One minute I’m feeling happy, content, in flow, grateful and full of love, then something can happen and I feel fearful, anxious and totally STRESSED OUT!

Only yesterday, along with my partner Naturopath Naomi Judge, we were recording a webinar for the members of our Break Through! program, about the incredibly important area of stress.

We acknowledged stress is an unavoidable part of life and often out of our control. What we do have control over however, is reducing the amount of stress we experience and mitigating the harmful effects of the stress we just aren’t able to avoid.

Back to my last two days for a moment.

Well, let’s just say they’ve been ROUGH on a personal level!! And the stress of it all affected me on a physiological and psychological level. How do I know? Well I tuned into my mind and body and these were the things I noticed going on…

My muscles around my neck and shoulders were tight
I had headaches 
My tummy felt off
I was feeling exhausted
I was snappy
My breathing was shallow
My mind was catastrophising
Insomnia paid a visit
And I was just generally out of sorts

That’s a lot of symptoms right there!

It’s so easy to get stuck in our stressful situations and not allow ourselves to move on. Often we just don’t know how to move on. 

Our society doesn’t value self-care, so often we don’t have the tools to know how to deal with stress.

I didn’t allow myself to linger in my stressful place for too long as I would have once upon a time.

Awareness, consciousness and acknowledgment were the first steps in dealing with my stressful situation.

What did I do to ease my stress?  These small things helped me enormously…

Reached out to my husband for support
Called my brother for advice
Spoke to my mum for empathy
Observed my negative self-talk and gently changed it to positive self-talk
I took a nap (normally unheard of but I listened to my body and whilst napping my beautiful daughter took it upon herself to wash all the dishes in the sink. She sensed I needed some support)
Deep breaths
I may or may not have had a vodka on the rocks
I stayed in the moment rather than let my mind runaway with all the catastrophes it could think of
I went out for my morning walk and instantly felt my troubles wash away…here’s a pic…

Truth is, stress is wreaking havoc on our health in so many ways. It’s becoming chronic and prolonged and no amount of nutrient-dense food or supplements can save us.

It affects so many systems of our body, including our gut, it puts us at risk of various health and modern degenerative conditions like heart disease, diabetes, hypothyroidism and autoimmunity. It affects our physical body, our emotions and our psychology.  

Everything that happens to us has the potential to be a stressor. But we have control over this in the form of choice. We can reduce stress’s harmful affects by changing our attitude, improving our daily self-care routines and being mindful to avoid unnecessary stress.

Those stress management skills we acquire and implement, we need to start teaching them to our kids so that they will have healthy coping strategies to help them survive the rollercoaster of life. This will allow them to deal with stress in healthy ways and positively manage the inevitable stress that will turn up in their lives.

Bren x

Dijanna from Wardrobe 101 was sent on a journey to unlock some of the dark secrets of my wardrobe with the only half tongue-in-cheek warning that there might be more work in there than she bargained for. It was as much a search-and-destroy mission as it was a mercy dash to search-and-accessorise! It’s not that bad, really, but many of my clothes had ceased being an inspiration, and that needed to change. Or the clothes had to! The equation was pretty clear.

Sure enough, when I returned not five minutes later, it was to a heap of clothes that resembled the detritus of the fashion world and the early stages of a bonfire much more than it did a well-maintained treasure. So I guess I didn’t disappoint her .. or maybe I did!

In any case, after explaining why these clothes were headed to the great clothes rack in the sky (which you can see in the video), she softened the blow with some kind words for a cropped black jacket which had survived the cull due to its versatility. Dijanna showed me three easy and gorgeous ways to style it that will see me off to a casual lunch with girlfriends, a more formal meeting with a corporate client, or a movie opening at the Verona.

You can check the outfits out below, but in the meantime, see what was ditched and why.

While Dijanna was working her magic, I had snuck into the kitchen to whizz her up Quirky Cooking’s ‘My Favourite Green Smoothie’. It’s actually my second favourite smoothie, beaten to the no.1 ranking by the Coconut Chai Green Smoothie from her new cookbook (which is one of the prizes in this big giveaway!). It’s a great breakfast option for Dijanna and her family (and quick!), and I’m hoping she will add it into her growing repetoire of nourishing, yet snappy family meals.

Here’s how to make this delicious green smoothie…

GIVEAWAY (This giveaway is closed and winner has been contacted)

I’ve decided to run a fantastic giveaway which includes five amazing prizes valued at over $400!!! Entry details below.

Food versus fashion giveaway includes:

<1 x Wardrobe 101 sustainable eco-friendly T-shirt, making it easier to make smart fashion choices without compromising the planet. It is 100% organic. Value $145.

