Healing Asthma with a Plant-Based Diet with Margot Freitag: PYP 347

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Margot Freitag is a coach who helps people transition to a plant-based diet successfully and sustainably. Growing up in Northwest Ontario (cue "Helpless" by Neil Young), she suffered from asthma, and made constant trips to the ER throughout her childhood. As a teen, she became a yoyo dieter, trying every variation she stumbled across in an attempt to lose weight: the apple-only diet, the "don't eat for a week" diet, low carb, etc. One plan she tried allowed her to eat cheese but not carrots, because sugar. (Sigh...) As luck would have it, her nutrition instructor in massage school was none other than superstar dietitian Brenda Davis (who kindly appeared on this podcast's 18th episode to talk about defeating diabetes and debunking paleo). From Brenda, Margot learned that dairy was not her friend. Read more »

How to Have a Good (and Healthy) Day with Caroline Webb: PYP 344

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Caroline Webb is the author of the wonderfully entertaining and useful How to Have a Good Day, which is basically a cookbook of how to be an effective human in the world. She is an executive coach, economist, and speaker, and the book comes out of her extensive knowledge of behavioral science and its application in the real world. How to Have a Good Day has influenced my own health coaching so much, I wanted to talk with Caroline specifically about applying her tools and "recipes" to the challenges around improving diet and lifestyle. Read more »

“It Turns Out Willpower Doesn’t Exist” with Jud Brewer, MD PhD: PYP 337

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Jud Brewer is Director of Research and Innovation at the Mindfulness Center at Brown University, and a second-time guest on Plant Yourself. I wanted to catch up with Jud to find out how his academic research and public writing had migrated into the world. What is the state of mindfulness-based health improvement? Does he have data on how his approach compares to current best practices, like Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for smoking and other addictions.  Read more »

The Martial Art of Tech-Proofing with Glenn Murphy: PYP 322

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Our lives have changed dramatically since 2007, when the first iPhone was introduced.As today’s guest, Glenn Murphy, points out, if we handled any other object over 1000 times a day, we would be considered severely OCD, or addicted, or certainly life-impaired in some way.Yet that’s exactly how many times most of us reach for our smartphones in a typical day.And this behavior pattern is not just weird - it’s damaging to our productivity and mental health. Read more »

Changing Habits and Lifestyle Through the Entrepreneurial Process with Danny Warshay: PYP 315

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Danny Warshay is the executive director of the Nelson Center for Entrepreneurship at Brown University, and a long-time friend. He dropped by to talk about how to apply his Entrepreneurial Process to lifestyle and habit change. Neither of us knew exactly what we would discover when we began speaking, although we both had hunches that there was direct applicability somehow, some way Read more »

Vanquishing Procrastination with Hillary Rettig: PYP 306

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Hillary Rettig is both an activist and a productivity expert, two vocations that don't seem to have much in common at first glance. But as soon as I started reading two of her books, The Lifelong Activist  and The Prolific Writer, I got the connection. Unproductive would-be activists are disempowered activists. And in a world that systematically tries to disempower those who challenge its structures of power and privilege, the last thing we need is to get in our own way when we stand up to injustice. Read more »

“If You Want Real Change, Make Real Change” with Joseph Alexander: PYP 305

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Joseph Alexander is a nurse and park ranger in Minnesota. He's always been interested in health, and has always loved the outdoors. Knowing just those facts about Joseph, if you were to close your eyes and picture him in your imagination, you probably wouldn't see him as a 438-pound diabetic who had started - and given up on - just about every diet and weight loss strategy known to man. Read more »

Howard Jacobson on Procrastination, Cocoons, and the Unfinished Office: PYP 303

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Happy New Year! I come to you today from the cab of my truck, in my driveway, to talk about the fact that my new office isn’t ready to move in, and it’s January 1, and it’s kind of driving me crazy. I don't even have access to my studio, my computer, my completed interviews - nothing. Everything is in tight storage, because I thought the new office would be ready for me by New Year's Eve. I turn for solace and wisdom to the poet David Whyte. In today's episode, I read and discuss with you a short essay titled “Procrastination.” Read more »

Defeating Distraction and Living Powerfully with Chris Bailey: PYP 301

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When you're doing a video podcast with the guy who wrote the book on focus and mastering our attention, you don't take lots of notes. Instead, you look at your guest and stay present to the wisdom and insight he's dropping left and right. Which explains why I don't have a lot of show notes for today's guest, Chris Bailey. Chris and I got on Skype to discuss his latest book, Hyperfocus: How to be More Productive in a World of Distraction.  Read more »