The Journey Towards Health: Embracing Plant-Based Nutrition

Journey along with us as we sit down with the ever-inspiring, health-conscious mom, wife, businesswoman  and podcast co-host Vesime Schroering. In this episode we delve into her captivating transformation towards a plant-based lifestyle. Vesime's quest for wellness has led her to create a nutritionally rich world for herself and her family. From almond milk and oatmeal to veggies and starchy carbs, Vesime's choices reveal the power of plant-additive nutrition and its undeniable influence on her health and fitness goals. 

As we briefly discuss the food culture of Europe, Vesime shares her experiences in maintaining her vegan lifestyle while traveling. She candidly discusses the challenges and rewards of raising her children to be plant-positive. Armed with invaluable tips and insights, Vesime demonstrates how a busy working mom can still juggle a plant-based diet amidst the chaos of life.

As we shift gears, we'll delve into the profound impact of diet on health and the critical role nutrition education plays in society. We discuss the myths and misconceptions surrounding traditional bodybuilding diets and animal proteins, and the stranglehold Big Pharma has on our society. Learn about the blue zones, where meat is used more for celebration than daily consumption, and understand the link between nutrition, animal cruelty, and our environment. 

We wrap up this enlightening chat by encouraging everyone to take slow, sustainable steps towards change, spreading the seeds of positivity and empowerment. Whether you're a seasoned vegan or just starting your journey into plant-based living, this episode has something for you. Tune in, be inspired, and here's to healthier living!

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Transcript

Daphne Bascom: 0:04

Welcome, welcome, welcome. You are tuned in to Perfectly Planted, where the podcast is dedicated to growing together on our journey towards a healthier, happier and more sustainable lifestyle. Good morning. I'm your co-host, daphne Bascom, vegan Health and Fitness Coach and advocate for all things plant-based. If you're new here at Perfectly Planted, we believe in the power of positivity and the strength of community. We're here to empower you, to nurture your growth and to help you bloom into the best version of yourself. We're not just talking about fitness and nutrition, but about self-love, about mental health and fostering a deep respect for this beautiful planet that we all live on. Whether you're a seasoned vegan, whether you're dipping your toes into plant-based living or just curious about a healthier lifestyle, you're in the right place. So let's dig deep, let's learn together and let's get Perfectly Planted.

Daphne Bascom: 1:05

Bessame, good morning. Good morning, today is such a special episode because I get to interview you. I want to touch on several key topics, including your travels abroad this summer and your personal health and fitness goals. But first, I know that there are those in the audience who follow Perfectly Planted, who know you very well, but I want to make sure that you get to share your story. Can you share with our listeners and viewers a little bit about who you are, your journey to veganism and what influenced you to make this lifestyle change.

Vesime Schroering: 1:45

Yeah, of course, stephanie, first of all I thank you and I'm absolutely honored to have you interview me today, just really humbled by it, and I love doing this podcast with you. So, for those who may know or not know, I am Bessame Schwering, co-host with Daphne of Perfectly Planted podcast, and I'm the mom of three amazing boys who are very active a wife, gosh, 18 years daughter, sister, friend, so very busy. I also have a profession in health care as well and my journey started actually more towards a plant-based lifestyle, actually before that with you, daphne. I remember after I had my third son, remembering look, I just want to be that person, the mom who can run and play tag and not feel winded, and I just wanted to feel stronger and healthier overall, just to be there, be present, be healthier and feel better. Because I was over-caffeinated, did not prioritize my sleep, was running, like my dad says, burning the candle on both ends, and I knew I wasn't necessarily prioritizing myself. Through it all I felt that the more I gave others was self-satisfying and gave me that satisfaction of feeling achieved and it wasn't so. It was actually hurting me and hurting my health. So I remember reaching out to you directly saying look, I have a milestone birthday coming up and I really want to feel stronger. I just want to be able to run better and play around and just feel energized and not so sluggish. I just remember feeling so sluggish, and rightfully so. Having little kids, you do get a bit sleep deprived. But I knew that, again, I wasn't prioritizing myself, and so I went ahead and took the plunge and I think you helped me so much with just having that routine, having a fitness plan, having a nutrition plan, which is so important, and then also the accountability tied to it, and so making sure that I was doing what I said I was going to do was so important.

