102. Sustainable Health & Nutrition with Molly Pflederer and Ryan Parnham
1 Corinthians 10:31 (ESV) “So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.”
**Transcription Below**
Molly Pflederer is a 38 year old mother of 3 and has been married for 16 years. As a trained holistic health coach and graduate from the Institute of Integrative Nutrition, Molly is passionate about helping others feel their best and find purpose. She has always been passionate about health and fitness, but grew increasingly more intentional when she found her health in a bad state. She was experiencing daily headaches, body/joint pain, extreme fatigue, brain fog, and digestive issues. With 3 kids under the age of 4 at home, she was miserable but couldn’t simply lay in bed. Then, the depression started to set in. After years of useless doctor visits and unexplained symptoms, she searched to find a different way.
Hope was finally found through a more holistic approach to health, where simple daily changes made a huge impact. She experienced first hand how food can be medicine, and that it truly affects the way you feel on a daily basis; both mentally and physically.
Molly firmly believes life shouldn’t be about restriction, rather balance; learning how to enjoy the things you love in moderation and having a healthy relationship with food! Not using food as a crutch, rather as fuel to nourish our bodies in the best way possible.
Following the 80/20 principle can bring so much freedom to enjoy dinner out with friends, birthday parties, holidays and those fun ice cream runs with family and friends! Knowing you don’t have to be a slave to your decisions, yet make conscious choices that will benefit your long term health.
Ryan Parnham is a 40-year-old husband and father from the Midwest. He works as a nurse practitioner and has been practicing for over 12 years. He is a certified Primal Health Coach and has also completed additional training with the Institute for Functional Medicine.
His passion is living with meaning and purpose while achieving and maintaining good health for life. Ryan has been a health and wellness expert for many years and believes the path to good health does not need to be complicated and should be approached with both balance and common sense.
Ryan found himself overweight and out of shape in his early 20’s and, since then, has dedicated his life to reversing this pattern by achieving and maintaining great health. He is not a fan of fad diets, exercises or supplements and develops his approach based off of what he calls “the four key elements” to health: nutrition, sleep, movement and stress. He loves helping and coaching others on their journey to better health and vitality.
Article on Gluttony with John Piper
Ryan and Molly’s Recommended Recipes:
Egg muffin bites (Easy breakfast)
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Gospel Scripture: (all NIV)
Romans 3:23 “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,”
Romans 3:24 “and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.”
Romans 3:25 (a) “God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood.”
Hebrews 9:22 (b) “without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.”
Romans 5:8 “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”
Romans 5:11 “Not only is this so, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.”
John 3:16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”
Romans 10:9 “That if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”
Luke 15:10 says “In the same way, I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”
Romans 8:1 “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus”
Ephesians 1:13–14 “And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession- to the praise of his glory.”
Ephesians 1:15–23 “For this reason, ever since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers. I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is like the working of his mighty strength, which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.”
Ephesians 2:8–10 “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God – not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God‘s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.“
Ephesians 2:13 “But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ.“
Philippians 1:6 “being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.”
**Transcription**
[00:00:00] <music>
Laura Dugger: Welcome to The Savvy Sauce, where we have practical chats for intentional living. I'm your host Laura Dugger, and I'm so glad you're here.
[00:00:17] <music>
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We get to chat with two health coaches who happen to be local to central Illinois, but have an online platform and online course where they're able to coach people from anywhere in the world.
Ryan Parnham and Molly Pflederer are going to share actionable steps for intentional and sustainable results in your health journey. [00:01:22] We also chat about health in the broader sense, as it's a stewardship issue.
They have an interesting perspective, how to know if a lack of or over-focus on our health is actually becoming an idol.
Here's our chat.
Welcome to The Savvy Sauce, Molly and Ryan.
Ryan Parnham: Hey, we're super excited to be here. Thanks for having us.
Laura Dugger: Let's begin with you both sharing more about yourselves and what qualifies you both to coach individuals through their health journey.
Molly Pflederer: Well, hello, I'm Molly and I am a health coach. I'm a graduate of the Institute of Integrative Nutrition. I suffered from my own chronic poor health in my late 20s and early 30s.
After years of searching for answers and going through unexplained health symptoms, doctor visits, ER visits, and just kind of a lot of wasted time — I had three young kids at the time and I was just always kind of feeling like I had the flu — I started looking for alternative options to begin to feel better. Because this went on for a couple of years. [00:02:27]
I started looking into diet and lifestyle and different avenues to change my health. Thankfully, I found some answers and then later on went through some education and training to become a health coach so I could help others.
Laura Dugger: Wow, that's incredible. I'm sure that was a really trying journey to go through. Would you be willing to elaborate a little bit more on what they did find?
Molly Pflederer: Yeah. You know, my kids were... I had a newborn and a one-and-a-half-year-old and a three-year-old and I just felt sick all the time. You know, it's normal to be tired and run down after having that many children and that many close of time span, but I just constantly felt sick.
I had headaches and nausea and body aches. I couldn't get past like one o'clock in the day without just feeling just terrible. So I started digging in and just found I had some different food sensitivities. The inflammation in my body was elevated and just started going through a process to see what foods those were. [00:03:32]
It took some time and some food elimination and trial and error and learning. You know, over the course of about a year, I really found some answers and what foods I needed to avoid. It was a big learning process. But I learned so much. I started feeling better and that gave me the motivation to keep going.
Laura Dugger: Awesome. Thank you for sharing. Ryan, what about you?
Ryan Parnham: Hi, I'm Ryan. I'm a married father of two and I've been in the healthcare industry for almost 20 years now. Started out as a nurse and then went back to school, got my master's degree and I've been working as a nurse practitioner now for almost 13 years. That's my full-time gig.
I'm also a certified health coach as well through the Primal Health Coach Institute. Really had a kind of a lifelong interest in health and wellness. But despite that, my early 20s, I kind of got out of hand with me, with going through college, getting married at an early age, and just not making the greatest choices with my eating habits and all that kind of stuff. [00:04:40]
So by the time I was about, I don't know, 21 or 22 years of age, I found myself significantly overweight and out of shape. I just didn't want to be like that and feel like that. You know, working in healthcare, you see what happens to people over many years that don't take care of themselves.
