Modern plant-based diet advocacy often revolves around making food as appealing as possible to swing voters. That is to say that the more the plants are disguised in the dish, the more the traditional meat-eater is likely to flirt with a vegetarian or vegan diet. During saturated promotional events such as Veganuary, vendors at the top of the food chain compete to offer the most meat-like options. The result is a dining experience that resembles an Outback steakhouse more than a greenhouse in bloom. In truth, it’s often argued that many of the wellness, lifestyle, and health benefits of making a plant-based transition can become lost in the highly processed nature of the end product. And when it comes to one’s mental health, if no real effort is being made to overcome bad habits, it’d be reasonable to suggest that no meaningful life change is being made at all.
Moreover, plant-based diets are naturally tied to reduced calorie intake. But if mainstream veganism loses touch with flora as it grows in the field, much of the overall benefit of vegan habits risks being lost forever.
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Chief among those benefits is the inevitable weight loss challenge, which is desired by a staggering number in society. Kerryn Sawyer, @theplantpowercoach, sees the inherent harmony between plant-based eating and health and works with willing clients to revitalize passions in the abundant advantages offered by a shift in diet.
While it pertains to many current trends in lifestyle management, Kerryn’s approach is unique in its blend of beneficial elements. She is not simply a health coach, a life coach, or a weight loss mentor. In fact, she acts as all three, prioritizing the synergy between schools as an effortless transistor of plant-based knowledge. Different aspects bring different benefits for her clients, too. Kerryn believes the habit-changing potential of health coaching mixed in with the mindset and emotional management opportunities of life coaching can offer people a true long-term solution to their weight and lifestyle issues. “My clients tell me that my coaching program is a little like seeing a dietitian, a doctor, and a shrink all in one!” she exclaims.
When it comes to the nitty-gritty, one of Kerryn’s biggest focuses in mobilizing The Plant Power Coach was ensuring she was as qualified as possible to create the most effective client experience. On the technical side, she is certified in Plant-based Nutrition by eCornell and is a qualified Health & Life Coach through the Health Coach Institute. But in the arena of popular support, her position is assured, as she was named #2 ‘Life Coach To Watch’ by Yahoo! Finance in March 2021. Since making the shift into coaching, Kerryn has invested countless time and money in upskilling herself and her offering. Indeed, the hard work paid off, as the Yahoo! listing came after just 12 months of being in business.
Today, The Plant Power Coach’s flagship course is ‘Plant Power Transformation,’ a six-month coaching program that guides clients through creating healthy habits in bite-sized chunks. Using life coaching methods to understand behavior patterns and improve emotional management allows clients to reverse engineer their initial weight gain and identify and overcome the hurdles preventing them from achieving weight loss. The motif of the program is its focus on small changes, which empower the client to meet reachable goals. Kerryn believes that empowerment is the ultimate futureproof mechanism to prevent reversion to fruitless short-term solutions.
It’s those potentially harmful pseudo-solutions that motivate and challenge Kerryn daily. Humanity, with its idealism and shortening attention span, is often drawn to quick fixes to what Kerryn understands as complex, deep-rooted problems. Expensive pills and cheap dietary tactics tend to reel in consumers with false promises. The proponents find themselves a direct adversary of The Plant Power Coach and its mission. A fundamentalist with her eyes firmly on the modern age, Kerryn believes whole plant foods can be the kryptonite to civilization’s super unhealthy relationship with eating. She argues that the health and weight loss benefits of a plant-based diet and its positive effects on the natural world make it the optimum way to fuel the human body.
A concept as limitless as Kerryn’s coaching blend demands ambitions far greater than one course. In the next few years, she aims to scale up The Plant Power Coach to a group model to help more people reach their goals. After all, Kerryn believes a healthy way of living is present in nature for anybody willing to find it, as will soon be The Plant Power Coach.
Macy Parker is a freelance journalist based in Ottawa. Macy has written for the Vancouver Sun, Reader’s Digest, CBC Online,, Rogers Media and others. When Macy isn’t busy writing, she’s working as a PSW in an aging care facility in Lavel. Macy mostly covers stories concerning vulnerable patients
