Who Needs Cheetos When You Have Checklists

Who needs Cheetos when you’ve got checklists? If you’ve ever felt that tiny rush from checking a box, grabbing a “comfort food,” refreshing your feed, or packing your day so full you can’t hear your own thoughts, you already understand the pull of dopamine and instant gratification. We’re talking about the sneaky ways stimulation becomes our default and why that doesn’t always lead to joy, even when the habit looks “productive.”

We explore what’s happening in the nervous system when rest feels unsafe, including how hypervigilance can form through real life experiences like motherhood, caregiving, stress, and trauma. We also unpack dopamine desensitization, why you need more and more to feel the same relief, and how modern life amplifies it with 24/7 access to everything. On the wellness side, we connect the dots to sleep, blue light, circadian rhythm, and the very real downstream impact on stress, burnout, inflammation, cravings, and perimenopause and menopause symptoms.

We talk about building a more cyclical life again through seasons, rhythms, and simple boundaries like a checklist-free day, plus how to “wean off” the thing you’re using as your fastest hit. Most of all, we keep it faith-first: learning to sit at the feet of Jesus, letting Scripture shape your blueprint, and trusting that peace is possible without chasing it.

If this encouraged you, subscribe, share it with a friend, and leave a review so more women can find faith-based wellness support. What’s one small thing you’ll do differently after listening?

 We’re so glad you’re here. 

In this quick pause, Melissa shares why Heart & Soul Elevation exists, how Stephanie's and Melissa's coaching work together beautifully, and what you can expect along the way. 

From time to time, we’ll pop in to invite you into things we’re creating - always as an invitation, never a sales pitch. 

Thanks for listening. You belong here. 

Transcript

Melissa 0:03

Today on the Heart and Soul Elevation Podcast, who needs Cheetos when you've got checklists. Welcome to the Heart and Soul Elevation Podcast, where faith meets wellness and women learn to live aligned spirit, mind, and body.

Stephanie 0:20

We're your hosts, Melissa Holman and Stephanie Pasniokis, two Jesus-loving women passionate about helping you steward your health without losing sight of the one who gave it to you. Around here, healing happens in community. Scripture leads the way, and science simply confirms what God designed.

Melissa 0:40

Let's elevate your heart and soul together. I love checking things off of my list. I, when I clean the house, I will write down every single thing I'm going to do. Not just clean the kitchen, clean the bathroom, but clean the kitchen, and then I will have sub sub things that I can start checking off. Wipe off the counters, clean the sink, sweep the floor, pump the floor, clean the stove, wipe down the I will literally write down every single thing that I'm going to do so that I can check it off. I love checking things off my list. How about you?

Stephanie 1:19

I have to I have a funny little story. When my uh youngest was seven, I we still have this list. She had this little it's our little normal. I don't have one here, which is a shocker, but a little yellow notepad in her pencil, and she didn't even spell checklist right, but she and she said do chores, C-H-O-R-S-E. She didn't even know how to spell. And she had her first checklist. She's been doing checklists and doing chores and getting stuff done since day one. So I don't know who she learned that from. It might have been both her father and myself, I have to say. Might have to own that one. But uh yes, I I love I love checklists. I I have planners full of checklists. I I it helps me think and it feels good to say I did that thing.

Melissa 2:10

Well, and I like to get something good about them. I like to get things out of my head and onto paper, not on my phone, not on my computer, but onto paper so that I can see it instead of have to remember it.

Instant Gratification And Dopamine Chasing

Stephanie 2:28

Yeah. I mean, what is it? What is what is a list but uh an external hard drive? Exactly. I mean, we've got wetware up here and it gets full and it can get you know messy, but it can get gummy and gummy, it can get distracted. I mean, it's really a superpower of you know what it can do and what it can do well. And and our brain is fantastic at automating things. But when we're trying to get these things done, it really helps our brain and helps our nervous system to write things down so that our brain doesn't sit there at three in the morning and go, You said you were gonna remember the thing and you forgot it and you're up and you're like crap. Right? Because our brain is always going to try to remember, remind us of those things because it thinks that we needed them to survive. We thinks we needed to do the dishes in order to survive. We've decided to say the dishes are really important. It's going to remind us if we don't do them. Um, that's just a silly example. But so listing, I call it listing, listing can be really, really important. Um uh, you know, but what does it mean? Like, what are we doing? So, so yes, listing can be an important thing, but but really whether it's Cheetos, I loved your your little title there. Cheetos, uh, whatever dopamine we're going after, right?

