Turning Inward To Ancestral Health And Wellness With Laura Rupsis

 

The moment we start to look for outward validation is when we need to look inward the most. The world is already crazy, chaotic, and unpredictable as it is. Why let it dictate who you are and what you want to be? Break free from that by turning inward. But how do we do it? In this episode, Rebecca Victor sits down with Laura Rupsis of Primal Health Coach Institute, who will share with us her journey of how she’s turned inward for guidance and understanding so that she can live a life that has greater meaning, value, and joy for her. She talks about the importance of taking care of your overall health, her passion for ancestral health and wellness, and pursuing what it is that speaks most to you. Through Laura’s experience, you can get the idea of what it means to look within and then turn outward and live it. Follow along to this episode to learn more.

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Turning Inward To Ancestral Health And Wellness With Laura Rupsis

Thank you for joining us. I’m looking forward to sharing with you a special interview that I have with Laura Rupsis, who’s going to share with us her journey, her story of how she’s turned inward for guidance and understanding so that she can live a life that has greater meaning and value and joy for her. As we learn this idea of turning within, it’s easy to get heady. It’s easy to talk, but what does it look like when we turn within? How do people truly experience this idea of what it means to look within for guidance and then turn outward and live it? Through the process of Laura sharing her story, we’ll get an idea to see how she does it, and maybe there might be some ideas for you that come from this.

I’d like to welcome Laura. As I do, I’d like to tell you a little bit about her. Laura is a mother of four children. She understands the demands of the busy lifestyle and the detrimental impact that the dietary and lifestyle choices of many of us that we make interest of convenience can have. After spending many years in the financial industry and about five years of hard work and planning, Laura was able to leave that world behind to pursue her passion for ancestral health and wellness. Laura earned her first Nutrition Health Coach certification at the Institute for Integrative Nutrition in 2012 after suffering severe health issues that were only alleviated through diet and lifestyle changes, rather than the conventional medical interventions. She then aligned herself with the Primal Health Coach Institute in 2013 to coach others to long-term lifestyle changes using the ancestral health model that has helped her maintain her health and optimal weight effortlessly.

Laura also became a CrossFit Affiliate Owner and trainer in 2013, and has been using Primal Health Coaching since the gym opened as a way to add more value to differentiate her box from all the others and to add additional sources of revenue. She’s committed to coaching others into a healthy, real food, holistic lifestyle that best suits the unique metabolic and lifestyle needs of each individual. Laura joined the Primal Health Coach Institute as a team member in 2016 as the Director of Admissions. She is also a faculty member and coach supporting, guiding and educating new Primal Health coaches. She has a list of certifications, which I’m going to ask her to share a little bit about with you so that you get an idea of where she has walked in her journey to get where she is now. Laura, do you want to share some of your certifications?

My first step towards getting a certification was with the Institute for Integrative Nutrition. To make a very long story short, I’d gotten very sick and struggled for a couple of years to get well and found the path to wellness was in focusing on wellness rather than focusing on my illness. I was working with more of a naturopathic physician, and it was fixed with nutrition and lifestyle changes. It wasn’t medicine. Was I PO-ed that I spent years staying sick in pursuit of fixing the illness when what I needed to do is focus on wellness. I wanted to share this a-ha moment that food is truly medicine. You know what else is? Sleep, stress reduction, exercise. These are things that made me well.

I wanted to share that. I felt as though even though professionally, I was in a finance world and at the time my goal was not necessarily to leave the finance world. I felt I needed to feel qualified to help other people. This was many years ago. At the time, there weren’t that many schools available. I was a single mom of two kids at the time. I was trying to figure out how to pay for college for them. I couldn’t put myself back to school to get a degree. Through some research, I found a couple of schools that did what I wanted, and the Institute for Integrative Nutrition was one of them. That was my first credential. It took about a year to get through that.

That particular school was missing a few pieces of the puzzle for me. I did have a bias towards this concept of ancestral health and wellness. They didn’t talk about that at all, nor did they get into how the body worked. I felt they needed to go take a Biology class or Biochemistry. When the Primal Blueprint, which is now the Primal Health Coach Institute, came out with their first course, I jumped on that because that’s what it had. It was very much aligned with my own philosophy. It was very geeky that way. It taught a lot of science. I took that course as well, which was great. I had access to a lot of resources, but I also needed the fitness component because I had started CrossFit as a member at another gym and I loved it. It was hard work but totally addictive.

