EP #140: Navigating Wellness Trends: Insights from Hannah Margaret Allen, Executive Editor at MindBodyGreen

Welcome back to another episode of Everyday Endorphins, a mental health podcast focused on the importance of finding joy and daily living. I'm your host Stella Stuffinopolis, and this week I am so thrilled to bring on someone who I truly admire in the wellness and journalism space, Hannah Margaret Allen. Hannah Margaret is the executive editor at MindBodyGreen, which is a lifestyle media brand dedicated to inspiring you to live your best life. Mentally, physically, spiritually, and emotionally. But I love about their philosophy is that they really take a well-rounded approach to well-being, and holistic wellness has been an area that I've gained personal interest in over the past few years. So it was such a privilege to get to speak with Hannah Margaret about how MindBodyGreen communicates those messages through an editorial perspective. We talk a lot about Hannah Margaret's career, how she got interested in journalism, and some of the hot topics that she's been thinking about recently, being in this space, and seeing how the wellness industry has transformed over the past few years, and especially in recent times. I actually saw a statistic somewhere that came out recently about the global wellness industry being worth $6.3 trillion, which is insane. And it really goes to show how our society is now placing a very strong emphasis on our holistic health and well-being. So we talk a lot about how MindBodyGreen defines well-being versus wellness, how the platform defines joy, and how Hannah Margaret personally tries to practice what she preaches, being in the wellness space, how she actually puts structure around her wellness practices, and how that structure helps her to actually be present in enjoying the joy for a lack of a better term. And lastly, of course, Hannah Margaret shares, who upends her endorphins, and how she finds joy in her life. So excited for you all to dive into this interview, reminder to like, rate, and review this podcast on any listening platform that you prefer. And let me know how you like the interview, shoot me a message, send me a DM, I love hearing from all of you. So let's continue to spread the love and spread the endorphins. [Music] Hi, Hannah Margaret. Thank you so much for coming on to Everyday Endorphins. It's so great to have you here today. Thank you so much for having me. You know, it's kind of crazy how we met, I think exactly a year ago, because we're recording now in October of 2024, and we met in October of 2023 at the Jack Taylor Wellness Summit, where you were moderating a conversation with Kimberly Snyder, who I actually just interviewed on the podcast recently. So it's incredibly full circle, and really grateful that you're coming on today, and we've gotten to chat over the year and over the past few months, and it's been really exciting for me just to get to learn more about your story and your background. So just excited to have you share your own perspectives here on Everyday Endorphins. Thank you so much. I really appreciate you having me, and I've been so impressed with all of the things that you bring to the table, and I love that you spoke to Kimberly, and just obsessed with her new book and the angle of what she's kind of going after right now, and I'm glad to be here. I actually have the book on my desk right now. I read it in preparation for the interview, and definitely resonate with a lot of those messages around heart coherence, but separate from Kimberly's book and how we got connected. I want to start off with just getting to hear a little bit more about your entry into first journalism, secondly, your passions for health and wellness. Being a journalist at MindBodyCream, primarily focused on the health and wellness space, and I'd love to hear kind of what informed those passions of yours in that area, and then also what got you interested in journalism, and reporting and investigating these topics. So to start with the journalism question, I have been a writer my whole life. I was a journalist ever since I was a kid. Obviously, the journals were very, they are not quite journalistic in nature, but I do think that the passion or the desire to document is truly at the core of what it means to be a journalist. And still a journalist, I remember as a kid documenting things that were happening, that were going on in a world around me. I really loved getting time magazine on the newsstands at the grocery store, and I found that I really wanted to be creative. I knew that I was a creative person, really prioritized English and the arts. So to me, journalism was a logical next step. It was pretty much the plan. After high school, I was like, I'm going to get my journalism to agree, and we're going to go from there. So it was a pretty easy decision from the jump, and I really didn't waiver, which I think is a pretty rare thing. I think some people, you know, they change their majors that come up with different ideas, but I was pretty dead set on journalism. And then from there, I worked in magazines, I started at Men's Journal, then I went to CondiNast, and so I worked at these classic establishments, these old legacy publications that have a lot of clout and a lot of name recognition. And I felt they were great training grounds for who I became in the journalism and media space. I didn't feel like I really was making enough of an impact. I couldn't quite get the footing that I wanted. So I made a transition into start-up publications. So one of my editors at Men's Journal decided to start a