Melissa 3:45

Whatever dopamine we're seeking, yeah.

When Rest Starts Feeling Unsafe

Stephanie 3:48

Whatever dopamine we're seeking. So that is the real, I think that's really the crux that you hit on when you asked about that. You know, so maybe you're not eating Cheetos, maybe you're doing the checklist thing, but what is it that you're doing to seek that instant gratification? And uh, you know, recently we, you know, or or will or have, or I don't know. But there's this this idea that we have to stuff every spare moment of our day full of stuff, right? And and then the question is well, what's the motivation for that? Why do we do that? Is it because we don't even know how to be quiet or still or rest anymore? Why do we do that?

Melissa 4:25

Or is there some or is there something deeper? Is there some kind of trauma that makes rest feel unsafe? Sometimes something has happened in the past that if if I sit and if I rest, that that that part of the brain goes online. Oh my gosh, something needs to be done. I need to get something done, and rest becomes unsafe.

Stephanie 4:51

Not only that, as a mother, how often have or had it ever happened, certainly did to me, where one of your children hurt themselves while you were resting? Yep, yep. You know, that we get we're we're on, like honest to goodness, once I had kids, my sleep, dude, the smallest noise, I have to sleep with a fan on so that every little sound doesn't wake me up because I'm hyper aware. Even when my daughter was living and she had morning sickness and she was living with us um before she had my grandson, it could be in the middle of the night. I could have six fans on in my room, I was gonna hear her.

Melissa 5:33

Oh, yeah.

Stephanie 5:34

And I was gonna be awake. Like your brain, your mama, your mama brain, doesn't it? Mama brain. I know.

Melissa 5:40

It's hyper-vigilant when our kids were infants. You know, we had them in the um bassinet at the foot of the bed. My husband never heard him, not once, not once. Yes, I was breastfeeding, yes, it was my job to feed them, but like literally, he didn't hear anything at all. Like, men are not wired, they can be trained, their brain can be trained, yes, but just in general, totally not wired to hear that. But like something I never wanted to be a mom, that wasn't something that was on my bucket list for life. Um, and and you definitely did the thing, yeah. I we have four kids, and I wouldn't trade them for anything. I love them, and you can love yours, and I'll love mine, and that's how that will work. But like something switched, like that switch flipped right on, and total mom brain, like everything, yeah. Dope, and this is this is all the happy hormones, all the happy hormones, motherhood, yeah.

Motherhood Hypervigilance And Burnout

Stephanie 6:43

Yeah, and I mean, and that's not to say that there isn't postpartum depression or there isn't depression with motherhood, like you know, it can get hard, especially if you feel like you're alone, especially if um you're not having your own physical needs met. And when I mean that, I mean like your building blocks, your your your nutritional needs, your sleep needs, your stress, your your restore, your restoration needs. When do I take a shower? Like, seriously, can I just go to the bathroom without somebody knocking on the door? Right now, my kids, my youngest is 18 now, and I've got a grandson, you know, and and you know, there's it's so different place, but been through the other thing too. And and there's part of it never changes you. And then yet we've got some women listening who have never been moms. Maybe they wanted to be, maybe they didn't want to be for whatever reason. Um, some people are married, some people live on their own, some people are divorced. Um, some people are all of the above.

Melissa 7:42

Well, one of the things that I love about our feminine experience is you God designed us to bring life to the world, and life is not just children. Yeah. Life is not just children. Life, like, what if you're just the most amazing auntie to all of the all of the nieces and nephews? Like, that's bringing life to the world. My aunt, my dad's sister, she never had children of her own. She is the aunt that every kid should have.

Stephanie 8:11

Like, we we have one of those, yeah.

Melissa 8:13

She bring everybody should have one, and she just brings so much life to the world around her. And that's part of what our feminine design is, is to bring life to the world, not just and that creation.

