I believe it is fair to say that we all want to be healthy and happy… And I believe it is also fair to say that we all go about being healthy and happy in our own way. Which is totally valid. Then, isn’t it curious how the health and wellness industries are in such demand? Though we are all different and we all go about our own pursuits in our own way, at the end of the day we still want information, guidance and support in this area that might not be our area of expertise.

Creating health and vitality so we can live long and gorgeous lives, requires we are intentional and invested in implemented healthy habits, routines, and approaches. It is important to have a holistic approach to our health and wellness to ensure we actually are healthy… Focusing on all the pillars involved in our health helps us in this quest:

~ Sleep, exercise, nutrition and supplementation, hydration, stress relief and mindfulness

But there are other factors to consider for our overall wellness, attention to not just our bodies, but mind and spirit as well… And all the other factors outside ourselves that impact us… All worthy of exploration as we pursue becoming our best self, creating our radiant relationship and living our best life.

In today’s episode I’m excited to have a conversation with Marvin Bee, a fellow podcaster about how to go about our own personal health journey. He focuses on removing unhealthy habits and all things not good for us in his approach to health and happiness…

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🌟ABOUT OUR GUEST:

Marvin Bee is host of the popular "Uncle Marv's Unhealthy Podcast", where he shares his personal journey of overcoming unhealthy habits and lifestyle choices. With over 25 years of experience in the IT industry, Marvin is no stranger to the challenges of balancing work, health, and personal life. Through his own trial and error, Marvin discovered the power of functional nutrition, mindfulness practices, and technology-enabled wellness solutions. He now uses his podcast as a platform to share these insights and inspire others to take a holistic approach to their health, empowering others to break unhealthy habits and achieve lasting well-being. You can find him at Unhealthy Podcast.

Find him also here:
Facebook | Twitter

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🌟MORE ON THIS EPISODE:

Watch the YouTube Video!

More about the podcast on our Podcast Page

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DISCLAIMER: This content is meant to support your Journey and not as a replacement for professional assistance. Additionally, the ideas and resources provides by our guests are their ideas and recommendations alone and not necessarily a reflection of the host’s.

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Emma Viglucci: 0:32

Hello, I am so excited to have you here for another episode. I have the pleasure of having Marvin be with us today. He is going to share some wonderful insights that he has learned on his own journey of becoming more healthy. Now he's a podcaster himself, so he's going to share the insights that he's learned on his journey from other guests that he's had on his show. So today's show is a little bit different and it's going to be so exciting to hear where his takeaways have been, what he has learned and how he has applied all of the lessons to his own life and how he see others apply it to theirs. So, without further ado, I'm going to bring Marvin on in a minute. Stay tuned, you're in for a treat. Welcome and hello. I'm so excited to have Marvin with us. Let me read you his intro before we say hello to Marvin.

Emma Viglucci: 1:32

Marvin B is the host of the popular Uncle Marv's Unhealthy Podcast, where he shares his personal journey of overcoming unhealthy habits and lifestyle choices. With over 25 years of experience in the IT industry, marvin is no stranger to the challenges of balancing work, health and personal life. Through his own trial and error, marvin discovered the power of functional medicine, mindfulness practices and technology-enabled wellness solutions. He now uses his podcast as a platform to share this insight and inspire others to take a holistic approach to their health. On his podcast, marvin brings on a wide range of expert guests, from nutritionists and fitness trainers to mental health professionals and sleep specialists. His engaging interview style and deep industry knowledge allows him to extract practical tips and strategies that listeners can immediately apply to their own lives. His goal is to empower listeners to break free from unhealthy habits and achieve lasting well-being. So, without further ado, I'm saying hello to Marvin. Hi, marvin, I'm so excited that you're here with me today.

Marvin Bee: 2:44

Hello Emma, how are you? Thank you for having me.

Emma Viglucci: 2:48

I'm doing well and thank you for being here. I'm so excited that you're here. We're going to have a fun conversation with all the fun takeaways that you have learned yourself and will help others do the same, right.

Marvin Bee: 3:00

That's what we're going to try to do.

Emma Viglucci: 3:02

That's the goal, that's the intention anyway. So, marvin, it's so interesting that you started in IT and so you have a full blown career before you became a podcaster. So tell us a little bit about that experience and what led to your wellness journey and then to become a podcaster.

Marvin Bee: 3:22

Well, I'm going to zigzag a little through the history here, because I have actually had a podcast for seven years through the IT business. So that came first in this new podcast I started just recently. And the reason that I started that is because I've spent 27 years in IT, but most of those years I was actually active working out playing basketball, eating right Well, I shouldn't say eating right, but I was actually active working out playing basketball, eating right Well, I shouldn't say eating right, but I was working out enough that I could eat and still look and feel healthy. And IT, technically, is one of those types of jobs where you're just kind of sitting around a lot, but I have a type of business where I would go out and see clients. So I was always active, always walking, moving computers, moving clients from one office to another, so it wasn't that big a deal.

