Why Food is NOT the Problem When Your Diet Falls Off Track (Ali Shapiro) | Ep 271
Do you feel trapped in a cycle of dieting and frustration? Why do your best efforts with food seem to fail when it matters most? Is it possible that your food struggles are about something deeper than food itself?
Philip (@witsandweights) explores the deeper roots of food consistency with integrative health pioneer Ali Shapiro. Ali shares why food battles often represent safety battles, how to identify hidden triggers and a practical framework to break free from emotional eating. Learn why food is more than fuel, how unmet emotional needs affect your habits, and how to achieve sustainable food freedom.
Ali Shapiro is the creator of Truce with Food and host of the Insatiable Podcast, and she brings a fresh perspective to overcoming diet struggles by addressing the emotional and psychological roots of our relationship with food.
Today, you’ll learn all about:
2:38 Why food struggles aren’t about food
6:32 Understanding emotional hunger
11:58 Tools Vs. Deeper psychological work
18:37 Food and the human experience
25:32 Stress, loneliness, secret eating, and falling off track
29:58 The T.A.I.L. framework for emotional triggers
36:18 Facing triggers and learning growth
38:34 Ali’s personal journey with food and health
45:04 Finding trust and meeting your needs
51:26 Compassionate witness and feeling significant
55:45 Outro
Episode resources:
Website: alishapiro.com
Instagram: @alimshapiro
Youtube: @alishapirollc.founderoftru9290
Why Food is NOT the Problem When Your Diet Falls Off Track
If you’ve ever felt like food is your greatest struggle, despite your best efforts to track, measure, and follow all the rules, you’re not alone. But what if the real battle isn’t about food at all? This article unpacks why food is often a symptom of deeper emotional and psychological triggers—and how understanding these can lead to freedom with food.
The Root Cause: Safety and Belonging
According to Ali Shapiro, creator of Truce with Food, our struggles with food often tie back to a need for safety and belonging. From childhood to adulthood, our emotional systems are wired to seek these needs, and food often becomes a substitute when we feel unsupported, inadequate, or isolated.
For instance:
Emotional eating can be a response to feeling overwhelmed or lonely.
Overeating in secret often signals a lack of support in your life.
Cravings may reflect a need for comfort or reassurance rather than physical hunger.
Understanding these connections is the first step toward lasting change.
The TAIL Method to Identify Emotional Triggers
Shapiro outlines a practical framework called the TAIL Method to help identify emotional triggers behind food struggles. Ask yourself: What’s at the TAIL end of your food noise?
Tired: Are you exhausted, physically or emotionally? Rest might be the missing ingredient, whether it’s physical rest like walking or emotional rest through support.
Anxious: Is uncertainty or external stress weighing on you? Focus on feeling resourced rather than in control.
Inadequate: Are you doubting your capabilities? A compassionate witness—someone who offers support without judgment—can help you navigate self-doubt.
Lonely: Do you feel isolated or disconnected? Addressing your need for belonging or significance can reduce feelings of loneliness.
By recognizing these triggers, you can meet your emotional needs without turning to food.
Why Falling Off Track Isn’t a Failure
Many of us view “falling off track” as a failure, but Shapiro argues there’s no such thing as a track. Life is fluid, and every challenge is an opportunity to learn and grow. Instead of beating yourself up, ask:
“Why does this behavior make sense?”
“What feels hard right now?”
“What do I really need in this moment?”
The answers to these questions can help you uncover the unmet needs driving your behavior and develop more effective strategies to address them.
Food as a Metaphor for Belonging
Food is deeply tied to our sense of belonging, whether it’s sharing meals with loved ones or the comfort we derive from childhood foods. Shapiro explains that food noise often reflects a hunger for connection, safety, or meaning.
For example:
A parent hiding in the pantry to eat after a stressful day might be seeking respite from feeling unsupported in parenting.
A corporate worker stress-eating at their desk might be masking feelings of inadequacy or unfulfillment.
The solution lies in addressing the root need—whether that’s support, connection, or a sense of purpose.
Building Self-Trust and Food Freedom
Breaking free from food struggles requires rebuilding self-trust. Start small:
Identify your triggers using the TAIL method.
Meet your needs with appropriate actions, like asking for help, creating emotional rest, or practicing self-compassion.
Shift your mindset from “fixing” yourself to learning from your experiences.
With time, these steps can help you achieve true freedom with food—no white-knuckling required.
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Transcript
Philip Pape: 0:01
If you've been fighting food for what feels like forever, tracking, measuring, following rules, only to fall off track again and again, and you're exhausted from food being the project in your life, this episode is for you. Today, we are discussing how the real battle isn't about food at all. It's about something much, much deeper. You'll discover why what you've tried in the past has not worked and how to finally move to a place that's less lonely and isolating and much more confident when it comes to your eating habits, so you can finally attain that freedom with food. Welcome to Wits and Weights, the podcast that blends evidence and engineering to help you build smart, efficient systems to achieve your dream physique. I'm your host, philip Pape, and today we are daring to discuss the deeper roots of food consistency with Ali Shapiro.
Philip Pape: 0:57
Now, ali is a rebel with a serious cause, a pioneer in integrative health, the creator of Truce with Food, and she's the host of the top-ranked Insatiable podcast. Go, give that a follow. I think she's going to have me on soon, so follow that podcast. She has spent over a decade helping clients break free from the cycle of dieting frustration, burnout, not to mention the challenge that we face in the industry with the medical system, diet, culture, body positivity, movements and she does that in her own unique way. And what I love about Allie's approach is how she goes way past those surface level ideas and the motivational memes about consistency and she instead helps solve the emotional and psychological roots of why we fall off track. So today you're going to learn why food battles are actually safety battles, how to identify your hidden eating triggers and a practical path to food freedom that doesn't require white knuckling your way with an unsustainable solution. Allie, thank you so much for coming on the show.
Ali Shapiro: 1:57
Thanks for having me, philip, this is going to be good.
Philip Pape: 2:00
It's going to be awesome. Yeah, the stuff that you talk about with food safety and the relationship with food is super interesting and I think a lot of people listening they struggle with these different thoughts that they have. Right, somebody might say you know, I just can't stop eating, or I have no discipline around food, or it might be very narrow and topic, like I can't help but eat those Hershey kisses every time I see them, right, right. So I mean, so how do you actually? You know, we know it's not about food. I think is where we're going to get to in this conversation. They're telling you something else. So in your words, you've mentioned something about the relationship with safety being part of that. What do you mean by that?
Ali Shapiro: 2:38
Yeah, and I love that we want to define our terms, because safety could be a lot of things, right? Let me start with the food as an example, because it can be about the food and you talk about this a lot on Wits and Weights. So if you think about like, you're sometimes having thoughts of like oh my God, I need I don't know a burger or something, right that might be. Your body feels physically unsafe because your blood sugar isn't balanced right. It's like you don't have enough protein, right, and so that food noise is driven by your body saying I am unsafe. I may have the calories, but I don't have the nutrition I need, right.