Stephanie 8:27

There's all different ways we create some things create food, we can create art, we can create uh uh uh you know, safety for people.

Melissa 8:35

I was just thinking the same thing. I was just thinking this how I was gonna say safety.

Stephanie 8:41

Who are you?

Melissa 8:42

I don't know. This is weird.

Stephanie 8:44

Uh so you know, so how does this tie back into this dopamine thing? What is what is this drive to always be feeling this hit of of of dopamine? Where did this come from in our society? Where did it come from where we can't sit in peace and joy and have that be fulfilling? Because this is this is I want to give an example, physiological example, because that's where I come from. This is the kind of analogy that I understand. You walk into a stinky room, like it smells dirty socks, whatever. You walk into a stinky room, you spend enough time there, you don't smell it anymore. Correct. Until somebody brings something in stinkier, or you or you stick some essential oils, or you walk out of the room and come back in, or you walk out and come in. We get to sensitize to this dopamine, right? We get to sensitize. So if we're overly sensitizing ourselves and we don't take time to reset our perception, where uh whatever kind that is, it could be nose, eyes, spirit, right? It our nervous system, you know, sleep is a lot of times when that happens. We're not doing that very well anymore. We're sleeping like crap. We're we're staying up too late, we're in blue light. There's a lot of things getting in the way of our physical resetting, our physical restoration. Um, what are some of the things from your perspective that people are chasing to get this dopamine hit? I was, well, before I answer that, I was talking to somebody, even uh one of the things is thinking that adrenaline mistaking adrenaline and the highs from adrenaline and the feeling of energizing from adrenaline as necessary for joy, right? We we're conflating two things that aren't necessary, right? I I don't know how to explain that better. But we we make incorrect associations sometimes in our superpower brain. It's really good at associating, but sometimes it makes wrong associations. And and I think that this this chasing of the dopamine stimulation as a proxy for joy is one of them. Did I say that in the in a way that makes sense?

Melissa 11:11

I think so. I think so. And unfortunately, just about everything in our world right now is set up for that immediate hit. Um almost everything. I can go to Amazon and have something delivered in two hours. I can go and scroll, I don't have my phone in my hand, but scroll through my phone and that that is set up to give us that dopamine. Cheetos. Cheetos, Cheetos are well, well, that's the bliss point, right? I we've talked about it, but I don't think we've explained the bliss point. We've talked about it on another episode, but like our food is is designed in a laboratory to hit that that point of bliss in our brain so that we will continue to chase it.

Creating Life Beyond Having Kids

Stephanie 12:04

Yeah, continue to chase it. The actual definition of the bliss point when it comes to food is the the the formulation of a particular food item that results in the maximum calorie intake. And so when they do food studies and they're they're testing different formulations and they bring people in, they look at the the bliss point is exactly the formulation that that results in the most eating. All right. So so think about this, guys, when you're going to grab these foods that you feel are comfort foods. Why are they calling the comfort foods? Because they're they're they're hitting the points, they're hitting that dopamine. It's dopamine, sartonin, it's it's it's sugar, it's it's all the happy remote. It's all the happy stuff. But it's do it's being done to manipulate you. And in the end, it you need more and more and more, more often, in order to, it's like, and and people, you know, we get really squirrely about saying food can be addictive because food is necessary for life. And people like to say, well, it's not addictive in the way a uh an addictive drug is addictive, like tobacco or or other types of things, which are very physiologically addictive. But behaviorally, you know, we have to think about why is it that we're doing something, you know, and and what's what's feeding that whole entire cascade of choices to eat these foods. And so we don't, you know, very sensitive to people with um eating uh just you know, what might be considered an eating disorder or some sort of um, you know, uh orthorexic food um uh obsession or or or fixation. However, there is these these foods that hit the bliss point. The owners of these companies that are creating these foods were the food addiction scientists, were the addiction scientists that came from the tobacco industry. And you can this is history. You can read about this. This is not secret, this is not tinfoil hattie, this is real history. Um, you can read the book, Sugar Salt, Fat by Michael Moss. And it's very clear, and he was an extremely good researcher. And um he talks about all of this. I had to read it as a textbook in one of my uh, you know, uh, so it's a it's a heavy read, but it's a really good book. And I I've highlighted, I I don't know why I bothered having a highlighter, because literally it was everyone. The whole book was highlighted.

