Why do high-achieving women struggle most with the very thing they think defines them: performance?
Ciara Foy spent years believing success meant hustle, billable hours, and proving her worth through perfectionism. She thrived in Toronto’s cutthroat Bay Street legal world, worked with two assistants (one for 9-5, another for 5-midnight), and equated exhaustion with excellence. On the outside, she was crushing it. On the inside, she was crumbling under an eating disorder, control issues, and the belief that rest meant weakness.
Who is Ciara Foy?
Ciara is a Registered Holistic Nutritionist and author of “Empowered by Food,” specializing in helping women over 40 thrive through perimenopause with hormone-balancing nutrition and metabolic health strategies. After leaving her high-stress Bay Street executive career to reclaim her own health, Ciara discovered that conventional diet approaches fail perimenopausal women facing the perfect storm of declining estrogen, muscle loss, and metabolic shifts. Known for her warm yet no-nonsense approach, Ciara believes that while doctors treat disease, they weren’t trained in metabolic optimization or prevention.
Ciara’s Story: From Perfectionism to Self-Preservation
Ciara’s definition of success has been rewritten more times than most people attempt in a lifetime. From corporate law clerk billing insane hours to stay-at-home mom drowning in isolation and postpartum depression, from building two full-service weight loss clinics to navigating divorce, health breakdowns, and devastating loss, Ciara has learned that high performance without boundaries isn’t performance at all. It’s just slow-motion burnout dressed up as ambition.
In her 20s, success meant external validation through billable hours and perfectionism. It meant developing an eating disorder after getting fired, then proving everyone wrong by landing a role at one of Canada’s top law firms. It meant saying yes to abandoning her law career dreams when her ex-husband suggested she stay home with their daughter, then feeling resentful and lost in the monotony of motherhood.
The breaking point came when pregnancy forced her to confront the eating disorder head-on. She made a deal with God: help me overcome this, and I’ll devote my life to helping other women do the same. That promise launched her into holistic nutrition, where knowledge became the key that unlocked freedom from food fear and perfectionist thinking.
But the real transformation came in her 40s, when life handed her grief, loss, and circumstances that would have decimated the hustle-obsessed version of herself. When she lost her 11-month-old puppy Torrin recently, the pain was devastating. But instead of abandoning herself the way she once would have, Ciara held the line on the foundational habits that keep her whole: sleep, movement, three square meals. Not because she’s superhuman, but because she’s finally learned that high performance requires self-compassion, not just willpower.
Today, at 49, Ciara defines success not by how much she can do, but by the freedom to choose how she shows up. She works with high-achieving women who, like her younger self, are running on fumes and calling it ambition.
What we talk about in this episode:
- Why perfectionism is really about control, not excellence – Ciara reveals how her eating disorder emerged after getting fired, and why the belief “I have to be perfect to be loved” nearly destroyed her health and relationships.
- The cost of abandoning yourself for someone else’s version of success – How leaving her law career dreams to become a stay-at-home mom left Ciara isolated, resentful, and 70 pounds heavier, searching for external validation she could no longer get from work.
- What high performance actually requires in your 40s and 50s – Forget hustle. Ciara explains why boundaries, sleep, self-compassion, and treating your body like you treat your babies are non-negotiables for sustainable success.
- How to stay in integrity with yourself when life falls apart – When devastating loss hit, Ciara didn’t push through or perform her way out of grief. She held the line on foundational habits while giving herself permission to feel everything.
- Why knowledge is the key to food freedom – How understanding the “why” behind nutrition gave Ciara agency over her body and broke the all-or-nothing perfectionist patterns that kept her stuck.
- The difference between high performance and high hustle – Success used to mean billable hours and burning the candle at both ends. Now it means executing the things that matter at a very high level while having the courage to let everything else go.
- What it means to treat your body like your baby – Ciara’s powerful reframe: your body relies on you the way your children do. Would you deprive your baby of sleep, nourishment, and care? Then why are you doing it to yourself?
- How to maintain muscle and metabolic health through perimenopause – Why eating three square meals during grief wasn’t about willpower, it was about self-preservation and refusing to lose the strength she’s worked decades to build.
- Why freedom is the ultimate success metric – After chasing external validation her entire life, Ciara now measures success by one thing: the ability to choose how, when, and with whom she shows up.
This episode is for you if you’ve ever:
- Believed that success meant hustle, billable hours, and proving your worth through exhaustion
- Abandoned your own dreams or career to accommodate someone else’s vision for your life
- Struggled with perfectionism, control issues, or the belief that you have to be perfect to be loved
- Found yourself numbing with food, scrolling, or other behaviors when the pressure became too much
- Felt resentful being everyone’s rock while quietly crumbling inside
- Wondered if you’re a high performer or just someone who’s really good at running on fumes
- Sacrificed sleep, movement, or basic self-care because “there’s too much to do”
- Lost yourself in motherhood, a relationship, or a role that looked good on the outside but felt empty inside
- Struggled to eat or care for yourself during grief, stress, or major life transitions
- Built impressive external success while feeling disconnected from your own body and needs
- Equated rest with weakness and boundaries with selfishness
- Wondered what high performance actually looks like in your 40s and 50s when hustle stops working
How to redefine high performance without burning out
Here’s what most high-achieving women don’t realize: the version of success you built in your 20s and 30s will absolutely destroy you in your 40s and beyond. The hustle, the perfectionism, the belief that rest is weakness – those patterns don’t just stop working, they start actively harming you.
Ciara’s story shows us that real high performance isn’t about how much you can do. It’s about how well you can execute what actually matters while protecting the foundational habits that keep you whole. It’s about having boundaries that aren’t negotiable, even when life gets hard. Especially when life gets hard.
Because when grief hits, when loss devastates you, when circumstances spiral beyond your control, you can’t hustle your way out. You can’t perfect your way through. You can only lean on the integrity you’ve built with yourself, the promises you’ve kept, the habits that hold you together when everything else falls apart.
The cost of staying stuck in hustle-mode isn’t just burnout. It’s losing muscle you can’t easily rebuild. It’s teaching your body it can’t trust you. It’s arriving at 50 frail, exhausted, and wondering why success feels so hollow.
Ready to stop confusing hustle with high performance?
The Congruency Audit is where we look at the gap between the success you’ve built on the outside and what you’re actually feeling on the inside. We’ll identify the exact patterns keeping you stuck in over-functioning, the wounds driving your need to be perfect, and what it’s going to take for you to finally create success that feels as good on the inside as it looks on the outside.
You don’t have to choose between your health and your ambition. You don’t have to sacrifice sleep, strength, and presence to be successful. But you do have to redefine what high performance actually means.
Book your free Congruency Audit: lisacarpenter.ca/audit
Connect with Ciara Foy
Instagram: @ciarafoyinc
Podcast: The Empowered Feminine
Book: “Empowered by Food”
————————————
Success that feels as good on the inside as it looks on the outside.
00:00:06:29 - 00:00:33:12
Lisa
You built success that looks damn good on the outside, but inside it's costing you your health, your relationships, your energy. And no matter how much you do, it never feels like enough. Welcome to Congruent. I'm Lisa Carpenter, the coach. High performers call when they can afford to burn it all down, but they can't keep living like this either.