publication with a guy that had actually started Bleacher Report. So there was a group of people that started this website called Inverse, and it was a science tech culture website for men. It's now owned by Bustle Digital Group. And so we started that from scratch, and we were able to build that up from nothing, which was really fun, a great learning experience, very hard. And I think that was really exciting how to do all the things, not just, you know, write stories. And I think I started to see my passion was around making sure that the process behind these publications worked well. And that I really found team management to be something that I excel that and also found very fulfilling. I love people. I like to facilitate the stories. I don't necessarily have to be the one with the byline. So I, and mainly because also the topics that we were covering in Inverse were not my own personal interests. You know, it was a lot of Elon Musk in space and tech really very technical writing. I mean, it was fun writing, but it just wasn't my bread and butter. And so I always wondered. I was like, maybe I'm good at my job because I don't care that much about the topic matter. I'm like Rick and Morty, I don't know anything about Rick and Morty, but I can do the SEO research and I can get the team excited about writing about it. And then I got this opportunity to interview for a job at my buddy Green, and I had already been pretty passionate about health and wellness. So getting this job as an originally managing editor and now I'm executive editor at my buddy Green really was like, okay, am I going to be really good at this? Or am I going to be really bad because I do care so deeply about the space I was doing was really big into hot yoga at the time. I hadn't eaten meat and I gave up meat in 2013 as a New Year's resolution and then I just kept it going. So I was vegetarian, I was doing hot yoga all the time. I was very much on a wellness journey that a classic wellness journey. Sipping green juices, trying to meditate the full kitten caboodle. So I was doing all of that and getting into my buddy Green, I found that having a real interest in passion in the space helps tremendously in the work. And actually does create better results. So I've been here now for six years and it feels like, in a lot of ways, it feels like the blink of an eye. But it's been such a fascinating time and I'm sure we will get into this more but you know, six years I've seen just such a massive transformation within the well-being space. And what was a niche fringe thing has become very mainstream, very normal in great ways. So there's so many more people, so many seats at the table that now people are able to join and it's been a real pleasure and joy to watch the space really open up. And we've been kind of at the forefront of that and we've really always tried to not have like a overly, you know, there are some wellness publications that are cooler than potentially my buddy Green. But like there's something about us we're real, we're authentic, we're dedicated to things that are doable, we're focused on the science, we're focused on the things to me that matter. So that's the trajectory of my interest in wellness and how it has translated into being a part of it. of sharing that information in diverse ways. So for example, we're doing podcasts, we're doing videos, we're doing social posts, we're doing articles, obviously, and we're doing newsletters. We've got these great editorialized newsletters that we're working on. So whatever you're preferred form of consuming information, we've pretty much got an option for you. So I think that's important because I think we're all, we all, you know, we have different preferences. Some people like to listen to a podcast while they walk to the gym. Some people would rather read, skim it on their phone, you know? It just depends. So the way people consume media now to your point has really shifted. And I think the younger generations in particular want the short video clips or the short audio clips, like traditional media, I think is no longer the preferred form. I think of consumption for better or for worse. But I mean, I'll say like I get a lot of my information from TikTok. I do. I get a lot of my information from Instagram. So as someone who I guess is Gen Z, I'm 25, like I am representative of that generation that this is how I'm consuming my media. And as someone who hosts a podcast, this is how I like to share my information, my wisdom, the wisdom I'm gaining from other people. And I think what excites me actually is getting to see how I can package an idea or a concept and communicate it in different ways, be it through audio. So talking to each other or through how I translate this, I don't know, 50-minute long interview into the Instagram platform, launching my sub-stack, creative writing. Like it's a fun exercise for me to think about the ways that I then express my thoughts. So just kind of the reverse, I guess, from when we think about how media is shared outward to an audience and how it's being consumed by other people. But I was going to say just really quickly, what you're talking about is just, it's repackaging. You take the same information and you can piece me a little into a million different types of content. And that's so cool. And we have this ability to like, so I'm curious just really quickly when you're talking about consuming your information from TikTok and Instagram, are you seeking out information, asking TikTok, like the TikTok search bar questions? Or are you just receiving the information from scrolling? Receiving from