E114 - Creative Heart Health Part 2 - Lisa Murphy
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Beth: [00:00:00] Okay. Here we go.
Hello, my creative friend. Welcome back to another episode of Create Today with Beth Buffington. Today we have Lisa Murphy with us again, our Healthy Aging coach. She's here to discuss part two of Healthy Habits for a Healthy Heart. She was here with us last week to talk about the first two things to be mindful of, to have a happy and healthy heart, and those were food related.
And they were having some peace and quiet and calm times in your day if you weren't able to listen to that yet, make sure that is next on your list of things to listen to on your favorite podcasts. But today we are going to move on to part two. We have two more important areas that you need to be aware of to have your heart be its healthiest.[00:01:00]
So Lisa, welcome back to Create Today. Come and talk to us about these next two important pillars that you want to share with us today.
Lisa: Thank you so much, Beth. It is always so fun being on your podcast and talking with you about all things creative and wellness and wellness and creativity and oh, I just love how they go together,
But yeah, thank you so much for mentioning the first two pillars. Of heart health and they are indeed food and mood and we gave lots of information in part one. Part two, we'll focus on two more important pillars and they are rest and movement. So today we're gonna dive deep into healthy habits for a healthy heart in these two pillars.
So should we just kick it off with rest?
Beth: Let's do it. I mean, I think we're a nation of tired people.
Lisa: Mm-hmm.
Beth: so talk [00:02:00] to us about what it means. To have rest and then let's talk about how we can have it and have rest be successful.
Lisa: Yeah, you're right. We are chronically grouchy toddlers, aren't we? Because we don't get enough sleep. I consider rest in two different categories. The first is what most people probably think of is sleep. So you go to bed at night, you sleep, you wake up the next morning.
It's not always that simple, but that's the concept, right? And then there is also downtime. Are we taking vacations? Are we taking breaks from work during our day? How are we resting our bodies and our minds in the ebb and flow of our daily rhythm? And they both are really important.
And they both matter.
Beth: Yes, I think that there are. A lot of us who we get up, we rush to work, [00:03:00] we rush home from work, have dinner, plop on the couch, we watch television tell it's time to go to bed. Then we go to bed and we try to sleep the best we can, and then we get up and we do the whole thing again.
What's wrong with this picture, Lisa?
Lisa: Yeah, I, I identify that as contract and collapse. We are in contraction mode all day long. And then what do we do? We just have, we just have to collapse. So that might mean pouring a glass or three of wine. Binging on Netflix with a pint of ice cream, right? Like these are ways that we're trying to calm our nervous system because we haven't self-regulated throughout the day.
And this is really important for heart health because if you think about the scenario I just described, if we are up like this all day long, our blood pressure is up, our heart rate is elevated. We are stressing our ticker.
Beth: And if you are listening to the podcast right now. [00:04:00] You weren't able to see what Lisa was doing with her body.
We are constricting ourselves. Shoulders up high by our ears. Our hands sometimes are clenched. So, uh, rest is partially getting that deep relaxation going. Yes,
Lisa: Exactly, Beth.
I mean, having these breaks during our day, during our week, during our month, and during our year is so important so that we are able to self-regulate so that our heart and our whole cardiovascular system is not just pounding, pounding, pounding, going overtime. All day, all week, all month, all year. Because then we certainly have no choice but to collapse.
Beth: Mm-hmm.
Lisa: And you know, sometimes that collapse is just flopping on the couch with a glass of wine and a bowl of ice cream, but sometimes that collapse comes in a much more dangerous form, such as if we're speaking about heart health. Heart attack, heart problems, mental breakdowns like I'm, I know that sounds very dramatic [00:05:00] illness, but that's the reality when we don't give ourselves and our nervous systems the chance to regulate.
Beth: Yes. So I know you have clients who are always telling you things about. Sleep and unrest. What are some things you've heard people say about resting and sleeping
Lisa: Well, it's really funny because there's the famous quote from the Warren Zevon song, I'll Sleep when I'm Dead. And I hear that a lot.
Oh, I'll sleep when I'm dead. Well, the sad truth is you will probably be dead a lot sooner, not just for cardiac health, but for overall health. So I've also heard sleep is overrated. False. It's actually quite underrated in our society, and I've heard people say I just guess no one gets a good night's sleep.
