- Hey everybody, I am joined by the wonderful Ali Spagnola.
- Hi, how's it going?
- Tell my audience a little bit about what you do
on your channel and your different platforms.
- Sure, so I do a lot of music and comedy stuff.
If you're checking me out on Instagram,
it's a lot of fitness.
I've been streaming my workouts lately, actually.
- Really? - Yes.
- Wow, look at that. (laughing)
So yeah, go check her out.
She talks about all sorts of different things.
Like I said, each platform's a little different
and I think that's kind of cool how you do that.
- Yeah, I'm a different person wherever you're looking.
- Yeah, exactly, but her YouTube channel,
and obviously I'll link everything in the description,
but her YouTube channel's focused on music
and stuff like that.
I've been to Ali's shows and they're really cool.
But today we're gonna talk about balance
and how Ali balances all that she does.
Because I know that we talk abo eating disorders a lot
and struggling to keep a balance between healthy lifestyle,
like healthy mind, healthy body we talk about all the time.
I wanted to dig into that a little bit with you,
because if you check out Ali's Instagram,
it's all about being Fitfaced.
(laughing)
- And balance.
- The joke of it is and like the term fitfaced
is because like being shit faced,
like getting drunk and having a good time
and going out and then how do we balance that
with working out.
I know that being online and being,
using a platform to share your workouts
and what you're doing,
has that been hard
to keep a cap on or keep it under control?
- Yeah, there's certainly a lot of pressure,
especially when there's internet eyes on you,
but I think it's the same that everyone deals with.
We're all under pressure.
We all feel like we're being watched.
We're all self judging.
- Yeah, and because I know that sometimes we can get
to calculating and counting,
I've talked a lot about that with my audience,
we can feel pulled to do that to make sure we're working
out enough and were trying to keep a balance
from going out and exercising.
Has that been a difficult thing for you, like recently,
or throughout your life at all?
- Yeah, actually, it's been a more recent thing for me
that I started calculating more so.
I used to just sort of calculate my calories.
I struggled with trying to eat as little calories
as possible when I was younger.
And thankfully, I recovered from that
and I'm feeling much more healthy about it.
- Has that been something that's always been a part
of your life, even taking away exercise and food stuff?
- Yeah, absolutely.
I'm so type A.
I make lists in my sleep.
Not just food.
- I can attest to that.
- Work, it's even play.
I have lists of all the hikes that I wanna do.
- Oh, so it's list after list after list.
- Yeah.
- And I think that is a common comorbidity we'd call it
in the mental health world,
meaning that things run together.
So like OCD and eating disorder behavior can,
they're kindred spirits.
They hang out a lot together.
One can ease into the other.
So as a kid, when you were younger, no tracking of food?
Was it more list based or?
- Yeah, I think that I was just sort of driven,
a very regimented kid, but now the list things started
more like during college.
- Is there anything that you feel prompted it
or what were the first little signs of it?
- I guess, I had always sort of had body image issues
being a woman in America.
- Yeah.
- I grew up being a dancer so I was always in a leotard,
being compared to other girls my age.
I actually wanna say that it started even then.
Maybe I wasn't making lists when I was that young,
but certainly I was getting in my head
and judging myself in the mirror.
So I guess it was just sort of college that I started
being more goal oriented and so it came out
on paper and whatever.
- Yeah, and it's kind of interesting 'cause I think a lot
of us, it can start at a young age without even knowing.
'Cause we don't really take stock when we're that little,
but it could be needing to be the best.
Like I remember specifically knowing that,
looking back now, knowing that my type A-ness started
when I was in band and I wanted to be first chair.
Like what?
- That's a big deal.
- But it doesn't make me cool, or does it?
- It kinda does.
(laughing)
- The clarinet has come in super handy, by the way.
- No, okay? (laughing)
- But I think it's like looking back, we can always tell.
If you think back to college,
was it the lists that was the first thing
you noticed or was it just thoughts?
- Yeah, I guess it was just sort of like trying to change
my body and then that came out in the control,
being writing it down.
- And then, as far as getting over it,
'cause a lot of my viewers struggle with stuff like
that and wanting to count and calculate and all of that.
What are some steps, if there are any,
that you know that you took to move past that?
- Yeah, I realized that it wasn't working for me,
just calculating my calories and trying
to eat as little as possible.
I felt so much better when I sort of broke out of that.
I guess, the tip I can give
to get away from that
and what helped me was self experimentation.
If something's not working and you feel broken,
try something else.
And you don't have to stick to that.
If that doesn't work either,
try something else and figure out what works for you.
But experiment, because it's free.
- And I think, even personally,
'cause I'm definitely more of the anxiety,
OCD type of a person and I love my lists.
You guys all know that.
I think when I decided, I remember I was talking to Ali
about this before we started filming,
back before Sean and I got married,
I pulled a muscle in my shoulder.
I used to rely so much on yoga to manage my mental health.
It was most of my self care at that point in time,
which is not good.
Should have a bunch of different things going on.
But I was relying on that and then my doctor
and my physical therapists were like,
you can't do that anymore.
For a month, I need you to do nothing and I was like, shit.
What do I do?
- Right.
- And at first, it felt really terrible and scary
and I hated it.
But then, I wanna say it was by week three,
everybody's gonna be different, but for me,
it was around week two or three, I started to embrace it
and be like, this is awesome.