Vesime Schroering: 4:09

Then we started dipping into different nutrition topics and I remember through this journey, you were like well, I think I'm going to try to do more plant-based. And I remember asking you why and you're like, just watch Game Changers and the documentary which we did, my husband and I did and we were just baffled that so much science and so many results have come from just plant-based eating and what it does to your body. And why aren't we making this more of a societal norm? Why aren't we making the talking about it more? And so it was one of those things where I said, ok, look, I came from, that I'm a traditional thought that lean meats, vegetables and the right kind of carbs to eat healthy. And so I still battle with it, daphne, with knowing that I can eat a starchy carb for dinner and still be OK and not feel like I'm going to gain weight, because they always, traditionally, they would always say take out the starchy carbs. And so I think in general I was just wondering why isn't anybody else talking about this? And so I think that's what stemmed the purpose really for us to start sharing it, and so I dipped my toe in.

Vesime Schroering: 5:37

So again I will say I'm not 100% plant-based. I do have occasional animal protein here and there. It could be very seldomly People now eat an egg and I remember thinking, ok, how do I start this? And it started with just almond milk instead of regular milk, and then oatmeal instead of eggs, and then at dinner I remember filling up my plate more of the vegetables and taking less of the meat and adding a little bit of the starchy carb but good, starchy carb brown rice, sweet potato or quinoa, and just adding a little bit of that and I remember eating the meat. I'm like, why am I even eating this meat. Now it's starting not to taste that great to me. It's just I don't even really want it. The vegetables have, as long as you season it well, it's have so much flavor, and so that's kind of how my journey started, through it all.

Daphne Bascom: 6:38

So you practice plant-additive nutrition.

Daphne Bascom: 6:41

That's right, that's right, and so I just want to pull the thread a little bit about nutrition, because, I mean, we've worked together in the past and we both spent a lot of time on the road, and I also know that you spent quite a bit of time in Europe this summer on your sabbatical. There are lots of things we can deep dive into nutrition for so many reasons, and it would probably take two hours for us to have all the conversations that we have offline. But one thing I find with clients that I coach is that they struggle with help easily when they're traveling. Do you have any tips or things that you do, and not even just traveling? You said you're a busy mom, so how do you navigate being a busy mom? How do you navigate being a businesswoman who's on the road? How do you navigate holidays abroad where maybe you don't have access to all the things you have in your kitchen, but you still want to have plants at the center of your plate?

Vesime Schroering: 7:48

It's not easy, and I'm not going to say that it is. It is not easy because specifically so I'll start with work travel. So work travel often is early morning, get to the airport and you're going to fly to a specific city. Now I have a job where I know a lot of restaurants already in the cities that I'm traveling to, but it's that in between, it's the airports, it's the drive, it's that time, and so oftentimes I will pack a ton of snacks and or buy them at the airport, and so what? These snacks are like? More nut trail mixes, so cranberry, raisin nuts, and I'll have that to satiate my appetite in between where I'm going and going to.

Vesime Schroering: 8:38

I will say that when so many people, if you're in a business dinner, it's difficult because you're at a restaurant that is five star restaurant or whatever it may be. It may not be, it may just be a restaurant down the street, and it's like oh, how do you pick the right ones? And sometimes I do find myself looking at side dishes to put them together, or asking for just make me a plate of, whether it's pasta but light on the butter or whatever it may be. You just try and make the modifications and I just do the best I can. Will it be 100%? No, but definitely always vegetarian based. And so that leads me to Europe. So Europe we traveled through Italy, switzerland and France and I think if anybody's ever traveled to Europe you've already had the sense that it's so different. Europe bans 1300 ingredients that the US bans 11. And so the food naturally there is just better, and I remember just eating more bread than I ever would have ever and feeling like, oh, this is going to get me in the long haul and not Normally I feel bloated with gluten. Didn't feel bloated. Oftentimes I'll feel like my blood sugar shift a little bit if I have a sweet or some refined carb. It didn't.

Vesime Schroering: 10:09

And I think that it all starts with the process, the land that they have and the respect that they have for not only farmers but also the respect that they have for their animals. So I, during my Europe trip, I was like, okay, if I could just stay within my guardrails of definitely vegetarian, I'll be good, because there's a lot of cheese there and there's also a lot of chocolate, especially in Switzerland, which I was like I'm going to eat the chocolate. And you know they, we did a make your own chocolate. It was so amazing to learn the process and to make your own chocolate bars, and through that they talk about how, what does Swiss chocolate?

