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Real Food for Real People with Lynne Bowman
28 Plays6 months ago
Brownies for breakfast? Eating real foods is easier — and more delicious — than you might think, and a low-sugar diet has measurable impacts on the quality of your sleep. Learn why we all could benefit from eating like diabetics and feel inspired to make small changes with huge impacts in your life. Plus, you still get to have dessert.
Lynne Bowman is a grandma, philosopher, and real food advocate. She's the author of Brownies for Breakfast. Learn more at https://lynnebowman.com/ and https://lynnebowman.substack.com/.
In this episode:
- Working single mom, three kids, and healthy eating? It's possible
- Why we all can benefit from eating like diabetics
- Alternative sweeteners: Low sugar doesn't mean low taste
- The impact of real food on longevity
- How what we eat impacts our sleep
- Autophagy: The body's recycling process
- Clean eating can be easy cooking
- Lynne's life lessons
Connect with us at SuenoLabs.com. We're currently looking for contributors and podcast guests!
This episode is brought to you in part by Auphonic.
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Transcript
Brownies for Breakfast and Real Foods
00:00:01
Speaker
Brownies for breakfast? by alphonic dot com brownies for breakfast Yes, it's possible. Hey everyone, welcome back to Sweeneyo Labs. This is the last episode of our spring season here before we take a little summer recess.
00:00:19
Speaker
And yes, we are talking about brownies for breakfast, perhaps more generally about how pursuing a healthy lifestyle with real foods can greatly improve your health, your well-being, your sleep.
00:00:31
Speaker
And it doesn't mean that you have to give up on the fun stuff either. So tonight's guest is somebody who brings decades and decades and decades of experience.
00:00:41
Speaker
She would appreciate if I said that, don't worry. Who is going to talk about what impact it's had for her health, her lifestyle, her family to prioritize and seek out real foods.
00:00:59
Speaker
Tonight, I talk with Lynn Bowman, a grandma, philosopher, and real food advocate about the long-term health implications of limiting sugar in our diets and effective strategies to choose healthier meals that fit with your family and lifestyle.
00:01:18
Speaker
I'm Jimmy Leonard. This is Sueno Labs.
00:01:27
Speaker
Lynn Bowman, welcome to Sueno Labs. How are you today? i am ah getting older all the time lovely. I suppose we all are, right? and In the most literal sense there.
00:01:40
Speaker
Yeah. And it's it's a topic for me lately. I mean, every time I turn around, somebody else is talking about longevity, getting older. yeah And typically it's some 35-year-old guy in a sweaty t-shirt. And I'm always wondering why people think that's a great resource.
00:01:57
Speaker
I feel exposed. You basically just described to me, hopefully I don't look that sweaty at the moment. No, put a regular shirt on. You're good. Yeah, yeah. I'm here representing grandmas.
00:02:08
Speaker
That's what I'm doing. Well, tell us a little bit about yourself then. So you're representing grandmas, but of course, you've done many things. I mean, as I was getting to know, you've been an an actress, you're a cookbook author. So tell us a little bit about how you got to where you currently are in life.
Career Challenges and Societal Constraints
00:02:23
Speaker
How much time we got to work?
00:02:25
Speaker
We'll keep it rolling here. Yeah. Okay, well, you know, the difference is that back in the day, I mean, i graduated from high school in 1964. So think about that for a minute. You know, women couldn't have credit cards. We couldn't go to co-ed colleges, which included the Ivy League. You know, I mean, our options were considerably more limited than they are now. And so the whole idea of having a plan, having a career,
00:02:56
Speaker
and ah no I mean, the i was ah educated to be a Pasadena housewife, but it didn't work out.
00:03:06
Speaker
I went bad. ah You know, the the sexual revolution came along and um changed a lot of us, ah hopefully somewhat for the better.
00:03:16
Speaker
in Insofar as career was concerned, we took whatever job kind of came along. I was in L.A., so the jobs that came along were acting and writing and holding lights. And you in my case, I did some makeup.
00:03:32
Speaker
People would say, well, hey, I'm doing the shoot on Saturday. you know Can you do some? math Yeah, I can do some makeup. Okay, good. So for me, it was just company town kind of stuff. And I enjoyed it.
00:03:43
Speaker
you know ah Nothing wrong with it at all. But it didn't take long to figure out that ah a young woman like myself might be challenged in Hollywood to have a career that didn't involve certain activities with certain folks that I didn't want to do.
