In this week’s episode of The Whole Circle Podcast we talk all about food, mindset and movement with Luke Hines.

We were so excited to interview Luke for this episode.  He has inspired thousands of people with his healthy food lifestyle, mainly centring around Paleo and Keto diets and Jo just loves his cookbooks.

He was so lovely and down to earth, it really was a pleasure to chat with him and we got so much out of this episode and we think you will too.

Who is Luke Hines?

Luke is a Nutrition Coach, Motivator, Personal Trainer and Cookbook Author with 9 best-selling cookbooks.

Here is how Luke describes himself:

Having spent over 15 years in the wellness industry, I am here to help you achieve your health and happiness goals.

In my teenage years I always struggled with my weight, earning myself the nickname, buddha! I knew I wasn’t taking the best care of myself and one day I woke up and I realised I needed to make some positive changes if I was to live to my true potential and have a happy and healthy life. So I began eating well, moving my body, reading and researching, and most importantly I started thinking more positively about myself and where I was heading, and after 12 months of these positive changes I found myself feeling incredible. I was at my ideal healthy weight, I felt more energised every day, and for the first time I truly started to believe in myself that I could achieve anything if I put my heart into it.

With this incredible new lease on life my passion turned to wanting to help others achieve the same, so I become a personal trainer whilst continuing my research. For several years I trained clients in various gyms and private studios, I then moved into private one on one consulting which brought so many highlights, perhaps the best and most exciting of all included working alongside Angelina Jolie on the set of one of her films managing nutrition and training.

Early on I realised that true health and fitness didn’t just revolve around the ‘moving’ or exercise part and so I developed a huge passion for healthy food, which landed me on Australia’s number 1 cooking show, My Kitchen Rules, where I got the chance to show Australia that healthy food can not only be easy but delicious too! Making it to the finals, it truly was an incredible experience and upon the completion of filming I moved into publishing healthy recipes in cookbooks to showcase to the world that heathy food doesn’t have to be bland or boring diet food.

Nine best selling cookbooks later and my nutritional therapy qualifications under my belt, I have developed this program to combine my passion, expertise and love for nutrient dense delicious meals, realistic mindset motivation, and the moves that will keep you well for life, because my number one goal is to help you positively change your life to be the best, healthiest and happiest version of you.

Mindset is vital

Luke realised that the key component missing for a lot of people when they are wanting to transform their life into a healthy lifestyle is mindset.  Making the right food choices and exercising can only go so far if you are coming at it with a negative mindset.

Luke learned through his own journey that mindset and mindfulness were key to maintaining a healthy lifestyle.

Mindfulness seems to be the buzz word of the last few years.  Not many people really knew much about it or in fact how to practice it on a daily basis.

Even meditation is fairly common practice these days whereas a few years ago, it wasn’t so.

Once people realised that meditation didn’t have to mean sitting with your legs crossed on the ground chanting ‘Om’ and that it could simply mean disconnecting yourself from technology and sitting in a quiet place and being comfortable within your own thoughts, it became more mainstream.

So, where do you start?

The most important thing to remember is to not look for perfection.  You don’t have to practice meditation or mindfulness perfectly.  Everyone is different and it’s about discovering what works for you.

The same goes for exercise and food, it is an ever-evolving process and something that as individuals we need to work on each and every day without putting pressure on ourselves for perfection.

It’s not about success or failure, it’s simply about doing it each day as you will find you get better and better at it and the good habits become ingrained.

For Luke, he lives by his motto of ‘Meals, Mindset, Moves’ which is that each and every day you try to each nutrient-dense meals, cultivating and supporting a positive mindset and moving your body in a way that works for you.

Cultivating and supporting a positive mindset is a continuous journey.  There’s no end goal, it’s actually not about that, as cliché as it sounds, it’s all about the journey.

So, if you are in a headspace where you are stressed, overwhelmed, anxious, uneasy in your thoughts or feelings then turn off your device, find yourself a quiet place to sit down and just sit in your thoughts.  Be present in the moment and allow the thoughts to come in and out of your mind without controlling them.

It’s not complicated and some days you will do better at it than others and that’s totally ok!  Some days you will love it more than others, but it doesn’t mean you should stop. Keep going.

Luke’s eating lifestyle

Luke is a self-confessed ‘low-carber’ who cycles in out of a strict ketogenic diet.

Strict keto for most people is 50 grams or less of carbs in a day.  For some people depending on their body types, less than 50 grams of carbs a day is better.  But when you break it down and look at all the wonderful above-ground vegetables and fruits with carbs, it is really easy to get to 50 grams a day and actually hard to limit it to just 50 grams a day.

So low-carbs are a really great and sustainable way to live which is around 100 grams of carbs per day.

If you have goals to achieve whether they be to kickstart a weight loss goal then you can adhere to a strict 50 grams of carbs a day for 2-4 weeks, but for the most part Luke believes a low-carb approach is more enjoyable and sustainable because you don’t feel like your missing out nor are you worried about a bowl of broccoli.

Cookbooks

Luke has a bunch of cookbooks on the market and he is constantly evolving as an author.  At the front of all of Luke’s books he always says that even though his books are gluten, dairy and refined sugar-free, not everyone has to be like that.  The books are about helping to reset your health with tools, tips and recipes that he thinks reduce inflammation and increase energy and manage hormonal imbalance and cravings.

You can find all Luke’s cookbooks at all good bookstores and online.