Vesime Schroering: 10:56

Why Swiss chocolate so different? Well, it actually starts with the milk. Because they treat their cows with so much respect. They have acres of land. The farmers and the owners of the cows will make sure that their land, their acres of lands, have certain types of grasses or wildflowers or whatever, in order for the milk to be sweeter, and so they also, during summer months, will, just to show the level of respect, they will move their cows up to the cooler climates at the top of the mountains in order to Swiss Alps, in order for them to stay cool in their body, not overheat, and so they are really treated humanely, and I think that that's one of the things where we fall short on. You know, we are that mass producing country and society of everybody needs meat on the plate at every meal, and that's not the situation there.

Vesime Schroering: 11:58

You know you go to through Italy and its pasta. It might be with vegetables, it might be, you know, the sauce is homemade, and so it's just that different. You know, I had the best vegan dish I think I've ever had in Lake Como, italy, where it was rice with zucchini mixed in and surrounded out with, like this, tomato sauce and a basil emulsion and flowers on edible flowers on it. It was so pretty. I actually posted it on our Instagram account, and not only did it taste amazing, but I think I didn't even take a sip of water in between bites, because it's so good I finished it so fast, but it was, you know, normally, historically, daphne.

Vesime Schroering: 12:45

You know, when we try to, through my fitness journey and through trying to lean up and feeling better, it's, you know, take out those, some of those carbs, and it's that that was the main blueprint in my brain and so to shift. It has been interesting. But, like you said, we could talk about nutrition for hours. But you know, it's just so different in Europe, and so I would classify myself more vegetarian when we traveled. Because of that, because of the dairy piece of it. But the fruits, the vegetables, everything is locally sourced, everything is grown with pride, and the culture and the society is just so different that it's just healthier. They don't have the same level of chronic conditions that we do. Because of it, I truly believe that that's my opinion.

Daphne Bascom: 13:40

Well, there, there's so many things about the food systems in the United States that and and I know we have a podcast coming up on that, so I won't dig, I won't lift that scab today, because it's a wound that's deep and it's one that we need to talk about. I guess the other thing that I would love for you to share with everyone listening or watching is how do you do, how do you manage this as a mom, because you eat very healthfully. I see your photos, I love what you cook, the. Do the boys like it? Do you have to cook two meals? How do you navigate the meal preparation part of life and, and you know the shopping, the prepping and everything else.

Vesime Schroering: 14:26

Yeah, so so I have not transitioned my boys to be plant-based yet. I say yet, because we're working on it. We all. I grew, I raised them to always eat vegetables. They're very good at eating their vegetables, which is very Opposite of some families. I know that the moms have a hard time with their kids eating any vegetable, anything that's green. In general my boys did not, and I I don't know if it was because we started them early on or not, but you know the avocados, the peas, the green beans, the salads. You know they love salad, and so those are some of the things that are just staples and so they they will eat that.

Vesime Schroering: 15:08

Now, for me it's always the they have their meal like, let's say, girl chicken, and so they may have girl chicken. Now I buy less, so my grocery bill has been slashed in half, so they have a little piece of chicken, but then I will put the roasted vegetables that I make, and you know they have another salad or something else, and so for breakfast I also like to alternate. So you know, no cereal, I don't have them eat cereal just because of the refined, refined way it's made. But we do a lot of oatmeal and variations of oatmeal, so a lot of times, sometimes I'll put chocolate chips in it, peanut butter and banana cinnamon. It's like it kind of makes its own banana bread.

Vesime Schroering: 15:57

Now, when I try new recipes, like recently, I posted, how you know, brooke had her chickpea blondies and I made that the day of and it was gone. They loved it. They're like I also made her breakfast cookies and those are delicious, and so those were gone immediately. And so they, they do they, you know, for those types of things they will absolutely try. You know my they're. Each of my sons are different and their palette is different, but two of them have these mature palates that they want to try, and so it's like the bowl of A beans in a red sauce with with rice is like comfort food For them so it's just eliminating and I love to use Susie Cameron's analogy of omd one meal a day.

