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Well, hello there. Welcome to the happy, healthy, hustle podcast.

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Where I'm going to explore the intersection of health, happiness, and productivity.

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I am Christiane, your host, and I'm super excited to be here with you today.

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Today, we're going to talk about the art of the happy, healthy, hustle.

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So before I'm really like getting too deep into it, this is my very first podcast.

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And you might be wondering, what is this all about?

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So today, I'm focusing all about defining happy, healthy, hustling.

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So we want to be successful in our personal and professional lives.

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But we often forget the importance of taking care of ourselves along the way.

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So let's jump right in and let's explore this.

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First up, I would like to talk about how can we be happy and healthy while we are hustling?

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I don't know about you, but I can hustle if I'm not feeling my best.

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So that's why I'm always making sure to prioritize my health.

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And personally, I like to eat nutritious foods, stay hydrated, getting enough sleep.

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So that's absolutely non-negotiable.

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What I'm going to focus on today is just that little bit more that might make a difference

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and make us even happier hustlers.

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So what about that happiness?

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After all, what's the point of hustling along if we're not enjoying it?

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So I love to find joy in little things, like maybe my morning cup of matcha tea,

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taking a nice walk and listening to a good audiobook at the same time.

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I have my very first guest here on my very first podcast, and it is my husband, Josh.

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We've been married for nearly 20 years and are very different.

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So I would love to see his perspective and what brings him happiness.

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So Josh, why don't you go ahead, and share with us what are some things that bring you happiness?

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Wow, 20 years.

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That time went by quick.

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But it's been such a joy and a fun journey so far.

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We've got two young girls that live with us, and we're always constantly trying to improve,

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I guess not necessarily improve, but teach them how to be happy and healthy and learn how to hustle.

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So they're both in high school and middle school right now, getting involved in all

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kinds of different activities, trying to get them involved in the community.

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And one of the things that I always taught to the kids, dropping them off at elementary school,

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is we had our three rules that we would always talk about.

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And rule number one, and the girls still repeat this to this day, even though it's been going on

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for 12 or 15 years, rule number one is always to be safe.

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Rule two is always to have fun.

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As long as they're being safe and having fun, the rest will fall into place.

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And then rule three is not to judge other people.

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So those are our tenets of how we live our lives.

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And one of my elements of how I guess the thing that makes me happy is one,

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spending time with the family, doing different things together.

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And then my passion for the majority of my life has been the game of golf.

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And to me, the game of golf mimics the game of life.

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If you want to call it a game, you get yourself into trouble.

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You've got to figure out how to get yourself out of trouble.

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You can take the risky shot and try and be the hero, or you can take it safe and do something

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that's more calculated.

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There are a lot of things.

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Golf to me improves your health.

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It brings social connections while you're out on the golf course.

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You're usually not doing it by yourself.

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Or, if you are, you get a chance to reflect upon who you are and the choices you make

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just on the golf course.

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It can be just a time for self-reflecting.

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And the game of golf can be part of what it is, the activity you do.

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Or you can focus on your game and improve your skills and things along those lines.

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So much like what the game of life is, you get yourself into some trouble.

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You get yourself into some sticky situations.

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You've got to figure out how do you move forward.

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How do you become a better person?

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And the game of golf to me does a lot of those same things.

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Throughout the game of golf as well, you're also exercising.

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You're working out your physical health.

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And then you're out in nature.

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Golf is a fantastic activity to where you put all your technology aside if you don't want to have it out there.

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And just enjoy all the surroundings, all the wildlife, the other people that are having fun.

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It's a phenomenal place to be.

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And during the pandemic, a lot of people came to the game.

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They realized that this is an outdoor activity.

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And we kind of golf in the, or kind of joke in the industry that we created social distancing golf.

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You could go four hours playing golf with somebody and not talk to them unless you really want to.

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But the other element of it is you spend four hours with somebody.

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There's only a few activities.

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You get an opportunity to do that where you can really connect, really connect with somebody.

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Connect, really divulge each other's information and help one another out.

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Or just have somebody to just chat with and spend some time with.

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So, you know, golf to me is, it's really my life in and of itself.

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I remember when we were, when Celine, our youngest was growing up,

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I came home one day, she wasn't even two years old and said,

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dad, when are we going to go to the golf course?

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She'd realized early that if I'm going to try and get close to dad,

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we got to figure out this golf thing pretty quickly.

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So they both enjoyed being in the first tee, which is another great program,

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you know, talking about happiness, healthiness, and hustle.

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You know, it teaches the nine healthy habits or core values that it does, you know,

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responsibility, integrity, perseverance, community, self, you know, self-motivation,

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a lot of these different elements, that help build people into who they are,

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help us become and grow better community members, not necessarily better golfers,

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but using the game of golf as a tool to try and help people improve their lives.