00:04:02
Speaker
So i I took off in this sort of journalism direction. Somebody said, hey, I need somebody to, okay, I can edit that for you. And I wound up going back to Wilmington, North Carolina to become ah a, quote, anchor person for the NBC affiliate in Wilmington. And I got back there and it's like, well, we're not going to do that anchor desk with you.
00:04:30
Speaker
How about weather? How about doing some what? Didn't, of course, know dip about the weather. ah Back in that time, it you didn't have meteorologists on TV doing weather.
00:04:44
Speaker
I was definitely the worst weather person in the history of broadcasting anywhere. It didn't last long. But, you know, that's how it was. You you tried something, you failed, you moved on to something else.
00:04:58
Speaker
none of us were all hot and bothered about, i mean, none of us, I can only really speak for people such as myself of the predominantly female persuasion. um We didn't have a plan.
00:05:10
Speaker
There was no plan that you could have. I wound up doing a lot of different things and I wound up doing the most successful things for myself in advertising. I could write. That was the thing that I could typically get a certain amount of money for and live on it.
00:05:24
Speaker
And That ah went on for a long time. And I don't know. it I married. i had three little kids. It turns out that I had married a veteran from Vietnam, ah Marine who, like many of those guys, um came back, thought he was okay, acted normal.
00:05:46
Speaker
and just fell apart. So I ended up having to run for my life with these kids, two, three, and four.
Silicon Valley and Family Life
00:05:55
Speaker
And ah we left with what we could carry on a train in 1980 from North Carolina back to California.
00:06:04
Speaker
And i landed in Silicon Valley, and nineteen eighty s So do the math on that. It was and interesting time. And it turned out that they had couldn't find anybody to write about this amazing microcomputer revolution that was going on.
00:06:22
Speaker
And I loved writing about technology from the point of view of the consumer. Okay, girl, come on and And i I did that saying a lot of being the only girl in the room in Silicon Valley, but it was interesting. It paid well.
00:06:39
Speaker
It helped me raise my kids. And um then I ended up coming out here to, I fell in love with an old, my my now husband and myself fell in love with this old funky farmhouse, the way you do.
00:06:56
Speaker
And I'm Money Pit and have been here since, ah let's see, 96, we moved out here. in Pescadero, California.
00:07:07
Speaker
And we have fruit trees and weeds and
00:07:14
Speaker
and we're right next to the redwoods and we hug them and love them. So is is that kind of the stage of your life where you started taking more of an interest in nutrition, just having some of the the fruit trees and getting to be a little bit more in touch with nature or was it different?
00:07:32
Speaker
That's an interesting idea. But in fact, Jimmy, i I took an interest really early in my adult life because I found out when my first baby, my son was born, that he was 10 pounds, just under 10 pounds.
00:07:48
Speaker
And so the amazed OBGYN said, G, it looks like maybe you had gestational diabetes, which is, and they know a lot more about it now, but ah back then, you're just going to have to watch your weight and wear rat and you will most likely develop type 2 diabetes.
00:08:08
Speaker
So for me, that was my signal that I needed to really watch it and take care of myself because I had these three kids um
Health Journey and Cooking Skills
00:08:16
Speaker
as I went along. They followed and fast succession.
00:08:20
Speaker
And ah my mom had died when I was 18 of a chronic disease. And so I had this just interesting, you know, kind of focus. I was not going to let go.
00:08:33
Speaker
I was going to hang in there for my kids and be as healthy as I could possibly be. So that meant educating myself. And there was nothing out there. Medicine was so different, first of all, and we didn't have access. We couldn't just look stuff up, you know, on the internet.
00:08:48
Speaker
um So I did everything I could to to learn how to provide good food for my little family. And um my superpower then actually became putting a meal on the table in 15 minutes and having healthy with three screaming but babies.
00:09:06
Speaker
and But also because I never had much money or time, i would entertain my clients at home. at my dinner table.
00:09:17
Speaker
So I had this combination of cooking, serving, and having kids at the table with my business associates. And it turned into a lot of people saying, how the heck do you do this?
00:09:30
Speaker
And of course, the joke was always, I went to work to relax. work was an easy part of life. What really was the challenge was going home and doing all that came along with, and you know this, you're you're a dad, all that came along with having these little ones in the school and the you know activities and everything.
00:09:50
Speaker
And I had a more than full-time career. So, and the good news there was that I actually went, ah ended up going in business for myself in 87.