Vesime Schroering: 16:46

So I always have At least try one meal a day for my kids to just be plant-based, and that way I know that's just one meal. It's helped. Not only is it helping our earth, but it's helping their health as well. And so we, we, we, go that way, but it's always the roasted vegetables that I have with, like the quinoa, and they'll have, you know, maybe the the animal protein with it.

Daphne Bascom: 17:13

And those are great tips for anyone who's a mom or an auntie or a grandmom and trying to navigate, encouraging their kiddos to have more plants, but knowing that it's a journey. It's not, it's not going to be something necessarily that happens overnight, unless they were Started that way from birth. The you know. One other thing on nutrition, and then I'd love to hear more about your fitness journey as you went from omnivore to plant-based. But what it? What are the foods like when you go to soccer games? Because I know I had a mom send me a picture of she was at her daughter's swim meet and she sent me a picture of the food that was on the table and she's just like, oh, mg, we are.

Vesime Schroering: 18:02

I will say that because of my, you know, definitely I, for our viewers and listeners. I Grew up not in a sport, but I was classically trained in ballet, so I'm a dancer, so I was around a lot of eating disorders, and so that made me create this desire. This, you know, added interest in nutrition and to learn more, because I knew that there was that wasn't healthy, but I needed to find out what was, and so I've always had this really passion for nutrition and my, my father, is type 2 diabetic and so I see what, you know, what it can be. I also had gestational diabetes when I was pregnant with my last son and so, you know, I was told, you know, stay away from all of these carbs and just eat, you know, the, the meat and the vegetables, and no dairy, no, you know, no refined anything. And I'm like I don't really think that's right. And though my blood sugar was out of whack, I was like there's, there's another reason for this. So, having said that, I've always had this desire and interest and passion for, for nutrition and to learn more. Some a student of nutrition constantly.

Vesime Schroering: 19:19

My boys playing soccer. We are very strict in what they eat and consume when they're During soccer season. So summertime it's been like, yeah, whatever you want to eat, it's fine, but once it's soccer season we're very strict on not so strict, but like for breakfast. If you're gonna have something, you have to eat something, and it has to be something that's going to be give you sustained energy. So I will give them oatmeal with peanut butter or an almond butter or some type of nut butter and banana, and then, if they want another fruit, it could be a berry tied to it, because I don't want them to have too much of the Like. Grapes have a lot of sugar associated to it, so I don't want them to have grapes right before, before they're games.

Vesime Schroering: 20:08

And then for lunch we never get anything fried and so oftentimes people go to Chick-fil-A and it's like, oh, we're having Chick-fil-A. I will not, unless I'm going to get them a salad with grill. If they want grilled chicken, they have grilled chicken. I often get the salad without the grilled chicken or I'll give them mine, and so that you know I tend not to do that we go to. The big thing is firehouse subs. They love subs and they will get their, you know, lean meats. Now I we try not to go there as often because of the process meats, but that is an that is oftentimes a sample and it's always better.

Vesime Schroering: 20:50

I was. You know I do fear soccer season because sometimes we do go to these towns that all they have is like a Wendy's, and so sometimes we'll just try and find a grocery store to get like veggies and hummus or you know, the peanut butter and jelly or something like that that could give them what they need, as opposed to the junk that oftentimes people think. Other kids, they have high metabolism, they could eat whatever they want. And you know I don't believe that.

Daphne Bascom: 21:21

You still need to feel them like they're athletes. That's right, yeah, and you know you are an athlete. So how has your fitness journey changed over the years?

Vesime Schroering: 21:35

So I was scared that I wasn't going to maintain my muscle mass with being more plant forward and plant based. And you know you gave me a workout that was challenging but at the same time really motivating me to do higher weights. And you know you're supposed to, you should lift heavy and it's not because I want to bulk up or anything, but it's really to maintain muscle mass so that really to protect your bones and to prevent any type of breaks or anything. So so I found that I lift better plant based than I did not, and it's still. It still baffles me because you know again that blueprint, initially that I was told was lean meat and then vegetables and no refined carbs, or you know, and it's like, okay, and here I am lifting up the highest amount of weights, like when I'm just plant based. It try, you know, and I think that that's many reasons I keep thinking about you know, the, the nutrients that are in my bloodstream during lifting and also the oxygen, like everything. All the goodness in my body with being plant based is so much better. And now, when I do seldomly have animal protein and I workout, I feel sluggish. So it's just, it's shifted for me particularly. Yeah, it is. I would have never, because even people that are in you know when I'll share a story Before we went to, before I got married, I wanted to lean up and I wanted to have that Jennifer Aniston toned arm look in my wedding dress, and so I went to a gentleman who did trained the Baltimore Ravens cheerleaders to slim, slim down.

