How to Overcome Health Information Overload and Take Aligned Action

Overwhelmed by the constant barrage of health and wellness advice? 

In this episode, we'll chat about breaking free from the cycle of information overload and taking meaningful steps toward a healthier, more embodied you. Together, we'll unearth the common pitfalls that keep you stuck in perpetual contemplation, and reveal actionable strategies to transition from merely intellectualizing health to truly embodying it. 

From the confusion surrounding supplements and exercise routines to the paralysis caused by endless research, we tackle it all with a focus on compassion and self-awareness.

Finally, we'll highlight the role of external support systems like coaches, therapists, and loved-ones in overcoming analysis paralysis. See you in the episode!

How to Work Together

• Free Training! 🔥 Ignite Your Holistic Mental Wellness Transformation
• Join Calibrate 🧬 Become Your Own Medicine by Harnessing the Power of Your DNA & Daily Choices for Optimal Health & Mental Wellness (50% off on pre-sale now!!)
• ✨ Book Your Mental Wellness Breakthrough session! This is for courageous folks who are ready to ditch the physical and mental health symptoms, take their life back, and embody their most flavorful, fulfilled life. (New Client Session)

Links & Resources

• Join the Community & Dive Deeper on the Unforked Newsletter (This is where you sign up to receive my potent AF affirmations & more!)
• More Resources & Holistic Wellness Services
• Full Episode Shownotes & Transcripts

Thank you to YOU, the listener, for being here on this journey together.


With a full heart (but always room for a slice of pizza),

Haley Schroth, RDN, LD, CPT, RYT, CMWC | Founder & Integrative Mental Wellness Coach

Transcript

Haley: 0:03

Howdy friend, welcome to Unforked, an unfiltered holistic nutrition and mental wellness podcast for evolving folks that crave a delicious life of fulfillment. Haley, here I am, your host, a trauma-informed functional medicine dietitian, holistic mental wellness coach and the founder of the Fulfilled Fork. On this show, we dish up insights and activations while learning about sustainable mind, body, soul lifestyle practices. It's sweet, it's savory and it'll spice up your life. To stay connected, make sure you sign up for our unforked email list at thefulfilledforkcom. Forward slash links. Let's dig into the episode. Thefulfilledforkcom. Forward slash links. Let's dig into the episode. Howdy friend, and welcome back to the UnForked podcast.

Haley: 0:56

Today, we are talking about being in our heads. We're talking about being in our heads because, when it comes to anything but especially health and wellness information, it's really easy to go down the rabbit hole and only think about all the things like what's healthy for me, what's not healthy for me, what supplements should I be taking? What supplements shouldn't I be taking? Is this healthy for me? Is this not healthy for me? What exercise is going to be the best one for me? How do I exercise? There's so many damn questions. There's so many questions, and so we can spend a lot of time being in our heads instead of actually embodying the things we say we want. There's a big difference there. So before we get into that, though, I do just want to one thank you for being here. If you are a listener who has come back again and again. If you are new here, also thank you. I'm so stoked to have you here, so damn excited, as always. If you have not yet downloaded the Ignite, your Mental Wellness training, please do it already. Go do it. You are going to just love it.

Haley: 2:09

I absolutely know that, when you come out of this free training, you're going to understand more about what is holistic mental wellness, and where are you at on the continuum from struggling, surviving and thriving. There's a continuum, and we move across it throughout our lives, and sometimes even day to day, right, and so where are you spending a majority of your time, a majority of your days? You're going to want to identify that and be self-aware of where you're currently at in your journey, so that you can then gather and build the momentum towards your vision. We have to know where we are first, though, in order for any of that to work right. So you're going to learn that. You're going to learn more about nutrigenomics, nutrigenetics and epigenetics and why I feel that it is one of the best damn decisions you could ever make in your life when it comes to your health and mental wellness, absolutely, hands down, changed my life and has changed the lives of my clients. I'm just going to leave that at that. You're also going to learn about the assessment, so there's a self-assessment in there. We talked a little bit about how self-awareness is really really key, and so the assessment in this training is going to really get you understanding even further where you're at in your mental wellness journey.

Haley: 3:42

So where do you desire to go? Where are you getting stuck? What are the most common places where you're getting tripped up and not actually achieving your goals? That's a big one. I see this so often is that there are common mistakes that people make. There are reasons why people are not actually seeing the results that they want in their health and in their life. Yet it's huge. So please do not sleep on this, my friend. Go and download it now. The link is in the show notes. You can also find it on the website Big letters, free training. You can't miss it. Cannot miss it. So let's dive in to the meat of the episode. If you're not a meat eater, let's dive into the main course.

