This week’s episode of Good Girls Get Rich is brought to you by Uplevel Media CEO and LinkedIn expert, Karen Yankovich. In this episode, Karen interviews Veronique Cardon on the importance of taking care of your brain.

Veronique Cardon, the creator of the CogniDiet Program, is a holistic nutritionist who teaches others how to rewire their brains, make their brains happy, and help them lose weight naturally. She shares with us how you can take care of your brain for greater productivity.

#GoodGirlsGetRich

We want to hear your thoughts on this episode! Leave us a message on Speakpipe or email us at info@karenyankovich.com.

 

About the Episode:

A lot of people struggle with stress, not getting enough sleep, weight loss, and so many other things. And when people struggle with these things, it effects their productivity.

I had the great joy of interviewing Veronique Cardon and learning what practices will help us take care of our brains and be more productive.

We, as entrepreneurs, live hectic lives, so it’s important we be as productive as possible. But if our brain isn’t taken care of properly, our productivity will decrease. Here’s what Veronique says we should do to have a healthy brain.

Nutrition

Proper nutrition is essential to a healthy brain, and a healthy brain is a happy brain. Without proper nutrition, your brain can’t function at peak performance. In fact, of the most important nutrients you can give your brain is magnesium. So instead of pasta for lunch, how about a salad?

Exercise

We all know exercise keeps our bodies healthy, but did you know it also helps keep your brain healthy? One benefit of exercise for the brain is the release of endorphins. Endorphins not only make you feel good but also help your brain function better.

Sleep

Another factor in keeping your brain happy and being more productive is getting enough sleep. Sleep isn’t a waste of time. It’s a free way to relax your mind and recharge your body.

Without enough sleep, your brain won’t function at peak performance, which means you won’t reach maximum efficiency in your work.

Trouble sleeping? Exercise during the day. Exercising helps you spend enough energy during the day so you can sleep at night. Also, limit your screen time at night. The light from your phone can reduce melatonin levels, so instead of scrolling through your social feed while lying in bed, read a book or practice meditation.

As an entrepreneur, you have a lot of stress, and you need to function at maximum efficiency. The first step in achieving maximum efficiency is taking care of your brain.

Episode Spotlights:

  • Where to find everything for this week’s episode: karenyankovich.com/109
  • Introducing this episode’s guest, Veronique (3:27)
  • What Veronique says our brains need to be happy (6:31)
  • What type of exercise Veronique recommends (12:17)
  • Exercises for when time is limited (14:49)
  • Why sleep is important for your brain (16:19)
  • How Karen prevents her phone from keeping her awake (20:59)
  • Veronique’s rule on keeping her phone and computer out of the bedroom (22:10)
  • The hectic life of an entrepreneur (23:47)
  • Tips on slowing down to meditate (25:46)
  • How Veronique helps build healthy habits into people’s lives (28:37)
  • How to find out more about Veronique (37:05)

Resources Mentioned in the Episode:

Help Us Spread the Word!

It would be awesome if you shared the Good Girls Get Rich Podcast with your fellow entrepreneurs on twitter. Click here to tweet some love!

If this episode has taught you just one thing, I would love if you could head on over to Apple Podcasts and SUBSCRIBE TO THE SHOW! And if you’re moved to, kindly leave us a rating and review. Maybe you’ll get a shout out on the show!

Ways to Subscribe to Good Girls Get Rich:

Read the Transcript

Karen Yankovich 0:00
You’re listening to the good girls get rich podcast episode 109

Intro 0:05
Welcome to the good girls get rich podcast with your host, Karen Yankovich. This is where we embrace how good you are girl. Stop being the best kept secret in town, learn how to use simple LinkedIn and social media strategies and make the big bucks.

