Show Notes
Today on The Jay Allen Show, Jay speaks with Sonia Funk! Sonia is the owner of the Whole Avocado. If Sonia sounds familiar, it's because she is a former singer song writer who has charted on Canadian radio. She now spends a lot of time speaking about wellness and mental health around the world.
Hear this in depth conversation between Sonia and Jay on The Jay Allen Show!
The Jay Allen Show would like to thank the ACFS and Safety FM Plus for the sponsorship of this episode.
The transcript is not perfect.
[00:00:03] spk_1: This show is brought to you by safety FM. Well, hello and welcome to this edition of the J ALLen show. Hopefully everything is good in grand in your neck of the woods. So how are you enjoying this last week of april of 2021 As we start rolling closer and closer to May, speaking about May next month, the A C. F. S is putting on Safety Day 2021. This event that has several speakers that are coming in and talking about who's in your corner, we'll talk about that in a little bit. We will actually be broadcasting from the site of Safety Day 2021 as the speakers are presenting and so on will be doing some off and on. But we'll talk about that towards the middle of the show. But let me tell you what I have for you today because I think you're really gonna like this, its safety with a twist and I'm not joking as I say this today, I have the privilege of speaking to Sonja Funk. Soniya Funk is an employee wellness strategist, corporate speaker and nutritional therapist with international experience in the wellness industry. Her superpowers include outrageous common sense, keen observation skills and willingness to ask hard questions which allows for easier answers. Sonia is known as a bit of a paradigm flipper if I may say so myself and has been nicknamed Master of the obvious on several occasions, our presentation topic strategically and psychologically crafted in a way that allows her to communicate life changing information and insights that the listeners can truly here and act on. Sonia is in the media regularly, largely due to her unique collaborative healthcare events and she has a sweet partnership with a local coop promoting local growers and producers and community wellness initiatives in Canada. In her former life Sonia was an award winning singer songwriter in a recording artist. She even managed to chart on Canadian radio back in the day. So without much further ado, let's get the interview started with Sonia Funk right here on the J allen gel
[00:02:19] spk_0: is
[00:02:19] spk_1: streaming now on safety FM dot life. Well, I have to tell you, sonny, I appreciate you taking the time to do this because I know that this is could be one of those things that could be a little time consuming for some, depending on how far you want to go down the path.
[00:02:34] spk_0: Yeah, well, you know, the work for speakers is just starting to come back. So I've got a little time.
[00:02:40] spk_1: So I'll tell you, I don't do any kind of proper introduction as you and I are on the phone together. I will actually take care of that on the back end of everything that we do. So I have to ask because of course as we were able to find some information about you and taking a look around, I have to understand how does biology and music all of a sudden transition into nutrition. I've been mind boggled by the whole thing.
[00:03:03] spk_0: Well I had I had a moment after high school where I went and saw the counselor at the university here and I said I want to do a double major in Biology and music. And she looked at me probably the same way you're like, how does that even work? She's like, do you mean music and math? Because they go together, Biology and music don't and I just like, you know what, I'm gonna do this anyway. So I actually, I ended up quitting university halfway through and touring with my band.
[00:03:36] spk_1: Very nice. So what position were you in in the band? Were you a singer instagram player? What exactly?
[00:03:41] spk_0: I was the singer songwriter, I want songwriting awards. I've turned it on Canadian radio, done all the things and eventually I wanted to go back into something biology, natural medicine related. So I ended up choosing To skip the musical therapy program. I got into New York and I'm like, no, I'm going to be a holistic nutritionist because I need the biology because I had a mission in my life that I knew I wasn't really going to hit till I was 40.
[00:04:11] spk_1: So, do you ever look at this and go, maybe you can do some of this therapeutic nutrition standpoint from via song
[00:04:18] spk_0: Hell? Well, not exactly, but what I do love it. And I knew would come would be the neuroscience where we know a lot about frequency and vibration. Like I explain personal boundaries in my team building workshops for companies via musical theory.
[00:04:39] spk_1: Well, let's talk, let's talk a little bit about this. So at what point do you start realizing the importance of food and nutrition and how, let's just be realistic, some of us don't look at it as a safety aspect, but how important nutrition is into development.
[00:04:53] spk_0: That's a bit of a long explanation. So we're gonna jump into that one.
[00:04:57] spk_1: We have time.
[00:04:59] spk_0: Yeah, we do. So I have I'm going to just I guess use my my presentation accidents of adaptation to to explain it because that's where I really go into it. So I call it the biology of safety because there is this disconnect. There's been a lot of, you know, well, there's always a new research study coming out on nutrition, contradicting the last one because that is just the world that we live in. So I've really taken food and nutrition down to very basic levels of what food is and what it isn't. So I could talk for an hour and prove to you that there is no such thing as healthy food. Like something is either food and it helps your body or it is not food, but it's disguised as food and it actually steals from your body. So when you tell me
[00:05:47] spk_1: more, you know that I'm not going to let you off the hook that quick, we have to hear part of this.
[00:05:52] spk_0: Okay, well, my my favorite part of that work that I do and what always really resonates with people and make sense to them is I'll take the crowd through what I call Superfood mountains and we will, I'll draw this mountain, I'm known for my terrible diagrams, that makes so much sense and and but they make sense. So everyone kind of loves them even though it's like chicken scratch really? So I draw this mountain on a white board and we section off the mountain in decades. We start in the eighties, there's the nineties and the zeros or whatever we call them and the tens and we go through as much as people can remember what decade, what superfood was a thing. So by the time we're done, this whole mountain is full of, you know, apples and carrots and milk and skinless chicken breast from the eighties. And then you've got flax oil and you know, the pomegranates and stuff like that in the nineties and then you've got kale and zeros and we kind of sum it all the way up to L. J. And so you can imagine the avocados and almonds and like all the things that are on this, right? Because you've seen all the studies, it's generally the decade that the new york Times decided it was worth writing about. That's the decade that goes into. So by the end of this, the question I ask everyone and to this date, I have not gotten the answer that I'm looking for unless someone has already heard me say this, I ask everyone, Okay, so what do all of these super amazing foods have in common and people and sort of the way they have been trained by food marketing to answer their high in omega threes, they're high in antioxidants. Like they say, all of those things that we have been taught via nutrition is um which you know, started happening when we discovered vitamin C under a microscope and we started thinking of food as the sum of its parts instead of just as food. So you might be able to sense where I'm going here now. No one ever gets the the quote unquote right answer. And so I look at everyone and I'm like no, everything up here is just food. Everything has had its 15 minutes. Can we just stop now?
[00:08:04] spk_1: You must tear up some controversy among different groups by saying something along those lines one would assume on my end.
[00:08:12] spk_0: Um possibly I have never really, I've never gotten it. Some people have tried and then when I take that definition down to Every food that is actually food has had its 15 minutes because it feeds your body and it gives more than it takes. Everything that has been manufactured, stripped of things re put together. When you put it into your body, it takes away from your body. Your body has to replace the enzymes and the nutrients that that food was supposed to come with, which are the batteries that that that your body needs to make that food work in the body. So if you're putting a refined oil or refined flour, whatever it is into your body, your body has to go to other um systems into the pancreas and to the immune system to say, hey, I need batteries to make this non food work in the body so that it doesn't hurt me.