scrolling, it's the algorithm. It's this magic algorithm that somehow keeps feeding me things that I either want to see or I'm bound to see because my friends are seeing it. And it's actually kind of scary to think about if you really dive deeper into the way that algorithm works and how I think it shapes pop culture, trends. That might be a separate conversation, like to what extent does technology actually enhance our society and our own and drive to learn and to be hungry for more knowledge? That can be a whole separate podcast. - It's a great question and I honestly, I wish we had all the time in the world to think about it. - Maybe a part two, but you'd made an interesting point around this evolution of the wellness industry and seeing it from the inception of your career to where you're at now as the executive editor at Mindbodies Cream. I remember creating Everyday Endorphins as an Instagram 10 years ago in 2014. And it was a fun blog where I would post content on this Instagram about being a rower, being a student athlete, what I was eating. And it was just something that I did for fun and kept myself accountable to staying healthy, to staying focused, to staying fit. But this was like the pre-influencer days. And I've seen the wellness industry now blow up and I think to your point, there's so many benefits to this where more people can have seats at the table. And in a way, I think it's nice that wellness can be more mainstream now because I think it's encouraging people to prioritize their health and well-being at the same time. I have this internal conflict or struggle where I feel like the wellness space is now too saturated. And I feel like we're just being thrown one thing after the next, after the next to fix these problems that are kind of short-term solutions. And I would love to hear your thoughts on just how this evolution has happened with the wellness industry. Are we being bombarded with too much information? How do we sift through that? How can we, to the best of our abilities, like honestly and authentically communicate messages around health and well-being when there could be maybe, you know, a not so great spin to that as well? - There are so many ways that we could dig into this topic. And I have thought about it a lot. It's obviously how I spend most of my time thinking about this space. And I don't, you know, starting at the beginning of my time at my buddy, Greene, the wellness space was, like I said, crunchy, fringe-ish. It still was a fairly open, but it was still a touch fringe. And there has been an openness. And I think that's probably the biggest thing that's changed is there's an openness to not immediately frown upon some hack or trick or tip or remedy that I think we needed. And we need. There are a lot of ancient practices and traditions that we have replaced with Western medical solutions that actually aren't better. Or there are, you know, Western solutions that actually are better. And there's a balance of it all. And I think we sometimes having a food solution or an herb or a simple hack, like, you know, I'm trying to think of something that like is an easy solution to every day. So like, for example, something like mouth taping. I don't think that if I had told my 2016 self that I would tape my mouth shut at night to get better sleep, to potentially help some of my TMJ, I would be like, what? You're going to tape your mouth shut. Like, that's not normal. But now it's very acceptable to mouth tape. And it's not even weird. That's not even a thing that people would, you know, I think twice about. So just the openness is such a great, I think a great transformation that has, again, opened the door, brought more people to the table. I think the reason why so many people, specifically women are coming to wellness for solutions is because the medical system hasn't shown up for them. They're not supporting us in a way that is helpful. They are, it takes 10 years to get a diagnosis of endometriosis. I can fact check that, but I think that's, I mean, it takes on average, I think it takes 10 years to get an autoimmune disease diagnosis. And for women, you know, eight out of every 10 cases are, of autoimmune disease are women. So we're the ones suffering with these issues and we can't get answers. And I think we have been omitted from studies for various reasons and I think that's a real problem. I think it's a real problem. It's obviously a real problem. We don't understand pregnancy, we don't understand fertility, we don't understand menopause, we don't understand paramedicause. Wellness has become our part of our answer. So I don't necessarily think that too much information is the problem. I think there's a more systemic issue underlying that is causing our appetite for the information. We need it because we're struggling with various issues. So, yes, there are instances when you read enough about inflammation that you're convinced that you have inflammation and you might not. There are fear-mongering tactics. We all, as we just spoke about an algorithm, algorithms feed on fear and hatred and vitriol and all the good things that get us going. And I just want people to remember that those are the things that are getting clicks and getting numbers and likes and follows. But you don't need to over-complicate it. Like it's not rocket science. It's some foundational basics, sleep, exercise, nutrition, movement, some sort of mindfulness, spirituality, component, whatever that looks like for you within those confines, like it shouldn't be too complicated. So, I hear your concern on us having too many things, but we're not