00:00:33:14 - 00:00:58:24
Lisa
Here we rip off the mask of success and expose what's real. The patterns that you keep running, the price that you've paid, and how to build success that fuels you instead of empties you. Real success is agency. It's powerful self leadership to run your life instead of being run by it. To let your drive and your well-being finally work together.
00:00:58:27 - 00:01:08:22
Lisa
Because the real win is success. That actually feels good.
00:01:08:25 - 00:01:32:27
Lisa
You're successful. You've built something that matters. You've proven yourself over and over. But if you're honest, the version of success you're chasing is slowly destroying you. The hustle, the perfectionism, the belief that rest means you're weak. It's not just exhausting anymore. It's unsustainable. And your body is trying to tell you that. But I bet you keep pushing through anyways.
00:01:33:00 - 00:02:00:10
Lisa
Welcome to congruent. I'm Lisa Carpenter, and this podcast is about what success actually costs you, and what it takes to feel as good on the inside as success looks on the outside. Today's conversation is with someone I've walked alongside for many years now, not just professionally, but as a woman. Navigating growth. Identity shifts, grief, reinvention, and the quiet moments where life asks us more than we feel we're ready to give.
00:02:00:13 - 00:02:31:07
Lisa
Ciara Foy is a registered holistic nutritionist, author of Empowered by Food and host of the Empowered Feminine Podcast. She works with high achieving women over 40 who refuse to accept brain fog, exhaustion and weight gain as inevitable. And she knows this work intimately because she's lived every part of it. Ciara spent her 20s on Bay Street in Toronto's cutthroat legal world, burning the candle at both ends, believing success meant billable hours and perfectionism.
00:02:31:09 - 00:02:52:15
Lisa
She had two assistants, one for 9 to 5 and another for five to midnight. On the outside, she was crushing it, but on the inside, she was battling an eating disorder, control issues and the belief that she had to be perfect to be loved. We talk about the cost of abandoning yourself for someone else's versions of success. Why?
00:02:52:15 - 00:03:18:21
Lisa
High performance in your 40s and 50s demands boundaries, not just hustle. And how to stay in integrity with yourself when life devastates you, and what it really means to treat your body the way you treat your babies with the care and the reverence she deserves. If you've ever confused exhaustion with excellence, or wondered what high performance actually looks like when hustle stops working, this one's for you.
00:03:18:25 - 00:03:49:21
Lisa
Today's conversation is with someone I've walked alongside for many years now, not just professionally, but as women navigating growth, identity shifts, grief, reinvention, and the quiet moments where life asks us more of us than we feel ready to give. Ciara has redefined success more times than most people do in a lifetime. From corporate leadership to motherhood, divorce, entrepreneurship, health breakdowns, and most recently, profound loss, this conversation isn't about resilience as performance.
00:03:49:22 - 00:04:10:03
Lisa
It's about what it actually looks like to stay in integrity with yourself. When life disrupts your plans, your pace, and your sense of control. We're talking about success not as something you achieve, but as something you learn how to define on your own terms. I'm so glad you're here today, Ciara. You and I have grown up right?
00:04:10:05 - 00:04:16:12
Ciara
Did you love that? Yes. That was a nice introduction. You're going to make me teary. I just know it will.
00:04:16:12 - 00:04:37:23
Lisa
Be crying in this episode. So you and I have grown up alongside each other in many ways, and what I've witnessed over the years is how often life has asked you to redefine what success even means. So I'd love for us to go in the Wayback Time Machine and look back at a version of you that believed success looked a specific way.
00:04:37:24 - 00:04:50:26
Lisa
So let's start with like Ciara and Corporate, which I have a hard time even imagining you in corporate. But let's start with hearing corporate. What did she think about the world back then, and how did she define success?
00:04:50:28 - 00:05:31:28
Ciara
Man with me turning 20. Sorry, with me turning 25 this year, we wish you was with me turning 50 this year. That is 25 years ago. That's how long ago that was. I was a baby. I was baby Kira. You know, it's it's so interesting. I think one of the things that has made me successful and I'll talk about, like how I defined it then, was putting myself in the right space.
00:05:32:06 - 00:06:05:21
Ciara
Right? So making sure that I was around other people who I could learn from, who I looked up to and success back then was definitely a whole lot of hustle. So I worked on Bay Street and I worked at a law firm called Davies Ward and back to Davies, Ward, Phillips and Vine Berg now. But literally on the street, as we would say, because it was like one of the top three, you know, business law firms in Canada.
00:06:05:23 - 00:06:39:12
Ciara
They called us Davies slaves. Well, I kid you not. I kid you not. So I was a law clerk who specialized in transactions, and I was attracted to that because I started in corporate. But I was attracted to that because it was more intense. There was more hustle, and it was absolutely burning the candle at both ends. So I had an assistant from 9 to 5 and five to midnight.
00:06:39:15 - 00:06:40:18
Ciara
Whoa. Okay.
00:06:40:18 - 00:07:05:28
Lisa
So in that environment, if, success was hustle and doing more, how would you have known that you've reached success? Like, what was the measure of knowing, like, if I get here, then I'll be successful. Billable hours, right? Could you ever build enough hours to feel successful? Like did you ever actually feel successful in that environment?
00:07:06:01 - 00:07:36:17
Ciara
I mean, I think because my, my idea of success was, so much more narrow than it is now. I actually enjoyed it at the time because you know, I think now I'm unemployable. And so what that means to me is that there is no way I could be put in the confines of working for somebody, answering to somebody, doing something a certain way that I'm supposed to based on what somebody else, you know, wants.
00:07:36:18 - 00:07:59:26
Ciara
Right. And back then, I was still that version of me. And so being in that environment, the reason why I actually thrived in it, even though it was like super intense, like, of course I was, I was 23, like, you know, well, I mean, I was 21 when I started in that area, but at that firm I was 23.
00:07:59:29 - 00:08:31:20
Ciara
And, it was it was really, like trying to figure out how I put this. It was really to me about having autonomy and having respect. So there was a lot of autonomy, and there was a lot of respect because I worked so much, because I built so many hours and because I was on files where I was just responsible for my work, and I didn't have anybody managing me.
00:08:31:20 - 00:09:10:02
Ciara
I had no, like, if I didn't, if I didn't walk into the office until 10 a.m., nobody bat an eye at me, right? Because they knew I was there. They knew I was getting the work done, etc.. So from a corporate perspective, it was the perfect place for me to be. And when I ended up at a law firm after that and there was like, manager of law clerks who micromanaged everything I did, I literally wanted to jump off a bridge like I would drive home with, you know, my now ex-husband at the time, who was also a lawyer, you know, who, like, works at, you know, the, he worked at the same
00:09:10:02 - 00:09:32:24
Ciara
firm. That's how we met. And I would bawl my eyes out because I couldn't handle it. Right. So it was it was very interesting from that perspective, because as long as I had the freedom to show up the way that I wanted, I was I was okay at that time being balls to the walls. Right. Let's sell about those.
00:09:32:25 - 00:09:54:22
Lisa
20 year old versions of yourself. So I could actually do balls to the walls, because that's not possible for me anymore. I know it is for younger, but there is something about that time in our lives where we have that, you know, we are chasing success in that way. Looking back now, what are the beliefs that you held that really drove that version of success for you, that you no longer subscribe to today?
00:09:54:22 - 00:10:14:03
Lisa
Because I know for me, so much of success was built around, you know, if I achieve this, if I do this, then I'll feel like I'm good enough, even though it was all unconscious. But there's so many stories that often drive these types of behaviors, and I so I'm really curious what those were for you for sure.