Marvin Bee: 4:21

So a few years ago I quit basketball and I said you know what? I've spent the first 40 plus years of my life always doing something, whether it was football, basketball, track, running, softball. And I said you know what I'm done, who am I trying to impress? Fine, and then a few years the belly starts getting a little bigger, a little bit harder to get up in the morning, a little sluggish and tired throughout the day, and I finally got to the point where I said you know, I guess I got to start doing something. But then the hard part is trying to find out what I could do that I would enjoy and that would work. Then it was trying to find a way to be accountable, because telling my wife I want to eat healthy just wasn't working, even though she had spent a lot of years in the weight loss industry. What she did for her patients in the weight loss wasn't working for me.

Emma Viglucci: 5:26

Oh, how interesting.

Marvin Bee: 5:28

So I said I got to go out and start finding what's going to work. So two years ago I actually tried to reach out to people and talk to them about what was working and what wasn't working, and I thought, you know what? I need to make this a podcast so that I could find a way to force myself to be accountable with the information that I learned. And a podcast would be a a way to force myself to be accountable with the information that I learned. And a podcast would be a good way to get guests you know, knowledgeable people, experts to come on the show and share what works for them. So it was kind of a twofold thing, and so I started that about eight months ago. And here we are doing better Not 100%, but better.

Emma Viglucci: 6:15

I love it, so that's fascinating. So you had this whole thing going on. You were already podcast or you were doing your things. For some reason you just need to continue doing sports. And you were like I'm good with all this sports, I've tried them all already, I've enjoyed them, I'm good. But then you're like like, wait a second, how do I get my activity? And if I'm not playing sports and I'm not moving clients around or working the same way that I used to, right makes sense. And I was like, okay, I have to figure out how to do this differently so that it works for me. And let me tell you something we get a little older. It's not so easy, right?

Marvin Bee: 6:45

because no, it is not yes.

Emma Viglucci: 6:48

So whatever you did, what we did when we were younger and it worked like immediately and I was like, okay, I had to put a little bit more effort for it to do the same things, right?

Marvin Bee: 6:56

well it's. It's a lot of different things. So, you know, I took off basically about four to five years before I started getting serious again about working out, eating right. So I would get up in the morning and, you know, start to do a little run or start to do some jumping rope and, you know, every few days something would hurt and I'd have to stop. It was just something like, okay, I've been an athlete all my life, things shouldn't hurt, but they did.

Marvin Bee: 7:26

So obviously I had to make a change and I wanted to find a way that I could do things that you know you see on the YouTube videos. You know, do these 10 things. You know, eat what you want. And I knew they were wrong. We got by with eating healthy and not getting. You know, in my case I'm going to say fat without having to work out, and you know CrossFit and do all that stuff. So something in this world has changed to where we have to work harder to look and feel better. So I wanted to find ways that, okay, how can I reverse that and go back to what you know? In the seventies and eighties I didn't have to work this hard. Now some of it's my age, but I think a lot of it is the things that we do in life now with our food and our exercise and our lifestyle and our environment.

Emma Viglucci: 8:28

Yeah, yeah, I'm hearing the knowledge that you've gotten, that you've learned recently, beginning to come through. I love it. So why don't we jump in with the first thing that you've kind of learned or able to take away from the experts that you started working with, or rather interviewing and learning from? So I'm seeing that one of the things was you could look great and feel great, but maybe you're still not healthy, maybe there's still something wrong.

Marvin Bee: 9:01

Right.

Emma Viglucci: 9:02

So that's very, very interesting concept, because usually if we look great and feel great again, we don't like what's there to worry about. Then Right, like, how do you know that something's not right?

Marvin Bee: 9:12

Yeah, that was one thing. Now I took it from the other perspective because I named the show unhealthy for a reason.

Emma Viglucci: 9:19

Right.

Marvin Bee: 9:20

Because we all hear about the things that we can do from the healthy standpoint, but what about the things that we're doing unhealthy, that are either canceling out, or about the things that we're doing unhealthy that are either canceling out or battling the things that we're doing healthy?

Emma Viglucci: 9:34

Yes.

Marvin Bee: 9:35

And one of the first things I realized that it's not really about how you look and how you feel, because there are many people that we can see out every day that look great, they look fantastic and yet they're unhealthy.

Emma Viglucci: 9:52

Right, what are they doing to look that way? It's not very healthy.

Marvin Bee: 9:55

Right, right. So either that or they're still, you know, running up and getting sick, you know, on a constant basis and things. So I'm like, okay, it's, it's gotta be more than just how we look and feel. There's gotta be some other stuff. So that was the first thing I started learning, when I was talking to everybody where they would talk about the same things as me. They were doing all the things that they thought they were supposed to be doing and for some reason it either wasn't working or they would do all of that stuff. They would lose the weight, they would lose the inches, but still be miserable.