I think I was about 23 years old and I vowed, you know, I'm going to spend the rest of my life just trying to make myself the healthiest version of myself that I can be and also just continuing to research, study, so I can help others become healthy as well.
I've also completed training with the Institute for Functional Medicine. So I'd say I have a pretty, you know, well-rounded approach and a lot of education from different various sources.
Laura Dugger: Both have fascinating stories. I love to start with the end in mind. So how would you both encourage us that it is a worthwhile pursuit to gain great health? [00:05:41]
Molly Pflederer: You know, when I'm working with other people or just talking with a family member or a close friend, I think it's easy to want to be on the fast track. You know, everybody wants quick, rapid results or wants to feel better faster. And really it does take time and being patient.
And just looking at it with the perspective that, you know, whatever position you're in, you didn't get there overnight. And it's going to take some time.
When we feel good, we are better people in society. I mean, I know for myself, I'm a better mom, I'm a better wife, better friend. And when I went through those days of not feeling well, I was grouchy and irritable. It just didn't allow me to be the best version of myself and who God intended me to be.
So I think keeping that in mind as well, just when we feel good, we do good and we just have more desire to be who God created us to be.
I listened to a short podcast that John Piper was being interviewed on. [00:06:44] And it was really good. He referenced four warning signs that you might be going through that you might have a sinful relationship with food. I thought those were just really good to reflect on.
He talked about when we become indifferent to the harmful effects that food has on our bodies, we just get to a place where we aren't even concerned about it.
Number two, we become indifferent to the way we steward our money around food choices, which I think is something that we don't often think about either.
Number three, we use food as an escape from our problems, kind of like using it as our medication for our sadness and our discomfort and just our day when we have stressful days.
And last, he said that we stop enjoying food as a way of enjoying God and we stop tasting the goodness of God in our food. And we replace the goodness of God with food.
I think that this is something I know in my own life that I have seen times where I've gone through that. Or, you know, even up until just last week, days that my kids are driving me crazy or stressful things happening with work or spouse. [00:07:46] And it's just you find yourself gravitating towards those poor choices.
So I think keeping your relationship with food in check and your contentment in God I think is something to be cognizant of.
Ryan Parnham: Yeah, I agree with everything Molly said. It can be uncomfortable to talk about, but there's some sins that are really easy to pick out: lying, the cheating, the stealing, the idolizing money, sexual sins, materialism, you know, whatever. The list can go on and on.
But really I feel that not taking care of our bodies that God has gifted us with can also be a sin. Because if you're not feeling your best and you don't have energy and you don't feel like doing anything, then you're really not able to be the disciple that God puts you on this earth for.
We can idolize food, laziness, comfort, whatever. It's really important to really take inventory and be honest with yourself about my honoring this body that God has given me. [00:08:46]
And then really taking a very balanced approach to achieving great health. Because it's really easy to flip upside down and go from not taking care of yourself to now the pursuit of health becomes the idol. Molly and I have recognized that at periods of time in ourselves, too, where we've had to learn how to really approach health with a balance.
Yeah, just knowing how to be honest with yourself in your current state of health and recognizing that a change needs to take place so you can be the best version of yourself.
Laura Dugger: I appreciate that paradigm shift where you're teaching us that it can become idolatry on either side. I'd love for you to elaborate just a little bit more on warning signs of it becoming an idol of worshiping your health.
Ryan Parnham: Sure. Well, there's probably quite a few warning signs, but I'd say some of the main ones are: it's something you're just constantly thinking about. You can't even enjoy time with your spouse or your kids because you're so worried about, you know, getting that workout in. [00:09:50]
Or say it's a celebration of some sort. It's a birthday party and you feel guilty because you had a piece of cake. You know, you've been eating great all week and then you have that piece of cake for the birthday party and then you feel guilty. You feel terrible. "Oh, I just messed up my diet. And then maybe you get off the bandwagon or maybe you just continue to beat yourself up over it.
You know, just constantly obsessing over the scale, getting on social media and comparing yourself to all these different models or whoever else you might be seeing on there.
Even just comparing yourself to other people in general is a slippery slope. You should just be worried about yourself and your own health. So I would say those are kind of the main warning signs that come to mind.
Molly, do you have any other ones?
Molly Pflederer: As a female, it can be really hard. We play the comparison game a lot, especially, you know, as moms. I know for me, I'm moving into my 40s here and I think that it's really easy to kind of beat yourself up and play that comparison game. [00:10:52]
I spent a lot of wasted time when my kids were younger trying to get back in shape after having babies. And, you know, maybe one of them had a snotty nose but I'm like, Nope, we're going to the gym. You know, got to get that workout in.
I spent a lot of that time 12, 13, 14 years ago just in that space and it wasn't fulfilling. Yes, I may have gotten in shape faster. But at the end of that, there's no fulfillment inside.
A lot of it is trial and error. A lot of it's just learning as you go. And hopefully, you can connect and speak with other women that are like-minded and have gone through the same thing. It's kind of like, you know, when you're in high school, they say, "Oh, enjoy those years. They go by so fast."
And then you get married, "Oh, enjoy those single years. It goes so fast." It's kind of starting to really look at your peers and your elders and people that have gone through that and just embracing the phase you're in, embracing the body you have in that moment where you're at with what God gave you, and loving yourself. [00:11:56]
But yet keeping health on the forefront of I'm doing this to be healthy. 1 Corinthians 10:31 says, "So whatever you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God." God truly wants us to be healthy, but not at the sacrifice of our family and our friends in our everyday.
Laura Dugger: Well, and I'm sure something that everyone listening is picking up is something that I appreciate about both of you. It's your balanced and holistic you. So can you tell us a little bit more about your 80-20 rule?
