, hell no, we're we are taking up space in any way and every way, and maybe louder than I'm taking up more space now at 49 than I did at 39 and 29, and doing it with more, with more passion and confidence. And so I love meeting other people who are doing the same thing because we want women to know that this is a great time of life. It's an amazing time of life.

Speaker 17:21

I think that's and I think that's exactly what it is. And I I feel so free. I mean, when we're in our 20s, we we really are wondering what everyone's thinking of us. Physiologically, ethically, we're meant to. We're like looking out, and perhaps we're looking for a mate, or you know, all of those kind of things. And in our 30s, then then there's kind of young children, and we're in the middle of that by the time now my my children are a bit older, I'm a little bit freer. Yes, you could, you know, we talk about sandwich generation, so there's pressures.

Speaker 1 17:53

Yeah.

When Pushing Through Stops Working

Speaker 17:55

Once you can connect once you connect with the mental piece, once that once the freedom in your mind clicks, everything and anything is possible. And life is really good. It's not always easy. I mean, you you will know the hormones are doing funny things. You don't know where they are from one day to another. Um and I will say this actually, we walked up Ben Levis and we got home and my my our dog, our family dog, uh was dying, and I knew that was the case. So we've done a big kind of mountain walkers of family, and somebody who adored that dog was was was dog sick. And we came home and I knew he was really sick anyway. And I woke up one day with a panic attack, and I would call that a breakdown. I I'm gonna call it a breakdown because it lasted two weeks. I used those words, and that was in the middle of this reinvention of myself, right? Life isn't there's hurts. There's there's ups and downs. I want it all. I want it all, I want it all. Two weeks was hideous. It was absolutely hideous. And I was stuck and I got a bit claustrophobic, and I'd have to like literally walk around the block, I'd have to force myself to walk around the block because my whole body was a I think like my whole somatic I'm not fine like it felt like my whole somatic body had just crashed and said, Yes, you're gonna rest. We're gonna take two weeks out, we're gonna have time out. And if you kind of look after yourself, doing I was looking after myself, I was moving, I was doing yoga, I was doing meditation, tick, tick, tick, tick, I was doing it all.

Jenn Salib Huber 19:44

Well, yeah, and I mean I I do think one of the gifts of midlife that may not be perceived as a gift, but our ability to push through really does change, you know. Um, I I think part of that is age, but also just maybe having a bit more clarity on what the cost is of pushing through and not resting and not taking that time to take care of ourselves. I'd like to come back to the picture for a moment or you know, to that real. And because you mentioned about how so many people reached out to you and said, oh my gosh, I could never do that, or I wish I could do that. And one of my missions is to help people feel comfortable showing up in the body they have today and recognizing that we can't always control what our body looks like. And as we get older and as we age, our body's gonna age too. It doesn't matter what we do, like we can't stop that process. How do you what do you say to women? Because you you've got a little side project going, because I saw a picture recently of a group of you that you know taking this this picture. Were you in bathing suits or just covered up with a towel? I can't remember now, but it was like a group of you. Nude, okay. But not in the picture you posted on Instagram.

Speaker 20:55

Yeah, we were. There's recently, I just did it recently. Oh, I'm and I unless we're talking about different No, no, okay.

Jenn Salib Huber 21:03

No, that's all right. You were just strategically covered. That's what it is.

Love Letters Nude Photo Project

Speaker 21:06

Um, but it obviously on Instagram you can't post anything. So we had the first one we were in dressing gowns, and the second one we'd managed to sort of turn to the side and put arms in a way. So um so there's two things. That should we go nude photo shoot, or what do I say to people?

Speaker 1 21:28

Let's start with it.

Jenn Salib Huber 21:29

I think they're related. I think they're related. Yeah. So maybe tell me about how that photo shoot came about.