Melissa 14:40

Yeah, I've had I have those books.

Stephanie 14:44

The point is that you're right, we're getting this this constant need.

Melissa 14:52

And and just like just and just like with our stress levels, just like with our stress levels, if I live here all the time, I stop feeling it. I have to go up here to feel it more. And I and then when I stop feeling it there, I have to go even higher to feel it more. So it's the same.

Stephanie 15:12

The dopamine, meanwhile, your menopause symptoms or perimenopause symptoms are freaking out. You're hot flashes, you're not sleeping, you're you're you're fainting, you're tempered, you know, all these things are happening. You're gaining weight. You know, you might even find yourself in with diseases of chronic inflammation. You might find yourself with insulin resistance or metabolic syndrome or cardiovascular disease or type 2 diabetes or Alzheimer's or like all of these things are associated together, fatty, fatty liver. And and in in a sense, it's this big, huge snowball of chasing satisfaction.

Melissa 15:49

And you know, there's satisfaction can be found in so many ways. It's not just the food, right? No, it's not just the food, it's not just like you said, it's the checklist. It's not just the checklist. Like I could, I can work out to excess, I can do good things to excess. Mm-hmm.

Stephanie 16:08

Yeah. And and so then the question becomes like, what's what is what does it look like to not do that? And I've had to train my body over the last eight years, and it's taken that long. And I've I think I've made my biggest strides in the last year. This is ridiculous. Um, I wish I had known these things earlier. I wish I had someone like me to tell me these things earlier, but I'm telling my girls now and they're younger, and I'm hoping, I'm hoping that it we can squeeze this earlier and earlier in life because um we I'm learning how to be quiet. And and the so again, I have to go back. I had stopped eating, I was eating too much sugar and things like that, uh, and hitting that bliss point all the time. I started practicing um, you know, a different, you know, way of eating, taking care of my health, and my sensation for sweetness became resensitized. So where I used to have to take a nice, ripe, very sweet strawberry and add sugar for it to taste good, I can have one that's slightly green at the top, and it's most people would consider tart and not worth eating. And to me, it's bliss, it's the perfect sweetness, right? Our biggest appreciation for things can happen when we're not getting them all the time.

Melissa 17:40

Yeah.

Dopamine Desensitization And The Bliss Point

Stephanie 17:41

So now that my grandson isn't living here every day, that the certain kids aren't living here every day. I appreciate so much more when they are here, and I have so much more patience for them when they are here, and I can so much more uh, you know, and so then the question is how do we again, it's just two good things, right? Where's this tension? We're holding in tension. We need to sit at the feet of Jesus. I love that you often bring up a um an image of just sitting at the feet of of Jesus like a child, or walking beside God, holding the hand and being led and guided. And this just this idea of this relationship first, and and saying, God, show me in your word what is the blueprint for my life to have uh to be to be and do what you would have me be and do. And I just I have been a Christian and following God since I was 17, and I'm just figuring this out. My dad and I started having our daddy-daughter dinner dates about seven or eight years ago, and I've seen a lot of change in him, but I've been sitting at his feet at these dinners every month. We're having another one tonight, and I'm and I am learning so much of this wisdom from him as well. And I thank God every day for for that I'm so lucky that my my father on earth is a child of my father in heaven and gets to share his decades more of wisdom with me. And you know what? Things happened in his life later than they're happening for me. So it is getting earlier, right? Yeah, but um what would we say to someone? Because remember now, I've got you might think this is a trick question. If you're just sitting down all day doing nothing and you feel like you're lazy and no energy or whatever, are you chasing dopamine? Are you filling your day? Well, what are you doing? Are you on TV? Are you on your phone? Are you reading like what are you doing? You're not necessarily doing nothing, like just sitting and doing nothing. You know, uh, because I was it's immediately I thought, oh, you know, one of my kids, you know, they're not doing anything. Well, hmm, my young my son is playing video games all day long on his days off all day, and then sleeping in between, maybe getting something to eat if I remind him, if he's visiting. This is if he's visiting.