Molly Pflederer: The 80-20 rule is more of a phrase that kind of helps people relate to a style or an approach. So 80% of the time you're eating whole foods, so it's like one ingredient foods, you know, things that God put on this earth for us to eat. If you can grow it, you should eat it.
The 20% comes where you're eating... maybe you're at a birthday party and you have that slice of cake. So we really focus on this approach because it is a sustainable approach long-term. [00:12:56] We have found our members that we've coached have really loved this process.
It's the way both Ryan and I have lived for,... I think we decided it was maybe 20-plus years combined. So we feel like it's a very successful, sustainable way of living.
Ryan Parnham: It takes away that pressure of having to be perfect all the time. Many people try to go on a diet with the idea that they're just going to crush it. It's going to be 100% perfect. And then human nature is, you know, several weeks in, you're going to fail at some point in time, okay?
The New Year's resolution thing, that's why by first week of February, the gyms are empty again. It's that same mentality.
What the 80-20 approach does is it allows you to have some flex in there. A personal example for me, and I think Molly's family does a similar thing, on Friday nights we like to make homemade pizza and watch movies or play games or whatever the case might be. And that's kind of a flex meal for me. [00:13:57] I incorporate that homemade pizza into my 20% and I enjoy it and have no regrets and get right back on track the next day.
So it takes sometimes a little bit of thought and planning. You look ahead at your week and you say, "Okay, Sunday, it's grandma's 90th birthday. I know I'm going to have some cake that night." And you just build that into your lifestyle and you enjoy it and you get right back on track the next day.
Laura Dugger: Another thing that I see both doing well is incorporating some less thought of topics into your program. You do cover topics such as rest and stress management, mindfulness, and social relationships. So I definitely want you to elaborate on all of those in addition to the foundational blocks of food and fitness. But let's just begin with food and nutrition. Will you share some of your knowledge and tips with us? [00:14:54]
Molly Pflederer: You know, when it comes to the nutrition side of our program and what we believe, we try to keep it as basic as possible. We focus on just whole foods. And that's going to be your plants, your fruits, your lean proteins, nuts, and seeds. Like if you grow it, eat it. So we try to keep things really simple.
The thing is our ancestors ate that way. But now we have grocery stores and so many things easily accessible, processed foods, and so we really try to avoid those.
Just some simple tips for just better nutrition. Keep it simple. Plan ahead. Meal planning is such a big part of my week. That's what we encourage our members to do, just for the simple fact that when you have a plan in place or if you have that food in front of you or in your refrigerator, even if you went the next step and went ahead and prepped it or batch cooked.
So cook your vegetables or your proteins ahead of time. [00:15:54] And then from there, you can build a plate or a bowl at lunch or on a busy night. During the week, if you need a dinner idea, you can easily grab food that you already have ready, kind of on the go. If you're at home and you need a quick lunch.
Or during the weeknight, if you aren't going to cook and you need a fast meal, you already have food prepped and ready to go. So that's really what sets you up for success. I know for me, I do this on Sundays.
I usually spend a little bit of time, and you can designate however much time you have, and I just make sure my groceries are ordered, I cook a few things, and then I have it ready for the week. Sometimes during the week when I cook, I'll double my recipes, and that's something that's really simple to do. And then you have food for the next day or to throw in the freezer. I have found this to be very successful, and I know that our members have too.
Laura Dugger: Just one follow-up question with that for somebody getting started. How much time do you personally spend on that meal planning portion, deciding what it will look like before you get started? [00:16:56]
Molly Pflederer: Probably 20 to 30 minutes. I sit down with my calendar. I look at my week ahead. This is usually on Sunday for me. I'll look at the week ahead. I'll see what nights we're home for dinner and sitting down. I'll see what nights we might be there but busy and needing to go.
From there, I'll just gather my recipes. I use Pinterest. I think it's probably one of the best resources out there. I will decide what's for dinner. I'll put it physically on a calendar. But I'm a paper person, so it's really simple for me. And then I order my groceries.
So I just hop online, order them, so I know I can look in my pantry, see what I need, have everything done and ready. So that usually takes me 20, maybe 30 minutes tops. But then I may spend at least a solid hour, and it's usually right around dinner time where I'm prepping food.
If I get real crazy and I want to plan everything for the week, I might spend two hours. But honestly, it could be a 30 to 60-minute commitment one day a week just to even give you a jump start and get you ahead. [00:17:53]
Laura Dugger: What's fascinating about that is that we may have excuses or be reluctant to try this and say, Oh, I don't have time. But really think of Monday through Saturday, when dinner time comes, you are going to spend a long time deciding what to do and probably will waste more time. Has that been what you've found as well?
Molly Pflederer: Yes, for sure. The weeks that I don't go into it prepped and planned and ready to go, I will be way more likely to kind of turn circles in the kitchen. I don't know what we're having. Or then, hey, let's just go grab something. Let's go out. Which is okay every once in a while.
But I feel like just taking that time and setting it aside saves time, even though you may think on the forefront, I don't have that time to begin with. Everybody has 30 to 60 minutes a week that they can set aside for this. It's just a matter of finding what day and time works best for your schedule.
Laura Dugger: I've heard somebody else... it was a different podcast. [00:18:52] I can't think of the lady's name, but her pastor challenged her to say whenever she was coming up with an excuse, "and that's just the way I like it". So if you say, Oh, I never have enough time to make a healthy dinner, and that's just the way I like it, it puts ownership to make you think, is that true, or do I need to change my priorities?
Molly Pflederer: That's great.
Laura Dugger: Well, you two also teach about intermittent fasting. So can you share what that is and explain why it's so powerful?
Ryan Parnham: Yeah. Intermittent fasting, it's a very popular buzzword these days. And that's because it is a very powerful tool. So fasting, of course, is refraining from doing something. So with intermittent fasting, we're talking about fasting from food for a certain amount of time. What exactly does that mean? And why would somebody do this?