well. As a society, especially in the United States, we're not feeling our best and if mouth tape helps, then great, let's lean into that. I'm now becoming a spokesperson for mouth tape, apparently. - No, I mean, you make really great points because something I was thinking about as you were sharing that example, mouth taping. There's a lot of these practices now that are new and trendy and can help solve some sort of problem. And to your point, if it works, might as well lean into that if it works for you. And something I try to come back to is bear with me with this metaphor analogy, kind of like the chicken or the egg scenario. What comes first is we need to grasp for these products and gadgets and things to alter in our lifestyle to enhance our well-being. Like biohacking is a great example. Do we need all these supplements? Do we need the mouth tape? Do we need the hatch alarm clock that mimics the natural, do we need all these things to like modulate our environment so that we become healthier or does that actually start within us and the thoughts that we create in our minds and you know if we can fix that if we can work on our inner dialogue and our you know our sense of self is that what will then cause the more positive ripple effect to feel empowered to take better care of ourselves without the need of these external products or gadgets or whatever you want to call it and I mean I don't have the answer to this question because I think I I lean towards like both ends of the spectrum like I try to curate my environment and my routine in a way that would think aligns well with the typical wellness figure going to yoga teaching yoga. I have the hatch alarm clock like all those things but then at the same time I get overwhelmed with like I need to take colostrum and all these supplements and all these things and I'm like you know what that's too much I need to do like the inner work to feel healthier and happier within myself and hopefully the rest kind of falls into place so I feel like I it's something I've been thinking about a lot and I would love to hear your perspective on that like where do we start? It's complicated and I think the answer is both I think you know what Kimberly talks about with Hart coherence starting with your your own heart and what's going on inside of you is crucial and aspect to it. I do think that there are real positive solutions coming from products that cannot be denied. There are for example. I was I think in 2014 I was pretty run ragged. I had been very stressed and again vegetarian probably not in my healthiest phase of life but I was still feeling I exercise a lot but I was honestly I was just I was run ragged and I couldn't make it up the stairs at Broadway Lafayette the subway station without taking breaks and I was like this isn't normal. I'm a young person I don't feel right and I went to the doctor and not only did I have a thyroid deficiency but I also had an extremely low B12 so I started taking a B12 supplement and I felt Incredibly different like to the point where I was struggling with would have been called not severe depression but pretty intense depression that was actually just a B12 deficiency and once I started handling my B12 deficiency and the thyroid situation I was kind of lifted out of the cloud and so you know that heart coherence or that mindfulness that Stability from within is sometimes dependent on an external Factor our soil is depleted the food that we're eating isn't as nutrient dense as it once was you know 60 years ago So getting a little extra support from a supplement or from an alarm clock that doesn't jolt you out of your skin every Morning like those little things do count in contributing to the internal Motivation and the internal kind of ability to keep yourself grounded and balanced So I do think that there is I would prefer all of our solutions be free Like that would be great. I would love it. We unfortunately can't you know things come up That's money and we have to sometimes pay for them But I do think that a lot of the solutions can be free But you know it takes time it takes energy. So yeah, I would say it's a balance That's a really good point and It just reminded me about my own health journey as well and I remember a doctor telling me Kind of the exact same thing like your deficient in these vitamins like this is probably why you feel brain fog or whatever the other symptoms were and My issue was sometimes with those practices. I'm so not consistent So maybe this is a room of reminder for me to get back into taking more supplements because I'm sure I could probably Actually benefit from that if I did blood work again now I'm probably deficient like vitamin D and all the other ones which is not great But I do see where you're coming from where like it could be valuable to lean on to those things outside of yourself to strengthen That inner heart coherence like striking that balance and also recognizing that at different points in your life That can also change too and I think as we get older and more wise like learning to Hear your intuition really loudly and lean into that is is such an important skill to cultivate into hone in on Which I think is actually a really great transition into another topic. I wanted to talk about with you this afternoon and We were chatting about this a little bit offline, but an area of interest. I think that you've been Cultivating recently and has been covered in mind body green is this concept around Women's relationship to strength so I'll let's just start there I'm like what comes up for you when you think about this topic. I think you