Karen Yankovich 0:23
Hi, I’m Karen Yankovich, the host of the good girls get rich podcast and we’re Episode 109. And this podcast is brought to you by uplevel Media where we teach simple relationship and heart based LinkedIn marketing. We do that in all kinds of ways from programs to masterminds to private client work to, to membership programs, we’ve got all kinds of exciting things happening around here. And you can check all that out at Karen Yankovich calm. So what we teach here is digital marketing with the human touch, and we want you to actually build relationships with people people that you know you just can’t wait to get on the phone with Artists guest Veronika is somebody that I’ve actually met in person built relationships with, you know, with the human touch, we have met at local networking events. And she’s got such an interesting story that I really wanted to share that with you today. So I hope you love it. We’re going to introduce Veronika in a minute. But you know that you know if you’ve listened before or you love this episode, I love to hear from you. And I love I want to hear exactly what you loved about this episode because that helps us help you even more. So go on over to wherever whatever the podcast catcher that you’re listening to this on Apple podcasts, whatever, leave us a review. That helps us in so many ways, but one of the ways that helps us especially if you tell us specific to this episode, what you loved. It helps us do more of this kind of thing. Right? And it also of course helps us get more visibility. We love sharing your reviews on podcast. And of course I’d love for you to also share this episode on social media. So If you stop what you’re doing right now, take a quick screenshot of what you’re, you’re listening to this now, and tag me in it. I’m at Karen Yankovich, put it in your stories or put it in your social media. And I’ll be sure to share your post with my audience. And that’s how we all get more visibility, right. We’ve got show notes, there’s a link for all the things we talked about on the show today. But there’s also a link for speakpipe, where you can leave us an audio review. And I would love that it’s really, really easy to do, you can tell us what you love about this particular episode. And if you want, you can, you know, tell us about maybe future guests you think we should have or topics you want me to talk about? This is like, you can just kind of like leaving us a voicemail message, right? So take advantage of that, because that helps us help you as well. So again, I mentioned that I met ronique in person marketing events. And you know that technique right there, like leveraging using LinkedIn to leverage your in person and offline marketing is really the best way at the fastest way I think to grow the profits in your business. And what I love about roenick story is that not only does she teach us how we can be better people, human beings, business owners, but also a little bit of her journey and how she got to where she was, which was an opening of his corporate stuff to where she is now where she’s got a best selling book that that helps, you know, tons and tons of people. So I think you’re going to love roenick as much as I do, and here we go. I am so excited to be here today with Veronique Cardon. We have met in person a few times we live near each other and network in some of the same circles and I have loved the work she’s been doing for a while so I was excited to be able to invite her and that she accepted the opportunity to have this conversation here for all of you that are listening, not just Veronique and I talking about it in the corner of some networking meeting. So Veronika is a she had a wonderful career in Europe and pharmaceuticals. She was General Manager in her 30s and traveled the world for many years. She was awarded young businesswoman of the Year by the Financial Times in 1994. moved to the US in 1995, and worked for different pharmaceutical companies and biotech companies in commercial leadership in roles of growing importance, she won many leadership and advertising awards in her career. And I could talk about this forever. But what I what we bring her on now for is that Veronique has written a few books, and now supports primarily women, I think, but I’ll let her tell you that with the how weight loss and stress and your brain all impact your your level of success and in your life and in your business. So I’m sure that I botched that Veronique but I’m going to let you jump in and tell everyone a little bit about yourself.