00:10:14:04 - 00:10:44:20
Ciara
Well, 100% it was perfectionism. And I think that that was the underlying foundation, because I will also share with your audience, even though now I'm, I'm a nutritionist and I have been for over 20 years at that time in that environment. I had a very unhealthy relationship with food, which obviously was a reflection of a lot of control, a lot of perfectionism being very, very hard on myself.
00:10:44:22 - 00:11:26:03
Ciara
And I had, you know, a new condo. So I was I was 21 when I put down the down payment for my first condo downtown Toronto. And I would go home, you know, at eight, 9:00, and I would go into the convenience store at the bottom of the condo, and I was on the second floor, and I would buy all sorts of junk food, and I would walk upstairs to my condo after a, you know, crazy, busy, intense day of being perfect and eat all of the junk through food and then proceed to throw it all up and have a protein shake.
00:11:26:05 - 00:11:57:19
Lisa
Perfection. So such a tricky one, right? Because it really when we get into perfectionism, what we're really trying to to do is control other people's opinions of our, of us so that we can feel okay so that we can belong. And it's just wild, the stuff that we get, the stuff that we get caught in. So on the other side of perfectionism, there's often this like we're looking for an avenue to just let loose, which is why, like people get into drinking, scrolling, binge eating, I mean, all the all the different numbing activities.
00:11:57:21 - 00:12:07:08
Lisa
So what happened in your life that really started to disrupt this pattern, where you really started to realize, like, this is not going to work for me long term?
00:12:07:11 - 00:12:35:07
Ciara
My first pregnancy. Yeah. So there was there was a lot of faith that was involved. From a perspective of, I think I really got reacquainted with God and started to have, you know, a lot of conversations and, you know, some of them were around the rocky relationship I have with my now ex-husband. You know, we were just on again, off again.
00:12:35:10 - 00:13:06:29
Ciara
But, I very much wanted to be in that relationship. And, and then it when I became pregnant, I was like, okay, like, this can no longer happen, you know, and it was really just like a literal come to Jesus moment where I said to God, you know, if you help me to overcome this, I promise that I will, you know, pass it forward and devote my life to helping other women do the same.
00:13:07:01 - 00:13:12:12
Lisa
What was the hardest part for you to accept about yourself in that season?
00:13:12:14 - 00:13:14:05
Ciara
Oh man, that's.
00:13:14:05 - 00:13:37:03
Lisa
A lot of grief. There's a lot of things falling away to go from a perfectionist to being a mom, which good luck trying to be perfect doing that. I mean, the whole thing of motherhood and entering into it is so messy. Relationships. Yeah. So I'm just I'm really curious what was what was hard for you to accept about yourself that season?
00:13:37:05 - 00:14:02:02
Ciara
That is a good question. I mean, I'm trying I definitely, you know, it was, it was all stemming from apparently I have to be perfect to be loved. Right. So like perfect in all of the ways how I was seen and how I looked and what my, body looked like, all of those kind of things.
00:14:02:02 - 00:14:26:03
Ciara
Right. And when the eating disorder manifested, it was because I got fired from my first job as a law clerk. And when I got fired, that is what happened afterwards. And it wasn't like I then went on to work at the best law firm in the entire country. But at that time, that shook me right. It really, really shook me.
00:14:26:03 - 00:14:55:08
Ciara
And so it, yeah, I think I think a lot of it also had to do with self-preservation, survival. You know, I grew up in a family that didn't have a lot. I worked from a really young age. I didn't ask for anything if I couldn't afford it myself. And, so, you know, that was like, if if I didn't maintain that my survival was definitely at risk.
00:14:55:08 - 00:15:09:08
Lisa
That risk. What was the story you told yourself about yourself when you got fired? Because that's that's hard for a perfectionist who is striving to, like, be the best. I know nothing about this archetype. It's that's really hard, right?
00:15:09:08 - 00:15:10:20
Ciara
And that's why to tell.
00:15:10:20 - 00:15:24:18
Lisa
Ourselves these stories about. Well, if I just work harder, if I just try, try more. If I put in more hours, if I like, cut my hair or do my makeup different, whatever it may be. Yeah. What what did you start telling yourself about that? About yourself in that moment?
00:15:24:20 - 00:15:48:11
Ciara
Yeah. So I did all those things. Basically my first job was again, I was in a law firm that was managed, and there was other law clerks, and it was kind of like this little fishbowl. So there was a lot of like negative female relationships. And I, I went there I, you know, showed up at nine, I left at five.
00:15:48:11 - 00:16:12:20
Ciara
I kind of did what I thought, you know, I should be doing. And ultimately they basically told me, like, literally when they fired me, they didn't just fire me and say, oh, you know, this didn't work out, but they literally told me that I absolutely sucked at being a law clerk, and I should go find another vocation. Oh yeah, that's what I blow.
00:16:12:22 - 00:16:33:11
Ciara
Like you should go do something else. And also I will also say that to me, the the being a law clerk was a stepping stone to being a lawyer. I was just afraid because I was paying for school myself to go to law school and then not like it. So I thought, okay, I'm going to be a law clerk and then I will see what that's like.
00:16:33:11 - 00:16:56:19
Ciara
I'll do my LSATs and I'll apply into law school as a mature student. So that was my plan. And so it, it absolutely ripped me apart like that was that was an absolute breakdown for me. And yeah. So I got myself another job and I was in.
00:16:56:19 - 00:16:57:19
Lisa
Another law firm.
00:16:57:19 - 00:16:59:16
Ciara
Right. And another law firm. But didn't.
00:16:59:16 - 00:17:05:09
Lisa
Change. Did it change your belief that you could go to school and become a lawyer?
00:17:05:11 - 00:17:20:08
Ciara
No, because I basically was I mean, this is kind of who I am, like, fuck this shit. This is not going to happen to me. You know, so somebody told me I couldn't do something.
00:17:20:10 - 00:17:21:17
Lisa
Yeah, I'll show you.
00:17:21:18 - 00:17:43:19
Ciara
I'll show you. Yeah, I'll show you. Because that that firm was called foreskins, which is not nearly as good of a firm as Davies, for example. Right. So but I went to another smaller boutique law firm in, in the mid term, and I just did everything at that boutique firm because it was a small firm. I stepped in, I was H.R.
00:17:43:20 - 00:18:20:08
Ciara
I hired people, I organized everything, I stayed late, I just absolutely was the star of the firm. And and then I got poached because I was on the other side of a file, and the lawyers from Davies were like, we want this clerk. And that's how I ended up at the best firm. Okay, so. Yeah, so it was, it was definitely if I if I work harder, but it it showed me a lot of grit, like, it showed me what I was capable of.
00:18:20:10 - 00:18:29:11
Ciara
You know, I don't regret any of those experiences, but it was definitely just burn the candle at both ends.
00:18:29:13 - 00:18:34:02
Lisa
So in having your daughter, is that what got you out of the law firms?
00:18:34:04 - 00:18:56:27
Ciara
Yeah. So when I started dating, my ex-husband, he was like, it would be crazy for us both to be lawyers. Like, you know, why don't you? I wanted to have kids. And he was like, why don't you stay home, have kids? We both don't need to work like this. So that was the plan until I was, you know, I had a really rough pregnancy.
