Transcript
WEBVTT
00:00:05.607 --> 00:00:11.134
Hello, my friends and fellow animal lovers, welcome to the Story of my Pet podcast.
00:00:11.134 --> 00:00:19.934
I am Julie Marty Pearson, your host, proud fur mom, pet lover and all-around animal advocate.
00:00:19.934 --> 00:00:27.984
I'm so happy to have you here to listen to the incredible pet stories that I have collected from around the world.
00:00:27.984 --> 00:00:33.491
I hope you enjoy this episode and I can't wait to share this pet story with you.
00:00:33.491 --> 00:00:47.353
Hello, my friends and fellow animal lovers, I am happy to be here with a new episode and to introduce you all to my guest, tenny Manassian.
00:00:47.353 --> 00:00:49.685
Tenny, thank you so much for being here.
00:00:50.969 --> 00:00:53.125
Hey Jolie, Really glad to be here.
00:00:53.125 --> 00:00:54.067
Thank you for having me.
00:00:55.020 --> 00:01:02.145
Tenny and I connected because she wanted to share with me her new book called Lucy Goes to the Gentle Barn.
00:01:02.145 --> 00:01:05.126
So I have it and I love it.
00:01:05.126 --> 00:01:10.174
I was reading through it again last night and it's really a cute story and it's a great story for kids.
00:01:10.174 --> 00:01:21.805
And so before we get into that, Tenny, I wanted to talk to you a little bit about Lucy, your dog, and you are a proud dog mom, I have to say yes, very proud.
00:01:21.805 --> 00:01:26.632
So how did the adoption of Lucy and you guys coming together?
00:01:26.632 --> 00:01:27.674
How did that come about?
00:01:28.819 --> 00:01:31.465
Yeah, so Lucy is actually my first dog.
00:01:31.465 --> 00:01:35.974
So first and only dog so far, I adopted her in 2015.
00:01:35.974 --> 00:01:40.088
I had just come back to LA from the Bay Area.
00:01:40.088 --> 00:01:45.912
I was going to grad school up there and I always wanted a dog and my family always said no.
00:01:45.912 --> 00:01:55.325
I told them before I moved back that I for sure was getting a dog, and so I think they felt bad for me at this point, going through my whole life without a dog.
00:01:55.325 --> 00:01:57.852
So they reluctantly agreed.
00:01:58.052 --> 00:02:06.831
I was already trying to search for dogs and I knew I wanted to ideally get a puppy or just a younger dog, so that we can just have that experience that we've never had.
00:02:06.831 --> 00:02:21.433
And I found through a rescue, I found they had some puppies and so I took my parents and we went and we visited the puppies and my mom actually ended up picking Lucy out of all of them, which is ironic because she's she was so scared of dogs.
00:02:21.433 --> 00:02:25.502
So for her, this is like her first experience with a dog, so it was really interesting.
00:02:25.502 --> 00:02:28.663
She was so scared of dogs, so for her, this was like her first experience with a dog, so it was really interesting.
00:02:28.683 --> 00:02:33.407
But that's great because for people that don't have animals growing up, that first one can be really scary.
00:02:33.407 --> 00:02:38.370
So I think that's a great thing that your parents were able to go on this journey with you.
00:02:39.151 --> 00:02:41.832
Yeah, no, it's been really wonderful for my whole family.
00:02:41.832 --> 00:02:49.897
So my family's Armenian but we're from Iran and so in Iran growing up like my parents didn't really have pets, like it wasn't normalized there.
00:02:49.897 --> 00:02:56.187
It's a bit of a different culture than what we have here in the Western culture.
00:02:56.187 --> 00:02:57.835
So for them it's been a complete night and day like change.
00:02:57.835 --> 00:03:03.151
Now, like Lucy's their grandchild, like their granddaughter, they're obsessed with her, but, yeah, it's been really amazing.
00:03:08.520 --> 00:03:09.002
That's so great, I love.
00:03:09.002 --> 00:03:11.272
I love hearing that so many of my guests are like animal lovers from the time they're born and all of that.