There's a lot of different ways to go about doing intermittent fasting. There's a lot of different protocols and different definitions. Some people consider a short overnight fast as sufficient, and some really zealous people are doing five, six, seven-day fasts. [00:19:58]
The main thing is that our bodies are designed to have periods of time where we eat, and we're designed to have periods of time where we don't eat. Modern society has really encouraged just constant sort of grazing all the time, and our bodies really weren't meant to do that. Our bodies thrive, they heal, they repair during periods of time where we're not taking in food.
So this fasting period is, number one, very, very good at helping your body tap into its own body fat stores for a variety of reasons.
A second big advantage of fasting, and this is backed up by a lot of scientific studies, is that there are so many health benefits that go along with it. It can lower blood pressure. It can improve blood sugar. It can reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease and maybe even cancer and lots of other different things.
So it's a very, very powerful tool that we all have the ability to do. But there's a big disclaimer here. [00:20:59] If it's not something that you've ever done before, you just don't want to just dive into it and start some fasting protocol that you're not being guided on or you're not exactly sure how to do because there's various ways to approach it and different tips that we recommend.
Part of our program is we help walk people through getting started with some intermittent fasting. It's a very gentle approach that gradually builds throughout the program. It's very doable, very sustainable.
We're huge believers in it. We both have practiced it for... I've probably been doing it for at least five years now or so. It's just been life-changing for me. I think Molly's been doing it for a while as well.
Laura Dugger: So what does that personally look like for you?
Ryan Parnham: Great question. Great question. I'd say time-restricted feeding, in my opinion, is the most doable form of intermittent fasting. So basically what that means is every day you're going to have an eating window and a fasting window. [00:21:58]
And that time period is going to vary from person to person, sometimes day to day. Honestly, most people, it should vary in length day to day. Nothing with the human body should ever be just stagnant in the same day by day. Our bodies were meant for variation and variety.
So for me, I stop eating after dinner. So if we're done eating dinner by 6:00 or 6:30, I'm done eating for the night. Then I will fast into the next day. Now how long do I go into the next day is just going to depend on a variety of factors. It's going to depend on, number one, how do I feel? Did I sleep well? Am I really stressed out? Do I feel really hungry? All those sorts of things.
If I'm not feeling my A-game, then I will likely eat breakfast in the morning. If I get up and work out in the morning, I typically will eat earlier. But a couple days a week, I push that fast a little bit longer. I may shoot for 16 to 18 hours, one to two days a week.
I always do a minimum of 12 hours. [00:22:59] I think that's associated with a lot of health benefits. A lot of fasting experts and a lot of research has shown that at least shoot for that 12 hours of going without any food. It lets your body repair and digest.
The reason I don't eat much food before bedtime is because if you eat too close to bedtime, it can interrupt your sleep. It can interrupt the repair systems in your body. So that's why I choose to stop eating right after dinnertime.
Laura Dugger: You've mentioned abstaining from food. What about something like tea in the evening, something in addition to water?
Ryan Parnham: That's a great question. With fasting, you're abstaining from food and all calories. That includes beverages as well. But if you have herbal tea, black coffee, black tea as well, without any cream or sugar in it, those are totally fine.
So in the morning when I'm fasting, I drink black coffee. Molly will have tea. In the evenings, I like herbal tea, so I'll drink some herbal tea in the evening. And yeah, that does not break a fast. So that's an excellent question. [00:24:04]
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Laura Dugger: Getting really practical, do you guys have any recipe examples for breakfast, lunch, dinner, snacks? And ideally within this, if you could include some kid-friendly options.
Molly Pflederer: We just talked about fasting and breaking your fast, and that's where the word breakfast comes from. But you can eat breakfast at any time of the day, right? It can be 6 a.m. to 10 a.m. Some people even eat more of a brunch, and that looks like breakfast.
I think for breakfast, keeping it pretty simple is always a good idea. You don't ever want to overload your first meal of the day with a ton of carbohydrates and processed foods. [00:27:04] I like to eat eggs, just a simple omelet with maybe a side of berries, a smoothie with a quality protein powder, with some berries and a handful of greens. You can throw some avocado in there for some healthy fats.
So those are great, easy, relatively quick meals. And the good thing about eggs is you can make eggs ahead of time. You can make little egg muffins, just store them in the refrigerator or the freezer. And those are even kid-friendly for school mornings. So that's something that we like to do in our house to keep it pretty simple.
Ryan Parnham: Regarding lunch, for example, I always recommend having a huge green salad for lunch. And not just greens. So you're going to add some protein to it and some healthy fats and such. So like an organic spring mix, for example, where you get some spinach and arugula and some kale and stuff like that. And just make a nice big salad. [00:28:02]
Then if you had chicken or steak or something the night before, you know, dicing that up, throwing it on top. Maybe take half of an avocado and put it on there. Feel free to be liberal with some extra virgin olive oil, some almonds.
I mean, it's going to be packed with nutrition. You're going to have non-starchy carbs. You're going to have fiber. You're going to have protein. You're going to have healthy fats. And the most important thing is going to be satiated.
And because there's no simple sugars or anything like that, it's not going to spike your blood sugar up, causing that mid-afternoon crash. There's a lot of people that have that mid-afternoon energy crash. So it's super important that at lunchtime you have a really healthy lunch that's not going to spike your blood sugar. It's going to have healthy protein and healthy fat and hopefully keep you satiated until dinnertime.
Molly Pflederer: Yeah, dinner I feel like I tend to keep it a smaller meal. I'm kind of with Ryan. I tend to have a bigger lunch and keep dinner a little bit smaller, sticking to, you know, a lean protein with a side of vegetables and some healthy fats. [00:29:06] I would say my plate is probably more full of vegetables than anything.
After dinner, a lot of times what we do in our house is a bowl of berries with dark chocolate chips. So something, you know, if you're having those sweet cravings too, to just kind of satisfy that.
I know especially for women and hormones, there are those times where you really just want something like that. That really does the trick. And my kids have adopted that and really love to do that too.