Beth: Mm, yep. as a creative professional, I've worked in a lot of agency like, um, environments where the deadline is king, the client is the [00:06:00] most important person in the world, and meeting those deadlines is priority number one. And so your sleep or your rest was not important, not a priority, and it almost felt like a weakness when you said, I need to break for lunch, or I, I need to just go outside for a bit, or I need to actually just go home and go to bed.
No one mentioned those things because you, you got it. Got pushback.
Lisa: Absolutely. And I can feel the resistance already from some listeners, you know, and this is what I encounter in my work daily, and I think that as a society we have. Gotten into the busyness trap where you're not valuable, you're not productive if you're not quote busy.
Beth: Yeah.
Lisa: And I don't know, I think if everybody's really honest with themselves, if you are sleep deprived, if you haven't had a [00:07:00] proper break or an honest vacation in years, there's just no way that you are operating. A hundred percent your work product. it is just not possible. Right.
We're, we're just running by the seat of our pants and caffeinated and
Beth: yeah. Yeah. I think it's always really great to have someone say to you. It is okay to go to bed. Yeah. And there's nothing wrong with going to bed early. Just like, I remember you telling me one time, it's okay not to watch the news.
these things need to be said out loud.
Lisa: Yeah.
Beth: Because somehow as a society, we've decided that's a sign of weakness if we are needing sleep or if we need to take a break. It is. Okay. And it is mandatory. It should be a priority for you to get your rest.
Lisa: Absolutely. It's not just, okay, it is required and you know, maybe we can get away with a lot of things when we're younger, but [00:08:00] that will eventually catch up with this, and I think a lot of times.
Because of the conditioning and the demands put on individuals in certain workplaces, and I'm, I'm not suggesting that that's not real, but then we come to believe that ourselves, and it, it becomes an assumption and it's something that we do out of fear if I don't work from. 7:00 AM to midnight, you know, be on.
I'm hoping nobody's actually working from 7:00 AM to midnight, but I'm guessing plenty of people are on their phones, on their, on their computers, on their emails. Then something bad will happen to me. Maybe, but maybe not. You know, I think we get caught in this trap. And what if it could look different?
What if you actually could take care of yourself and your work product improved?
Beth: Right. A good test for everyone who is thinking, I, I don't know. I can't set my phone down at night. [00:09:00] I am on call for emails. I have to work until seven or eight or nine o'clock every night. A good test might be pick a day where you are most likely to be okay not to have to overwork.
See how your day goes. Allow yourself to stop working at four 30 or five o'clock when you're supposed to stop, and then go and do something that is restful. That doesn't include, the several glasses of wine. It doesn't include the pint of ice cream, it doesn't include binging on Netflix.
What would you like to do? Taking a walk or, going to the theater, listening to good music while you make a healthy, delicious dinner. Dancing into your kitchen a little bit, playing a board game with your family. Those kinds of things are restful. And can really turn your day completely around and you might find that you have more energy when you allow yourself to have those evenings where you are not working late, late, late.[00:10:00]
Doesn't have to be every day love. You can have those breaks.
Lisa: I love that. I love that so much. Play a little game with yourself and try it once and see if something absolutely terrible happens.
Beth: Yeah,
Lisa: my guess is the opposite, and especially for our creative friends. We cannot create from a stressed state.
It's just not possible. You cannot be creative if you are all up in your head and you know out of your mind. Crazy. Hanging off a cliff with your hair on fire. It's just not possible.
Beth: No. And to bring in creativity here, it is a great thing to do for rest. Creativity is that thing you can do that is going to take you away from the pressures of the world and give you a little place to just exhale.
And especially when you're doing a creative pastime that is easy to do. And when I'm talking easy, I'm something as simple as. Getting a coloring book and coloring
Those all are very reassuring and bring [00:11:00] you down from a busy day.
Lisa: Absolutely. So listeners may be wondering, well, how much sleep do I need to get?
Beth: Yes, let's talk about that.
Lisa: Well, most adults need. Seven to nine hours of mostly uninterrupted sleep most nights. Now, that doesn't mean if you get up and go to the bathroom, you've gotta start the clock all over again.
