So I did this podcast interview a few weeks back and honestly, I haven’t been able to get it out of my head.
It doesn’t come out for another month or so, but there were so many good moments in it that I just couldn’t sit on it and wait. I had to write about it now.
Her name is Toni. She’s 62. Full-time public health nurse, mom of six, grandma of five. She lives out in rural Minnesota, skis through the woods with her four dogs in the winter, and every summer she takes her kids on these multi-day canoe trips deep into the wilderness.
She also had never picked up a weight in her life before coming to us.
One of her main goals when she joined? She wanted to be able to flip a canoe over her head again. She’d lost the strength to do it and it was driving her crazy. That was her thing. Not “lose weight” or “get fit.” Flip the canoe.
I loved that.
Anyway, I pulled out five things from our conversation that really stayed with me. Nothing groundbreaking, but the way Toni said them just hit differently. I think you’ll see what I mean.
Your why needs to be something you can feel, not just think.
Toni didn’t come to us because she wanted to “be healthier.” She came because she got an osteopenia diagnosis that genuinely shocked her, and because she couldn’t flip her canoe anymore, and because she could see herself slowly losing the ability to do the things she loves with the people she loves.
She said to me: “I can’t flip it. I flip it by myself. It’s up on my shoulders to carry. That’s the thing I have lost the ability to do. So I’m going to get back.”
That’s it. That’s her why. Super specific. Tied to something real. I think when the why is that clear, motivation stops being something you have to chase. It just kind of shows up.
Starting scared is completely okay.
Toni told Ivy on her intake call that she wasn’t sure this was going to work for her. She had zero confidence going in, zero experience with strength training, no gym nearby, and a life that was already completely full.
She described the idea of strength training before the program as “horrid.” She didn’t know where to start, didn’t know what was too much or too little, and was honestly a little afraid of failing at it.
Then a few months in she told me she wakes up excited to train. She’s having “so much fun.” She did not see that coming.
I think about this a lot because so many people wait until they feel ready. But Toni wasn’t ready. She was scared and she started anyway. And that made all the difference.
Protein might be the simplest thing you’re not doing.
This one came up naturally in our conversation and it just stuck with me.
Toni is a nurse. She’s been plant-based for three and a half years. She reads the books, she does the research. And she still wasn’t getting nearly enough protein.
When we got her closer to her target, the cravings she’d been battling for years started to quiet down. The scale started moving after being stuck for almost two years. She felt stronger in her workouts.
She laughed and said “why did I have to wait until I was 62 to figure this out?”
If you’re eating well and things still feel stuck, it’s worth looking at your protein. Genuinely. It’s one of those things that sounds too simple to matter and then you try it and you’re like oh. Yeah. Okay.
Nobody’s journey is clean and that’s kind of the whole point.
Toni works four ten-hour shifts a week. She travels. She goes on five-day wilderness trips with no gym access. She still battles evening snacking. Life does not stop because you’re in a transformation.
And she’s down 13 pounds of fat, she’s building muscle, her bone density is improving.
When she slips up she wins the next meal and keeps going. When a trip interrupts things she picks it back up on the other side. That’s genuinely it.
She said something during the interview that I wrote down immediately: “Consistency compounds.” Simple. But the way she said it, after everything she’s navigated to get there, it just landed.
The story you’re telling yourself about why it won’t work is probably wrong.
I want to say this as gently as I can because I know it’s a sensitive one.
Toni came in not really trusting herself. She’d tried things before. They hadn’t worked. She wasn’t sure she was going to be the person this worked for either.
At some point I said to her, look, we’ve done this with over 1,200 people. Do you really think you’re going to be the one exception?
She laughed. And then she got to work.
I’m not saying your history doesn’t matter or that your situation isn’t real. I’m just saying that story we tell ourselves about why we’re different, why this probably won’t stick, why now isn’t the right time, that story has been wrong so many times before. It might be worth questioning it.
The episode comes out in about a month and I think a lot of you are going to love it.
If something in here resonated with you, just hit reply and let me know which one. I genuinely read every single one.
Sincerely,
Maxime Sigouin
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