Ali Shapiro: 3:12
So I think- True hunger true hunger, yes, physical hunger, true hunger, right. So I look at everything through this lens of safety. What most people, if we go out one ring, if we're looking at like safety rings, like I think of like physical, emotional, spiritual, right, but emotional is kind of in between that and all of us have this deep primal need to basically feel at home in the world, right, feel at home in our bodies, feel at home when we're at home with our families, feel at home at work in a way that we feel we can contribute. So I think we can think of emotion as safety, as like abstractly kind of feeling at home, but on a biological level we also need to feel, we also need to know that we have that safety.
Ali Shapiro: 3:58
So, even though in America we kind of have this highly individualistic like and I'm all for personal responsibility, this is about holding the end and we need each other. And so one of the really interesting things that you know wasn't available to Maslow when he was creating his hierarchy of needs that neuroscience has now proven is that the sense of belonging is more important than even having your basic needs met, and that's because we can think about safety as when you're a child, right, you need someone to care about you to get your basic needs met right the caretaker, feeling at home and being at home with that caretaker and again, there's lots of variations in that definition but you need someone to care about you enough that they're going to get you to where you can be self-sufficient. But still, even as adults, we still have a need to have other people and feel like we have our place in the world and that we can contribute. And so that's what I mean by feeling a sense of safety.
Philip Pape: 5:01
Yeah, that's a very it's a profound and almost mind-blowing place to flip the idea of the you mentioned Maslow's hierarchy of needs and saying that we are social creatures. You have no argument for me on that at all. I used to be a very much like independent cause, like it's we're all you know, in my idealistic youth right, it's all me. But I've come to realize through family and friends and business and life and also, like you said, biology and what we've learned about evolution, that we wouldn't be humans without depending on each other. For that, I mean, babies are helpless for the first few months of their life because they're able to survive with humans.
Philip Pape: 5:35
So your work then proposes that this food noise gets louder because we are feeling separate or feeling alone. And I think you even talk about the physiological piece of that, like the stimulants or the attachment chemicals in our brain, I believe. So I mean let's keep going down that thread, just so people understand, okay, what exactly is happening. And we're not talking about physical hunger, we're talking about what do you call it? Physiological or psychological, emotional hunger.
Ali Shapiro: 6:03
Yeah, I mean, I would say it's emotional hunger, like it's the metaphor, the metaphor of hunger, right, cause our body doesn't speak in language, it speaks in metaphor.
Philip Pape: 6:12
I mean that's good, stop Hold on A metaphor of hunger. Okay, this is great. A client in my recently went back and forth Cause I was saying let's address your hunger, and she's like it's not hunger. It's not hunger, it's cravings. I'm like oh, I see what you're getting at and I think this is part of the thing we want to clear up with terminology is that hunger is like not just food hunger, it's hunger for many other things.
Ali Shapiro: 6:32
Yes, yes, and you can. I mean, I've sometimes call it phantom hunger, but I think it's also realizing that, yes, hunger is a metaphor, right, and so once you know your blood sugars, balance, your gut health, your strength, like, you got all the physical safety Right and you're still having that food noise. So an example I'll give you a couple of food examples of how people, when that food noise, when it's an emotional food noise, right, and these are come straight from client examples. Right, I was with, I was just starting with the client and she's like OK, so I'm all or nothing. And I don't really. I think all or nothing is that's a whole other podcast. But I was like okay, so when do you get into your nothing phase where you're like chuck it, f it, right.
Ali Shapiro: 7:13
And she's like well, like I'll be eating really healthy, and then my, my kids want to go to Chick-fil-A and we're rushed and it's convenient and easy, and so I will just be like, okay, I'm going to just eat this for this lunch, and then the whole day is ruined, right, and what we were able to parse out is that she actually has a story that her needs are inconvenience.
Ali Shapiro: 7:34
She's like I've been told I've been in inconvenience, like my whole life, right, and so it's like okay. So in that moment she didn't even know that she had needs, right. It was just like, oh, I want it to be easy, I have this food noise. This is the most easy path to that, because feeling our emotions actually requires space and time, because so many of us are going going, going. But that's an example of and it's unconscious, not because it's deep and dark, but just because you're going on automatic pilot. But she had a need there to feel like I want to eat something healthy, but she thought that was in conflict with what her kids wanted and she didn't want to be an inconvenience there.
Philip Pape: 8:15
Okay, I see she didn't want to be an inconvenience herself too. Isn't it funny how we separate our kids from ourselves sometimes like that, unconsciously or not.
Ali Shapiro: 8:24
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so it's like, okay, we need to work on, like how is this not like a being health, eating healthy is all on you, like you have to carry the family that way, like because when we're often in all or nothing, we we think we're in, things are there's a conflict between our needs and everyone else being happy. So that's like the safety right? Oh, if people are happy and they get their way, then I'm still going to be included. Here is kind of the assumption in that particular case. So there was a need to want to eat healthy, but there was also a competing need, the perception of being an inconvenience, and obviously you can reconcile both of those once you understand what's happening. But that's one example of emotional safety.
Philip Pape: 9:07
Yeah, and how? How did you uncover that? Like, how does someone listening uncover that? Obviously, we're all we're always going to say go talk to Allie, you know she's a great coach join her program and all. But in reality, you know, people want to understand. What are the tools here, what are the strategies for doing that?
Ali Shapiro: 9:25
Yeah Well, I think the first thing is to realize that when you have phantom hunger hunger that's not physical the go-to knee-jerk reaction is to beat yourself up to be like, oh, I told myself I wasn't eating the Hershey's today, why am I? I can already see myself going home and eating them. Or if they're at your co-worker's desk, I don't know, do people work in person anymore? It's true? It's true, the bulls are there. Yes, you're still there all these years later. I knew they were there when I was in corporate.
Ali Shapiro: 9:50
So the first thing is just to say, like, why does this make sense? So, rather than beating ourselves up because you were talking earlier about that physiological need for safety, and so what you were talking about is what Dr Deborah McNamara talks about in her book Nourish. She's a child developmental psychologist, but she talks about how food stimulates attachment chemicals, but it doesn't give us the deeper belonging that we actually need. So from the time we're born, right, food gets coupled with someone cares about you. So as adults, we turn to the food. We feel like someone cares about us, but we don't actually have the support of the. It's not a caretaker when you're an adult, but it's people that care about you, including yourself, advocating for your needs. So that's why you have to say first of all, why does this make sense? Like on a primal level, I need to feel this emotional safety and it's my hunger. This emotional hunger, as a metaphor, is pointing me to the fact that I do not have it Like that is all that's telling you. It's a symptom, not the problem.
