INSIDE AND OUTSIDE: Nature + Pop Culture News with Jessica Murnane · Jessica Murnane

Prescribing Nature for Better Health + The Problem With Food Trends + How To Start Weightlifting with Laura Wright (Cookbook author and Founder of The First Mess)

·45 min·3 clips

Laura Wright says she started weightlifting at 40 because she was scared of menopause and muscle loss.

1. INSIDE AND OUTSIDE: Nature + Pop Culture News with Jessica Murnane centers on nature, food trends, and Laura Wright's weightlifting routine. 2. Jessica Murnane is the host, and Laura Wright is the guest as founder of The First Mess and author of The First Mess cookbook. 3. The episode asks what nature prescriptions, seasonal eating, and strength training actually mean for daily life. 4. Jessica opens with her reason for growing things: hope, using Audrey Hepburn's line, "to plant a garden is to believe in tomorrow." 5. Laura describes picking raspberries with her family at their original home in Niagara-on-the-Wake, where her father ran a local produce store. 6. She remembers being paid $2 per half pint, eating warm raspberries on the vine, and feeling the season change when the second August flush arrived. 7. Jessica and Laura compare that childhood seasonality with today's produce system, where strawberries, mangoes, and broccoli can appear year-round. 8. Laura says local produce can cost up to double grocery-store prices, and she still buys broccoli from Mexico or Costco when that is the realistic choice. 9. Jessica pushes back on food-content rules by pointing out food deserts, rural communities, and the limits of telling everyone to shop at Whole Foods. 10. Laura says the right approach is to meet people where they are, especially if a frozen bag of broccoli is already a meaningful step. 11. Laura revisits her old cookbook-era beliefs, including being more rigid about brown rice, gluten, and ingredient standards. 12. She says she is now mercilessly editing archived recipes on The First Mess to remove barriers and make them clearer up front. 13. Jessica notes that Laura now offers more substitutions in recipes, including options like jasmine rice instead of brown rice for faster cooking. 14. Laura says she wants more people to enjoy whole plant-based foods, even if that means loosening rules she once treated as fixed. 15. Jessica introduces a 2025 Canadian study on prescribing nature for human health and quotes the finding that 92% of reviewed studies showed consistent benefits. 16. Laura says 76% of study participants were extremely likely to visit nature spaces if a healthcare professional recommended it. 17. Laura's "inside thing" is weightlifting at a local powerlifting gym, where she works with a trainer and lifts three times a week. 18. She says compound lifts like deadlifts, barbell back squats, bench press, and overhead press became her benchmarks, and protein plus hydration became necessary for better workouts. 19. The episode feels conversational and reflective, with Jessica using studies and personal stories to move between nature, food access, and menopause. 20. Anyone interested in seasonal cooking, local food access, or beginner weightlifting will get the most from it.

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