It just means in general, and I'm talking about most nights, right? Everybody has the off night here or there, if we wanna get back to Heart Health specifically, some studies show that if you are routinely getting six hours or less. Per night, you are doubling your risk of heart attack and stroke and increasing your chance of developing congestive heart failure, which is a disease when the heart does not pump efficiently by 70%.
So let me repeat those statistics because I think they deserve to be. Heard. If you're regularly getting six hours [00:12:00] or less of sleep per night, you're doubling your risk of heart attack and stroke, and you're increasing your chance of developing congestive heart failure by 70%. That's just those two specific parts of cardiac health.
you're more likely to have high blood pressure, like the list goes on.
Beth: And I think Lisa mentioned that you don't need to worry about having this exactly seven to nine every night, that there is going to be those nights where you do have trouble sleeping and you shouldn't lay awake in bed thinking, oh no, oh no, I'm having a bad night's sleep.
That it happens occasionally. And I think everyone has those seasons in life where sleeping is a little difficult. I'm looking at you all your new moms and dads. But knowing that this is something that you need to be mindful of, and then giving yourself the most opportunities to have a good night's sleep.
But be mindful that that's seven to nine hours for most adults.
Lisa: [00:13:00] Yeah, absolutely, and I think there are some really easy, let's say simple, not necessarily easy, some simple ways to do what you can to optimize your sleep.
Actually, I prefer to call it prioritizing sleep because that's really what it is. It's habits that we can enjoy or employ. To help us prioritize our sleep hygiene and one of the first is we've been joking about the glass or three of wine, but man, you, the booze will wake you up at 3:00 AM like nobody's mother.
Right? Like,
Beth: so true. Yeah.
Lisa: Yeah. If you are okay with trading a good night's sleep for a glass or more of wine. That's your choice, but do it with awareness. So cutting back or cutting out the booze is only going to help probably with all areas of your heart health, but particularly your sleep. [00:14:00] another fun habit is coffee or caffeine.
Who doesn't love, uh, you know, a lovely latte in the morning? Again, no problems, but just know that the half life of coffee is five hours. That means it takes five hours for half of the effects of the caffeine that you just consumed to go away, and then another five hours for the next half and so on. it can take up to 10 hours for the caffeine to be completely processed by your system.
So if you're still having coffee at noon. 10 o'clock at night, you still likely have the effects of caffeine in your system. So again, just something to be mindful of and aware of. We talked in part one a lot about peace and quiet, mindfulness, calming practices, really helpful for sleep hygiene. So what are you doing right before your lights go out?
Are you. Rushing home [00:15:00] from work, shoving down late dinner, scrolling your phone, watching a violent program on tv. I mean, these are clearly not habits that will set you up for a peaceful night's sleep. And a wind down routine again, is helpful for all areas of your health, particularly your heart health. So, uh, a nice walk after dinner, a warm bath.
Um, for sure devices off at least an hour before bedtime, power down hour. These are just some really simple, not always easy, but simple ways that we can help set ourselves up for the sleep that we need to take care of our hearts.
Beth: this is a great time to be thinking about what creative activity can you do before you go to bed that's going to help you relax and get into that slumber mode and. Simple, coloring is a great thing to do. easy knitting or crocheting, something where you're not worrying about things, [00:16:00] you're just allowing yourself to wind down.
Um, journaling at night is a really good thing to do, and that is another very creative way to allow your brain to wind down. There's something very, calming about writing in a journal too, that, that handwritten, repetitive movement of writing. I think it's, um, it's a skill that a lot of us forget is actually a creative pastime as well.
Lisa: Oh, those are wonderful, wonderful tips, Beth, and to me, they all speak to nourishment and ways to self-regulate from within. you know, a lot of people, asked, well, can I, can I take magnesium and can I take melatonin? Sure. Those things can be very helpful. Yet I'm finding that a lot of our.
Sleeplessness. Is not because we're magnesium deficient. I mean, but some people may be, and that's good to know. And yes, [00:17:00] magnesium can be wonderful, but sometimes we've really gotta do the work and address the other habits. And are we trying to put bandaids on things when we've just gotten ourselves depleted?
Beth: Oh, but Lisa, we love a silver bullet. Isn't there something out there that if we just did this one thing, we could just party till one o'clock sleep? Like. I rock and then get up and rock and roll. I mean, isn't there something, and the answer to that is no, you, you gotta put the work in.