Veronique Cardon 4:47
You know what, thank you for this wonderful introduction, Karen. In fact, yes, at one point, I was very happy with my career in corporate America, but I decided I wanted to help people. You know, just change and become healthier. So I became a nutritionist, and I developed the CogniDiet, which is a way to help you lose weight by changing your behaviors focusing on yourself, because if you don’t change, you’re going to lose the weight. But the minute the date is over, you’re going to go back to your old habits, but also, I guess it’s based on my education, but I’m kind of a nerd. And I’m a very interested in the brain. And in fact, it’s by studying neuroscience that I came up with the cognitive diet because you know, weight loss, our brain, this is where you make all your decisions. And as a corporate person, I did very well but I had my share burden of stress. And at one point, I also you know, collapse frankly speaking in 2006. So taking care of your brain is crucial for success. For a happy life, and I, you know, in my practice, I see so many business women and men, more women than men who are really on the verge of collapse, because they’re multitasking, they have ambition, they have those amazing careers, but they really don’t take the time to take care of themselves. So I, you know, I developed a process that or something that is very dear to me that what does our brain need to be happy, and we always look at our muscle, you know, if we go exercise too many times and we go too hard, or muscle, our legs or arms are going to be sore, right? We never think about our poor brain. Our brain is a muscle but it also needs a mental break. And so if we don’t get your brain wants to have Pleasure, the brain wants to be happy. It’s really true. And we need to give our brain this happiness through, you know, love, an exercise and being nature, meditation, relaxation, whatever. But we all like running and running and running like from eight in the morning to 10 at night non stop, and we don’t even sleep enough most of the time. That is like a couple of things that I feel like your brain really needs. So that is highly performing and you can be the best leader, the best businessperson. The best person in general, is it’s your brain needs of course, oxygen, and good fats and minerals and so forth. But you need sleep. It needs relaxation, it needs exercise, and it needs self love. So they are, I’m going to cut it short because it could be a whole new Nutrition lecture. Okay? You’re like four, there are four nutrients that are crucial for your brain health. And if you have to remember one thing from this interview is you need magnesium. You need probiotics, because you know there’s a superhighway between your gut and your brain and recent research shows that you know, lack of probiotics or an unhealthy gut can trigger you know, mental issues such as depression, anxiety and so forth. It also completely lowers your immune system. The third one is the wonderful B vitamins, all of them a complete supplement vitamin B six and vitamin D 12 are very important. And the last one is omega sorry that you can find you know, in fatty fish, but also implants like chia seeds, flax seeds, and some plants like personally. So remember this magnesium, probiotics, your vitamin D complex, and omega three.

Karen Yankovich 9:15
That is interesting. That is interesting. And the reason that to me it’s interesting is I was at a conference just last week, and you know how when you’re at a conference, you get a bag swag bag full of stuff. And I somehow ended up with two swag bags. And it was this little pocket of magnesium things like magnesium salts to put in your bath magnesium oil to put somewhere else some some kind of spray and then some kind of like a it looked like a lip balm kind of thing like so something that you could some kind of a bomb, and I was looking at it, and I kept it because I’m like I need to find out why. Why this person thinks magnesium is so important. And now here you are telling me that magnesium is so important. So interesting, really interesting.

Veronique Cardon 10:01
Yes, make magnesium has an impact on the health of your, of your synapses. So the web not to get too scientific but it’s it’s acting as a gatekeeper for an MDA receptors which are found in your nerve cells. And it’s important for brain development memory and learning. Interesting Oh, and omega three is very important because it’s it’s promoting nervous tissue grows and function. And the vitamin D as I was saying is the happy environment it makes you It makes you happy in the creation of serotonin dopamine in and so forth. So yes, this is this is nutrition but the second one that is very important is exercise. It’s not only because Going to help you get rid of the extra stress which it does. But you know what? It’s going to improve your sleep a lot of people tell me I don’t sleep enough I don’t sleep well. Well, it’s because you’re not really tired because you haven’t moved enough during the day you did not have enough physical activity. And the you know, it’s gonna improve your sleep. It’s it’s releasing endorphins and serotonin. And it’s, you know, even walking, walking for for one hour a day is going to affect your ability to focus. So I always say sometime to my clients, you know, I’d rather you stop paying me for nutrition and hire a trainer or take your body seriously. And build muscle and move. And and really, you know, each time you move and you exercise, you’re promoting an accelerated block. flow. So you’re bringing extra nutrients and extra oxygen to all your cells in your body. And you promote the growth of micro capillaries, micro capillaries, including in your brain. So, I’m always saying the more you exercise, the more effective you will be. And I know some people know that, but you have to have the discipline to do it every day.

Karen Yankovich 12:26
So do you have a particular type? I mean, do you? Does it matter if it’s cardio or weight training or yoga? Or was it just a matter of getting your heart rate up like Tell me a little bit about what types of exercise you think contributes best?