As far as snacks, you know, something in my house that's really common that we do a lot is make kind of peanut butter protein balls. Those are gluten-free oats and honey and peanut butter and maybe even some, you know, dark chocolate chips in there. Just kind of rolled up, stored in the refrigerator or freezer, and they can grab those. They even like to make them. So we are happy to share that recipe.
Laura Dugger: Yes, let's definitely link to some of your recipes that you guys have mentioned. One last thing, you said that a lot of your dinner is vegetables. What are some of your go-to vegetables? [00:30:04]
Molly Pflederer: You know, I tend to eat with the season. That's just more my cravings. In the winter, I tend to crave more roasted vegetables like broccoli and roasted squash, whether it's butternut squash, even some sweet potatoes, green beans, mushrooms.
Ryan Parnham: Roasted Brussels sprouts for sure.
Molly Pflederer: Roasted Brussels sprouts are great. I'm a big fan of sheet pans. Sometimes I just even empty out my veggie drawer and just put everything on it, toss it with avocado oil and some garlic powder, salt, and pepper. And that's kind of my trio seasoning. Anything tastes good roasted in that. So that would be more wintery.
Summer we tend to grill and we have a side salad with dinner or we'll have the summer fresh market vegetables that I can grab. We tend to eat more raw or grilled vegetables in the summer.
Ryan Parnham: You know, exploring different spices and seasonings is super important. It can make a bland meal taste absolutely amazing. [00:31:03] So chicken and broccoli, for example, is really, really dull. But if you add the right seasonings, it tastes pretty darn amazing.
Another tip I like to do, especially in the wintertime, if we roast Brussels sprouts or steam some broccoli or whatever, I'll take that and whatever meat we're having, whether it's venison or chicken or whatever the case might be, just throw it all in a bowl and put some olive oil on it with plenty of seasoning. And, you know, like everything but the bagel seasoning is really good.
Play around with stuff like that. Otherwise, yeah, it can get really dull. But if you add the right seasonings and enough salt to taste and that sort of thing, it can be really delicious.
Laura Dugger: This is so helpful to get started with food. Are there any foods that you would absolutely recommend we completely avoid?
Ryan Parnham: You know, we're all individuals, right? So the foods that we tolerate are going to vary. But I think it doesn't matter what diet you're talking about. I think vegans and carnivores and everybody in between alike can agree that processed foods are just not good for us. [00:32:08]
These prepackaged foods made in factories, they're just full of sugar. If you look at the ingredient list and you can't pronounce it, it's probably not going to be very good for your body.
And avoiding sugar. In small amounts, a little bit might be okay, but it's never good for you. High fructose corn syrup, all those things, those can just trigger a whole host of issues in the body from bloating, brain fog, fatigue, increase your risk of metabolic syndrome and diabetes and heart disease. Nothing good comes from those if you're consuming those on a regular basis.
If you choose to add those into your flex, maybe into your 20% once in a while, that's okay. That's an individual thing. For the most part, I stay away from that stuff. I just feel better if I don't eat it. But there's nothing wrong if you want to have a donut with your kids on a Saturday morning or something like that. That's what the 20% is for.
Then the other big thing to avoid are sugary drinks. [00:33:06] So drinking your sugar is just so hard on the body. So hard on the body. It gets immediately absorbed. Usually, it's full of high fructose corn syrup and stuff, and the body doesn't know what to do with it. So it ends up storing it as either body fat or visceral fat, which is fat around the organs.
And it's so easy to drink those huge sugary drinks. Those big ones you get at Starbucks sometimes have 500 or 600 calories and maybe even 100 grams of sugar. So that's just a big hit to the body. So we really recommend just being really, really cautious and trying to avoid drinking your sugar for sure.
Laura Dugger: The topic of sugar makes me think about these energy bites that you were talking about as well. Is it okay to put honey in all of those, more of a natural sugar, or would you recommend staying away from that?
Ryan Parnham: I think a little bit of honey is okay. It's a natural sweetener. There are some health benefits to honey. But you don't want to go overboard. Like those little energy bites, my wife makes those too, and they are really good. But I would not consider it a health food. [00:34:08]
I would consider it a healthy alternative to a dessert. It's enough to kind of take the sweet tooth craving away. You kind of have to tell yourself ahead of time, I'm only going to eat two, not 12. Because it's really easy to taste so good to eat a bunch of them. It's just having the right mindset about it.
Laura Dugger: Let's transition now into talking about fitness. When it comes to movement, what would you say is the purpose?
Molly Pflederer: The purpose of movement is to be healthy. Of course, when you're working out or exercising you're burning calories. I think so many people have the mentality that I ate this yesterday, so now tomorrow I have to go to the gym and I need to work out and be on the treadmill for an hour. And they're watching the calorie count and they're making sure they're burning what they ate. And really, that's a race to the bottom. It's not going to work, first of all.
You can't outwork a bad diet, for one. Number two, if you can look and change your perspective on movement, exercise, or fitness from a health standpoint and keeping your muscles toned and in shape is going to help protect your body and the structure of your body and your bones as we age, as well as your cardiovascular health. [00:35:23]
Looking at your fitness through that lens versus the staying thin diet lens is definitely the approach that we have. We tackle this topic a little bit within our online course about just functional movements. You know, squats and push-ups and possibly pull-ups, or even how beneficial walking just alone can be as a de-stressor. Just keeping your body in motion throughout the day.
There's that magical 10,000-step number and a lot of people try to hit that. Not that you have to hit that exactly. But all that means is at the end of the day that you've been up and moving about throughout the day and not sitting still.
Ryan Parnham: My goal anyway is not necessary to have a long lifespan. I do hope to live a long time, but I want to have a long health span. Meaning that I'm going to be as healthy as possible as long as I live. Unfortunately, I don't think our Western society values that a lot. [00:36:21]
I mean, people may be living fairly long, but how many of those years are healthy versus unhealthy? Working in health care and chronic disease, I see all too often these people, they may be 80 years old, but they can't do a thing. They haven't taken care of their body over the years.