Philip Pape: 10:57
And do you? What is your opinion on the idea that there are different angles of attack for this right and there are different tribes and camps and I know how you're big, like me, you are skeptical of anybody who goes all in one direction but there's the idea that we can use tools and strategies to process our way through, In other words, not necessarily have to uncover the root cause, just find something that helps us move forward and then maybe it eventually resolves the issue, versus going all in on the psychology side, uncovering your deepest, darkest secrets from when you were a child, to like figure it all out, right, Like a therapist. Like what is your thought on that spectrum? Do you know what I'm asking? When it comes to like like you could just change your environment that's a common strategy that's talked about. Right, Like change your kitchen environment and put food where you don't see it, and like those strategies you know what I'm saying and they can help people without always understanding the trigger fully, and I think you need both. It depends, but I'm curious on your thoughts.
Ali Shapiro: 11:58
Yeah, that was gonna be my answer. I think if someone's new to all of this, they should try that, and Someone's new to all of this they should try that. And if it works, my clients have tend to be overwhelmed by all of that. They've tried it and I think of like, for example, some of my clients had food insecurity as a kid Right and so them not having food in the house makes them feel emotionally unsafe. It's like I even though I know logically and this actually I had I actually had a couple of clients who were cruising and then COVID came and they just needed one spot session because they were like, why is this food noise back?
Ali Shapiro: 12:28
Like I have not had this for years. And I was like what feels hard about it? Like that's the next question, what feels hard about right now? And it was like, oh my God, there's supply chain issues. I can't get all the food I need. I'm. I am back to being eight years old again and not knowing if we were going to be able to eat at night, and so these.
Ali Shapiro: 12:46
I think what ends up happening is we give people these blanket prescriptions, not knowing like what does that trigger Cause, even if you change your environment. Even if you do all of this stuff, you still have to be with other people, you still need to interact with people, and so it's, you know, and I, for example, I also had one client. She was trying to do mindful eating, okay, and we were actually working on her feeling really alone and isolated in her life and she had friends around her and all this stuff, but she, there was still stuff that she didn't, she didn't realize she wasn't bringing like her full self to her relationships, right, and so she ended up feeling quite alone, even though she was around other people who liked her and cared about her, and she was like, you know, I've tried the mindful eating stuff. I know I'm not supposed to listen to podcasts, I know I'm supposed to breathe and she's like, but when I do that it's so apparent how alone I am.
Philip Pape: 13:38
Like yes, cause it's now she's, so she's just with her own thoughts. She's even more alone.
Ali Shapiro: 13:42
Okay, interesting, I was like, turn on the podcast. Like, like, you know, like, like that's not, and I think cause you're an engineer, you'll appreciate there's. There's like a sequence over strategy, right, like, okay, all of these strategies will work at some point at potentially for you, but what is the sequence that it makes sense?
Ali Shapiro: 13:59
right so if someone is. You know, I have a lot of clients who have, like you know, hashimoto's or maybe on the pre-diabetic track or something right, like if you may need to stabilize yourself physically, um, but if you've already tried that and it's like I know what to do but I can't do it, um, you know, maybe I need to look at more the psychology. And I would also say and I know that you know it's both camps, but we know what stress this the way that I look at it is like this is whenever you're working on the physiology, you're also working on your psychology, and whenever you're working on your psychology yeah, it's just like an infinity feedback loop.
Ali Shapiro: 14:36
So it's like, oh, the psychology I was going to say is also realizing that so much of our safety is in our body. So it's like these emotional needs generate our thoughts. So I don't, I'm not, I'm. I do more developmental psychology where I'm like, I'm not concerned about all of these thoughts going on. We need to look at the deeper need that makes you think you're, you're trying to be good in your thoughts, but it's driven by a need that needs you to question if that's really the good thing to do.
Philip Pape: 15:04
Right, so like, for example, okay, yeah, no, no, you please, please, yeah.
Ali Shapiro: 15:10
So, for example, um, one of my clients, she would find herself, you know, before going out to eat. This was before we started working together. She's like I will go, look at the menu and I will know what I want to do, I want to make the healthy choice. And then I get there and I am just like, go with the flow I'm going to order, you know.
Ali Shapiro: 15:30
And it's like what is happening and it's like, oh, she was feeling high maintenance, like when we actually got to it right, it was like she thought the good thing was to be easygoing and eat with everyone else she felt judged or whatever, for being too prepared or something, yeah.
Ali Shapiro: 15:47
Well, the perception and this was based on the past, again, it wasn't deep dark into her childhood. It was just like, oh, my family judged picky eaters right, and so it's like, if I didn't know that I'm putting that on my friends now, which, when I so, then we have her try. It's like, okay, that's a small risk. Next time just say you know what, I'm good, I'm going to order this, like what happens? And it's like, oh, nothing happened In fact. Like it opened up this great conversation about oh, I know this is embarrassing, but I used to feel pressured to eat with all of you guys. And then it opened up this big, deeper conversation, generated more emotional safety about, like you can totally eat what you want. I sometimes feel pressure the next time a couple other of her friends ate order different.
Ali Shapiro: 16:32
And so what's often happening with our perception is we're always bringing the past to the present, right, like all of us. So we're often thinking like the good thing was to just go with the flow, be low maintenance, don't be a burden, and what the task of developmental psychology as adults is to say wait a second. This is what I learned and it's not my work is, even though maybe we will touch on the hard things that happened in childhood. It's really about the cultural conditioning of what everyone thinks is normal. That is good or bad, right, and so it's like that's like normal. The more you do this work, the more you're like normal is bad shit, crazy, but we keep going along.
Philip Pape: 17:16
Yeah, yeah, no, I, I. You hit me so hard there. The cultural cause I was thinking, even thinking of alcohol and like the more extreme things that we rationalize to some nth degree. And it wouldn't make any sense if an alien came to our planet and said what are you doing to yourself? What are you guys doing? It's part of our culture, it's our conditioning, and there's behavioral psychology, there's social psychology and learned behavior. So I think the average person, if they could know more about what you're saying and kind of be just open to it and aware of it, will help maybe interrupt some of those patterns and issue just from the awareness.
Philip Pape: 17:49
Here's my maybe this is a deeper question, or maybe not. Why are we even talking about this? And what I mean by that is why is food itself the thing? Like? Many of your clients are probably just like mine. They're highly independent, they're intelligent, they're disciplined, they're high achievers, they're successful in a lot of things. Why do they struggle with food? I mean and we're talking everybody, like it's almost everybody has some struggle with this. Is it because it's your area of expertise and we're talking about it, or is it literally come to the top of the list because it's something we do, we need every day, as humans, like. What are your thoughts on?
Ali Shapiro: 18:20
that. I love that. You asked that because I'm out in the wild and people are like what do you do? Like the easiest way is to be like I help people who want to eat, eat and be healthy do it. And they can't. And they're like isn't that all of America? And I'm like, I'm like, yeah, I'm like, yeah.