00:03:11.272 --> 00:03:15.586
But it's great when we hear stories of people who haven't and have ventured into rescue and adoption.
00:03:15.586 --> 00:03:20.248
And then you find that dog that you're meant to have, which I think is what happened with you and Lucy.
00:03:20.248 --> 00:03:21.562
That's exactly what happened.
00:03:21.701 --> 00:03:26.689
I actually wanted a male dog and I was going to name him Milo and I had this whole plan.
00:03:26.689 --> 00:03:30.401
And so when I saw the four puppies, I wanted the little runt of the litter.
00:03:30.401 --> 00:03:35.853
He was like this little black, like poodle mix boy, and I was like I want this one.
00:03:35.853 --> 00:03:38.362
And my mom said, no, I want this one.
00:03:38.362 --> 00:03:43.448
And she pointed to Lucy and I was like, all right, well, since they're compromising, they're getting the dog.
00:03:43.448 --> 00:03:46.531
So I went with what my mom wanted and it was exactly what I needed.
00:03:46.691 --> 00:03:47.412
That's so funny.
00:03:47.412 --> 00:03:54.784
When I was little and I got to get a puppy it was a litter and I picked out mine, champ, which was a boy my mom was like no, we've only ever had girl dogs.
00:03:54.784 --> 00:03:58.528
I'm like no, this is the one, and it was the one, yeah.
00:04:05.139 --> 00:04:06.525
I always say our find us the way they're supposed to.
00:04:06.525 --> 00:04:07.266
That's absolutely what happened.
00:04:07.266 --> 00:04:11.923
Yeah, it was just so cute and as soon as she came to our house, like we just all fell in love with her and it's been a very nice journey.
00:04:11.923 --> 00:04:13.385
So she's eight years old now.
00:04:13.385 --> 00:04:16.461
Every time we meet people they'll ask me how old she is.
00:04:16.461 --> 00:04:18.024
I say eight and they're like eight months.
00:04:18.024 --> 00:04:19.850
I'm like no, she's eight years old.
00:04:19.850 --> 00:04:25.793
She looks like a puppy, so she just has so much energy and she just is very friendly.
00:04:25.793 --> 00:04:28.204
So we go on all these adventures together.
00:04:28.406 --> 00:04:35.110
I have her Instagram page where we post about that, and that's what led me to wanting to share our story of going to the Gentle Barn.
00:04:35.110 --> 00:04:42.843
I think a lot of kids can relate to some of these same lessons that we're learning, just even with dogs.
00:04:42.843 --> 00:04:49.208
So, for example, even when I take Lucy to the vet and she's scared, I just think about kids going to a doctor and being scared.
00:04:49.208 --> 00:04:57.345
So I just have so many different ideas of books that I want to share through Lucy's perspective and through her voice and her experience.
00:04:57.464 --> 00:05:00.362
But yeah, the Gentleman was the first one I was going to say.
00:05:00.362 --> 00:05:10.920
That's such an important parallel to make because obviously kids and pets are different, but young dogs, or even dogs you adopt that aren't puppies and they could be a few years old or older.
00:05:10.920 --> 00:05:17.089
You don't know what their experiences have been, so their experiences with you are brand new, just like with kids going, like you said, to the doctor.
00:05:17.089 --> 00:05:25.973
And it's the same thing in a way, because when young kids you can't, you know, explain the way that maybe when they're older thing with pets, you don't know how much they're understanding.
00:05:25.973 --> 00:05:27.382
And it definitely.
00:05:27.382 --> 00:05:38.112
As I was going through the book I could see how you were helping Lucy to understand the different animals she was meeting, just like for a child meeting a cow for the first time or something like what is this?
00:05:38.112 --> 00:05:38.952
Why is it so big?
00:05:38.952 --> 00:05:40.507
Is it going to be nice to me?
00:05:40.507 --> 00:05:49.793
So I love that idea that you're using the lessons you've learned with Lucy to make a parallel into the stories you're telling yeah, exactly yeah.
00:05:49.812 --> 00:05:53.464
And when we took Lucy to the Gentle Barn, it was 2017.