I decided at some point I wanted to know more about that. I went and got my CrossFit level one certification, I opened my gym. As we navigate through putting the pieces of the puzzle together to learn more and help others, you figure out, “What’s next? Where’s the gap for me? What else do I need to learn?” That’s when I got my MovNat certification. Finally, in 2019, I went and decided to get national board-certified. Those other two schools, I’m certified through them but they have their own unique methodology, their own way of teaching and they’re very different from each other. What this national board certification does is it puts a stake in the ground for a minimum standard of quality education experience as a part of this as well.

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Anybody that holds this national board certification not only has that level of experience, it has the level of education to meet their stringent requirements. I had to take a pretty hard test. I’ve got to maintain my continuing education in order to remain national board certified. It elevates me a little bit. Now, I’m in the process because I moved. Even though I still own that gym, I’m no longer physically at my CrossFit gym anymore but I want to continue to do programming on a more personal level. Filling in the gap, I’m now going to sit for my personal training certification through NASM, which is the National Academy of Sports Medicine.

That looks like it was a rather significant journey for you, Laura. When you were getting ill, was that what caused this desire to make this big shift for you of looking?

Back then, I was in a different career entirely. I was in a very male-dominated industry. I was in finance. I was one of very few women in my role and because of that, to a certain degree, I put more pressure on myself. This need to outshine the dudes, that I belong here. I worked very hard. In addition to that, the way I presented myself was important to me. I definitely had a desire to remain looking professional, fit, healthy and what have you. I was eating what I thought was a healthy diet. From an exercise perspective, I thought I was doing things right. When in reality, knowing what I know now, I was doing the complete opposite of what I should have been doing given the rest of my lifestyle.

When you’ve got a lifestyle or a career that’s very high in stress, and I see this with a lot of the women I work with. I work with a lot of high-level executive women, that type-A personalities. Some of them aren’t executives. They’re stay-at-home moms that are crazy neurotic about the perfect children, everything’s just so and what have you. The stress of that was also a contributing factor. I was eating in a way that wasn’t in line with what I needed as far as wellness. I was exercising like a maniac, an idiot, a lot of high-intensity cardio training, which was ruining my immune system. High levels of stress, also ruining my immune system, which of course made me not sleep. I knew that I was under stress, I knew that I wasn’t sleeping but I thought the exercise and the way I was eating was doing the job. I was completely stumped that no matter what I did, I kept getting sicker. I was going to see other conventional doctors because that’s what insurance pays for.

I went to conventional doctors, “You have another sinus infection.” I would get three a year, which then eventually led to other upper respiratory problems, which then led to lots of antibiotic use, which again led to other health problems. At one point, I kid you not, I was on antibiotics a couple of times a year. I was on steroids to calm down the inflammation. I was on allergy medicine, which I didn’t need because I wasn’t necessarily allergic. I was on pain medications, sleep medications. At one point, doctors wanted to put me on an antidepressant or an anxiety medicine because in their minds I was literally making myself sick because of the anxiety level. When in reality, all of these were symptoms of another underlying problem. It wasn’t until I got well that made me want to pursue all that. I don’t think I would have had this passion unless I had gone through that journey.

What helped you go from where you were taking all these meds and all this conventional instruction to move into a totally different direction? How did you know to trust that process?

I was desperate. I walked into a client’s office. Here I am dressed in my suit and high heels, going in to see a client to talk about my global bond fund or whatever financial instrument I was going to talk about at the time. He’s someone I had seen for years and he’s like, “Don’t take this the wrong way but you don’t look good. What’s wrong?” I was literally popping cough drops so I could hold a conversation because I couldn’t stop coughing. Finally, I sat down and poor guy, I unloaded on the guy about how crappy I felt. I couldn’t figure it out. In my mind, literally nothing worked. That’s when he said, “Are you willing to be open-minded?” I said, “At this point, I’m willing to try anything.”

 

He referred me to a naturopathic doctor that he went to and this guy is chiropractic by training, chiropractic and Chinese medicine. He did acupuncture and stuff like that. He said, “Tell him I sent you. He’s done wonders for me. Go see him.” I went to go see him. It’s not that I’ve never been through chiropractic care before but what this guy does, he didn’t just adjust me and that was it. This guy sat and talked to me and had a conversation with me about how I was feeling and what it was like to live in my life and what it was like to live in my body. He asked me questions about what my daily routine was like. What was I eating? When was I eating? How was I feeling? “Let’s talk about this exercise and how you’re using it. Let’s talk about these medications you’re on and how you’re feeling.”