When we're up and moving and we're not sitting for long periods of time, it just benefits our body in so many ways. We have our lymphatic system. When you're sitting idle, it's just not good for your body. Fluids pool. Our bodies were meant to move and work. That's how God created us. And really, our modern society has stopped us from doing that.
We're meant to be up and moving all day and then resting appropriately. But we're meant to lift heavy things. That doesn't mean you have to become a bodybuilder, but building muscle, even if it's just a little bit, helps, like Molly said, to protect your bones.
When you get older, it'll protect you from... if you fall, it'll help maybe prevent you from breaking your hip and ending up in a nursing home or something like that. [00:37:20] And then also, the more muscle you have, the more forgiving your body is too. If you do eat some more calories or some food that isn't as good, it gets absorbed up into the muscle.
And working out, like Molly said, is not good for burning calories, but it's great for your cardiovascular health. Cardiovascular exercise is shown to help prevent dementia and delay cognitive decline just through some of the hormones it releases. And just overall, it's like nature's natural stress reliever and antidepressant as well.
Laura Dugger: If you've been around The Savvy Sauce for a while, you have heard our invitation to join our support team of patrons. Patreon is a platform created for the community to financially support people who offer creative content. Our team gladly spends a lot of time and money to produce episodes that we're excited to share, but the reality is, this is an expensive endeavor.
We would be so grateful if you would think about what role you could play to support us. [00:38:23] It's super easy to join with only a few clicks. As you visit thesavvysauce.com, click the "Patreon" tab, and then click "Join Patreon Here". We hope you're rewarded for your generosity.
Now let's discuss some of those less thought of topics. How does stress management affect our overall health?
Ryan Parnham: Our bodies were really designed for short-term stress. If you go back to hunter-gatherer days before we had 40-hour plus work weeks, before we had a kid that had to be at baseball practice and another kid that had to be at band practice and deadlines and social media and all that stuff, we had short-term stress. Running away from danger or fighting another tribe or something like that. The stress was short and sweet and didn't last forever.
What's hurting us now in modern society is this chronic stress. [00:39:22] Our fight-or-flight system, that's what gets kicked on when we're stressed out, and that's meant to save us in a short period of time. Well, that fight-or-flight system is on all the time now.
What that can do is increase levels of cortisol and other stress hormones in our body and can really damage our health over time because our bodies are not meant to be in chronic stress. We try to cope by drinking more coffee or drinking alcohol or sleeping less to get more done, all those bad habits and stuff.
So finding a way to manage that stress is just paramount to health. It's just as important, really, as eating well and exercising. Because if you're doing those things but your stress is just way out of control, it can really have devastating effects to your body.
Laura Dugger: What about when it comes to mindfulness? Why is a proper mindset so critical to success?
Molly Pflederer: This is a great question. This is something that wasn't always present for myself. [00:40:24] I definitely was somebody who went through the motions and did the things and ate well and exercised and had all my ducks in a row, but it wasn't until just in the last few years that I've really considered this aspect of health.
Doing something without understanding and thinking about the why really doesn't lead to lasting change, and it truly also doesn't lead to authentic change. We can mandate say, hey, this is really what you need to do. You should really eliminate this from your diet. You should work out this much a day, and you should probably go to bed at 9 o'clock every night.
But if you are inside making those choices and being mindful and thinking about all of those choices, then you might do it for short term, but that's not going to last over the long haul. And simply taking a step back, take an inventory over your life, think about what's working and what isn't, and really nailing down even a purpose, right?
So why do you get up every day? [00:41:24] What is your purpose for that day? There is a huge opportunity in your relationship with God in this department.
Something that I have always tried to keep mindful of is that I can do all these things, but ultimately God is in control, right? He could take my life tomorrow. I have to keep that perspective as well, that as much as I try to do, do, do, He's in control, and it's just my job to be here and to make the best with what He's given me.
Having a coach or a community of like-minded people is also something that's extremely important in this process because we are all human, and we thrive off community.
Something that we really encourage people to do is to make empowered decisions. So when it comes to your nutrition choices or just health goals and choices in general, to just stop and just ask yourself, is this decision going to get me towards my goal or honor my body? And you navigate from there. [00:42:24]
It's just about taking a moment to stop, think. So it's recreating those habits, and then it just becomes part of your daily routine.
Laura Dugger: That's really helpful. You're mentioning community involvement. Why do you believe that community support is so important for someone who is going to embark on this journey of changing their health?
Ryan Parnham: Well, God made us for community, whether that's our church community, our families, work, our friends, or maybe our health community. Doing things on our own is difficult. We only have so much willpower. We only have so much knowledge. Life is just better when you have people to support you, especially like-minded people, people who are going through the same thing as you are.
Everybody's stories are going to be a little bit different, but having that support is huge, and that's what helps keep you accountable. Accountability is huge for change. [00:43:23] When you have a community of people that you can be open with, that you can share your successes with, that you can share your struggles with, that's really what helps set the tone for ongoing change and success. And having people pick you up when you're struggling and praise you when you've succeeded, it's just super powerful and much more effective than trying to go about it on your own.
Laura Dugger: That's so good. Let's talk about that topic of sleep as well. Why do you both believe that rest and sleep is important for sustainable improvement in our health?
Ryan Parnham: Sleep is so important. It helps to optimize our hormones, our bodies repair themselves, our bodies are able to rest. Good sleep helps prevent cognitive disease, heart disease, diabetes, and lack of sleep does the opposite of all that. It mess up our moods. We become irritable. We become angry. Of course, that can have a negative effect on our relationships and our overall outlook on life. [00:44:29]
The exercise and nutrition component are very important. The stress management part is very important. But sleep is kind of what ties all this in together.
When you exercise, for example, when you do a weight training workout, the benefit of that weight training workout does not occur when you're doing the workout. That's the stimulus. The repair and the rebuilding happens while you sleep. So you're actually cutting yourself short if you're not sleeping well, but yet you're trying to exercise. It's going to make the exercise all that much better.