Emma Viglucci: 10:31

Okay so.

Marvin Bee: 10:31

I'm like, okay, there's something we got to pay attention to.

Emma Viglucci: 10:35

Right, Right. Well, so with that piece of information or awareness, did you come across some other things that what the unhealthy things are that people should not be doing?

Marvin Bee: 10:50

Well, yeah, I'm getting a bunch of those, and what's funny is they're really all the things that we've been hearing for the past several years. They're all about, you know, get good sleep. They're all about change your diet, but not in the standpoint of, you know, dieting as we know it. You know, diet should be just our regular food that we eat on a daily basis. And getting away from everybody knows to get away from sugar. Everybody knows that you should eat less calories. But it goes deeper than that. It goes into what is it that you're actually eating? What's going into the food that we're eating?

Marvin Bee: 11:30

There's so many things that are considered healthy or low fat that they're really not. They may, you know, they may not have all the calories here, but they've got all these chemicals and ingredients that are still leading to our unhealthiness, whether it's, you know I don't want to say too many things you know outright naming them, but you know the high fructose corn syrup, all the chemicals that if you look at a food label, why is this acid in my food? So that's a part of it too, where we've kind of conditioned our bodies to accept these unhealthy things and then, when we try to be healthy, our body's got to get rid of all that crap you know what's really interesting.

Emma Viglucci: 12:24

So one of the things that I've learned recently I'm also a wellness junkie, right, so of course my profession is mental health. I specialize also a wellness junkie, right, so of course my profession is mental health. I specialize in working with couples, couples therapy and all of that, but this is my cup of tea on the side, right, like learning all of the wellness things. And so one of the things that I learned recently was that oils are actually worse than sugar for your body, because the sugar you potentially could get rid of, you could release from your body. The oils actually stick to you and it takes I forget what the number of years was like years and years and years for whatever oil you took in like bad oil, for it to release or get out of your body, for you to detox from that oil.

Emma Viglucci: 13:07

So all of it. Like when you go through a drive-thru and you get French fries, it's not just the potatoes, it's like the fried, but why? Because it's fried in that nasty oil. So there's a bunch of oils and I'm not gonna you know, this is not the type of podcast, right but so a bunch of different oils that, for those of you who are interested. Who are listening? Do the research. There's a bunch of oils that when you eat those, it's impossible to get them out of your body and that's really, really, really toxic. That's like the worst thing that you could eat, even worse than sugar, and sugar is the devil. So very interesting, yeah. So go right ahead, yeah.

Marvin Bee: 13:44

Yeah. So, like you said, learning those things are what's really going to help us. However, the second point that I think I put down there is that the journey is different for everyone. You know our bodies. Yes, we're all kind of built the same. We have the same organs, but, because of how we've lived, the things that work for some may not work for all. I learned this after one of my friends gave me a whole bunch of keto stuff when I first announced that, yeah, I like to lose a few pounds off the belly here. And she said, ok, well, here's a whole bunch of keto stuff. And I tried it and it did. It just didn't ever work. And it took talking to some other people where they said, well, keto may work for some, it just may not work for you. And I learned, you know, not to poo-poo on any of the programs out there. Every program works for somebody. You just got to find what works for you.

Emma Viglucci: 14:52

Yep, for sure. There are so many different things that affects who we are. Just, if we have this type of enzymes more than others, we could digest the food better than somebody else, right? Some people can't process coffee and caffeine and some people thrive on it. Like there's actually enzymes and genes for this stuff. It's like what, right? So there's all kinds of information out there in terms of, like, we are very specific machines and so just to learn more about ourselves because, like you said, what might work for you might not work for me and vice versa. Correct, so right, excellent. So what else about your journey? That's made your journey special? You said it's about eight months in what have you? What are some other things that you've, you've tried so far that you feel like, okay, I might be in the right track with this one. A keto, not so good. So what else?

Marvin Bee: 15:45

Well, the biggest thing is maintaining consistency in the changes we make. I think one of the things that we do is you know, we'll do something, and we have this tendency to believe that if it doesn't work in a week, well then it must not be working. And I'm learning that. No, my body didn't get this way in a week. My body's been on this earth for many, many years, so it will take time to reverse the effects of what I've done to it, especially over the last few years. For the first part of my life, I was working out, I was active and stuff. Well, being inactive, four to five years that accumulates.

Marvin Bee: 16:31

So, it may take me a good four to five months, if not another four to five years, to reverse what I've let my body do. So, changing up the diet, changing what I drink, those were kind of the first things, but I'm doing them kind of in baby steps, you know, not trying to change everything at once, because I think that kind of is an overload to our system and you have to make the changes, or for me, I had to make the changes gradually and allow my body to adjust to all the things that I was going to start making you do.