Ali Shapiro: 18:42
But I think it comes down to like nature really designed food to be communal and to help us. Like, if you think about um, like it helped us. If we think about belonging, even if we go out to the original belonging is belonging to the land, right. Like food helps orient us. That's a form of safety, like here's the season you're in, right, here's how to take care of your body.
Ali Shapiro: 19:00
And I think about food being the most intimate relationship we have, like what we eat literally becomes our blood, our bones. Like you can't get more intimate than that. And so I think between that, we feel healthier when we feel rooted into place. We feel healthier when we're rooted into family, into community. And again, I'm pulling from some of Dr Deborah McNamara's book nourish, but she talks about like nature, creating this exquisite design of how you know, mealtime is really about. Like I said before, feeling our feelings requires space and safety, and it's like mealtime is often the chance to like, slow down and feel these feelings and then you have the food as like almost what can't be said right, like if, when I think about when people pass away, what do people do to show you that they're there for you?
Ali Shapiro: 19:53
They, they bring a casserole, they bring you know, and it's so to me it's just like nature. Quote unquote comfort food isn't bad, it's necessary. It's when we're turning to comfort for something that it can't.
Philip Pape: 20:08
It can't fulfill. Yeah, it can't fulfill. Satisfy it can't satisfy. You're insatiable. There you go, yeah, yeah, dr.
Ali Shapiro: 20:13
Gordon Newfield says there's. Who is Dr McNamara's mentor? He says there's nothing as addictive as something that almost works, and it's like the food almost works, but it's the, it's the care that's in in constant, that that is what we really need. And so and I think in our culture that has a lot of food issues I don't think we have a lot of communal care. You're expected to do everything yourself.
Philip Pape: 20:38
The care ensconced in food and the experience of food is what we need. I love that. I like the word ensconce too, but I don't know where that came from.
Philip Pape: 20:47
It's great. I know it's so poetic, right. Like this is great. Yeah, so many things come to mind, like just humanity and culture and religion as well, Like people, different religions and how food is a central part of that, and like we don't want to deny those things. We don't want to like. What you're implying here is that there is a, there can be absolutely a comfort and enjoyment of food, and I've seen people post comments to when I've said that before. I'm like if you can enjoy your food, if it satisfies you and you can eat it without guilt, like that's a great place to be. Oh, you shouldn't enjoy food, or food is fuel. Like. What are your thoughts of those? Are those like you know?
Ali Shapiro: 21:22
food is fuel.
Philip Pape: 21:23
You shouldn't enjoy food, yeah.
Ali Shapiro: 21:24
Yeah, I mean, I think it's and right, it is fuel. And again when we think about you. Know, the Surgeon General said loneliness is more dangerous than smoking right or longevity and health right, yeah, yeah.
Ali Shapiro: 21:37
And we're in a culture that loves to measure and quantify it, and I love numbers and all that stuff and they, I think, the best things in life. You can't always quantify. Like you know, you, you have kids. It's like, oh my God, I saw that dance recital. It's like, how do you quantify that, that feeling of pride of seeing your kid like nail something after struggling with it, or even in yourself, right Like it, even at the gym? Like it's like when I can, can just get like even like one pound more on the squat rack. It's like it. Yes, I know I've done better because of the one pound, but it's like it's the, the strength and the courage that ultimately is like what makes, I think, life worth meaning. So I think food can be fuel and I think we need. If you're struggling with it or if you, if you, I would just I think of food as a metaphor. So I'd be really interested with someone who thinks it's only fuel. Like what, what are you missing out on that you don't think you're missing out on? Yeah.
Philip Pape: 22:34
Oh, for sure, For sure. And I joke all the time on my podcast how I'm like kind of a foodie and my wife and I are very different. Like she, she can basically eat anything and it does. It kind of all tastes the same to her. I mean she admits that's just her how her taste buds are, you know, there's like two super tasters and whatnot. She, she, appreciates really good food, but I I'm at the next level, like I could tell you what ingredients are in there or not in there. You know this needs more of this, needs more of that. So there is a fun connection and I like how you tied it to how we feel when we accomplish things or when we're in the gym or whatever, because it's so central to the human experience.
Ali Shapiro: 23:06
Well, I was going to go back to one level deeper too, because this is, I mean, this is the spiritual level. But depending on your beliefs, I mean I think God is part of the earth, right, so it's like it's almost also this, like spiritual right and, like you said, all religious traditions, right, revolve around food and the symbolism there. So we can also look at, you know, it is like us, like the universe, right, it's like commuting with that like right. And when you're like I often say to clients, like when have cause, sometimes people will come to me like I struggle with portion control and I'm like, well, tell me a time where portion control was easy.
Ali Shapiro: 23:44
And it's like, oh, when I went to my family's and we make this thing, let's call it sourdough bread. I don't know, that's probably because I just was on Instagram Everyone makes sourdough bread Like, oh my God, it takes so long, but we all do it together and it's like, oh my God, that spiritual experience of being with others and having you know, and just like that is like the nourishment that we really want. And so I also think it's just food is spiritual, for how I I think of the earth and what it provides as part of that spiritual energy that that has created all of this.
Philip Pape: 24:19
Yeah, and if and if I were to connect that for people who are not as spiritual and that's cool I would say that food making food is one of the last primal things we do like, other than sex. Right, it's making food and that, like we don't build our own houses I mean, most of us don't I built a little bit of my house, but that I would never do that again. But you know, we don't build it Like we don't build shelter, we don't hunt for our food even, or we don't do all the primal things. So maybe it's just like a vestige of what's left from our primal, you know nature yeah.
Philip Pape: 24:51
As we're on the internet talking on a podcast. So it's pretty cool. It's pretty cool, it's holding the end.
Ali Shapiro: 24:55
It's holding the end. Yeah, it's holding the end.
Philip Pape: 24:57
I like that holding the end to your partner.
Ali Shapiro: 25:03
Yeah, yes, Say what they said, and.
Philip Pape: 25:05
Conan O'Brien's really good at that. His podcast, what's it called? Conan Meets a Friend One of the best podcasts ever.
Ali Shapiro: 25:12
I really liked him. Why did the nightly show with him not work out? That feels like forever ago, but I was really-.
Philip Pape: 25:18
I think he's driving now though on the podcast, you should check it out.
Philip Pape: 25:23
Yeah, it's okay. So I guess, going back to um, see, I always have a bunch of questions and notes that I'd never get to, which is cool, so okay. So, handling stress and the alone, the loneliness of all of this, and then tying that to falling off track with food, where do we want to take it to? What's the next step? Right, so now we've, we understand there's the psychology of it. I understand why food is maybe important on both sides of it. Talk about the loneliness and the stress and handling that and falling off track, because ultimately we want to get back on track, or maybe it's not even a track Like maybe we should talk about. Is there really even a track? Is that a faulty premise? I don't know.