Haley: 4:37

So one problem that I see, like I mentioned, is that people are intellectualizing health, they're intellectualizing wellness, but they're not actually going out and taking action, and that's a big fucking problem. I'm going to say it again that's a really big problem. Okay, it's a really big problem. We have to be able to, yes, understand the information. It's so beneficial to understand information so that you know why you're going and doing the thing, right. It's one thing for me to say, oh, vegetables are healthy. Right, we all know that vegetables are healthy. Of course we do. We know that. And it's a whole different thing to go out and be eating the vegetables on a regular basis in most of your meals, all the things.

Haley: 5:33

So if you are intellectualizing it, you might also be. You're just trying to solve your problems with your head. Right, you're just trying to solve it with your head versus, yeah, taking the action, and so when you're in your head, you might be. I'm thinking of myself because I've done this, I'm thinking of past times and what I was doing. Okay, it's a really easy trap to fall into is to just spend time researching. Right, and there is a stage when researching, there's a stage of change and this is a literal behavior, change theory, right. So there's a stage of change where you are contemplating about making a decision right and you're working up the courage and you're gathering the information and getting ready to take action.

Haley: 6:28

And that's where I see a lot of people come into the fulfilled fork and the unforked podcast and just the whole tribe in general. And absolutely nothing wrong with that it is. It is a part of of the the change journey, right Is we have to, we have to be gathering the information, we have to know what decision to make. But the problem is when we get stuck there and I see this a lot, see this a lot. So somebody will come in and they'll just be able to regurgitate nutrition information to me and just say, oh, I think this is healthy and I heard this and I heard that and I researched this and I researched that and I'm like, wow, okay, all right, this person has a good base of knowledge.

Haley: 7:16

But I'm noticing that a lot of the people that do this, they have a really hard time following through on what they say. It is that they want. So if they say they want to eat more vegetables, and they're not doing it. But they know all of these benefits and they have all of this information about nutrition and vegetables. Maybe they know a bunch of bioactives that are, that are in the vegetables and that, and the specific health benefits of, say, broccoli, for example, and that there's sulforaphane in broccoli and it does this and that, and if you activate it with myrosinase, it's, it's, it's, it's going to be more beneficial for you, and not everybody comes into me with that kind of information, right, but let's say, let's say that somebody does. And so this person, though, is not able to carry out this desire that they have to eat more vegetables. So they are eating them sometimes, right, amazing, love that, but they're just not. They're not where they want to be. It's not because they know that vegetables are healthy. That's not why they're not able to take action.

Haley: 8:40

I know, if you're here, you are somebody that wants to eat healthier, you are somebody that wants to feel amazing in your mind, body and soul, and I know that you are the person who wants to live your most fulfilled life, and we can't do that without the health. And so if we are in our heads searching and trying to figure out what's wrong with us, or finding out the benefits of some food. Sometimes we can just get caught up in searching symptoms, right? What is it that I have? Do I have depression? Do I have major depressive disorder? Maybe am I just sad, I don't know. I'm just going to Google and Google and Google and try to find it out.

Haley: 9:24

It comes to a point sometimes where where it's it's like neurosis and we're obsessively consuming this information, because doing that, consuming the information, makes us feel like we're taking action. I will say that again when we are obsessively searching for information, when we are looking outside of ourselves and just going down the Google rabbit hole and researching and getting stuck there, that is a problem problem. It is a problem because we feel that we are making progress. What you're actually doing if you're stuck in the research rabbit hole and intellectualizing, is that you are giving yourself little dopamine hits. You're feeling good. You're feeling good oh my gosh, I found this information out. Wow, how great, amazing, aha, so cool.

Haley: 10:27

And not saying that it's not beneficial to know the things, but it's not beneficial when you're stuck in this loop. And you're just stuck in this loop of researching and researching and researching and never going out and taking action. So you're actually not making progress because you're not taking action, you're not implementing, you're not taking the time to embody the thing. That's a problem. That's a problem. And sometimes, when we're in that state of mind, if you find yourself doing that, you might be thinking, well, what's the one thing? There's one thing that's going to solve all my problems, like that is a fallacy. I, yeah, there's so many pieces to the puzzle and sometimes the research rabbit hole happens because you feel like there's just one missing thing. If you find out that one thing, everything else will make sense, and that is probably very not true and you most likely are not aware that this is going on.

Haley: 11:35

It takes practice to be able to identify. I used to be this person a lot. I would do this a lot, so I'm very familiar. I feel you, if this is you, you if this is you, and the more we recognize these tendencies in ourselves to be searching and searching, and searching, then you can recognize that it is a form of self-sabotage in a way. That's what I believe, anyway is that if you are stuck in that pattern, like you're not getting anywhere, you're just on your stationary bicycle, pedaling and pedaling and pedaling, and gather information.