Veronique Cardon 12:40
Well, so. So especially for women, doing strength training, or weight lifting is very important because you need to keep your muscle mass and I have so many women I see who are like I call them the skinny fat because they have an amazing weight but when they get on my special Body Composition scale, they realize that they have a 45% body fat, which officially like into very, very extreme, I don’t want to use the certain word but very high. And it’s because even when you do cardio, you are going to lose your glucose and then you’re going to be burning fat. But you’re not going to be a muscle. In fact, if you do too much cardio and not enough strength training, you can even start to burn your muscle. Well, okay, yes. Whereas, okay, so cardio is very good at burning your fat especially your belly fat and of course at accelerating your heart, your heart rate so it’s all micro capillaries and you feel great after re because swelling you eliminate toxic strength training is going to help you you can do this with yoga or plotters, but it’s going to help you build your muscle mass and your muscle mass is burning three to four times more calories than your body. mass. So the more muscle mass you have, which is an advantage for men, in fact, the more the more effective you are at Burning extra calories. So I hate to say you can eat more when you have more muscle mass, but it’s true. Because you are a burning machine. And you know, we women as we age, you know, and men, you want to be independent, as long as you can in your life. You want to be able to continue to walk, play tennis, play golf, whatever, stand straight, avoid osteoporosis, I mean, so many benefits. So your muscle mass, especially in your back is going to help it’s going to hold you and keep you helps you being independent. And, you know, very often people tell me, well, I don’t have the time or so but you know what, there are a couple of words they hacks that you can you can do and you know, like for instance, you know, you can sit on Those balls, you know, like those? Yeah. Right, yeah, that that’s going to help you burn an extra two or 300 calories a day because also you have to, you have to work with your back, you have to walking desks, or the standing desks. And then you know, I do this all the time, every two hours, you should take like a two minute to five, five minute break. Please take the time and that’s going to give a little mental break to your brain. And it’s going to help you move and shake all this blood in your body. So they always to to move me I always said to some companies, you should have like a walking path in Europe. Like, you know, like,

Karen Yankovich 15:47
yeah,

Veronique Cardon 15:48
is that, yes, five minutes walking fast. And even with some scenery and some plans. I God knows why. But you can become very creative. In fact, at Google You know, they have all those ways.

Karen Yankovich 16:02
Yeah. I was just at a Google office a couple weeks ago and it was so fun to see all the fun things they had there.

Veronique Cardon 16:11
Yeah, yes. So um, so exercise was my second thing and then the third thing is sleep. And I’m a I’m very disciplined with my sleep too Even to the point that my family says, Oh my God, you’re so boring. Because…

Karen Yankovich 16:31
Veronika you and me both you and me both I am very disciplined I thank goodness I sleep well and I began I am as well very disciplined because I know what my days are like when I don’t have a good night’s sleep. Me too.

Veronique Cardon 16:44
I know. Yes.

Karen Yankovich 16:46
Yeah. So I’m pretty I’m like okay, I mean, obviously there are times I’ll, I’ll stay out later or whatever, but I am really very disciplined about it.

Veronique Cardon 16:55
Well, sleep is a free Yeah. is a free way. Of being super effective in your life because and you know, when people say, well sleep is for, you know, sleep is a waste of time. No, no, no, because I mean some studies that just showed that was just published, that when you sleep, the some protein, the briefs are being expelled in the fluids in your brain. And the thing is a correlation between the accumulation of those 14 degrees and the onset of Alzheimer’s disease. So, to claim in fact, when I vision sweep as the garage is open, and all the mechanics are coming in your brain to repair all your synapses, and, and your your neurons, this is during the night, that all all the elements of your brain are taking a break and are being repaired. And if you shortchange your brain of sleep, it’s not being repeated. And if you don’t sleep, it’s also during sleep that your short term memory is getting transformed into long term memory. So if you want to have a good memory when you get old, please sleep.

Karen Yankovich 18:15
I didn’t know those things that’s interesting

Veronique Cardon 18:18
yet and the D, your, your European studies show that your emotional state, you know, your your ability to be resilient and to to really be very good and have strong executive functions, logical thinking and being being focused laser focused. It’s also being mended during the night. Okay, the role of dreams By the way, still not fully understood, but you know, sleep deprivation for 35 hours he did some studies with the Marine Corp is going to lead you to hallucination and erratic behaviors. So sorry, five hours Is not that long. I mean, come to think about it. Yeah. Oh, right. So I need to an end. It’s the discipline that matters. You need like seven to eight hours of sleep a night. If you sleep five hours and six hours, two or three days in a row, and then you sleep 12 hours. This is a good thing, but it’s not gonna be enough. It is the sleeping on a regular basis like you and me. Like whatever from nine to six or something.