00:10:01
Speaker
And so I had more control over my time and my clients and so on, but it was still, you know, working all the time. But i could I learned to cook. I learned to put a meal on the table that I could eat as a type 2 diabetic and not be hurting myself.
00:10:20
Speaker
And guess what? That turns out to be great food for everybody. And i a lot of my friends and clients said, you know, you need write about You need to do a book. You need to let people know how you're doing this.
00:10:34
Speaker
And as time went on, I i did a couple of books with a friend, um ah Deidre Hall, and i did a couple of books for her marketplace. She's an actress, and that was fun, a success for her ah market.
Cookbook for Diabetics and Family Support
00:10:52
Speaker
And so then I decided to do this this book, which is Brownies for Breakfast, which a cookbook for diabetics and the people who love them, which is very deliberate because you can't expect people to eat the way they're supposed to eat if they're not supported by their family or their friends. It's very hard. I think it's the hardest thing because wherever you go you know to stop for coffee or eat out, someone is always shoving a pastry at you.
00:11:26
Speaker
say Why not? you know Come on, treat yourself. Have some pie. um So I thought it was interesting to have a book that was for eight-year-olds, for 85-year-olds, anybody who wanted to put a meal on the table, easy, fast, nothing complicated, stuff you probably already have in your cupboard,
00:11:48
Speaker
throw it out on the table and have people go, oh, this is great. Thanks. And I also had created some recipes in here, specifically sweets, hence the title and the cover picture, because, yeah, I love sweets.
00:12:05
Speaker
But in the book are all these sweets made from things like, I mean, the brownies are pumpkin right out of the can and cocoa right out of the can, no sugar, and nut butter right out of the jar.
00:12:19
Speaker
So you already know you're adding that up. Okay, that's good food, right? Vegetable, nuts, great food. Cocoa is a health food if you don't put sugar in it. And um some cinnamon and and then the sweetener,
00:12:34
Speaker
My highly recommended, most recommended sweetener, and people are already cringing hearing that word, alternate sweetener or artificial. It's not artificial. It's called allulose.
00:12:45
Speaker
It's food. It has one ingredient, and that's allulose. It's a food product. And it tastes like sugar. doesn't give you any funny reaction. And it's you can cook with it. You can do anything with it that you, it it will even caramelize lovely.
00:13:03
Speaker
And so you can make all those same, there's recipes in here for donuts and cakes and stuff. ah The difference is you just use algalose instead of sugar. So there's, eat you want.
00:13:15
Speaker
Yeah. all you want difference is you get full, Jimmy, because it's real food. And if you're eating pastries, um processed food, flour, it you don't get full.
00:13:30
Speaker
Or you're hungry again in an hour or two or three. And that's the difference. If you're eating whole food, real food, You don't need to worry about how much, really.
00:13:42
Speaker
It's kind of hard to overeat. These brownies, I mean, you know, you think, brownie, come on, I can have, yeah. No, ah trust me, a couple of those brownies and you've had enough.
00:13:53
Speaker
Yeah. And I think that, you know, you're your point about it being a superpower to put a meal on the table in 15 minutes, i mean, that's, I can imagine that's still just as true as it ever was. i i think that's often the story people tell. It's the story we tell each other is sure, I want to eat healthier. I wish I had time eat healthier, but I don't have time. Or like you said, you know, I work after work or I have little kids or we're always running here, we're running there. And a lot of times I think that I don't know if excuse is the right word, but it just becomes sort of the the narrative is as I don't know how to cook or like i I couldn't do this or I don't have
Importance of Family Meals
00:14:30
Speaker
time for that. And i think that's the trap that so many people relate to.
00:14:34
Speaker
And the book has changed. And what's two things have changed. Fast food became the food. that's It became the thing that was easy and palatable and nevermind what's in it.
00:14:48
Speaker
You know, the kids will eat it. So let's do that. And so everyone ended up with everybody eating in the back of a car out of a bag. And then the other thing, of course, is phones. So those two things, I mean, I'm talking, you know, cell phones, those two things have taken everybody away from the table.
00:15:08
Speaker
And so a lot, and you can see my, one of my tables in the background here. I'm all about a table. i especially for you young families, I can look back on, on raising my kids. I'm now of course, grandma, and I'm got more, a whole other generation at the table.
00:15:26
Speaker
But your table is where you learn the most important things in life, as far as I'm concerned, other than maybe making some huge mistakes that we all have to make to grow up.
