Rita Black: [00:00:00] Did you ever hold yourself back from going for a dream because of your weight? Today’s guest, Marie knows that feeling and what it takes to move beyond it. Marie is an emergency room physician who spent years giving to everyone else who her own self-care slipped to the bottom of the list between odd shifts, stress, and I’ll start again tomorrow.

She felt stuck. Until she discovered a different path through the shift weight mastery process and hypnosis, Marie learned to align her mind and habits starting with small, doable rituals, like a calming meditation in her car after work and quote unquote marriage therapy walks by the ocean. With her husband.

She released the weight, quieted the food noise, and reclaimed energy for the life she really wanted. And then she did something bold. She [00:01:00] celebrated by paragliding over the Dolomites in Italy. Yes. Literally lifting off into a new chapter, lighter in body and in spirit. This conversation is more than numbers on a scale.

It’s about using your whole mind to create freedom, joy, and the confidence to say yes to your dreams, whether that’s a peaceful holiday season, a daily walk, or floating above the Alps. So if you’ve ever postponed a dream because of your weight, today’s episode will help you see what’s possible when you stop starting over.

And start shifting your mind.

Did you know that our struggle with weight doesn’t start with the food on your plate or get fixed in the gym? 80% of our weight struggle is mental. [00:02:00] That’s right. The key to unlocking long-term weight release and management begins in your mind. Hi there, I’m Rita Black. I’m a clinical hypnotherapist, weight loss expert, bestselling author, and the creator of the Shift Weight Mastery Process.

And not only have I helped thousands of people over the past 20 years achieve long-term weight mastery. I am also a former weight struggler carb addict. And binge eater. And after two decades of failed diets and fad weight loss programs, I lost 40 pounds with the help of hypnosis. Not only did I release all that weight, I have kept it off for 25 years.

Enter the Thin Thinking Podcast where you too will learn how to remove the mental roadblocks that keep you struggling. I’ll give you the thin thinking tools, skills, and insights to help you develop the mindset you need. Not only to achieve your ideal weight, but to stay there [00:03:00] long-term and live your best life.

Sound good? Let’s get started. Hello? Hello? Hello? Hello? Hello and hi. Come on in. Happy November. Come on in. I just love it. Love it, love it. When dreams come true, don’t you? And I don’t mean that in the Cinderella fairy dust, you know? Pumpkin sort of way. I mean, when someone truly changes how they see themselves and their lives by changing from the inside out.

And so that is why I’m so excited to have my guest, Dr. Marie on I heard Marie and our membership talking about. Going a paragliding over the a Dolomites. And I was like, what Marie, you have got to get on the podcast and tell us about that. I don’t know if you’ve ever been [00:04:00] to that part of the world, but it is just gorgeous.

And I, I was just, my mind was blown that she glided over that whole area. And she did it because she finally felt good, you know, in her body. She said, I felt light enough to have, you know, go on this thing with somebody behind me and all of that, and I just can totally relate to that. Just my weight held me back for so many years from just going for the things that I wanted to go for.

And it wasn’t just about the weight, it was just about how I related to myself. So I’m really excited for our conversation. But before that, this week, I just want you to know we are doing this fast sort of offering of my free online masterclass with weight release hypnosis. So if you’ve ever struggled with eating over the holidays, I don’t know, eh, have you, I mean, did you intend to be healthy?

And then [00:05:00] it all went to hell in a. Thanksgiving, cornucopia shaped basket. Well move over because you’ve got lots of company. Lots of it. Because most of us struggle not because we are lying to ourselves with wanting to be healthy over the holidays. No. I mean, we get so mad at ourselves like, I wanted to be healthy.

Why did I, why did it all go to hell? Is because 88% of your mind doesn’t care that you wanna be healthy over the holidays. It just wants all the holiday goodies it has come to know, and it’s gonna fight hard. To get it once and once that train has left the station, it’s an express trip that doesn’t end until January 3rd.

So listen. I know when I struggled, I could gain easily, like what it was every year. It was like, well, how much am I gonna gain this year? Is it 10? Is it 20? [00:06:00] Is it 30? ‘Cause I have literally gained almost 30 pounds over the holiday season, so my masterclass is gonna help you intercept that subconscious mind.

Help you work with it. So it’s not working against you, but it’s aligned with you so that you can have a health, happy, healthy, light, and connected to yourself. Holiday, you know, I know the holiday food beckons, but there are something deeper about staying connected to yourself through the holidays, and it doesn’t mean not eating.

Your favorite holiday treats, but it means showing up for yourself and truly taking care of yourself. So in this masterclass, we’ll do a healthy hypnosis session for weight release so that you can just experience hypnosis, have a really relaxing and focused. Holiday where you are taking care of yourself and your health comes first, [00:07:00] so you can check it out.

The, the link is in the show notes. It’s free, it’s online. You can access it from your phone, your tablet, your desktop. Super easy. Go to the show notes or if you don’t know where the show notes are, you can go to www.shiftweightmastery.com/free. That’s www.shiftweightmastery.com/free. And just sign up now.