00:05:53.464 --> 00:05:57.713
So she was still pretty young and we just had such a wonderful time.
00:05:57.713 --> 00:06:01.149
We met basically all the animals that I named in the book.
00:06:01.149 --> 00:06:14.473
So Lucy the cow the same name, which is cute, and Hiroka, but we call her Hiro the horse, and they had a really cute moment where they like almost kiss and I have the photo.
00:06:14.473 --> 00:06:14.894
Yeah, it's very cute.
00:06:14.894 --> 00:06:17.023
And then so the way she illustrated in the book was perfect.
00:06:17.163 --> 00:06:21.480
Obviously, before the book came to existence, you actually went to the Gentle Barn.
00:06:21.480 --> 00:06:24.607
How did you learn about them and what they do?
00:06:24.867 --> 00:06:26.951
Yeah, well, I've been on my vegan journey.
00:06:26.951 --> 00:06:30.137
It's been almost seven years, yeah.
00:06:30.137 --> 00:06:38.254
So I actually started the journey because I adopted Lissy and then after about a year I went vegetarian.
00:06:38.254 --> 00:06:45.108
I started really questioning like why I was eating some animals and then having her in my home, like opening my home up to other animals.
00:06:45.108 --> 00:06:47.002
So it just didn't make sense to me.
00:06:47.002 --> 00:06:48.064
So I went vegetarian.
00:06:48.064 --> 00:06:56.360
About almost a year later is when I went vegan and I learned about the dairy industry, the egg industry, just horrible things happening to animals.
00:06:56.360 --> 00:07:15.947
So at some point during this journey I was following the Gentle Barn on social media and they're just a wonderful organization very close by to me, about half an hour away, so we went to visit and I got my first cow hug and it was so healing Like I can't even put into words like how amazing a cow hug is.
00:07:15.947 --> 00:07:20.586
So if you haven't experienced it and you have the chance to go to a sanctuary, it's the best thing.
00:07:21.348 --> 00:07:25.886
It's funny because when I met you virtually and learned about your book, I'm like I know the Gentle Barn.
00:07:25.886 --> 00:07:31.973
I follow them too and they're about, I think about an hour and a half from where I live in Bakersfield, so I've heard of them.
00:07:31.973 --> 00:07:43.086
I was like God, that would be so great to go there, because a lot of sanctuaries like Gentle Barn do have days where people can come and meet the animals and I've heard it's such a great experience, so it sounds like that was really transformative for you.
00:07:43.887 --> 00:07:50.081
Yeah, and I think a lot of people have a similar experience going there, which is why they're just so popular and so well known.
00:07:50.081 --> 00:07:54.891
Yeah, just a really friendly place to go, good for kids and families.
00:07:54.891 --> 00:08:05.168
Yeah, so when I took Lucy, I went with her and my dad and so we were just holding her around and like showing her the animals and, yeah, she had just a wonderful time.
00:08:05.168 --> 00:08:07.639
She just loves going out and meeting people and other animals.
00:08:07.920 --> 00:08:10.028
She's very it sounds like she's very social.
00:08:10.449 --> 00:08:14.108
Yes, I joke that she's the extrovert to my introvert.
00:08:14.108 --> 00:08:16.305
We just love to be home and reading books.
00:08:16.726 --> 00:08:17.387
She's let's go out.
00:08:17.387 --> 00:08:18.612
Let's go, mom.
00:08:18.612 --> 00:08:19.764
We're not sitting here all day.
00:08:20.105 --> 00:08:20.848
Yeah, exactly.
00:08:25.620 --> 00:08:29.250
Our pets are often the thing that we need in so many different ways, and it sounds like she's taking you along on her adventures.
00:08:29.271 --> 00:08:32.243
Yeah, absolutely Like she gets me out of that house for sure.
00:08:32.243 --> 00:08:34.447
She's also my emotional support animal.
00:08:34.447 --> 00:08:39.571
So I went through a lot of depression, anxiety, was in a really bad like emotionally abusive relationship for a long time.