Ali Shapiro: 25:59
I freaking love that you asked that question, because of course, I use that in my marketing, because that's right, but there isn't a track. If you know how to learn from what's happening, it's all the same. You know, and this is I mean. This comes down to religion as well Like, but I mean well, there's certain spiritual traditions that believe like, everything's welcome, it's not a problem, right To try to like right. But in America we believe you have to earn your goodness. So it's like falling off track is bad versus like.
Ali Shapiro: 26:25
Why does this make sense? Why? What can I learn from this? And so I think, if people and I love that you use the word alone, because that is you know, and especially for people listening you know that you feel alone if you're secret eating right Like that's what I tell clients Like, your food is always telling you what your needs are in a metaphor. So a lot of my clients, for example, will like after their kids, like their, their, like their kids are melting down or something they just like escape to the pantry and it's like secret eating Okay.
Ali Shapiro: 26:56
Secret eating yeah, yeah, I got it. Or waiting till everyone's alone. You're doing it in your car at night, whatever. That's a symbol or that's a symptom, symbol, metaphor, whatever you want to say that you're feeling unsupported somehow in your life, so kind of the. And I'm gonna give you these steps and knowing that this can be hard, because often the emotions are so overwhelming that you may have to ask yourself this three or four days after the fact.
Ali Shapiro: 27:17
So in Truths, with Food, I always wait. I always tell people like in the beginning. It's kind of like we're just saying like can we catch this after the fact? Not till you're like two or three months in. Are you going to be able to like catch yourself in the moment, because these needs the more we restrict these emotional needs, kind of like, the more you restrict your hunger, then they come back even more in terms of that kind of unnameable energy that causes people to turn to food. So why does this make sense?
Ali Shapiro: 27:45
And then, when the food noise is happening, right, like if you're my client who was like in the pantry, right With her after, like her kid, like hiding from her kids, right, it's like what feels hard about this, right, and if, again. If you're also eating alone, you might want to say it may not be about what just happened the day, like the moment you left work and now you're in your car. It may. It may be something that happened, but because our emotions take space to like actually feel an unfurl, it's not going to be like this happened and then this, and then the food noise happened. It's going to be like once I act although for many of my clients the food noise is just a constant hum, right, it's like it's like a rock in their shoe.
Philip Pape: 28:24
So it's like it's all the time, which could make it even harder to tie it to the thing, which is why we need to dig in here.
Ali Shapiro: 28:31
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I think saying like, what, what feels hard about this, right, and it's like I feel alone in parenting, right, I feel alone. I'm trying to think of a recent you know, yeah, I feel alone with my family trying to eat healthy, right, I feel alone. Um, I'm trying to think. When I struggled with food, I felt, um, my corporate job was like, um, my corporate job was like stressful but boring. I don't know if that makes sense.
Philip Pape: 28:58
I totally understand that. Yeah, yeah.
Ali Shapiro: 29:00
And like, and I again, I was in my early twenties but I had had cancer at 13 and I was like, why am I wasting my time? I don't this feels so hard to like do be spending my all my time, and I don't know what I want to do, and you know. So it's like I felt really and a lot of my friends were like really into climbing the corporate ladder, which I get, but I was just like. That's just not like. You know, you didn't have a purpose.
Ali Shapiro: 29:28
Yeah, like for me that just did not seem enticing you know, I mean, and I was in a competitive corporate job and I was doing that, but I was like this sucks. And again I have friends who love that right, like I love corporate. But it made me feel even more alone because again, having cancer at 13, it sets you on a just a different existential track, let's put it that way. So you want to ask yourself what feels really hard about this and then you want to try to unearth the need that's within that difficulty, right? And there's one of the intermediary steps that you can ask yourself what feels hard about this. You can say what's at the tail end of my food noise? And tail stands for T, a, I, l, and this will help you identify the underlying kind of state of being. So T is for tired, right? So a lot of my clients who are at the end of the night, they're like I deserve this.
Ali Shapiro: 30:19
And it's like why does it make sense? I'm exhausted, I've had no fulfillment all day. It's you know, get up, get the kids work, get home, get the kids, and now it's like this is the only reward.
Philip Pape: 30:33
And it could happen at 3 pm in the afternoon too, right oh?
Ali Shapiro: 30:36
yeah.
Philip Pape: 30:38
Yes, I've heard it all.
Ali Shapiro: 30:39
Yeah, well, and if you're going through perimenopause or menopause and have like sleep issues, you know it could be like first thing in the morning and so T is tired, a is anxious and this is uncertainty and this is uncertainty from the outside. So I don't know about you, but I know a lot of. I had a lot of clients drug come to me during COVID, right, covid was like this uncertain time, like what is happening? How long is lockdown? What are people are sick? I should I go outside, Right? So that uncertainty. We saw alcohol and food consumption like skyrocket, right. Our public health went down considerably, right, not to mention like kids' mental health. So anxiousness is like uncertainty from the outside.
Ali Shapiro: 31:21
Then the I is inadequacy and that is when we're wondering is it me Like? I had a client who introduced with food? It was awesome, she was able to interrupt the cycle because she went to a new job and she was like learning all the systems and everything, but she accidentally did like the wrong project and she's like it made me feel so inadequate and she's like my old way of being would have been like okay, you're going to work and you're going to fix it and then you're going to eat because this sucks. While you're doing this, she's like what I started to do is like I'm going to tell my boss, like you know and, and, but she, so she had to. She felt inadequate. But I was like, are you really inadequate or are you new to the job? You know? So it's like you need someone to be like oh, I have this need for an extension of time and the boss was like, yeah, but I definitely need it by Wednesday.
Philip Pape: 32:13
Let's make sure that you understand, you know, and it was like, oh, my God, you can do that you know she was like, it was probably a big relief.
Ali Shapiro: 32:15
Yeah, yeah, yeah. But when we're feeling inadequate, we're like it's me, not the environment or the contextual, the specifics of the circumstance. And then, last one is that loneliness of like. I just feel separate from here in some way. I feel alone. Often a way that you know that you're having that lonely trigger is you're like if I was thinner, this would not be happening, right? That's a common way of kind of offloading the sense of aloneness of you know, I would. I would be dating now. If I was thinner, I would have already asked for that promotion, if I felt more confident in my body and all of that stuff. Again, holding the end can help and you don't have to wait for that. You can start working on the skills you need to get better communication in relationships or what is the path to the promotion and who do you have to talk to? So those are the triggers of like, when you can say why does this make sense? What's at the tail end of this? And then there's needs within each of those triggers.
Philip Pape: 33:12
Yeah, love it. I love frameworks like that. No, this is really good and I know we could do multiple episodes about each one of these, but I like having that framework where it's definitely not just one thing and we oversimplify it sometimes, and we talked earlier you can't just patch it or bandaid it with a tool or one size fits all like here.
Ali Shapiro: 33:34
Here are the tips for how to blah, blah, blah Right Um, but you can use a framework right. Framework gives you agency.