Speaker 21:35

Well, during all of this process of me and and learning to kind of look at my body or decide who decide that I'm okay. And like I said to you, there are there are other bodies out there that I would, you know, if I was given a tick box, I might choose a different one. But this is the one I'm in, and I'm so grateful for all it did. We, you know, we all know the birthing of beautiful babies, or we don't all know that, but to me that was a fundamental part of my journey. And um at some point I saw a photograph of myself age 16, and in my head I've always been fat. That's the word I'm using. And for a very long time I carried in my head, in my head, that I'm lazy. And nobody would have ever said I was lazy, but to me the two came together. So because I wasn't slim, I was therefore lazy, which is just they're such rubbish concepts. But it took me a while. I definitely had therapy, I definitely had a coaching. Anyway, I looked at this picture of myself at sixteen and I was like, Oh my god, you were dropped dead gorgeous and that poor girl that you had Ticker tape voice, who I call Bob, in your head saying you're like you're fatter than everyone, you're not worthy of the boys. It was about the boys. And it was that age where we were all meeting with boys and you know, all excited. But of course I didn't think I was worthy. Therefore, I stood back from everyone. I judged myself. I caused it. So I looked at that picture and I thought, what a shame like that we're always going to we're like so mean to our body all the time or and say negative words about it. Whenever we look back on it, we're like that body, flat body, that body, that body. And I thought that is gonna continue to happen. So how am I gonna stop that process? Because I'm now it was 47 when we started out as 47 years old. But I was like, when I'm 57, I'm gonna look back on this 47-year-old body and think, wow. So I decided to do this this project. I mean, it sounds more related than it really was. Um I decided I was gonna have a photographer shoot me naked every year for 10 years. So that and it's called Love Letters to my 16 year old self. Like, I'm not gonna let that happen again. And then because I'm who I am, I put it on Instagram and I said, and if anyone wants to join me Oh my gosh, three fabulous strangers I'd never met before said yes. I mean it was one of the most stressful things I've ever done. Because once I did that, I then had to find a photographer. I wanted to have the license for the photographs, which is quite difficult because I didn't want anyone else to have them. But I also needed the women that joined me, I needed to have the license their license for the photographs as well. And for them not to be able to share them, but me to be able to share them if I wanted to. Like, as in the idea is at some point we may do an exhibition or whatever, who knows? It's like it's we've still got another six, seven years, seven and a half years. It's amazing though. I love them. And I didn't even speak to the women that came there, like we didn't even have a conversation. There was no presum. There was no whatever. I just said if you want to come this time, this place, this day, and sign this contract that gives away all of your rights. But not just the good pictures of your naked body, like all the like the the goods, or the right, like I'm putting that in inverted commas now. They're all a body.

Speaker 1 25:25

Yeah.

Speaker 25:26

And so that's how it happened. So six sets in total. We met up in we we did the first shoot in November and then last year everybody said, Lisa, can we change it for summer? It was really cold. So so we've done two. We did November and then we did June last year. And the first time there were tears, there was it was fabulous. I know as experiences go, I'm gonna tell you a tiny story. We all went into my loft space because it felt really safe and nobody could look in. I live in London, there's people all around me. And we went up there and we were in dressing gowns and we'd done the first photograph where we dropped the dressing gowns. So then we were all naked. We were like all of us, of course we were petra foot. And then we kind of put dressing gowns on again and we were gonna do one single photo and I've got like a sloping velux window. So the idea was looking out the window, but but slightly away from the camera. And one woman said, Can I go first, please? And we we said yes. She was really nervous that she wanted to that's fine. But we can close we can close the door, you can have your face, you can have your moment with the photographer and everything. Because it was the first thing in the morning. And she's like, Well, you know, I kind of like everyone to look at me. That's why I'm here. Like I I I judge myself, I want to see other people's kind of thoughts or reactions. We're like, okay, okay. And I said, Well well, Lucy, okay, you did I know this sounds really weird. Sorry, well Then I was like, Okay, Lucy, I'm gonna drop my dressing gown and I'm gonna watch you naked, because then we're all naked and we're equalising whatever. And the other girls were like, I'm gonna do it too, I'm gonna do it too. We're all feeling brave. And then someone said, Oh, I'm so sorry. My nipples. We all laughed. And after about 20 minutes of these single shots of us, the youngest among us, who's 30, and she was eight months pregnant. So the photo short you saw she'd had the baby by then, but she was eight months pregnant, she was the ultimate goddess. She said, I want a photograph of us all on the bed together, squeezed up together, and we're like, Okay, Tulula. So gingerly, we all kind of get on the bed, but at that point we're all it's a double bed, but we've all got to touch skin on skin. And everyone's squishing a bit, and we've got the embarrassment factor, and then someone said, I'm really sorry, I'm just gonna have to pop my boob on your shoulder. And the reason I tell the story is because we went from very British, kind of like, Oh, I'm so sorry, like I touched your flesh, you know, in some way, to we were all on the bed, arms around, photographer at the I mean we kind of had crossed legs, but you know, photographer at the end of the bed, photographer. And after that moment, that was once we once we've done the on the bed photographs. I mean, they're so not arty photographs, especially that first lot, because we were all just like I mean, like we were like giggling children because we had so much fun. And then the second shoot that was like six months later, I swear to god, it was like some of my oldest serious friends walked in the room because we you know, all the all the masks were down, there was no possibility to be anything but our true selves.