1 x Chasing Issy one off necklace. Value $120.

1 x Quirky Cooking cookbook that contains over 130 healthy, mouth-watering recipes catering to a broad spectrum of specialist diets. Value $50.

1 x case of Natural Raw C coconut water. Low in sugar and super delish. Value $40

1 x copy of Wardrobe 101, a go-to manual to create your perfect core wardrobe.  Value $34.95

3 simple steps to enter for your chance to win all these prizes:

Firstly like the Facebook pages of:

Wardrobe 101
Chasing Issy
Quirky Cooking
Natural Raw C 
Brenda Janschek Health and Lifestyle

And then sign up to my free newsletter here.

Finally, leave a comment in this blog telling me which cropped jacket outfit  is your favourite (1, 2 or 3) and why.

Terms and conditions:

* This giveaway runs until midnight, 6th of August 2014.
* The winner will be chosen randomly.
* This competition is open to Australian residents only.
* The winner will be announced by email.

Best of luck everyone!

Bren x

PS: Did anyone notice I’m wearing the same shoes and bag in each picture. She’s a clever gal that Dijanna!

As a mumpreneur, my focus had shifted to more immediately necessary  things – raising my family, preparing meals, after school activities and events, creating and building my business. You know how it goes. I used to love fashion, my clothes, and getting dressed for the day. When did it get so hard? Where did that girl go? I miss her.

It was time to call in the expert. Lucky for me my bestie is Dijanna Mulhearn from Wardrobe 101. She is no stranger to my frenzied texts the night before an event desperately seeking styling advice. So we struck a deal: in exchange for her fashion education, Dijanna asked me to show her the easy way to good health through food.

It struck me that if Dijanna and I were having this food/fashion struggle, then possibly you might be too. And when I asked you the question on Facebook, it your replies confirmed my suspicion. It seems to be a universal issue.

So this post is the first in a fun series exploring some easy fashion and food fixes, and allows us to remember that it’s healthy to indulge in a bit of self care and self love.

Click on the video as we set up our challenge – Dijanna shares a quick fashion tip and gets a taste of a delicious quick snack for her efforts. (We’ll work on video length and blurriness factor for the next ones!)

You can find the full recipe for Brenda’s Brekky Ball here

Dijanna’s fussy eater 7yr old not only loved Brenda’s Brekky Ball, but shared some with his mates who have sent an order through for some more 🙂

What are your fashion/food woes? We’d love to hear from you and address your stresses!

In the next installment of Food versus Fashion, Dijanna finds a little gem in my wardrobe and proceeds to show me how easy it is to create three different looks with this single piece. And I’ll make sure I supply here with an ultra-tasty, supercharged smoothie to send her on her way to face another busy day without a stop off at McDonalds!

Look out for an awesome giveaway coming up in the following weeks and we’d love it if you shared this post to help other mums in the same boat.

Bren x

Once I posted a photo of my healthy breakfast on Facebook, and very promptly received this message from a follower:

“I’m trying extremely hard to lose the baby weight after my fourth bubba. Right now I am 10 days in, eating clean, but I find I’m fighting it everyday. I am feeling better in my body but I always feel starving and that it will only be a matter of time before my mental strength fails me. I was drooling over your eggs and bacon this morning and I basically would love to know how you eat that everyday and look amazing.  Do you eat like a sparrow the rest of the day to counteract this? I’m curious and starving.”

I know exactly where this mum is at. What’s more, I receive similar messages like this regularly. As a health coach, I offered her a complimentary half hour chat to find out more. During that conversation, I learned that what she really wanted was to be able to lose weight, but not to starve herself in doing so. The thing is, most people think that deprivation is the only way to make this happen (possibly because that’s how diets are designed) and because they have set up goals based on an archaic goal-setting method, and not in a way that gives them purpose and joy (but that’s a story for another time).

But how long can this be sustained for? Sure, you will most likely lose weight on any diet you try, but only over a specific period (usually very short!). It’s unnatural, and hardly sustainable. The research shows that you will end up putting the weight back on , and then some.

During dieting we are often depriving the body of wholesome and nutritious food (your body’s fuel), which it then craves, causing binging post-diet. It’s madness, and it’s unhealthy. Placing stress on the body is the route to immune-system dysfunction and susceptibility to disease. Although in jest , this mum said herself, the hunger was making her feel a little aggressive.

What she needed was permission to let go of her clean-eating superfood diet and feed her hunger by enjoying the type of breakfast our ancestors would have eaten. Yes, the very same type of breakfast she was droolng over on my Facebook page. A delicious breakfast full of wonderful fats and protein sourced from healthy animals and farms, with carbohydrates in the form of lots of vegetables.