Let’s jump off the cliff into my conversation with Dr. Marie. Well, hello Marie. Thank you and welcome to the Thin Thinking Podcast. I’ve been excited about our interview because. Selfishly, I wanna hear all about your adventure, but I wanna introduce you to our listeners as well and have them hear all about you and your story.

Dr. Marie Strenger: Oh, thank you. I’m glad to be here and very happy to share my story and. I, I’ve learned a lot from your group and [00:08:00] the Facebook community has been a wonderful support for us. And the Shift community is something that I’m going to have to keep up with because they are my biggest support system outside myself, and so I really appreciate it.

Rita Black: Yeah, it’s so amazing. I’ve been listening a lot to, you know, other. People in, in talking about the power of the group and something I, I didn’t know. I mean, I knew that studies show that people in groups any type of group that is a support system. Do better, stick with things longer, have larger success.

But I, and, and I had a feeling it was subconscious, but I didn’t, I, I just recently heard that one of the reasons this is true is that when we see people a little ahead of us on the road, like, who’ve, you know, been in the game, whatever the game is, whether it’s business or health, or, knitting or what, [00:09:00] whatever your thing is in that group you subconsciously wanna uplevel to where they are, like you, just that, that is a human drive and desire point.

And I, I, I understood imprinting and maybe, ’cause I know you’re. And, and I can’t wait to hear about your emergency room doctor things. But I mean, maybe when you were an intern or maybe you have doctors you look at and you’re like, oh, you know what they do so cool. But I was just like, oh, okay, I get that.

Okay, that makes a hundred percent because you just, you can’t help but assimilate. ’cause our human brain wants to. Sur survive and do better, and do better, and do better, and, and, and to up level and up level and iterate and reiterate, and having people around you who are in the same place doing the same thing and finding different ways of doing that, it just gives your brain so much more access to [00:10:00] what works.

Exactly.

Dr. Marie Strenger: Exactly. Yes.

Rita Black: Yeah. So I, Marie has been with us for a while and I, I was I, you know, when it, she posted in our group about a trip to Italy where she went parasailing, which we will be hearing about soon. I was like, okay, I’ve gotta talk to Maria about this. So. But please Marie, start with where you started with your own weight journey.

’cause I know you’ve had quite a patchwork, like a path in your life.

Dr. Marie Strenger: So, weight has always been kind of very prominent in my family. Like my parents both struggled with their weight, but wouldn’t necessarily acknowledge that. But they placed a lot of. Fat shaming on my siblings and I and we were latchkey kids, so we were taking care of ourselves and really putting meals on the table [00:11:00] from second and third grade.

We were taking care of that. And, you know, you’re cooking what? Second and third graders will eat meat, love spaghetti. Somebody I talked recently about the block of fish that he would put in the glass oven. Not necessarily the healthiest food. And I grew up in a very eastern European area. So I made a lot of like cabbage and noodles cabbage rolls pierogis, so a lot of Eastern European ethnic food.

Which can be heavy, that kind of goulash, so. You can only blame your parents though for so long in life. I also wanted to get out of the system and be successful. I’m the oldest. I, early on I knew I wanted to go into medicine. I wanted to be a doctor. My mom is a nurse and so I wanted to be in charge.

I didn’t necessarily. I’m the oldest. I’m kind of bossy. I wanted to be in charge. So, [00:12:00] and, and I’ve always been, I’m, I’m tall. I’m currently 52. I’m five eight. And I’ve always been a littler on the bigger big farm girl. Told I had farmer arms and a little on the bigger side. And when you’re tall. And a lot of your friends are petite, kind of given a pass because, oh, you’re tall, you can carry that weight.

But I didn’t necessarily feel good about that and mm-hmm. I was always on some sort of diet, but not really paying attention. You go to medical school, you would think that you know how to do nutrition. They really don’t teach that much nutrition in medical school. I

Rita Black: thought I heard, like somebody said, you get a half a day of nutritional training or something, you

Dr. Marie Strenger: just don’t get a whole lot of information.

But you’re always like trying to do diet In residency. I always, it’s a very male dominated field that I am in, and all of the guys were on the Atkins diet, on [00:13:00] Diet Coke, and lots of meat and bacon, and they’re losing weight. And I am not, and I’m, I’m quite bitchy without carbs. And so I needed, I needed to find something I would try, but I wasn’t losing weight.

And your cortisol levels up. You’re not sleeping when you’re doing residency. It was a very stressful time. But my turning point really came in after I turned 50. I, and really with COID, we were locked down and gaining kind of. Wait, I was isolated. I was still having to work. Everybody else is in lockdown and I’m still going in.

You were in the front line and taking care of people and not knowing a whole lot, especially in the beginning of how to deal with this.

Rita Black: And to work when you scared,

Dr. Marie Strenger: I

Rita Black: mean, were you, was everybody incredibly frightened at that time when you didn’t do You’re

Dr. Marie Strenger: nervous, but I was more [00:14:00] nervous about bringing something home to my family, like to bring something home to my husband that.

That he would pass on to any of his family. So myself, this was what I signed up for, but my family didn’t necessarily sign up for that kind of frontline work.