00:08:39.571 --> 00:08:44.912
So she actually got me through a lot and she literally saved my life.
00:08:44.912 --> 00:08:48.190
I had like suicidal ideation for a period of time.
00:08:48.190 --> 00:08:58.352
So when I tell people like she saved my life, like she literally saved my life, and still like to this day, like every day, it's like I get up and I'm just like so happy that I can just be her mom.
00:08:59.000 --> 00:09:00.306
So that's so great.
00:09:00.306 --> 00:09:02.067
We always talk about who rescued who.
00:09:02.067 --> 00:09:07.986
You and your family did adopt her and rescue her, but it was meant to be for you.
00:09:07.986 --> 00:09:19.030
It was that support you needed, and sometimes we don't even realize it and it could be years later that they're the support we needed and we would have had no idea, but they're the reason we get up and go through our day for them.
00:09:19.030 --> 00:09:24.211
And so it's just really special that you guys have that bond yeah absolutely.
00:09:24.352 --> 00:09:29.629
It's been wonderful, yeah, and we actually took her to Armenia in 2019.
00:09:29.629 --> 00:09:30.270
Oh wow.
00:09:30.720 --> 00:09:31.884
That's a big adventure.
00:09:32.206 --> 00:09:33.068
Very big adventure.
00:09:33.068 --> 00:09:36.586
I have a few books in mind for that, so hopefully we get to do those.
00:09:36.586 --> 00:09:39.427
But yeah, she's, she's just always with me.
00:09:39.620 --> 00:09:44.006
No, that's a great book too, to teach kids about Armenia through the eyes of a dog.
00:09:44.006 --> 00:09:48.674
Yeah, exactly, so you have all these great stories and adventures.
00:09:53.279 --> 00:09:55.370
How did you actually decide what the first book would be, and what was that process for you?
00:09:55.370 --> 00:09:57.539
It was, I think last year I had gone to the Gentle Bar and I took a former co-worker.
00:09:57.539 --> 00:10:01.105
She was going for the first time and I love taking people for the first time.
00:10:01.105 --> 00:10:01.606
It's so much fun.
00:10:01.606 --> 00:10:29.919
No-transcript.
00:10:29.919 --> 00:10:31.003
Yeah, just reach out to us.
00:10:31.003 --> 00:10:32.687
And so I did.
00:10:32.727 --> 00:10:38.129
And the new year I reached out to them and by the time we started a meeting I had to get a chance to talk.
00:10:38.129 --> 00:10:44.724
It was April of this year and so I spoke to Ellie and she was really excited about it and she loved that.
00:10:44.724 --> 00:10:48.527
It was a book about my dog and her perspective and her adventure.
00:10:48.527 --> 00:10:53.691
So they were really excited for me and after I got their approval I just wanted to make sure they were okay with me writing the book.
00:10:53.691 --> 00:11:07.345
I went ahead and did my final draft and the process started for me to try to find an illustrator, find an illustrator, and so I found Agavni.
00:11:07.404 --> 00:11:24.846
Agavni is a young Armenian woman here also in the Los Angeles area, and I really wanted to hire specifically an Armenian woman because I wanted to support them, especially now with the rise of AI and all of these things like artists are not really being supported as much, and so I really wanted to make sure that I was doing that, and so I was really lucky with Agavni.
00:11:24.846 --> 00:11:25.629
She's amazing.
00:11:25.629 --> 00:11:29.267
She's done other children's books and I just love her art style.
00:11:29.267 --> 00:11:43.365
We went back and forth about just trying to get Lucy's character right, making sure she looked the way that I wanted, and so once we crafted that and got that perfect, then we went through the whole book and just page by page were collaborating on it.
00:11:43.365 --> 00:11:45.174
Yeah, I love I'm just looking through the book, book and just page by page.
00:11:45.195 --> 00:11:45.878
We're collaborating on it.
00:11:45.878 --> 00:11:46.119
Yeah, I love.
00:11:46.119 --> 00:11:51.340
I'm just looking through the book as you're talking about it and her illustrations are just there.
