Cross Joe - The Reboot With Joe Fully Charged: 7 Keys to Losing Weight, Staying Healthy and Thriving

Joe Cross is a filmmaker, entrepreneur, author, and wellness advocate. He directed, produced, and was the subject of the award-winning documentary Fat, Sick & Nearly Dead, which has been seen by more than 20 million people around the world; authored the New York Times bestseller The Reboot with Joe Juice Diet, which has been released globally in multiple languages; and is credited with having accelerated the plant-based eating movement by media outlets including the Wall Street Journal, the Times of London, and The Dr. Oz Show. His website, www.rebootwithjoe.com, has become an integral meeting place for a community of more than one and a half million Rebooters worldwide. His second documentary film, Fat, Sick & Nearly Dead 2, focuses on how to stay healthy in an unhealthy world.

WWW.REBOOTWITHJOE.COM

Thank you to:

The 20 million-plus viewers of Fat, Sick & Nearly Dead whove seen the film and spread the word.

The one million-plus and counting members of the Reboot community, who continue to inspire and motivate so many, including me. Youve created a movement.

The Reboot teamJamin Mendelsohn, Kari Thorstensen, Susan Ainsworth, Amie Hannon, Shane Hodson, Brenna Ryan, Jamie Schneider, Sophie Carrel, Chris Zilo, Ameet Maturu, Alex Tibbetts, Erin Flowers, Sarah Mawson, Lisa Merkle, Grace Ha, Sean Frechette, Kristen DeAngelis, Vernon Caldwell, and Kurt Engfehrwho put their hearts and souls into nurturing the Reboot community and supporting the mission of Reboot with Joe.

My expertsDr. Sheila Kar, MD, Dr. Dean Ornish, MD, Dr. Brian Wansink, and Dr. Russell Kennedywho generously gave of their time and shared their knowledge with me on how to sustain weight loss and stay healthy.

Barry Jacinto, Bobby Brennan, Carrie Diulus, MD, Christopher Treloar, Ciruu Kiniti, Kate Elinsky, Michael Kyles-Villalobos, and Phil Staples for your willingness to share your stories.

Our Reboot nutritionistsStacy Kennedy, Claire Georgiou, Isabel Smith, Abigail Hueber, Rachel Gargano, and Rhaya Jordanwho have patiently coached Rebooters, answered questions, and given advice on rebootwithjoe.com.

The Reboot with Joe Medical Advisory Boardin addition to Stacy Kennedy and Carrie Diulus, MD, Ronald Penny, MD, DSc, and Adrian J. Rawlinson, MDfor keeping the facts straight and for advocating the benefits of Rebooting.

J. P. Faber for helping to write this booktranslating hours of conversation into a manuscript and providing research and insight.

Sarah Hammond and the team at Hodder & Stoughton and the team at Greenleaf Book Group for their guidance and enthusiasm in bringing this book to market.

Juice on!

ONE

In the previous chapter I talked about our two most important relationships. The first is our relationship with ourselves. The second is our relationship with plants and with the nutrition we get from them. For the sake of brevity, I kept it simple. Just get more plants into your body.

That is good, straightforward advice, but our relationship with food in general, including plants, is a little more complicated than that. Not only is it a big part of our lives, its also a very emotional one. And its something we really need to understand because nothing we do when it comes to eating, or improving our diet, is going to last unless we change our relationship with food. If you dont have a good relationship with it, you will have a hard time with every other tip in this book.

When it comes to sustaining a healthy lifestyle, the key to lasting change is to understand the psychological side of eatingand that means, first and foremost, understanding your emotional relationship with food.

I cannot tell you how many people have said to me that theyve tried every diet under the sun and that nothing works because they are emotional eaters. Well, as psychologist Dr. Russell Kennedy would say, everyone is an emotional eater. That is what makes us human.Think about it, Russ pointed out at a Camp Reboot talk, from the day we are born, we start to associate food with comfort, community, and love. Babies are nursed when they are hungry and when they need comforting.

As we grow older, we show our love through food and usually through unhealthy food. Not many parents give their child broccoli when they want them to feel better after getting hurt; not many parents put candles on a pineapple instead of a birthday cake. I know several busy parents who insist on making their childrens birthday cakes. Cooking special treats shows our love. What makes us feel better than grandma baking us a batch of cookies or serving us a plate of warm lasagna?

This bond of food goes beyond the immediate family. As a social species, we invest our shared eating experiences with huge emotional capital. For as long as weve been human, food has sewn together our social fabric. We celebrate just about everything with food, from formal meals for the whole tribe to ritualized social events for visiting heads of state. Almost every gathering were part ofwhether its a date, a church social, a party, a wedding, even a funeralinvolves food.

Eating is a fundamental part of our culture, and almost all eating has an emotional component. Our food has a lot to say about who we are as people, says Dr. Kennedy. It really makes us feel connected to our communities, our families, and our cultures. Its a way that we show love to other people, to make or bring them food.

Now there is nothing wrong with these emotional events. They provide us with some of lifes richest pleasures and most meaningful experiences. The problem comes when we start to use foods emotional connections as our primary tool to feel better or to soothe ourselves. When this happens, our relationship with food becomes dysfunctional.

Comfort food is one of the best examples. We know that lots of people eat as a coping mechanism, especially in reaction to stress. Eating can also be a reaction to a more general feeling of unhappiness or loneliness. Since a lot of your relationship with food goes back to your childhood and to the foods you found comforting as a kid, eating can be a way of feeling safe, secure, and cozy. Its an experience were all familiar with.

When I was a kid, we didnt see my dad a lot during the week. He usually worked late, and we were in bed by the time he came home. Friday nights my mother would drive us to the McDonalds near Manley Hospital in Sydney, where wed meet Dad. Friday night was a ritual of family meals at McDonalds. Sunday evenings meant Catholic mass followed by 7:00 p.m. dinner at Hancourt Chinese Restaurant in Mosman. The maitre ds name was Herman and every dinner was the samesizzling chicken, fried rice, honey corn. So our two nights out were Friday night McDonalds and Sunday Chinese.

Yes, I was hungry. And yes, I thought McDonalds and Chinese food tasted pretty good, too. But the food also meant community to me. It was family time. It meant my parents undivided attention, being silly in the back seat with my brothers and sister. So its no coincidence that when I feel lonely, frustrated, or stressed out, I really would like a burger, fries, and a chocolate shake, or a big plate of fried rice.

Ive also spoken publicly and written about how I was frequently bullied in school. My mom and dad moved a lot. Dad was a doctor and Mom had a real talent for renovating homes and selling them. That meant us living in them, dealing with construction, and then moving. This was great, as every kid loves a building site, but as soon as it was all done and perfect, wed move on to the next place. That meant we changed sub-urbsand schoolsa lot. Add to that our time in Columbus, Georgia, in the United States, where Dad went to further his orthopedic training and I did third grade at St. Annes school.