Rita Black: Right. Can I ask you, before you dive into the COVID and the, your, your turning point, you know, in between residency and this point in your life, and, and I, I’m just curious because I know you and I had a short conversation about.

Really your profession, which is somebody who is giving, giving, giving. And you are on your feet and you’re responding and, and your job is very demanding. And I know some of our listeners have demanding jobs we, you know, have and how that took a toll on your self care, the way you prioritized yourself prior to turning your life [00:15:00] around and your health around.

Where did you see the pain points with that? Like, were, would you, would your work, cause you, you know, ’cause I have no idea. So I’m just super curious to emotionally overeat or just, was it neglect and, and, and lack of, of care for yourself? Like that caused, you know, the, the challenge.

Dr. Marie Strenger: Well, when I was working a lot more rotating shifts, you don’t have really time to care for yourself.

But also a regular shift. I never would take time to eat like. You don’t eat. I have to figure out do I have time to eat or do I have time to go to the bathroom? I’m gonna take the time to go to the bathroom. And wow, you’re, they don’t want you to have a whole lot of, you know, food or drinks at your station and during different times.

And it’s very difficult to get away. And you’re there for 10 to 12 hours at a [00:16:00] time. So then I would get home and I thought I was eating healthy, but I was probably overeating and eating a lot more comfort food or a lot more calorie dense food that wasn’t good for me. You don’t feel like you have time to exercise.

You’re going to make maybe sleep a bigger priority, not realizing that if you exercised a little bit, you would. Feel more energized but you’re just trying to get through the day and start over again. And no shift is the same. So your cortisol levels are always going up and down because you’re always in that kind of fight, flight, or freeze mentality.

Wow. And a lot of stuff I do is very mundane, a lot of urgent care. Things. But you also spend a lot of time compartmentalizing. You’ll have somebody come in who’s very sick, it, you know, there’s nothing more you can do, and then you, you do everything you [00:17:00] can and you don’t make a save, but then you have to go on to the next bed.

They recently did a TV show called The Pit where. They show I’m interrupted every five minutes. Somebody’s putting a piece of paper or somebody’s calling me about every five minutes. And I was like, that’s so true. You’re just being sit. You have three seconds to read the CK, G. Somebody hands it in front of you, make a decision what to do next.

And. You do, and it’s, I’m good at my job. But you’re expected to carry on no matter what throughout your shift. So like there’s no crying in baseball, right? You’re having to push down

Rita Black: a lot of stuff.

Dr. Marie Strenger: You push down stuff and you find other ways to cope and sometimes eating. Is coping.

Rita Black: Yeah.

Dr. Marie Strenger: Then again, when COVID hit, it really took a toll and my weight [00:18:00] started going up and I wasn’t feeling good.

I actually probably had COVID but wasn’t diagnosed with it, but my lab work became very concerning. And I had to go see my own physician and get worked up and eventually the numbers straightened themselves out and we never quite figured out. We just assumed I had COVID. And that was what had changed all those things.

But I started working on being healthier and I was looking for other things to kind of calmed me down. And I didn’t think that meditation would be something. That would help because I’m kind of a tense person. But I’m amazed how much it did. But I think that’s when I was looking for I was looking at different books and.

I saw your ad for, you know, it’s kind of the meditation and kind of self-soothing. I had read a book about why French women are thin. And that led me to the, your [00:19:00] book from Fat Thinking to Thin Thinking. So I read your book in the winter of 2024. That spring I took my niece to Greece. We take our nieces and nephews on a trip and I look at those pictures and I am.

I’m very hefty and I look very self-conscious trying to, you know, pose so it’s not showing off your belly in, in different ways. And it’s sad to think that you’re concerned about that when you’re taking pictures with family. You know, I should be just enjoying the moment, not just trying to figure out how to position myself.

So you can’t see that, so I came in and then I started the SHIP program and I set goals and, you know, your first goals. So that’s in, I always consider the end of May when I started and my goal was to, I started at almost 180 pounds and I wanted to get down by my anniversary and a pink concert down to [00:20:00] 1 53 over the summer.

And I made my goals working on that and. It was, I had a great time at that pink concert. I visualized myself in a sparkly top dancing unconscious unselfconsciously with all my friends and we had a great time. Sounds amazing. So then, but it, but it was something I could maintain. So then I went on to Decem.

By December I was still dropping and I hit what I thought was my maintenance weight of one 40 by December. So I’ve basically been maintaining since December 1st of last year. And though your goals initially start off at as numbers, I’ve had to learn how to adjust my goals. And so I’ve adjusted my goals to be now more.

I want to go, I want to attach myself to another human and throw myself off a mountain. That was my Italian. [00:21:00]

Rita Black: I’m gonna, I’m gonna, I’m gonna interject here just ’cause I wanna pause and kind of highlight your transition from hitting your goal, which mm-hmm. You, you did, and I think I remember when you did hit your goal, were you.

Concerned or worried that you were gonna be able to maintain it, or did you feel pretty confident that you were going to maintain?

Dr. Marie Strenger: No, I you definitely wobble and have a lot of self-doubt, especially if you’ve gone up and down and yo yoed Yeah. For a lifetime. It’s not easy. But what I like about your program is it’s not a.