Haley: 12:10

Whether we're in that stage of behavior change or not, whether we're contemplating changing our behaviors or not, our habits. We just then have to recognize when it becomes a problem for you. When does the scale tip over for you? When does the scale tip over? When is your research reaching the point where it's not helpful anymore? And I mentioned that it's a self-sabotaging behavior.

Haley: 12:58

It's like a protection mechanism, because sometimes if we're researching enough, then we feel like we're going to know exactly how to do it and can't fail because we're going to be perfect at it and everything's going to be just fine and you're going to be safe and it's going to work and you won't be rejected. You won't disappoint yourself, you won't disappoint others because you have all the information. You feel like you have all the information. You feel like you have all the information. You're not going to get criticized by making a mistake, either from yourself or others, because oh my gosh, if I research enough, I have the information, I have all of it. So, whatever it is, just recognizing that this is a route of keeping ourselves stuck.

Haley: 13:49

You can recognize when it becomes a distraction. When the research becomes a distraction, it's really important. And when you recognize when the research becomes a distraction, when it's actually not benefiting you to research this subject or this topic more. Then you can flip into action-taking mode and embodiment mode and take those steps, take all the things that you've learned and start implementing them, because that is how you're gonna get to where you want to go. That's how you are going to manifest and reach your goals, dreams, desires, ideal state of being sooner, because a lot of the time when you're in this research mode, like I said, it's protection, it's a protection mechanism in some way, shape or form, and it's also a self-awareness problem for most people, unless you're the person that is catching it rather quickly hopefully rather quickly, but it's a win, no matter when you catch it or not or a partner, family, whoever it is.

Haley: 15:27

Sometimes it takes somebody external to then say hey, I noticed that you're researching a lot and you're not actually doing the things you say you want. That can be really hard to find somebody that does that for you, though, unless you have a coach, therapist et cetera. Not everyone has those people in their life. So one find more of those people, because those are amazing people and you're going to have a much better life. It kind of sucks sometimes to hear that stuff Like hey Haley, I think you're being really hard on yourself and I was like, oh shit, you're right, you're right, I have been really hard on myself. Or hey Haley, I noticed you've been researching this thing a lot and you keep talking about it but you haven't actually done it yet. We all do it sometimes. It's human behavior.

Haley: 16:25

But the key is to have that self-awareness and to have those people in your life that can tell you that it's so important, it's so, so, so important. So the self-awareness problem here is that you're not recognizing that you're doing it. That's the problem number one. And then number two with the self-awareness is making sure you're not getting caught in a cycle of self-criticism and self-blame once you do gather the awareness that you're not where you're at, that you're not where you want to be at in your life, in your health. That is key. It is key to be able to be aware and then also to give ourselves that compassion. And if we need to process it with the coach, therapist, whoever, then we can process that.

Haley: 17:33

Those big feelings, little feelings, whatever comes up, the shame, the guilt, sometimes those things come up and the reason you want to process it is, so you don't get stuck there, because if you get stuck in that space then you're still having trouble moving forward. And this is just a thing I see so often, so often, and people that inquire about coaching, people that I just know in real life. I've seen it with clients, I've seen it with myself. Like I said, it's a human thing, it's so human to be doing this and the self-awareness is the key. And so a big part of what I do here at the Fulfilled Fork is mindfulness, because that is self-awareness, it's being in the present moment, it's being able to be in our bodies, to understand ourselves, the world around us.

Haley: 18:32

Most people are not paying attention and most people are too afraid to confront themselves. Most people are too afraid to recognize where they're at because of the feelings that come up, because they don't know how to work through their feelings, they don't know how to sit with the feelings and not let them. Not let the feelings like eat that person alive. Essentially Because I know that that's how some people feel is that the feelings that come up from the self-awareness of not being where you desire to be in your health or any other goal in your life.

Haley: 19:17

It's just so important to have the support, in my opinion, to go through this process of cultivating self-awareness, to go through this process of disseminating the information and learning how to embody it, because how you embody the information is going to be very different than how I embody the information and how so-and-so embodies the information, different than how I embody the information and how so-and-so embodies the information. Everybody is going to embody the information, the research, differently. It's just like the nutrigenomic testing that I use. We know that every single person's body is so, so, so different and so we have to recognize that when you are working on your health, when you're wanting to be more mentally and physically well and optimize your health and step into that next level, you have to recognize that you cannot just go research yourself to death on the internet. You cannot just go and research and research and research and expect to find either the one missing piece or all the information that you're going to need. I'm not saying it doesn't help, because it can and, trust me, research absolutely. I'm a nerd. It helps, it helps, but it's not the whole a nerd. It helps, it helps, but it's not the whole picture. It's not the whole picture. That's the important piece to know. So, having the awareness to catch yourself when you are over-researching, so so, so key, so important, so so, so key, so important, and then making sure we're turning that compassion towards ourselves, processing the emotions, not bypassing them, and then taking that individualized approach with all the information you have and with support, because that's how you're going to get where you want to go faster.