00:18:56:29 - 00:19:24:06
Ciara
Mentally. Not physically. Physically. I mean, I did gain 70 pounds, so that was problem, but, but there was no complications. She was born at home. Everything was good. But I kind of lost myself. And that was like that transition between. Okay, I'm not. I'm done with this eating disorder and I'm not going to have any restrictions whatsoever.
00:19:24:13 - 00:19:38:04
Ciara
So I didn't want to be weighed. I ate whatever I wanted and it was kind of like it was all about how other people viewed me, as you said, because it was like, well, I'm pregnant, so people can't look at me sideways if I gain weight. Now.
00:19:38:06 - 00:19:54:08
Lisa
Well, I also find it really interesting that you were so, you know, attached to this version of success and working hard, and you're going to go be a lawyer and like, don't tell me I can't, and I'm going to. And then this man waltzes into your life and it's almost like you abandoned that part of yourself as well.
00:19:54:11 - 00:20:12:26
Ciara
Yeah, I did, I absolutely did. And that was, you know, once I kind of pulled myself out of I had I had a lot of work to do. I had a lot of weight to lose. I had a I was really not proud of how I treated myself during my pregnancy. I wasn't working out anymore. I didn't feel good.
00:20:12:26 - 00:20:34:18
Ciara
My mental health suffered. I had postpartum depression, I was alone, I was isolated because he was making partner at the firm. So I was alone with this new baby, and I was young in terms of Toronto standards, like I was 27. So, you know, I didn't have any friends who had kids at babies. I had one.
00:20:34:25 - 00:20:59:29
Ciara
And in any case, I was absolutely miserable. And that is when I went back to school to be a nutritionist because I was like, I cannot handle being at home, being a, you know, stay at home mom. It was so, so challenging for me. I think it's just absolutely the hardest job in the world because you don't get any credit.
00:20:59:29 - 00:21:04:28
Ciara
And again, I was always working from like outside generational.
00:21:04:28 - 00:21:18:18
Lisa
Getting that external validation and being in that hustle environment. And it's very, lots of adrenaline, which is the exact opposite of being a mom. There's a lot of days of of monotony.
00:21:18:21 - 00:21:19:01
Ciara
Yeah.
00:21:19:07 - 00:21:27:00
Lisa
And, you know, spit up and you wear your sweatpants. You're not even in a power suit. Oh, yeah. When you're raising a child. Right?
00:21:27:00 - 00:21:38:22
Ciara
I was so jealous when when my ex, like Rick, he would talk about, you know, going out for lunch with colleagues, and I would be, like, seething inside.
00:21:38:24 - 00:22:11:26
Lisa
Yeah. It's really. I haven't really heard this part of your story before, even though we've known each other for a long time. So it's really interesting for me to just see, like, how much of yourself you gave up in order to, you know, have a child. There's nothing wrong with that. Right? But when we make these big swings from one identity to another, there is going to be a lack of congruence, because that part of you that was into the drive in the hustle and the external validation and the perfectionism doesn't go away, which then leads you like, no wonder you ended up having an eating disorder because those parts of you were being neglected,
00:22:11:28 - 00:22:25:05
Lisa
didn't know how to to be with them. Because when we're in our 20s, we're not self-aware like, let's just face it, we were not self-aware. We were just doing the things we needed to do to live a good life. And keep our eyes in the clouds. Zero.
00:22:25:07 - 00:22:34:27
Ciara
Zero. That's when I watch a lot of TV. Like that's what my ex and I used to do, like watch TV at night. Like, I'm like, now I'm like, wow, that's so crazy.
00:22:34:29 - 00:22:53:08
Lisa
I still remember I used to watch soap operas. I don't even know if soap operas are on anymore. And there came a point where I had to say to myself, like, Lisa, this is imaginary land, and it's messing with your real life. Like it was messing with my head watching soap operas. So I gave up watching soap operas and, you know, got into life.
00:22:53:11 - 00:23:15:24
Lisa
Yeah. My first experience of, like, oh, what you put in impacts how you think and feel about yourself. Okay. So you you decide to go back to school, you learn about food, hormones. I mean, you've been learning for years now. How did learning about all that give you back agency over your body, and how did that shift your relationship with your with your physical well-being and how you saw yourself?
00:23:15:26 - 00:23:44:20
Ciara
Yeah, for sure. I mean, it it changed everything for me. Knowledge was really the key that opened up my world and gave me freedom with respect to food, you know? So and I know that, that is the place that I operate from in my own practice, because I work with women who are very similar to me. Right, who are high performers who expect a lot of themselves, and they are all or nothing.
00:23:44:20 - 00:24:11:16
Ciara
And that's why they've struggled so much, you know, with weight, with their health and being consistent in that way. Because the truth is, you know, like, you can't be perfect with your food. You can't be perfect in life. But they, you know, I can see them because I was there and, you know, from from that perspective, it just gave me freedom because of that knowledge.
00:24:11:16 - 00:24:40:22
Ciara
So it's why I always encourage, you know, my clients, I'm not like, like maybe some coaches or whatever, kind of like, listen, here's your marching orders. Just do what you're told, right? That is not me. Right? So I will be I will explain things. I will teach a lot. I want people to ask why? Because my experience for myself was when I understood why it wasn't.
00:24:40:22 - 00:25:00:08
Ciara
And I could connect that to myself and what I wanted and how I wanted to feel. Then I would do the thing because it was no longer like, oh, what cura says, or what somebody else is telling me to do. But it was like my actual knowledge base combined with really tapping into my body and what do I want?
00:25:00:12 - 00:25:07:16
Ciara
So it was all then self-driven, and that's something that I try to like actualize with my clients as well.
00:25:07:18 - 00:25:25:20
Lisa
Is that how you broke the all or nothing pattern within yourself? Like how did you maneuver yourself out of, the eating disorder? Because that is all about fear and control, right? Trying to control your environment, you, your body being the environment. So how did you move yourself out of that?
00:25:25:22 - 00:25:55:21
Ciara
I mean, other than the faith, I think it was like the faith part really brought into, you know, who are you? And treating myself with love and respect made me love and respect myself more. Right? So it's like, you know, acting as if and then, you know, be do have. Right. So I, you know, by really upgrading my standards.
00:25:55:21 - 00:26:29:07
Ciara
And I think that's really what happened to me in school for nutrition, everything was upgraded. From a perspective of how I looked at food, because I went to school for holistic nutrition, I learned a lot more about health, about chemicals, about processing, about, you know, vaccines, about all sorts of things. Right? So it became, a process of really increasing my standards for myself and, you know, through treating myself better and putting that much time and effort into myself.
00:26:29:10 - 00:26:55:28
Ciara
It's really like what you say, like what you love, you take care of. So over that period of time, it was, just you know, like constant acts of kindness to myself to bring myself to a place where, you know, I wasn't exercising as a punishment because of what I ate or threw up the night before. Right. It was very much I was exercising out of love.
00:26:56:00 - 00:27:24:12
Ciara
And really, from being a present, person, how do I want to feel today? Right. I know that if I, if I workout or if I eat this way, I'm going to feel better and I also had a ton of like, I was diagnosed with IBS and all sorts of things in my 20s as well. Again, like pressure, anxiety, all sorts of stuff that kind of lead into that, that gut brain connection.
00:27:24:14 - 00:27:37:09
Ciara
And so, the healing of that also was really helpful because, again, I was making choices based on how I wanted to feel not was like good or bad.