From Fear To Laughter Together

Jenn Salib Huber 28:41

So we've got I love that, and thank you for sharing all the the little bits and pieces of that because what especially starting with your story of looking at the 16-year-old picture and realizing that your body was never the problem, it was the story that you were telling yourself. And this is what I I try and articulate to people when they say, Oh my gosh, if I could just get into these jeans, wear this dress, get to this size, get to this number, then I will be able to. And when somebody can have that really like, you know, experience that they can sink their teeth into of like, oh, I felt the same way 30 years ago in a much different, smaller, younger body, whatever, that I'm am today, you can really connect the dots that your body's not the problem. It is the thoughts and feelings that you're having about your body that's holding you back. Which is what everybody was battling in that photo shoot, right? It was the thoughts and feelings about their own body and what they thought other people would think. And once all of that had been dropped, once the pretense of that have been dropped, you're all just people and bodies, right? And it's that must have been a beautiful experience.

Speaker 29:59

And it I was just I was thinking of lots of things then. One, I was thinking the body is just a vessel. It's just a vessel. I mean, it's beautiful. We've got to look after it and care for it and not, you know, discard it. Um the freedom, the true freedom of being seen by other people and being seen with no clothes, no boundary, no, nothing between you and that other person is amazing. And also being able to, like you said, that connection between me and the 16-year-old, the sadness that I can have as a woman in my 40s for that 16-year-old child, like the sadness, the awareness, the like, oh I'm so sorry that you had to go through that. And then reconnect it back to myself. I I'm not gonna do that to you anymore. I'm not gonna do that to you anymore. And there's very little that worries me now of about my body. Don't we we went to Budapest, my husband and I, and there were these we went they they have big sar culture. There was one area. There was one area where you went into naked pfar and sauna and whatever. And and I'm not gonna lie, I I don't skip in there like, oh, here we go. Sometimes I do, but not really. But I went down and there's this Hungarian man on the deck, and I was like, So when we go in, like I like to know what the rule what the rules are around the nudity. You know, can we put a town or can we do this, whatever? And he said, Young lady, you will be fine. You are so beautiful. In you go. You have to be careful now, because sometimes you can't say anything in this world, but maybe in Hungary it's a bit difficult in a wonderful way. And I just thought, okay, what am I talking about? You know, what am I worried about?

Speaker 1 32:01

So it's not that it's it's not that it's always easy. It's not meant to always be easy. But it's worth it. Yeah, it's worth it.

Your Body Is Not The Problem

Jenn Salib Huber 32:15

It is worth it. And what you were talking about, your body being a vessel, I've shared before that I had to call my body a meat suit for about two years in my kind of body-image healing. I had to almost externalize it. It had it just had to be a vessel. It was just the vehicle that my that I was living my life through. And it really helped to just think of it as like a meat suit that was holding everything together. And um, and I, you know, I really started affectionately calling it my meat suit. Um, and and I think that we've placed our culture has taught us too, but as individuals as well, we place so much emphasis on the importance of what our body looks like when it is the least important or interesting thing about someone. And when you can access that trust, and you and I both know that that's not easy. You know, it sounds like you've been on a similar journey as I've been on. It is not easy to get to that place of like really truly believing that you can just show up in the body you have today and life will be better. Um, it is worth it though. It's it is work, but it is so worth it. So worth it. And that's why I love you because you're just like on every day, you're you're making that loud and clear that that is your mission and that is your message.