Lisa: The answer to that is no. We tend to get ourselves backed into a corner but let's be. Preventative and proactive with our self-care instead of trying to walk back our bad habits.
Beth: Yeah. Yes. That's so very well put. So, uh, yes to supplements that are doctor approved. 'cause if, you know, you should check with your doctor, but they're not the silver bullet. You have to take a look at how you are caring for yourself in those hours before you go to [00:18:00] bed or even through your day.
What are you doing to stay relaxed? 'cause the more calm your day, probably the better your sleep will be in the evening as well.
Lisa: A hundred percent. A good night's sleep starts the minute you wake up.
Beth: Ah, that's some wise words. So, Tell us, sleep, taking time during the day.
What else are we looking at that would constitute rest for us that many of us might be overlooking and not paying attention to?
Lisa: Well, starting the day with ease. Um, you know, don't, don't open your phone the minute you wake up. give your nervous system a gentle, slow, warm upstart rather than an immediate jolt of stimulation.
So I think a lot of it comes down to devices. Are we giving ourselves chances to regulate from this constant device use that we're all addicted to now? Let's be honest. I think true breaks from work, [00:19:00] time. Offline, you know, when is the last time you went a good chunk of time without being connected to your work or even your family?
And I understand there are different considerations. But you know, when is the last time you were someplace where there was no internet or you did not have your device? I mean, these are true breaks. A proper vacation where you don't check email, um, some time in nature.
You know, these are ways that the nervous system really gets a chance to settle.
Beth: And vacations don't need to be very expensive. You can have a staycation where you just shut down at your home. the separation of, social media and the news and emails.
That is where you're going to find your vacation is getting away from those things. If you go to vacation in Hawaii and you take your laptop with you and you have, uh, two Zoom meetings and you answer emails and you [00:20:00] are, doing six reports, you are not on vacation.
Lisa: No. And that's, that's not a true break.
And I like the idea of your fun game here too, if this is giving you practically a heart attack, listening to us. Talk about taking this kind of a break. Yeah. If you started really, really small and took one half of a day on the weekend off.
Beth: Yeah.
Lisa: So from noon to five, or let's make it from three to 8:00 PM on a Sunday.
Beth: Yes, and And tell yourself, Lisa and Beth said it was okay.
Lisa: They said it was not only Okay, but it was required.
Beth: Yeah. Sometimes you just need to hear someone say that you need to do this. It is important for you to do. Otherwise you believe that the truth is, on the flip side of the coin, it is important for you to always be plugged in.
It is important for you to answer every email. It's important for you to dive on your phone. Every time a text comes in. Nope. It's actually the very opposite. [00:21:00] Allow yourself to step away and just unwind and feel the goodness of what we used to enjoy before the internet barged into our world.
We used to have times where you weren't by a phone and you didn't even have an answering machine. I'm old enough to remember those days that the only way someone can get ahold of you on the phone is if you were home.
Lisa: We survived.
Beth: We did. We survived. we were calmer people.
Lisa: Yeah. Yeah.
Beth: Our lives were slower and we didn't expect everything to happen, in a blink of an eye. because things can happen in a blink of an eye, then suddenly that became the way things should be. It all should be done right now. There should be no waiting.
I texted you, therefore answer me back. And that needs to be loosened up a little bit.
Lisa: Yeah, and I think it's really important to acknowledge that some [00:22:00] listeners may think that does not work for me. I would get fired. So again. I encourage you to try some very small experiments. What if you took 30 minutes a night where you shut off earlier than you normally do before bed and just see what happens?
And then. If you really cannot do your job without being attached to it 24 7, and if your job does not allow you to get at least seven hours of sleep most nights, then I think you really have a big choice to make, and that choice is yours to make.
but be really honest with yourself. Are you trading that for your health?
Beth: For your health? And then the question is, is it worth it?
Lisa: And again, it's just a matter of are you interested in prioritizing your [00:23:00] sleep, Which. Is prioritizing your own health, particularly your heart health.
Beth: Also know that when you first get started on these things. You are gonna feel guilty that you're not answering that phone, that you've, you have turned your phone off or left it in a different room, and you're going to feel guilty about that.
And that is only because you're trying something new and your brain doesn't like you to do new things. So after you've done this for a while, it's gonna be become the norm and it's gonna feel fine.