00:27:37:11 - 00:27:53:18
Lisa
So what I'm hearing is, you know, in your corporate career, you were running a certain version of yourself, and then you abandoned that version of yourself to become a mom. And then when you went back to school, what you were really starting to do was find the version of yourself like who you really were and you really prioritized.
00:27:53:18 - 00:28:03:17
Lisa
Instead of the relationship with work or the relationship with the partner and the child, to really cultivating the relationship that you were having with yourself and healing that.
00:28:03:19 - 00:28:30:05
Ciara
Yeah, absolutely. And that was I mean, that's hard because, you know, what happens when women do that? The outside world things for selfish. Yeah, right. The outside world, kind of tries to like slap you down about like, well, it it's it shouldn't be about you, though. Yeah. Right. That's the.
00:28:30:08 - 00:28:34:03
Lisa
Story that we've been passed down from generation to generation.
00:28:34:05 - 00:28:34:14
Ciara
That we're.
00:28:34:14 - 00:28:52:22
Lisa
Slowly breaking, you know, I guess in the circles I'm in. But then when I go out in the real world and I listen to people talk, I realize, oh, I am in a very small bubble of people who actually see the world this way. That's part of why I do this podcast, to open people's perspectives, in ways that they haven't had them challenged before.
00:28:52:22 - 00:29:09:18
Lisa
And unless we start to redefine success and how we take care of ourselves and how we look at our relationship with our bodies and our overall well-being, not much is going to change. Women will continue to perpetuate these patterns. And as much as people talk about like, oh, men are keeping us down, no no no no, no, it's not the men that are holding us back, ladies.
00:29:09:20 - 00:29:22:10
Lisa
It's women that are holding women back by perpetuating these stories and then trying to shame other women for living healthy, vital lives. And I know you see this all the time in your practice and online.
00:29:22:12 - 00:29:44:20
Ciara
Oh, 100% like when I had my weight loss clinics. Because I originally became a nutritionist, I was getting a divorce basically at that time after being in school for a couple of years. By the time I was done, I was getting a divorce and I had women sit across from me in my weight loss clinics. I had two full service weight loss clinics.
00:29:44:20 - 00:29:59:19
Ciara
I employed like 10 to 12 girls, and they literally said to me, I'm multiple occasions. I just thought that women like you were bad mothers. Verbatim.
00:29:59:21 - 00:30:01:21
Lisa
Crazy what people think,
00:30:01:23 - 00:30:21:21
Ciara
It's crazy. And I was like, you know, and I would. That's how I learned to have these really difficult conversations. Because when you have two full service weight loss clinics, you have you see so many people. So I have, you know, a lot more knowledge than somebody who is just running like a clinical practice on their own, for example.
00:30:21:21 - 00:30:49:03
Ciara
Right. Or just experience with women and, you know, and that's when we'd have those conversations. But like, okay, so but you've lost yourself, you know, you've like, you've lost your relationship with your husband, you've lost the relationship with yourself, you've lost your health. And you know, your kids are the most important thing. But would you want your children to treat themselves the way that you were treating yourself?
00:30:49:05 - 00:31:06:20
Lisa
Yeah, and that's such an important thing that I really talk to a lot of women about. It's are you modeling what you want your kids, how you want your kids to be? And if you if the words coming out of your mouth don't match the actions that you're taking, if there's an incongruence there, your kids will not hear your words.
00:31:06:20 - 00:31:35:04
Lisa
They'll see your actions. Your actions trump your words so you can tell your kids to eat healthy. Take care of yourself. Put yourself first all you want. But if you're murdering yourself, they're only going to see the martyrdom part. And that's the story that they'll there, that they will carry forward. So you define success a certain way. When you were younger, I'm guessing that you defined high performance very differently when you were in your corporate versus how you define high performance now.
00:31:35:04 - 00:31:43:15
Lisa
And I know you and I share a lot of the same views around high performance in our 40s and 50s. You're going to be crossing the line into the 50s.
00:31:43:15 - 00:31:51:23
Ciara
Okay. Okay. Great. Okay. You've been waiting. You've been waiting. You're like, I'm like, I'm like the oldest.
00:31:51:23 - 00:31:53:26
Lisa
In our in our peer group.
00:31:53:29 - 00:31:56:04
Ciara
Are you I don't you I have
00:31:56:06 - 00:32:20:03
Lisa
I am, which is really interesting for me because. Yeah. Don't know just one day I looked around, I'm like, how did I get to be the oldest here? And then be okay, be okay with that, because it doesn't actually really mean anything. And they're years as you get older. I know I don't need to tell you this, but as you get older, there is wisdom that comes with those years that somebody in their early 40s just isn't going to have.
00:32:20:06 - 00:32:29:08
Lisa
That's just the reality that that year, between 40 and 50 are tremendous growth years for women. I believe that's really when like.
00:32:29:10 - 00:32:29:19
Ciara
You.
00:32:29:20 - 00:32:39:21
Lisa
You, you wake up to stuff, you wake up or you're going to shrivel up and die in your life. You're going to dry out. As we were talking about before, we.
00:32:39:24 - 00:32:57:27
Lisa
You know it really? Yeah. The 40s really are an invitation to look at your life and say what's working and what's not working here? And how do I want to redefine this? Because, you know, once you hit 50 and this is the way that I've looked at it, I've talked about it, and I say it jokingly, but you're halfway to dead like your life is half over.
00:32:58:00 - 00:33:02:04
Lisa
This is a mess. Like this is this is math, right? I made more than.
00:33:02:04 - 00:33:04:08
Ciara
Half of my time to get to 50, right?
00:33:04:08 - 00:33:28:23
Lisa
Yeah, but the reality is we will age. And as we get into our 80s and 90s, I still want to be very vital. But I'm also not naive to the fact that I'm not going to be in my 20s or 30s. Like my body will change, everything will change. So yeah, in your 40s, if you don't start to step into responsibility for what you want to be, who you want to be, how you want your life to look, you are running out of time.
00:33:28:27 - 00:33:52:21
Lisa
You are running out of time to make the changes that you need to make so that you can live out the best years of your life. And I think that that's what the 50s and beyond are. They're meant to be the best years of our lives. But we see so many women crumble because, again, they're living under this old definition of success and performance, because we're talking about specifically, you know, men and women who are really high performing people.
00:33:52:24 - 00:34:03:16
Lisa
So let's come back to the question around how do you define high performance now versus how would you have defined it back then?
00:34:03:18 - 00:34:34:14
Ciara
I think the biggest difference for me is high performance has to have really solid boundaries, and that is something that I continually talk about because you have to be able to put your foot on the gas and also coast. Right. And so you need to be able to go back and forward, and you can't always have your foot on the gas, otherwise everything is going to fall apart.
00:34:34:16 - 00:34:58:14
Ciara
And I mean, that's that's why people end up in my, in my office. Right. So high performance to me really comes with high standards. But like, a lot of self-compassion. Right. So like, I mean, I don't have all of these people are always like, you have like, chocolate in your house. I'm like, yeah, like.
00:34:58:17 - 00:35:01:20
Lisa
And you know, I don't quit. I might add, having stayed with you, there's.
