68. Getting Comfortable with Discomfort & Changing for the Better with Clinical Health Psychologist, Dr Marissa Alert

I’m excited you’re here today for an incredible episode with our special guest Dr Marissa Alert. Dr Alert is a licensed clinical psychologist and speaker. She is passionate about helping people improve their health habits, lose weight, manage stress, and overcome barriers to live a life that’s in line with their values.   Dr Alert is an associate director and clinical product expert at Johns Hopkins HealthCare Solutions and she spends her time developing digital programs to help individuals better manage chronic medical conditions, including diabetes and obesity.   Whether it’s delivering corporate wellness webinars or leading in-person sessions, Dr Alert loves connecting with people to help them move from where they are to where they want to be. Today's episode begins with Dr Alert and I discussing why change is so hard and why so many people can’t stick to their healthy behaviours despite the best of intentions. We talk about facing the same problems over and over and how to break out of these patterns and also we talk about overcoming self-sabotage.   Next we discuss how to get comfortable with discomfort, how to sit with our feelings rather than eating them and how else we can manage emotional eating.   We then we talk about more difficult emotions such as grief and loss and Dr Alert gives us some wonderful and practical tips to dealing with difficult emotions.   Finally, we end the podcast talking about the changes a lot of people have experienced due to the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic and we focus on some positive things that are within our control to end on a lovely positive note. If you would like to learn more about Dr Alert follow her on Instagram at @dr.malert. Please subscribe and leave me a review  If you enjoyed this podcast, please tag me and share it in your Instagram stories and leave me a positive rating or review in the purple Apple Podcast app (in the rating & reviews section underneath the episode lists). This really helps my podcast get prioritised by Apple and helps me disseminate evidence based information to the people that need it the most! Don't forget to subscribe to my podcast so you never miss an episode!