I can do other things.
I started coloring again.
I spent more time catching up with friends,
going out to dinner.
I went on walks, started listening to podcasts,
which you all know I still do as part of my self care.
So it forced me to branch out and to have more things
that I can rely on.
Have you ever tried doing other things
when that urge comes up?
- Well now I want to.
(laughing)
I do get that feeling of like those first three weeks
that you had or no, I like these lists and I rely on them
and it's actually empowering to know when I worked out
or if I sang today or all of the things
that I keep track of.
It seems empowering and if I didn't have that,
it would be negative, but hey,
maybe I should just get over that hump and see
what it's like to skip a day of piano and see what happens.
- Yeah, 'cause it is an experiment.
It's like a personal experiment.
- Yeah.
- Do you use music in the same way?
Is it part of, like have to do it a certain amount?
- Yeah, yeah, actually.
I make it a point to do this amount of vocal warmups
every day and try to work on music.
I'm big on creating habits and I wanna sort of turn it
into a habit so I don't have to think about it
and so it's not like forcing myself to sing everyday.
It's just what I do.
But maybe, maybe it's okay to not do it once in awhile.
- Yeah. - And go color instead.
- I'm always, against black and white, like all or nothing.
I have, that's why the I have to do.
It's good to still work on stuff and practice.
Like Sean's learning guitar
and he's doing 30 minutes a day-ish.
- That's impressive.
- And there are some days when you can't do it.
- Yeah.
- If we're traveling or if you just have a really busy day
and you're burnt, it's better to take care of yourself.
But yeah, it's all about balance.
- Yeah, and I think that's where my problem lies
is if I have a busy day and I don't get to it,
I beat myself up about it.
So I should probably be, yeah, that part of self care
and be like, it's okay.
Today was rough, don't worry about it.
You didn't get all the boxes checked.
- Yeah, I know and that's, it takes time though.
Even for me.
If I get really stressed, I have a lot of,
I'll feel the need to check all the boxes
and oh, I didn't that video edited and oh, I'm so terrible.
But then it goes into negative self talk, really.
I'm a loser, I can't do anything, ugh.
Then we feel worse.
- Right.
(laughing)
- And also something that we've kind of talked
about a little bit is the balance component but the fact
that your body actually does need rest.
For instance, yesterday, I filmed,
I did a livestream for two hours and then I had to film
a podcast with a friend and at the end of the day,
I was totally burnt.
- Right.
- And I legitimately couldn't do anymore.
I could try to push myself, but so there are limits,
and my brain needed to boo for a while.
- Right and if you'd of done something after that,
it would have been mediocre anyways,
so you shouldn't push through it.
- Totally, so do you find that?
Are you able to take some time off from music,
exercise, or any of those things?
- Yeah, for sure, especially the exercise world.
That was a box that I needed to check every day
and would beat myself up if I didn't.
But it was even like, I would never miss a day
and once I realized that your body needs recovery
and your muscles are building in that rest day,
it was so much more helpful.
You're basically working out by not working out
and if you go do something that day,
you're harming yourself more.
- Yeah, and for any of you who are struggling
with eating disorder behavior,
something that was really interesting for me
to learn back in the day was that,
essentially what Ali's saying, your body needs rest days
and that's important because if we don't,
we actually start eating away at our muscle
and our heart's a muscle and that's why heart attacks
are so frequent in the eating disorder community
and so dangerous is because we're weakening our system.
It's important.
We all need rest.
Taking mental health care days is important.
- Yeah, that's when your muscles grow, when you're resting.
- Exactly. - Taking a day off.
- I always like to end my videos by offering up tips
and tricks that they can use today, so are there two things,
maybe, that you've done to help yourself feel better
and keep a better balance in life?
- Yeah, sure.
I'd say my first tip is have fun.
If you're working, it still should be enjoyable
and you should also allow yourself that play time.
- Totally.
- And I guess I would say the other one is that,
do appreciate the time off and look at it as also
taking you toward your goals.
You shouldn't beat yourself up if you're taking time off.
It's actually still heading you
on the same positive trajectory.
- Yeah, I think we could even tie that in to
your body needs rest.
- Yeah.
- You're still growing and changing
and working towards goals on your rest days.
- Yeah.
- And for me, something I've been trying to do,
two things I've done, is I've noticed my self-talk.
So if I'm beating myself up,
that's not helpful or constructive.
It only makes me feel like shit, so I've been noticing
and trying to turn that around to more positive.
And then the second is taking time, taking breaks,
having fun, being not responsible.
I know that sounds crazy, but as a type A person,
I can definitely be like, I have to do the right thing
all the time and that can be really exhausting.
It's fine to be irresponsible sometimes.
Let loose, have a good time.
Those are, I'm practicing; they're works in progress but
it's been really helpful. - Yeah, same here.
- But thank you, Ali, for sharing your tips and tricks.
- Of course.
- And I know that people feel off balance from time to time,
but there are ways that we can get ourselves back in balance
and we're all (laughing) whoa.
And we're all working day in, day out, trying to get better
and that's all that really matters.
Like I said, we did a video on Ali's channel,
so click over here and check it out.
All of her links will be in the description,
so make sure you check those out and I'll see you next time.
Bye!