Change Is a Process, Don’t Skip the Most Important Part

Change Is a Process, Don't Skip the Most Important Part

Don’t Skip the Most Important Part of Change Most people find change hard, particularly without any support or guidance. But the most difficulty about change is when you’re not taking the right action to help yourself create the change you want. Change requires our willingness to think, say and do things differently. This means trying new things and being willing to undertake tasks that you’ve never done before, such as finding reasons why you can try something new, instead of why you can’t. Old stories and ways of thinking perpetually create the feelings that we experience on a daily basis,

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Releasing Toxic Emotional Weight – Why It’s Not Always About Food

Releasing Toxic Emotional Weight - Why It's Not Always About Food

Releasing Toxic Emotional Weight Why It’s Not Always About Food   This week I reached out to a trusted friend and colleague for assistance in reaching a specific issue around my changing weight, that I couldn’t on my own. A few years ago after an emotional rollercoaster with key family members (still not resolved on their behalf), my body began to shift into protective mode (i.e. stress and survival) and my weight started to slowly increase, regardless of my eating and movement not changing – improving actually! Excess weight is often about ‘protection‘. When I became aware of what was happening, I

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Why We Relive Past Stress & Emotions | Understanding Stress & the Brain

Why We Relive Past Stress & Emotions | Understanding Stress & the Brain

Why We Relive Past Stress & Emotions Understanding Stress & the Brain   Here’s a brief explanation of the stress response and why we relive past emotions. These short 3 minutes could change the way you think! Some comments people sent me: Shared  I can totally relate. My fight or flight is triggered easily which has been the cause of muscle tension and pain in my neck and shoulders for years! I have been gradually working on it using deep breathing and meditation  – Emma Beautifully articulated Viki ?  Do you mind if I share this clip? – Bec I’d love nothing more

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How Memories Can Affect Your Digestion

How Memories Can Affect Your Digestion

How Memories Can Affect Your Digestion   Is stress impacting your digestion? Find out how eating either in a stressed or relaxed state affects your ability to digest your food properly in this brief introduction that will make total sense in illuminating your eating behaviours! In this powerful 6 minute video, I share a brief explanation of why we get stressed and relive past emotions when eating. It’s got a lot to do with our nervous system, how our brain processes information, and the individual meaning we attach to past experiences. These short 6 minutes could change your life! (I hope so)   Viki Thondley

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On Behalf of Your body, PLEASE do This

On Behalf of Your body, PLEASE do This

ON BEHALF OF YOUR BODY, PLEASE DO THIS…. Do you ignore your body’s needs… like the need to eat, to pee, to sleep? Are you often so busy or up in your head that you ‘forget’ your needs, or simply put your needs aside? Let’s be honest – we ALL ignore our needs at some time or another. But when it becomes a regular occurrence, your body is the one that suffers… malnutrition hormonal imbalance discomfort fatigue low energy moodiness weight gain increased stress and strain… and the list goes on. Working WITH your body means listening to its’ inner wisdom

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She’s Coming OFF her Anti-Depressant Medication

She's Coming OFF her Anti-Depressant Medication

She’s Coming OFF her Anti-Depressant Medication! Here’s How….   For those of you experiencing depression, anxiety, isolation or low self-esteem, I want to share this story with you to provide hope for a future you might not yet be able to imagine possible… Last week after teaching a postgraduate course on Autonomic Nervous System Reprogramming to my MindBodyFood Institute Advanced Diploma students, I received this totally unexpected gift of appreciation. The student who gave it to me came to this work after working with me on her self-doubt, insecurities and personal fulfillment. She wanted to feel happier, healthier and create a sense

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How Chronic Stress Impacts Your Long-Term Health [Audio Interview]

How Chronic Stress Impacts Your Long-Term Health [Audio Interview]

Chronic Stress Impacts Your Long-Term Health AUDIO INTERVIEW w/ Alison Palmer   Let’s talk about stress and how chronic stress impacts your long-term health. This year I’ve given multiple audio and video interviews and appeared on several (all different) online summits. It’s so great to connect with like-minded people in different parts of the world and talk about various topics that I love, and help people work through every day, both professionally and personally. We never stop helping others do we?! Stress is always a major topic of conversation, and a big reason why people want to learn meditation and relaxation tools.