[00:09:12] spk_1: So I have to ask the question then. So as you look at these trends and diets that come out all the time because you see something new all the time. I mean I've seen different variations of the same thing with different titles, different marketing, different branding, just depending on where you're at. What style of living do you do you approach? Because it is a style of living because diets are normally a fat, you have to actually have a life changing event for to be able to proceed for saying this is what I'm, my lifestyle is going to be because if you call it a diet, it's gonna be, oh, I, what is my cheat day? Well, I don't know a lot of good relationships that work out. When you say, hey honey, I'm gonna go cheat on a day, I'll be very back. This doesn't kind of go over too
[00:09:52] spk_0: well. Well, when, when I try to teach this to a larger group, it's a little bit different, but well, I guess kind of similar in the one on one work that I do, but I go really just down to the basics. People need to understand that the reason that all this research keeps coming out and regurgitating the same thing is because researchers need grants to make money. I mean,
[00:10:19] spk_1: it's a good point. I mean,
[00:10:22] spk_0: yeah, I mean, so it's just like that, that is just the world that we live in and everyone's gonna keep saying the same thing in a different way over and over because we have created the economy. These people do this, they need to make a living so they will regurgitate the same thing and depending what kind of coffee and what part of city and which coffee shop you're reading the research in coffee is either good or bad for you and it's going to keep going back and forth forever.
[00:10:49] spk_1: Well, I was I was reading something not too long ago where they were saying, if you're hungry and you don't have anything that's kind of fatty or has a lot of lot of oils in it, go ahead and eat a stick of butter, eat a stick of butter
[00:11:04] spk_0: that just doesn't
[00:11:05] spk_1: translate in my brain.
[00:11:07] spk_0: Well, you know, a lot of it is. So going back to what like, the food actually is, if you start to understand that a refined food doesn't have the batteries that your body needs to use it properly, so therefore it hurts you or takes away from you. That's helpful when you look at what, what was this thing that's on my plate? How many steps and processes has it been through from when it was last alive? And if it's been more than one or two steps, then, you know, that it doesn't have necessarily what you need. And then, because, you know, food became a big food, marketing became a really, really big commodity and think that, you know, drives our economy. There's this training that has happened in our, in our psyches for what food is. We label things as good or bad, which creates a conflict in ourselves and creates eating disorders and our taste buds have been manipulated by the things added to these foods on purpose to make us want them. And then our hunger mechanism inside of us has been messed up. But there's physiological reasons and and that's why I say willpower is not a thing. It's
[00:12:24] spk_1: interesting that you say that because I look at some of these organizations such as restaurants and we'll talk fast food. I won't name anything anybody by name. And they reference that they're looking for food Scientist, which I always thought was interest interesting in regards to how the warning was. And it's because of that exactly what you're saying. It's how they make the food to make it addictive.
[00:12:45] spk_0: Yeah. And because it's just become a commodity like fashion and we've just forgotten what food actually is and it has it, I mean, we'll we'll get back to the safety part in a bit, but it has a direct correlation to actual safety, because if the food you're eating doesn't have the batteries you need, then your body doesn't have what it needs to regulate itself properly. And with all the studies that are out there and it's gotten confusing and so people just kind of, you know, give up, everything is bad for me, so, you know, whatever. And then getting back to your question of the stick of butter, getting people back to the basics of what food actually is and then letting them know that their hunger feelings have been hijacked. You know, just like if you talk about, because I know you've talked to my colleague, Sylvia, marissa gets, or when stresses hijacked your brain, you're not thinking rationally. When low blood sugar and food intolerances and low batteries have hijacked your physiology, there is no will power that is going to stop your body from not forcing you to eat something to give it relief right now.
[00:14:04] spk_1: And it's interesting that you say that because not that I disagree with the reason that I say this is because this is our default. It's I'm stressed out. Let me Benji let me go to this cookie chips. It's normally my terrible go to, but I love them. I can just get stuff. But it's what it's one of those things that that's what we turn to, especially in areas of stress. So based on what you've studied in what you've learned, number one, how did you know that you were going down the right path And # 2? How do you know what is the right food?
[00:14:38] spk_0: So how do you mean? How does some, someone else know that they're going down the right path? I'm asking
[00:14:43] spk_1: you, how did you, how did you figure out that you were going down the right path is okay? You're doing this other amazing career, you decided that you had to go into the biology side of the world? How do you know that the information that you're getting at the time is a correct info because apparently it's worked out for you. But you know, I mean how do you distinguish especially now seeing so many different research papers or white papers or information out there, That's not what we will say accurate for everyone.
[00:15:06] spk_0: I think that part of that answer is just simply the fact that I was born with this ability to step back and look at the big picture. I don't really think that I could necessarily credit the things I've actually studied with, the perspective that I bring to my work now. I've always been determined to see all of the details, kinda get a lay of the land and then I stepped back. I choose to forget a lot of the details and just have a general idea of it. So I'm like that person that reads three quarters of a book and I'm like, okay, so I've got the main concept of this now, I'm going to apply it to this
[00:15:42] spk_1: seriously. So you would love the service called Bleep. I think it's our flip. It actually gives you everything within like seven minutes of the whole context of the book.
[00:15:50] spk_0: Oh, I actually might, might like to utilize that, that, that service. So, I mean that that's part of it and that's what it is, right, when you can take a career that a lot of people have and separate yourself and it is having a unique perspective, that's just kind of the person of the personality stuff that I think I was just born with. So, but getting the knowing the basics of it, what I have just really found and where the learning has been very, very handy is understanding the basic cause and effect of the biology in the body. And if you want, I can sum this up really nicely with the recipe that I have for a traditional north american anxiety at 11, a post lunch dip around one o'clock at a complete move collapsed
[00:16:35] spk_1: for J Allen show. Hey, have you ever wanted to hear what's going on around in the world of safety and you're not able to do so? Have you ever wanted to take a listen to what exactly is going around in the world of safety? What if we call that thing? Around the safety pie? We told you month over month, what is happening in the mix? Would you care to know, what would it be worth to you? Now? Here's the fun part besides that. You can find out exactly what's going on inside of the world of safety. There's also other information available there, stuff that you can start using as early as today. How about you? Give us a look go to our website. Safety FM plus dot com. That safety FM plus dot com to find out what exactly is going on, inside of the world of safety, around the world of safety and inside of the world of safety. And don't forget to tell them that J Allen Center, I'll see you on the other side. Make sure to join the revolution. Have you ever sat back and ask yourself that question, Who is in your corner? Well, that's what we're all about. On May the 18th at safety Day 2021 presented by the A. C. F. S. Come to the event on May the 18th at the Rosen Plaza Hotel in Orlando florida. There will be world renowned speaker speaking about this all important subject of who is in your corner when it comes to dealing with safety. If you want to learn on how to reduce risk houses aboard safety and be a health champion, this is the event for you. Don't miss out on this event available by the A. C. F. S. Now the question that always comes up is what are these events worth? What is the cost? What is it going to cost me? Well, it's not gonna be as much as some of the other events, You will get this great value for $30. Yes, you heard me correctly. $30 that's lunch, that's parking. And that's even C. E. Use for $30. For more information. Go to a cfs dot org. That's a cfs dot org. And enjoy safety day 2021 an in person event. And we are back on the J allen show on safety. FM. Yeah. You're you're spot on. You were you're spot on. Sounds just like it.
