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I Went Back to the '70s and Lost 6 Stone
- Sarah Sayer
- 3 days ago
- 6 min read
Updated: 5 hours ago
How a self-sufficient childhood, a modern health crisis, and the reclamation of sovereignty changed everything.
This is not a weight-loss blog. This is a sovereignty story—with real results. If you’ve ever wondered why you can’t “just do the thing,” this is for you.
Childhood
We bartered for shellfish, drank raw milk still warm from the farm, built dams in burns, and made rafts. Sometimes, we got lost—but we always found our way home.
We weren’t mollycoddled—after all, we are Gen X. And we were rarely ill.
It was in part idyllic, in part stressful—parental marriage decline and upheavals. And that's really why that time in our lives ended.
Out of Balance
Fast-forward 30 years. I found myself chronically ill with an autoimmune condition, liver damage from autoimmune hepatitis. I wasn't doing so well in life.
I lacked purpose. I drifted. I wasn’t getting a grip on what I was doing—or why I was doing it.
Maybe because of my childhood, I wasn’t willing to accept managed health decline. But I also couldn’t fully understand why I was ill, unhappy, unfulfilled—why I kept repeating the same cycles, blindsided by events that shouldn’t have surprised me.
And maybe, also because of my childhood, the one thing I was good at was plodding along like a carthorse—year after year, stuck in the same conditions, never fully developing myself.
But bizarrely, at the same time, doing mountains of self-help.
What Would You Do?
So, if you were me, what would you do with a diagnosis like mine?
I thought I was tackling it head-on.
First, I went down the nutritional therapy rabbit hole.Instead of seeing a specialist, I did a post-grad diploma in nutritional science and practice. I learned a lot—completely valid, useful information.
But I also gained two stone in weight while studying nutrition. Not ideal for someone in the wellness field.
Then I went down the mind rabbit hole—training as a clinical hypnotherapist and specialising in regression therapy. That led to energy work, quantum particles, meditation, manifestation, and the power of the mind.
And guess what?
I gained at least another stone or two.
By this point, I had all the tools and knowledge. But I still wasn’t managing to do the thing—for myself.
The Isolation Period
COVID-19 lockdown gave me time to think. A lot of time.
To be honest, I had to decide whether I was going to bother finding a solution.
I wasn’t suicidal, but just being me felt like so much hard work.
When I'd watched enough Netflix to actually lose the will to live, I had to sit with myself.
Nowhere else to go.
No distractions.
No deadlines.
No clients.
And sitting in that quiet, with nothing left to distract or entertain me, I realised:
I had spent so long collecting qualifications—nutritional therapy, hypnotherapy, energy work, and mindset coaching. Each one is useful in its own right.
But I wasn’t building myself—I was building a framework around a missing centre.
I had focused on accumulating knowledge, rather than anchoring myself first, at the core.
I was searching for answers outside of me, before I had even learned to sit with myself.
And that was the real problem.
I didn’t need more information.
I needed sovereignty.
The Missing Piece
It began by simply drawing a circle on a piece of paper—my line in the sand.
Inside the circle, I listed everything I was fed up with being, doing, and having in my life—the thought patterns and behaviours that stemmed from a lack of personal sovereignty.
I hadn’t been raised with sovereignty as a concept or a thought process. Few people are. And over time, that absence became so ingrained that I was blind to it.
Unearthing something significant isn’t always a lightbulb moment. Sometimes, it’s wrenched out of you, almost painfully.
During that time, I realised I had knowledge. I understood concepts, methods, and strategies. But I couldn’t implement them. Because I didn’t understand myself.
The gap between where I was and the healthy, balanced person I could be was huge—and untraversable.
I was disconnected.
No sense of self.
No self-respect.
No integrity.
And so, I frequently fell apart.
The weight I carried wasn’t just physical. It was a manifestation of that disconnection.
At the core of all self-love, worthiness, or acceptance is sovereignty—the ability to stand in full knowledge and ownership of Oneself.
Without it, all the knowledge in the world remains just theory—circling endlessly, orbiting your atmosphere without ever landing and taking root.
