I was asked by Kushi to provide them with a testimonial for my experience at the institute.   Here is my story:

The KUSHI story – learning to eat before you can run.

The Kushi story for my starts not with my health but about growing my business. I own an ecommerce company in China and I have been looking to grow it – grow it big.

In that quest, I have looked to find a mentor to guide me in this endeavor. 10 months ago, I met an amazing Italian gentleman by the name of Pecce – a man that has done what I am looking to do.

Now in his 70s, Pecce was the chairman and CEO of Wall Street English China – a company that provided training English language training to Chinese students. At age of 68, his company sold for a 125 million dollars. He too the business from 0 to 125 million in less than a decade.

Pecce agreed to be my mentor – and that is how my Kushi story begins.

During our first session, I asked Pecce a simple question. He gave me an answer I didn’t think I was looking for. My question was “What is the next step I need to take?”

Pecce’s answer was – “go to Kushi Institute”. As you can imagine, going to Kushi Institute, which deals with food, health and eating – wasn’t exactly what I was looking for. I was looking for strategy, hire guidelines, funding options, etc. But food?

I was schedule to go for a trek to the Everest Basecamp next month – and Pecce gently said – “Cancel it. Kushi instead”. So, perhaps it wasn’t so gentle, but the message was clear – The first step to success is Kushi. I checked out the information about Kushi, and challenged Pecce on it – “Pecce, this place is so cheap, are you sure its good?”. Pecce said – “Yes. Go”.

In fact, he actually didn’t want to talk to be about ‘business’ until after Kushi – until them he said, my mind and thoughts wouldn’t be clear enough to make good decisions.

Hmm, I thought I was doing pretty good. But one of the rules of mentorship is that if a mentor tells you to do something, you better do it. And what was the harm?

So, I canceled my Everest trip and instead rebooked myself for a month long trip to Kushi.

The results

It’s now been four months since I have came back from Kushi Institute. I have now thanked Pecce probably over a dozen times for instating I go there. Why?

When you are in an executive position – be in a CEO or a CMO (Chief Mom Office) – the utmost importance is clear mind, strong energy and good health.

I didn’t realize how much of those things I didn’t have. The years of building my business to what it was today have taken a great toll. I didn’t quite see it, but Pecce did.

· I gained weight and was sluggish.

· I was fatigued most of the time

· I was stressed about even the small things.

Now , how does food and eating help with this? Well, it turns out, that it’s everything.

· After 4 months, I dropped a lot of weight – over 30lbs. Weight loss was NOT any of my goals, but it was a very nice benefit of eating the Kushi way.

· My energy levels have increased 10x. or maybe 20! Where as I would get up in the morning before and start my day at 11AM – with a few cups of coffee to help me get started, I start my days now at around 7AM. Coffee is gone and green tea is there instead.

· My stress levels have reduced – and the small things now are just that – small things. Even as I write this, I’m facing challenges that in the past would have seen my stress levels go through the roof – but now I am to process them in a calm and relaxed way.

· My restless leg syndrome that was affecting my sleep for last 15 years – has improved by a great deal – I sleep better now that I have in the past

· My allergy to gluten has much improved – if I had gluten in the food I ate before Kushi, even a bit, I would be ‘out’ the next day. Now, if somehow gluten got into my diet – I can feel it – but I’m still good to go.

My mom had tried to teach me about food for years but I didn’t listen. It wasn’t till Kushi that I truly EXPERIENCED the difference food makes.

Even now, if I go out to dinner and eat something that is not Macrobiotic, I pretty much know that tomorrow I will not be in my optimal condition. I expect that I will be a bit slower, a bit more sluggish and probably a little less sharp. And, being an engineer, I have proven this. If I eat the macrobiotic way, I am in top shape. The day I depart, I can FEEL the difference.

With this bit of knowledge, I still go out sometimes – but when I do, I know that what I put in my body today, will have impact on my performance tomorrow.

My story and my results so far have been added by some things I did to re-organize my life around macrobition (Kushi) way.

· When I left Kushi, I had one of the councilors prepare for me a very detailed, 2 week menu and recipes. This one of the best things I did – although Kushi teach you how to plan your own menu – I found that having it done for you is tremendously helpful and make macrobiotic diet that much more accessible.

· I am lucky to have a cook in Beijing that cooks all my meals for me – and I had those recipes translated into Chinese, all the ingredients sourced, and a schedule established

· I work close to my home – so my lunch (and if I work late, dinner) get brought over to my office from home.

BUT, my story is not about, whether someone call pull it off. I know that without a cook, and what I have in my daily life, eating macrobiotic way would have been rather difficult. But, I also know that in North America, most people are accustomed to cooking for themselves. And, for those times when I cook for myself, making a macrobiotic meal is actually easier and faster that a western type meal.

The point however is, that as an experiment, the macrobiotic way, works and works well. The results are incredible and the performance gains I got from the new way is something I could never imagine.

Pecce and I are now going to start talking about business – balance sheets, P&L, strategy, etc. But, when we do, keeping macrobiotic eating in the forefront – because I understand now that I can’t run if I don’t learn how to eat!

My graph of my weight is attached. Remember though, weight loss not my goal, but the weight loss matched the improvement in my performance.

About Paul Lepa

A marketer at heart, Paul has managed to overcome the challenges of linear thinking from his Electrical Engineering background, to blend technology, sales and marketing into one. With focus on ‘getting things done’, Paul has held a varied number of positions, all bound by the common thread of selling and marketing. Paul is current the CEO and Co-founder of PearlsOnly.com – an ecommerce company founded together with his wife, Lise – 5 year ago. With now nearly 100,000 customers in the US, UK and over $12MM in sales to date –organically grown with an initial investment of $2000 – Paul has proven that there is no limits to what one can do.

Prior to PearlsOnly, Paul held number of varied positions, notably, as a Senior Account Executive at Telvant, in Calgary, Canada. Focusing on long term, long lead sales, over the period of 4 years; Paul was directly responsible for the strategy, pursuit, proposal and negotiation of over 15 large scale pipeline automation projects – with the combined value of over $40MM USD. Assembling multi discipline teams from within Telvant ranging from R&D staff, to C level executives, Paul would relentlessly battles against competitors – constantly crisscrossing the US – often waking up and not remembering what city he was in on a given day.

While at Telvant, Paul was recruited by ABB and relocated to Manheim, Germany – to take up the post of Director, Global Pipeline Solution Unit. At ABB Paul was responsible for looking after the marketing and sales of ABB’s Pipelines solutions globally, directing a team of professionals across the globe, include a Chinese section. Relocating to Europe was an amazing experience, and exploring Europe from within Europe was a highlight – especially the ability to cruise on the Autobah at 250km without the threat of a ticket. However, professionally, shortly after arriving in Germany, Paul has come to realize that the climbing the corporate ladder, in Germany, although financially rewarding, wasn’t very good for the soul. When an opportunity presented itself to relocate to ABB in China – Paul took the leap. However despite the move, the strong desire to hold ones destiny in ones hand persisted, and when the opportunity presented itself, Paul resigned his position with ABB to start PearlsOnly.

Paul holds a B.SC in Engineering with Computer Minor, and has completed a number of post-graduate courses in digital filter theory. In his spare time, Paul’s like to play with the latest and greatest electronic gadgets, likes to read marketing, psychology and business books – and enjoys reading science fiction novels.