He was the first person that spoke to me in terms of not just, “You have a sinus infection.” It’s, “Your immune system’s broken. You literally have no immune system left and this is why.” He explained it to me, and he explained to me how to rebuild it. This guy, not only did he treat me, but he educated me. He asked me what I was willing to do, not just, “Go do this.” He was willing to work with me where I was in the moment and the capacity that I had at the time. I was so desperate. You’ve known me for a long time, you probably know this about me. When I set my mind, I go do it. It was, “Tell me everything.”

I’m the Band-Aid ripper. I’m the person that I’m going to rip it off and I’m going to go full speed ahead. He told me how I should be eating. I did everything and I was well. I still had room to go but my symptoms were gone within six weeks without medication. It was eliminating the foods that were not serving me, calming down my exercise routine. It was doing things differently. I had to learn how to sleep like it was my job. In order to do that, I needed to manage my stress, which meant I had to do something I was very uncomfortable doing, which was learning how to say no to certain things that I’d love to be able to do it but I can’t.

That led me down the path to find out more. I was blown away that food and lifestyle choices could make that much of a difference. Not one of my other doctors ever asked me how I ate, they never asked me how I felt. As a matter of fact, there were doctors that literally told me that food wasn’t going to make a difference. In their mind, food doesn’t cure a sinus infection. That’s their mind. What they’re not thinking is how can we support the immune system. The pivot was this connector, this individual that gave me a resource. That’s what this person did for me. He gave me a resource that I could follow.

How did it feel to get that resource?

At the time, I didn’t know what to expect but again, I was grateful to have another avenue to go that I hadn’t tried yet because I felt like I had tried everything. Clearly, I hadn’t. This person gave me another door to walk through to see where it could go.

Wasn’t it interesting, almost kismet in a way that when you walked into that office thinking that you are all that to discover somebody looking at you and like, “Are you okay?” All of a sudden, not only did you walk but there was a person who was willing to care enough to ask if you were doing fine and then had ideas that you could take and move in that direction to explore. Look where it has led you. Tell me more. When you made that decision and you started to embrace these health changes. It’ll be fun to learn a little bit about ancestral health. When you started to pay attention, what is it that you used that said what this guy is telling you is worth it? Is it because all the others were not?

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Nothing else worked. In addition to that, it was clear this guy cared first of all. There’s a lot of empathy in how he treated me. Also, I am intelligent enough to realize food has got to have some impact. Otherwise, why do we eat? I was willing to try it. I had known certainly that diet can influence weight and energy. If any woman’s ever been on a diet, you know this. I was like, “I’m willing to give it a try.” Now I know the diet he put me on, it’s essentially an elimination diet. What we did is we took away a lot of the common inflammatory triggers, a lot of foods that tend to cause inflammation or cause of blood sugar disruption. These are all big words.

I ate meat and veg for six weeks, but it took away dairy. It took away eggs because egg white protein in some people can cause inflammation. Dairy is a big trigger for a lot of people. I took away nuts for the same reason and took away all processed grain products because gluten can be a real problem for people. Even other non-gluten grains can still carry molecules that act like it. They cross-react. We took away all that stuff. Plus, we took away anything that was going to because blood sugar spikes because there was suspicion that that was an issue for me from the standpoint of energy. Also, I had candida overgrowth, so candida feed on that stuff.

I was willing to try it. What could be bad about eating a lot of vegetables and meat? I tried it, that was the direction that went. The thing for me was it was so eye-opening, and it was such an a-ha moment that I felt it was my duty to share with other people. If I could help somebody avoid what I went through, if I could help one person, I would feel happy. I started talking to everybody. I became that annoying person that talked about their diet all the time and preached to people and gave them this look like, “You shouldn’t be eating that.” I look back now and I’m like, “I would have hated eating with me.” That’s when I decided to start a little blog.