Emma Viglucci: 17:09

Lovely, very good. One of the things that I've been playing with is sleep. That's like a major thing and I don't know if you've done anything with that yet. You mentioned that you had sleep specialists on your podcast, so if you have any good tips, by all means I want to hear them. But definitely, aside from getting the seven to eight hours everybody talks about, right, just making sure, like the whole circadian rhythm, the sleep hygiene before you go to bed, like all the things to make sure that you get good sleep, enough sleep, and why sleep is so important, right? So what do you got? Anything that you've accumulated?

Marvin Bee: 17:46

Well, again, a lot of this stuff is what we've heard before Get your seven to nine hours in, and you mentioned the regimen before you go to bed. A lot of times I was so guilty of working up until the time it was, you know, time to go to bed. Yeah, whether I was so guilty of working up until the time it was time to go to bed, whether I was here at the office my office is a thousand yards from my home, so I could work till late at night and then go home and think, oh, I'll just hop in the bed and go to sleep. And then, of course, I'm tossing and turning and the wife is fidgeting. She's like what is wrong with you? That sort of stuff. So getting into a regimen of winding down before going to bed was huge for me, giving myself, you know, at least an hour of no working, you know, no eating, which was a big thing too. I, you know, go home and eat something before hopping into bed, right?

Emma Viglucci: 18:44

And then right there, that would do it. That's like all the extra pounds right there.

Marvin Bee: 18:49

And turning off the TV. You know, both the wife and I like to watch TV to fall asleep, and I'm getting to the point now where, okay, I'll, I'll do it for a few minutes, but at some point TV's got to go off.

Emma Viglucci: 19:04

Yes.

Marvin Bee: 19:05

Got to focus on the sleep and allow your body to do that. And then I've got. Actually, I found a tracking app. Now, I don't know how good it is, because even when the wife's away, the numbers are the same. Even when the wife's away, the numbers are the same. And so at first I thought, well, it's you know tracking her as well if she moves, that's right.

Marvin Bee: 19:25

Or if both of us are snoring or talking or getting up and going to the restroom and stuff, but at least having something that is, you know, physical enough for you to look at and see. Okay, this is my pattern and this is the percentage of sleep that I'm getting each night. What do I need to do to raise that percentage? Do I need to sleep another half an hour? Do I need to find a way to stop myself from snoring? Do I? You know all these things? So the app, I think, is huge. I hit 100% sleep the other night.

Emma Viglucci: 20:08

So I totally hear you. When I used to track mine, I gave up on it because, like you said, it's tracking all these things. My husband's there, the dog's there. It's like, oh, you were moving all night long, no, I wasn't. Or you were snoring no, I wasn't. My husband was snoring. I was up, I was listening the whole time and he's the one that's snoring, like that kind of thing. You know, oh, you got up, no, I didn't. My husband got up, you know, like so, definitely not tracking me.

Emma Viglucci: 20:27

I was like, okay, this is not very, very, you know, honed in. I know there's a gazillion million apps and gadgets. Right, the aura rings are really good, because then that's tailored to you, right, right, or or the watch. For me, those didn't work because I'm like I can't have anything on me, everything comes off. So, like I'm very sensitive to stimuli, so I couldn't have any devices on me to track.

Emma Viglucci: 20:49

I was like you know what I don't need to track. I know if I slept okay or not, I could tell in the morning. Right, that's good enough for now, you know, until until I get more fancy, I don't know, but yeah, so thank you for all of those and I love the point that you made about. Okay, so if the percentages are not so good or if you're not tracking it per se with devices, but in the morning you get up and you're still very tired, even though you were in bed for like all these hours and supposedly you were sleeping for all of these hours, but you still you get very, very tired. Hmm, maybe that wasn't the best sleep, right? So how can I improve it? You know, maybe the room needs to be cooler, maybe my pillow needs to be thicker or softer or this or that, like all those little things. Right, until you start hitting, like that little sweet spot.

Marvin Bee: 21:33

Right and it may take some time, but again, consistency being willing to continue even when you don't think it's working. Yeah, it's like consistency being willing to continue even when you don't think it's working.

Emma Viglucci: 21:44

Yeah, it's like okay, so I'm working on my sleep. So let me keep working on my sleep. Let me keep cracking the codes, fine tuning, tweaking right and staying on it. Yeah, for sure.

Marvin Bee: 21:55

I like it. I compare it to the game of golf. So you know, most people that play golf will kind of admit that there are those shots that you hit that are you're like, oh, that was the shot that was perfect, but yet you spend the rest of the day. How do I duplicate?

Emma Viglucci: 22:16

Right.

Marvin Bee: 22:20

And the grass and the angle, and then the club, and that's what we do with when it comes to things like sleep and our health.

Emma Viglucci: 22:28

That's why we say it's a journey and it's not a destination, because we're constantly tweaking and fine tuning and getting better. Yep, Right. So I used to say which I think that we are familiar with it the phrase practice makes perfect. But there is no such thing, right? So somebody corrected me, or rather instructed me, and said how about practice makes progress? And I was like Ooh, so I've been quoting this guy for a while now. I love that. Yes, we just keep getting better and better, right.

