Health coach Lindsey Kaszuba has figured out that the best way to make big changes in your life is to start by making little changes every day. Lindsey tells Zibby the biggest mistake so many women and mothers make is setting big resolutions that are hard to attain in the short term. But by taking small steps (and drinking water every day!!!), working towards larger goals like losing weight, exercising more, or adopting a plant-based diet become increasingly accessible.

Transcript:

Zibby Owens: Welcome, Lindsey. Thank you so much for coming on “Moms Don’t Have Time to Lose Weight.”

Lindsey Kaszuba: Thank you so much for having me. I’m excited to be here.

Zibby: You are a health coach. You’re a mother of two, I’m assuming. This is from your website, so you should really just tell me. You seem to have figured out a lot of stuff in this area. I wanted to pick your brain a little bit and talk to you about how you’ve ended up being a coach, what your philosophy is on eating, especially as a mom, and how the rest of us can get through the day.

Lindsey: Being a mom is tough. It’s insane. My whole philosophy is it’s all about the small, tiny, little things that you can do throughout your day that really create a big impact. It’s been a lifelong, really, trial and error for me. Just finding what works in each season of life, that changes. Obviously, before you have kids, you have all of this time. You don’t think you have time then. Then you have a kid, and you’re like, how did I have free time? It’s wild. I really think that it’s just all about finding the things that work for you and trying to silence the noise. There’s an overwhelming amount of information on all of the diets we should be trying and the workouts we should be trying and what our friends are doing and what the people that we look up to are doing. Really trying to silence all of that and find what works for you, that’s really what I focus on in my own life, is just finding the things that work for me. Sometimes it’s like throwing spaghetti at the wall and seeing what sticks and just making it attainable. When you do things that are really tiny, they become attainable. Then they just become part of your routine. It becomes something that you do. It becomes easy. It is okay for something to be easy. I feel like we overcomplicate things a lot of the time.

Zibby: Give me an example of a couple really tiny things that make a big difference.

Lindsey: Going for a walk, I think that’s a huge thing. I live in New York City, so it’s easy for me to just get out and go outside and see people. Sometimes I’m like, I’m too busy, I can’t get outside. Literally, even stepping outside and going across the street and getting a coffee does wonders for my mood. It takes two minutes. If you live in the suburbs or somewhere else, going to get a coffee might be a little bit more . Go in the backyard. Walk out on your front porch. Just breathe in the fresh air. I think sunshine and being outside is life changing. I’m from Florida originally, so the sunshine does a lot for my mood. Taking three deep breaths, especially as a parent, has helped me a lot, just taking a step back. I have a two-and-a-half-year-old and an eight-month-old. Toddler tantrums are real. Patience is not necessarily my strong suit, so really being able to take a beat and just be like, okay, we’re going to breathe through this, then we’re going to keep going, is very, very helpful. It takes two seconds.

Zibby: That’s so funny you said that because literally right before this, I interviewed Ann Garvin on my “Moms Don’t Have Time to Read Books” podcast and her main piece of advice was to have patience. It courses through everything. By the way, I have four kids, but my eight-year-old had a massive tantrum today about going to camp. It does not end, necessarily, just because you’re out of the terrible twos or whatever.

Lindsey: Actually, my two-and-a-half-year-old’s going to camp. She was getting ready to walk in. She was just like, “I don’t want to go.” I’m like, what? You love camp. What are you talking about?

Zibby: I know. I don’t love camp. I hate camp. It never ends. There’s always something.

Lindsey: Then they come out and they’re like, look at this cool art project I did.

Zibby: Yeah. I’m like, so you didn’t really hate it, did you? Then they forget the next morning. Nonstop, but so too with food. You can’t ever get over this. It’s not something you can ever put to bed. It doesn’t ever become not a challenge, necessarily. It’s always something you have to figure out a way to deal with. Sometimes it’s easy and sometimes it’s hard, but it’s always there. Were there any challenges that led you into this direction? Did you really struggle, or was it just a fascination with healthy eating? How did you arrive here?

Lindsey: I think it started as a fascination. Ever since I can remember, I’ve always been interested in health and wellness and fitness and just trying to do things that feel good. Definitely, earlier on, it came from a place of, I want to look good. I want to be skinny. I want to be fit. I felt good, but I was actually in a very unhealthy place mentally. I was so focused on the number on the scale and what people thought of me. It was a very vain, outside happiness. I got my health coaching certification from the Institute for Integrative Nutrition.

Zibby: I did that too, by the way.

Lindsey: You did it? Amazing.

Zibby: Yeah, I did that.

Lindsey: I love the program. I started it just to really increase my own process and my own journey and knowledge. As I started going through it, I was like, wait, this is really incredible and something I’ve always been really passionate about. I’ve always been that person that my friends have come to. What should I eat? What should I do? Have been that person that people have bounced ideas off to improve their routines. I was like, I should just turn this into a career, this is incredible, take my passion I’ve always been passionate about and help women become their best self and truly feel good. That just slowly spitballed into something where I was like, okay, I’m going to do this full time. Beginning of this year, I made that decision. I was like, you know what, leaving the corporate world, doing this on my own. I want to help as many women as possible. It’s just been one thing after the other. It’s been incredible. I really am happy with the balance of my life. Owning your own business is insane. It’s a struggle. It’s very satisfying at the same time. It just really started as a passionate thing in that I wanted to grow my knowledge and been rolled into this, what it is today. It’s so satisfying.