Lisa: Yeah. We just have to prove to the brain that this new thing won't kill us because that's what it comes down to.
Yeah. New things are scary Yeah, so small baby experiments, give yourself time. Prove that you won't get fired or die.
Beth: Yes.
Lisa: And then get on with your bad self.
Beth: Yeah. Alright, I, is there anything else about rest and sleep that we haven't talked about yet?
Lisa: I think that's it, Beth. I think that's it. Shall we [00:24:00] move on to movement?
Beth: Let's move to movement. Yes.
Lisa: Let's move to movement. Okay. I call it movement instead of exercise because I feel that takes the pressure off.
You do not have to go to the gym. You do not have to be a runner. However, you must move your body to be healthy. Full stop. There's just no getting around that, We need to clear that up upfront, especially if you wanna have a healthy heart.
So let's talk about that. Everyone out there is completely different as far as what they're capable of doing for movement.
Beth: So how do we know we're gauging our movement correctly, that we should be doing more or we should be doing less.
Lisa: It's a great question and I think unless you are an ultra athlete or someone who is really working to optimize your fitness, I don't think you need to get too caught up in zone two or
VO two, max, all that stuff. I think the general guidelines are a [00:25:00] great place to start and they are. 150 minutes per week of moving your body. And that yes, should be a mix of gentle movement, cardiovascular movement. Um, if you are doing really high intensity movement like running or swimming in the pool for swimming laps, you don't necessarily need to do 150 minutes if you're just doing gentle walking.
150 minutes is great. And if you're hearing 150 minutes and going. My gosh, that sounds like a ton. Again, do the math. And it's only a little over 20 minutes a day, and the really great news is you do not have to do that 20 minutes all in one chunk. So let's take 20 minutes. You could wake up and go for a nice, gentle walk around the block with your doggies.
Maybe that takes 10 minutes. You come home, you do a short yoga practice, or you do some squats in your kitchen while the the kettle's boiling. You can see how easy it is to get [00:26:00] 20 minutes of movement most days.
Beth: So there are times where you are exercising or you're doing your movement and you might not even realize it because you are having fun. I think for so many people. you hear the word exercise or movement and you think, oh, it has to be something I don't like, because that's what it's all about and it's not true.
you can garden or you can dance in your kitchen. All of those things are moving your body and, and that all counts. Yes,
Lisa: absolutely does. If you think about it, your heart is a muscle just like your bicep and your muscles. Your biceps only get stronger when we use them. The heart only gets stronger when we use it.
So when we move our bodies, the heart has to be a little bit quicker to send blood to the muscles that we're using. So the blood carries the oxygen, So any kind of movement does count. And if you are [00:27:00] really into fitness, that's one thing. If you are not currently moving your body in any way, forget about all that other stuff and start really, really small.
If you're not doing five minutes a week, now, start with five minutes a week.
It's a perfect place to start and just like sleep. We don't have to fix it all at once. In fact, if you try to, you're likely to risk injury or a cardiac incident that you don't want. Yeah, right. Yeah. Like the weekend warriors who decide to go out and run a marathon.
No, I don't recommend that at all.
Beth: Not a good idea. Well, and if you're doing things you don't like or you're doing too much too soon, you'll stop doing it. Yeah. And you need to find something that you look forward to doing every day.
Lisa: Absolutely. If, if you say you don't like to move your body, I will challenge that.
You just haven't found the right thing for you.
Beth: Yes, I agree. I, I suggest everyone find the podcast every week. [00:28:00] Put your earphones on your earbuds and just go for a walk and listen to Lisa and I while you're out walking.
Lisa: Yeah.
Beth: So doubling up with, uh, something you enjoy, with something that you might think you're not looking forward to is a great way to, get yourself out there. but you just have to do it slowly so that you can get up to a, a distance that makes you feel like, oh, I really like this.
I can do this.
Lisa: Yeah, absolutely. And if you're already pretty fit and you have a routine, you can uplevel by thinking about the different forms of exercise. So most people are familiar with cardio, you know, walking, biking, getting on the treadmill. What about flexibility and mobility? Yoga is a great example of both.
flexibility of the muscles. mobility of the joints. But strength training is really awesome and very important for not just our heart health, but our bone health. And our brain health as well. So [00:29:00] everybody's different. Start where you are and these are ways that you can uplevel if you're ready to do that.