Melissa 20:16

And I think it's important to remember that God designed the world in a cyclical way. Going back to your strawberry analogy, or strawberry, um, not analogy.

Stephanie 20:31

My sugar sensitization.

Stress Tolerance And Health Consequences

Melissa 20:34

Sugar sensitization. There was a time in history where strawberries were not available every day of the year. There was a time in history where we couldn't get everything all the time. And when we were when we were going to get it, it was something to look forward to, something to be excited about, and something that we and something that we savored. Exactly. But but because everything's available all the time now, 24-7, we don't have to wait for anything.

Stephanie 21:07

Our our sensitivity is remember when the circus would come to town.

Melissa 21:12

Remember?

Stephanie 21:13

Do you remember Barnum and Bailey's?

Melissa 21:14

I do remember when the circus would come to town, and it was always something to really look forward to. Always something to look forward to. But where can we where where can we choose a cyclical pattern in our lives? Some people choose to eat like what's in season, go into the farmer's market and only buying what's in season. Um, but where where can we make something in our life a little bit more cyclical instead of constantly 24 7?

Stephanie 22:43

Honestly, I love following the seasons in a lot of ways, not just for food. First of all, when we do that, um, especially if you're living where your family has always been. Because there's something to be said for the genes that tend to express more in your body based on uh latitude planet. You know, if you're from a tropical area and your body and your family's always been there, you're gonna have actually a slightly different expression of genes. You're not genetically like more amylase, less amylase, like more you know, it's gonna be different. But if you're where like my family is still at the generally the same latitude of as they've always been, um, it's a little harder now that we're more melting pot. But you know, in the winter, we slow down, we have less sunlight, we're inside more. It's warm, you know, we we eat a little more, we might gain a little bit of weight. That's there things are changing. It's a it's a quieter time. And in the spring, we want to get out more, we start to come alive, just like the birds and the and the and the and the bees and the and the plants, right? Um, we're gonna be more active, we're gonna get more done, we're gonna be out and about more. There's there's there's a cyclical nature to the seasons when you're in a place that is seasonal, that there's the foods, there's the activities. Um so I see for me winter as a time of rest and restoration a little bit more than other times and in a different way. Um, so it can it can look like that. I also um cyclically, like how I how I eat during the day um in different times of year, uh like I try to eat during sunlight so that my body's natural circadian rhythm is is is my food is tracking with my natural circadian rhythm, right? Things like that. Um what else what are some of the things that you're thinking?

Dropping The Checklist And Weaning Off

Melissa 24:49

I'm just uh just thinking back to how our you know our stress when we when we're feeling our stress gear all the time, it takes more for us to feel it. Just like you were talking about your sugar sensitivity level. If I if I'm here all the time, I have to have more and more and more to actually taste it. So where can I where can I in my daily life let some of that go?

Stephanie 25:19

I think I think the circadian rhythm is a really great one, right?

Melissa 25:22

Yeah, I think so too.

Stephanie 25:24

We don't get light at the right times. We're getting blue light when we should be getting red light, and we're getting uh we're we're we're we're both light deprived during the day and light toxic at night.

Melissa 25:36

So but I'm also thinking about the Cheetos in the checklist. Like, is there a time where I could not use a checklist? And not seek that dopamine in that way.

Stephanie 25:48

For me, that's Sundays. I don't do checklists on Sundays. Yeah, Sundays are Sundays, that's my day where I feel no guilt about not feeling not even having to do a thing. I mean, I'll make dinner, yeah, whatever. I go to you know, I go to church and I it's our habit or our our our standard to just hit the grocery store on the way home from church.

Melissa 26:09

But other than that, it's I think the question though is like where am I where am I so where is where is it that my level is so high that I have to do even more to feel to feel that relief? I mean, just like just I'm talking about anybody who's listening, like anybody, where in your life are you noticing that you have to go above and beyond to even feel that bliss again, that dopamine hit again? It like I said at the very beginning, clean the kitchen, wipe the countertop, mop the floor, list everything out. Could I just clean the kitchen? Do I need to have a list like that? Do I know how to clean my kitchen? Yes. So could I look at the kitchen?