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5 Steps to Manage Stress + Live Facebook Workshop

5 Steps to Manage Stress + Live Facebook Workshop

5 Steps to Manage Stress   Recently I hosted the first of many Live Facebook Video Workshops – this one on Steps to Manage Stress.   Learning to better manage stress in our lives is a 5 step process. Here are the steps and some tools to help you: 1/ Develop an understanding of how stress affects us physiologically and psychologically. • Stress Management Diary • Understanding self • Paying attention to self-talk 2/ Learn to recognise the symptoms of stress within our bodies. • Progressive Muscle Relaxation Exercise (PMRE) • Meditation and Mindfulness • Self-awareness 3/ Understand what our

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{Podcast} Self-Care, Cancer & Making Friends with Guilt

{Podcast} Self-Care, Cancer & Making Friends with Guilt

NEW MINDBODYFOOD PODCAST SERIES I have an inspiring and awesome new free resource for you, in the form of my brand new MindBodyFood Podcast series. An easily downloadable audio mp3 interview and meditations series you can listen to on the go. Hormones and Self-Care are huge topics for many women, so first up is an honest, practical and very inspiring self-care journey that started with a shock thyroid cancer diagnosis at 23, forcing a high-achieving, people-pleasing music teacher to reassess her life choices and start making herself and her health a priority. This meant learning to make friends with guilt and stop feeling resentful when

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Do You Need to Slow Down?

Do You Need to Slow Down?

The Low Down on Slowing Down For months now I’ve been caught up in the gotta do-more, be-more, give-more cycle, and I’ve created my own well of resentment in not giving enough to myself. I bet you can relate. Over Christmas I felt suffocated. I just wanted a breather, a break, a moment to myself to process a mountain of emotions – away from running my business, planning events, and being switched on for others all the time. Time away from feeling like I had to post on social media, write blogs, articles and newsletters at certain times and days –

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Why Women are more alike than they think

Why Women are more alike than they think

Self-Love, a Retreat for the Soul Recently I hosted my 4 day Women’s Wellness and Meditation Retreat for a large group of beautiful and brave women. WOW! Awesome experience I’ve waited patiently for years to be able to create and host. Most of the ladies came from the Darling Downs; however a few travelled from New South Wales, ACT and the Sunshine Coast to be with us. These ladies were of course, all different. They ranged in ages from 27 to 66 years old. They each had a story – some quite a few. They had experienced all the modern

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Is Stress Causing Your Weight Gain?

Is Stress Causing Your Weight Gain?

Stress and Weight Wars A 2011/12 Queensland Health report revealed an average 57.3% of adults who are overweight or obese. On average, only 56.6% of adults reported getting sufficient physical activity, whilst 15.6% of adults reportedly drink alcohol every week. Eight in ten people with weight problems also suffer from chronic stress and some form of mental health issue. Why? Because our bodies react to stress and emotional trauma by packing on the pounds to protect us. When we experience stress of any kind – real or imagined – our thoughts contribute to the intensity of emotions we feel. If

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Meditation Basics and Dr Ian Gawler

Meditation Basics and Dr Ian Gawler

Meditation Basics Last week I had the wonderful pleasure of having Dr Ian Gawler and his wife Ruth over to my home prior to his Toowoomba seminar on “The Science of Health, Healing and the Mind”. Together we recorded an interview for my YouTube channel over a cuppa and some raw chocolate, discussing some of our favourite topics: lifestyle medicine, mind-body healing, epigenetics, cancer recovery, psychoneuroimmunology, and of course, meditation. Throughout an evening of research and inspiration, I saw many people inspired to begin meditating after experiencing a taste of inner peace first hand. Often people are curious about meditation

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10 Tips to Stress Less Now!

10 Tips to Stress Less Now!

Stress Less Now! Stress is now the number one underlying cause of all illness and disease in modern society. If you’re not sure what stress actually is or how it affects the body (physiologic responses) then check out my article on What is Stress that also includes 10 tips for promoting the Relaxation Response. Over-stimulation, achievement, demands, stimulus, finance and relationship challenges, children and lack of exercise…. the responsibilities all adds up. If we’re not stopping regularly to recharge our minds, bodies and spirits, then chronic stress hormones begin to damage the body and lead to illness and disease down the track. You

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Do You Feel Safe in Your Body?

Do You Feel Safe in Your Body?

That weighty feeling Who’s been on a “diet” before – lost weight, regained weight and done the whole thing over again? I’ve tried numerous diets over the years and a few methods I made up myself. But nothing ever truly worked until I learned to listen to my thoughts and understand what my beliefs and fears were saying to me unconsciously, continuing to trigger my fat storing hormones. What’s the difference between losing weight and regaining, and losing weight and staying there? It’s our emotional, mental and spiritual experience of whether we feel “safe” at a lower weight and comfortable

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