Marvin Bee: 22:56

Yeah.

Emma Viglucci: 22:58

Very good. So now you mentioned that part of your journey when we were talking about yourselves, and in the material you sent me that there was emotional eating also as part of this thing, right? So any thoughts about that. As a therapist, of course, I understand this concept, but for our audience, what have your learnings been and your takeaways, what you're working on with that? What have you learned?

Marvin Bee: 23:23

Well, this is one of those places where I actually had another expert on and I should probably let your listeners know I myself not even close to an expert. I don't pretend to be an expert, this is just my journey that I'm documenting talking to other people. But Renee Jones is a coach that came on a while back and in my mind I always associated emotional eating with, you know, the Lifetime movie or the Hallmark movie where you know the person sitting at home in bed upset, that their date, you know, stood them up or something along those lines. But emotional eating is so much more than that. You know. Stress is an emotion.

Emma Viglucci: 24:10

That's right.

Marvin Bee: 24:11

So if we're stressed at work or stressed in relationships or anything else, that affects how we eat, how we entertain ourselves is another thing. So again, I'm a sports guy, so I watch a lot of sports on TV and we're just so conditioned that if we're in front of the TV there's got to be a bucket of wings or some fries, or some burgers, soda or beer. That just goes along with that.

Emma Viglucci: 24:43

Well, you know how to watch TV. I was going to say popcorn, but man, you know what you're doing over there.

Marvin Bee: 24:49

It is sports, so it's either going to the bar or trying to duplicate the bar at the home Right right.

Marvin Bee: 24:56

So that all plays a part of it as well. So this whole emotional part of our eating. Now, you wouldn't think that sitting in front of the TV watching sports is part of the emotional part of it. But how are you feeling when you're sitting in front of the TV or you're out with your pals? That's all part of the emotion. You've got this adrenaline, you've got the dopamine, where you're happy and excited and you're just eating away. So that was something that I learned that emotional eating is not just that sad ice cream filled moment that we think Absolutely.

Emma Viglucci: 25:34

Yeah, you know, I love that example, because usually that's not how I hear the example of emotional eating. So that's a nice other addition to it. And, yeah, you're making the connection to this is how I have fun, this is how I enjoy things, this is how I connect with people, this is how you watch sports Like, this is how it was exciting. And all of those even positive feelings get all connected to food, right, and so you need to have the food to create the whole experience and to have all the fun, the connection, the assignment, whatever the experience, and so all those associations are being made, and so there's emotional eating involved in that. That's interesting, I love that. Yeah, that makes sense.

Marvin Bee: 26:14

Or if you're working late, throw in another pot of coffee, order a pizza. It's just part of the thing that we have to adjust as part of the emotional part of what we do, as it relates to the eating.

Emma Viglucci: 26:29

Yes, you know I'm going to add another angle on this, and that is that we use food for self-regulation, right To moderate our feelings. So if we are feeling anything that's sad, it's stress, not good, upset, bored, you know we put a food in to self-soothe, to self-regulate, like food is comfort, so it's like okay, I'm okay, I'm not gonna die, I have food. You know, psychologically there's like a thing there and so that's how we take care of ourselves with food. Everything that, anything like, let me take care of ourselves with food. Anything like, let me take care of it with food. And the more physiological side of that is also sometimes we confuse the hunger cues, right, like we're thirsty but we think we're hungry, so we're constantly eating Meanwhile we're actually thirsty. Those cues are very hard to distinguish sometimes.

Marvin Bee: 27:17

Yes, they are.

Emma Viglucci: 27:18

Yeah, so many things. I hear you so much nuance to all of this right, because we could talk about the food, the hydration, the exercise, the sleep, the relax and we didn't touch on that yet. Like all the pillars for wellness and each one of them has like a zillion little parts. Like you go granular with this with this right and it could be overwhelming. So the thing is like I love what you said much earlier to just focus on like take it easy, you know like one or two things and just consistency and nice and steady wins the race, right.

Marvin Bee: 27:58

Yeah.

Emma Viglucci: 27:59

Beautiful. Okay, so the next thing that we want to touch on was that the body is an interconnected system, so it's not just a little body just here, and if I do this, everything's perfect. So tell us more about what you're thinking about that.

Marvin Bee: 28:15

Well, some of the things that I've been learning with some of the specialists is I've had people that have come on and talked about specific types of alternative lifestyles I guess it's the best way to describe it you know, looking at functional medicine or looking at something like Ayurveda, which has been around a lot longer than we know about, but what all of these do is they look at the body as a whole and we tend to focus more on just the one thing that we think is wrong.

Marvin Bee: 28:54

Right, well, I'm fat, so I'll just fix that and everything will be fine.