[00:19:06] spk_0: Yeah. So, and this is the story that I bring into accidents of adaptation because which we I almost got to um earlier but it kind of slipped my mind is uh when you talk about food and when you talk about being tired and you talk about accidents and mistakes that we made because we have been marketed with willpower and all of these things that are fantasies and don't really exist. We are kind of stone walls with guilt and shame which then leads to apathy. So it's hard to hear the messages now. So if you can kind of slip under the radar of those triggers and people tell them a story about themselves without making them feel like it's their fault. It changes the way they received the information and how they process it and what they can do with it. So my mental health keynote, which we won't talk about today but it's called it's not your fault
[00:19:59] spk_1: for these are the teasers. Are we trying to get them to the whole avocado? Is that what we're doing?
[00:20:05] spk_0: Well, I mean yeah sure of course we are. Uh we can touch on it if we have time for sure.
[00:20:11] spk_1: Please please please do
[00:20:12] spk_0: because none of my topics are really separate. I've separated them into bite size things to understand, but it's really hard for a company to bring me in for just one thing because then they need the other things too. Right? So I'm going to, so the story goes like this of the day in the lives and this is a rinse and repeat story. So we get up, we're tired. Maybe we had a glass or two of wine to you know, survive bed time with the kids the night before if you're a parent.
[00:20:41] spk_1: So
[00:20:43] spk_0: it's, it's seven a.m. You throw back a cup or two of coffee, you're in a hurry, you get the kids to daycare, you get to work, you have another cup of coffee. Maybe you grab the sugary muffin at Starbucks or in the cafeteria, whatever it is, it's non battery food. It's going to give you the thing to help you get to your desk and do something 11:00. Suddenly you feel a little bit anxious. It all it takes is one email that may or may not actually be someone that's upset, but because you're in a state of alarm because your blood sugar is tanking hard, you're lowering blood sugar creates a panic in your body that sets you up for an emotional panic. If something triggers you so you can perceive something that either that feels like a little bit of a threat and then bam you have anxiety, you cannot wait for lunch. You're starving by the time you get there, so you eat a big, heavy greasy, you know, mood pacifying lunch for a period of time so that you feel okay for a bit. Then after lunch, you get back to your desk and you're just so tired and you don't know why that space between your your eyebrows isn't working properly, because now your body suddenly has all of this food that it has to break down and digest. You've given it no energy from the morning to sustain this process. So your body moves out of the anxiety, stress response state that so many of us live in and it forces you into rest and digest because it has to digest this food, because if it doesn't break down properly, it's more trouble down the line. So now you're tired because your body is focusing inward to deal with the garbage that you dumped into it, and it's pulling resources from everywhere in your body. And so your brain isn't as high of a priority. So then you probably go for a cup of coffee or another sugary something to give you an artificial bump and to get through some of the afternoon that only lasts for so long because you've just set your nervous system and your blood sugar regulation system and your blood pressure system up for failure. So between 3 34 it starts to tank and now this is where you are hungry but you don't know it, you're moody, you're not sure how you're going to survive through the evening or get to dinner or whatever it is. Maybe you have another cup of coffee before you pick up the kids to survive. You get home, you do dinner probably the best meal quality meal that you're going to have that day and then your body is just upset and your nervous system is upset and your mood is upset and nothing is working properly because now your microbiome is angry at you. So all the new research on the microbiome is like if it's not happy and it's not getting the right information from the right food Because food is information to your microbiome, it's producing neurotransmitters aren't helpful. It's sending messages up the gut brain access to your brain. This is where you might feel a bit of hopelessness, you're not sure how you're going to survive. It's almost worse than it was at 4:00 but your home. So if you have a good home environment that helps if you don't have the best home environment that it's worse, you throw back a glass of wine to cope with bedtime. Rinse and repeat.
[00:24:04] spk_1: My stress level has just went up.
[00:24:06] spk_0: Well, I know it's a triggering story because we all if it's not us, if we have somehow managed to get out of that, you know, negative feedback loop that our world has put us in because it's no one's fault that there there are life that we live has set us up for that. And if you haven't fully gotten out of it, it triggers a bit. But then I go through the story of how this happened and that it is not your fault. And then, of course in the food stuff and the mental health stuff, these are the things you can actually do that aren't a massive overhaul, but really, this kind of stuff is going to come down to HR and health and safety, and companies understanding these things and figuring out how do we support our employees to understand these things without making them feel bad about themselves? Because then you and
[00:25:02] spk_1: that's the that's the question right there. How do you start that conversation? Because let's say, for instance, we're on a construction site is using this as well, and we have some of our people out there going to the go to popular energy drink at the moment and they're saying this is what I need to be able to make it through my day. They run out, get a hamburger, whatever french fries and so on. Well we know that this is not gonna probably be the best quality stuff for them. So how do you initiate that, that first conversation without sounding or coming across as, hey, this is what you need to be eating because this is what the organization is telling you to do.
[00:25:38] spk_0: Yeah. Because that message does nothing because people are too overwhelmed. Anything that feels like another thing they have to do is just going to make sure that they don't do it because they can't handle it. I did a little mini rant on this, on a video, on linked in a little while ago where I was just like, don't do another challenge. Like 2020 just happened. Like, like really stop no more challenges. So my my strategy because really like going back to what we touched on before with the way that I grew up and the career that I've had, because I also did a lot of stuff in the hospitality industry. Like I was a shift leader at Earl's. I was in a girl's girl for a long time. I managed pubs in the beaches in Toronto when I when I lived there. So I've seen so many different aspects of business and different things of of safety and the perspectives on it. You have to go in with a strategy and I if someone wants to bring me in for this, I'm going to say, okay, first I want to do this for your leaders. And then after I've done the presentation, I want the feedback from the leaders on what they're seeing so that I can tailor this to your demographics and your people and the cultures that are in your company. Does that make sense?
[00:26:56] spk_1: Yes, that makes sense. So let me ask the strange question. So normally when an organization reaches out to you, what where are they reaching out to you from? Like what are they looking at initially? Are they noticing that they're having issues with wellness inside of the organization? I know you spoke earlier about mental health as well or are they looking at that aspect? And they say, I need to call Sonia and we need to have this conversation on how we can bring this into our organization.
[00:27:22] spk_0: Well, previously it was just a company that was trying to get some wellness in and I was kind of the nutrition wellness person to bring in so that the coming in and doing a little bit of my, there's no such thing as healthy food would generally open the door for the rest of my work Now post 2020 and the way things are really coming together and the way I'm structuring things, it's almost like I'm kind of uh, it's newer now. So where I'm coming more from is the different perspective on mental health that I have, which is that I see it as an outcome. I explained, this is not your fault. I asked different questions and that's kind of where the interest is until very recently, where I've started talking about this, the safety of biology and health and safety kind of cock their heads and they're like, uh, no one's ever told me that sugar and caffeine cause accidents.
[00:28:26] spk_1: I know it's always the area surprise when that is brought up.