00:15:38
Speaker
but But if you're not sitting at a table or on a rug in a circle, but relating to each other as a family, if you're not inviting friends to the table, if you don't have you know maybe a couple of generations at the table, but at least if you're You need to be at a table with your children, teaching them certain things that they can only learn from you. And you don't want to send your kids away from your house, your table.
00:16:10
Speaker
i mean, they need to know how to use and not a knife and a fork. Right, for one thing. You don't want them to be the only one in the dorm that doesn't know how to use utensils. And I mean, I'm hearing this from parents and teachers and ah various community folks that there are so many kids who just grew up eating out of a bag who don't know how to use utensils, which is shocking to a grandmother.
00:16:37
Speaker
So, um, and, and there's, the you learn how to share, you learn how to speak in turn, you learn how to pass things at the table, you learn how to ask questions.
00:16:48
Speaker
And my kids have all said to me way after the fact, they're, they're much more polite now than they were, but they've all said that it was like this kind of graduate course in marketing being at the table with me and my friends.
00:17:02
Speaker
which not that you want your kids to be in marketing, but they need to learn who you are. They need to learn what your skills are and why and how those served you and how those went.
00:17:14
Speaker
Those are the kinds of things that you're not learning if you're eating out of a bag in the back. No, I agree with that. that's um That's the one thing that we really try to prioritize in our family is having family dinner. And and sometimes I feel like it's almost a silly battle to fight. I've definitely had days where a three-year-old is screaming and like, I don't want.
00:17:36
Speaker
dinner. And I'm like, you will have dinner, you know, like strong arming them over there. But it's, it's like, you know, you gotta, you gotta establish that you got establish the norm and just say, Hey, like, I'm, I'm not gonna die on every hill. But this is important. This is important to our family. And and this is something that we do.
00:17:51
Speaker
So yeah, I'm absolutely with you on that. And my kids tease me about my my famous little trick. And this is, I think most parents know this, but kid looks at food and goes, now, and you go, oh, of course, no, this is way too grown up for you. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have even put this in front of you.
00:18:07
Speaker
You don't. this This is something that just grownups eat and you take food away from them. And of course they immediately want it, whatever it is. So I've sold a lot of broccoli that way, by the way. Yeah, the the power of no. Absolutely. Lynn, I wanted to go back to the the type two diabetics. You mentioned that that that was a big impetus for you in thinking about your health and nutrition.
Whole Foods and Disease Prevention
00:18:32
Speaker
I think it is a surprise to no one that type two diabetes is on the rise. Who who needs to be concerned? First of all, and the the the way I talk about eating and in the book and so on on is not just for diabetics. This is the way that anyone who wants to prevent the preventable chronic diseases can do it.
00:18:52
Speaker
It's just whole food, real food. That's about it. It sounds so simple. Like just real food. Yeah. That's the point. It's a little harder when you go, okay, so is this whole food? No.
00:19:05
Speaker
Is it anything with a label on it? right that has to list out what's in it is not whole food. I mean, and then, well, then, then you get into, okay, and you really should have greens two or three times a day.
00:19:20
Speaker
And you really should have fermented food at least once a day. and these are simple, simple things, Everybody should be eating this way.
00:19:31
Speaker
You know, it's it's just the most ordinary thing in the world. But Americans don't. And so and your question was, what at what point do you get concerned about diabetes? I think is sort of basically your question. Yeah. I mean, do we have to wait for a doctor to tell us to be concerned? He started mentioning that it's preventative, too.
00:19:50
Speaker
It is. And the thing is, you don't know that you are in trouble at all. You don't know that you're headed that direction until you have a blood test, a hemoglobin A1C or another. There are a couple of other blood tests that can tell you that you're having problems.
00:20:05
Speaker
but And I'm looking right at you now, you men. You that will not go to the doctor until you've got a leg falling off. and but ah But actually, what gets you there in in when it comes to diabetes is erectile dysfunction.
00:20:22
Speaker
That's the thing that guys finally go, oh, dang, this might be serious, right? So, they get but but diabetes has taken a long time to do this damage.
00:20:34
Speaker
So the time to think about it is before it's even a thing, before it's a problem. ah Hopefully it won't become one. It won't be a part of your life. If you're eating the way you should eat as a diabetic, it means you're eating the healthiest diet you can eat any way.
00:20:49
Speaker
So why not just do it? Because it prevents heart disease. It prevents ah inflammation. Anyone who's reading about health now knows that inflammation is the key word for everything.
00:21:04
Speaker
And the way to have more inflammation is to eat sugar. That will put inflammation all through your body. The way not to get inflammation is, guess what? No sugar.
