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Actress, Author, Healthy Living from the Inside Out
www.marielhemingway.com

There’s nothing like a conversation with Mariel Hemingway to kick your well-being program right where it counts. The actress-cum-wellness ambassador has turned her life experience into a recipe for health and happiness, both of which did not find her easily. As the granddaughter of author Ernest Hemingway, whose life ended ultimately in suicide, Mariel shouldered the enormous burden that naturally comes of being the offspring of a tragic legend. She also suffered the sudden loss of her sister, the model and actress Margaux, who overdosed in 1995. Mariel is an Oscar nominee, a two-time Golden Globe winner, a wife, and a mother of two teenage daughters. She has channeled the sum of her life experience thus far; her fears and anxieties, her successes and joys, into a lifestyle and book that pledges allegiance to her four virtues: food, exercise, home and silence. Read on to find out how she helped her husband overcome cancer and how just being quiet is sometimes the best thing a woman can do for herself.

What I learned from Mariel: You can try every diet in the world, but there’s only one real way to sustain a healthy, lifelong relationship with food; balance!

Her Life as an Actress: Choices, Choices

“I always made a choice based on stretching the envelope for myself and often my choices were ahead of their time. For example, the movie ‘Personal Best’, or kissing Roseanne… getting nude on television… these were all risks. But I didn’t ever do it for the press. I was curious about taking new steps in my career and how it would make me feel. Consequently I kissed far too many women and my poor hubby looks like a beard!”

Looking Good, Feeling Good:

“I was on a set once and the production assistant asked me, “Mariel, I’m in my twenties but I can’t figure out how all of us are all so tired all the time, and you just always seem to be so energetic?” So I talked to her about food and not using artificial stimulants to stay up, since so often people on sets are constantly eating junk food and drinking caffeine to stay awake, and also about yoga and meditation. I get up two hours sometimes before my call time so that I can do what makes me feel good, whether that means 20 minutes of yoga or an hour. I know what keeps me going; and when I stick to that, I feel really good.”

Selflessness is Not A Virtue

“Taking Care of yourself empowers you to help others (and your business!) If you can’t take care of you, you can’t help take care of another. Selflessness does not serve you or anyone else. You can’t be an authentic you or express who you are. And, don’t forget, you are an example to those around you. Make a contract to be nice to yourself and be a friend to yourself. Ask yourself, would I have a friend who talked to me like that? Would I have that mean friend over to my home? The way we talk to ourselves can be so abusive, yet we would never, ever keep a friend like that.”

On Doubt and Negativity

“You don’t drop thoughts and you can’t push them away, but at the same time that voice of criticism is not who you are. Instead, label your thoughts but do not make them wrong. Acknowledge the thought by saying something like “ok, that is the ‘judgmental’ me, or the ‘critical’ me, or the ‘controlling’ me, and then just let it go. That’s what I do. I label it, then I try to just move on.”

Coming Out of Despair

“I grew up in a household with a lot of sickness. My mom died of cancer and I think there were all of these triggers that led me to want to be very extreme in how I took care of myself. Some of these were actually really unhealthy, even though I thought I was being so pro-active in my health. I have had some serious depression. The way I eat now pulled me out of it, plus my silence and learning to label my feelings. It has been a process knowing that energy shifts and that when you are in a low, it’s just one personality being expressed. We are more than just what we feel. In a moment, we are the accumulation of our experiences, events, history, and conditioning. Knowing that can be a release… a savior if you will. Knowing that we are many personalities and that one is not running the show.”

Changing Others

“Although as women we often think through love, persistence and hard work, we can change others. You do not change people. I don’t tell people what to do. I recommend they try things. Just try it. That’s all I suggest. But it can’t be about you. When my husband was going through cancer, I could preach to him all day about what to eat, what to do, but until he decided to make that change himself, it wasn’t really going to be a change with any lasting results. And he did ask me for help, and ultimately made lifestyle changes. But it was his choice, not my pushing it on him.”

Inspiration for the Book

“My husband and his second bout of cancer was my motivation to create a world of healing. I believe the four elements food, exercise, home and silence can help anyone heal, and I knew my message had to be shared.”

(Note: Mariel’s husband is now cancer free!)

Food, Glorious Food!

“Eating is good for you! I know that sounds normal and rational, but at different points in my life I actually didn’t believe this. I would be on the brown rice diet or the raw diet or the fruitarian thing. I tried everything! The idea for eating is to pull back on noisy foods (like sugar and caffeine) that cause agitation in order to return to our neutral zone that help us find the silence necessary to listen to our bodies. We know what those foods are and it’s about making different choices. I don’t need to tell you how to eat right! We all know what’s good for us and what isn’t. But if people would see that food really affects how they feel, they might make different choices.”

Fat: Yeah!

“Fat is a great food. I eat tons of olive oil, raw nuts or low heat slow roasted nuts, avocado, coconut oil and raw sesame oil. These are good fats. Fat does not cause body fat. It is the best nutrient to keep your hormones in balance and slow down the aging process as it nourishes the body and the cells from the inside. I don’t encourage giving up anything you love but be careful not to over over-indulge. Over satiation will breed contempt. Your food should be a celebration! ”

Shhhhhhhhh……

“What comes to you in silence is the truth. Silence is a place where your energy can fill up and where you are present with who you are. It is a place to just be. Women, being strongly intuitive, can make their best decisions here. It is okay for “me to be good to me” and I encourage everyone to start by taking simply two minutes a day in silence and slowly build on that. It will change your life.”

Movin’ and Groovin’

“I used to exercise like a crazy woman. I would do one hour one day, two hours the next day, then eventually build up to four hours of exercise a day, until I got sick. Now I know that less is actually more. Movement teaches us how to breathe, which is life! You don’t have to go to a gym to move. Doing movement with intention makes all the difference in the world. When you exercise in silence, you double the benefit. It teaches you how to be present. Your intention creates energy, which in turn, creates change (including in your body.)”

Home, Sweet, Sacred, Home

“I think everyone needs a place in their home where they can set up their silence. Find a place that is just yours. Ask yourself what speaks to you at your heart? This space can change based upon how you grow and develop as a spiritual being and it should. But make it yours and make it sacred. My space looks totally different than my husbands, but we both each have our own quiet place.”

Mariel’s Advice on Success

“Quite simply, be yourself. You don’t have to fit into a mold that is not your mold.”

This Featured Lady was profiled by Jennifer Galardi, a Los Angeles based dancer and fitness professional and owner of special event dance company Girls a Go-Go.

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