00:11:51.340 --> 00:11:57.932
There's like a softness to it, yeah, and playfulness, but all of the animals just look so happy.
00:11:57.932 --> 00:12:00.750
They all look like they're smiling and I just love that.
00:12:00.750 --> 00:12:05.524
It's just like a very happy book to look through and lucy just looks so happy throughout the whole thing.
00:12:05.524 --> 00:12:06.225
I love that.
00:12:06.868 --> 00:12:08.390
Yeah, which is true.
00:12:08.390 --> 00:12:20.251
It's based on true story, obviously but yeah, the animals are so happy there, like every time I go, I'm just like I just hearing like how they care for them and everything that they do is just so amazing.
00:12:20.251 --> 00:12:26.325
And also, the Gentle Barn is a great place for people to visit and it provides healing for humans too.
00:12:26.325 --> 00:12:33.289
So it's like they healed animals Right and, in turn, there's healing for people, which I feel like is similar to Lucy and I's story.
00:12:33.289 --> 00:12:35.751
It's like I rescued her, but she also rescued me.
00:12:35.812 --> 00:12:37.972
Right, that's great.
00:12:37.972 --> 00:12:43.717
So did she actually meet Lucy or visit the Gentle Barn, or did she just go off of photos?
00:12:45.860 --> 00:12:47.583
meet Lucy or visit the Gentle Barn, or did she just go off of photos?
00:12:47.583 --> 00:12:48.746
No, I just gave her some photos.
00:12:48.746 --> 00:12:54.726
She hasn't met Lucy yet, but I do need to give her a copy of the book so hopefully when we do that, when we drop it off, we can have her meet Lucy.
00:12:54.726 --> 00:12:58.601
But she did a great job, just like capturing Lucy's essence, I think.
00:12:58.601 --> 00:13:12.306
I think that can be hard to do, like you said, like she hasn't met her, but just going off of photos, and I sent her a lot of photos from the Gentle Bar, from our visits, from the website, just to make sure the characters look exactly like what you're doing.
00:13:12.306 --> 00:13:13.129
She did a great job.
00:13:13.229 --> 00:13:19.248
So I love that you were purposeful about wanting to support female artists and Armenian artists.
00:13:19.248 --> 00:13:40.490
I think that's so important for all of us that are in whatever type of creative world it may be writing, podcasting, things like that because there are so many and, like you said, AI is taking over and we want the true humans to be the ones creating these things, so I think that just adds such another great layer to how great your book is.
00:13:40.490 --> 00:13:41.371
I really love that.
00:13:42.340 --> 00:13:42.943
Thank you so much.
00:13:42.943 --> 00:13:56.063
Yeah, and I also want to mention we are donating a part of the proceeds of the book to the Gentle Barn, which I think is also important for me to support them because they've been so influential, not just in my life, but, I think, in so many people's lives.
00:13:56.063 --> 00:13:59.279
Every time I mention the book, people are like, yeah, I follow them on social media.
00:13:59.279 --> 00:14:00.442
I'm like, oh, this is amazing.
00:14:00.442 --> 00:14:01.864
You already know about the Gentle Barn, so it's great, yeah.
00:14:01.864 --> 00:14:02.105
And amazing.
00:14:02.125 --> 00:14:08.735
You already know about the Chetford, so it's great, yeah, and that's one of the ways I try to do it with the podcast to get more people to know about different rescues and organizations.
00:14:08.735 --> 00:14:20.964
But thank God for social media that we can all follow these amazing things, but it's even better when we can get a real story behind it and the impact that they're actually making with their animals and with people.
00:14:20.964 --> 00:14:29.068
Yeah, absolutely, and so everyone listening, there'll be a link in the show notes and I'm also going to post on social media where you can purchase the book.
00:14:29.068 --> 00:14:29.870
It's a great gift.
00:14:29.870 --> 00:14:34.010
I would say it's a great gift for kids, but anybody's going to enjoy reading through it.
00:14:34.010 --> 00:14:39.130
I did myself so in terms of the book, and you have all these other ideas.