Diet program. Mm-hmm. The lifestyle change, and it’s a lifestyle change that I was able to incorporate and add my husband to, and that carried over in so many different ways. If people are coming to this [00:22:00] program thinking that you’re going to them what to eat and how to magically do everything, that’s not what this program is about.

It’s about shifting your mindset. On how to embrace your life and how to kind of decrease the food noise in your head and make some better decisions that are healthier and figure out a way to have a lifestyle that you may maintain. So I think that’s the thing I think I can maintain is the lifestyle that I’ve.

Adopted here, and there’ll be ups and downs I’m sure. When you were

Rita Black: doing, when you were making these adjustments. ’cause I just, I I just wanna kind of go back ’cause I think a lot of your tweaks that you made for yourself being a super busy person and like you said, high cortisol job, all that. I, I just wanna kind of highlight some of the things you and I talked about that really worked for you.

One of the things you mentioned to [00:23:00] me was you know, we do morning meditations, but obviously on those early shifts you couldn’t do that. So tell tell us about like how you worked meditation

Dr. Marie Strenger: into your day. And that’s something that I share a lot on the group page because people are really concerned that they can’t do the morning meditation.

I’m like, it’s okay. I didn’t do the morning meditations either. I did them in the afternoon. So I usually go into work, I around, I get up at four 30 and I’m usually at work at 5:00 AM so I don’t have time. I’m not going to make time to wake up another 15 minutes earlier to to do the morning meditation, but I have found that doing it, as soon as I leave work, I sit in my car.

For 15 minutes and I just listen to that meditation and I meditate before I go home. It gives me a little boost of that willpower that we don’t have very much of and realigns me for the evening hours that I’m home. And it [00:24:00] also just, that decompresses me from my day. It gives me a separation from work to go home, and it gives me that time to focus on myself.

And some self care, whereas a lot of healthcare professionals, nurses, doctors, or a lot of people, I told you. Don’t feel that they can focus on themselves because they’ve already given so much at work and then they don’t have very much to even bring home to their family, but they don’t feel worthy of giving it to themselves.

And one of my new mantras is. Sybil Shepherd saying I’m worth it. The L’Oreal from the eighties just, I forgot that commercial. That was an awesome commercial and so I am worth it. And I sit down in my car and I do that. My husband says he kind of can know when my car opens up or if the lock’s on, and he is like, oh, she’s meditating.[00:25:00]

She should be coming home shortly. And I give that time to myself and then I do the hypnosis when I’m going to sleep at night. Okay. And I find that that is helpful.

Rita Black: I think that and just gonna talk about what you did and you because I, I just for our listeners, I think. That idea. If you’re somebody who like Marie is going to work and getting really stimulated by your work environment, whether you’re a teacher or a nurse or a doctor, or you know, many of us work jobs where we go and, you know, from the time we’re there until the time we go, it’s nonstop like boom, boom, boom, boom, boom.

What Marie created was very genius and I, and I will often coach people to. Take a pause before they go into their home, whether it’s their parking in their driveway, or like Marie parking in or in the parking lot, and slow down their brain. Connect with yourself before you hit home, because [00:26:00] then what invariably happens, and I don’t know if this was happening for you before you started listening to meditations.

Is that you’ll go home and then the kitchen becomes your numbing point, like your, your meditation. Basically you’re shoving food in your mouth and numbing yourself that way, and calming down and coming back to center in a completely, you know, non-healthy way. So taking that time and really slowing your brain down, coming to center, calming down your breathing, just connecting with yourself and like you said, kind of giving your brain a refresh.

So helpful and genius.

Dr. Marie Strenger: I’m glad you came to that. On your own. So another thing that I started incorporating a little bit more and getting my husband involved is then I would come home from work. And we live fairly close to the beach, but we have a three and a half mile loop that we do between the neighborhood and down by the ocean.

We hold hands when we walk. Hmm. Neighbors call [00:27:00] us the walkers because anytime they see us, we walk several times a day if I’m off. But it’s good marriage therapy too. You cannot be angry at somebody when you’re holding their hand. I love that. That is such, it is advice. You can have those hard conversations when you’re both looking forward and talk about things that are really hard.

And we’ve gotten some. Very good conversations out of that. And we both look forward to our walk. Mm. He understands it’s also time for me to vent about my day. He can vent about his day and then it’s gone. We don’t need to worry about it, we move on. But it is a way to connect and just stay together.

And he is been on the journey and my lifestyle hasn’t. Impacted him in a negative way actually made him healthier and I, and I like that. We also then do an after dinner walk just around the neighborhood. We call it our [00:28:00] after dinner constitutional, where we walk around the neighborhood and the neighbors all know, well, what did you have for dinner?

It’s doing your after dinner walk.

Rita Black: Sounds like a great neighborhood. I think that, you know, that after dinner walk is so. Key for longevity. I believe that because it really, your blood sugar insulin that gets shot up during your meal gets re altered. I mean, I, they’re always, when I was wearing that continuous glucose monitor, it was, you know, you get prompted by the app like.