Vesime Schroering: 23:36

He also was a physique competition trainer, and so he taught me things to eat and it was a traditional thing that people still do. It was like start with four egg whites and you know, a third of cup of oatmeal, no sugar berries. You could use cinnamon and use like stevia or Splenda or something like that. And so then for lunch, then you have a snack and it's a you know, processed protein bar, and then for lunch it is sweet potatoes and grilled chicken and you know that's it Typical bodybuilder diet and then for dinner.

Vesime Schroering: 24:16

it's just your veggies and your protein, and if you get hungry then you can have more protein like chicken. Just eat some chicken before you go to bed and you'll be fine. Or turkey, and I'm like, okay, and I did slim down Daphne. I did, like it worked. But that was the first, my first encounter of how to train and lean up, because I didn't need to through dance and everything, but that's kind of how was ingrained in my brain. And so now you know, through your help and guidance and everything that we've learned and all the studies that have been conducted, it's, it's just. You know it's so different You're not supposed to do that. Forget about the. You know the. You still have fats and chicken like it's not. It's not the leanest protein as one may think, and so you know it's and honestly, I don't miss it.

Daphne Bascom: 25:13

I don't miss it.

Daphne Bascom: 25:15

I mean your gains have been amazing and you look wonderful, so I mean that you're fueling your body with what it needs and a lot of what we talk about. I'm perfectly planted. Yes, we focus a lot on the meals. We talk about movement in terms of fitness, but you touched on the fact that your dad has type two diabetes and I guess my question is, as you've moved through the past, I was looking back and you know we've been working together almost six years and over that journey, how has your perspective on lifestyle and its impact on health and, knowing that you are also in the healthcare industry, what are your thoughts on? What are we doing wrong? Why is why are we less healthy? Now? I mean, to your point, we have all this knowledge, we have things like the game changers, we have T Colin Candle's book, we have Dr Esselstyn's work, but we're less healthy than we were 10 years ago. It's it. This does not compute.

Vesime Schroering: 26:19

It doesn't, and we've we've had this discussion too. I mean, it's why? Why are other countries not battling the amount of the population in that are suffering from chronic conditions? And it's really big pharma that has taken over our society. And also the. You know, the initial blueprint of my brain is probably stamped in 100 other different people's brains. You know where. This is what's needed.

Vesime Schroering: 26:47

Your, your muscle needs protein, and protein is animal protein. You know, oftentimes I, everybody, looks at me when they're like, how are you getting your protein? It's like um, through the dollar. For every time we got that question, I know, and it's like that because somehow somewhere down the line, we have, you know, meats used to be it. Let's look at the blue zones. You know meat.

Vesime Schroering: 27:15

Meat was you would have chicken or whatever it may be, but that was like for Christmas, for Thanksgiving, for a celebratory event. You have this meat. You know, and, and, but all the other time you're eating grains, you're eating legumes, you're eating, you know, pastas and rice and vegetables that are grown in the garden, and it's somehow we've kind of created this. Every single meal needs to have that protein which is coming from an animal, and it's not true. How are all of these animals getting their protein? They're getting their protein from the vegetables, so, and the grains that they're eating. So how do we, why do we think that our muscle, to you know, fuel ourselves? We need this meat.

Vesime Schroering: 28:02

I still don't understand why, you know, I do know it's just this society and our culture has created this. This is what you need and this is part. This is your. This is what your meal should look like, you know? I mean, how many times have we seen a healthy plate and it has like a picture of an egg or a chicken, and then you have the vegetables, and then you have the potato or the, you know, the grain, more of the starchy carbs, like rice or potatoes. It's like why? Why did we say that that was the healthiest? The nutrition pyramid for the longest time had that as well, and so I think, just through the education process and as we've grown, it's just become that's what you need to have a well-rounded diet, and it's false, it's all false, and I think that that's why I love our podcast, because I feel as though we can share some of the knowledge that we've learned and from those and others that have that have adopted this type of lifestyle as well.