What I had done is I started googling things on the internet. I was looking for recipes to make food and veg more interesting. When I did start to add back things, I realized eggs are totally fine. Certain foods are totally fine.” I started looking for recipes that took out gluten, dairy and all this other stuff. I miss ice cream and I wanted to find a recipe for a non-dairy. I found these recipes. I started blogging. I kept hearing reference to this thing called a Paleo diet. I read probably every book that had ever been published on this approach. They all said essentially the same thing with different nuances.

They were written by different authors. This is what makes my version different. That’s what diet books do. They all sound the same but here’s this one nuance. It was all nutrient-dense fresh whole foods. That was the underlying scene. I called my blog Mom Gone Paleo, which I haven’t written for in years. It’s still out there somewhere. I still pay to maintain it. I don’t know why, but probably because I want to go back and use that content later for other things. I was sharing recipes. I wrote a lot of different articles about that stuff. Everybody else was sick and tired of listening to me.

I started Mom Gone Paleo and that’s when one of my three readers found me and was like, “You should do this for real.” She’s the one who recommended, “Have you ever considered becoming a health coach?” I didn’t even know what that was or that it was even a thing, “What is that exactly? What is it, like a nutritionist?” She’s like, “Check it out.” She’s the one who pointed me in the direction of IIN at the time because she was going there. Of course, I looked at a couple of other ones but that’s what sent me down that path.

Isn’t that interesting? Following the thing that you’re passionate about doing because it matters to you and then all of a sudden, something pops up to take you in a new direction. What happened then that you decided to do that? You were still in finance.

 

The one nice thing that that career in finance afforded me was some financial flexibility. The cost of that course was about $5,000. It was expensive but it wasn’t going to break my bank, I could do it. By the way, I enrolled on a lark. I had no intention of using it as a career path, but it was me taking this to feel better qualified and adding a little bit of confidence to what I wanted to share. I went down that path and I’m like, “Maybe I’ll write a book, maybe I’ll try to invest in some nonprofit, local area where I can provide a place for resources for people,” because that’s what helped me. What I do as a coach is to provide resources. This is what people need.

I graduated from IIN and I was helping people organically. I was that mom that brought a cooler to soccer games and baseball games. My poor children were mortified because their mom is the one with the kitchen she brings to baseball games. I wanted my kids to eat real food. I also looked different than some of the other moms. I was careful about what I ate. I exercised a lot. A lot of times people would see me running up to the baseball game. People start to ask questions, to which I asked them other questions or I answered the questions and then inevitably it was an offer to help. “Can I help in any way?” I organically became a go-to person of resource for other people that wanted some help, but I wasn’t doing it professionally until I decided one day to hang a shingle and put out there. Maybe I should do this on purpose and take on a client, but I didn’t know what I was doing in the beginning.

How did it feel as you were moving forward? How did it feel that people were coming to you to connect and it seemed as if this movement was growing organically for you? How did that register inside of you? You’re like, “Maybe I ought to hang the shingle up,” versus like stay where you are.

I felt grateful and honored that somebody would ask my opinion about something and thought that I was worthy of asking. That was a big thing. It also gave me a sense of responsibility. In my opinion, if somebody asks me a question and trust me enough to want my answer, there’s a lot of responsibility there in wanting to do that. Also, clearly there’s a need for this. I knew that there was a need for the right information. That’s why I started my blog. Over time, I began to realize information is helpful. It’s part of the puzzle but it’s not what gets people to make different choices and decisions. That’s when I started to try to build it and make it more of a relationship for people and ask more questions, “Let’s sit down and have a real conversation about this.”

I went back and thought through the training I got from my first program about coaching and building a program and building a coaching-client relationship. That was my first inkling that maybe I could do this part-time. It still wasn’t, “I’m going to leave finance,” because I was still a single mom, I still had two kids I wanted to put through college. I felt guilty for not wanting the job I had. It was a great job from the standpoint of the financial stability that it provided. I still hadn’t been honest with myself on the personal and physical sacrifices I had to make to do that job well. Some of the women that I work with when we have these conversations, these coming to Jesus about the unintended consequences of their career, that’s a hard thing to come to grips with. In my heart, I knew it, but my thought was, “Someday, I won’t have to do it.” It was this when, then. When my life gets to the point where I can afford to leave it, I will, which seemed very far off in the future. My thought was, “I’m going to build this thing on the side to help create a bridge for when I’m ready to do that.” That’s when I started to do this more on a part-time basis.