Philip Pape: 33:37
So yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah for sure, and it and it's nuanced and it gives you options to kind of dig into each of these. And, as you were saying that, I was thinking, oh yeah, interesting, thinking about my past, where I struggled for like 20 years with food and and I always thought it was a very different way than others. And that's true because we all, we all, get there in different ways. Inadequacy is an interesting one, right that? I assume that's uncertainty from the inside, cause you said, anxiety is uncertainty from the outside, right, self-doubt is an easier way of saying it. Self-doubt is an easier way of saying it Self-doubt.
Philip Pape: 34:07
And I like the example you gave, because there are I bet anybody listening can imagine can think almost every day a situation where you screwed up or did something, or maybe somebody gave you a disappointing answer, right, like I wanted to do this collaboration with another podcaster. His PR person's like said no, he's not interested. And immediately you think, okay, it's me right, like there's something wrong with me. And of course, you could ask, you could say, oh, can you help me understand why? But, like, 90% of the time, it's some other situation that has nothing to do with you. At the same time, I like your thought of nothing is bad, everything is. You should be curious, right, Be curious and look at it as a way to learn, even if it is something you did, I mean sometimes a way to learn, even if it is something you did.
Ali Shapiro: 34:49
I mean, sometimes there is that so Well, and what happens is, like when we struggle with food, it wears away at our self-trust a lot. And so what ends up happening is, if we don't ask those questions like what could I do? Or I love that podcaster example, Like oh, why did I? I remember pitching someone that I was friends with, like friendly, you know how it is, and like I heard nothing back and so I was like, look, I understand your platform is, like, you know, next to mine. If that's the issue, that's fine, I'm just following up. And she's like, no, let's do it. But it was like I mean, that's like a happy ending, but you know, you sometimes in this-.
Philip Pape: 35:21
But you stood in For a while, right, yeah, until you got that answer, yeah.
Ali Shapiro: 35:25
But what I'm saying is like, we have that inadequacy trigger will stay until we actually learn the skills of like. So if someone said, if they were like, look, it was great, it's just bad timing and they're going to have an opening in September, it's like okay. Or if they were like I mean, you're a podcaster, I get are horrible, I know yours would not be horrible. But like, if you're someone who keeps getting denied, it's not that it's you, it's the skillset that you can learn. Right To like okay, you need to get better at pitching, otherwise you're going to keep thinking it's you rather than realizing. So that's part of like the work, as well as like all, right, I have this need, I want to be on this podcast, and it's like okay, let's work backwards and figure out because you're capable, right, you can. Yes, yes, sounds like criticism, but now, okay, I know that we're kind of running out of time, but tell me about like, what were the 20 years? Like, what was going on for you, if you think of that break?
Philip Pape: 36:17
Yeah, I mean I I don't get. It's not a big dramatic story, to be honest. Uh, but you know, from from the time I got out of college to when I was about 40, I just didn't know how to eat or train or anything, and so I was constantly dieting and yo-yoing and all of that. But when you mentioned things like eating in secret because I definitely have clients that deal with that and I've thought of my own times in the past doing that, eating in a car or when I was in my 20s and there was relationship issues I would like go to friendlies and buy like this huge chocolate fudge sundae and then just like eat it in my bedroom. You know what I mean and stuff like that, which I couldn't imagine doing now. But you know what. It took a lot of learning about yourself and right and that empathy, that like self-empathy, and tools and practice and falling in your face over and over to like figure it out.
Ali Shapiro: 37:13
So yeah, but can you see, isn't it interesting? Friendlies and relationship issues, doesn't that make sense? It's like, okay, it makes sense because you I don't know what the relationship issue was, but like, let's just say you wanted to be in a relationship or you had a fight, or whatever. It's like, oh my God, I'm feeling alone in this. So it's like the food gives me the attachment.
Philip Pape: 37:27
Exactly.
Ali Shapiro: 37:28
Can you see how?
Philip Pape: 37:29
like that oh for sure, for sure, it lines up.
Ali Shapiro: 37:35
I just I appreciate you sharing because I think everyone listening should ask themselves, like when was food easy for me and when was it hard for me? And you will probably see this theme because once you see it you can't unsee it, but it takes kind of a while because it's invisible, right?
Philip Pape: 37:48
It is, it is and you you can I mean as coaches you can kind of see pretty quickly in talking to someone that maybe they're they're on one side of that precipice or another. Right Like you, can I mean unless, unless they're putting on you know, a bold face, right Like some people might do initially, until you really learn who they are deep, deeper down. But, um, yeah, you can tell in people's language sometimes, like this is not really an issue. Let's focus on the facts and let's get our through our goal and others are like, well, I keep falling back off track on this thing. So now that you asked about me, I actually want to ask about you, cause you mentioned, I know, your history of an early cancer diagnosis. I know you've talked about that on your podcast as well. I mean, where does all this come from and this desire to help people do this? Because I imagine it's from a deep place for you.
Ali Shapiro: 38:34
Yeah, yeah, I mean I started struggling with my weight like probably when I was around oh my God, I'm so bad with like ages but probably like seven or eight, and at the time I didn't understand, like what I know now with my functional medicine. Background is like I had been exposed to pesticides a couple like right before that and I have like an overactive immune system, I mean, based on type of cancer I had, that's what it was. But I started to gain weight around eight or nine years old and I think it was from the inflammation, from the pesticide exposure Cause. I was an active kid, like we ate. My dad was a health and phys ed teacher. My mom grew up on a quote unquote organic farm. They didn't call it organic at the time. It was just like my grandma was all about nutrition, like she believed in that. Like in the forties she was so progressive and so we ate really healthfully and everything.
Ali Shapiro: 39:25
And I just started to gain weight and I tried to do Do you remember Richard Simmons? Oh, yeah, yeah, I tried Weight Watchers at 11. But what had happened in between? That is, I had been bullied in fifth grade and I think and my parents I mean you and I are around, I think the same age, the 80s and 90s people, just I'm only 25, just so you know, just kidding.
Philip Pape: 39:46
No, I'm just kidding, I'm 44.
Ali Shapiro: 39:48
So I'm like a couple of years older than you, but it was like no one has done feelings, you know, until recently. So it was just, and I think I was like so ashamed, like I could have told my parents, but I didn't. And so that's when I would start coming home and eating bagels, like my parents were city school teachers we didn't have bagels in the suburbs yet this is how long ago that was and so there would be these like cinnamon raisin bagels, and I would just come home and be so. I mean, it's called an emotional immune system, which is basically your belonging system but it was so alarmed that it was like, because I had been ostracized right From all of these girls, that was like those bagels saved my life. I mean, they then caused me to gain weight and like then feel even more ostracized and then, yeah, then I got, you know, obviously, went through cancer at 13 and lost a ton of weight and was like the thinnest that I had ever been, and because it was still the early nineties like not a lot of difference of media, I had still internalized that health equals thinness only, and so it felt like there was all this pressure to stay thin, to not, you know, not have a relapse, that.