[00:28:30] spk_0: Yeah. So honestly, at this point, what's, what's happening right now is it is the take on stress and the relationship with mental health and food and our lifestyle choices and past trauma. It's like, it's almost like I can't really go in and do just one thing. So the best thing to usually do if they're bringing me in is what topic resonates with the leadership right now, that you need to know one. Let me do that for your leadership. I'll give you like a package deal to do the presentation that you need, you know, for the, for the bigger group as well and see what the company's actual needs are. So that's more of a strategic way to approach it. It's very tailored because no company needs exactly the same thing all day. Every anyone knows right now is that everyone's been stressed too long. Those that are a little bit intuitive or have a little bit of wellness background, they see the train wreck that's coming, but they don't know all of the avenues that it's coming down so they need someone to come in and explain all of these things to them and then you'd be surprised on the stuff that resonates with them and the direction that they can actually give to me. It's a long answer for your question. But
[00:29:47] spk_1: you know, I love long answers because sometimes I get answers that are just like yes and it's like, okay, I guess it wasn't open ended enough, but no, you're definitely covering some ground here. So as you look over the last year, in particular with everything changing in the way that it has and of course a lot of us being in front of a desk, sitting down for a long period of time, what are you seeing that has been the trends with how people are adapting to their food environment or vice versa, or the food environment adapting to them? What are you seeing and things that need to be changing quickly? Yeah,
[00:30:19] spk_0: I think the first place to go with this and of course this is my, my strategy mind kicking in is obviously we have not been eating that great because in the collective stress response that we've been in, even if, you know, some of the the pandemic kind of worked out a little bit better for some of us and not so great for others of us, there was still this state of alarm that we were all in that we have just adapted to because there's a global crisis. So to go in and say you got to change your food now isn't going to work to go in and say you've got to do this for your mental health, isn't going to work to come in with a message of, hey, so this happened and this is the impact that it has had on everyone. This is the impact it has had in our homes that it's done to our bodies. If we don't figure out a way to intervene on a collective scale, this is the collapse that's coming in. Our physiology ease, which then Will take the blanket out from underneath our mental capabilities in approximately 12 to 18 months after the crisis ends, so to speak, because we're in, we've been an alarm for too long. The foundation of accidents of adaptation lies on the work of hats sally. He's known as the father of stress. He coined the term with the definition we use today and so the three phases of general adaptation syndrome, which was his work was alarm, resistance exhaustion. We've been an alarm for a long time. Moving into resistance is where the body tries to fight the impact of the alarm to bring the blood pressure down to stabilize the blood sugar to support the microbiome and immune system. So we don't have Overreactions to keep the unhelpful Euro well not necessarily unhelpful but to keep the neurotransmitters that impact us the way we would define negatively at bay to be able to filter them out of the blood in a timely manner and try to normalize things. So we've been in resistance to long those bodies systems can't do this forever. And so that's why people like Sylvia and I because I know that you know her, we've actually teamed up were created, we have created a stress recovery navigation system for this to actually support the body systems that are taxed and that are going to collapse. And with that then our mental health collectively is going to go as well.
[00:33:08] spk_1: So if if people want to find out more of what you and Sylvia are doing together work and they go to find out because I think this is such important information because I'll tell you, I've seen your your team up videos on linkedin. You kinda do the drop buys. I even saw the one recently where apparently you weren't able to make it in the cat made the appearance for you. Uh which is kind of funny. Uh But where can people find out more information?
[00:33:29] spk_0: Well, the best thing on that right now is linked in, we haven't we're working on our website, we are looking for a pilot companies right now. The best thing is to find Sylvia Karasik and I on linkedin, you know, we've got some of the out takes and that kind of stuff which I think ended up being an accidental strategy of people kind of getting to know us a little bit and what it's like to have us in the company. But the best thing right now is linked in because we haven't released the domain yet, Survival of the fittest dot com is what it's going to be.
[00:34:02] spk_1: We got an early scoop. I love it. I love it. I have to ask the question from you. So I found something and I want to make sure that I have a clear direction of this. Do you have in grocery stores in Canada, your picture inside of some of these grocery stores with recipes that you come up with
[00:34:21] spk_0: the yeah, the local co op Winkler morden call up here and I have had a really sweet partnership for a couple of years. So how does that feel when
[00:34:29] spk_1: you walk into a co op and all of a sudden your pictures right there with what you have, what you're, what you're describing to people that throw you off at the very beginning.
[00:34:36] spk_0: Well, my, my face in the produce section is funny. It's um I think probably I have a tolerance for it because hearing your voice and your songs on the radio is maybe a little bit more jarring. So I think I had exposure to, to that kind of thing. But they've been really great for me because they really helped me move into the community wellness strategy that I have because even when the pandemic hit, they brought me in to do some short videos on your nervous system and the breath and on parenting strategies that are centered around managing stress. So yeah, my face is in some grocery stores and I'm actually working with an even bigger call up here in Manitoba and we're talking about doing even more stuff. So fingers crossed,
[00:35:21] spk_1: that is awesome, sonia people want to know more about you and what you have going on work and they go currently to find out more information.
[00:35:28] spk_0: The best thing is the whole avocado dot com. Make sure you spell avocado right? And just hit my, my corporate page. It has the description for accidents of adaptation and some of the other things that I do and that's just the best place and our connect on linkedin. That's where a lot of my, my little blurbs and little rants that I do an employee wellness are
[00:35:51] spk_1: well sonia, I am so thankful that you actually came onto the show today to have this all important conversation. And I really think at some point we need to talk about having you and Sylvia on at the same time to kind of go further down the path.
[00:36:04] spk_0: Oh, for sure. Maybe we'll let you be one of the inside scoops on survival of the fittest when we launched. Oh,
[00:36:10] spk_1: thanks again. Well, what did you think she had a lot to say for sure. So if you want to find out more information about Sonia Funk, go to the whole avocado dot com. No, that's not a joke. It's the whole avocado dot com where she can give you some more information on what's going on in her world anyways, I hope you enjoyed the conversation with Sonja as much as I did. Don't worry, we'll be back with another episode of the J Allen show before too long. Good bye for now. Want more of the J ALLen show. Go to safety. FM dot com. The views and
[00:36:59] spk_0: opinions expressed on
[00:37:00] spk_1: this podcast are those of the host and its guests and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the company. Examples of analysis discussed within this podcast are only examples. It should not be utilized in the real world as the only solution available as they are based only on very limited in dated open source information, assumptions made within this analysis are
[00:37:20] spk_0: not reflective of
[00:37:21] spk_1: the position of the company. No part
[00:37:23] spk_0: of this podcast may be reproduced
[00:37:25] spk_1: stored in a
[00:37:26] spk_0: retrieval system or
[00:37:27] spk_1: transmitted in any
[00:37:28] spk_0: form or by
[00:37:29] spk_1: any means
[00:37:30] spk_0: mechanical, electronic
[00:37:32] spk_1: recording or otherwise, without prior written permission of the creator of the podcast, jay Allen. Mhm. Safety FM. Changing safety cultures. What? One broadcast and one podcast at a time.
Hear this in depth conversation between Sonia and Jay on The Jay Allen Show!