You started doing it on a part-time basis and you’re talking about all the different elements. I heard you’re sharing you listen to your heart, how do you create time during this time of shifting and changing that you’ve talked about up until now? What are some of the practices or what are some of the things that you do to make sure that you are hearing what you need to do, you’re honoring or you’re paying attention and you’re acting in behalf of it?

During that period of time, it was a couple of years, I got lost in the weeds and I got buried under life like everybody else does. It’s not a perfect trajectory. I wasn’t actively looking to promote my business. I was willing to take on clients when they came to me. That was fine with me for a while. I did start to charge people. The other thing too is because it wasn’t my primary business because in the beginning, I was still feeling my way, finding my way, I wasn’t charging what I should have been charging. I was still building the foundation and I knew it that way. I believe in this so much. This has literally begun to define my life and my own identity. One of the things I try to work on with some of my clients is to help change that identity and go from talk of, “This is who I am.”

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They identify as somebody who’s always been heavy or has always struggled with their weight or I identify as somebody that’s always had anxiety around whatever. This is their identity and we need to change that self-talk and change that story. The reason I feel like I can help people do that is because I did that myself. Going from rather than somebody that has this illness to I can be somebody that doesn’t. If I don’t feel like I’m there now, I have to start thinking in those terms. Here’s the way I look at it with my clients and the way we try to do it. You might not feel as though you’re this slim, strong, sexy little beast right now. If you start eating like that person and moving like that person and sleeping like that person, you become that person.

We’re going to have moments in time where you’re like, “This is so hard. Is it worth it?” I look at my kids who are by far my number one motivation. All I need to do is hear one person say, “You inspire me,” and I’m back in the game. I realized I know enough about how our environment feeds this motivation to know that when I’m feeling low, I need to change my environment a little bit. I need to get out of the change of scenery. I need to get out of whatever it is that’s dragging me down and remove myself from that environment so that I can be inspired again.

It’s an energy. Environment has an energy to it. To be able to move ourselves, at least for me, I know that there are times I have to step out. It doesn’t mean I’m not going to re-enter and check it out, but I’ve got to walk away enough to regain and remember, “This is who I am. This is why I’m doing this.” I appreciate what you shared because that’s how people connect with their genuine journey. Knowing that the journey itself is filled with moments that were gung-ho and then filled with moments where we’re like scratching our head and going, “What did just I do? Why did I eat that entire gallon of ice cream?” Instead of beating ourselves up, create that space of compassion and then continue to move forward. When you are in a space where you’re moving forward like that, how do you help yourself? In addition to moving beyond like moving out of the energy or out of the location or environment, what are some of the things that you tell yourself? How do you communicate with yourself that creates the space to support you in moving forward?

This is something that was hard for me to learn. It’s something that’s a real struggle for every person I work with, particularly if they’re a mom. It’s reminding myself that if I don’t take care of myself first, my ability to care for others is compromised. This is part of it. This is part of the guilt for me was I’m a mom and there are others that rely on me and I don’t have the time to devote to myself because it’s going to take time away from my children and things that I have to do or from work. The other thing is money, feeling guilty about spending money on myself to better myself. That was tough for me until I began to realize that when I don’t feel well and I’m grumpy, I’m not a good mom.

My kids, I could see it in their face. I’m like, “I’m in bad mommy mode. Why am I in bad mommy mode? What did I not do today? Where did I not take care of myself today?” I take a minute. This is something that I work with my clients and I’m sure you do too. All of this is tagging back to those underlying values that drive my motivation. I’ve got to remind myself. People reading, you’ve got to have reminders of what those values are all around you. My house is filled with pictures of my family. I moved. I’m around my immediate family, my husband and two of my children, but my other two are not with me. That’s so sad, but I am surrounded by pictures of my family. I tag back to them every day.

I joined Snapchat. I’m not a technology person but I joined Snapchat, so I can have a little chat to Matt and Mia every day, this tag back to my kids. I did that because this is my value statement. There’s something about a deep down but yet altruistic value mechanism that helps drive and maintain motivation. For me, I am terrified of ever being a burden to my children. I want to be that grandma that’s out dancing with the kids at my grandchild’s wedding on the dance floor when I’m 80 years old. I want to be that person.