00:21:16
Speaker
Duh. Right? So it doesn't matter really. I mean, it's the sooner, of course, the sooner any of us start really being serious about our own health, which is typically you become a parent and suddenly you think, oh, it's important. I need to stay on my feet.
00:21:36
Speaker
Plus I need more energy than I have. I can't do this without energy. and And so it just comes along with all the other good health habits. Sleep, hello, very important, but you can't talk about sleep or movement, exercise or diet without talking about all of them.
00:21:55
Speaker
They're all connected and and your sleep affects how you deal with the food that you take in or if you don't deal with the food so on and So another one of those little rules, if you want to call it that, um that i I try and make sure people understand is you have to stop eating at a certain point in the day, hopefully three or four hours before you go to bed. So no pizza in front of Jimmy Kimmel, no more.
00:22:22
Speaker
Mm-hmm. and You have to stop eating as early as you can, which is so hard for families that the mom and dad are working, kids are in baseball, rah, rah, rah. You have to do your best to keep the bulk of your food up earlier in the day.
00:22:38
Speaker
Real challenge. I'm going to tell you story because I think this is this is maybe how a lot of people experience
Benefits of Reducing Sugar
00:22:43
Speaker
this. So a few years ago, my wife and I, we did this nutrition challenge. I refer to it as the sugar purge. I don't remember what what diet plan it was or what my wife was the one who who asked me to do with her. And so I said, yes. And so we we went through this program.
00:22:57
Speaker
where for a few weeks, we basically cut out all artificial sweeteners and, you know, and I will tell you, honestly, i felt amazing. i I had so much energy. i felt great.
00:23:09
Speaker
But I was like, does this mean I can never have ice cream again? I mean, they like I just, I had these things that I was, I don't know if I'm ready to give this up, even though I feel amazing. And I think that sometimes when people hear you say no sugar, that that's kind of the trigger is like, are you taking away...
00:23:29
Speaker
all the things that are going to be fun. you know, how how am I going to celebrate? um i how am i gonna How am I going to do the things that I enjoy? You know, are you saying, look, I can never do a drive-thru again? You know, what do we say to that kind of fear, if we want to call it that?
00:23:43
Speaker
A couple of things. One, when you know the downside and plus, I am now in my eightieth year. And I love telling people that ah because our vision about what 79 or 80 looks like and on is not at all in keeping with what's possible for people who take good care of themselves.
00:24:07
Speaker
stuff can happen, you know, you can get a disease. I don't mean that, but 60 to 80% of what's wrong with older folks is preventable.
00:24:18
Speaker
So if if your attitude is, I want to be the healthiest I can be for as long as I possibly can, that's one set of behaviors.
00:24:29
Speaker
If your attitude is, i am going to eat ice cream, whenever I want to eat ice cream, no matter what, then that's a different set of behaviors. But this book tells you how you can eat cakes, pies.
00:24:44
Speaker
ah My gelato is fabulous, but it's real food. You make it with real berries and yogurt, and that's about it.
00:24:55
Speaker
And you add a little bit of allulose, yeah As far as the sugar thing is concerned, the the chemistry of it is what if you really do stop eating sugar, it takes about three weeks for your saliva to change and s things start tasting different to you.
00:25:14
Speaker
And if you give it a little bit of time, you will break your addiction, which is what it is, to sugar. There's nothing about sugar. real old-timey you know cream ice cream that appeals to me anymore.
00:25:28
Speaker
just It makes my tummy hurt thinking about it. But to make a frozen fruit, nutrient-dense also, but a wonderful, fragrant dessert out of real food, ah sign me up.
00:25:44
Speaker
These are so sweet, delicious, fabulous foods, but they are a food that you can buy in Safeway.
00:25:54
Speaker
And I think that's the problem is it's really just I need to know what the alternative is. That's probably true for a lot of people. It's like I I want something else, but I don't know what it is because no one showed me or I haven't seen examples. And um man you have to but right, exactly. But I mean, that's where like your book and others like it, where it it just gives people an alternative. And and I like how you talked about it. It's it's things that you probably have or you could easily get. We aren't.
00:26:18
Speaker
saying that we need to fly halfway around the world to find some obscure route or anything like that. You know, it's just... Exotic. like so I do have a substack and and I've been talking on my substack about my search for allulose without any erythritol in it because people you get kind of hung up on this artificial sugar thing or the sugar substitute thing.