Ali Shapiro: 40:54
And then when I was in high school, high school I could outrun my eating, like I got up every morning, like you know I mean I was I ran a lot Like I definitely was like, okay, and you get attention, you know, from for me, for from boys, it was like, oh, this is amazing, you know. But then when I went to college which again was that uncertainty trigger, even though I was really excited to go, I was a smart kid, like it wasn't academically challenging, it was just, oh, my God, this is different. It was like I started my emotional eating, started to turn more into binging and stuff like that, and so that that's like a brief, you know history of of my background. But yeah, no, this is.
Ali Shapiro: 41:32
And again, when I found functional medicine in my early twenties and was able to reverse my depression, my IBS, all of this stuff, and lose 15 pounds, but then I couldn't keep it up when I was stressed, I'm like no one has more incentive to be healthy than a cancer survivor, and I know this stuff now that food can be medicine, not just calories, and I was like there has to be more to this, because I'm pretty disciplined, so that's kind of how I came to it and I just you know this, I mean being. I love what you do because you can be with the nuance, but the default narratives in this industry are just like so outdated. And it's like come on, people like let's update our software here, you know.
Lisa: 42:12
Hi, my name is Lisa and I'd like to give a big shout out to my nutrition coach, philip Pate. With his coaching I have lost 17 pounds. He helped me identify the reason that I wanted to lose weight, and it's very simple longevity. I want to be healthy, active and independent until the day I die. He introduced me to this wonderful app called macro factor. I got that part of my nutrition figured out. Along with that is the movement part of nutrition. There's a plan to it and really helped me with that. The other thing he helped me with was knowing that I need to get a lot of steps in. So the more steps you have, the higher your expenditure is and the easier it is to lose weight. When it's presented to you like he presents it, it makes even more sense. And the other thing that he had was a hunker guide and that really helped me. So thank you, willow.
Philip Pape: 42:55
I get the sense. You know I don't want to generalize, but I get the sense that people, once they learn a little bit of information, they're experts, right, you know what?
Philip Pape: 43:02
I'm saying, oh yeah yeah, and I mean maybe we all do it. I'm sure I do it as well. I try not to. I was having a text chat with a friend of mine lifting buddy, and we were saying how both of us had had mentors early on that taught us the value of humility and like asking stupid questions, like asking. And I told him I had a, a boss of mine, maybe 15 years ago, who knew, you know, he had 20 years of experience and he would always go into a new project asking questions like a third grader Like I initially was shocked because he would ask questions that I would, I feel like other people would feel embarrassed to ask.
Philip Pape: 43:35
But then you realize everybody else wanted to ask the same question. You could tell Cause they're like oh, I'm glad he asked that and and and. That's how he would just learn really fast. So why did I bring that up? Because, oh, we're talking about the industry and I think there has to be that curiosity and openness that you don't know what you don't know, right, right, that's the hardest part. And even what you do know may be subject to change because you don't have all the facts or all the information. So the other cool thing is about you, allie, since we met. How did we meet? I don't know, it was through podcast pitching or something right, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Philip Pape: 44:26
But like I couldn't figure all this out till I was 40. And I did it in a different way than necessarily uncovering the emotional side. But when I speak to folks like you, who's an expert in this other realm, I love it because you're like you come on here and you teach me and the listener that there are just so many things that we can not that we have to be overwhelmed with, but that we have tools to the process with right To get through these like cause. I talk about data all the time and tracking and awareness, and I think there's a place for that. But some people have other trauma and things that they got to deal with um, unnamed energy or under what did you call it? You called it unnamed energy. Yeah, yeah, well.
Ali Shapiro: 45:06
I mean cause. Some clients call it automatic pilot. Some clients feel like they're like something voracious just comes over me and what it really is is their emotional immune system is so alarmed that they feel so unsupported or their needs are not being met. And there's no amount of like. I always tell clients you can do, you can, you can do all the morning routines, you can. You can have every hack available to you, but we have a primal need to have these caretaking needs met.
Philip Pape: 45:32
Yeah, Belonging yeah.
Ali Shapiro: 45:33
Yeah, yeah. So it's like I'm all about less is more. Self-care is being self-aware these days. Don't get me wrong. I have a sauna too. I mean, I'm not like a purist here.
Philip Pape: 45:46
No for sure, Self-care is being self-aware. No, I love that and it goes both ways. Yeah, absolutely so. When the belonging thing? So just to pull on that a little bit, when we talk about the tail method and understanding where these things come from, how do we then get to the trust that we want? That's the big question. A good way to maybe wrap up this segment today.
Ali Shapiro: 46:10
But I will say for people, I mean I'm not going to get into like the boring academic piece of why this happens, but when people can just start to identify those tail triggers, if they are like in in Truce with Food, we talk about seven inch, seven foot, 70 foot waves. If there's seven inch waves like, they're just like oh, I'm tired, that sometimes that's enough to be like this is, the more you do it, the more you're like oh, this isn't about the food, and so like, the more you can see that even that starts to restore self-trust. Because so many of my clients like I've tried everything right, if there was a solution out there, I would. I would have already known by now like it's, they really feel like they're broken in some way or they love food too much. That's that's also sometimes what people think.
Ali Shapiro: 46:50
So understanding, why does this make sense? What's at the tail end of this that can start, especially in those seven inch smaller stressful situations start to be like oh, so the needs are, when you're tired, you need rest and people think rest is just sleeping. No, there's physical rest, which is I mean, this is your wheelhouse, it's walk, it's walking non-exercise recovery yeah.
Ali Shapiro: 47:15
Yeah, non-exercise activity, thermogenesis, right, right. Neat activities, right, I mean I can't tell you how many of my clients I like gently suggest I'm like walking after meals, walking when you're stressed, walking to be more creative, and it's like once it's like all of us who are super competitive have dismissed walking because we're like it doesn't count, it's not fast, it's not intense, it's amazing. There's other kinds of rest and I'm pulling on I forget her name's work. This is someone's work who has identified these types of rest. But there's emotional rest, right, so hiring someone like you, or coming into Truce with Food, where you can have someone help you figure out what's going on, right, and so that's not all on you. So there's different kinds of rest that you can again, and I like focusing on needs because it offers flexibility, right, I mean some of my clients. I'm just thinking of one client. She's a partner in a law firm, you know, and she's on the 50th floor of the building and it's like so many of these ideas for, like she's like I get, you know, I bill every six minutes. I don't even have time to go down the elevator to the 50th floor, you know. I mean, well, now she's a partner, now she's not the same, but point being is you have to be able to find something that can fit your environment Right. So that's why focusing on needs enables flexibility with uncertainty or anxiousness is often how people can identify.