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So that's what gets my motor running the game of golf and spending time with family

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and doing both of those two things together are very important for me.

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I love that.

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And I love that you are talking about how happiness is all about connecting

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because it could be connecting with loved ones.

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It could be connecting with nature.

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It could be that you are chatting with a friend, maybe volunteering.

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You mentioned that first tee program right there.

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And, of course, connecting with your inner self.

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And by the connection, you are essentially really creating that happier you, that joy

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that you're getting happy inside and out.

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So I couldn't agree more connection is key.

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And I think it's really important to surround yourselves with positive, supportive people

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that might be inspiring us to be our best selves.

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So speaking about best selves, I want to talk a little bit about productivity.

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So we mentioned the happiness.

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And now I want to talk a little bit about the hustling part because it's super easy to get caught up in that hustle

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and forget about the importance of taking breaks.

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So I like to work and sometimes I get completely carried away where I'm like, oh my gosh, I need to take a break.

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And I call it no more like focused bursts.

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So I take a while when I'm sitting down and then I take a short break that might be like a recharge break.

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And then I'm going back and sitting down.

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So if you kind of like think about, you know, maybe 50 years ago where people would take

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cigarette breaks now instead of smoking a cigarette, maybe you can just get up and stretch,

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maybe you can go outside.

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And it's actually super easy to just build those five minutes into your day.

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And what helps me also is having a good mantra.

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So I'm going to ask my husband again, what is a mantra that helps you to increase your productivity to keep you hustling?

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What I mentioned just a little bit earlier too is it's just trying to become a better person or just make one thing today that you were better than yesterday.

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Doesn't have to be grandiose ideas or goals.

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Could just be simply just expressing your gratitude for other people a little bit more throughout the day.

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Or, you know, if it's a fitness goal of we're going to do 20 pushups today or we're going to do 100 pushups today or some squats or whatever else to improve your strength, your cardiovascular nature.

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Or as Christian was just mentioning is during your day of I want to just get out and go get some fresh air and after a meeting,

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you know, you can just walk around the block or wherever it is that you work at could just be walking around your house or doing some jumping jacks something to just get your mind transition from one thing to the next to get your brain and your body ready for the next task at hand.

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What do you think I mean, I know you do a lot of different things throughout your day. Christiana that, you know, the mix things up between all your fitness and your professor jobs and everything else that you do.

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I mean, there's so many different things that you get after and you're a true hustler.

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And then the hustling is really becoming efficient. So I balance a lot of different jobs. I am in academia, but I also work as a fitness instructor.

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And then of course I do my health coaching and moreover I'm a mom and wife.

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Sometimes go by the mantra. And that's kind of like I call them one minute mantra. Give it five minutes. You would be so surprised if you would realize how these five minutes can really change something in your day.

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So, saying like maybe I'm just going to take a quick walk for five minutes. It's unbelievable how many steps you might be able to take in five minutes, or maybe a five minute stretch break might be completely the difference between having 10 shoulders or a tight back and feeling great.

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If you stack those five minute breaks, they're going to sum up. So let's say you take five, five minute breaks. You already had 25 minutes right there.

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So for me, giving it five minutes is personal mantra number one, because that is something that you could just squeeze in in the middle of your day as a busy mom or in your job those five minutes might just be all that you have.

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And that small action might lead to a bigger outcome because again it stacks and it accumulates, and it also builds. So it builds joy it builds momentum and that sometimes all would be neat, because it might seem super intimidating to work out for an hour but when I say how about working out for five

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minutes, I'm like, oh my gosh, totally gain for that. Well, then we are working from that we're starting small and making it a snowball effect and making it momentum.

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And so it can be just five minutes of mindfulness or five minutes of meditation or things along those lines. You know we all spend five minutes or we waste five minutes all multiple times during our day. If you can just take five minutes and actually focus and almost use that as a meditative state

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of mind and just focus on what you're doing. I mean obviously if you're going out and walking in traffic and things along those lines you have to be kind of paying attention but you can just kind of zone out and actually clear your mind and clear your soul a little bit and help yourself out just in a short

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completely agree. And the other day I was standing in line at a supermarket, and it was a long line, and I could have totally felt like oh my gosh I have to stand in line I'm not good waiting my husband can totally confirm that.

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I won short for short downfall that I was sure I have not a good person that's waiting, but I thought you know what let's turn this around. Let's make this a positive situation so here I am waiting I could pull up my phone I could look at that right now, or how

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can I just adding some quick little stretches. So I started adding some quick little stretches that close my eyes did a neck roll. I even like roll up my shoulders and then I went down to my wrists and before I knew it I was up and getting ready to put my items on the conveyor belt.