Karen Yankovich 19:31
Yeah. Yeah, that’s exactly what that’s exactly why schedule. Yeah.

Veronique Cardon 19:36
And when you when you don’t have a good night’s sleep, your crappy in the morning, you’re not going to make the right the best decision. The brain is slow. And also your cortisol, the stress hormone is going to be more elevated. And to come back to weight. You may notice that after a bad night’s sleep, you’re going to be you’re not going to be So good at also making decisions and you’re going to have a tendency to go for carbohydrates is because an elevated cortisol is also going to mess with your glucose level. So the, you know, staying sleeping sleeping is absolutely crucial and, and the discipline you need is also to prepare for sleep. And to I mean, it’s recommended to stop being on your computer or in front of the screen, even watching a nice TV show that the screen light is going to mess with your melatonin and Melatonin is the hormone that’s going to tell you to go to sleep makes you tired. Well, if you spend too much time on the screen, it’s going to delay so you add or influence the release of that hormone so you’re not going to feel or you’re not gonna fall asleep us as quickly as you should.

Karen Yankovich 20:58
So you know what I did to trick myself A little bit with that just recently I did this or only I on my phone which is really what I’m on more than anything I mean sometimes I’m sitting at my desk still at seven eight o’clock at night but usually I’m not but I have my phone is always in my hand I changed it so that the night setting starts at seven. So if I pick up my phone and I see that the it’s almost like like like a bar I can see it right and I’ll see it look different and that will remind me that I should not be on my phone as much now right like so. I just recently changed it to that and I made it at seven o’clock because I do shoot same assume similar I like to go to bed at night I love even getting up at five you know so but between five and six is usually when I wake up and and I go to bed at nine as a result of that so at seven so for the two hours right? presume Annette normal basis before I go to bed My phone is in night mode already. So that way when I pick it up and look at it, I’m not as tempted to keep it in my hand and maybe play a game or see what’s happening on Facebook. or whatever. And

Veronique Cardon 22:02
yeah, that’s, that’s very that’s a, that’s a very good tip. I never thought about this. What I do is, and it’s tough for me to do it because I’m kind of a person who never stops working. But I have a rule that my computer and my phone cannot be in my bedroom.

Karen Yankovich 22:24
And I’m not there yet. I’m not there yet.

Veronique Cardon 22:28
Yes. So and and that works. Yeah, that works. Because that just the sheer fact that those objects tools are in your bedroom is impacting you.

Karen Yankovich 22:44
Absolutely. Yeah. So so these are these three things are things that so many of the people that listen to the show are entrepreneurs or they’re very hard working women professionals, and we’re doing so much, right. We’re raising our families. We’re cleaning our houses Were volunteering and you know, working and doing a million things. And it’s Push, push, push. And what I love about what you teach is that, you know, incorporating some of these other things might, you know, you’re saying incorporating some of these other things will, will make those make it make us more effective at all of the other things that we’re doing and what I found in my own life, and I am so far from being perfect with this. I’m still I’m still trying to incorporate little things at a time. But the more I incorporate the things you’re talking about, in small ways, the more productive I am and the less I have to work. You know.

Veronique Cardon 23:46
I in fact, I can tell you that I, we intrapreneur have a very hectic life. I mean, I’m not saying corporate doesn’t have an active life, but as an entrepreneur I have because I be sorry, five years in corporate so I have enough years as an entrepreneur that I can show the field of dance, we have to jump from one thing to another all the time, and we have to have this flexibility that things happen. And origin agenda can really change often. So for instance, I found a way to not be bogged down that all I need to access a professor or I go, I’m very religious about discipline about the gym, but sometimes I learned to compromise. Okay, I have to cancel this session with my trainer. But I’m going to find a way to do 20 minutes of high intensity interval training on the treadmill. So I went from one hour to 20 minutes, or okay I have been working a lot. I don’t have the time to go to the So what I do is I go walk outside for 15 minutes. So I call them the the mental, the mental brain hacks. You can always find a way to take 510 15 minutes to take a brain and mental brain a mental break for your brain. Oh my God, that’s a complicated word. And when you come back, Karen, you’re refreshed. It’s like, Okay, my brain though, is happy. And I have noticed that when I adopt this kind of behavior with the good sleep and so forth, I can work almost two more hours per day. I am more productive. Two hours more.