00:35:01:20 - 00:35:32:11
Ciara
Always there know. Yeah. There's it's like multiple bars of chocolate. But I can have like a couple pieces of chocolate. Like there's always more where that came from. Right. I don't have to like, it's not bad. It's not off limits. You know. But yeah, just, like having enough self-compassion that I'm not so hard on myself having boundaries that mean that the things that are always going to get done are the things that hold me together, you know, first and foremost.
00:35:32:13 - 00:35:57:09
Ciara
So sleep is a huge one, I think. I don't know where I would be today. Besides, like, honestly in a straightjacket somewhere if I had to go through what I've gone through in the last ten years and I didn't focus on sleep, right, I, I don't know how women manage, I really don't. That's always been a pinnacle for me.
00:35:57:09 - 00:36:30:03
Ciara
And so, like, learning to keep those boundaries because I like myself better. Right. You know, so high performance like it really. It's like bookended by just you know, first, my day always starts with something that's going to help me, that creates my foundation. You know, good sleep movement, really solid nutrition. Like, I can't imagine, you know, walking out of my house or, like, skipping breakfast or not thinking about those things.
00:36:30:03 - 00:36:55:06
Ciara
Right? Because that's literally what puts the wind in my sails. You know, I have such reverence for my body and appreciation for her that, you know, I often describe it as like, I talk about her quite often, and I often describe it as like, you have to treat her like you treat your babies right because she relies on you in the same way.
00:36:55:08 - 00:37:20:02
Ciara
And so high performance to me requires those things. Because if you think that you're a high performer and you're not sleeping well and you know, you're you're not nourishing yourself, you are hitting yourself. If you think that you are actually operating at the level that is possible for you because there is no freaking way.
00:37:20:07 - 00:37:52:15
Lisa
Yeah, I 100% agree. And I love that you woven that compassion as a part of high performance, because it really is such a big piece. And those foundational pieces around movement sleep, you know, I often say that sleep rest is a success strategy, like and and like you said, anybody who thinks that they are a high performer if they're not taking the boxes of basic self-care like the basic things your body needs to thrive movement, sleep, hydration, good nutrition, you you simply can't.
00:37:52:20 - 00:38:19:29
Lisa
And for me, you know, when I look at high performance, it's also about are you committed to you? Are you committed to your overall health and well-being? And are you committed to things that only matter? Right. Because if you're a high performer and you're committed to all the things, you're not really committed to the things that matter, and there's no possible way you can stay in integrity, even though you might be in integrity with other people, but you're constantly be breaking those promises to yourself.
00:38:20:01 - 00:38:37:16
Lisa
That's not high performance either. That's just doing, doing, doing. So I think once upon a time I really saw high performance as like how much I could do, how much I could do, how many boxes I could tick. And now for me, high Performance is about, can I do the things that really matter?
00:38:37:18 - 00:38:40:05
Ciara
Sit and execute them at a very high level, at a.
00:38:40:05 - 00:38:49:06
Lisa
Very high level. And that takes a lot of focus and a lot of integrity. Right. Like I can't, I can't be going outside of those lines.
00:38:49:06 - 00:38:50:28
Ciara
So yeah okay.
00:38:50:28 - 00:39:09:28
Lisa
So I want to talk about something that happened in real time. Because this is really the embodiment of this work that you've been living for so long, so recently, you just really tragically lost your baby, Torin. He wasn't even a year old. This is Kara's puppy was a nurse. Yeah, but it might as well have been her. Your child, right?
00:39:09:28 - 00:39:11:04
Lisa
Your fur baby?
00:39:11:07 - 00:39:14:18
Ciara
Yeah. He wasn't quite 11 months. So he was a baby?
00:39:14:21 - 00:39:21:11
Lisa
Yeah, he was a baby. And it really knocked you on your ass as it should have, right? Because life is always going to.
00:39:21:11 - 00:39:22:24
Ciara
Right. I know you're.
00:39:22:24 - 00:39:25:16
Lisa
Going to cry. This is why I'm like, can I ask you about this?
00:39:25:18 - 00:39:26:10
Ciara
I'll be okay.
00:39:26:10 - 00:39:50:13
Lisa
I think it's really important. Yeah. This is when we're talking about high performance and success. A lot of it is like how we show up for ourselves in these moments of tremendous adversity, grief, loss. So can you talk a little bit about what that moment asked of you and how you truly stayed committed to yourself?
00:39:50:16 - 00:40:24:04
Ciara
Yeah, I mean, like you said, integrity is very important to me. And first and foremost, you know, integrity to me is about how you treat yourself and and walking your talk. Because otherwise, if you only have integrity with other people, then it's just performance. It's not integrity. So, you know, for me, I am somebody when I'm stressed. I'm very much ruled by my gut and it is very hard for me to eat.
00:40:24:04 - 00:40:43:00
Ciara
Right. I could feel the energy. I think I told you that even when I would go and work out, I'm like, I feel like I'm not working out, but my trainer's like, oh, you just had a personal best. But it felt easy to me because there was so much adrenaline, so much, you know, hormones that were going on.
00:40:43:02 - 00:41:16:15
Ciara
So I had to be really conscious of that. But it's really the chop would carry water. My friends, like, you know, I knew that if I didn't eat, that is a scary thing for me at this time in my life, right? Because you and I are both petite. Right. And if you're a petite woman and you're 49 years old, and you all of a sudden allow yourself to fall into a place of like, you know, I was definitely depressed for a while.
00:41:16:15 - 00:41:37:28
Ciara
Like it was just a depressive mood that I had to go through, but I couldn't. I was like, sure, you need to eat three square meals, like, okay, you have to eat three square meals because the amount of muscle that I would have lost. Right. It is really, really hard to get that back. Right? So those are the kind of things.
00:41:37:28 - 00:42:02:06
Ciara
And it's not like it's a very different mindset from how do I look to I don't want to be frail, you know, I'm a single mom. I don't have a partner. I want to be independent as long as possible. You know, I believe that there is a perfect person out there for me. But, you know, freedom to me is that independence?
00:42:02:06 - 00:42:21:11
Ciara
And that means I have to be strong. So that was part of it. And then the other part of it, of course, was like movement. There was a lot of tears. And there was, you know, a lot of movement. The thing that was hardest for me to bring back in, actually, was my walks, because I always walked with my dog.
00:42:21:14 - 00:42:43:09
Ciara
Right. So that was the hardest part. And sometimes still hard, you know, like literally today I was coming home and there was always this guy in the apartment building outside of my condo, and, he was always out there when I would take Torin out because he smokes, right? So he would just always be sitting out smoking.
00:42:43:09 - 00:43:00:00
Ciara
We never talked, never anything. And every time I walk by him now, I'm always like, I wonder if he wonders where the dog is. No. And I asked him today and he was like, yeah, like, what happened to your dog? And I was like, you know, it makes me sad when I see you because it reminds me of my dog.
00:43:00:02 - 00:43:21:01
Ciara
Anyway, but it was it was hard. It was hard for me to go outside, to walk, to do the things that I actually really like. And so I just, I just had to do it right, like, I, I did my workouts, I had a personal trainer, I showed up with her, I did not I wasn't working out 5 or 6 times a week.
00:43:21:01 - 00:43:48:10
Ciara
I had like three workouts I took. I took it down a notch, but I went and showed up in the days that I didn't feel like doing anything. I just did something, you know, like I was not. It was just a matter of keeping myself in the game, so to speak. Because, you know, like when you feel like you're kind of hanging by a thread, you've got to do the things that make you feel safe, right?