Stephanie 27:03

Yeah, and there might be times where there might be times where you need the list extra extra deep because you're needing to have a little bit of that um positive reinforcement, like that little bit of motivation, get the ball rolling, activation energy, they call it in chemistry, like get that exothermic reaction going. But I'd say that if you're if there were to be a formula for this, it would be identify the thing and wean yourself off of it.

Melissa 27:39

Yes, absolutely.

Valleys Mountains And A Better Expectation

Stephanie 27:40

Start to just decrease it, wean it, say, what would it look like if you know if you're not sure? I mean, call a coach, you know, you're talking to a couple, whatever, right? If you're not sure, but I mean, or a friend, a a mentor, a wise person in your world, right? Pray about it, find an example in the word, dig into it, but first acknowledge it, notice it and recognize it for what it is. You're gonna wanna start dialing it back, you're gonna start wanting to wean off of it so that you can appreciate it more when it has to happen, right? We need to start treating the evening. If we go back to before there was artificial light, there were candles and there were fires, and those were expensive. And so people would go to bed, you know, they would stay up with the fire. Fire is very soothing, it's very so it's not to say let's undo all of this modern modernity, it's not about that. It's saying, you know, how can we put that balance and that space and that margin back into our lives so that we can have appropriate levels of appreciation with appropriate levels of stimulation?

Melissa 29:00

Yes, yes, you know, and and and lower our tolerance for dopamine, and we're so much less likely to burn out. So that when I do get ahead of dopamine, I actually feel it.

Stephanie 29:13

Yeah, without burning out, without getting to the point where you're you're having to burn it, you have to chase it so hard that your body breaks down.

Melissa 29:22

We don't want that.

Stephanie 29:23

We don't want that. Your body can break down because you're trying to do and accomplish, but it can also break down because you're trying to chase the the good feeling, the happy feeling, right? So because too much of a good thing is still too much, yeah. And we're not always gonna live in in joy and happiness. There are times where we need to have sorrow. There are toy there are we're supposed to have hills and valleys. There's sometimes where we're just enduring and it's just the great plains, right? That's the beauty of life. And um, for some reason, I was just praying about that this morning.

Melissa 30:01

Like, God, I know that there are valleys, I know there are mountains, but I know that you're always walking right beside me. Like, I don't have to worry about my next step. I know exactly where I'm going to step because you're already stepping there.

Stephanie 30:13

How do you appreciate the mountain if you don't have the consciousness?

Melissa 30:16

If you've never had a valley, yeah.

Stephanie 30:18

So we have to allow life, we're gonna learn from those things.

Melissa 30:23

We learn in the valley, yes, so that we can experience the mountaintop, and so we can teach other people about the valley, and teach other people about the valley so they can get to the mountaintop too, yeah.

Listener Reflections And Closing Steps

Stephanie 30:35

Right. So there's an the whole entire experience that we're having um is meaningful in total, the good and the bad, the happy and the sad.

SPEAKER_00 30:49

Uh and our world has created a situation where you're told that you should always feel good. And I don't think that's to our betterment.

Stephanie 31:17

I think it's led to a lot of um disordered behavior and expectations that are stealing the joy from people. Yep. So what are we asking our listeners for today?

Melissa 31:34

What can you do with what you now know? We wanna we want to hear. Tell us in the comments. Yeah. What what hit home for you today? Like, what is it that really was like aw moment?

Stephanie 31:49

Yeah, yeah. I what we'd we'd love to know. We'd love to know what you want to hear more about, too. Yep. But I hope that this has shed some light on on some things for you today. I'd love to know what uh what that dopamine you're chasing is, what that might look like to, you know, what's one thing you would do differently? Just one small thing you'd start doing differently. Awesome. That's where we start. It's just that one step. So awesome.

Melissa 32:17

I'm gonna go make my next checklist. Thanks for joining us for today's conversation on heart and soul elevation.

Stephanie 32:30

If this episode encouraged you, be sure to share it with a friend. Remember that healing happens in community.

Melissa 32:37

Be sure to subscribe for more faith first conversations. And if you're desiring more community, come join us over on YouTube where we grow together in real time. Until then, keep your eyes on Jesus, care for the body he gave you, and may his peace guard your heart and mind.