The Christian Nutritionist

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105: Growing Strong with Cambria Joy

Chelsea Blackbird

At the age of 14, Cambria Joy overcame an eating disorder by crying out to Jesus during a bread binge. She’d been severely restricting her diet, overexercising, obsessing about her appearance and feeling disgusting in her body. 

What the enemy intended to destroy, God used to His glory. He focused her heart on Him instead of on her body and now she influences hundreds of thousands of women to do the same. 

Listen in as certified fitness and nutrition coach, Cambria Joy, shares how she overcame binge eating and overexercising to find peace in food and fitness. This week’s episode is packed full of scripture and strategy - you’ll love it!

EPISODE 105: Growing Strong with Cambria Joy

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SHOW NOTES

(0:00) Intro

  • Hello my friend, welcome back to the club.

  • I love connecting with fellow health practitioners who love Jesus and I have a beautiful soul with us here today.

  • She is a certified personal trainer and nutrition coach, she inspires a huge following on her YouTube channel and she has a book called Growing Strong and I’m so happy she’s here to talk about food, fitness and Jesus with us today. 

    • Welcome Cambria to The Christian Health Club Podcast! 

(1:42) Tell us more about you and the work that you do.

  • Cambria tells her story of how she started her YouTube channel at 14-year-old.

  • How an experience led to an eating disorder.


(5:06) When you started putting content out, were you still in the midst of struggling with the eating disorder?

  • Sophomore year, diet culture.

  • Always walked with Jesus since she was a little girl.

  • The enemy distorts everything that is good.

  • Asked the Lord for help.

    • Surrendering body and health over to God.

    • Being transformed by the renewing of our mind.

  • There is a better way, we don’t have to go in circles.

(13:37) Being “flesh-minded”

  • Putting too much emphasis on the way we look.

  • Sometimes it’s hard to look beyond what we see in our physical body.

  • Nourishing ourselves on daily bread:

    • Jesus is the bread of life

    • Everything we do can be done in the glory of God

    • A surrender and an invitation

    • Adding to life vs. Sucking from life

    • Finding rest for our souls

  • Removing the mind drama

  • Spirit based approach

(20:00) What is your dietary approach now?

  • When it comes to food, no dieting

  • Intentional nourishment with intuition

  • There is so much more to health than how you look

    • First pain-free period

    • Hormones

  • Protein and carbs every 3-4 hours

  • Many women do no get enough protein

    • John the Baptist

    • Weston A. Price

    • Exo Bars

(30:36) In the book you say, you don’t like to emphasize numbers in your fitness journey…How do you stay on track with food and fitness when you’re not measuring things?

  • Keeping this super simple

    • Eating every 3-4 hours

    • Protein with every meal and snack

  • Looking at your food and having a general understanding of portion sizing.

  • Protein is the most satiating macronutrient

(35:36) Let’s talk about fitness! What would you say are the biggest bang-for-your-buck strength moves? You do have a philosophy of “core before more” - so talk to us about that too?

  • Everything it interconnected.

  • Strengthening abs, glutes, low back, etc. everything working and strengthening in unison so we can move well and prevent injury.

    • Squatting, pushing, pulling, lifting, rows.

    • Strength movements that we are doing in life.

  • Any sort of movement that you like to do, do it!

  • Strength training can be added slowly, try just 10 minutes 2x per week!

    • Exercise routines in the book.

(43:20) In the book you say, “God is never in a rush and He created everything that way, so instead of fighting it, embrace the opportunity to be present in the moment and to be present to your Maker.” I love that - how do you and how do you help others push through those times when they want to throw in the towel because they aren’t seeing results?

  • A common issue for many of us is that we’re in a rush to see results and I’m always trying to remind people that we must give our bodies the time to change and heal and rebalance.

  • Your body has to believe you

    • Think about planting a tree

  • Ask yourself, “What action did I do today to make me one step closer to my goal?”

    • Questioning our unit of measuring ourselves.

    • Consistency, don’t give up!

(51:24) Anchor Questions:

  • What is your anchor meal?

    • Breakfast: two eggs with ghee and orange juice

    • Gorilla Milk

      • Celery, cucumber, spinach, nut milk

      • Homemade almond milk

What is your anchor verse?

  • Exodus 14:14

  • The Lord’s timing is perfect

  • He makes a way when there is no way

(1:01:35) Where can people connect with you and tell us more about the book.

(1:02:52) Outro & Disclaimer

Thanks for listening! Have a healthy and blessed week!




XOXO,

Chelsea