00:43:48:10 - 00:44:11:12
Ciara
And so, like going back to that baby that I talk about my body and how I treat her, you know, babies, anybody who's a mom knows that baby is like, you know, most content and happy when they know what's happening next, right? When there is a schedule, when they're on the schedule. And I truly believe that our body is exactly the same.
00:44:11:17 - 00:44:33:00
Ciara
So I tried to give that to myself as much as possible, you know? So and that's the thing like when it's like the buck stops with me. But for all of us, it does, because nobody is going to come into your life and make you do those things. Like even if you have a partner, you know, they're not going to be like, hey, you have to do this.
00:44:33:00 - 00:44:57:05
Ciara
I'm going to feed you and like, push you to the gym and all of these things. Like, we have to learn how to show up for ourselves and it has to come in those really difficult moments. It it has to come from a really deep place and a really important why. And you know that that is what I truly believe is just like, again, an act of self-love.
00:44:57:05 - 00:45:00:24
Ciara
I was like, my body needs me to show up for her.
00:45:00:27 - 00:45:18:07
Lisa
And this is the embodiment of the work because it's not about, you know, I see a lot of women that get into, you know, life happens and they put their heads down and push through. This isn't about pushing through. You and I have gone through incredibly painful seasons in our life, and it was never about I'm just going to push through.
00:45:18:09 - 00:45:48:18
Lisa
It was still honoring the emotions, still being with the grief and still coming back to. But what are the foundational things that I live and die by, regardless of what's happening in my life? And so many people live by their circumstances, and if their circumstances change, then they don't stick to their habits and routines. And one of the things that I love about you, and one of the things that I take a lot of pride in myself, is that regardless of what is going on in my life, I embody the things that I teach.
00:45:48:18 - 00:46:14:03
Lisa
I embody the things that I coach, and there's a lot of coaches out there that are really great at marketing, and they're not so great at actually embodying the work. So I just watched you navigate it so beautifully and so, you know, it was so messy and it obviously is still so painful, but you're such an example of what can happen, when you do show up for yourself and again, like, it didn't have to be perfect, I know I had I, I'm like, you.
00:46:14:05 - 00:46:33:24
Lisa
My hunger turns off when I'm under incredible amounts of stress. I had to really work on eating, making sure I got enough. And even with that, it's still. I still ended up losing weight that I didn't want to lose. And I also had to be okay with that because it was not the priority of eating five times a day and lifting heavy.
00:46:33:24 - 00:46:48:09
Lisa
That was not the priority. It was, how do I love and care for myself? How can I dial this back so I still stay in integrity to the things that matter and the things that are actually going to help nurture me through, this season?
00:46:48:12 - 00:47:29:11
Ciara
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's it's hard, but the truth is, is that. I wouldn't have such a profound like, love and respect for myself. Like, I really like who I am. And it's because of that transparency. It's because, you know, I actually do the things that I say, I never ask, you know, one of my clients to do something that I don't do myself, even through the hard times and, that I'm proud of that, you know, and again, it's not like I'm not an overbearing mother, you know?
00:47:29:11 - 00:47:35:17
Ciara
Oh, no. And listen, I'll never get on a stage. It takes a lot of discipline.
00:47:35:17 - 00:47:55:16
Lisa
In those moments to to not go into overdoing. Like, I know for me that season it was likely. So you're not going to just pour yourself into your work. So yes, you get to find some solace in your work. But we're not just going to suddenly start working ten hours a day to avoid yourself. You're still going to go to the gym, but you're not going to necessarily push as hard as you would in the past.
00:47:55:16 - 00:48:23:20
Lisa
Like, I had to be very mindful of how I was utilizing my self-care tools so that I wasn't weaponizing them against myself. And even with all the, you know, all the tools and tricks and mindsets and things that I know, even with all of that stuff, there were some days where I'm like, you need to close your toolbox and really just allow yourself to be in the deeply human experience of this without trying to figure out how to move myself out of it, how to shift my emotions.
00:48:23:20 - 00:48:42:12
Lisa
Maybe I just need to be in at least. And that's how your emotions will shift. Because I don't know about you, but grief sucks, and it is the emotion that we most want to move away from because. So painful. And if there was a way that I could have fast tracked myself out of that, I would have taken it.
00:48:42:14 - 00:48:57:04
Lisa
And there is no fast track to grief. It's learning how to expand your capacity for that discomfort and still show up for yourself in it. Because that actually, I think, becomes the foundation for how those emotions move faster. That's just my take on it.
00:48:57:06 - 00:48:57:27
Ciara
Yeah.
00:48:57:29 - 00:49:05:16
Lisa
So now that you're in this, now that you're in this season of life, what, you're still, adjusting and adapting.
00:49:05:19 - 00:49:06:24
Ciara
How?
00:49:06:27 - 00:49:25:10
Lisa
Because I know that for me, success, how I define success has really changed over the years. And I think it's going to be a moving target indefinitely. Because every season of life brings something new. But how would you define success? Now for who Kara is. At 49, heading into her 50th year.
00:49:25:12 - 00:49:30:29
Lisa
What's important to you now about success and how do you define it?
00:49:31:01 - 00:49:55:04
Ciara
Success for me is more than anything is about freedom is, you know, I get to choose how I show up. I get to choose the things that I want to do. I get to, you know, spend, you know, take a week off of work and spend time with my amazing friends. I get to travel when I want.
00:49:55:06 - 00:50:33:18
Ciara
You know, I've I've worked really, really hard through incredible, like, shit storms. And to be able to get to a place where I trust myself, I trust my business, and I have a level of freedom that, you know, I just I just get to choose and that's that's really it. I mean, I get to decide when my calls and, you know, I get to decide the days I take off, I get to decide, anything.
00:50:33:20 - 00:50:37:18
Ciara
And that is something that makes me feel great.
00:50:37:21 - 00:50:49:13
Lisa
What is interesting is I've been listening to you through this whole episode, is that freedom is obviously one of your top values, and freedom has been the thing you've been chasing your entire life.
00:50:49:16 - 00:50:53:26
Ciara
But it the.
00:50:53:28 - 00:51:17:18
Lisa
The desire to have freedom now is coming from a healthy, grounded place. So back in corporate, you were chasing freedom, but you weren't chasing it from a healthy place. When you had your daughter and you left all of that, to get married, you were still chasing freedom, but it wasn't coming from a truly aligned place. Right? There were all these unhealthy beliefs and behaviors that were were driving it, and we always moved towards what we value the most.
00:51:17:18 - 00:51:40:03
Lisa
It's just so often we don't realize that the beliefs that are driving us aren't healthy, the values good, but how we're wanting to achieve that value, how we're wanting to honor that value, often doesn't come from a healthy place for many high achievers. So I love now that you're in this place where freedom is still that top value, but you've really done the work to embody the beliefs about yourself.
00:51:40:03 - 00:51:49:22
Lisa
For it to be aligned with who you really are, right? So it's like you don't have to chase it anymore from an unhealthy place. You're in a really healthy, grounded place with it.
00:51:49:24 - 00:52:17:26
Ciara
Yeah. And from a place of success like my health also has risen to that too, right? Like I'm moving into my 50th year. I don't have any worries about my health. You know, that doesn't mean that I think that I'm not like that. I'm, you know, impenetrable. Like, you know, that anything, anything could happen. But I know that I'm showing up and taking care of myself the best way that I can.