Beth: Yeah, encourage encouraging yourself to see, okay, I did this. Can I do more?
It's a beautiful way and a very inexpensive way to keep your health at its peak.
Lisa: Yeah, and it can be free. You don't need an expensive gym membership. You don't need a fancy piece of equipment. You can use your own body for all the forms of exercise.
Beth: so when you say isometric, I can you, I, I know you explained it a little bit, but let's just go into that a little bit more because I think that's a very healthy way to get some movement in.
So can you break that down?
Lisa: Yeah. Isometric exercises are really great for cardiac health because they are very effective ways to not only strengthen the body and the bones and the heart and the brain health, but they are really useful to help lower elevated blood pressure.
So an isometric. Exercise [00:30:00] by definition is, a movement or an exercise that strengthens the muscles without moving the joints. So you could think about some strengthening exercises. You're lifting weights, you are doing squats, the joints are actually moving in isometric exercises, you hold a static position.
Beth:
Lisa: and that requires the muscles to hold that shape, and that's when they work. You might think of like the muscle fiber's firing, Some examples of this would be plank, holding a plank on your knees or on your arms or elbows. Um, wall sits where instead of doing squats up and down, you just go over to your wall.
And you sit against the wall and feel your quads working. there are lots of different isometric exercises that you can do that will provide all those benefits in addition to helping to lower hypertension or high blood pressure.
Beth: Okay. Awesome. But now let's just talk [00:31:00] about, like dance movement, right? Movement.
Lisa: Yeah.
Beth: Really great exercise there.
Lisa: Yeah. Cardiovascular exercise. Mm-hmm.
Beth: And we talked about gardening. Mm-hmm. So when we're gardening, how much movement do we need to do to be able to say, I, I gardened and I moved,
Lisa: It's kind of the honor system.
Beth: Yeah.
Lisa: So if you're sitting on your porch watching your weeds grow, that does not count.
Beth: Oh,
Lisa: in general, you know, get to know your own body and if you can tell that your heart rate's getting up, if you're bending over, if you're using your muscles, it counts, you know, and the body will get more efficient at what it does.
Repeatedly so things will start to get easier for you. So that's when you know, you maybe take a need to take it up a notch.
Everyone is different. And for most of us, we don't need to think about optimizing and heart rates and [00:32:00] zones and things like that.
We just need to move our bodies. And once you get to that baseline and you wanna go further. Fantastic. Let's talk.
Beth: Yes, again, there's no silver bullet here. There's no magic wand and Lisa talked about how much time you need to spend each week.
and that you do need to get your heart rate up. Can you talk a little bit about what that means, Lisa? How do we know if our heart rate's up?
Lisa: Yeah, yeah. You don't need fancy gear. if you go for a walk, can you easily talk or are you a little bit out of breath?
If you're a little bit out of breath, that's because your heart rate is. Elevated and it's harder to get the oxygen to move. It's not a bad thing. That's a good thing. So learn to know when your body is in effort and when it's in rest. And again, I'm not talking to the athletes in the group, [00:33:00] we can talk about optimizing, but for most of us just, are you sweating a little bit?
do you feel huffy and puffy? Just a little bit. If you do, you're working your cardiovascular system.
Beth: So again, it's doing the work and It does take a little bit of effort to, know that the movement that you're doing is doing goodness for your heart, and that is why it is so important to pick out something that you enjoy doing.
Lisa: Yeah, absolutely. Jump around and tell you are out of breath.
Beth: Yeah.
Lisa: And then pat yourself on the back.
Beth: All right. what do we need to know next, Lisa?
Lisa: Well, I just want to point out that. I can hear a lot of listeners saying, yeah, well, I have heart disease in my family, or I'm genetically predisposed for this or that, or the other.
That may be, and I hear that and I honor that. However, we now know that only 25% of [00:34:00] our health outcome is based solely on our genes. That means that 75% of our health is in our own hands. So. There's so much that we can do for heart health. We've talked about food. If you haven't listened to part one, loads of juicy, tasty morsels in there to be, to be picked up.
So go back and listen to that. But I'll recap briefly. Eat more, eat more anti-inflammatory and fiber filled foods, including chocolate.