The Jay Allen Show would like to thank the ACFS and Safety FM Plus for the sponsorship of this episode.
The transcript is not perfect.
[00:00:03] spk_1: This show is brought to you by safety FM. Well, hello and welcome to this edition of the J ALLen show. Hopefully everything is good in grand in your neck of the woods. So how are you enjoying this last week of april of 2021 As we start rolling closer and closer to May, speaking about May next month, the A C. F. S is putting on Safety Day 2021. This event that has several speakers that are coming in and talking about who's in your corner, we'll talk about that in a little bit. We will actually be broadcasting from the site of Safety Day 2021 as the speakers are presenting and so on will be doing some off and on. But we'll talk about that towards the middle of the show. But let me tell you what I have for you today because I think you're really gonna like this, its safety with a twist and I'm not joking as I say this today, I have the privilege of speaking to Sonja Funk. Soniya Funk is an employee wellness strategist, corporate speaker and nutritional therapist with international experience in the wellness industry. Her superpowers include outrageous common sense, keen observation skills and willingness to ask hard questions which allows for easier answers. Sonia is known as a bit of a paradigm flipper if I may say so myself and has been nicknamed Master of the obvious on several occasions, our presentation topic strategically and psychologically crafted in a way that allows her to communicate life changing information and insights that the listeners can truly here and act on. Sonia is in the media regularly, largely due to her unique collaborative healthcare events and she has a sweet partnership with a local coop promoting local growers and producers and community wellness initiatives in Canada. In her former life Sonia was an award winning singer songwriter in a recording artist. She even managed to chart on Canadian radio back in the day. So without much further ado, let's get the interview started with Sonia Funk right here on the J allen gel
[00:02:19] spk_0: is
[00:02:19] spk_1: streaming now on safety FM dot life. Well, I have to tell you, sonny, I appreciate you taking the time to do this because I know that this is could be one of those things that could be a little time consuming for some, depending on how far you want to go down the path.
[00:02:34] spk_0: Yeah, well, you know, the work for speakers is just starting to come back. So I've got a little time.
[00:02:40] spk_1: So I'll tell you, I don't do any kind of proper introduction as you and I are on the phone together. I will actually take care of that on the back end of everything that we do. So I have to ask because of course as we were able to find some information about you and taking a look around, I have to understand how does biology and music all of a sudden transition into nutrition. I've been mind boggled by the whole thing.
[00:03:03] spk_0: Well I had I had a moment after high school where I went and saw the counselor at the university here and I said I want to do a double major in Biology and music. And she looked at me probably the same way you're like, how does that even work? She's like, do you mean music and math? Because they go together, Biology and music don't and I just like, you know what, I'm gonna do this anyway. So I actually, I ended up quitting university halfway through and touring with my band.
[00:03:36] spk_1: Very nice. So what position were you in in the band? Were you a singer instagram player? What exactly?
[00:03:41] spk_0: I was the singer songwriter, I want songwriting awards. I've turned it on Canadian radio, done all the things and eventually I wanted to go back into something biology, natural medicine related. So I ended up choosing To skip the musical therapy program. I got into New York and I'm like, no, I'm going to be a holistic nutritionist because I need the biology because I had a mission in my life that I knew I wasn't really going to hit till I was 40.
[00:04:11] spk_1: So, do you ever look at this and go, maybe you can do some of this therapeutic nutrition standpoint from via song
[00:04:18] spk_0: Hell? Well, not exactly, but what I do love it. And I knew would come would be the neuroscience where we know a lot about frequency and vibration. Like I explain personal boundaries in my team building workshops for companies via musical theory.
[00:04:39] spk_1: Well, let's talk, let's talk a little bit about this. So at what point do you start realizing the importance of food and nutrition and how, let's just be realistic, some of us don't look at it as a safety aspect, but how important nutrition is into development.
[00:04:53] spk_0: That's a bit of a long explanation. So we're gonna jump into that one.
[00:04:57] spk_1: We have time.
[00:04:59] spk_0: Yeah, we do. So I have I'm going to just I guess use my my presentation accidents of adaptation to to explain it because that's where I really go into it. So I call it the biology of safety because there is this disconnect. There's been a lot of, you know, well, there's always a new research study coming out on nutrition, contradicting the last one because that is just the world that we live in. So I've really taken food and nutrition down to very basic levels of what food is and what it isn't. So I could talk for an hour and prove to you that there is no such thing as healthy food. Like something is either food and it helps your body or it is not food, but it's disguised as food and it actually steals from your body. So when you tell me
[00:05:47] spk_1: more, you know that I'm not going to let you off the hook that quick, we have to hear part of this.
[00:05:52] spk_0: Okay, well, my my favorite part of that work that I do and what always really resonates with people and make sense to them is I'll take the crowd through what I call Superfood mountains and we will, I'll draw this mountain, I'm known for my terrible diagrams, that makes so much sense and and but they make sense. So everyone kind of loves them even though it's like chicken scratch really? So I draw this mountain on a white board and we section off the mountain in decades. We start in the eighties, there's the nineties and the zeros or whatever we call them and the tens and we go through as much as people can remember what decade, what superfood was a thing. So by the time we're done, this whole mountain is full of, you know, apples and carrots and milk and skinless chicken breast from the eighties. And then you've got flax oil and you know, the pomegranates and stuff like that in the nineties and then you've got kale and zeros and we kind of sum it all the way up to L. J. And so you can imagine the avocados and almonds and like all the things that are on this, right? Because you've seen all the studies, it's generally the decade that the new york Times decided it was worth writing about. That's the decade that goes into. So by the end of this, the question I ask everyone and to this date, I have not gotten the answer that I'm looking for unless someone has already heard me say this, I ask everyone, Okay, so what do all of these super amazing foods have in common and people and sort of the way they have been trained by food marketing to answer their high in omega threes, they're high in antioxidants. Like they say, all of those things that we have been taught via nutrition is um which you know, started happening when we discovered vitamin C under a microscope and we started thinking of food as the sum of its parts instead of just as food. So you might be able to sense where I'm going here now. No one ever gets the the quote unquote right answer. And so I look at everyone and I'm like no, everything up here is just food. Everything has had its 15 minutes. Can we just stop now?
[00:08:04] spk_1: You must tear up some controversy among different groups by saying something along those lines one would assume on my end.
[00:08:12] spk_0: Um possibly I have never really, I've never gotten it. Some people have tried and then when I take that definition down to Every food that is actually food has had its 15 minutes because it feeds your body and it gives more than it takes. Everything that has been manufactured, stripped of things re put together. When you put it into your body, it takes away from your body. Your body has to replace the enzymes and the nutrients that that food was supposed to come with, which are the batteries that that that your body needs to make that food work in the body. So if you're putting a refined oil or refined flour, whatever it is into your body, your body has to go to other um systems into the pancreas and to the immune system to say, hey, I need batteries to make this non food work in the body so that it doesn't hurt me.