00:26:44
Speaker
and And you do need to to use the right one, ah one that is healthy and real food and so on. So I want that information out there. The truth of the matter is though, Jimmy, you have to cook.
00:26:56
Speaker
You have to chop something or you can't be healthy. You can't be healthy even eating in good restaurants all the time. You don't know what's in that food. i e I like to eat in a restaurant once in while too. I love being waited on. But the more you know about what goes on in a restaurant kitchen,
00:27:13
Speaker
or in a grocery store, the less you really want to rely on that as your food source. And and i as I've already told you, I live out here in regenerative w ranching territory where all the Californians are raising the healthiest food they can possibly raise, you know, and they know the first names of all their little cows and things. And and I'm making fun of them, but I love them and I love what they're doing, um both to protect the land and to make the idea of raising cattle or sheep or goats ah more humane and much, much healthier.
00:27:50
Speaker
So I just, it's all a matter of knowing where your food is coming from.
00:27:59
Speaker
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00:28:22
Speaker
One of the things that we do talk about a lot on Swinier Labs is sleep. So you mentioned that. I wanted to make sure that we touched on that a little bit because, you know, we said, oh, okay, it's all connected.
00:28:33
Speaker
And yeah I think you gave some good advice about, you know, not having the late night pizza and some of those things. But tell me a little bit more about how having this diet of whole foods contributes to better
Whole Foods and Better Sleep
00:28:47
Speaker
sleep.
00:28:47
Speaker
Well, it's real easy. Your tummy doesn't hurt. the And have you discussed autophagy on the show? Have you had someone talking about it? Tell us about that. So autophagy. Autophagy, it means self-eating. And this is something that I really didn't know anything about until, don't know, two or three years ago ah when the the online docs started talking about this.
00:29:09
Speaker
But it's the process by which your cells... clean themselves out and recycle the other cells that are no longer functional. So, but and it's a process that can only take place.
00:29:23
Speaker
They have, there haven't, there's no pinpointing it exactly, but it's somewhere between 14 and 18 hours after you have taken your last bite of food. Hmm. And so when you so you're mentally doing the math going, wait, how does that work?
00:29:37
Speaker
Well, it's not such a big deal. If you eat your last bite of food at four or five in the afternoon, then by 10 or 11 the next day or even eight or nine the next day, you're probably okay.
00:29:52
Speaker
But if you're eating at 7, 8, 9 o'clock at night, you're probably going to have that pastry, that bagel, whatever, at 8 or 9 o'clock the next morning. And you have not given your body the time that it needs to truly digest and and do all fun.
00:30:11
Speaker
The other thing that I didn't know until fairly recently was that deep REM sleep is the only time that you're actually healing from anything.
00:30:22
Speaker
And I mean, think about that. You know, when it comes to your kid and the boo-boos on their fingers or or you've had your liver operate on whatever it is so or something really minor, your skin, you you really need to be in full, complete sleep for your body to do what it needs to do to heal.
00:30:45
Speaker
which I think that's mind-bending when you think about it. And especially when you think about how doctors, not so much anymore, no i don't were trained not to sleep.
00:30:57
Speaker
Sleeping was considered some wimpy thing that people did when they just gave out. And there's a history of that. I think it's Casey Means talks about it in one of her books that um because she had the experience of going to medical school and and going through the hideous ah torture of not being allowed to sleep.
00:31:17
Speaker
But now it's understood that that's not only torture, it's just bad medicine. you know yeah We need to sleep. And so eating, of course, relates to that. i I typically don't eat after two or three in the afternoon, but I can get away with it because I no longer have to put a big fat... um I don't have to go collect people from school and ah bring them home and feed them ah and then do homework and so on and so forth.
00:31:45
Speaker
It's easier. Yeah. And I think in in my experience, it's similar to what we were saying earlier about, you know, it takes saliva three weeks to adjust. And in some ways that's true for your circadian rhythm and your sleep cycle too. i don't know if it's exactly three weeks, but a lot of times I talk to people because I talk about sleep a lot where do they they say, you know, I i don't sleep well, or it it takes me an hour to fall asleep or I'm tossing and turning all night. And and there's almost this like a disbelief that that could ever be different.
00:32:17
Speaker
And you know maybe you you try it one night where you say, okay, ah I'll try to to eat differently or you change some things about my routine, but it didn't make that much of a difference. It's like, you got to give it a little more than one night.
00:32:30
Speaker
You got to let your body reset. You got to get on to those new rhythms. And and if if you are used to eating late night snacks and you don't eat a late night snack one night, you're going to be hungry because your body is used to that.