Get up and get walking because now the, you know, it’s all going to your muscles and your, your or the glycogens going to your, the glucose going to your bloodstream go walk. So that after meal walk is always so helpful. That’s great that you guys do that twice and I love that you guys hold hands. That’s so sweet, Marie.

Dr. Marie Strenger: My other big aha moment is that I can’t eat as much as my husband. My husband is six foot three. You know, he is an active person. You can’t, I can’t have the same portions [00:29:00] as he is and he’s learning, no, I don’t need, if I say no. It’s okay. No. So I do measure out my portion before I bring food to the table.

My husband is a great cleaner. He doesn’t cook. He does the dishes. He doesn’t cook at all, so I’m in charge of that, and that also gives me ownership of what we’re going to eat. He’s a little bit of a picky eater, so I do cater a little bit to his wants and needs, but. He gets rice for when we do Chinese food, I have rice, cauliflower.

When we kind of mix that up a little bit,

Rita Black: how did you alter your cooking since it sounds like you were always in charge of cooking. It sounds like you’ve been cooking since you were a little. Kid. And I enjoy it. I

Dr. Marie Strenger: really do. Is it therapeutic for you as well? Like I do. Mm-hmm. Find it therapeutic and I find like, and I like to bake and I like to give food as a gift or make lemon curd [00:30:00] or different things.

So I do try to make things a little bit healthier, a little kind of shift here and there and how I’m baking. But my biggest. Is portion control. And switching to like rice, cauliflower, I do that. I do more spaghetti squash. I add a lot more vegetables. We always have a salad instead of trying to eat it last.

I’m trying to eat it first than deciding what I’d like to eat. So I still have bread, I still have betzel. So there are, I

Rita Black: I still, yeah. You haven’t, you haven’t cut food groups from your diet, you’ve just changed your relationship to it.

Dr. Marie Strenger: Yes, and I still have dessert once in a while. I made an ice cream cake last night for a, a nephew, and I have the three bite rule, or I’ll have a small piece of that and then I leave it there.

Makes it easier. [00:31:00] That’s

Rita Black: great. So, oh, those, those are very helpful. I, I, I think what you’re saying is so important is that you, what you decided really worked for you was not what you’re eating, but more the portion size and then also adding to what you’re eating, like adding more vegetables and swapping out things.

Dr. Marie Strenger: And eating at work now too. I, I didn’t eat at work prior to this. Now I bring in like a tuna packet and mm-hmm. I just did like, seaweed sheets. I call it my gas station sushi. And I can run in the back and I can eat that. So I’m not having that. Fall or I’ll mix cottage cheese and. Greek yogurt together to make like a little breakfast parfait that’s high in protein that I can get started with.

I add protein powder. My husband makes me coffee every morning before I go to work. He gets up with me and makes my coffee to hand it to me as I’m going out the door. I don’t dole [00:32:00] when I get up. We get up, he makes the coffee while I’m just getting ready to, to leave the house and I’m generally out the door in like 15 minutes from waking up.

Amazing. He makes my coffee and he puts my protein and collagen powder in there so that I at least have something more than just coffee when I’m getting my day started.

Rita Black: Is so does the protein powder act sort of as a creamer?

Dr. Marie Strenger: Yes.

Rita Black: That’s a great idea. I think as some people in the audience might not be aware that you can do that.

Like the add the protein powder kind of works. Do you do vanilla or do you do I like chocolate.

Dr. Marie Strenger: Chocolate. Ooh. So like a mocha. I like chocolate. It’s not like a mocha little bit stronger flavor to the coffee and I love that and, but it gets me through the day and then I’m not. Vanished when I come home.

So important that so again, that my husband was always like, you should eat at work. I’m like, I don’t have time. You really should eat [00:33:00] something. Taking a lunch. I don’t have time. He’s like, it’s amazing you had to eat at work to lose weight. You were right honey. I needed to do this for

Rita Black: myself. Oh, I know.

It’s so crazy. I love how you made that work for you though. Has have any of your coworkers. Followed suit. Like what’s in the, what’s in the staff room at an er?

Dr. Marie Strenger: Oh,

Rita Black: it’s terrible. It’s

Dr. Marie Strenger: terrible. And it, the administration thinks that pizza will solve everything. That here’s pizza. You don’t have supplies.

Here’s donuts, here’s pizza. So, oh my gosh. It is not necessarily always the, our break room is never necessarily filled with really healthy things. Right. It always cracks me up and

Rita Black: I get that, but, and I, I think what they feed you at hospitals too is just, I, I mean, I don’t know about the place [00:34:00] you work, but I, I’m just shocked at how atrocious at like, who is creating these nutritional menus at these hospitals.

Dr. Marie Strenger: We have a galley. I work for the government and they have the galley kitchen. And it’s not expensive, but I don’t go there because it’s calorie dense. Lots of it for not too much money. So that’s not what I want. Yeah. Well,

Rita Black: okay, now the moment we’re all waiting for, so Italy, so what, what, how, tell us like where the first seat of.

Italy was planted.

Dr. Marie Strenger: Oh, my husband and I love Italy. We went for, we’ve gotten several times. And we were talking about the Dolomites. We hadn’t been up to northern Italy. So as you got to maintenance, I said you kind of changed your goals from numbers. To changing your visions to these non-scale type of visions to keep that dopamine fixed kind of going.