Daphne Bascom: 29:08

Yeah, because you mentioned Dr Bessard, who was on our podcast on our last episode and talking about her book. Chew on this, and I would encourage people to purchase it because the recipes are delicious. But you're right, the I mean unwinding what we've learned and restarting. I mean, I don't know what they're teaching in schools around nutrition anymore, or connecting what you eat with where it comes from in terms of chicken isn't chicken. Chicken comes from a chicken and that chicken is part of an ecosystem and there's so many intricate connections between what we put in our body, cruelty to animals and harm to our environment that I don't think is actually taught and I know I didn't learn it. Yeah, Daphne.

Vesime Schroering: 30:04

It starts in the schools too. We talked about education and what's taught in the schools. Look at the school lunches. I I mean, I think this could be a whole nother episode for us, right, but I was. I was, you know, on social media and I saw a picture of what a school lunch in Italy would look like, and it was so. It was all locally sourced from the farmers surrounding that community for that school and for those schools, and it was also very healthy, you know, with fruits, with the vegetables, with some pasta that was made by the grandma down the street or the, you know, the merchant down the street, and it had a very small portion of like animal protein in there, which is not necessary. It could just be beans. And and then look at ours. Look at ours.

Vesime Schroering: 31:00

I, you know, I think I visited my son at school, at elementary school, and I was. He loves the grilled cheese with the tomato soup, and then I was surprised they actually had steamed broccoli and they had grapes and other and strawberries and fruit, and I liked that lunch, but I took a taste of the broccoli and it was not. It was heavily seasoned somehow, and so you know, it's one of those things where it's like who they're getting the most. They're trying to stretch that dollar so far and by doing that it's the cheapest way of making meals, you know that's. Then they have Friday pizza, then they have ice cream, then they have breakfast. The breakfast is ridiculous, it's donuts. I mean I. You know, I'm sorry, but I don't think to get to keep the level and attention and focus that you need for your brain. You're not going to feed your brain donuts, and so you know it's.

Vesime Schroering: 31:57

It all starts in our schools and how we feed our kids and they emulate and the kids now go home and then they're like oh, I want that too. You know I want, I had that at school, can you get that for me? And it's like. You know you don't want to be the mean mom and be like no, but oftentimes I've created a let's find the healthier choice of this. You know, let's try. Okay, don't us us to not have healthier choice. Sorry, but you know.

Daphne Bascom: 32:20

Blondies, blondies.

Vesime Schroering: 32:21

Yeah, the blondies we can make it at home, yeah, or the breakfast cookies, you know. And so those are some of the things that I think needs to change. It all starts, you know, from the beginning.

Daphne Bascom: 32:31

Yes, but there's a lot of subsidy that happens in the school system and there's a lot of. You're right, we should be feeding our children. I'm not a mom, but I am a community advocate. And as you were talking about the donuts, in my head I was seeing the glucose spikes.

Vesime Schroering: 32:49

Yeah, exactly that's exactly what I see too. I'm like, oh my gosh, they're going to be hyper. And then the couple. Why would any teacher?

Daphne Bascom: 32:54

want that and they're going to crash? Yeah, no, and why should we be doing that to our kids anyways?

Vesime Schroering: 33:02

Exactly, but it starts those eating habits in our children that are tough to break, and so I think that we really do need to have. It's a lot of work, because then you have to advocate on the district and state level for healthier lunches, and that's what it's driven. Here's the amount of money that you have and here's the amount of money that you can use, and if you don't use it all, you can keep it and spend it in different ways, and so the schools want to stretch their money as much as possible.

Daphne Bascom: 33:35

But I mean just thinking about conversations that I've had with Switch for Good, who are advocating for removing dairy as a requirement for school lunches. If you look at the number of milk cartons that go into the waste bin and the number of dollars that are wasted, there's so much waste in the system. I mean probably the broccoli that was overseas and probably over salted too. So I call foul on money as the yes, incentive dollars. Yes, but are there ways to recoup what we're wasting? I think that there are opportunity dollars there that we're not exploring and there's just no energy or incentive to do it.

Vesime Schroering: 34:27

I agree.