Karen Yankovich 25:43
Wow. Wow. So you know, I’ve recently not recently but I have been really good for the past at least year if not a couple years, about morning mindfulness and really kind of being intentional about how I spend my morning and I I’ve been really good really intentional about it. minimum of a 15 minute meditation every morning. And I know I 100% know that it impacts what I do. And my intention for the last couple months has been to incorporate a second one in the middle of the day. I am not doing it. And I even put it on my calendar. Because I know that it makes a difference, right? I even put it on my calendar, like in the middle of the day, I’ll block out a half hour, you know, for like a second meditation in the day. And I’m not I’m you know, you’re right about the discipline, the discipline, and I’m determined. I’m trying not to be I’m trying to push this. I’m trying to incorporate it rather than to kind of force it. But I was just going first morning, why am I having so much trouble putting this incorporating the second one into my day?

Veronique Cardon 26:47
Okay, well, first of all is because your brain is super active and being busy doing things. So when I am a meditator, I’m a very disciplined meditator. So I can tell You’re done when the brain is overactive, it’s even it’s very difficult to get into the meditative state. Okay, so there is a certain resistance of the brain to slow down. Okay? So and I’ve been in your situation so what you do is if you can you go for a walk, okay? preferably outside, okay where you see nature. And even when I was working in New York, sometime I was doing it. I was going outside and just to have the fresh air if you can see that New York areas really fresh air, but you see the point and what you do for 510 15 minutes, you you just let your mind wander on admiring a building or a flower or even looking at people. You just let your mind go on to an observation of your surrounding This is a kind of meditation and school walking meditation. And that’s going to give you what you need without you having distressed I think, Okay, I have people meditate now.

Karen Yankovich 28:11
I like that. I like that. I that’s a great idea, even if I what I’m hearing in that too is maybe what I will do. Because I like the opportunity. I maybe I’ll go for a walk First I’ll take the dog for a walk first, because then it gives me like an ease in period, right to a 15 minute quiet meditation. Right? Because I, you know, so that’s interesting. Maybe I’ll try that today. I think you know, so you created a, you’ve written a book about this, you’ve got a whole program about this. Tell me how you help people, you know, build these these habits into their lives and the kinds of results the people that you’re supporting are getting.

Veronique Cardon 28:53
Well, today for the interview, you know, as we prepared, we decided that we would focus on something That would be very useful for the entrepreneur for the corporate person who needs to be feeling like I’m using my brain. And I’m, I have a very well oiled and well cherished brain. But it’s because I told you I’m, I’m very interested in the brain. I’m still studying the brain a lot. But my core business is the cognate diet, which is a weight loss program. That’s where most of my business is. And the books I’ve written are about this but I incorporate stress management as a tool that you have to tackle if you want to lose weight because if you are constantly stressed, and constantly in a fight or flight mode, it’s like you are a fighting a, you know, a wild animal nonsense. But you’re not using, you’re not using your legs, you’re not using your arms, you’re just stuck in a meeting and you boiling with anger, or you’re frustrated or whatever, right or you’re stuck at the red light. We’re in traffic. So this elevates your cortisol and cortisol, in fact, depletes your serotonin. So it stress makes you unhappy, and also makes you fat. So that element is, is in is in my book that if I have clients who say they’re unique, and there are business women very often, I’m doing everything right, I’m exercising and this and that, and I still cannot lose the weight. Well, those women are so stressed that, you know, sometimes they’re not even into the meeting with me, because they already think about the next, the next appointment or what they have to do in their lives. So

Karen Yankovich 30:58
that’s giving me goosebumps That’s giving me goosebumps I thinking I’m totally my body is like totally relating to that. Yeah. saying listen to this woman.

