Want to know how to live a happier and healthy life? I’ve got Toye Penny to share with us her secrets for you to live a healthy life and make putting yourself first a priority.
Busy moms repeat some of the same patterns which lend to an unhealthy lifestyle.
Read the post below or listen to the complete episode to learn more about what you can change to have a healthier life.
What are primary and secondary foods?
Toye has a holistic approach to health and foods.
So your primary foods are your self-care, your relationships, your career, your spiritual practice, your mental, your mental awareness, your mental health and your physical fitness. Those things are your primary foods and your secondary foods are the foods that you actually eat and put in your mouth.
Primary foods are the things that fuel you in your life. These are things that give you fulfillment, keep your life filled with joy, or make your life exciting and blissful.
Many times we focus solely on the secondary foods, the foods that we actually eat.
So if you’re leaning more on your primary foods, then you’re tending to lean less on your secondary foods and vice versa. So for example, we all know that mom, or maybe it could be yourself who is, who has a great healthy diet, but yet her lifestyle is just like all over the place. It’s filled with drama and her relationships is off. So that’s why your primary foods and your secondary foods are super important.
If you find yourself craving foods, it is possible that your body needs some type of nutrient.
But many times it is because we are lacking in other primary foods.
Maybe your relationship with your husband is rocky, or you have a strained relationship with your mother. My favorite one… your job is driving you crazy.
These things can cause you to crave foods when actually all you need is a hug. Or time to pause.
Keeping your balance with primary and secondary foods will help you with emotional eating and unusual cravings.
How putting yourself first is a priority
As moms, we are famous for putting ourselves last.
We are the last ones to get dressed. The last one to eat. Even the last one to go to sleep.
Putting yourself last causes the primary and secondary foods to get out of whack.
Part of growing love for yourself starts with putting yourself first.
If we learn to love ourselves first, it will reflect in our marriage. If we learn to eat the healthy foods, it will reflect in our relationships or how we act at work. So if we’re learning to put ourselves first and do everything that we need for ourselves, everybody else and everything else will fall into place.
Although putting yourself first and making yourself a priority may make you feel guilty or even selfish, there are so many benefits that you don’t want to miss.
Putting yourself first doesn’t have to be selfish.
Eat nourishing foods
The simple act of making sure that you eat foods that nourish your body is putting yourself first.
I know the cookies and the candy taste really good. But eating to satisfy your taste buds all of the time will leave your body missing key nutrients.
Focus on eating the foods that will give you the energy that you need to sustain you throughout the day.
Sweat daily
Next, you want to eliminate toxins daily.
I think we put a lot of toxins into our bodies, whether it’d be the air that we breathe, the food that we eat, whatever it is, our surroundings, our environment. We put a lot of toxins in our body daily and we also need to eliminate those toxins daily. And so one way you can eliminate that. It’s through sweat.
This doesn’t mean that you have to kill it at the gym. It could be as simple as running around, playing with the kids that makes you work up a sweat.
One of my favorite ways to work up a sweat is in the sauna.
And this is to eliminate the toxins that are in your body that are poisonous to your body and can cause negative health effects.⠀
Have a spiritual practice
Toye made it very clear that no matter what you believe in, you need a spiritual practice.
Whatever your spiritual practice is, if you pray, meditate, whatever it is, we need a moment to ourselves where we be thankful and we have gratitude for a higher power.
Remember you are more than just a body and a soul. You have a spirt too.
Take time every day to be thankful and to show gratitude.
Have a routine in the morning and evening for yourself
Toye brings up that she is still breastfeeding and finds that having time for herself is really needed.
She shared her morning and evening routine that you can modify and implement yourself.
Toye starts her morning at 5 am. The time before the kids and husband wakes up is so precious.
I understand if you think that you are not a morning person. Start by waking up 15 minutes earlier than usual first.
Toye begins her day with a spiritual aspect. Whether it is reading her devotional or repeating affirmations.
I’m feeding my soul spiritually so that I can give back not only to my children and my husband and myself, but also to my community, to my clients, to other people that are around me.
She then moves into a quick exercise to get the blood flowing.
Once she starts her day with the spiritual and physical, Toye is ready to tackle the day.
Toye mentions that she ends her day the same way she started her day.
Toye knows that doing exercise is more likely to keep her awake than help her go to sleep. So she doesn’t do anything strenuous that will have her awake a majority of the night.
Ending the day with gratitude is essential for Toye.
Even though things may have not gone the way I plan them to go. I still just like you said earlier, find the good.
Take time every day to find something good in the day. If you focus on the good things that happen in your day, you will be able to maintain a positive mindset and more good things will continue to happen.
If you’re not feeding yourself spiritually, if you’re not giving yourself the love and the attention, it will definitely reflect on them. You can be snappy, gripey all of that. And that’s a reflection of you’re not caring for yourself first.
2 simple things that you can implement now for a healthier life
One simple thing that you can implement now to live a healthier life is to eat more green vegetables.
So green veggies is really the most missing food in today’s society’s diet right now. So if you can just eat more green veggies, I’m telling you, feel renewed, refreshed, and you’ll be energized.
The beauty of green vegetables is they are packed with vitamins and minerals but they are low on calories.
Some examples of healthy green vegetables are kale, collard greens, spinach, cabbage, and turnip greens.
The second thing that you can implement now is, you know it, put yourself first.
Instead of making yourself last on the priority list, put yourself first and you will find that it will reflect positively in your work and relationships.
About Toye
Toye is a holistic health and lifestyle coach for busy career moms.
She teaches moms simple ways to eat and live healthy so that they can feel more happy, energized, and fulfilled in life.
She typically works with clients is through one on one coaching through classes and courses.
Toye is a mother to 3 beautiful girls and wife. Her journey to become a holistic health and lifestyle coach started when she was a little girl.
When Toye was 9 years old her mother died of Lupus. Before passing away, her mother would have Toye help with cooking.
When Toye was young, she felt that if she had cooked healthier meals, her mother would have lived longer.
When Toye was in high school she got pregnant unexpectedly. But that didn’t stop her.
She still graduated top of her class and went on to massage therapy school, then started working in a spa at 19.
When Toye was 23 she purchased the spa she was working in and became a business owner.
Like many business owners, Toye found herself emerged in her business and off balance.
She ate out more than she cooked because of little time she had to spare in the evenings were left caring of her daughter.
Toye came to her breaking point and knew that something had to change.
She began studying nutrition and ended up finding a nutrition school. After studying nutrition for a year, she found that she was not eating correctly and how it was associated with other areas of her life.
Once Toye started shifting her eating habits, her physical, emotional and spiritual health started to improve.
Her daughter even started to lose weight and she started to enjoy life as a business owner.
This is what lead her to become a holistic health and lifestyle coach.
To learn more about Toye, visit her website. And be sure to grab her Busy Mom’s Guide to Creating a Healthy Meal Plan. You can also find Toye on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.
Links mentioned in this episode:
- Shop with t-shirts
- ToyePenny.com
- Busy Mom’s Guide to Creating a Healthy Meal Plan
- Toye on Facebook
- Toye on Instagram
- Toye on Twitter
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