Keto and Paleo diets

A lot of people can tend to focus on what they can’t have on these diets instead of what they can have.  There actually isn’t a lot that’s stripped from your diet, but it opens up an abundance of nutrient-dense foods that you can eat which are amazing for your body.

Yes, Paleo and Keto came in very quickly and they’ve been labelled as fad diets, but according to Luke, when you look at the science behind these diets, for him, it’s a no brainer to eat this way.

It’s about filling your plate with nutrient-dense foods that are going to benefit your body and not harm it.

How does Luke maintain his eating lifestyle whilst travelling?

He makes sure that he is prepared in advance.  Especially with domestic travel in Australia, we don’t need to eat plane food because the flights aren’t that long.  For example, have a wholesome breakfast and then eat another wholesome meal once you’ve arrived at your destination.

If you haven’t prepared snacks for the plane, then some enforced intermittent fasting isn’t a bad thing.

It’s all about the choices we make.  You can choose to eat the plane food which you know is not a great choice, or you can get up ½ hour earlier and eat good food before you go or get up ½ hour earlier and pack nutrient-dense snacks for the plane.  It’s all about the choices you are choosing to make.

Intermittent fasting

 

Through guidance from Tracey’s Naturopath after having done a series of tests to see where her body is at, she has been undergoing intermittent fasting.  Her Naturopath is recommending she fast 5 out of 7 days.  Tracey has guidelines around this in that if she is not feeling well then not to fast as much etc. basically a whole plan has been set up for her.

Whereas after having undergone the same tests with the same Naturopath, Jo is only recommended to fast 2 out of 7 days.

Intermittent fasting has two major approaches.  One is where you choose an entire day or period of time to fast or periods of time that you can implement across 7 days.

To break it down further, if there was a type of fasting that you implement over a 7-day period, this may be called an eating window or time-restricted fasting whereby you can eat whatever you want (within reason) within a designated eating window.  For example, one of the most popular approaches is 16:8.  That is where you fast for 16 hours and you have an 8-hour eating window.  You can implement that from anywhere from 1 to 7 days a week because you’re eating every day.  The thing to note about this type of fasting is that during those 16 hours you are allowed to have black coffee, tea and also plenty of water because those things don’t spike your blood sugars.

During the 8-hour eating window, it’s not about reducing calories, it’s about eating nutrient-dense foods that you can eat in abundance (again, within reason).

The other approach is the 5:2 which is 5 days a week you eat what you want within reason and then on the 2 days you have restricted calories of around 500 calories or less.  This can be tough for people given the heavy restriction of calories.

Luke believes that a really great way to start is a 12:12 approach.  12 hours of fasting and 12 hours of eating.  Most of us already do this anyway.  Once you’ve mastered that then you can go to 16:8 or even 18:6.

Is breakfast good or bad?

For so long it has been drummed into us that we have to start the day off with a good breakfast.  Yet with fasting we don’t have breakfast, well certainly not on the 16:8 approach.

It was widely believed that the more we ate the faster our metabolism would go and yes there is science that does point towards that, but it’s not a one size fits all scenario.  It’s an individual approach.

So, when people ask Luke is breakfast the most important meal of the day, he puts this back on them asking is it the most important meal for them?  If they’re not hungry at breakfast time then don’t eat, if they are hungry then eat.  The more you listen to your body and become attuned to it, the better.

Luke Hines 10

This is a program created by Luke.  Here is how he describes it:

Each week you’ll receive a structured meal plan, shopping list, mindset coaching and daily 10-minute workouts to have you looking and feeling your absolute best.

MEALS: My program exclusive recipes are all 100% gluten-free, dairy-free, and refined sugar-free with Meal Plan options for Paleo, Low Carb (keto-friendly), Nut Free, and Egg Free to suit any lifestyle (all options are Paleo). You’ll heal your gut, reduce cravings and become an intuitive eater with these quick, easy and affordable meals. Your kitchen will be ruling in no time!

MINDSET: To be truly healthy, you need to be happy, which is why we put a great deal of focus on mindset coaching, setting and achieving realistic goals, and being in the right headspace to be your best self. You’ll receive a complete 10-week mindfulness and wellbeing program delivered by our in-house Psychologist Michael. You can eat the healthiest food in the world and train your heart out, but unless you’ve got your mindset right, you can’t make long term sustainable change.

MOVES: Train along with me, anywhere, anytime, with my daily functional fitness sessions. These results-based workouts are designed to burn body fat, increase lean muscle mass, and get you moving, for life. If you’re more advanced, I challenge you to repeat the workouts up to 4 times consecutively with a minute break in between. For those who may be injured, have restricted movement or unable to exercise like you used to, don’t worry because the food and food alone will transform your health, the functional fitness is optional but I also provide simple movement guidance for those needing to take it easier.

Luke Hines 10 gets you the results you’ve been looking for because it’s a holistic approach, finding synergy between delicious nutrient dense food, realistic mindset motivation and the moves that keep you well for life.

My team and I will offer accountability, structure and support, backed by passion, expertise and a genuine love for what we do. Luke Hines 10 is more than an online program, it’s a culmination of what I do every day, to help you be the best version of yourself and change your life for good.

You can find out all about his program at https://lukehines10.com/page/about-our-program

Where else can you find Luke?

Website:           https://lukehines10.com/
Facebook:         https://www.facebook.com/LukeHinesOnline/
Instagram:        https://www.instagram.com/lukehinesonline/
YouTube:          https://www.youtube.com/user/bondipt

Jo and Tracey x

 

 


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