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And then it passed and I felt better afterwards refreshed I felt stretched, and I thought well that was a refreshing situation instead of standing there and becoming all bitter about waiting in line I use that time wisely and that's, I think really the essence of happy healthy

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time, not getting caught up in the hassle and forgetting the importance of taking breaks, but rather focusing on taking those short breaks to recharge, no matter where we are, no matter what the situation is, it always helps to kind of reset.

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You have to be really intentional about that how you spend your time because it's not just about working harder. It's about working smarter. So if you prioritize your, your personal to do list and what's on most important, then you're actually going to see results.

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Sometimes we also travel a lot and sometimes we smile and we sit in airplanes and they go through the little safety videos right there because in the safety videos what do they always say what you have to do.

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You've always got to put yourself first.

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You've got to take care of yourself first. So, use that mask on yourself, and then help others. And as parents, we couldn't agree more with that so the stronger we feel about ourselves the more we take care about our of ourselves.

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The more we can model that behavior to our children, but the more it will make us better parents because of course we are feeling grounded and connected to our in ourselves.

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A lot of times when people ask me how is it to be a health coach how is it to be working in fitness or what they think about is moving your body.

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That's true for sure, but it's also about mental health. So the mental health doesn't always necessarily even mean that we are moving it could even mean that we are sitting closing our eyes and connecting with our inner self.

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We are maintaining that good health, cultivating the happiness and pursuing our success by finding balance with ourself and connecting to ourself in a way that we listening to what our body actually needs on that day so recognizing that a healthy mind and a body are really essential for our long term success and happiness.

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So, Josh, how do you connect to your inner self in the middle of the day. What do you typically do in terms of breaks.

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To me, breathing is an important aspect of some things that I do so if I find myself, you know, I'm sure everybody's kind of had that feeling where you feel like your shoulders are up around your ears and your neck really doesn't even exist.

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Whenever I start feeling like that, which is oftentimes when I sit down on a keyboard I mean like I said I work in the golf industry I love being outside I love working with my hands.

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I love talking to other people and interacting with one another. But part of my job is also doing reports and talking to staff members and, you know, directing them on how they do their day and sometimes those can get into stressful situations so when I'm sitting on my computer oftentimes feel like my shoulders are starting to creep up and I get tense in my shoulders

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so I'll just, I'll literally just stop push my chair away from my desk and I'll just meditate or not necessarily meditate but just focus on my breathing, you know take some deep breaths, five or 10 deep breaths, long slow, breathe them out, clear all that bad energy out.

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It's unbelievable how much more relaxed and how much more focused you can be after doing something like that and it doesn't take very much time 30 seconds 45 seconds boom you're ready to get back into it and get your day going again.

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I love it that's really good breathing is super important because actually have to say given that I'm a researcher.

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Most people will be breath into their shoulders so they breathe in and out and lift their shoulders along the way.

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Because I teach those core fitness classes I always emphasize we have to do some rib cage breathing. So while you're breathing focus at your cage expands and inhaling the rib cage basically deflates.

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So where you're feeling you're using your whole volume of your lungs and your body and not just half of it because that leads to shallow breathing and overall you're feeling you are getting stressed out.

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So hustling is actually also a positive thing. So you don't want to remove all stress in your life it's actually good to keep some stress there because it keeps us alert.

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And at the same time it also makes us, you know, motivated to go for the next goals.

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And that's something that I personally want to encourage and use so whether you're thinking of adding fulfilling little breaks and I'm in love with a creating a mantra finding joint happiness I would really encourage you is having these healthy conversations with your loved ones and checking in with them.

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What brings you joy what brings you happiness, because I think sometimes it's even just starting a conversation about it, whether that's on a walk, whether that's at the dinner table to where you're creating a little bit of connection and I think connection and health and happiness and hustling are deeply rooted together.

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And then you can come back and you can ask yourself, alright, so what is it for me what brings me joy what gets me going. And there are always days when you especially need to dig down and say what gets me going because you need that extra motivation on those days it's finding that balance.

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So that's it for today's episode. I hope you enjoyed our discussion about the art of the happy, healthy hustle and remember health and happiness and productivity are all interconnected.

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And we need to prioritize all of these three to reach our full potential. So now in our next episode, I'm going to focus on one minute mantras.

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And I would love to explore that topic with you, because I want to give you a few more ideas about how you can create your own one minute mantra we heard from my husband Josh today we heard his one minute mantra.

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We heard my one minute mantra today, and I'm sure that you might want a few more pieces of motivation maybe have your own to I would love to hear from you.

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So thanks for tuning in. We'll catch you next time. Stay happy healthy and see you soon.