Marvin Bee: 28:59

Where it might be that other parts of our lives could be affecting that particular area, we talked about emotional eating, where how we interact with other people, how we interact with TV that's part of that holistic approach and how we feed our bodies, how we feed our minds and how we treat our body and minds kind of has to be looked at from a whole perspective.

Marvin Bee: 29:32

There is a show that I listen to that I'm trying to get her on the show where she's talked about this low-tox lifestyle when, yes, there's a lot of things in our food that are making our body unhealthy, that are making our body unhealthy, but there's a lot of things in our environment where some people have this weird association with smells or touches or sounds. It's hard for me to put it in words, but I've learned from all of these practices that you have to look at the body as a whole, because the symptom, that you have to look at the body as a whole, because the symptom that we have might be caused by something completely different than what we think it is. So that's one of the things that I haven't quite grasped it yet, but I'm learning that we have to look at our body in a multidimensional, holistic way.

Emma Viglucci: 30:29

I love that. You know, at first I thought you were going to say okay, so if my stomach hurts, I have something wrong with my stomach, right. Or if I have headaches, okay, something's wrong with my brain, right. And then, but there might be other things, like what are you putting in your body? What are you eating? Or maybe hormones are off, or maybe other neurochemicals are off, or whatever. There might be other things going on in your body that are creating symptoms, in particular organs or parts of your body. So I thought that's where you were going.

Emma Viglucci: 30:56

But then when you suggested, like, well, it's not just the body, the body is part of everything else too, like there's a whole context to your life, it's not just your body. So that is so beautiful. That's a fantastic way of looking at this, right, because usually when something's wrong with the body, it's not well, it manifests as a physical thing, but that's the end product. There's all of the things that probably affected it in the first place, correct? So I love that. The whole thing with emotions definitely they get stuck in the body. There's all kinds of things going on interrelational things, stress, like all kinds of things. They show up as symptoms in the body, right and I love that. So from your side, when you're looking at it holistically like that, any thoughts on what systems are impacting the body, as far as from your own experience for yourself or things that you have heard from your guests?

Marvin Bee: 31:53

So I mean, I've heard a lot of things that I have not yet experienced myself, so I'm in the process of trying to figure out. Am I going to go and get tested and figure out? You mentioned hormones. There are things, when it comes to hormones and vitamin deficiencies and all of those things that we just don't think of, that we may need to go and find out. Okay, is our body deficient in one of these areas? And yeah, sometimes it might be, change your diet to get those deficiencies. Sometimes it's something where we might actually need to get medical help to get that deficiency taken care of.

Marvin Bee: 32:36

There was another story that I mentioned the smell. So there was a lady that got helped by one of my people I haven't had them on the show yet so I'm not going to say their name but she was telling me the story of somebody that for years would have these headaches not at work, not out and about, but at home, and they could not figure out why until somebody came in and started looking at their environment. It turns out that they had been getting these candles for years and every night they would go home and light candles because they loved the smell and it turns out these particular candles were triggering something in their body and giving them pain. And it got the candles removed, the headaches went away. I mean, it's it's. It's weird that we would hear something like that and most of it, most of us would think come on, really candles.

Emma Viglucci: 33:40

I believe you.

Marvin Bee: 33:43

But there are things in candles now that probably shouldn't be in candles. I mean, vanilla doesn't become a candle.

Emma Viglucci: 33:52

Right, natural, that's right. Oh, absolutely, I'm forgetting the name for them. But, yeah, definitely there's stuff in candles that you're not supposed to be inhaling. So there's a healthier version of candles that you're supposed. If you love candles, you could get. There's other things, things in all of the places. It could be a rabbit hole man, let me tell you, rabbit hole. Very good. So, for overall health, for overall wellbeing, any recommendations for having a holistic approach to your life, to your approach to health and wellness?

Marvin Bee: 34:33

In terms of an overall approach. I think the last thing I mentioned just looking at your body as a whole is not only a good place to start, but something that you have to revisit over and over again. Something that you have to revisit over and over again and I was trying to think of this word before we started recording but be more accepting of yourself.

Emma Viglucci: 35:00

Compassionate.

Marvin Bee: 35:02

That's a good word, yes, Accepting.

Marvin Bee: 35:06

And we don't have to look perfect to be healthy, live happy, which are the mantras of my show. The thing is to be healthy, you know, and be happy. So I may not have to look like I did 20 years ago in order to feel like I did 20 years ago. So I need to adapt some things while adjusting others and being able to realize that it's not just the body, it's also the mind, it's also the spirit, the soul. All of those things play a combined role in what we do.

Emma Viglucci: 35:50

Yeah, exactly so. Have you integrated any habits yet? I don't mean to put you on the spot and if not, what are you thinking about integrating in terms of for the mind, for mind health, mental health and for spiritual health or spiritual well-being? Because mind, body and spirit, right. So the body you're working, and what are the two other areas to bring it full circle? Have you given them any thought yet?