Speaker 33:34

But it's magic. That's why we want to tell everyone magic. It's like sparkles and fairies, and like once once you stop wasting so much, everything is energy, everything is energy. And if you're wasting that bit of energy on that, you know, pushing yourself down, keeping yourself small, you are missing out on other things. You are missing out on so much. And once you kind of get to that quick, I mean, I did a post recently, I didn't, it was a terrible again. Say terrible, they are what they are, I am what I am. Like I have a tripod, don't really know how to use it, but you can stick a phone in it sometimes. And I and I did this post with a white bra and black pants, which again is like, oh we cannot do that. Like, when were we taught we couldn't do that? I had a white top on and all my pants no white pants. And you know, so I wear a white bra with my white top and I put it on and I thought, shall I change into a black black bra? And I was like, No, I'm a bit busy, I've got time. All right, I'll just shoot this quickly. And I think I was gonna try and close and that time run out and whatever. And then I I shot it, I left it and I sort of shot it. And then I mean, God forbid, uh somebody once told me they call it the mother's apron, like the way the belly hangs hangs over. And God forbid I turned around to the camera and I untucked my mother's apron for my pants, which is normally where it's safety kept. And I lifted it and I sort of picked it up and lifted it up and put it down again, and I I did the thing and I cut it just to make it a short little thing. And again, people said I've never seen my body on Instagram. I've never seen my body on Instagram. This idea that somehow your body, like all the other bodies, the big, the middle, the little, the you know, whatever, short tool, like somehow they're all okay, but yours just yours. Like because we give so much grace and comfort and love to everyone else.

Speaker 1 35:46

Yeah.

Speaker 35:47

We'll give it to a best friend and yet we'll talk to ourselves in the most heinous ways. And again, this resonating with people like it was the fact that I could actually hold my tummy in my hands and pick it up and put it down again. And everyone's just like, and of course, because I've done that so often now as well, that's part of my freedom. If I ever had a troll on Instagram, two or three people, two or three women have said to me, really, why do people have to show it off or be naked? And I'm like, everyone can have their opinion. Everyone's allowed their opinion, no judgment for me. That's about that person's got funny, you know, what you think about me is your business, it's not mine.

Speaker 1 36:26

Exactly, exactly.

Speaker 36:29

But it's just that I think both of us there's the core in the mission about just wanting to share that magic with people. Yeah. And actually that's a real meat suit comment, isn't it? Like I picked up the meat suit. It's like, oh, meat suit, you know, it's like put it down again. Oh, but look, I'm still me, I can still turn up and sing and dance, or like play with the kids, or do a triad on or I mean, I've had two c-sections.

Jenn Salib Huber 36:56

I had two pregnancies, one of them was a twin pregnancy. Um, and so I always say it doesn't matter what I would do, there is no going back to the before. Like there's no amount of money that can buy a before situation. And, you know, with a C-section and a scar, I've got the C-section shelf, which I think is essentially this apron, whatever. It is what it is. And I can put all my time and energy and effort into fighting that, or I can accept that it is what it is. And the only thing that it is holding me back, the only thing that's holding me back is my thoughts about it, not the actual situation that's happening. And choosing clothes that are comfortable around that. You know, people have had c-sections, like we often have skin that is funny. So, you know, wearing thing, clothes that are comfortable, um, you know, wearing clothes that stretch, wearing clothes that allow my body to move so that I am not constantly aware of what's digging in and where. That is the kind of like day-to-day experience that I see so many women missing out on. They're trying to like spanx their way through every day and only wearing, you know, what they think makes them look thin and small. And it's just it's exhausting. It's exhausting.

Speaker 1 38:17

Take the space, exactly.

Tiny Steps And The “Bob” Voice

Speaker 38:28

My heart breaks, and all I can ever say to people is just one teeny, tiny step at a time. Because the other thing women do is I imagine that some people see me and well, I do know it actually from the wobbly body post, but and people like I could never do that. Oh, I wish I could, oh, I wish I could be like her. And it's like the like me is nothing special. Like the difference is just that I don't waste time, you know, hating on myself. So I've got more time available to do other things. And I didn't become this version of me overnight.