Beth: Chocolate, yes.
Lisa: Manage your stress better. I'm not saying eliminate stress. We live in a stressful world. We talked a lot in part one about how to do that part two, rest, which we divided up into sleep and downtime, seven to nine hours, most nights of mostly uninterrupted sleep and true breaks break from work, break from [00:35:00] devices, break from stimulation, and then.
Move your body. The guidelines stay 150 minutes a week, which is about 20 plus minutes most days. Find something that you love and go do it. And I'll let you in on a secret, if you do all these things at least a little bit, you don't have to do them all 110% a little bit.
You're not only protecting your heart, you're protecting all of you, your bones, your brains. Everything, your emotional wellbeing, your mental health. So the prescription for one is really the prescription for all.
Beth: the thing I like about what you bring to the table, Lisa, is that. These aren't expensive things to do.
You don't have to have a gym membership. You don't need to, have elective surgery. You don't have a lot of expensive supplements that need to be, brought to your medicine cabinet. These are things you can do for. [00:36:00] Free or for just a little bit depending on what kind of art suppliesor workout supplies you think you need.
But really it's not hard to do and they are almost free to do, and that, that is an amazing advantage right there.
Lisa: The good news is it's mostly up to you.
Beth: If you're listening to this going, holy cow, this seems like so much do small changes, just micro changes that are going to then add up for a lot of goodness down the road. And if you don't start now, you're going to wish you would have a year from now. So you might as well just pick a couple things that you think, oh, low hanging fruit, I can do that.
Lisa: It gets a lot harder as you get older if you haven't already set the conditions for success. Believe me. Yeah.
Beth: And yet another thing is it doesn't matter how old you are.
Lisa: Oh, it's never
Beth: too
Lisa: late.
Beth: Yes, you can start adapting all of these things. Even if you're in your [00:37:00] fifties, your sixties, your seventies, your eighties, your nineties, you can still do movement.
so you can reap some benefits from all of these things, no matter how old you are.
Lisa, one more thing that I wanna talk about and that is some ways to think about. The health you have, the creativity that you have, and how you are mingling with other people to get better health and happiness and more creativity in your life. And that is through the Sylva events that you and I are co-hosting together.
Let's talk about that for just a quick minute.
Lisa: Absolutely. Beth, I'm just so delighted to be working with you to bring creative practices into my healthy aging and health practices because one can absolutely support the other and vice versa. So I'm just thrilled to be running retreats that are the intersection of creativity and wellness.
And we've got a couple of those coming up in [00:38:00] 2026. The first one is this May in Atchison, Kansas, and then the second will be this fall near Asheville, North Carolina. And you don't have to wait for the retreats because we do this. Twice a month in our Sylva Sessions online group Mastermind, where we talk about the three Cs of creative wellness, core care, which is your self-care, creative care, which is how you're caring for your creativity and community because we can't, nor should we do this alone.
Beth: Yes. all those things you say are so important and if you have been listening to Lisa and I talk and you are fascinated by the topics that we, discuss, We're giving you some great ideas, but if you would like to really do a deep dive and figure out best ways for you to understand more about how your brain is working with your creativity and with your movement and your food, [00:39:00] this is what we talk about and we do it in those three Cs, so we would love it.
if you would come and join us and we can meet you in person either through Sylva Sessions online, through Sylva Synergy, which is our retreat that will be in Kansas in May, or through Sylva Solace, which is our retreat that will be taking place in the Smoky Mountains in Asheville, North Carolina this fall.
So you are invited to join us in one, two, or three of these places. We can't wait to have you join us.
I can't wait. Beth, it's gonna be a great year. It's gonna be so much fun.
Yes. So come and join us. You will love every single minute of it. You'll love the people that come, and we love meeting all of you at our events. So join us at a Sylva event. Soon. Soon, soon you will be able to find, all the information that you need to register or get on the [00:40:00] wait list in the show notes, or by going to www dot bdi create today.
Lisa: Thanks Beth.
Beth: You're welcome, Lisa. Thanks for coming. I love it. Love it, love it when you are part of the Create Today with Beth Buffington podcast.
Lisa: always my pleasure, Beth. It's great fun to be on.
Beth: So everyone go out, take care of your heart and we will see you later. Bye-bye.