Zibby: Amazing. I love your recipes, by the way.

Lindsey: Thank you.

Zibby: I love how they’re presented on the site, and the snacks and the breakfasts and the green muffins. I’m like, ooh, this looks really interesting.

Lindsey: They’re really great. You have to try them. My biggest thing with recipes — it’s funny. I never used to like cooking. Just in the last year, I’ve started really enjoying it because I’ve been able to play around with really clean ingredients and playing around with being more plant based. It’s been more fun. I’ve made it kind of a challenge. Now my toddler is becoming — she eats everything. She’s becoming picky. She’s like, “I don’t want the greens. I don’t want this.” I started trying to get creative with my recipes and making them colorful, but not with food dye. The green muffins have spinach in them. She’s very aware they have spinach in them, but they also have chocolate chips, and so she eats them. All of my recipes are super quick and easy because I have two young kids. I don’t have time to be in the kitchen, nor the interest, really. I’m not the person that’s going to do this elaborate meal where I have to cook it for an hour. I don’t do that. Everything’s really quick and easy, has minimal ingredients, usually kid-friendly.

Zibby: What do you tell clients is the trick for maintaining motivation? I feel like women and friends of mine and whatever and me, you go through all these peaks and valleys as to how motivated you are to make big changes or to even focus. If you’re going to eat healthy or whatever, you have to focus on what you’re doing. We all have such limited bandwidth. It’s easy to feel motivated at the beginning, but after a couple weeks, how do you keep that going? What do you do when you start feeling yourself slip off the wagon? How do you get back? How do you keep people motivated?

Lindsey: This is this a New Year resolution thing. People are like, I want to lose twenty pounds. I want to work out every day and do this kickboxing class this day. We create these massive goals for ourselves. Then when we don’t do it one time, we’re like, we failed. It’s not worth moving forward on. We ditch that whole method. We do tiny, little tweaks to our life. Of course, have these goals, but break them down into very tiny tweaks that are realistic for your specific life. What works for me might not work for you. Maybe our mornings are different. Maybe our nights are different. The time that I work out might be different than the time that would be ideal for you. It’s really breaking your life down and seeing what you can move around to make these little changes realistic for you. That’s the secret sauce. The tiny tweaks are what it’s all about. When we think of these big goals, it’s very overwhelming. We’re like, how can we even do that? When you make really small changes that are realistic and achievable and then you succeed, you’re like, I feel awesome. I just succeeded. Then you do the next thing and the next thing. Then you’re setting yourself up for success rather than failure. Then you feel great. You feel pride. You feel strong. You start realizing that these little changes are actually making you feel really great and it’s worth implementing. I think that’s the secret sauce.

Zibby: What is your biggest downfall? What do you have to work the hardest on? What trips you up?

Lindsey: I have tried to get into a meditation practice. I find myself resisting it so much. I know that when I do it and I do it consistently, I see a difference. I feel so much more peaceful throughout the day. I sleep better. My thoughts, I have more clarity. It’s just tough for me. It’s really tough. As a mom too, meditation can be so important because it really allows you to center and focus on what’s really important and silence all of the noise. It actually really helps me with patience. It’s just so tough for me to do daily. I do , but it’s hard.

Zibby: I don’t even try. I love that that’s your downfall. I’m like, whatever, that would be great. I can’t even get past breakfast sometimes.

Lindsey: It’s tough. It’s really consistency, being consistent with everything. We’ve all just gone through a global pandemic, so I feel like we all have a lot of pitfalls.

Zibby: If you could leave listeners with just, aside from breaking things down — you’re right. You’re absolutely right. Small, actionable steps are obviously much more empowering than setting giant goals and failing, as I know all too well. What are some main takeaways for the busy moms who are just like you and who might be listening in the two minutes that they have free? They do want to be healthy. They just feel so time-pressed. What can you tell them?

Lindsey: Drink more water. I say drink water for pretty much everything. Oftentimes when we feel hungry, we’re actually dehydrated. Drinking water before every meal and first thing when you step out of bed really helps control your hunger ques. Then just stopping to really listen to your body. What do you need? Notice when you’re having a craving and you go for a snack. Why are you reaching for the snack? Really pay attention to your inner voice and your inner being because that person really, truly exists. That’s the person that we should really try to listen to the most. It’s hard to do because there’s a lot of external noise that’s going on around us constantly. Just really tuning in and listening to what your body is telling you. It’s a really smart machine.

Zibby: My body is telling me to go get more coffee and eat more sugar, so I don’t know. I don’t know if I should listen to my own body at the moment.

Lindsey: Have a glass of water first.

Zibby: I never drink water. I see how long I can go without drinking water. It’s the worst. I’m the worst. Lindsey, thank you so much. Thanks for coming on. Thanks for sharing your tips. How can people find you and research you and all of that good stuff?

Lindsey: I’m on social media. My handle is Lindsey Kaszuba Health. The last name is K-A-S-Z-U-B-A. Lindsey Kaszuba Health and lindseykaszubahealth.com. I also do free consults. For anybody that is interested in just learning more or chatting and how I work with my clients, set up a call.

Zibby: Amazing. Excellent. Thank you.

Lindsey: Thank you so much, Zibby. It was so great chatting with you.

Zibby: I hope you have better luck with the camp drop-off tomorrow. I hope I do too.

Lindsey: Me too.

Zibby: Thanks.

Lindsey: Bye. Thanks so much.

Zibby: Buh-bye.

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