Hugh Flint

1. What brought you to study Holistic Nutrition at IHN?

In May 2021, I woke up after a party I don’t even remember getting to and thought, “right, that’s it. I’m never getting drunk again and am willing to do whatever it takes to get there.”

In that moment I realized how little I knew about what I wanted from life, and how to look after myself. It opened my mind to health and wellness and I was suddenly open to new concepts and to trying anything. From there I did what it took to change my relationship with alcohol and drugs, and started doing really well at my job as a restaurant chef. I earned 4 promotions in 2 years and hit my ceiling in the restaurant I was working in.

With my new love of health and wellness I couldn’t see a future I wanted in restaurants, so began looking for some way to put all my experience and love for food and cooking into a more sustainable, aligned profession. I was dating a doctor at the time. She had experience studying nutrition and really encouraged me that I could do so much more than cook in a restaurant. That planted the seed. I started researching nutrition schools and programs, and settled on IHN due to its comprehensive curriculum and Co-op program. I signed up, quit the restaurant, and never looked back.

2. What professions have you worked in prior to enrolling at IHN?

Leaving school at 17, I worked on the crew of wooden square rigged sailing ships and sailed around Australia for 3 years. From there I went to culinary school in Adelaide and did a chef apprenticeship at the InterContinental in Adelaide.

Not long after completing my apprenticeship at 21 I started my own granola company called Hughsli and threw myself into that. It was one of the most creative times of my life, and I built it up into a busy little enterprise over the next 5 years. I worked myself to the bone, 90 hour weeks, and burnt myself out in 2015 and decided to shut it down.

I moved down to Southern Tasmania and worked in an array of restaurants, cafes, cooking schools and bakeries while continuing my own catering/food manufacturing business on the side. I catered some elaborate events, hunting, diving, foraging and growing many of the ingredients myself. I created a sprouted chickpea hummus that was a roaring success in the township of Cygnet and is still made exactly the same today.

At 30 years old, I started to crave more excitement in my life than Tasmania could offer and planned a trip overseas. I began my adventures with staging (an internship) at 2 world famous restaurants in San Francisco. I spent a month at Chez Panisse (Alice Waters’ infamous 1971 restaurant in Berkeley, the birthplace of farm to table cuisine) and Benu (Corey Lee’s terrifyingly precise 3 Michelin starred restaurant).

I then found myself in Whistler for a season, and fell in love with the mountain lifestyle. The endless adventure and non-stop excitement, the beauty, the awe, the extreme sports. I never intended to stay, but couldn’t imagine leaving and now call it home. I worked as Sous Chef at an Italian restaurant in town for 4 years, before starting my own business again while starting my studies at IHN, and working as a private chef and offering personalized dining experiences in the beautiful chalets and homes around Whistler.

3. What degrees or academic achievements did you have prior to IHN?

Certificate III in Commercial Cookery, and trade-certified chef (Red Seal equivalent)

4. What are your goals/aspirations as a CNP?

I plan to be a functional nutrition coach, combining everything I’ve learned at IHN with my experience as a chef and my love of locally sourced, seasonal, organically grown produce. I want to help clients feel more energized for life, improve their digestion and sleep, help them manage stress intentionally, be clear-minded, focused and motivated, and have the energy they want to do the things they love. But I also want to show them how to do it, how to cook, how to organize their kitchen and pantry and nourish themselves without the stress and chaos. I want to motivate and inspire others with my story, and to show them that by looking after themselves they can feel fantastic and be exactly the person they dream to be. I want to educate people about the importance of localized organic food systems, and tell them the truth about the industrialized food system we live in, and the unbelievable amount of chemicals we consume without being aware of it.

5. What has been your personal best achievement?

So many things to celebrate. My life just keeps getting better and better. My openness to viewing life differently to the mainstream grew as I went on more and more elaborate backcountry adventures. Leaving behind all traces of humankind for days at a time, I found this oneness with my environment. I was so insignificant but part of everything.

All my fears, worries, anxiety, stress would disappear and I would be unbelievably happy and free, often in harsh, very challenging environments. I wanted to bring this feeling to my day to day life in the modern world. And to do that I had to change my entire belief structure. I would never have enough, be enough, be good enough to meet the expectations of my ego or the purveyed expectation of society. I didn’t want any part of greed, to value money above all else, to call a house, family, car, career success without even asking if that’s what I truly believe.

But I still wanted to be a part of society and have a functional life within it. And over my time at IHN, I have come to see right through the story we tell ourselves about life, and have now written my own. I am now so grateful for everything I have in my life. I live the best life I could imagine, doing exactly what I want with my time. I know who I am and can be exactly that person in my personal life, my social life, my professional life. I have let go of all the baggage, all the stories, the fear, worry, anxiety that was holding me back. Every day I write my own story and turn up exactly the way I choose. It’s f***ing awesome.

6. What is something you overcame in your life, that you didn’t think you could?

There were many times between the ages of 17 and 32 when I would drink so much alcohol and do so many drugs I thought I would be dead by the time I was 40 years old, and felt I had no control over it. I felt there was nothing I could do, as the addiction felt a part of me, like my identity. To overcome that, to put addiction behind me, to completely change my relationship with alcohol, incredible, unbelievable. Nothing will ever be more challenging than that!

7. What is something about you that would surprise people?

There are so many sides to my personality. My identity is no longer tied to what I do for work, what I eat, what activities I do, my achievements or how much I earn. But it’s who I am, the way I relate to other people, the way I show up every day, the way I care for myself, and the way I treat other people. This means I don’t stick to any particular diet or regime, I enjoy a huge range of activities, and work in many different capacities. I seek joy, love and happiness in everything I do, and use my abundant energy to radiate out to others, and here’s the biggest cliché, but my truth: “make the world a happier place!”

The whole experience has been transformational! I really had no idea what I was getting myself into. I had never really applied myself academically before IHN, so coming into biochem with Linda straight off the bat, I was like “all right, I’m going to have to learn how to learn.”

It became a much bigger part of my life than I imagined, and I dedicated a lot of time to every course. I have always believed in the importance of localized organic food systems, but in Nutrition and the Environment it really brought home the importance of eliminating chemicals from my life. I packed up all the cleaning chemicals, personal care products, cologne, and every other chemical in my house into a box and gave them to my neighbour. From that point on I was “all in,” making change after change as I learnt more and more.

Tahlia Sage was a fantastic influence in Symp 1, with lots of deep insights into the root cause of disease. Her ideas helped me develop my abundance mindset. When I started at IHN I was trying to be more and more restrictive to be healthy (vegan, sober, work out every day) and had never felt worse. Over time I shed this need to restrict myself, but instead choose what I really want, and let myself enjoy whatever it is that I choose. And now I feel so full of vitality.

And then I did Herbal Medicine. My mental health has been a huge challenge for me since I was 18, with suffocating anxiety and bouts of depression. I didn’t want to use medication due to the side effects, and through herbal medicine I created my own protocol. I sourced a tincture of St. John’s Wort and Skullcap, Boswellia capsules, and started taking 2000mg of Tyrosine daily. It kicked in after 2 days and allowed me to break free of the crippling anxiety, have some difficult conversations, and has significantly contributed to this new momentum and abundance in my life. It’s so fucking awesome.

I linked up with a local naturopath for my Co-op and had the most incredible experience. I wasn’t sure quite where it was going, and had let go of any expectations, but it has resulted in a job offer to run my own practice from his integrative health clinic in Whistler. Crazy. I am so grateful for this whole experience. It was far from easy, but it has pushed me to become the person I want to be. Now I wake up each day wondering “What miracles are going to unfold today?” Life feels impossibly good.