know I can just like rant about it So you're like strong women go Yeah, the biggest transition or to air transformation that I've seen within the wellness space has been this movement into to strength and I Do think that there are some incredible practices, you know yoga and Pilates that enhance strength for sure But there is a new approach to strength within the past year or year or two where women are focusing on lifting heavy Eating more protein focusing on muscle health own density things that are typically more masculine in nature and are just broy and I am super excited to see more women get into this space and really hone their own strength We have at my buddy green been focused on protein form. I would say a year and a half has been a dedicated topic of interest for us so much so that we actually created our own Protein powder which is delicious and then we also created our own creatine which is a great building block for muscle health and building and maintaining lean muscle mass which is so important for women we start to lose our muscle mass by the age of 30 so things start to decline quite rapidly and to be honest when you look back You know I look at people the older people that are in my life and they're quite frail and you know There are some horrific stats about if you fall and break a hip that you're likely to die and I wish I remember the percentage off the top of my head But it's a staggering stat and You need your strength basically and you need your strength so that as you age You're not diminishing to zero. You're diminishing to a place where you can still keep up your daily tasks to keep up the things that you want to do I think Peter itia is the one who talks a lot about thinking about what you want to be able to still do in your 60 70s 80s 90s and then work backwards from there and I like that strategy of working backward I think it's it's a good way to figure out how to Build your strength protocol. I Have not seen women in the gym and Talking about protein like this. This is just been a totally new new thing which The protein thing is so fascinating because After 10 years I started to incorporate meat into my own diet and Started to feel amazing and really felt the difference. I think my body was I was having dreams about Steak which that was like okay, maybe we need it Freudian, it's like telling you a time to eat meat again. I know it was Yeah, it was and then you know my body reacted great when I ate it It was like not like this horrific experience that I think people were concerned about for me But I think that in general eating or protein has allowed women to just change their relationship to food in general and Start to think about things with more abundance and rather than scarcity and think about food is a real fuel source in a way that makes us feel good and Achieve our goals our muscle goals, and I think that I grew up in you know then the 90s in the early 2000s where like thin was in and quite frankly I've seen us move away from it but this is the only thing that I had seen that's really been an Active decision to move away from that which I think is really helpful for women because we Historically especially if you were you were already a healthy eater I think if you were healthy eater. I think you probably were under consuming your protein needs and I didn't know that I definitely was I was a vegetarian and you know getting my protein from nuts and quinoa and tofu All of which I still eat and love but you know it wasn't like I you know no matter how many chickpeas you eat like you still you it's hard to hit your protein goals with that kind of With that kind of diet at least I have found and I think you know when you're going to the gym and you're Lifting heavy and you're really trying to focus on muscle health which was something that I didn't focus on at all I didn't want to be bulky. We all said that we were like we don't want to bulk up So we use the two pound weights and that's just I think it's been it's just a little ridiculous I am you know all for you know those heavy dead lifts I'm like ready to squat heavy and I think that there's like You know there's a real there's a real turning of the tide happening right now and It's just such a relief to see women stepping into their power and really embracing the strength that they should have been embracing all along. - Such a good point. And I've started to actually incorporate more strength training into my workout routine now over the past six or so months. And the first few months where I made that shift, I really noticed a difference in my body. And it felt really good to be strong. And also there's ways that you can build those workouts into your routine where you're not gonna bulk up. Like you actually become leaner. Just that's how it works. Like depending on the workout routine, you're on the exact program. Like for me at least I noticed when I was doing these 30 or 45 minute full body weight palaton classes and then I would do like a 15 minute in climb walk after. Like workout for a whole hour. Few times a week I started to like trim down. And have more muscle but be more lean and feel stronger. And the feeling of being stronger physically made me feel more confident. And it's this positive ripple effect. And so instead of focusing on needing to look super thin or drop a few sizes, the reframe was so powerful for me. I mentioned earlier I was on a crew team in high school. That's a really cardio intensive sport. And you're also like feeling a ton of lactic acid when you're in those, you know, the sprint workouts. And it's just, it's a lot on like your heart