The Energetic Gap
I was convinced that if I just learned enough, I'd stumble on the one game-changer, and things would be different.
But the gap between thought and action remained. I was self-sabotaging even as I tried to heal.
We’ll do almost anything to avoid painful truths. To lose 100 lbs, we first have to ask: why do I have 100 lbs to lose?Then, we have to find the ways and means to close the Energetic Gap—from The Situation to the Desired State.
Magic Bullets
Most of us don’t live “as within, so without.”
Modern life is stacked against us. It's designed to sell us magic bullets—quick fixes that promise to solve everything. It’s always an appealing idea.
But the deeper we go, the clearer it becomes: that’s not a real solution. We’re complex beings. And at our core, we are still feeding the reward mechanism—and neglecting our inner selves.
Sovereignty is the core.
Once you grasp that—really grasp it—everything else that is orbiting your planet either falls into place or spins off into space. It’s truly liberating.
The Practical Bit Everyone Asks For
So, how did I actually lose nearly seven stone?
I didn’t follow a plan.
I didn’t count macros.
I didn’t drink meal-replacement shakes or buy a gadget from Instagram.
I didn’t even weigh myself for the most part.
I simply returned to a way of living I had once known—before adult life buried it.
I went back to the 1970s. Not in fashion, but in function!
1. We ate real food.
Meat or fish, vegetables, and the occasional piece of fruit.
No snacking. No sugar addiction disguised as “wellness.”
Meals were simple. You ate what was in season. You stopped when you were full.
That’s how I ate.
2. We moved every day.
I walked for an hour a day. No excuses. No special gear. No gym.
Sometimes I walked with a podcast. Sometimes with my thoughts.
It cleared my head and gently reshaped my body.
3. We hydrated and self-cared.
I drank lots of water. And I added one modern twist: I body brushed.
I used a nubbly cellulite brush in the bath to stimulate lymph flow. It wasn’t about skincare—it was about self-care and reconnection.
None of this was glamorous. None of it promised overnight results like “no carbs before Marbs.”
But over time, the weight came off—sometimes slowly, sometimes steadily. There were pauses, I imagine, when my body was working internally to rebalance. Then came the big drops.
Inner Authority
Here’s the key.
Those were the external inputs: food, walking, water, and brushing.
But to remove the inner tug-of-war—the resistance, cheating, negotiation, failure cycles—you need something else.
You need Inner Authority.
Anyone can follow a plan for a few weeks. We’ve all done that. But lasting transformation only happens when we remove the barriers to success. And for me, those barriers were internal.
Before I built my Sovereignty Architecture, I was constantly pushing against myself.
I knew what to do.
I had the knowledge.
But I wasn’t doing it—at least, not sustainably.
Why?
Because I had no real authority over myself.
Once I reclaimed my sovereignty, defined who I was, where I ended, and the world began, what I allowed into my life—everything shifted. I became the architect of my internal world.
Resistance disappeared.
No more starting again on Monday.
No more white-knuckling through another juice cleanse.
Just consistent, clear, sovereign action.
The Truth Most Don’t Want to Hear
If you’ve read this far, you might still be hoping for the silver bullet. A product. A hack. A shortcut.
But here’s what I’ll tell you instead:
I lost seven stone because I stopped waiting to be rescued. I stopped outsourcing my authority. I became the sovereign of my own life.
And from that place, I could finally implement everything I’d ever learned.
No superfood. No supplement. No Ozempic link.
Just integrity. Simplicity. Action.
Just me—aligned with me.
If you’re carrying more than just physical weight, you already know this is about more than food. You’re carrying patterns. Expectations. Pain. Disconnect.
The answer isn’t just in what you eat, how you move, or what you drink—
It’s in who you are while you do it.
And that changes everything.
Sovereignty Architecture eBook
This 14-day journal series isn’t about quick fixes—it’s a framework to help you explore how you currently hold your sovereignty.
Each day offers a clear insight and a prompt to deepen your self-inquiry—not to complete, but to consider. It’s not about adding new habits on top, but about reworking your inner foundation.
Approach it with honesty, and it will meet you with clarity, integrity, and direction.
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