Veronique Cardon 31:07
Well, hmm. And so, so, you know, and and the dangerous stress is not the stress you’re going to have what, God forbid, because you have you’re in an accident or something terrible happened in your family, you know something major, that’s going to create stress. But we are living with this never ending stress. You know, it’s like warning there all the time. And practically speaking, we kind of get accustomed to it and we don’t deal with it. But this is very image stress is is at the root of 90% of diseases, cardiovascular diseases, cancer onset and so forth. So you have to take your stress seriously, and I always ask my clients monitor your stress level during the day. From zero to five, five is extreme it can happen during the day is zero is you are in Nirvana and see how you are silly during the day. And if you are in stage four or five, for too long, you know, you want to end up being disconnected from people and you will end up with a crash. So, and, and and be aware, be aware of the difference between a zero and a two because that too, needs to be addressed as well. To go back to what I’m doing, I am that’s what I was talking about, you know, all those elements that are important for brain happiness and balance in your life. Yes, I’m doing workshops about this in the corporate world. And you know, my stories that I did not listen to my stress level in 2006, and I got myself in level five are so long that I finally crash and my doctor told me, You broke your brain. And I hate you My gosh, yes, I hate you said you can break a leg, you broke rubber, and I had to heal my brain. And what saved me is running, which is a form of meditation and exercise. And, and, and meditation and of course treatment but meditation, you know, really is, is crucial and I wish more companies would organize like we do this one Asia, you know meditative meditation breaks, because that when you are in the meditative state, which is kind of similar to, to dreaming, or to certain forms of dreaming, you know, you have those when we call the alpha waves. Your brain gets two alpha waves and they promote calm relaxation, your brain gets a rest and it’s It’s it doesn’t have to be with meditation, but you know gentle yoga or when we call forest bad thing that they do in Japan right they call it forest bad thing when a forest and you are so one with nature, you are so grounded, that you you get into this alpha wave situation. So I mean, yes, please, please, please, all the people who are hearing us today, take care of your stress and sleep well and eat the right food because the food is going to give the right nutrients to your brain and take good care of yourself. You know, you said Karen, something that I applaud you for you said, I put exercise on my calendar.

Karen Yankovich 34:48
Well, I put I put meditation on my calendar exercises next.

Veronique Cardon 34:54
If you put it in your calendar, it means that you are serious about it. Yes, tension has Right. Yeah. Otherwise it’s like it’s always going away for another priority. So yeah, I am I do those workshops, and is called power ness, your brain and I use the NES for nutrition, exercise, sleep, stress reduction, and then of course self love. You have to love yourself. You have to love yourself to say I am worth taking the time to take care of myself. I deserve it. I need it. And I really deserve to take the time even if you are a multitasker and entrepreneur, a mother a father, you know a juggling a person juggling so many balls. But yeah, and there is one exercise that you can do. You take take your calendar, and for the past two days or whatever number of days You want take your 24 hours a day and split them into the activities you have been performing. And then and by the way surfing Facebook or Instagram is not what I call me time.

Karen Yankovich 36:17
I agree, but it but it is mine it is the I honestly that’s the time that I think that we have to be paying attention to the time that the time that’s getting sucked up in these mindless, you know activities.

Veronique Cardon 36:31
Yes. And and for me I am I’m, I’m a victim of this, but for you for you and me. It’s very important. We have to have a social presence, we have to communicate we have to promote ourselves and so forth. So this is my By the way, my decision for 2020 is to be more disciplined and disciplined about my social media time in You’ve been when it comes to work. Yeah.

Karen Yankovich 37:04
So tell me how people can find out more about you. We’ll put links in the show notes to your book and to your website. But tell me a little bit about how people can start to incorporate some of the tips that you have and you know, learn learn more from you.

Veronique Cardon 37:18
Okay. So the first thing is that if you if you interested to lose weight, and in a way that you look at yourself, and you take care of yourself holistically, it’s called The CogniDiet, and I did a clinical trials been published, it’s been, I mean, serious is The CogniDiet, and go on my website and I have all the social pages you can imagine. And I give a lot of tips not only for weight loss, but for for stress relief. And if you’re interested to have me as a speaker or organize a very oiled workshop on power and power And your brain or you just can email me at thecognidiet@gmail.com. My information is going to be all there, right?