to kind of kill yourself on the rowing machine all the time, psychologically and physically. And I remember we used to train out of Columbia's boat house like once or twice a week during the winter. And it was like weights strength training. I liked it because it wasn't the cardio. So I was like, okay, this is great. It's like it's a different type of workout. But I also had this fear that I was gonna bulk up from using weights. And I think there's this like misconception around that for women in particular transitioning into strength training. But truly, you know, I've seen it to be, I've seen so many positive effects from shifting, not only what I'm doing, but how I approach it. Do you think that your experience in a college sport allowed you to transition into strength training easier? I wasn't a sports person growing up. So transitioning into going into the gym was a real shock. You know, I didn't know my way around the gym. Do you think that that made it easier for you? - Being a high school athlete, I still loved being in the gym actually. Like even when I wasn't at practice, I remember going to the gym and doing like a 10 minute arm weight workout. Like I enjoyed doing that kind of stuff. The transition in college when I was no longer an athlete was really difficult for me. Because I didn't know how to build a healthy relationship to fitness when I didn't have a coach telling me what to do. I placed so much trust in someone else creating a workout plan for me and shaping my body that I didn't know how to do that for myself. And on top of that, in college, I was struggling with a lot of hormonal issues. And so I just felt like I could never do it right. Like I just didn't know how to create this healthy ecosystem for myself. So I felt really powerless for a long time. And I didn't know what workouts would give me the results I wanted. And I was being told to eat this thing and not that thing. And it just, it was so confusing for me. And it made me feel like a victim to my situation, which is not a good headspace to be in. You shouldn't feel a victim to your life. You should feel empowered to make changes and create the life that you want to live. But I just felt so lost at that time. And so it's really difficult for me to figure out like what would be the best type of exercise. However, the one thing that remained consistent since middle school actually was my yoga practice. And even now have found like when I do movement, that feels good in my body. I feel psychologically better. And then I'm more likely to commit to working out more frequently. So then my body is benefiting from that. So rather than feeling discouraged by not knowing exactly what to do, I now try to focus on, well, what feels good in my body? And then I know I'm more likely to commit to that. And the outcome, I guess, is that I feel healthier and I am healthier. It's a mental health practice. I think what I'm curious about is I feel like I was really behind when it came to my strength training journey. I didn't have any athletic laurels to rest on. I didn't have anything as a foundation. I danced in high school. I did-- I picked up yoga in college and really leaned into yoga for all of my 20s. And I think having a strength training renaissance in my 30s was a real-- and I relied a lot on classes. I thought these strength training circuit classes are the way for me to get the guidance that I need, because I truly didn't have that foundation. And I'm just super curious to know, when you do have a foundation, how does that shape your-- and it does sound like there's baggage really no matter what, I guess, that is probably what we can glean from it. But I do think that having a sports foundation is so fascinating and something that I wish that I had, basically. You bring up an interesting point and something that just popped into my mind. So I last summer was really into run clubs. Now I have thoughts on the way that this is transformed into a dating-- not even a dating app, but like Run Clubs as dating opportunities. But I was doing it at the time really, because I wanted to run. Anyways, I got into this one particular run club, and I started going consistently every week, really eclectic group of people. I found out about this run club through a podcast event that I did earlier that spring and just kept showing up. And what I loved about it was that you'd show up, and you didn't know what the myelage was going to be. It was the first time in a long time where I placed trust in someone else to guide me through my fitness journey. And I'm not a runner. The first run I went to with them was five miles, and that was a lot for me. But I remember finishing that run, and I felt so proud of myself for pushing myself, and for showing to myself I could do it, and I wouldn't die over it. I would come out alive and be fine. And that's what kept me going. I ended up towards the end of the summer, we didn't eight mile run. Of course it was a stop and go, but for me that was huge. And I started to notice this sense of confidence that I was building within myself because I felt strong again. I was like, oh my god, I feel strong, I can do this. And it took me back immediately to a moment in high school where we had a practice, and it was a 10K race on the rowing machine, which took me about at the time, I think, a little under an hour to row 10,000 meters at a study pace, and I was so exhausted from it, but the minute I hit that 10K mark on the rowing machine, I felt so accomplished. And the next day when I got to school, my body was physically sore, and it was a reminder what I did the day