Haley: 21:22

First step, again, is the awareness. So if you, for example, are researching and now you feel like you know everything about healthy eating, maybe you feel like you know everything about healthy eating. Maybe you feel like you know everything about vegetables or movement or sleep or whatever it is, but you never go and actually start eating the vegetables is that going to do for you Nothing? It's not going to do a damn thing for you. It's not going to do a damn thing. So remember that example when you simple, simple example, but remember it when you are starting to get in your head and you can tell when you're in your head, because sometimes, at least for me, I'm like oh my God, I just feel so unclear. It's going to feel different for every single person, but for me I feel so unclear, I feel so confused and crazy sometimes.

Haley: 22:32

Or the searching. That's another way to recognize that you're in it, and so when you are in the embodiment of something, you're just doing it. You're not spending time in your head, you're spending a little bit of time in your head to make decisions. The head is a piece that is meant to be supportive of the body right, it's meant to support us in making logical decisions. But we are beings that go through the world and our bodies have so much wisdom and so much knowledge and the information that comes from our bodies is so important.

Haley: 23:16

And it's a whole other conversation to unpack, like why some people don't feel their bodies, like dissociation and trauma and all kinds of things, why you may not be able to like fully experience life in your body. But for today's conversation, just know that when you get to that embodiment phase, it's more just like a doing that happens and you get an idea or you think of a thing and you go do it, or you're just going and doing it. You're just doing the thing and there's not a whole lot of logical processing and being in the mind. So I encourage you to just start building an awareness and recognizing when you are intellectualizing and overthinking a decision, whether it's in health or in a different area of life, right, it's all one and the same, but if you're doing it in one area of your life, like hell, you're doing it in other areas I can almost guarantee you that. So it's something to pay attention to and I just hope that that was an insightful conversation.

Haley: 24:46

I hopefully gave you some nuggets of wisdom that will help you move forward in disseminating health information, figuring out what's right for you, what's not right for you, personalizing a health plan towards you learning the foundations of holistic mental wellness. If that is something that you are interested in, just know, hey, I'm here, I'm Haley. I would absolutely love to see you in my coaching programs. Send me an email if you have some questions, but if you're already ready, go ahead. Link in the show notes to book your mental wellness breakthrough session and this is the introductory session for new folks into my world, and when you book this session, it's you and me 90 minutes. We're going to deep dive and go all in on your health and you will walk away with a solid plan to move forward, with a solid plan to move forward, solid plan, a super solid plan so that you can take that step to your next level of health If you are listening to this, when it comes out, or near when it comes out, just know that for the month of June, I've got a few days left.

Haley: 26:19

I have three spaces open for 50% off of a mental wellness breakthrough session that 90-minute one-on-one session with me, this coaching session where we're going to deep dive into your unique life, your unique vision. Unique life, your unique vision, your unique health, and get you on that journey, taking that next step, building that forward momentum. Maybe you'll come across with the breakthrough of why you're stuck in a certain area of your health. Depends on what you need out of the session, of course, but that's one of the common things that I do with people in the session is, hey, let's figure out like, hmm, what's going on here? Why are you not seeing results? That's a big reason why this session is so, so, so helpful, just to get you going. And if you would like to just have the one session, the one 90-minute session, wonderful, amazing, you don't have to continue coaching with me.

Haley: 27:28

But if you find that you do have a breakthrough or that it is super, super beneficial and helpful and, oh my God, I just love working with Haley then we can talk about which program in my world is right for you long-term coaching package, a shorter-term coaching package, whatever it is a program, what is right for you in your unique mental wellness journey. So, again, you will find the link in the show notes to book that. If you book in the month of June, you're going to get it at 50% off if you are one of the first three people to sign up. There's only three spots, my friend, so do not wait, do not hesitate, go ahead, book it now if you're interested. Literally, there's nothing to lose, especially at 50% off. Wonderful, my friend. Well, I hope you have a phenomenal day.

Haley: 28:21

I will see you next time here on the Unforged podcast. Thank you for listening to Unforged. You can find all resources and links from this episode in the show notes at thefulfilledforkcom forward slash podcast. If you enjoyed the episode, we'd love if you'd send it to a friend and rate and review the show on either Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Then email us a screenshot of your review to howdy at thefulfilledforkcom for a one-time credit to use towards our wellness services at the Fulfilled Fork Chat soon.