And I love [00:35:00] gowns or dresses, so I’ll buy those and I plan that. So when we were planning the Dolomites and trying to, we do all of our, our own planning to get our vacations. I was reading about paragliding in the Dolomites

Rita Black: Ah, ooh.

Dr. Marie Strenger: Had, had you ever thought of paragliding before? Like

Rita Black: had,

Dr. Marie Strenger: was that ever a fan?

That’s not something that I would do. And we, we’ve gotten horseback riding and we’re doing all this hiking, and I thought, and you’re reading it and you have to talk about your weight, and I was like, I need to feel comfortable enough about my weight to write it down, get on a scale, attach myself to another human being and throw myself off into the great unknown.

I’m gonna do that. I love that. So I talked to my head, I’m like, are you in? Okay, let’s do it. He’s not, he’s like, okay, sounds great. So we hiked. I, we love walking and obviously, [00:36:00] so hiking in the Dolomites and the Northern Italian Alps was beautiful. If

Rita Black: anybody has never been to the Dolomites, I, I’ve only been there once with my daughter had a pen pal that she went and we went and visited her in Austria.

And it was a teeny tiny little town on the a border between Italy and Austria. And it was like the sound of music, right? It looks just like the sound of music. So

Dr. Marie Strenger: much, so much. There’s, I actually sent home a video of me, it looks like a movie set in the background and then all of a sudden you see me twirling like, Maria, oh, Julie Andrews sound of music.

I love it. I, it is beautiful.

Rita Black: So yeah, so spectacular scenery. So you have, you can just imagine Marie is like going up there to go jump

Dr. Marie Strenger: off. We’re walking and we’re going between those, the eastern and the western Dolomites. We did this in the western Dolomites is where we did the paragliding. And we’re going across, and I’m looking at these sheer cliffs and I looked over at my husband, I said, do you think I’m [00:37:00] gonna have to like.

Be the person to jump off the, the side. I don’t know. I’m like, like, do you think, how are we gonna do this? And he doesn’t know. He’s like, well, anyway, you run your, the western side of the Dolomites are these High meadows. Okay. And so you kind of run and trot along with this person behind you, and the wind lifts you up and carries you over.

Wow. So I didn’t have to jump, jump off the, oh, thank God. Oh my God. But the wind lifted me up and then carried me over the edge, and then I could just enjoy the view.

Rita Black: Okay, so I have to build up to this. So, so did you guys get training? Like, so did you Oh, no, no, no, no,

Dr. Marie Strenger: no. You got a five minute lecture of make sure you’re running, like you’re, you’re trotting.

You’re gonna feel things pull, just keep running until you know, and I’m watching. So you

Rita Black: literally

Dr. Marie Strenger: walk into this

Rita Black: place? You know, sign, probably [00:38:00] sign every disclosure agreement. We’re signing all these disclosures

Dr. Marie Strenger: on your, we’re taking the tram up the mountain as you’re signing the paperwork. Oh my God. So, and then and then there are four other, there were, there were four of us doing it and the first girl kind of went and there’s four people helping, getting the parachute, all the stuff on you.

And getting that taken care of. And you watch her go and it was, they were really gusty winds. And then I watched my husband take off and he got pulled down a little bit and everybody’s repositioning. And this other guy got drug a little bit and he’s getting repositioned. And then I was like, there’s nobody to help us.

Like it’s me. And that last guy, he, he’s like, let me readjust some things here. And we had the most smooth takeoff, but he said, you just keep running. You’ll feel it. Pull. Don’t just stop running because you need to keep going. And then, and is he running right behind you? Like connect? He’s running behind and it’s a, it’s a trot.

It’s like, you’re right, you’re not [00:39:00] jogging. Not, yeah. You’re kind of trotting along. And at one point he’s finally like, you can stop running. We’re in the air. My legs are just still going. Wes, like, you can sit back now. Get yourself comfortable. We’re we’re good now. I was like, you just told me to keep going.

I’m gonna keep going.

Rita Black: Are you in an apparatus where you’re, you’re. You’re holding on with your arms and your, or are you like, are you sitting like

Dr. Marie Strenger: you are in a harness that’s for your that’s around your legs so that you can eventually sit back in the harness kind of acts as like a swinging seat for you.

Oh, okay. And he’s behind you in his own swinging seat and he actually has like a little pad behind him from when you land. You just kinda keep your feet straight out. And land on your bottom, so you didn’t have to worry about your knees going down and it was hitting an airbag as you landed across. Oh, so it was very gentle landing.

Rita Black: So you run, so you run and then you’re, you’re up in the [00:40:00] air. You’re, and then, and then what are you gliding? You’re gliding down into like a valley or Into the

Dr. Marie Strenger: valley. Okay. And so you grew up at 10,000 feet on some of these. Oh. Over there and we took a thermal ride. We took the longer one because it would rise like the birds, the, they’d hit a wind gust and you’d go back up again and then circle around.