Daphne Bascom: 34:30

But talking about the school system and then Switch for Good veganism and advocacy, I mean, I know that you are plant positive, but has this journey changed in other ways your thoughts around what we do for the animals, how you know what are we going to leave as a legacy for your boys in terms of the environment, and how do you become a better advocate? Oh, absolutely.

Vesime Schroering: 34:59

I mean, I think that you know, we can learn from our friends across the pond With you know their lifestyle and how they treat their planet and their portion of the planet and the beauty of our land. You know, I think we do have a lot of beauty in our country as well, but we also take it for granted. I think there is a level of an issue with entitlement and feeling as though this is something that you know we're entitled to do. But let's think of the longer term, and what are we really trying to accomplish? We want our family, our you know children, our friends' children, our children's children, to all live in a healthy, healthy lifestyles, and I think that change needs to happen, and it should start now with just the amount of waste that we have.

Vesime Schroering: 35:56

You mentioned Daphne and also, you know, just in general, the weather you could see has been crazy across the planet, and a lot of that is just from the carbon emissions. And what's the cause of that? It's not only traffic, right, it's not only that, it's a lot of. It is our mass production of animals so that they can continue to feed us with the way we think we should be eating. Yeah, Yep.

Daphne Bascom: 36:26

So many, and we have episodes coming up related to just that, you know, deep diving into our food system and talking about the environment. So for those of you listening or watching, stay tuned. This is just kind of a tickler for all of the things that Vesemé and I talk about, that we want to be able to share with you. So I need to ask you a question, because we always like to talk about our why. Yeah, what does perfectly planted mean to you and what seeds of positivity and empowerment can you plant with our listeners today?

Vesime Schroering: 37:07

Yeah Well, first of all, perfectly planted has brought me so much joy and hope, and it really has been an honor to work it with you, daphne. I've learned along the way as well, and I think we all can continue to learn from each other. I think that I'm very grateful for this opportunity really to be here with you. I'm also very grateful for you and what you have done for me through my journey and my health journey that I've learned so much about. I think that the one thing I would love to the seed of empowerment I would love to plant for everybody is that it's never too late to change, and you don't have to change everything at once. So I run on, daphne. We need to announce that we're going to be doing the Kiewa half marathon. We will be getting that officially later.

Daphne Bascom: 38:20

Oh, it's done.

Vesime Schroering: 38:22

Yeah, we will be running the half marathon, and so I've been running more and training more and I've been using my treadmill and one of the iFit trainers was saying some of the elite marathoners are there's a slogan and it really translates into slowly, slowly. You can't change something immediately, and I really think that if we want to make a change, it's never too late. You could make it and make it so that it's sustainable for your life, and then you can continue to add just slowly, slowly, give yourself grace and also it's really happened. Slowly, so that you can enjoy the journey, because that's the beauty of it all To see the difference, the changes in your body, the changes in your mindset, the changes in the way you sleep, the habits that automatically start to change and shift, and then your complete joy for your life because you're just feeling better. So I would absolutely make sure everybody just knows that it's never too late to start something new.

Daphne Bascom: 39:30

Words to live by. Thank you. So I know we've gone over as we always do. That's an eight. I am so blessed to have you as my co-host and to have a chance for our community to hear from you. I think the last time we had an opportunity to interview you it's been almost two years, so we definitely won't wait that long, and I think that now that we've committed publicly to the half marathon, we will keep everyone up to date, so that'll be a standing part of our next couple episodes how our training's going.

Daphne Bascom: 40:09

But for those of you who joined us today, we hope that you're walking away with new seeds of knowledge and ideas to cultivate and the inspiration to keep growing on your personal journey. And I think Besseme said it well slowly, slowly. You don't have to do everything today and you don't have to be perfect with everything you do. So a big thank you to all of you who are listening and all of you who are watching. Your support helps us spread seeds of positivity and empowerment in our shared mission to lead healthier lives and more sustainable lives.

Daphne Bascom: 40:46

So remember, like any garden, change takes time and patience. So water those seeds of positivity, give yourself some sunlight and don't forget to nourish your body with the power of plants. We hope that you'll take a few minutes to subscribe to our podcast and our YouTube channel so that you'll never miss an episode full of nourishing advice, more inspiring interviews and seeds of wisdom. And if you enjoyed today's show, please feel free to share it with a friend who could use a little bit of sunshine. So we appreciate you and until next time, be well.