Ali Shapiro: 48:32
That is, you need to feel resourced. People think they need to feel in control. That's not true. You need to feel resourced in amongst that. So, like if you think about during COVID, you know, if you were someone struggling with with food, how could you have resourced yourself more? And that might mean, you know, I know we were like daycares, like there were no daycares, I just had a baby. It was like we never planned on having a nanny but we ended up having to get a nanny so that like we could both work and it was not the expense that you know we planned on paying, but it was like I don't know how long this is going to happen and my husband and I both work. So it was like you know, you have to find resourcing and resourcing can also be rest right. So some of these you know time resource Yep.
Ali Shapiro: 49:14
Yeah, yeah, but always plan for more time and energy than you think you're going to do when you have to resource.
Philip Pape: 49:18
Yeah, yeah, we were just. We were talking about your new program that you're launching and how like the amount of work that that creates. That you don't necessarily expect and now all of a sudden it's, it's blocks in your schedule you didn't account for and you're like, okay, now I need to move things around. But you have a really excellent, great way of communicating, ali. That I appreciate here. I hope the listeners do as well. Where? Just the way you put the emotional rest right there? That term, I'm going to be using that from now on. Honestly, it's a simple two words that I haven't quite heard people use that, but the fact that you need support and community and someone else to lean on is really, really important, because not only does it give you the emotional rest right, it gives you the extra. It's like you're borrowing their whole history and experience to be your partner in this thing and so then creates future emotional rest too, by accelerating your knowledge and your everything.
Ali Shapiro: 50:09
So, yeah, I just want to give credit. That is not my term. There's a woman I forget what her name is, I'm like totally blanking right now but she is the one who came up with seven types of rest. So I just want to make sure.
Philip Pape: 50:21
I wasn't saying you trademarked it or anything. It's like Kleenex, you know, like we. Just I think that's a problem.
Ali Shapiro: 50:25
Like I really think like you know, giving sourcing, rooting back from where the people who have contributed, because it's all a conversation. We're, all you know, having conversations together. So I just want to give her credit, but I feel like I'm. So If you Google seven types of rest, she has a TED Talk.
Philip Pape: 50:41
It will come up I'm going to do that Seven types of rest, because that again is a very nebulous topic when people talk about rest and recovery. You know, even when I try to do it.
Ali Shapiro: 50:52
It's like okay, creative rest different. There's active and passive, physical rest um emotional rest, and I'm forgetting um a couple of the other. Oh, sensory rest, okay.
Philip Pape: 51:01
Which you know, so I know I know what that is, without even having explained to me. I need some sensory rest, Not right now. This is actually a very rejuvenating conversation, so I and L for the needs as well. Uh, oh well, I, what do you mean from tail? Yeah, so I did T and a. Oh, you mean Cause we're revisiting it? Yes, please, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Ali Shapiro: 51:25
Um, so I is. When we're feeling inadequate, we need a compassionate witness, and this is important because I want to define it, because a compassionate witness isn't someone who's going to try to swoop in and fix it for you, right? So a lot of times when my clients are like, oh, I'm struggling with my food, and why did I fall off track, it's like they'll go to like the one person that knows they're struggling and they're like you're beautiful, don't worry about it. Or someone's like why?
Ali Shapiro: 51:49
are you still hung up on that, you know, and it's like, okay, you want someone who trusts that you can figure it out if you just have the space to like have a soft landing. So I just wanted to define that for people Cause, and that's why working with someone like you or me and Truce with Food, you know, is like someone who's like I know how to support you in this with, like you know, making you more self-sufficient. But you first have to like know what's happening and all that stuff. But a compassionate witness with anything, right, like even you know, like my mom friends, like sometimes I'm just like, oh my God, I'm so tired. Like you know you could take care of yourself, whatever. But when you have a toddler and are working and daycare closes and just people being like I know, right, like, it's just like I feel seen.
Ali Shapiro: 52:34
And that actually brings me to L, which is loneliness, and loneliness. We all have a need to feel significant. We have a need to feel like we are contributing and that we matter. And so, really, when we're feeling alone, we have to feel like even our struggles are important and matter. So, like, even if you're my client who's in the cupboard struggling with parenting, it's like, okay, what's important to me here, how you know, do I need to get support? How do I want to show up to myself? What do I value, maybe, is is that need that that needs to be significant, but those are the four needs that that come with those triggers, and then, as those get satisfied, you stop turning to food because the real safety or belonging need is being satiated Is being met.
Philip Pape: 53:17
So that wraps the whole thing up really nicely. Right, because you've got the true needs. You're satisfying them no longer with food. All right, beautiful, I love that. Is there anything else we didn't? It's a lot, I know. And is there anything else we didn't cover that you wish I'd asked about in this whole realm? No, I think it's a great question.
Ali Shapiro: 53:35
I really appreciate you sharing your story because I think that prompted everyone else who's listening to think about that for themselves. Yeah, I could probably do that more.
Philip Pape: 53:44
Maybe I have a little bit of a wall when it comes to that stuff, but it's all good, all right, cool. So I know there's a lot going on in your world. I would like listeners to be able to find you. I also know you have a program launching this month and normally we don't do big promotions on this, but for this specifically, I do want people to know everything you just talked about. They can get that kind of support, so tell us where they can find you.
Ali Shapiro: 54:05
Yeah, if people want to go to alishapirocom. And, like Philip said, my Truce with Food program, which this is actually the 14th year I've run it, or it'll be the 15th year, and it's been featured in all sorts of media. Well, my client's weight loss success has been featured in media, but it's a six month program that helps you author a new story around belonging to find food freedom. No white knuckling required. It's six months, 13 group coaching calls with me and a research-based client, proven framework Cause. Again, frameworks create choice, help you become more self-aware versus um.
Ali Shapiro: 54:37
I attract a lot of perfectionists who, you know, think it's like oh my God, am I going to have to white knuckle and perform this perfectly? And it's not that. And then we also do cover the food piece around blood sugar and gut health. Um, and so yeah, yeah, because it's an integrated program and it is life-changing and people can go to alishapirocom backslash truce with food group program and you can see a ton of testimonials. It's a very thorough page. I'm a very thorough, research-based person, but I also, you know, academia and theories can only take you so far, so you'll see the real world applications. So, for people who want deep and practical, this is like and really want to learn that consistency, staying on track, and to eliminate all, like free up all the energy that the food noise takes and puts that in a different direction for 2025. This is the program for them.
Philip Pape: 55:28
Awesome. I will encourage people to check it out and I'm going to include the exact link. We'll make sure we get the right link in there for folks, so take them right there from the show notes and I encourage you, if you're listening, if this sounds like something you could use the help with and reduce your emotional, get some more emotional rest, allie seems like the right person to go to. So, allie, thank you so much for having this amazing conversation, sharing your expertise, your wisdom, your positive energy. It was great to have you on.
Ali Shapiro: 55:52
Thank you, philip, for having me, and I'm looking forward to having you on Insatiable Me as well. Looking forward to it.