Yeah. It’s not just gradually down, you can go up and down. We went up and down and circled the area and just was beautiful views. The weather was gorgeous. The clouds had parted long enough for us to enjoy the whole thing. It

Rita Black: really was. Were you able to relax, like were, was there a moment where you were kind of like, okay,

Dr. Marie Strenger: within about, you know, five minutes of after, between, like just before going, ’cause your heart is going that adrenaline, your terror.

Yeah. My husband’s like, I don’t know if they’re gonna get off. He’s already up there and he’s like, is she gonna do it? And once I got up there and. [00:41:00] I looked, I, I was just quiet and beautiful and Wow. It really was something He even let me steer for a little while the, the parachute. So I was very happy about that.

How big was that? How big of a apparatus was this thing? It’s a, it’s a big, it’s a big parachute. And so, and lots of, I don’t know. He just clipped me in to make They’re wide though, right? They aren’t like a parachute. It was very wide and, yeah, it’s narrower and wide. So that’s kind of a long arc over here.

Wow.

Rita Black: I, and how did you feel about your weight? Like, were you self-conscious at all? Did you, ’cause you had, you were at your ideal weight. So

Dr. Marie Strenger: like,

Rita Black: I was at my

Dr. Marie Strenger: ideal weight, I step on the scale. Yep. Matched me with my person. Yay. That, that was good. I didn’t mind. You know, you’re standing there in front of all these strangers stepping on the scale, and I was like,

Rita Black: that’s reasonable.

That is so cool. So, and so what was it like landing? I mean, I just wanna hear the whole exciting. So you’re

Dr. Marie Strenger: [00:42:00] standing and you’re going up and down, down a very gentle, and when you land, he’s like, keep your legs kicked straight up. I’ll tell you when. Just keep ’em kicked straight out and you come in. And that airbag underneath him just, we just slid across the field and landed very soft and it, but when we came down, we had a bunch of little spins.

He asked if I wanted to do that. My stomach could hold it. Oh yeah, let’s do it. Oh, that’s okay. And worthwhile. And we had the certificate. He was a very nice, guide to be tandem with, and we talked and he’d been doing it for years and he did acrobats with it and it was just, wow, what a job. So I know.

Very nice. And we continue to, I will say that, you know, with the shift, you give yourself grace when you’re traveling. We ate and drank, but in the Dolomites it was very easy because you’re walking. We were getting lots of big hikes in, we’re doing our own picnics a lot [00:43:00] more of that. And then we got down to Modna and Bologna and Parma, and we were doing more of the, some of the food tours there.

And then you tend to eat a little bit more without walking as much. And so I came home, but I also know, I know the skills. When I came, come home, I know my. Traveling like that, because I’ve been monitoring and weighing myself daily. I know that I’m going to be up at least five pounds for the first couple of days just from water weight and travel weight and looking at that.

And then you come down, you figure out this is what my true weight is. Okay, now I know what I need to do because one or two pounds is a lot easier to lose than 40. And so I make make my adjustments and then you’re back on. And I was really fortunate because the day we got back, we started this fall shift.

So able to get back in [00:44:00] line and coach and just great timing into it. Yeah.

Rita Black: That is so cool. I have another question about, because you can tell, I’m like, is this something I ever wanna do? Would is It’s not like jumping out of an airplane with a parachute where you’re hoping the parachute goes, you know, ’cause it’s right there.

Yeah. It’s gonna work.

Dr. Marie Strenger: I, I assume, yeah. I don’t think I would jump out of a plane again, that stepping off. Part, I wasn’t quite sure. I like being lifted up. I don’t think I would do bungee jumping. I don’t trust anything to fall like that. But the parasailing or paragliding I think is kind of quiet and I felt very comfortable doing it.

Rita Black: Sounds really nice. Yeah. I had a friend who turned 50 and she she wanted to do the trapeze. And that was something where you had to go up on this teeny tiny little platform that was very high and I am afraid of heights, and you had to then reach out to grab [00:45:00] that bar. And that was probably the most terrifying moment of my life.

So, but that sounds lovely, actually. That sounds like trotting and then being uplifted.

Dr. Marie Strenger: Being uplifted sounds really nice. And you then you get this great view to enjoy that. It would be like a drone just looking over

Rita Black: the hole. Right. And it is. I mean, I cannot, if you’ve not been to the dolomite, it is just.

You can’t even believe it. It’s just, it, it just seems otherworldly. ’cause it just so much is the Winter Olympics is gonna be there

Dr. Marie Strenger: this year. Tune into the Winter Olympics and be inspired and go

Rita Black: Oh, true, true, true, true. So, wow. Well this, this has been really great. Any advice for somebody who is, you know, just struggling and, and wants.

You know, wants to just take that first step. What would you [00:46:00] advise that first step would be? You know, like, just as far as like making a decision or, you know, like just,

Dr. Marie Strenger: you’re worth it. Make a decision to take care of yourself so that you can take care of others. You can’t really do that and well, until you’ve taken care of yourself.

So true. Easy to feed your soul than to feed your stomach. So start, start with taking care of yourself because you’re worth it. The other thing for maintenance is what I’ve found is that I. It’s looking for other non-scale victories. Again, I write down my visions. My vision for I retire hopefully in five years is what I’m hoping.