00:52:17:26 - 00:52:51:09
Ciara
So that's not something that I worry about. You know? And that's, you know, I, I don't think a lot of people have that peace, because we know that our world is more unhealthy than it's ever been. And when you're not getting enough sleep and you're, you know, like, constantly stressed and you're always putting yourself off your health, your movement, exercise, everything like that brings with it a palatable fear.
00:52:51:12 - 00:53:17:29
Ciara
Right? And and that can be just absolutely paralyzing, you know, and I see that in my practice with people and that's, that's another form of freedom for me is that, you know, there's there's always a next level, as you know, like if something ever happened to me, you know, like, I, I say this to my clients like there's always a next level.
00:53:17:29 - 00:53:38:22
Ciara
If, if I was diagnosed with something, there's lots of things I could change and upgrade and fix and do differently. Right. There always is. But, you know, I have a lot of confidence in myself and my body and just, like, have a lot of peace with that because her and I are like this, you know.
00:53:38:24 - 00:53:53:17
Lisa
So final question for you, what what questions do you regularly ask yourself to make sure that you are in congruence with your values?
00:53:53:20 - 00:53:58:08
Lisa
Like.
00:53:58:10 - 00:54:03:02
Lisa
And I kind of love that. I'm asking you questions that has you like pause and ponder.
00:54:03:05 - 00:54:36:08
Ciara
I really I really like that. I'm like I feel like I'm, I'm, it's almost become a habit now, you know, like to to just be who I say I am. But I mean, everything that I do, even when I'm writing sales pages and I'm speaking to clients, and you know, people ask me things like they're going to get 100% the honest answer.
00:54:36:08 - 00:54:58:04
Ciara
And that's what I'm always asking myself, right? Like, you know, is, is this is this true? Right? Is this true? Is this what I know to be true? And I mean, even today I was talking to somebody over, Instagram who was was thinking about working with me, and she was like, so, do you have a guarantee?
00:54:58:04 - 00:55:06:02
Ciara
I'm like, absolutely not. Not okay. Like, if you want it, if you want like an answer, just let's go.
00:55:06:02 - 00:55:15:27
Lisa
Hey, you are thinking, my friend, like the person signing up, like you want to guarantee you are that. And if you. Yeah, be that guarantee to yourself. Yeah. We have a problem.
00:55:15:29 - 00:55:47:12
Ciara
Yeah. And that's exactly what I said. Right. Like I, I don't blow like I just I'm not I'm not smoke and mirrors and you know, I've just got to this place and I think, you know, being almost 50, I think I've underneath been this person for a long time because even when I was talking about being in my 20s and, you know, caring more about what other people thought of me, that was from a like, I feel like a survival and success and things like that.
00:55:47:12 - 00:56:17:29
Ciara
But I was still the girl in high school who, when everybody else was wearing grunge, where I was wearing cowboy boots and Navajo leggings. I kid you not, because I worked in a clothing store and that was what was cool. And I got teased like crazy, right? So I always kind of did things my own way, but more and more, you know, every everything, every time something challenging comes up or even if it's a friendship or something.
00:56:17:29 - 00:56:48:08
Ciara
And I know, you know, through the period of time when I had my ex plant done and, you know, there was a friendship that like, you know, I love this person still to this day. But there was some things that came up that, you know, I, I can just let things go in a different way. Because I'm, I'm always asking myself, like, I, I lost, but I lost a friendship, because I put up a boundary.
00:56:48:10 - 00:57:12:22
Ciara
And I said, you know, I needed some time. And a month later, I was finally ready to talk about it. And I took the time that I needed and the person was like, no. And I was like, okay. So then I asked myself, like, you know what? I would I do anything differently today, you know? And it was just like, no, like I showed up the best that I could and that's that's it.
00:57:12:24 - 00:57:14:07
Ciara
This is it's all I got.
00:57:14:10 - 00:57:15:11
Lisa
I love that that's really.
00:57:15:11 - 00:57:17:23
Ciara
Good at my best. You know.
00:57:17:25 - 00:57:24:08
Lisa
This conversation is such a reminder that success really does evolve as we do. And often the most meaningful redefining.
00:57:24:08 - 00:57:25:23
Ciara
Moments, yeah, are the.
00:57:25:23 - 00:57:49:14
Lisa
Ones that don't even come from achievement, but honesty, loss and the willing to the willingness to listen to what life is asking of us next. I'm so grateful that you came on and had this conversation. I would love for you to share with everybody where they can find you, where they can creep you on social media, how they can connect with you and tell everybody a little bit about how you support your clients.
00:57:49:17 - 00:58:19:19
Ciara
Yeah, for sure. So I have been a holistic nutritionist, have been, you know, gosh, training and retraining for the last 20 odd years and have been specializing in women's health and hormones. And as a woman who is 49 in that perimenopause phase of my life, I'm very passionate about helping women, you know, really step into their power and letting them know that they can still feel great and vital.
00:58:19:21 - 00:58:45:03
Ciara
And, you know, my podcast, The Empowered Feminine, is all about that, right? So that I, like yourself, do not subscribe to this idea that we are just going to like, you know, wither out and disappear when we turn 50 and that we have to accept a lot of, you know, not feeling good, not sleeping well, not having energy, not performing.
00:58:45:06 - 00:59:26:02
Ciara
To me that is all just limiting beliefs and things that have been put on us. And so I help women in my practice. I mean, oftentimes people are motivated by weight loss, but, you know, really helping them get themselves back and feel good and develop that self-compassion. And when it comes to, you know, weight loss and their hormones really understanding what's happening in their body so that they want to do the things and they want to take care of her and they know why and, you know, helping them just have that agency over their health, how they age and how they feel.
00:59:26:04 - 00:59:51:22
Lisa
I love that one day, hopefully women will no longer define success as being skinny or weight loss. And they'll define what it is. And we're going back into that like skinny phase again, right? Like, oh yeah. Anyways, we've been there, done that. We've we've gone through that generation. We're not going back. But instead define success as, you know, feeling healthy and strong and vital.
00:59:51:24 - 00:59:52:09
Ciara
That.
00:59:52:09 - 01:00:03:00
Lisa
That to me is, is success with your relationship with yourself. Not that, that that arbitrary number on the scale. That means absolute shit. So thank you so much for being here. Where can people find you?
01:00:03:01 - 01:00:36:07
Ciara
Thank you. You can find me on Instagram. That's where I am definitely most active at Kira Foyer Inc C.r.a. f o y Inc. And yeah, I'm always in the DMs. And I also have, you know, if you want to learn a little bit more about me, my podcast, The Empowered Feminine, lots of information masterclasses on sleep and weight loss and hormones for women over 40 and lots of personal, you know, very, unscripted.
01:00:36:07 - 01:00:42:14
Ciara
Everything I do is unscripted, and real. So there's lots of that.
01:00:42:17 - 01:00:43:15
Lisa
That's why we get along.
01:00:43:15 - 01:00:46:28
Ciara
So when you're hanging out in my world, that's why we go. Yeah, yeah.
01:00:47:01 - 01:01:00:27
Lisa
Well, thank you so much for being here. Kira is definitely one of my go to people and has just become such a close friend and ally over the years, so I'm grateful you were here. Yeah. Thank you for tuning in, everybody. And I will catch you on the next episode.