We're all looking for kind of that magic supplement out there, right? The supplement industry is huge. There's some validity to some of them. Some of them that are probably not worth the money. But if we're really looking for that magical supplement that improves our hormones and is like the fountain of youth, it really is good quality sleep. We typically recommend a minimum of seven hours, seven to eight hours, maybe nine hours for some people of uninterrupted sleep is probably ideal. That's in most of the studies, of course. [00:45:30]
So if you're not getting those seven quality hours of sleep, you may want to look at your life and see what things you might be able to change.
Laura Dugger: Have you found with any of your studies and research that getting to bed earlier, even getting the same amount of sleep, that that's more quality?
Ryan Parnham: No, you should try to go to bed about the same time each night. Because you do develop a circadian rhythm. We all have a circadian rhythm that's innate to us, but they do get individualized, too. So if you're used to going to bed at 10:30 and then you switch it to 9:30, there is likely going to be an adjustment period there.
So the key is long-term trying to, you know, within a half an hour window or so, try to go to bed about the same time each night.
Laura Dugger: And one other thing I'm curious about with sleep, you mentioned that it changes our hormones for good or for bad. This is from years ago, but I remember reading, even if you're working out and burning a lot of calories, if you shortchange your sleep, it had something to do with the chemicals in your brain where it doesn't tell you when you're full and you're more likely to overeat. [00:46:34]
Ryan Parnham: Yeah.
Laura Dugger: Have you found that to be true?
Ryan Parnham: Yes. I'm familiar with what you're talking about. I've read up on that. And I would say that probably even applies to me. So leptin is an appetite hormone. Ghrelin is your satiety hormone. So both of those, yes, can be impacted for the negative if you don't sleep well.
So if you're on a weight loss journey, you're trying to do some fasting and tap into your body fat and that sort of thing, but yet you're only sleeping five hours a night, there's probably a good chance that your appetite's going to be ravenous and it's going to be harder to achieve satiety when you do eat compared to if you were sleeping eight hours of solid sleep per night. So that's actually a great question.
Laura Dugger: Well, Molly, you had alluded to this earlier, that ultimately God is in control. And I love how this conversation has gone in the direction of stewardship. You are challenging us to do, I think, what the Bible commands, this co-laboring with Him.
So if someone's hearing this today and they're inspired, but they're only willing to make one change this week, where would you advise them to begin? [00:47:40]
Molly Pflederer: Honestly, I think I would take it back to the sleep that we just talked about. I think that health... there's so many topics. I don't know, maybe Ryan would disagree with me, but I personally think sleep is probably the first and foremost.
When we're rested, we're also more peaceful. I know for me, especially as a mom, when I'm not rested, I'm not well. I'm not well with myself. I don't feel well. I'm more grouchy. I tend to make worse choices just with nutrition, even words that come out of my mouth, all of those things.
So, for me, it would be sleep. And I would advise somebody, if you can start with one thing, try to get seven hours quality sleep. That's in bed and sleeping for seven hours. So maybe you have to be in bed for seven and a half hours. So try to consider that too with your bedtime routine.
Ryan Parnham: Yeah, I 100% agree with Molly in terms of what habits should you do first, and it would be sleep. But I would even back up a little bit and say the first thing that you should do is just the self-reflection part of it, the mindfulness part of it. [00:48:45] Just sit down and really take inventory of what's going on in your life, like what's working health-wise, what's not working, what are your barriers to that, what are your goals? Because really it's going to take that honest moment with yourself before any of the other things can happen.
Laura Dugger: I think that those two answers together give us such a great place to begin. That's actionable.
Molly Pflederer: Sleep and be mindful, yeah.
Laura Dugger: Absolutely, well summed up. Well, in order for you to give us just one more dose of inspiration, do either of you have any success stories of clients that you've worked with?
Ryan Parnham: Yeah. I'll share one. A gentleman who's in his mid-40s who went through our Sustain program in its original form. Last spring it was called something differently then, but I'm still working with him now, staying in contact with him.
And really in 10 months he's continued to not only burn body fat, but his migraines went from like 20 times a month down to 2 a month, which has been absolutely life-changing for him. [00:49:53] He reports he has amazing energy. He's kept his weight off all winter long, when typically he would gain that 10 to 15 pounds over the winter. That's so common with so many people.
He's at a weight he hasn't been at in 5 years and still losing. He's told us that he feels like he's settled into a groove and that he can sustain this lifestyle for life.
It's just so much easier and has just become ingrained in him. He's done a lot of different diet plans and stuff in the past that were just short-term, and he feels it's something he can just do and it's becoming second nature to him.
In addition, he was on the verge of going on blood pressure medication and has blood pressure normalized too. All in all, just amazing. He's not the only one. We've had quite a few people share similar stories.
Molly Pflederer: I think that the common theme seems to be, yes, there's weight loss. Yes, there's maybe getting rid of some medications, feeling better. [00:50:53] But overall, the common theme has been just people feeling like they have a plan, they can follow this and sustain it over the long haul, and they feel confident moving forward.
I think, honestly, that's really kind of what sets this apart. Just to take a moment and say there's so many different things out there to try and fads and ways to follow, and some of them are really good. Some of them prove really great results.
I think it's just really important for people to consider what their goals are, an approach that they can do, that they can follow, that they can sustain, and something that's going to bring fruit in their life, and something that will make them a better person at the end of it all.
I've loved that about our members and their feedback, just the common theme of I feel confident, I feel like I can do this. And just finding that joy, truly finding joy of who they are and what they're here for and meant to be. [00:51:52]
Laura Dugger: It sounds like the results live up to the purpose and even the title of your course, Sustain. In general, with Equip for Health and with the two of you, where can people follow up online, and what tools do you offer that they can take advantage of?
Molly Pflederer: Sure. We are on social media. Equip for Health, on Instagram and Facebook. Also, we have a website, equipforhealth.com, where you can read up a little bit about us, as well as it has our course on there, where you can sign up to be notified when registration opens. Really, you can connect with us through email, reach out to us, private messages. We're easily accessible.