I wanna walk the Camino with my husband. That’s one of our goals for that end year. I wanna be a good example to my younger brothers and sisters of how to age gracefully and adventurously and to. Keep making goals. I’m not going to be sitting in the [00:47:00] corner. I’m trying to learn new things.

That’s one of the other goal setting opportunities that I’ve learned through the program. So I. I’m learning guitar and I’m doing doable goals. What You’re learning

Rita Black: guitar. That’s so cool. Teaching

Dr. Marie Strenger: myself guitar. My husband is a woodworker. He made a guitar. We don’t play music. I love music. I have it on all the time.

So my first goal was to learn how to play Happy Birthday. I thought I can learn how to play Happy Birthday on this. I’ll be happy. I can play about three songs. I was very happy when my husband said, well, it sounds like music now. At least something. I can only play very slow songs, but I keep trying and I just keep practicing.

When we were going to Italy, I was practicing my Italian. Practicing going there. I had a little bit of a short circuit when we were, if you’re up in the Dolomites, it’s a lot of Latin or their version of Spanglish is German and Italian together, [00:48:00] like Denki. Well, at the same time and everybody’s talking and I’ve been practicing my Italian and Duolingo and I was ready to go and finally I was just like, Gracia.

I don’t even know what to say anymore. It’s

Rita Black: a tough language. I, I, we’ve been watching a lot of Italian TV shows over the last couple of years when my husband’s very good at languages and he’s just like, I, I can’t wrap my mind around this one. He knows Spanish, he knows French.

Dr. Marie Strenger: So we, we go there. But I set just other goals for myself besides just.

A number goal, and I get on, I do the scientist thing with stepping on the scale and figure out more close what kind of adventure we’re going to do. That’s my my new goal is like adding more stretching to my criteria. And so I like the journaling portion of your program too. So if you don’t even know where to start, [00:49:00] start writing down where you see yourself in a month where you wanna see yourself in three months.

Where do you wanna see yourself in a year? And start with that. And then how can I make that happen then look back.

Rita Black: Yeah. I love that, that, that’s really, really great advice. I, I know for a lot of our maintainers in our community, it is it not having that struggle anymore because it’s such, it takes up so much brain space and so much of our time, like it is a hobby.

I think a lot of times that void that is created, unless you step into like what you’re talking about, challenging yourself to that next goal or following your heart and with a dream like the parasailing or you know, like you need to kind of keep moving the dream forward or else you fall back into that same.

Nah, you know, going back into that same [00:50:00] loop. And, and there is that tender time as you enter into maintenance where that, that is, so that, that was really great advice, Marie. Thank you.

Dr. Marie Strenger: And just remember the more emotionally drained, tired you feel, and that doesn’t necessarily help with that. I found that moving does.

I used to think that I was emotionally drained. I need a nap after work. I need that walk after work that gives me the energy. So maybe asking yourself, are you feeling emotionally drained or are you truly physically drained and need the sleep? Some people do, but sometimes a walk will give you that extra energy you need.

You don’t have to do much. Just walk around the block and see how that wakes you up and see how it makes you feel.

Rita Black: Yeah, I, I had this. Client who was a nurse who was significantly overweight and she had diabetes and, and like, like [00:51:00] you, just in the sense of her husband, she enrolled him in just starting to walk after dinner and they started with half a block and then that built to going around the block and then it built to two blocks.

And then she was walking, you know, eventually two miles, three miles. She, you know, she released 50 pounds. It is, but it works against that feeling of fatigue. The idea of it, you have to, and, and having somebody engage with you. It’s so helpful. Super helpful. Yeah. Super helpful. Yeah. Well, Marie, this has been amazing.

Thank you so much for your time and Thank you and your, you for having me. I feel like I’ve just gone paragliding gliding and the Dolomites walking us through that. That was awesome. And we will look forward to. Having you back on the Thin Thinking Podcast, but thank you for being an amazing coach during the

Dr. Marie Strenger: fall shift too.

Oh, thank you. Thank you. Wow. I love the program and I hope people look into it. Alright, Maria, I appreciate you [00:52:00] and thank you so much. Have,

Rita Black: thank you. You have a good day. Wow. Were you impressed? Would you go paragliding?

Oh my gosh. That sounds wonderful. But I don’t know. I don’t know. I know my husband wouldn’t, so I’d have to go with a girlfriend. I’m gonna think about it. Why don’t you think about it too? It does sound amazing. Huh. Well, thank you, Marie, for your story and the inspiration. I, I just get so uplifted by our members who just go out and do these amazing things after releasing their weight.

And again, not just because of the weight, but because the weight, they have changed their relationship with theirselves. So make sure you sign up for the free masterclass. Don’t be shy. The link is in the show notes or go to www.shiftweightmastery.com/free and have a great [00:53:00] week. And remember that the key and probably the only key to unlocking the door, the weight struggle is inside you.

So keep listening, keep finding it. I will be here next week, right? Right in the same place. So come on in. Okay, I’ll see you next week. Do you wanna dive deeper into the mindset of long-term weight release? Head on over to.