Karen Yankovich 38:12
We’ll definitely share everything per week. Thank you so much. I definitely have to pay more attention to the work that you do. I you know, I enjoyed it a little bit from more from the outside. I think I need to be a little bit more on the inside of it. So because I definitely I mean, I know that I could benefit more by following some of the techniques that you that you teach, because I’ve experienced it right. I’ve experienced it I know how much better My life is just by being really consistent with morning meditations. And you know, we talked a little bit about the mindless like social media type thing. That’s the kind of thing I say to myself. I think, why is it you can sit here with your phone and lose an hour on watching Instagram stories of people you don’t even know Yeah, when it when it comes to sitting down and doing 15 minutes of meditation you think you are better than that? Do you know like, Why? You know so. So it is really about training your brain and I love that you’re helping us with that because I want in this deck and this new decade, I want all of us women to have more abundance in our life and that sometimes that means time, right? Like, like having more imagine how amazing it would feel to have more space in your day and not have this crazy packed calendar. Because you took the time to do that. And listen, I I joke to people and I probably joked about it on this podcast. Like sometimes I need the universe to knock me over the head with a bat to remind me of these things, you know, like, be you know, because I know it but then like, you know, I mean, I’ll give you an example. There was one time I was in the middle of this big project and I was really pushing, pushing, pushing. It was a couple years ago for sales and I sat on the I said I have to get out of here. So I went to the beach for a couple of hours and while I was sitting on the beach for the couple of hours, like forcing came in. And I like that the universe hitting you over the head with a bat saying, just stop. Just stop and let everything that you’ve put in place start to happen, right? And enjoy the fruits of, of building more space into your life. And, you know, so I, I’m a big fan of that message. I’m so grateful that you came on the show to share your perspective and your techniques. Because I think we need to know where to get started with this. So everybody get Veronica’s book. And I think you’ll you’ll love it and you know, everybody, everybody that I think you’ll I think just incorporating the habits and I know some people that have taken your programs, and they’re they’re huge fans because they’re saying that the habits, the little habits that she’s doing is life changing. So yeah,

Veronique Cardon 40:52
And one last quote one last time. Don’t try to Don’t try to change everything at once you Like, if you’ve never been on a mountain, you say I want to climb the Everest just take small steps because that’s the best way to succeed that one step at a time. One new habit at a time. You know, if you saw me, I’m going to add 15 minutes of relaxation in my day, this is a start, and then you succeed at doing it and then you go to the next one.

Karen Yankovich 41:24
Yeah, perfect. Okay, let me I will put everything in the show notes. Thank you so much for being here with us today. And I look forward to more ways that we can collaborate moving forward into this new decade. Thanks so much again, Veronique.

Veronique Cardon 41:38
Thank you Karen.

Karen Yankovich 41:40
So I hope that you loved Veronique. I think she’s such an amazing woman. She’s got such an amazing journey. And you know, I I love the neuroscience aspect of what she does because as much as I love the marketing piece of this and really truly the conversation piece and the relationship piece. It’s so cool when it Actually a science based right that to me, really, I don’t know, it makes it it’s for me it makes it dive in, it makes me dive in a little bit deeper. We actually had Shantae Taylor on a few videos a year ago, maybe we need to have Shantae back. But we’ve had her on also talking about. She’s a neuroscientist, so just neuroscience and the brain. And honestly, any little tweaks we can do to help us have more productivity helps us actually have a better life. Right? So that’s one of the things I love about the story that veroni talked about isn’t the healthier we are and the better we can create a healthy place to live our life from right a healthy vehicle to live our life from, the more enjoyment we can get out of our life. And it’s all about joy, right? So I’m just I just really thoroughly enjoy her. So hopefully you know that by now that I’m here to support you in your journey as well. I would love to invite you to join us in our free Facebook group. You can the links in the show notes below or you can go to Karen Yankovich dot com slash Facebook group. That’s where we have all the best LinkedIn tips and tricks and I do LinkedIn video training videos there that I don’t share or do anywhere else. So you’ve got to join that Facebook group if you want to get the behind the scenes, LinkedIn training tips and training that are public. It’s a completely free group. But it’s the only place you can get these trainings. We don’t share them anywhere else. So come join us at Karen yankovich.com slash Facebook group. We’d love to have you there. And I will see you back here again next week for another episode of the good girls get rich podcast.