Marvin Bee: 36:18

I'll tell you the things that I've already done actively.

Emma Viglucci: 36:21

Okay, perfect, yes.

Marvin Bee: 36:22

So you know, in addition to adjusting, you know what I eat, the diet. Part of it adjusting my schedule. Yes, so that I'm not working. You know what I eat, the diet. Part of it adjusting my schedule.

Emma Viglucci: 36:31

Yes.

Marvin Bee: 36:32

So that I'm not working you know, those 12, 14, 16 hours that I'm getting my sleep. But also, what am I doing during those daytime hours? More breaks during the workday, so that I can simply give my body a chance to just, you know, settle for a few minutes, get a little bit of recharge and then go again. Now I've not done anything with regards to meditation or anything like that, but finding times to rest within the workday has been huge and I think it alleviates some of the stress. The mind part of it is just like. This is going to sound horrible to some people, but I think most will get it. The type of work that I do. If something doesn't happen, nobody's going to die. So it sounds harsh, but I'm just an IT guy and, yes, a computer may crash, a mouse may break, a piece of software doesn't.

Emma Viglucci: 37:43

That feels like the end of the world, Marv, when that happens.

Marvin Bee: 37:46

It does they call and you know I've got to get this done, or you know, and most of the times I have to just stop myself and say, okay, what's the worst thing that would happen if we can't get this fixed right away? Most of the time it's not as big as they thought, now. Granted, there are some times where I've got a project that I've got to get done in five minutes. I worked with a lot of attorneys, so of course everything is critical to them Got to get it to the judge right now. But I do what I can and I don't stress myself out about it. And if I can get it done, great. If not, I'm not going to beat myself up Because at the end of the day, nobody's going to die.

Emma Viglucci: 38:34

Yes, that's what a beautiful idea of like taking life in stride, right, like not being so serious about the little things, like most of it is not a matter of life and death and most of it can wait a couple more minutes or another day or a couple hours or whatever it is. And if we were to take that stock and kind of like give ourselves perspective on whatever's freaking us out in the moment? Most of it is like not a big deal, right, most of the things are not big deals. Even the biggest trigger, the biggest offense by your partner, usually is not a big deal, usually, right, there are things that people do, but for the most part, most things in our life we could take a step back and be like it's going to be okay, right, and if we could be gentle with ourselves and the thing that's happening, then we'll operate better and take care of it easier and better. Yeah, anyway, right, I. And better. Yeah, anyway, right, I love it.

Emma Viglucci: 39:31

Yeah, that's a great stress management technique giving yourself some perspective so that you don't go, so you don't take yourself on a ride and freak yourself out for no reason. I love that, perfect. And so what are some things that you're thinking of adding to your whole journey here Any cool habits that you think you'll be integrating in the near future. What are the things that are kind of having you curious?

Marvin Bee: 39:58

So I can tell you what the wife would love for me to do. Okay, let's start there. Take more vacations, sure, and the types of vacations where the computer doesn't go with, so that, while I'm away, work is away completely. Because we have a tendency as IT people that, regardless of where we are because we can work remotely, anything that comes up we're going to stop what we're doing and try to take care of it. So, again, that separation and allowing for things to just happen. Obviously there needs to be a backup in place to where, if I can't take care of it, somebody can, of course. Yeah, so that's probably one of the big things we are. One of the big things we are. So we're committed to start, I believe, next week or the week after, to clean eating.

Emma Viglucci: 40:57

Okay, where we're looking at all the aspects of whether it's organic or gluten-free or GMO.

Marvin Bee: 41:18

I mean it's looking at all of those things and finding out, okay, how clean can? We eat and still enjoy what we eat.

Emma Viglucci: 41:23

Right, yeah, that's a big journey, right. You know, like I said before, for each thing there's so much nuance, right, so many things that can be done for each thing. So that's a great approach of removing all of the toxicity from our food, to begin with, right, and then anything that's inflammatory like we said also earlier, everybody's different. So gluten doesn't sit well with me, dairy not so much also, so some things I have cleaned from my diet, but there's all the things like shellfish, peanuts, soy, it's like, oh, like there's like a few things that are really inflammatory. Eggs, like some things that just people say, like people who eat really, really, really clean, just don't eat any of this inflammatory food, right? So when you start removing all that stuff, then it becomes really challenging.

Emma Viglucci: 42:11

Okay, so what do I eat? And so it's a matter of like finding a healthy version and then not an inflammatory version. That's what keeps the weight stuck, a little bit Like when we're eating food that inflames the body, right, so the body's not optimally functioning to cleansing itself and digesting and getting all the nutrients into cleansing itself and digesting and getting all the nutrients. But, yeah, so kudos to you and the wife for taking on that big, big goal. I like it.

Marvin Bee: 42:37

That's a big goal.