before, but I remember walking through the halls of Bronx Science, which was a very competitive high school in New York City, and thinking to myself, nothing's gonna get in my way. No exam that I have to take, nothing is going to rattle me because I just did something that was really hard and I accomplished it. So I do think that sense of confidence that you got from sports or just from pushing yourself, like transcends. And now I don't push myself in that way, 'cause I'm not on a sports team. Yoga's very different, it's not about pushing your limits. It's a more mental and for me, it's spiritual practice, but I do remember that run club immediately brought me back to that moment in high school. And again, back to this conversation on strength, I felt really strong from being able to do something I didn't think I could do. And that made me feel really good in myself. It wasn't like that I ran all these miles. It was that I felt my body was capable and that's such a blessing, 'cause not everyone's body can do that. - I love the feeling that I did not want to go to the gym this morning, like at all. Like I had come up with every excuse to not go. And as I left, I was like, you truly feel like a superhero. You're like, if I can force myself to go and push myself while I'm there, and lift heavy, and today we were, I'm trying to work on my VO2 max. So I had to do some bike sprints and I just really don't like it, but you do it. And honestly, I should probably pick up some rolling, but pushing yourself makes you feel so accomplished. And there's just really nothing like that. And I wish that I had had that in high school. I feel like that would have been just such an incredible building block to becoming the person that I am today. And I wish that I had tapped into that a little bit earlier. - I mean, it's never too late to have that kind of experience. And I will say at least in high school, what was great about being on a crew team in particular with rowing is that I learned the value of being disciplined and building grit. And I think that when those skills are taught to you at a young age or when you're developing, that sticks. It's like hardwired into you. And it's actually funny we're talking about this 'cause I was out with some friends last night and we were talking about some goals we have for the new year. And I really reflected and I was like, I think I need a little bit more struggle in my life. Which I don't think anyone would ever wish onto themselves to feel more struggle or challenge, but challenge in a way that's productive. Like challenge in the way that I felt when I was on a rowing. team and I was pushing myself even in high school being in a really competitive environment. You know, now sometimes I don't feel very challenged at times. And I think when you learn to sit in that discomfort but then prove to yourself you can do something that is hard, it builds this inner confidence in you and it leads you to like want to accomplish the next thing. And so even just reframing struggle and challenge especially as women who are maybe taught to be more like soft spoken or to receive things or to not be so opinionated or the list can go on. I don't know. I just I was thinking a little bit about that yesterday and now this has now popped into my mind again but to kind of embrace struggle and challenge rather than to fear it. I think is like a very important skill and I think I learned that through high school athletics. It's almost like, you know, we talk about her medics stress a lot. So cold therapy for example or even exercise is a great example of good stressors. Stressors that make your body feel the pressure so that when a real struggle like a death in the family comes along you're mentally physically resilient to as resilient as you can be because they're horrific life incidents but they're intrinsically related and I think adding quote unquote struggle to your life is a great way to prepare you for whatever is going to be thrown your way. And I don't know how you're going to figure out what your struggle will be right now. I'm curious to know how you'll figure that out but I could not agree more. I mean today for me the struggle was going to the gym and I did it and now I have that kind of the benefits the endorphins so to speak to make me feel more accomplished. And I can handle what is thrown my way today. I love that. I was not expecting the conversation to shift this way but I'm so happy it has because it gives a whole new perspective into thinking about what it means to be happy and to be quote unquote happy all the time. I don't think it would be a life well lived honestly because that completely contrasts with this idea of feeling happy and joyous all the time like adding struggle. And so I'd love to hear your perspective on really like what it means to feel happy and to be happy and to have a life that's fulfilling to you. It's a big question. The idea that we really go after it. My buddy Green is to focus on well being overwhelm us. Wellness is to us very destination focused and very accomplishment driven and well being has more of a enjoying the journey mindset and we believe I believe that having joy infused into everything that you do is important. Does that mean that every time I go to the gym I am just elated? No. But the joy comes from the structure. So making sure that you have within remember I was talking about kind of the buckets like sleep, nutrition, movement, spiritualities, slash mindfulness, having those buckets, finding what you do specifically within those buckets is up to you and you have to find what makes you joyful. And