00:14:39.130 --> 00:14:46.283
What's the one thing that your experience with Lucy is your motivating factor to share her story?
00:14:48.004 --> 00:14:51.447
I think really she just taught me to enjoy life.
00:14:51.447 --> 00:14:53.586
She just enjoys everything.
00:14:53.586 --> 00:15:01.210
Every time we go on a walk, every time we tell her we're leaving the house and we're going out, she's so excited and she's just so enthusiastic.
00:15:01.210 --> 00:15:04.890
And she's also so friendly to everybody.
00:15:04.890 --> 00:15:07.351
She says hi to everyone.
00:15:07.351 --> 00:15:08.732
She wants to say hi to all the dogs.
00:15:08.732 --> 00:15:10.113
Sometimes they don't want to say hi to her, but it's okay.
00:15:10.113 --> 00:15:10.974
And she wants to say hi to all the dogs.
00:15:10.974 --> 00:15:12.173
Sometimes they don't want to say hi to her, but it's okay.
00:15:12.173 --> 00:15:25.278
So I think just her like zest for life in a way, and just getting me again through those dark days, just having her and like the responsibility of being her mom and taking care of her, was really important for me to get me through those days.
00:15:26.058 --> 00:15:26.639
That's great.
00:15:26.639 --> 00:15:29.019
Yeah, I think that is so true about animals.
00:15:29.019 --> 00:15:39.024
Even when we have animals that have been through hard things or they've been in shelters or whatever they've gone through, they just leave it behind them and they move for it and they're so happy.
00:15:39.024 --> 00:15:44.817
And when animals are so friendly, it's like they have no preconceived notions about who people are, about how they look.
00:15:44.817 --> 00:15:48.174
They just want attention from anyone they meet.
00:15:48.174 --> 00:15:51.153
Animals can teach us a lot, that's for sure.
00:15:51.153 --> 00:15:52.847
Absolutely yeah.
00:15:52.847 --> 00:16:02.327
So you mentioned that after adopting Lucy, you started this journey yourself of vegetarian to vegan, and now you're actually a vegan coach.
00:16:02.327 --> 00:16:05.585
So can you talk a little bit about that journey and how that happened for you?
00:16:06.647 --> 00:16:15.268
Yeah, so obviously she had a big impact on my life in that way too, and so I've been vegan for about seven years I think six or seven years.
00:16:15.268 --> 00:16:21.289
And yeah, I, just a year and a half ago, I quit my job and I said I'm going to be a vegan lifestyle.
00:16:21.289 --> 00:16:22.092
Wow.
00:16:22.253 --> 00:16:36.059
I know, and obviously I'm also writing and so I'm doing things like that, but I just wasn't feeling like I was living my life's purpose, and I think during the pandemic, a lot of people had those questions of re-evaluating their life.
00:16:36.059 --> 00:16:36.900
What am I doing?
00:16:36.900 --> 00:16:38.330
How am I spending my time?
00:16:38.330 --> 00:16:39.533
Basically Right.
00:16:39.533 --> 00:16:41.067
And so I did get to a point.
00:16:41.067 --> 00:16:53.817
Even though I enjoyed my job I loved the people that I met I just felt it was time to take a leap, and helping other people make this change is like really fulfilling for me.
00:16:53.817 --> 00:16:57.732
And also I help businesses too, so I do consulting.
00:16:57.732 --> 00:17:03.336
So if you have a business you want to add some options and you're not sure where to start, I can help you with that too.
00:17:05.710 --> 00:17:06.191
That's great.
00:17:06.191 --> 00:17:09.506
I was born and raised in California, so we've always had all those options.
00:17:09.506 --> 00:17:16.198
It's more normal here, I guess you could say, than even other parts of the country, let alone the world, but it's so true.
00:17:16.198 --> 00:17:17.768
I've worked at different organizations.
00:17:17.768 --> 00:17:22.731
I worked at a Jewish university and they had a kosher kitchen and I'd never had an experience with that.
00:17:22.731 --> 00:17:29.271
So I can imagine there's companies that don't even know what they should do to have vegetarian and vegan options for their employees.
