The drive to feed ourselves is innate. The desire to share a meal with others is deeply rooted in our past. The disappointment when we reach for that second slice of cake — that’s new.

In this episode, we look at how human evolution shaped our brains, our guts, and our appetite, and why the instincts that once kept us alive feel confusing in the modern world.

From cooking and plant foods to honey and energy needs, this is a story about why there was never one ancestral diet — and why your appetite isn’t a personal flaw, but an ancient survival strategy.

Carnivore. Vegan. Mediterranean. Paleo. Each one tells the same story: that there was once a natural, correct way of eating.

Everyone wants to believe there is a one size fits all diet.

In this episode of Modern Bodies, we start with food to ask a deeper question:

Do humans actually have a natural diet at all?

And if we do… is it the “paleo diet” we’ve all heard so much about?

This episode isn’t about telling you how to eat.

It’s about looking at food through the lens of human evolution — and seeing the modern diet conversation in a completely different way.

This episode marks a new chapter for the show.

Well With Felicia is now Modern Bodies — a podcast about how humans became human, and how ancient biology still shapes our experience of modern life.

In this short episode, I share why the show is evolving, what hasn’t changed, and the lens we’ll be using going forward: evolution, anthropology, and history.

For most of human history, survival depended on movement, cooperation, shared knowledge, and attunement to natural rhythms. Modern life didn’t erase those bodies and brains — it layered new systems on top of them, very quickly.

When we don’t understand where we came from, it’s easy to misunderstand ourselves. Stress looks like weakness. Restlessness feels like failure. Discomfort becomes something to fix.

But many of these tensions aren’t personal flaws — they’re ancient systems trying to function in environments they were never designed for.

Modern Bodies explores that mismatch to help you understand the deeper story you’re carrying in your body.

If you’ve been here for curiosity about food, health, or the body, you’re still in the right place.

And if you’re curious about humanity itself, I think you’re really going to like where this is going.

Follow @ModernBodiesPod