00:32:42
Speaker
your body is is used to thinking, okay, it's 1130. It's time for that bag of chips or whatever it might be. ice cream. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, it takes a while. And it's so easy. You know, it's like, um you know, so many times where i'm I'm out with friends or like we're doing something and it's late at night and you're at a bar, you're at a restaurant. And it's like but all the things that you shouldn't do. It's like, you know, there's alcohol, there's snacks and the snacks aren't healthy snacks, right? You know, they're chips and cheese sticks and fries and all these other things. And sometimes it it does take,
00:33:12
Speaker
a little bit of that discipline. But I think that's what you were talking about earlier is it's making that choice of where do I want to long term or even just remembering the goal I have for how I want to feel the next day to you.
00:33:26
Speaker
Yeah, and that what you're saying, especially for people who have challenging lives with other family members or you know intense career or whatever, you need to train like an athlete to do anything the right that we do.
00:33:41
Speaker
I mean, I'm a astonished at the amount of relearning we have to do every day. i mean, just changing cars. i just I just got back where I was driving someone else's car and then drove a car that I wasn't really accustomed to home.
Adapting to Life Changes and Stress
00:33:58
Speaker
you know and and we think we're just going to automatically know how to use the new software, you know how to how to make all these things just automatic in our lives.
00:34:09
Speaker
It's stressful. It's difficult. And the other thing we haven't mentioned is stress. It is a real thing that changes your body chemistry, that changes your muscular yeah makeup and movement.
00:34:26
Speaker
It affects every cell of your body. And we are living lives right now that are made of stress. Sleep is a huge part of the way that you defend yourself against the stress.
00:34:40
Speaker
I call it recreational sleeping. If you had to give a piece of advice, you know, where where does somebody start if they're listening to this, nodding along, thinking, yeah, I'm stressed. Yeah, I have all these things.
00:34:52
Speaker
You know, what's a good first step? ah Other than buying my book, you mean? I mean, it could be, sure. You know, brownies for breakfast. but But I ordered it on Amazon. I got to wait for it to come. You know, what do I do for this for two days?
00:35:07
Speaker
and so much one You can download it. What an answer. And you can get it on Audible, which I know it sounds a little weird, but my book is not just a recipe book. My book tells you how to change your life in very simple terms.
00:35:22
Speaker
And nowadays, I mean, every other thing that is coming through my email is a seminar, a coaching program, a thing.
00:35:33
Speaker
Everybody is wanting to sell you 90 days to this or that and, you know, be healthy and you learn the cellular structure so that you can, okay, that's good.
00:35:45
Speaker
But it really is pretty simple. And um if not my book, find another one that you feel is reliable. and There are others put out that are not as good as mine. and And plus mine is really pretty. but view it It is. Yeah, I was looking at some of the pictures and But that's part of it.
00:36:03
Speaker
You need to ah ah need to understand that you're not denying yourself anything. You will be eating better food, more delicious food. It smells better. It looks better.
00:36:14
Speaker
i mean, and you'll impress your friends. Sure. What's wrong with that? Everything in the book is simple. Here's a recipe. I'll tell you right now.
00:36:24
Speaker
It's fantastic recipe. Two ingredients. Get yourself a good balsamic vinegar. I love a ah like a gravenstein apple or an apricot balsamic vinegar.
00:36:36
Speaker
And then tahini. Okay, two things. And tahini is nothing but sesame seeds ground up. Sure. Nice name. You put them in the bottom of your salad bowl. I don't measure them. I just put them in there. doesn't matter.
00:36:49
Speaker
Stir them up. There is the most wonderful salad dressing you ever ate. It's fabulous. Lynn, you mentioned that the book is on Amazon or if or if we weren't clear enough about that, it's on Amazon. Is is there anywhere else where listeners can can find it or find you online? Yeah.
00:37:06
Speaker
I am Lynn Bowman.com. So it's just, it's L Y N N E B O W M A n I am Lynn Bowman.substack.com.
00:37:18
Speaker
Uh, and I'd love to see you there because I'm having some fun. It's kind of new. And, ah It's a fun format because it's it's short and snarky and it includes pictures and um it's a good way to connect. I love it when people ask me questions, send me pictures of the brownies that you made.
00:37:38
Speaker
ah That gives my life meaning if I think you're actually using these things, just like a grandma, right? Don't just talk about it, do it. I'm on YouTube. um if you just If you search my name, I'll pop up and ah you can listen to other podcasts like this fabulous one. And and I hope you will.