I don’t want to be the grandma that they got to transport in a wheelchair and sit in the corner on oxygen. Who knows? That may be me. I don’t know but I’m going to do everything I can to be the person I want to be in 30 years. Even though that’s all far off motivation and goal, I know that the way to get there is by focusing on what I’m doing now because it’s rooted in these values of being the best I can be so that I can be of service to others.

 

The values that you have or the image and the emotional tie in. Even the picture of the image, like you talked about the image of the women who are seeking. If you have a vision of her, then you live like her. You live like her now. You eat like her, work out like her, carry yourself like her, be her. A lot of that at one point is that concept of everything being energy, mind and emotions have energy. That energy and that thought is what moves us forward in the direction. I don’t know about you, but I can’t look forward and then walk backwards for the rest of my life. I got to walk in the direction where my eyes are or my heart and my vision are. I love how you have been doing that and helping others to do that who are seeking through a healthy mind and body and spirit. How do I live healthy? This idea that we have to age in the way that we’re aging is a falsehood. It’s something that has been fostered as a result of people who are wanting to make money off of people getting ill.

That’s sad to say because it’s such an easy thing we buy into and we continue to promulgate the idea not realizing that we are fostering that thought and helping it to grow. It’s like, “Turn the TV off.” How often do we look at a TV and everything on there tells you that you need this for diabetes and this hypertension and this for osteoarthritis? Aren’t we aware on a subtle level that we’re being fed an idea? Through following your passion and being guided and led,  that calling opened you up to the idea that somebody had the courage to say to you, “Are you okay?” and you were willing and open to say, “What are the possibilities for me?” Look where you are as a result of that. You left the finance world a few years ago and opened up your own CrossFit gym at that point.

We opened the gym first. I came from the finance world, I knew money didn’t magically appear because I wish it. We needed a plan and my husband was CrossFit certified at the time. He had a couple of certifications. The one thing I did have was a little bit of money. We had a partner who was in pharmacy and wanted to work his way out of the pharmacy. He had a little bit of money. We invested in that. Brad, God love him, worked like a dog for a year and earned nothing to get that gym up and running. We were finally able to pay him. That helped bridge a gap. My thought around the gym was if people are willing to come to a CrossFit gym and get their butts kicked because honestly, CrossFit is a hard workout.

Even at CrossFit, people who are severely de-conditioned, we modify the heck out of everything. My idea of a high-intensity workout is different than yours. What’s going to feel high intensity to you is different from me. We’re going to start where you are. I figured people coming to a gym like that were motivated somehow to achieve whatever health or fitness goal. My thought was I would have a friendlier audience because believe it or not, my father is a prime example of this. He is someone who would rather take a pill to fix the problem than to do the work to not need the pill because he has been sold the bill of goods. He’s in his 70s and X percentage of people in their 70s are all on prescription medication. Thus, this is a foregone conclusion, just take the pill. This is fundamentally untrue.

The healthcare industry is phenomenal at treating acute illness. You break a leg, some infection, some acute illness, they’re phenomenal at that. They are bad at eliminating chronic illness. They’re great at managing it. Now what we have is a healthcare conventional healthcare system that is disease management. It’s illness management. They’re not healing you. I’m going on the record to say you can reverse Type-2 diabetes and heart disease over time. Sometimes people do enough damage that even though things can improve, they’re probably still going to need some medication or a surgery or what have you. There’s certainly that. By eating real nutrient-dense whole foods, eliminating processed food, period.

If you do one thing, you eliminate processed food, you have done so much good for your body and we can literally reverse it. That being said, if you go back to eating all that crap, it’s going to come back. I guess you can’t use the term cure because it’ll come back, but as long as you maintain the what I call wellness management, let’s get out of illness management. We’re going to get into wellness management. If the more I can keep my clients laser-focused on being well and making the decisions and the choices that either take them towards wellness or keep them well, the less they’re going to deal with illness. That’s the way this works.

The realization through that process was to understand that they’re going to come up with all the old beliefs, all the old ideas that have been their challenges in the first place. To know that when they rise up, it’s not because they’re failing. It’s because they’ve now put a light on it. It’s coming up to say, “We see what you want, the old idea’s in your way now. What do you want to do with it? You can let it go. You can shift or you can maintain it.” It’s not because they’re failing. It’s because they’re evolving and growing. You took this opportunity to move through those five years at CrossFit and you evolved, but you had a dream. Somewhere within those five years or maybe before, you had a dream that developed, which has brought you where you are now.