[00:09:12] spk_1: So I have to ask the question then. So as you look at these trends and diets that come out all the time because you see something new all the time. I mean I've seen different variations of the same thing with different titles, different marketing, different branding, just depending on where you're at. What style of living do you do you approach? Because it is a style of living because diets are normally a fat, you have to actually have a life changing event for to be able to proceed for saying this is what I'm, my lifestyle is going to be because if you call it a diet, it's gonna be, oh, I, what is my cheat day? Well, I don't know a lot of good relationships that work out. When you say, hey honey, I'm gonna go cheat on a day, I'll be very back. This doesn't kind of go over too
[00:09:52] spk_0: well. Well, when, when I try to teach this to a larger group, it's a little bit different, but well, I guess kind of similar in the one on one work that I do, but I go really just down to the basics. People need to understand that the reason that all this research keeps coming out and regurgitating the same thing is because researchers need grants to make money. I mean,
[00:10:19] spk_1: it's a good point. I mean,
[00:10:22] spk_0: yeah, I mean, so it's just like that, that is just the world that we live in and everyone's gonna keep saying the same thing in a different way over and over because we have created the economy. These people do this, they need to make a living so they will regurgitate the same thing and depending what kind of coffee and what part of city and which coffee shop you're reading the research in coffee is either good or bad for you and it's going to keep going back and forth forever.
[00:10:49] spk_1: Well, I was I was reading something not too long ago where they were saying, if you're hungry and you don't have anything that's kind of fatty or has a lot of lot of oils in it, go ahead and eat a stick of butter, eat a stick of butter
[00:11:04] spk_0: that just doesn't
[00:11:05] spk_1: translate in my brain.
[00:11:07] spk_0: Well, you know, a lot of it is. So going back to what like, the food actually is, if you start to understand that a refined food doesn't have the batteries that your body needs to use it properly, so therefore it hurts you or takes away from you. That's helpful when you look at what, what was this thing that's on my plate? How many steps and processes has it been through from when it was last alive? And if it's been more than one or two steps, then, you know, that it doesn't have necessarily what you need. And then, because, you know, food became a big food, marketing became a really, really big commodity and think that, you know, drives our economy. There's this training that has happened in our, in our psyches for what food is. We label things as good or bad, which creates a conflict in ourselves and creates eating disorders and our taste buds have been manipulated by the things added to these foods on purpose to make us want them. And then our hunger mechanism inside of us has been messed up. But there's physiological reasons and and that's why I say willpower is not a thing. It's
[00:12:24] spk_1: interesting that you say that because I look at some of these organizations such as restaurants and we'll talk fast food. I won't name anything anybody by name. And they reference that they're looking for food Scientist, which I always thought was interest interesting in regards to how the warning was. And it's because of that exactly what you're saying. It's how they make the food to make it addictive.
[00:12:45] spk_0: Yeah. And because it's just become a commodity like fashion and we've just forgotten what food actually is and it has it, I mean, we'll we'll get back to the safety part in a bit, but it has a direct correlation to actual safety, because if the food you're eating doesn't have the batteries you need, then your body doesn't have what it needs to regulate itself properly. And with all the studies that are out there and it's gotten confusing and so people just kind of, you know, give up, everything is bad for me, so, you know, whatever. And then getting back to your question of the stick of butter, getting people back to the basics of what food actually is and then letting them know that their hunger feelings have been hijacked. You know, just like if you talk about, because I know you've talked to my colleague, Sylvia, marissa gets, or when stresses hijacked your brain, you're not thinking rationally. When low blood sugar and food intolerances and low batteries have hijacked your physiology, there is no will power that is going to stop your body from not forcing you to eat something to give it relief right now.
[00:14:04] spk_1: And it's interesting that you say that because not that I disagree with the reason that I say this is because this is our default. It's I'm stressed out. Let me Benji let me go to this cookie chips. It's normally my terrible go to, but I love them. I can just get stuff. But it's what it's one of those things that that's what we turn to, especially in areas of stress. So based on what you've studied in what you've learned, number one, how did you know that you were going down the right path And # 2? How do you know what is the right food?
[00:14:38] spk_0: So how do you mean? How does some, someone else know that they're going down the right path? I'm asking
[00:14:43] spk_1: you, how did you, how did you figure out that you were going down the right path is okay? You're doing this other amazing career, you decided that you had to go into the biology side of the world? How do you know that the information that you're getting at the time is a correct info because apparently it's worked out for you. But you know, I mean how do you distinguish especially now seeing so many different research papers or white papers or information out there, That's not what we will say accurate for everyone.
[00:15:06] spk_0: I think that part of that answer is just simply the fact that I was born with this ability to step back and look at the big picture. I don't really think that I could necessarily credit the things I've actually studied with, the perspective that I bring to my work now. I've always been determined to see all of the details, kinda get a lay of the land and then I stepped back. I choose to forget a lot of the details and just have a general idea of it. So I'm like that person that reads three quarters of a book and I'm like, okay, so I've got the main concept of this now, I'm going to apply it to this
[00:15:42] spk_1: seriously. So you would love the service called Bleep. I think it's our flip. It actually gives you everything within like seven minutes of the whole context of the book.
[00:15:50] spk_0: Oh, I actually might, might like to utilize that, that, that service. So, I mean that that's part of it and that's what it is, right, when you can take a career that a lot of people have and separate yourself and it is having a unique perspective, that's just kind of the person of the personality stuff that I think I was just born with. So, but getting the knowing the basics of it, what I have just really found and where the learning has been very, very handy is understanding the basic cause and effect of the biology in the body. And if you want, I can sum this up really nicely with the recipe that I have for a traditional north american anxiety at 11, a post lunch dip around one o'clock at a complete move collapsed
[00:16:35] spk_1: for J Allen show. Hey, have you ever wanted to hear what's going on around in the world of safety and you're not able to do so? Have you ever wanted to take a listen to what exactly is going around in the world of safety? What if we call that thing? Around the safety pie? We told you month over month, what is happening in the mix? Would you care to know, what would it be worth to you? Now? Here's the fun part besides that. You can find out exactly what's going on inside of the world of safety. There's also other information available there, stuff that you can start using as early as today. How about you? Give us a look go to our website. Safety FM plus dot com. That safety FM plus dot com to find out what exactly is going on, inside of the world of safety, around the world of safety and inside of the world of safety. And don't forget to tell them that J Allen Center, I'll see you on the other side. Make sure to join the revolution. Have you ever sat back and ask yourself that question, Who is in your corner? Well, that's what we're all about. On May the 18th at safety Day 2021 presented by the A. C. F. S. Come to the event on May the 18th at the Rosen Plaza Hotel in Orlando florida. There will be world renowned speaker speaking about this all important subject of who is in your corner when it comes to dealing with safety. If you want to learn on how to reduce risk houses aboard safety and be a health champion, this is the event for you. Don't miss out on this event available by the A. C. F. S. Now the question that always comes up is what are these events worth? What is the cost? What is it going to cost me? Well, it's not gonna be as much as some of the other events, You will get this great value for $30. Yes, you heard me correctly. $30 that's lunch, that's parking. And that's even C. E. Use for $30. For more information. Go to a cfs dot org. That's a cfs dot org. And enjoy safety day 2021 an in person event. And we are back on the J allen show on safety. FM. Yeah. You're you're spot on. You were you're spot on. Sounds just like it.