it's actually going to change. So you know you go through your phase of eating this and it brings you a lot of joy and then you get really sick of it. You don't want to eat it anymore and you decide to change your diet or you try new things. I think I'm a huge fan of experimenting on myself which again is not for everyone. Like I love to eliminate things from my diet or I mean I don't really eliminate things from my diet that often but like change my diet in a certain way, change my sleeping habits, change the way I'm exercising like just to see how like my HRV will benefit. And I think that what I have noticed is when my HRV, so my heart rate variability is high I actually am happier. So it is a metric for how I'm doing mentally as well as physically. It's a physical manifestation of how I'm doing in my body. So understanding that for example if I do a fasted workout it stresses my body out and then makes me stressed I get wired and in a bad way. So all I have to do is eat a little something before I work out and I feel so much better and I'm able to tackle the workout with more efficiency. I'm able to recover easier and better. I'm also just like mentally I think not as stressed. So within structure and this is something we talked a lot about or I heard a lot about when I was doing yoga more regularly but you have to have structure and there's freedom within the structure. So you have to have discipline in order to have freedom that means something. If your life is fully haphazard and you're doing whatever you want whenever you want, you don't get the joy from the moments of freedom if that makes sense. I think with health and well being the structure is super important because you're dealing with a physical animal that is our bodies and we need a lot more attention because the way that we live our lives is so it's the antithesis of how we probably should be living. We're hunched over computers. We're not talking to enough people. We're not spending enough time around other human beings. We're not eating whole foods. We're not breathing clean air. We're not drinking clean water. There's just so many things that are just off. So we have to work harder to hit homeostasis basically. And I think that there's, it's just really important to have the structure to then enjoy the joy. Enjoy the joy. And on that point, Hannah Margaret, the final question that I ask every guest on the podcast is about incorporating moments of joy into their life. So the question I'll leave you with is what is something that brings you a bit of endorphins every day? So many things. Like I have already spoken about my own structure, my own schedule. I like to wake up early. I like to get outside as early as soon as possible. I throw my clothes on and if it's a gym day, I walk to the gym, which is about a 15 to 20 minute walk. If it's not, and I just go on a walk around the park here in Brooklyn and getting outside and being in nature, especially when everything's a little quieter and a little bit more chill. There are always bad days and bad experiences. But in general, I find the city very invigorating and gratifying. I also really love spending time with people I love, my husband, cooking. I think it's all about the little moments in the day. Whether it's honestly, it can be a dear friend that just stops by one day. You know, they're in the neighborhood and they stop by and say hi. But it also can be those conversations that you have with the guy who owns the coffee shop on the corner. And just even if I'm not getting coffee, it's just saying, hey, in the morning, I think that we need to feel connected and a part of something. And it's really important that we get those moments throughout the day. And the foundations that I talked about are obviously a given too. But there's so many things. Yeah. Oh, I love that. And there's so much science and research too that supports the importance of connection in our well-being and how fundamentally humans are meant to connect with other people. For social creatures, we need that to feel a sense of purpose in our lives, feeling like we're a part of something bigger. And it's interesting now kind of also in this mental health epidemic, the loneliness crisis, we're craving connection more so now than ever before, especially coming out of COVID. I mean, I know it's been four years, but that really shook things up. So I try to come back to this idea of like, how can I feel more connected to myself and to other people? And how do I use that as the foundation to create a life with more joy in it? Because it's very cyclical too. And so I loved your responses. And again, just so happy that we got to do this. Where can my listeners connect with you? And of course, follow along all the content that my body green shares with the world. You could definitely find the work that my team is putting out into the world at mybuddydgreen.com. We also are on Instagram and TikTok at my buddy green. And we have some great newsletters if I may recommend the long game, which is our longevity newsletter or sleep school, which is our sleep newsletter or functional foods, which is our functional food newsletter. We also have a great commerce newsletter if you're looking for some product recommendations, which I always am. I am on Instagram at HM_Allen. And basically just find me at my buddy green. Amazing. Thank you so much, Hannah Margaret, it was such a pleasure. Thank you Stella. This is lovely. I appreciate it. Thanks for watching. Thanks again for tuning in and reminder to keep spreading in orphans and finding the things in life that bring you joy Until next time