Intuitive eating
What is it and how do you do it?
I found these definitions: Intuitive eating is a philosophy of eating that makes you the expert of your body and it’s hunger signals. Essentially it is the opposite of a traditional diet it doesn’t impose guidelines about what to avoid and what or when to eat.
Studies have also shown intuitive eaters have improved cholesterol levels and improved metabolism. So not only does intuitive eating help you heal your relationship with food, it also can help improve your mental and physical health. Intuitive eating is NOT a weight loss diet, nor was it ever intended to be.
Intuitive eating helps you get back in touch with internal cues, like hunger and fullness, cravings, and how food makes you feel.
It is my goal for all my online clients to get to this point, but just like anything else, this is a learned skill. I wholeheartedly embrace the idea of being able to eat whatever you want and don’t restrict foods from my clients. They get to choose what they want using a flexible dieting approach. This teaches them that yes, they can have that wine, chocolate or whatever they fancy and still lose weight. It all comes down to moderation.
Yep, there’s always a catch isn’t there? By knowing portion sizes you can then teach your body and your mind to be satisfied with that portion size instead of the one you “intuitively” want right now.
Over time we have overridden the cues that we are born with of knowing when to eat and when to stop. We’ve created new behaviors as we have 24 hour access to delicious foods that are engineered to make us want more. By creating new patterns we can set ourselves up to eating intuitively.