There's a greater risk in staying in a paradigm that leaves you unhappy. Click To Tweet

I wanted to live a life of purpose. I’m surrounded by those I care about in a place that allowed me to live the life that I wanted. It would serve me no good to build a business that was going to continue to keep me rooted in an environment that wasn’t serving me, “How do I tackle this?” One of the things I wanted to do was to get out of Illinois. I lived in Illinois for 25 years. I wanted out of there. It’s too cold for me, there were a number of reasons. I wanted a place where both me and my children could be outside pretty much the entire year enjoying outdoor activities. Exposure to sunlight is so important for your immune system, healthy outlook, positive mood, healthy body, all of those things.

In Illinois, I spent nine months out of the year inside. I hated it. One of my goals for the past few years was to get the heck out of Illinois and down to Florida, or not necessarily Florida. I just wanted to be someplace warm and sunny. I was open to wherever that was going to be. I knew I needed to somehow be able to bring what I was doing with me to get down there. While the gym was a brick-and-mortar business, we started talking about what does this look like when we leave? I did not want to handicap the gym. That was near and dear to my heart. You’ve seen my post. I love it there. I wanted to make sure they could remain successful and with COVID, they can’t buy us out right now.

They’re limited capacity, so that’s going to hang tight for a while. My goal with them is to continue to contribute in some way, either through personalized programming or continue to do some remote nutrition work. My work from my health coaching business, I can literally take it anywhere. My work with Primal Health Coach Institute, they don’t care where I live as long as I show up. I was able to build this cashflow, this income stream that was portable but still allowed me to do work I wanted to work but from a place that I could enjoy living my life. We call it our Salt Life. One of the first things we bought some kayaks. We were at the beach, we were all over the place and Brad is fishing twice.

We’ve been here since August 2020. I was talking to my second cousin Priscilla Garza. She’s like, “You guys look more like Floridians than I do. I’ve been living here all my life.” It’s like, this is where I wanted to get to. This was a big goal to me. We got down here and it was a lot of hard work, particularly in 2020. Trying to sell a home in the midst of a pandemic, moving in the midst of a pandemic and all of this was hard, but I was determined. Nothing was going to get in my way. We got down here and my work with Primal hasn’t skipped a beat.

I need to communicate with the gym and figure out what my place is there. As we were saying before, now I’m in this place where I got this big, hairy goal I had set for myself. I finally got it. My personality is what it is, “What’s next?” I’ve got these other things, but for whatever reason, that motivation to work as hard as I need to work to get where I want to go is not there. Part of that is probably because of my values. I’ve done what I needed to do that’s in line with my values. Now, anything after this is gravy. I’m going to put one foot in front of the other, but I want to give myself the space and the grace to enjoy this for a little while.

That’s half the gift of it. Why do anything if we can’t pause to appreciate it and enjoy it? That to me what life is about. It’s about doing the work that feels good, to do that allows me to experience what I want to experience. How awesome that you are doing that Laura? You’re creating that space for you and enjoying it. I’ve loved seeing the pictures of you and the kids and the kayaking, the climbing on the trees and being able to be with your children the way you have as nurture and care for yourself. Playtime and resting to enjoy is critical. It’s like you said when you’re doing your workout, you have to have time of rest, to allow the body to recoup, but to take advantage fully of all the work at that it has done. You’re in your resting phase.

I’m in my resting phase. As you and I were talking, I haven’t even gotten my new website up yet. I’m slowly working on that. Right now, it’s just my Facebook page and Instagram, which is they’re both personal pages. They’re not business pages but people can reach me through there. I’m taking on clients. I’m back to where I was in the beginning. Clients reach out to me, I have capacity, awesome, let’s work together. I’m not actively reaching out to see this business explode right now. I don’t have the capacity and the bandwidth for it, but I am taking clients one at a time as they come in.

 

For those of you who are interested and have enjoyed listening to Laura talk about this, we have her information. You can always feel free to check that out and we’ll provide that for people to connect Laura. You showed through what you’ve done, how you’re following what mattered to you and paying attention and owning that. How it supported you and your relationship with yourself, your relationship, with your children, your ability to develop and establish your relationship with your new husband, who is a sweetie. I find that refreshing because relationships are so significant. If you had to look at your journey thus far, what would be some ideas or some tidbits that you would like to share and encourage others as they are walking their process and learning to pay attention and follow what’s meaningful for them?