Speaker 1 39:05

Yes.

Speaker 39:06

It took me 49 years to become this version of me, because they all count. It's not even just the last ten years of freeing my mind from um it took 49 years to make me this beautiful. It's like that, isn't it? And when you hear people say, Oh, I wish I could, it's like and I So what women do as well is we we like we have another another level of hate on the level of hate, it's like, oh, I hate myself. God, I wish I didn't hate myself. Wow, like we hate on ourselves, we're hate on ourselves, you know, or whatever, whatever it is. Um just so tiny, tiny steps to become aware of the voice in the head. My saying on that one is if I thob. Like I made Bob for laugh. So when Bob comes in the room, like you can say thank you, Bob, because Bob's tried to keep you safe for ages, or whatever you want to call it. But like that voice tried to keep you safe because it's that's doing the best job, so you can say thank you, thank you. You're not needed anymore. But now I'm like ten years into that journey. If Bob pops in, I'm like uh uh get out. Get out, you're not welcome. But tiny, tiny, tiny steps each day to to just just become conscious, just become aware, and know that you're exactly where you need to be, you're perfect. Even if even if you haven't got to body acceptance, even if you really struggle to wear a swimsuit or a short skirt or short sleeves or whatever, just that's okay. That's okay too.

Finding Joy And Closing Calls

Jenn Salib Huber 40:42

It's okay. And surround yourself with people who are working on the same thing. It is infinitely easier, as your group of friends in this you know, picture scenario found out. It is infinitely easier to do the scary thing if you're not doing it by yourself, or if you're not doing it with others who aren't doing it. You know, um, so yeah, surrounding yourself. And and I think that's where there can be an upside to social media is that you can find people who might make it feel a little bit less scary because they're putting themselves out there, which is, you know, the work that you're doing and that I'm so appreciative of. And then I'm sure lots of listeners will, uh, if they haven't seen that video, I'm sure that they're off to Instagram to find it. So before we get to the last question, um, where can people find you?

Speaker 41:33

So predominantly I'm an Instagram girl, and it's and it's called walking underscore this underscore way. I well, friends of and I trained for a hundred K walk that you do through the night. So it took 30 hours. So and and I and I documented walking this way. So hence why I'm walking this way. But that's the best place to buy me is on Instagram. Amazing.

Jenn Salib Huber 41:58

Okay, and we'll have a link to that in the show notes. But last question what do you think is the missing ingredient in midlife?

Speaker 1 42:08

My immediate answer to that is joy is it's all around us.

Speaker 42:15

And it's so it's not missing, but we just have to remember, we have to look out for it, be consciously biased of the joy that's around us. The joy in the smallest, tiniest.

Jenn Salib Huber 42:27

Absolutely.

Speaker 42:28

The glimmers. The glimmers, the glimmers, yeah. I was looking for that word earlier, but my midlife brain would not give it to me.

Jenn Salib Huber 42:37

It's okay, that's teamwork, teamwork.

Speaker 42:41

And aren't women great at that?

Jenn Salib Huber 42:43

Yes, we are. It is. Yeah, thank you so much for your time. Um, thank you so much. I'm just so glad that we've connected. And uh, I'm sure that lots of people are going to benefit from hearing your story and uh certainly benefit from seeing you show up on Instagram. Um, you're definitely an inspiration, so thank you.

Speaker 43:05

Oh, thank you so much, as well. And for inviting me, I really appreciate it. That was a gorgeous email message to receive. Aww.

Jenn Salib Huber 43:15

Well, thank you for saying yes.

Speaker 43:17

Oh, thank you.

Jenn Salib Huber 43:20

Thanks for joining me for this episode of the Midlife Feast. If you're ready to take the next step towards thriving in midlife, head to menopausenutritionist.ca to learn more about my one-to-one and group coaching programs, free resources, and where to get your copy of Eat to Thrive during menopause. And if you've loved today's conversation and found it helpful, please share it with a friend who needs to hear this and leave a review wherever you listen to podcasts. It helps so many more people just like you find their way to food freedom and midlife confidence. Until next time, remember, midlife is not the end of the story, it's the feast. Let's savor it together.