This article is published in partnership with Dr. Alicia MacPherson—a naturopathic doctor dedicated to helping high-performing women optimize their hormones, restore metabolism & release stress fat to have unlimited confidence & energy. We’re honored to work with her. ~ ed.

Life feels big and scary and uncertain right now, I know.

So let me first say: whatever you are feeling in this moment is okay. I am right there with you. These past few weeks have been heavy, and the next few are probably going to be just as heavy.

But, even in the midst of darkness, I’m a silver lining kind of girl. I always look for the positive. I always find the opportunity. It’s easy to get stuck in the fear tunnel, but I want to push you to see the light.

Right now, in the safety of our own homes, what we have is time.

We have time to take care of ourselves, to finally slow down and look at what’s really going on in our bodies and minds, to forget the extreme diets and killer workouts, to take things back to basics, to nurture our needs, rebalance our hormones, and lose the extra pounds.

Yeah, I’m talking about weight loss right now, and here’s why: 

I battled my own body for 10 years and I can tell you that the huge knock-on effects of not feeling good in your own skin and lacking the physical and mental energy to get through the day when you’re a driven, caring, ambitious woman with a big plan for her life…those effects are way bigger than any number on a scale.

They impact your confidence and your ability to live the life you dream of living. And if there’s anything at the forefront of all of our minds right now it’s how precious this life is.

Let me get real vulnerable here with you for a minute…

Left: stressed out, calorie-controlled, CrossFitting-like-crazy me
Right: MacPherson method me

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Rewind 6 years. It’s 2014, I’m 23 and 30lb heavier than I am right now.⠀

Aside from the number on the scale (which I was obsessed with then), I feel puffy, uncomfortable, swollen, brain-fogged, tired (so tired), sore (from all the crazy exercise I’m doing to lose the weight), gross, and incredibly unhappy. ⠀

I feel like my body is betraying me, like I am broken.

I am also terrified.

I seriously think that if I stop dieting and exercising I will balloon. I never skip a day of training for this reason and I never stopped counting my calories or doing macros.

But dieting and exercising just made me fatter.

And once I realized the reason for this, I found more and more women who shared this same experience. 

Like Elephant Journal’s own, Kerry:

“I hit peak frustration back in August, after a morning where I made the mistake of stepping on the scale to see that I’d only lost two pounds in a month. This was not for lack of trying — I’d been eating perfectly and hitting the gym five times a week since June, but my stubborn belly fat did not want to budge. 

I felt at my wits end. It had been almost three months of no sugar, no white carbs, no fried food, no eating after 6 p.m., and this was on top of the strict vegetarian diet I’d already been following for a decade. Taking all these health initiatives should have made me feel amazing, instead I just felt exhausted.

Finally, defeatedly, I decided to hire an expert. I was amazed by her very first question: ‘How stressed are you, 1 out of 10?’

Ten! Of course a ten! I carried it with me through my work day, held clenched in my jaw as I surveyed daily to-do lists, only to spend my evenings mentally and emotionally conked out in front of my Netflix queue.

I was well aware of my stress, I just didn’t realize that it would show up so physically. You see, when you’re super stressed out almost every day, your body goes into a sort of survival mode where it holds onto all the fat it can, because the level of stress you’re operating at indicates that your life is in danger. More fun news: this does not happen to men! This response is exclusive to female physiology.

I cut back immediately on the HIIT and high intensity classes and began meditating — a feat of willpower in and of itself, as it often felt like meditating was just another thing on my to-do list. Within a month I’d lost seven pounds with relative ease, and eventually…a total of fifteen!”

You see, you can diet all you want. You can exercise like you’re training for the Olympics, but if your metabolism and your hormones aren’t working optimally you won’t lose fat.

Through the years of my own struggle, I realized I was unsuccessful because fat-loss for women is not solely about diet and exercise. That’s the old way of thinking and it just doesn’t work. Our hormones are the golden ticket to losing and keeping the weight off, starting with cortisol (the stress hormone). 

Stress fat is a very real thing. ⠀

Let’s face it, the busyness, the stress of our lives, and our ambitious goals are not going away anytime soon. 

Sure, some of them may be on hold for now, while we navigate this temporary new normal, but as driven women, our instinct is to forge our way through this just as we have through every other challenge in our lives.

However, without knowing how to harness our stress hormones and make them work for fat loss and maintenance, the reality is, we will always be battling our weight. 

And it’s not about the number on the scale or our dress size.

Weight-loss goes much farther into our psyche than “I just want to be skinny.” It’s confidence. It’s professionalism. It’s ambition. It’s looking, feeling, and performing our best so we can tackle our wildest dreams…even if that’s from the comfort of our home office for now. ⠀

No trendy, one-size-fits-all weight loss program is going to get you where you want to go:

And that’s feeling safe and comfortable in your own skin, having tons of energy to do all those things you’re passionate about, and not having to deprive or restrict yourself to feel that way.

The recommendations given in trendy weight-loss programs are generalized. This completely ignores the fact that 1. Women are not small men 2. Highly ambitious, driven women who have high stress hormones are not the same as the average woman.

Can you relate?

Fast forward back to today, and I’m fitter and leaner and more importantly happier and more confident than I’ve ever been. I help other high-performing women optimize their hormones, restore their metabolism, and release stress fat to have unlimited confidence and energy.

I let them in on life-changing secrets I’ve learned on my own journey, like:

• Why & how to eat like a girl: our bodies are cyclical and our nutrition plans should be, too.
• Discover your hidden food sensitivities & control the inflammation you didn’t even know you had
• How to use stress to your advantage so you can have the energy to wake up at 5 a.m. and go non-stop until 9 p.m.
• The secret to boosting your metabolism without restricting yourself & even eating more!

Harness your stress hormone, balance your other hormones, and lose the weight effortlessly.

Get my FREE webinar >>⠀~

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