Have you heard the term ‘intuitive eating’ crop up recently? It’s a phrase which is gaining ground in the wellness world, but what does it actually mean? How do we get to a point where we can eat what is good for our bodies based on our intuition, without overeating? I’ve written this piece, to help you to understand where intuitive eating truly leads and to expel any fears or misconceptions.
Going through the process of becoming an intuitive eater is not just about food. It’s about finding your self-worth and accepting yourself for who you are, regardless of weight or size. It’s about recognising the diet industry for what it is – a money-maker, with advertising designed to make you feel like you have to change yourself to be accepted in society. They make promises that their particular diet or ‘lifestyle change’ will be what you’ve always needed to finally be happy. But happiness doesn’t come from weight loss, it comes from accepting who you are on the inside. You must be open to working on yourself and accepting yourself for who you are. Because intuitive eating is nothing to do with losing weight. It’s about finding peace with food and yourself.
Let’s talk about one of the biggest challengers; your inner food critic. We are fed so many messages about what we ‘should’ eat and how we ‘should’ be. These messages can start very young from family members unconsciously passing off their own beliefs onto us. They also come from all mainstream media as we grow up;
- ‘Shed your Christmas weight’
- ‘Are you bikini body ready?’
- Society promoting only one particular size as ‘healthy’ and fat-shaming anyone else who dares to be different
- Clothes stores only stocking a small variety of sizes
- Only those with a certain body type getting certain jobs in tv appearances and the modelling industry
These are just a few examples. Thankfully, there is starting to be a shift towards acceptance for everybody, no matter what shape and size. But there is still a lot to be done. And if you’ve grown up with this being the societal norm, these ideas about how you should be to ‘fit in’ will be deeply embedded within you. Which means that it’s very easy for your food critic to pop up at every available turn; ‘You’re disgusting for eating that,’ ‘You’ll get fat if you eat that,’ ‘that is so unhealthy, throw it away.’ Therefore, part of the intuitive eating process is learning how to tell that inner food critic to f*@k off! It’s recognising that you do not have to change who you are. True self-acceptance can be hard. It’s a process within itself which involves exploring why you feel and act the way that you do. But the quicker you get it, the easier the intuitive eating process becomes. If you’re not criticising yourself for eating something, what is there left but to enjoy what you are eating? And move on and carry on with your day, satisfied, without food thoughts consuming your brain.
Intuitive eating takes time to understand. It’s a process which involves re-programming your mindset. It’s not another diet. You can’t click your fingers after dieting for so long and suddenly be an intuitive eater. Therefore, you can’t place any expectations on yourself that you will magically sail through the process and feel great within no time. It’s a journey, with many ups and downs; you will get frustrated, you will have to go to uncomfortable places, you will have to face fears:
‘Listen to your body.’ How many times have you heard this phrase and rolled your eyes? I know I have. Fundamentally, it would be nice to reach that place where you are so in tune with yourself that you naturally eat a very balanced diet and never over-eat. But if you’ve been dieting for years, restricting yourself, telling yourself that certain things are terrible for you, and having ‘blow-outs,’ you can’t expect those natural appetite signals to be there. They have been overridden for so long that your body has confused itself. For example, if you’ve made yourself only eat at set times of the day, in the belief that this is the healthiest way to be, you won’t be used to relying on any form of hunger signal to tell you when to eat. The good news is, that it is possible to re-tune. There are ways to find these signals again, but you must be prepared to ditch any preconceived ‘food rules’ and be happy to explore yourself.
One of the hardest things for those new to intuitive eating is the allowance of all foods whenever you fancy them. Let that sink in for a moment. You are allowed to eat whatever you want, whenever you want. Something which diet culture never promises you. But this can be so scary, maybe due to a fear of gaining weight, or the fear that once a small amount of something has been eaten, you’re afraid you can’t stop eating until it’s gone. The thing is, if you have been restricting something for so long, it’s a normal biological response for the body to want to eat so much of it. In a natural habitat, mammals must eat a massive meal in one go, because they don’t know when the next meal will be. Our bodies work in a similar way. Your body doesn’t understand the difference between ‘starvation mode’ and you restricting yourself because you are ‘on a diet.’ Our bodies are amazing, they have a survival mode. Which can be triggered when we restrict ourselves. Which means that when you sit down with that chocolate bar that you’ve not been allowing yourself for so long, your drive to keep eating it will be so strong, because your body doesn’t know if it will get it again.
I can’t promise that over-eating won’t happen on your intuitive eating journey. Because it most probably will. This is where self-compassion will be needed for yourself. It’s so hard. But so worth it. Once your body knows that it can have whatever it wants whenever, unrestricted, there won’t be a drive to binge on everything in front of you. That feeling will go. And as unbelievable as it may seem to you now, it’s possible to fancy eating something like chocolate and be satisfied with a small amount. Then move on, because thoughts of food are no longer taking over your life.
Another misconception of intuitive eating is the belief that the allowance of eating whatever you want means you will only eat a certain type of food. Again, this is a myth. If you start off on your intuitive eating journey having restricted yourself so much in the past, you may find that you end up eating mainly what you’ve not been allowing yourself to eat. I’ll use chocolate as an example, but it could be anything. If I ate chocolate all day, I would get to the point of not wanting to look at another chocolate bar for a while. I would get ‘meal hungry.’ We need certain things in our diet; protein, carbohydrate, different kinds of fat, vitamins, minerals etc. In the same way in which our body has a drive to eat the things we’ve been restricting; our body will start craving foods which contain all the things we’ve not had whilst just eating chocolate. I would find myself fancying an actual meal, with a mixture of colours and textures on my plate. After eating vast amounts of chocolate, my body will be wanting some gentle nutrition. And I will eat and feel full and satisfied. And carry on with the rest of my day without food on my mind because I’ve allowed myself what I wanted.
Have you picked up on a pattern yet? Diet culture messes with our brain. It leaves us unable to concentrate on the things that really matter in life. It leaves us thinking about all the food all the time. But with intuitive eating comes satisfaction and nurturing the body. The more you allow yourself to truly be in the process, the less that food thoughts will consume your brain. You will eat when you want to eat, you will eat something satisfying, and you will move on. And your brain will have room for more things; hobbies, friends, family, work, you name it. It’s a win-win.
If you would like to learn more about the intuitive eating process, please don’t hesitate to get in touch (hattie@hattierees.co.uk) or you can book your free discovery call here!