The point is that our diets need to be natural, nutritious and sustainable for our health to respond similarly.

The next morning after we spoke she messaged me,  and sent me these photographs:

And after less than an hour of coaching this is how she is feeling today…

“Happy, content, satisfied, calm, nourished, relaxed and peace. These are all the feelings I have this week, which are total opposites to last week. I had to share with you what life changing tools you have given me. I’m a very satisfied Mumma. I haven’t weighed myself all week and part of me is still a little scared too. But I haven’t had any cravings for 2 days and can’t believe how amazing I already feel. So thank you”

If you are struggling to lose weight, or reverse your  health issues, or simply want to know how to feed yourself in the most nutritious manner, then please take a look at my 28 day cleanse program, Break Through! To Feeling Fantastic in a Body You Love and learn which foods enrich and which foods to ditch, understand how your thinking plays a big role in your success, learn how to forgive yourself when you don’t make the best choice, stay motivated to keep on track, set yourself up for success, love yourself and your body, enjoy eating delicious, healthy foods and find all the support in the world with with this new amazing lifestyle.

Please share this blog post with anyone who you know who may be struggling with dieting and is ready to move to achieving their weight and health goals through a natural diet or are interested in moving their family to a nutritious and delicious real food way of life.

Bren x

A large part of that in modern society relates to body image – helping our little girls feel confident and worthwhile in their own skin. Women always seem to be under pressure to look their best, and quite often the ideal presented by airbrushed magazine models is potentially dangerous to how we view ourselves (and our heath). Our girls need to know the reality.

From a very young age girls are exposed to music videos, fashion magazines, Barbie dolls, advertising and TV shows that focus on appearance. The ideal image the media bombards us with is the skinny supermodel or actress, who’s image has most likely been manipulated to within an inch of it’s life. My fear is that this creates the unnecessary expectation of body image, setting them up for disappointment, low self-esteem, or even depression and eating disorders. In other words, failure by someone else’s rules.

But make no mistake, we are our little girls most important role models. They are listening when we talk about our (and other’s) bodies. They notice when we diet and how often we do so,  and this will become their reality too…

Our daughters need to know that true beauty lies within, and that they are respected and loved by their family and friends for who they are, not how they look.

My mother was very focused on her appearance, and knew that Dad liked his women skinny. I don’t recall specific negative self-talk about her body, but she seemed to be perpetually on a diet and certainly appearance was a hot topic on everyone’s lips at get-togethers. It’s a habit even amongst my own peer groups today, to the point where it’s almost a ‘conversation-padder’ like the weather. It wasn’t long before I was on the Weight Watchers bandwagon, beginning the diet merry-go-round which included diet pills at one point as appetite suppressors.

In my own home we don’t talk about our bodies in context of weight or shape. Rather, our bodies are strong, flexible or fit, and we like to explain how ‘moving our bodies’ makes us feel healthy and happy. It’s all about body function in our household, and proper nutrition and exercise takes care of that. We also don’t keep any scales, fashion magazines, watch video clips or the like around the house. However, Amercian sit coms are worryingly entering our zone, so it’s time to be vigilant!

As much as I try to protect my own daughter from this sort of exposure, this is the real world. The best I can do is to instill the values that I think will build a resilient woman who is confident and happy in herself.

Some tips:

– communication is crucial- explain how photos are manipulated, and why

– avoid emotive descriptions such as ‘fat’ or ‘thin’ and emphasise the benefits of a nutritious diet and exercise regimen for positive well being

– teach our girls to appreciate what our bodies can do, not just how they look

– focus on other factors other than appearance – effort, skill, positive personality traits and achievements

– draw attention to inspiring role models

– explain how sports and exercise clear the mind, and reduce stress and anxiety and highlight the good feelings produced after exercise and when eating a
nutritious diet

– explain how sport and recreation connects you with nature (surfing, rock climbing), or how Nippers (surf life saving) gives you confidence and skills, while connecting you to your community

Above all, I want to be a positive role model for my daughter, and I am in the best place to do it! My 8yr old knows I am passionate about healthy food and exercise, but she doesn’t even imagine it is born of wanting my body to look a certain way. She knows it’s because I want to feel a certain way – healthy!

I have worked hard throughout life on acceptance and self love, and finally in my 40’s I have not dieted in years! It’s funny in a way that the process of eating properly gives you the results that dieters search for, the difference being that one is sustainable as a way of life, and the other is temporary.

I am healthy and happy, and I hope that’s how my daughter will be, not just in her 40’s, but from today onward.

Bren x