We have our online course that we coach people through. It's a five-week course on an online platform, very easy to follow, self-paced, and then the coaching community that you are a part of during the course for that community involvement.
We do a lot of fun things in there, like challenges. [00:52:53] We coach two live sessions per month with them during the duration of their five weeks. We're very hands-on. We're very active and involved. Afterwards, there are opportunities to work with us.
And they can continue down that path. Five weeks is short, really, when you're talking about making sustainable, lifelong changes. We know that. Our members know that. The course is really just to give them an on-ramp or a basis of where to start.
Ryan Parnham: We have people from all backgrounds that join in all different ages. This is geared for the average person, really, that just wants to get healthier. Maybe they know a lot about this sort of thing, or maybe they don't, or maybe it's somewhere in between. But it's really geared for anybody.
We have people as young as age, I don't know, 30 to as old as 70s and everybody in between. [00:53:54] That's who we want to join. We want just average people that are just looking to be healthy and have a common goal in sight. The community support part of it is huge. It's fun. We enjoy it.
Molly Pflederer: We offer the exercise and fitness instruction. It's revolved a lot around nutritional guidance and recipe suggestions and how to build their plate successfully and healthy. Just to really have that balanced approach.
Ryan Parnham: Each week has a slightly different focus, whether one week is nutrition, one week is sleep, stress management. Also within that, we teach how to start incorporating the intermittent fasting as well in a very balanced and healthy way.
Laura Dugger: This is great. It feels very approachable. The two of you are very warm and great coaches. I just appreciate everything that you've shared already today.
We will link to all of this in our show notes and also on our resources tab, so regardless of when you find this episode and when you're listening, it will be easy to find Ryan and Molly. [00:55:02]
I just have this one final question for the two of you today. We're called The Savvy Sauce because savvy is synonymous with practical knowledge or insight. We would love to learn from both of you your most savvy tips.
Molly, start with you, what is your savvy sauce?
Molly Pflederer: Taking it back a little bit to the mindset and being intentional and having a plan, this is something I try to do every evening. I just look at my day for the next day.
I just use the Notes feature or app on my phone and I write down the top three to five things that have to be accomplished by the end of the next day. I will make a separate list of things that I would like to get done. It would be nice to have done but don't have to be done.
The next morning maybe you have your quiet time or whatever your morning looks like. You can glance at that and say, I know I've got to get these few things done above all else. It just takes the overwhelming factor off. I try to have a little bit of flex in there so that I don't get too caught up in that. [00:56:03] Definitely that little simple task has made all the difference in my days.
Laura Dugger: Great. Thank you for sharing. Ryan, what about you? What is your savvy sauce?
Ryan Parnham: I would sum mine up with just be intentional in every aspect of life. That can cover a multitude of things. When you wake up in the morning, have a purpose, have intention.
Take a few minutes in the morning to have some reflection or prayer or gratitude. Think about your day. Kind of like what Molly was saying, have a plan to it. Have a purpose to it. I think that's the foundation to ongoing success is being intentional about what you're doing.
Laura Dugger: I would say amen to both of those. I know that I'm certainly leaving this chat feeling motivated and know what my next steps can be. I hope that listeners feel that same way. You too, live out what you believe in and what you've talked about today. Thank you for your time. Thank you for being my guest.
Ryan Parnham: Thanks for having us on.
Laura Dugger: Thanks for having us. [00:57:06]
Laura Dugger: One more thing before you go. Have you heard the term "gospel" before? It simply means good news. And I want to share the best news with you. But it starts with the bad news. Every single one of us were born sinners and God is perfect and holy, so He cannot be in the presence of sin. Therefore, we're separated from Him.
This means there's absolutely no chance we can make it to heaven on our own. So for you and for me, it means we deserve death and we can never pay back the sacrifice we owe to be saved. We need a savior. But God loved us so much, He made a way for His only Son to willingly die in our place as the perfect substitute.
This gives us hope of life forever in right relationship with Him. That is good news. Jesus lived the perfect life we could never live and died in our place for our sin. [00:58:06] This was God's plan to make a way to reconcile with us so that God can look at us and see Jesus.
We can be covered and justified through the work Jesus finished if we choose to receive what He has done for us. Romans 10:9 says that if you confess with your mouth Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.
So would you pray with me now? Heavenly, Father, thank You for sending Jesus to take our place. I pray someone today right now is touched and chooses to turn their life over to You. Will You clearly guide them and help them take their next step in faith to declare You as Lord of their life? We trust You to work and change their lives now for eternity. In Jesus name, we pray, amen.
If you prayed that prayer, you are declaring Him for me, so me for Him, you get the opportunity to live your life for Him.
At this podcast, we are called Savvy for a reason. [00:59:08] We want to give you practical tools to implement the knowledge you have learned. So you're ready to get started?
First, tell someone. Say it out loud. Get a Bible. The first day I made this decision my parents took me to Barnes and Noble to get the Quest NIV Bible and I love it. Start by reading the book of John.
Get connected locally, which basically means just tell someone who is part of the church in your community that you made a decision to follow Christ. I'm assuming they will be thrilled to talk with you about further steps such as going to church and getting connected to other believers to encourage you.
We want to celebrate with you too. So feel free to leave a comment for us if you made a decision for Christ. We also have show notes included where you can read Scripture that describes this process.
Finally, be encouraged. Luke 15:10 says, "In the same way, I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents." [01:00:09] The heavens are praising with you for your decision today.
If you've already received this good news, I pray that you have someone else to share it with today. You are loved and I look forward to meeting you here next time.
Welcome to The Savvy Sauce
Practical chats for intentional living
A faith-based podcast and resources to help you grow closer to Jesus and others. Expect encouragement, surprises, and hope here. Each episode offers lively interviews with fascinating guests such as therapists, authors, non-profit founders, and business leaders.
They share their best practices and savvy tips we can replicate to make our daily life and relationships more enjoyable!
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