The first one is to not feel guilty for wanting to serve yourself and be true to yourself because you will be better for others if you nurture and honor yourself. Get that out of the way. The second one is all the intentions in the world are useless without action. I would not be here if I didn’t do something. One thing I have found is there’s a greater risk in staying in a paradigm that leaves me unhappy than there will ever be risk in taking an action to pursue something I’m passionate about. It may not get me exactly where I want to go, but every step or every action I’ve taken has at the very least taught me something. Take an action, do something. I can sit and dream all day long but I’m never going to get there unless I do something.

The other aspect is ask for help when you need it because you’re going to come up against roadblocks. You’re going to come up against challenges that seem insurmountable that through your own personal experience, you’re not quite sure how to handle yet, but somebody else likely has. Who is that? For me, if it’s something like I’m afraid I can’t pursue something because of the kids and the time, I’m going to tap my husband. For a long time, I had a “nanny or babysitter,” even though Matt and Mia were older. It was because I needed somebody to help do all that other stuff, I hired a wife. She and I used to always joke about that. It’s terrible gender roles but Brad, he will do the dishes. He will step in for me when I need to find the time and the space to do something. Find that resource. It’s all about resources. Find them, hold onto them and then be a resource for others. Pay it forward.

Those points that you made are so important, and having people in our lives and being able to give ourselves permission to shift the paradigm, to realize that self-care is critical before care of others. It doesn’t mean care of others is not a part of it. Often, we’ve been fed the idea that it’s about taking care of others at the detriment of ourselves and that’s not what that is. What’s the first thing they tell you when you’re in an airplane and the oxygen mask drops? Cover yourself. If you go, your child doesn’t have anybody to hang on to. It’s, how do we take care of ourselves and having that right person so that the two of you can co-create what needs to happen at any given moment at any time. I know my husband’s very actively engaged in caring for family and cleaning. I remember the first time we dated, he came to the door with a scrub brush from cleaning the toilet. I thought, “This is a good man.”

I appreciate your sharing because so often we get caught up in these ideas that don’t serve who we are. It’s nice to see someone who is challenging those as well and choosing something different so we can see how we might be able to want to do that ourselves. I’m grateful that you would share your story, you share yourself, and allow people to get to know you and for us to have a good time together. Readers, you can look up her old blogging on Mom Gone Paleo. I remember those. If you are fascinated or interested in the pursuit of a holistic primal health coach or becoming a coach, she can share with you that information as well. I do want to thank you for reading, for being with us, for spending time. We’ve hoped you enjoyed yourself. I know we have. Any last words, Laura?

Thank you. I’m grateful for you.

Thank you. Remember now, here is to you, so make it a good life.

Important Links:

• Laura Rupsis
• Primal Health Coach Institute
• Mom Gone Paleo
• https://www.Facebook.com/Laura.Puglisi.Rupsis
• @CoachLauraFit – Instagram

About Laura Rupsis

As a working mother of 4 children, Laura understands the demands of today’s busy lifestyle and the detrimental impact that the dietary and lifestyle choices so many of us make in the interest of convenience can have. After spending over 20 years in the financial industry and about 5 years of hard work and planning, Laura was able to leave that world behind to pursue her passion for ancestral health and fitness.

Laura earned her first nutrition/health coach certification through the Institute for Integrative Nutrition in 2012 after suffering severe health issues that were only alleviated through diet and lifestyle changes, rather than conventional medical interventions. She then aligned herself with the Primal Health Coach Institute in 2013 to coach others through long term lifestyle change using the ancestral health model that has helped her maintain her health and optimal weight effortlessly.

Laura also became a CrossFit affiliate owner and trainer in 2013 and has been using Primal Health Coaching since the gym opened as a way to add more value, differentiate her box from all the others and to add additional sources of revenue. She is committed to coaching others into healthy, real food, holistic lifestyle that best suits the unique metabolic and lifestyle needs of each individual.

Laura joined the Primal Health Coach Institute as a team member in 2016 as The Director of Admissions. She is also a faculty member and coach supporting, guiding and educating new Primal Health Coaches.

Laura’s Certifications Include: National Board Certified Health and Wellness Coach, CF Level 1, MovNat Level 1, Certified Primal Health Coach, IIN Certified Holistic Health Coach.