Emma Viglucci: 42:38

That's a nice one, Very good, All right, Marvin. Any last minute offers to the audience like a message, like an inspiration for them to go be not unhealthy.

Marvin Bee: 42:52

Well, the biggest thing I would probably say is the premise of my show. At first I thought was to just document my journey and figure out what worked. But it's turning into this journey of finding out what is unhealthy, regardless of what it is, and reducing or eliminating it, whether it's, you know, the diet, the exercise, because, again, just because you're doing something that you think is healthy, it may not be. Some people exercise in an unhealthy way. Yep, we eat a lot of times in an unhealthy way, we have relationships in an unhealthy way, and all of that plays a role into what we do. So the concept now has been find all the things that are unhealthy and either reduce or eliminate them and replace them with something that is healthy.

Emma Viglucci: 43:51

I love it. I'm going to put you on the spot. Since you mentioned relationships. You got to be careful what you ask for, emma, but any thoughts on things that you know to remove from relationships that are unhealthy, what would you offer our audience? Remove?

Marvin Bee: 44:14

So probably the one thing to remove would be our image of what we think the perfect relationship is.

Emma Viglucci: 44:24

Oh, look at you See, there's wisdom there.

Marvin Bee: 44:27

So some of the work that I've done um with one of the guests on the show has been to look at when we started our relationships what, what was it that we expected from the other person, along with what is it that we expect to provide them in the relationship? So that has been now just to give listeners a perspective. I've been married to my wife now 20 years. I've known her for 27. And I'm not going to say it's perfect, but we've gone through those times where it's like, well, you're not listening to me and you're not taking this seriously. But when you step back and think about, okay, what is it that we expect? Did we tell the other person that we expected that?

Emma Viglucci: 45:22

Exactly.

Marvin Bee: 45:24

Did we ask them what they should expect of us, them what they should expect of us. So it's been an interesting thing now to kind of sit here, you know, 20 years into a marriage, as if we're starting over to be like okay when I when I say this to you, what does it really mean?

Emma Viglucci: 45:41

Oh gosh, music to my ears, yes, right. And also I love that you said what are they? What are the? What can they expect from me? But also, do I know what their expectation of me is Like? They might expect things I don't even know right, and I could very easily do those things as I'm no skin off my back. It's reasonable. But I just don't know. And I'm letting you down over and over because I don't know right.

Marvin Bee: 46:02

Or you should know. I'm not gonna tell you, you should just know.

Emma Viglucci: 46:06

Don't even get me started with that. Yes, you should read me, because if you love me, you would know.

Marvin Bee: 46:13

Right.

Emma Viglucci: 46:16

If.

Marvin Bee: 46:16

I read minds maybe.

Emma Viglucci: 46:18

Yeah, very good, terrific. So a lot of wisdom in there and I love that you're on this journey and I am so proud for you for having all these amazing guests that you're bringing on for your own journey, for your own learning, and then you're sharing that, because a lot of us do that on the side, for ourselves, right, but we don't create a platform or context where we could share what we're learning with others. So I definitely subscribe to that idea and I commend anybody else who does as well. So I love it that you're on that journey and that you're as you're learning, you're sharing it. So that's amazing, so kudos.

Marvin Bee: 46:52

Well, I'm sharing it, and then I'm also sharing the voices of the people that are coming on the show. A lot of them are in the midst of their own journey, where they're finding out what works for them, and they're you know, some of them are, you know coaches themselves, and so they're looking for people that they can share their knowledge with. So, along with sharing my journey, I'm sharing a platform for them so that they can, you know, get the word out about what's worked for them and basically try to help each other out.

Emma Viglucci: 47:24

Yeah, exactly that's what I meant to say. Maybe I didn't say it fully. Right that in your journey, you're also bringing in your learnings, like the people that are helping you learn, right? So that's so good, it's like a win-win-win, right? They get to share your learning. You're sharing with others. Other people are learning so beautiful, so amazing, so good, perfect. So, marvin, why don't you share with our audience where they could find you? Tell them more about this podcast and your social media, or rather just a podcast, and then I'll put the links in the show notes.

Marvin Bee: 47:54

Well, everything starts with the website, so unhealthypodcastcom, and on there you'll find the past episodes that I've done. You'll also find all the links and a contact page where they can reach out to me.

Emma Viglucci: 48:07

Fabulous, Amazing Mr. Thank you so much can reach out to me. Fabulous, Amazing Mr. Thank you so much for sharing time with me. A pleasure having you on and learning from you and hearing your wisdom and about how your journey is going so fun. Thank you again for being here.

Marvin Bee: 48:20

Well, you're welcome. Thanks for having me and good journeys to you as well.

Emma Viglucci: 48:25

Thank you and to the listeners until the next one. Bye.

Successful Relationship with Emma

A Different Perspective on Habits for Overall Health and Happiness with Marvin Bee (Ep. 19)

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