You are likely busy, trying to balance your family, work, social life, and well, just the simple things like making it to the gym a few days a week.
Your health sometimes gets put on the back-burner, and even if you have the sporadic health kick (or diet or juice cleanse), it’s easy to fall back off the bandwagon right after.
What’s more, is you might not even realize just how bad you feel.
I get it. Prior to entering the world of nutrition, I used to think that being tired was just how we live, something that everyone experienced. I also never thought twice about certain foods leading to bloating, indigestion and frequent trips to the washroom. I had never really reflected on how I felt. I also had no idea just how bad stress could be on my body.
Perhaps you now realize a bit more about how much food matters, but you need the accountability and support to get there. That’s what I’m here for.
While working a fast-paced corporate job at a Fortune 500 company, I spent three years battling with extreme exhaustion, severely upset stomachs (diagnosed by the doctor as ‘just IBS’), overall weakness and even depression. I was too tired to keep up with the little things in life, let alone make it to the gym or have the energy to have much of a social life.
I was told by my doctor “It’s just something you’re going to have to live with.” Eventually, I took a different approach to my health and looked at it from a holistic side.
That's when everything changed.
When you start to make little tweaks to what you’re eating and daily habits you have, you start to notice big changes. Your energy improves, your stomach flattens, and your skin glows — not to mention the weight falls right off!
It’s my mission to make healthy eating easy and enjoyable so that you truly stick with it, make it a lifestyle and most importantly, get results!
During my time in the corporate world, I started to make little shifts in what I was eating and how I was taking care of myself. I noticed that all of a sudden I wasn’t experiencing that afternoon slump; I could concentrate better, was happier to come to work and was a more engaged employee!
I knew this was something I had to share! Given my seven years experience in the corporate world, I understand the pressure, pace and stress and real environments people work in and that a company’s employees are its biggest asset.
I’ve created corporate wellness programs for some of Canada’s top companies, including Google, Facebook, PwC and Odlum Brown. To learn more about HEAL’s corporate wellness programs, click here.
Natalia is a Toronto-based Registered Holistic Nutritionist and the Operations & Engagement Manager at HEAL. In addition to coaching one-on-one nutrition clients, Natalia leads our corporate wellness programs including our wellness challenge and lunch and learns.
Natalia has hosted wellness seminars for some of Canada’s top companies, including Salesforce, McKinsey & Company and Klick Health on a number of topics, including boosting energy, stress management and burnout recovery, digestive health, the immune system, and hormone health. She regularly hosts educational online seminars for HEAL, Goodness Me Natural Food Market, and has hosted in-person events for major brands including Jamieson Vitamins. She is also a regular contributor of content and recipes to the HEAL blog.
Learning to find balance in her own diet by emphasizing real, quality food, and prioritizing her mental health, helped her to overcome years of digestive issues, low energy and hormonal imbalances. Natalia is passionate about using a holistic approach to help others find the diet and lifestyle that works for them.
Amanda is a Kelowna-based Holistic Nutritionist, a Certified Whole30 Coach and the Administrative Assistant at HEAL. She graduated from Dalhousie University in 2014 with a Bachelor of Science and Bachelor of Management before going back to school at the Canadian School of Natural Nutrition in 2016. Amanda works closely with Natalia to facilitate our Corporate Wellness Challenges and helps create our social media content.
When she's not working with us at HEAL, Amanda also runs online Whole30 group coaching programs throughout the year and works one-on-one with clients at the West Kelowna Integrative Health Center. Amanda has a passion for women's health including digestion, hormone balance and energy optimization.
Dr. Jason Marr is a Naturopathic Doctor, Performance & Productivity Coach, Expert Health & Wellness Speaker, and Director of Evoke Integrative Medicine Ltd. in downtown Vancouver, BC. He arms urban professionals with the pragmatic tools to maximize performance, productivity and resilience. Using an evidence-informed, holistic and integrative approach, Dr.Marr is a productivity and performance coach for anyone who is striving to be awesome. Jason leads many of our Naturopathic-based lunch and learns and webinars, including topics on Burnout, Anti-Aging & Longevity, Men's Health, & Cancer Prevention.
Ayah Norris is a Yoga and Meditation Teacher and Holistic Healer, based in Toronto. She shares yoga, meditation, breath-work, energy healing, mindfulness tools and intuitive guidance to help clients rebalance, restore, and reconnect – to the body, mind, heart and soul.
Ayah first turned to yoga, meditation and holistic therapies to help manage a demanding career in sales and marketing across startup, corporate, and creative environments. After a decade of practice, she made the leap out of her corporate path, and followed her heart to deepen her studies in India where she completed her Reiki Master, Holistic Healing and Hatha Yoga Teacher Training certifications. She now shares the wisdom she gleaned from her studies with healers and teachers across the globe through her healings, meditation and yoga classes, and workshops.
Ayah is available to lead corporate meditation and mindfulness workshops in the Greater Toronto Area.
Sidney Shindle is a Certified Nutritional Practitioner and former national level synchronized swimming coach. She runs a private practice in New Westminster, BC. She is also a lead faculty member at the Institute of Holistic Nutrition and co-founder of Fiore Health, a continuing education platform for health and wellness practitioners.