00:17:30.434 --> 00:17:41.436
Yeah, absolutely, and even, for example, a restaurant or cafe or really any business, because veganism it's about what you're consuming, right Head to toe, not just what we're eating.
00:17:41.436 --> 00:17:44.989
So I think about people are really into cruelty-free cosmetics.
00:17:44.989 --> 00:17:58.828
Now that's becoming a thing which I'm really happy about, because animal testing is horrific, and so just thinking about everything that you're purchasing, everything that you're contributing to, and just really doing your best, I think that's really important to keep in mind.
00:17:59.570 --> 00:18:05.229
Yeah, I know myself I'm from health issues and I've never really been a big meat eater.
00:18:05.229 --> 00:18:09.057
I've just once I was a kid and realized where that came from.
00:18:09.057 --> 00:18:16.157
I had a hard time eating it and I have health issues that I actually my body doesn't really process meat, so I've never been big on it.
00:18:16.157 --> 00:18:21.578
But when I thought about like true vegetarianism or veganism, it can be overwhelming.
00:18:21.578 --> 00:18:28.365
So that's a really important service you're providing, because someone could say you want that, but then the whole world is OK.
00:18:28.365 --> 00:18:29.548
Well, where do I start?
00:18:29.548 --> 00:18:36.374
Yeah, if someone's listening and they're like OK, this is the time I'm going to do it, I'm going to try to be vegan or vegetarian.
00:18:36.374 --> 00:18:39.836
What are some of the first steps you would give them as good ways to start?
00:18:40.567 --> 00:18:46.246
I also have a vegan one-on-one course that I sell and it basically gives you a breakdown of.
00:18:46.246 --> 00:18:51.553
I call it a five-week kickstart, but you have the course for life so you can take your time with it.
00:18:51.553 --> 00:19:04.666
And I think that's important because my number one tip is really just to take your time and slowly make those changes, because you want it to be a sustainable lifestyle change, and that can take a while.
00:19:04.666 --> 00:19:09.847
You look in your cabinet right now you might already have a bunch of vegan things that you don't even realize that we're vegan.
00:19:09.847 --> 00:19:10.609
You're already eating them.
00:19:10.609 --> 00:19:22.165
You don't have to just swap everything out, right, but you do have to take those recipes that you're familiar with, make a few changes, get comfortable with it and also your body needs to process.
00:19:22.165 --> 00:19:29.230
Like if you're eating a lot more lentils and beans and things like that, your body needs to take some time to process and get used to that.
00:19:29.230 --> 00:19:32.096
So I just recommend doing things a little bit slower.
00:19:36.384 --> 00:19:39.660
That's such a good point I haven't even thought about that when you've been eating a certain way for a long time and you're like, oh, I'm going to change.
00:19:39.660 --> 00:19:43.795
If you go drastic and completely change, that's a big shift for your body and your internal systems.
00:19:44.444 --> 00:19:48.551
Yeah absolutely and, of course, like for most people, it's a very positive shift.
00:19:48.551 --> 00:19:49.394
You will feel good.
00:19:49.394 --> 00:19:59.346
But again, if you're not really sure about how to prepare meals or like, how do you even read labels, things like that it might take a while for you to get used to.
00:19:59.346 --> 00:20:02.676
So that's the whole point of the course and the coaching to help people.
00:20:03.325 --> 00:20:04.167
No, that's important.
00:20:04.167 --> 00:20:21.028
I've noticed more things now say vegan or cruelty free, things like that, but you also have to know what those mean, because something could say dairy free or whatever, but I'm sure there's levels of all of it and what it really means in terms of the actual ingredients.
00:20:21.770 --> 00:20:22.613
Absolutely yeah.
00:20:22.613 --> 00:20:26.488
So I go over definitions first thing in the course, because that's very important.
00:20:26.488 --> 00:20:28.974
You might go see something in the grocery store.
00:20:28.974 --> 00:20:34.714
It says plant protein or something and then you see, oh, it has some eggs in there or it has like dairy cheese or something.