Role of Family and Community
00:38:00
Speaker
I hope you will eat joyfully, not with guilt, you know not with pain. i want you to eat beautiful, delicious food with joy.
00:38:13
Speaker
Lynn, we covered so much ground here. Was there anything else that you wanted a chance to talk about that I maybe didn't ask about? I mean, I think the age thing is really fun. I think that that people are a little bit hesitant to really ask older people about their lives or their pasts or whatever. um they They don't want to insult you or whatever.
00:38:39
Speaker
I think that there's ah a bit of a disconnect. Again, it's part of American culture. you know We're not living with our grandparents or aunties and Aunties and uncles, I've talked about that. I know I got YouTube or two about it.
00:38:56
Speaker
People who don't have children but who are close to kids or fond of kids don't always appreciate how important they are those kids.
00:39:08
Speaker
you know? Um, and all the things we're talking about today, the, the influence about growing food, cleaning up food, all that it's, it's such a great thing for a kid to do with a, um, an adult that they love and respect. doesn't have to be their parents.
00:39:26
Speaker
You know, if you've got a kid that you like, grow them garden with them. You know, kids are kids will eat what they grow. And eat what they cook.
00:39:37
Speaker
And aunties and uncles are, you know, the kid will eat stuff with Auntie Marie much easier than she'll eat it with you, mom and dad, right?
00:39:48
Speaker
Yeah, it takes a village, as they say. and Everybody's got a role. So is there anything you want to ask, any impertinent thing you want to ask me? So you mentioned that when we learned so many lessons around the table other than some of the the biggest mistakes that we make in life.
00:40:05
Speaker
What do you think are are some of the biggest mistakes that
Life Lessons from Failures
00:40:12
Speaker
you see people make? I mean, you could answer for yourself if you want. Well, I've been fired a lot.
00:40:17
Speaker
um and And I think that's a result of... of saying yes a lot. I think that saying yes is a good thing. I don't think saying yes is a bad thing.
00:40:29
Speaker
um Just going ahead, trying something, seeing if you can do it, seeing how it works out. That's okay. People are less inclined to do that now, I think. um But the mistake, I think the most important decisions that you make are partnering up.
00:40:48
Speaker
who Who will be your partner? It can take you down or it can take you up. ah And there's a lot of talk now about women being less inclined to marry than men.
00:41:01
Speaker
i mean, and there's research coming out. And of course, we are adjusting to the fact that women don't have to be married anymore to survive. It's that simple. So they don't.
00:41:15
Speaker
ah Because, of course, when you talk to women my age, particularly what you learn is that not many of those marriages were particularly good or happy.
00:41:25
Speaker
One of the things as a society that we need to retool and do a different way is how we choose our partners and value our partners and And particularly if it's not working, yeah, see a therapist, whatever, whatever. But if you've made a mistake, get out.
00:41:48
Speaker
And other than that, mean, we've already talked about eating pizza late at night in front of the TV. ah Right. So, so so um, and you know, li I think a ah theme that I'm hearing is that people can change, right. And that's, and that's, you know, what you're saying, yeah even just in your story of, of, you know, moving around and coming back to California and, you know, whether you're, you're 18 or you're 80, if, if you've been doing something the same way for years and you think I can't ever do it differently, relationships, food,
00:42:22
Speaker
You can. And that's what I'm hearing. You absolutely can. Yeah. the The most poisonous thing in the world is to think that's just the way it is. No, that's not just the way it is.
00:42:33
Speaker
um and And I'm fond of saying, just just make a decision. You know, once you have really made a decision about your health, about your future, about how you look, about how you're working,
00:42:50
Speaker
any of those things, it's the decision that has to happen first. And then everything after that is gravy, that we will all fail. And you learn the most from your failures, from the big ugly ones, from the little stupid ones.
00:43:06
Speaker
But that's the only way we really do learn is hitting the dirt. Awesome. Well, the book is Brownies for Breakfast. Lynn Bowman, thank you so much for coming on the show. It's been such a pleasure.
00:43:19
Speaker
Thank you, Jimmy. It has been fun for me.
00:43:23
Speaker
se your labs is a show about sleep memory and dreams for more content visit our blog at swnyurabbs dot com and connect with us to learn more about how you can share your story related to brain health and the daily habits that help us to rest and live
00:43:42
Speaker
thanks for joining we'll be back soon
00:43:46
Speaker
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