With a decade of coaching experience in the sports realm, she applies similar approaches to her corporate wellness seminars and to her individual client work. She believes that by providing the right knowledge and tools, individuals are able to develop and sustain their own foundation of good health.
Dr. Courtney Ranieri is a Naturopathic Doctor who practices in the Toronto area and is passionate about improving and optimizing the health of her patients. She believes in treating patients with long-term health in mind, so that feeling great is achievable and sustainable. Her goal is to is dig deeper to treat the root cause of your concerns rather than the symptoms. She is a graduate of the University of Western Ontario and obtained her Doctor of Naturopathic Medicine from Canadian College of Naturopathic Medicine in Toronto. Dr. Ranieri is available for corporate lunch & learns in the Toronto area.
Anna is a yoga teacher and movement specialist based out of Kitchener-Waterloo that focuses primarily on workplace wellness, bringing various self-care practices to people at work. Striving to keep stress levels and career demands balanced, she found yoga was her most powerful tool. That brought her to her first 200 hour teacher training in 2007 at Octopus Garden Yoga Center in Toronto, and is now a forever student of yoga, biomechanics, various movement modalities, mindfulness and breath work. In 2016 she completed the Yoga Tune Up® and The Role Model® certification and in 2017 completed a year long program in Applied Functional Science® with the Gray Institute in Adrian Michigan. Both have been pivotal in her own movement, self-care and offerings to the community and in the past year while pivoting online during these unprecedented times.
Michelle is a Registered Social Worker and Psychotherapist based in British Columbia. Michelle's path in life has been one of self-development and growth, following her heart and being in service to others. Moving through addiction, depression, anxiety and burn-out, Michelle has transformed her own life and herself. She considers herself a student for life and a teacher, guide, mentor, coach and therapist.
Michelle is a renegade, always bringing the unconventional wisdom with her wherever she finds herself. Whether that be in former roles in numerous universities, catholic schools or forestry contracts to her current coaching, therapist, mentor and educator roles; she really knows how to WAKE people up to their true wellness in all settings.
Maya is a Certified Nutritional Practitioner and health-supportive chef who delivers wellness and nutrition-related speaking engagements and cooking demonstrations for numerous major organizations. Throughout her career, Maya has helped hundreds of people let go of fad diets and build lasting habits and mindset shifts that foster a positive relationship with food, empowering them to deeply nourish their bodies. She began her journey in the fitness industry as a sports nutritionist and has since transitioned to running her own coaching practice, Maya Nutrition, where she predominantly works with clients looking to improve their mindset and behaviours around food, exercise, and body image.
Taren Grewall is on a mission to inspire people to feel stronger not just physically, but to empower them mentally and spiritually. She is known throughout Vancouver for her unique strength training and circuit programs. A straight forward, efficient, results focused and fun take to the personal training experience. Throughout her years in this industry she is most proud of building am incredible community of goal smashing like minded men and women. Taren hosts HEAL's Ergonomics, Stretching & Pain Management lunch and learn.
Carolyn Anne Budgell (BA, ERYT 200, Kula 75, Prenatal, Yin) discovered yoga in 1999 as a ski bum in Whistler. She is now mainly a meditation guide (and lifelong student!). She has been guiding yoga + meditation trainings, retreats & corporate events worldwide for over 13 years. Carolyn has had the privilege of sharing mindfulness and yoga tools through various platforms: Insight Timer, Wanderlust Festivals, lululemon, Love Your Brain, Mala Collective and many more. With Carolyn, you’ll discover tools for the nervous system and mind through Mindfulness + Meditation, Breathing Techniques and Restorative Spa Yoga. Carolyn leads meditations for HEAL's Vancouver area clients.
Dr. Larissa is a doctor of Naturopathic Medicine. After competing in the Canadian National Figure Skating Championships her skating career ended with a chronic groin and low back injury. Years later, she ended up working with a kinesiologist & naturopathic doctor to heal the root cause of her injury and pain. It offered her an approach that was different. One that was grounded in both science & nature. Larissa's goal now is to inspire & encourage her patients to build lifestyle habits that cultivate wellness from within. She believes in creating a space for her patients to feel heard & supported. Her philosophy on medicine is to find the root cause of illness, treat the whole person & educate her patient so that they can make informed decisions about their health.
Nicole is completing her PhD in psychology, and as a researcher, has been sharing scientific research with other scientists for years. However, she noticed how infrequently scientific information is shared with the broader community. She is committed to addressing this disconnect and to making high-quality mental health and wellness research more accessible and digestible for everyone. She is also the founder of WellIntel Talks.
I’m down 5lbs after two weeks!!!! All from meal plan + 20 minutes (sometimes more) of treadmill walking per day. I feel great [...] and I know I can keep it going. Oh - and my boyfriend is in for his second week of meals, he loved it! Also, I finally have the energy levels I expected to have after my Celiac diagnosis.
We worked with Mandy to hold a professional development workshop that would educate our staff on the impact of enhanced wellness on personal and professional performance; it was one of the most engaging sessions I've ever participated in. She leaves you feeling empowered to make adjustments in your routine for tangible results.
Just wanted to say how much I've appreciated your continual wealth of info on the foods we've been eating, nutrition in general. You present a lifestyle that I found in no way too intimidating to attempt, and I believe that's so important for anyone looking to make a complete overhaul in something that's such a huge part of day to day life.