[00:19:06] spk_0: Yeah. So, and this is the story that I bring into accidents of adaptation because which we I almost got to um earlier but it kind of slipped my mind is uh when you talk about food and when you talk about being tired and you talk about accidents and mistakes that we made because we have been marketed with willpower and all of these things that are fantasies and don't really exist. We are kind of stone walls with guilt and shame which then leads to apathy. So it's hard to hear the messages now. So if you can kind of slip under the radar of those triggers and people tell them a story about themselves without making them feel like it's their fault. It changes the way they received the information and how they process it and what they can do with it. So my mental health keynote, which we won't talk about today but it's called it's not your fault
[00:19:59] spk_1: for these are the teasers. Are we trying to get them to the whole avocado? Is that what we're doing?
[00:20:05] spk_0: Well, I mean yeah sure of course we are. Uh we can touch on it if we have time for sure.
[00:20:11] spk_1: Please please please do
[00:20:12] spk_0: because none of my topics are really separate. I've separated them into bite size things to understand, but it's really hard for a company to bring me in for just one thing because then they need the other things too. Right? So I'm going to, so the story goes like this of the day in the lives and this is a rinse and repeat story. So we get up, we're tired. Maybe we had a glass or two of wine to you know, survive bed time with the kids the night before if you're a parent.
[00:20:41] spk_1: So
[00:20:43] spk_0: it's, it's seven a.m. You throw back a cup or two of coffee, you're in a hurry, you get the kids to daycare, you get to work, you have another cup of coffee. Maybe you grab the sugary muffin at Starbucks or in the cafeteria, whatever it is, it's non battery food. It's going to give you the thing to help you get to your desk and do something 11:00. Suddenly you feel a little bit anxious. It all it takes is one email that may or may not actually be someone that's upset, but because you're in a state of alarm because your blood sugar is tanking hard, you're lowering blood sugar creates a panic in your body that sets you up for an emotional panic. If something triggers you so you can perceive something that either that feels like a little bit of a threat and then bam you have anxiety, you cannot wait for lunch. You're starving by the time you get there, so you eat a big, heavy greasy, you know, mood pacifying lunch for a period of time so that you feel okay for a bit. Then after lunch, you get back to your desk and you're just so tired and you don't know why that space between your your eyebrows isn't working properly, because now your body suddenly has all of this food that it has to break down and digest. You've given it no energy from the morning to sustain this process. So your body moves out of the anxiety, stress response state that so many of us live in and it forces you into rest and digest because it has to digest this food, because if it doesn't break down properly, it's more trouble down the line. So now you're tired because your body is focusing inward to deal with the garbage that you dumped into it, and it's pulling resources from everywhere in your body. And so your brain isn't as high of a priority. So then you probably go for a cup of coffee or another sugary something to give you an artificial bump and to get through some of the afternoon that only lasts for so long because you've just set your nervous system and your blood sugar regulation system and your blood pressure system up for failure. So between 3 34 it starts to tank and now this is where you are hungry but you don't know it, you're moody, you're not sure how you're going to survive through the evening or get to dinner or whatever it is. Maybe you have another cup of coffee before you pick up the kids to survive. You get home, you do dinner probably the best meal quality meal that you're going to have that day and then your body is just upset and your nervous system is upset and your mood is upset and nothing is working properly because now your microbiome is angry at you. So all the new research on the microbiome is like if it's not happy and it's not getting the right information from the right food Because food is information to your microbiome, it's producing neurotransmitters aren't helpful. It's sending messages up the gut brain access to your brain. This is where you might feel a bit of hopelessness, you're not sure how you're going to survive. It's almost worse than it was at 4:00 but your home. So if you have a good home environment that helps if you don't have the best home environment that it's worse, you throw back a glass of wine to cope with bedtime. Rinse and repeat.
[00:24:04] spk_1: My stress level has just went up.
[00:24:06] spk_0: Well, I know it's a triggering story because we all if it's not us, if we have somehow managed to get out of that, you know, negative feedback loop that our world has put us in because it's no one's fault that there there are life that we live has set us up for that. And if you haven't fully gotten out of it, it triggers a bit. But then I go through the story of how this happened and that it is not your fault. And then, of course in the food stuff and the mental health stuff, these are the things you can actually do that aren't a massive overhaul, but really, this kind of stuff is going to come down to HR and health and safety, and companies understanding these things and figuring out how do we support our employees to understand these things without making them feel bad about themselves? Because then you and
[00:25:02] spk_1: that's the that's the question right there. How do you start that conversation? Because let's say, for instance, we're on a construction site is using this as well, and we have some of our people out there going to the go to popular energy drink at the moment and they're saying this is what I need to be able to make it through my day. They run out, get a hamburger, whatever french fries and so on. Well we know that this is not gonna probably be the best quality stuff for them. So how do you initiate that, that first conversation without sounding or coming across as, hey, this is what you need to be eating because this is what the organization is telling you to do.
[00:25:38] spk_0: Yeah. Because that message does nothing because people are too overwhelmed. Anything that feels like another thing they have to do is just going to make sure that they don't do it because they can't handle it. I did a little mini rant on this, on a video, on linked in a little while ago where I was just like, don't do another challenge. Like 2020 just happened. Like, like really stop no more challenges. So my my strategy because really like going back to what we touched on before with the way that I grew up and the career that I've had, because I also did a lot of stuff in the hospitality industry. Like I was a shift leader at Earl's. I was in a girl's girl for a long time. I managed pubs in the beaches in Toronto when I when I lived there. So I've seen so many different aspects of business and different things of of safety and the perspectives on it. You have to go in with a strategy and I if someone wants to bring me in for this, I'm going to say, okay, first I want to do this for your leaders. And then after I've done the presentation, I want the feedback from the leaders on what they're seeing so that I can tailor this to your demographics and your people and the cultures that are in your company. Does that make sense?
[00:26:56] spk_1: Yes, that makes sense. So let me ask the strange question. So normally when an organization reaches out to you, what where are they reaching out to you from? Like what are they looking at initially? Are they noticing that they're having issues with wellness inside of the organization? I know you spoke earlier about mental health as well or are they looking at that aspect? And they say, I need to call Sonia and we need to have this conversation on how we can bring this into our organization.
[00:27:22] spk_0: Well, previously it was just a company that was trying to get some wellness in and I was kind of the nutrition wellness person to bring in so that the coming in and doing a little bit of my, there's no such thing as healthy food would generally open the door for the rest of my work Now post 2020 and the way things are really coming together and the way I'm structuring things, it's almost like I'm kind of uh, it's newer now. So where I'm coming more from is the different perspective on mental health that I have, which is that I see it as an outcome. I explained, this is not your fault. I asked different questions and that's kind of where the interest is until very recently, where I've started talking about this, the safety of biology and health and safety kind of cock their heads and they're like, uh, no one's ever told me that sugar and caffeine cause accidents.
[00:28:26] spk_1: I know it's always the area surprise when that is brought up.
[00:28:30] spk_0: Yeah. So honestly, at this point, what's, what's happening right now is it is the take on stress and the relationship with mental health and food and our lifestyle choices and past trauma. It's like, it's almost like I can't really go in and do just one thing. So the best thing to usually do if they're bringing me in is what topic resonates with the leadership right now, that you need to know one. Let me do that for your leadership. I'll give you like a package deal to do the presentation that you need, you know, for the, for the bigger group as well and see what the company's actual needs are. So that's more of a strategic way to approach it. It's very tailored because no company needs exactly the same thing all day. Every anyone knows right now is that everyone's been stressed too long. Those that are a little bit intuitive or have a little bit of wellness background, they see the train wreck that's coming, but they don't know all of the avenues that it's coming down so they need someone to come in and explain all of these things to them and then you'd be surprised on the stuff that resonates with them and the direction that they can actually give to me. It's a long answer for your question. But
[00:29:47] spk_1: you know, I love long answers because sometimes I get answers that are just like yes and it's like, okay, I guess it wasn't open ended enough, but no, you're definitely covering some ground here. So as you look over the last year, in particular with everything changing in the way that it has and of course a lot of us being in front of a desk, sitting down for a long period of time, what are you seeing that has been the trends with how people are adapting to their food environment or vice versa, or the food environment adapting to them? What are you seeing and things that need to be changing quickly? Yeah,
[00:30:19] spk_0: I think the first place to go with this and of course this is my, my strategy mind kicking in is obviously we have not been eating that great because in the collective stress response that we've been in, even if, you know, some of the the pandemic kind of worked out a little bit better for some of us and not so great for others of us, there was still this state of alarm that we were all in that we have just adapted to because there's a global crisis. So to go in and say you got to change your food now isn't going to work to go in and say you've got to do this for your mental health, isn't going to work to come in with a message of, hey, so this happened and this is the impact that it has had on everyone. This is the impact it has had in our homes that it's done to our bodies. If we don't figure out a way to intervene on a collective scale, this is the collapse that's coming in. Our physiology ease, which then Will take the blanket out from underneath our mental capabilities in approximately 12 to 18 months after the crisis ends, so to speak, because we're in, we've been an alarm for too long. The foundation of accidents of adaptation lies on the work of hats sally. He's known as the father of stress. He coined the term with the definition we use today and so the three phases of general adaptation syndrome, which was his work was alarm, resistance exhaustion. We've been an alarm for a long time. Moving into resistance is where the body tries to fight the impact of the alarm to bring the blood pressure down to stabilize the blood sugar to support the microbiome and immune system. So we don't have Overreactions to keep the unhelpful Euro well not necessarily unhelpful but to keep the neurotransmitters that impact us the way we would define negatively at bay to be able to filter them out of the blood in a timely manner and try to normalize things. So we've been in resistance to long those bodies systems can't do this forever. And so that's why people like Sylvia and I because I know that you know her, we've actually teamed up were created, we have created a stress recovery navigation system for this to actually support the body systems that are taxed and that are going to collapse. And with that then our mental health collectively is going to go as well.
[00:33:08] spk_1: So if if people want to find out more of what you and Sylvia are doing together work and they go to find out because I think this is such important information because I'll tell you, I've seen your your team up videos on linkedin. You kinda do the drop buys. I even saw the one recently where apparently you weren't able to make it in the cat made the appearance for you. Uh which is kind of funny. Uh But where can people find out more information?
[00:33:29] spk_0: Well, the best thing on that right now is linked in, we haven't we're working on our website, we are looking for a pilot companies right now. The best thing is to find Sylvia Karasik and I on linkedin, you know, we've got some of the out takes and that kind of stuff which I think ended up being an accidental strategy of people kind of getting to know us a little bit and what it's like to have us in the company. But the best thing right now is linked in because we haven't released the domain yet, Survival of the fittest dot com is what it's going to be.
[00:34:02] spk_1: We got an early scoop. I love it. I love it. I have to ask the question from you. So I found something and I want to make sure that I have a clear direction of this. Do you have in grocery stores in Canada, your picture inside of some of these grocery stores with recipes that you come up with
[00:34:21] spk_0: the yeah, the local co op Winkler morden call up here and I have had a really sweet partnership for a couple of years. So how does that feel when
[00:34:29] spk_1: you walk into a co op and all of a sudden your pictures right there with what you have, what you're, what you're describing to people that throw you off at the very beginning.
[00:34:36] spk_0: Well, my, my face in the produce section is funny. It's um I think probably I have a tolerance for it because hearing your voice and your songs on the radio is maybe a little bit more jarring. So I think I had exposure to, to that kind of thing. But they've been really great for me because they really helped me move into the community wellness strategy that I have because even when the pandemic hit, they brought me in to do some short videos on your nervous system and the breath and on parenting strategies that are centered around managing stress. So yeah, my face is in some grocery stores and I'm actually working with an even bigger call up here in Manitoba and we're talking about doing even more stuff. So fingers crossed,
[00:35:21] spk_1: that is awesome, sonia people want to know more about you and what you have going on work and they go currently to find out more information.
[00:35:28] spk_0: The best thing is the whole avocado dot com. Make sure you spell avocado right? And just hit my, my corporate page. It has the description for accidents of adaptation and some of the other things that I do and that's just the best place and our connect on linkedin. That's where a lot of my, my little blurbs and little rants that I do an employee wellness are
[00:35:51] spk_1: well sonia, I am so thankful that you actually came onto the show today to have this all important conversation. And I really think at some point we need to talk about having you and Sylvia on at the same time to kind of go further down the path.
[00:36:04] spk_0: Oh, for sure. Maybe we'll let you be one of the inside scoops on survival of the fittest when we launched. Oh,
[00:36:10] spk_1: thanks again. Well, what did you think she had a lot to say for sure. So if you want to find out more information about Sonia Funk, go to the whole avocado dot com. No, that's not a joke. It's the whole avocado dot com where she can give you some more information on what's going on in her world anyways, I hope you enjoyed the conversation with Sonja as much as I did. Don't worry, we'll be back with another episode of the J Allen show before too long. Good bye for now. Want more of the J ALLen show. Go to safety. FM dot com. The views and
[00:36:59] spk_0: opinions expressed on
[00:37:00] spk_1: this podcast are those of the host and its guests and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the company. Examples of analysis discussed within this podcast are only examples. It should not be utilized in the real world as the only solution available as they are based only on very limited in dated open source information, assumptions made within this analysis are
[00:37:20] spk_0: not reflective of
[00:37:21] spk_1: the position of the company. No part
[00:37:23] spk_0: of this podcast may be reproduced
[00:37:25] spk_1: stored in a
[00:37:26] spk_0: retrieval system or
[00:37:27] spk_1: transmitted in any
[00:37:28] spk_0: form or by
[00:37:29] spk_1: any means
[00:37:30] spk_0: mechanical, electronic
[00:37:32] spk_1: recording or otherwise, without prior written permission of the creator of the podcast, jay Allen. Mhm. Safety FM. Changing safety cultures. What? One broadcast and one podcast at a time.
Listen On
Also Listen
-
EP 648 - Summer Music 2024
Lets enjoy some summer music today. -
EP 647 - Mini - The Message From RRSS 1000
Here is the message that Jay shared during the 1000th episode of The Rated R Saf -
EP 646 - Jim From Safety Wars
Today on Safety FM, we talk shop with Jim from Safety Wars. -
EP 645 - Mini -Pen Is Decommissioned
Ripped from the Main Story of The Rated R Safety Show.