Are you looking for ways to augment your health journey?
If so, you might have come across the words “intuitive eating.” Many people have started turning to intuitive eating because of its many benefits, and some even claim it revolutionized their health journey.
Coming across testimonials such as these might pique your curiosity.
But what is intuitive eating, and how do you implement it into your everyday life?
Keep on reading to learn more!
What Is Intuitive Eating?
So, what is intuitive eating?
For many decades, those who use their platforms to tout different diets have drilled into the mind of the public a specific set of rules when it comes to eating. One, in particular, has become the cornerstone of a lot of people’s healthy living regimens: fewer calories, combined with more exercise.
Yet, our bodies need calories to function. Certainly, you can eat too many calories, just as you can eat too much of anything else, but calories shouldn’t be your ultimate enemy.
Intuitive eating frees people from the confines of diets while continuing to promote a healthy lifestyle. It emphasizes the value of tuning into your body and honoring your need to eat. It also emphasizes being kind to yourself as you eat.
What Are the Key Points of Intuitive Eating?
Intuitive eating centers itself on 10 key principles, as outlined by nutrition professionals Elyse Resch and Evelyn Tribole. Resch and Tribole introduced the world to intuitive eating when they published their popular book, Intuitive Eating.
Instead of focusing on cutting foods out of your diet, Resch and Tribole encourage you to take a more gentle approach to health. They focus on helping you maintain your own personal psychological health as you eat well.
Let’s go into some of the main points of intuitive eating below.
No Dieting
When you go into intuitive eating, you might find yourself a bit surprised that you’re supposed to reject diets. The idea behind this consists of the fact that many people get caught up in trying to cut things out of their meals and then get discouraged when they can’t stop their cravings.
This leads to some pretty unsavory consequences. First, people grow discouraged and begin to get hard on themselves for seemingly “failing.” In reality, their brains are just used to having access to the foods they cut out and have yet to adjust to the new lifestyle.
Yet, people often reach this point of being hard on themselves much quicker than their brains get used to not eating the old food. This leads people to indulge in unhealthy foods. In fact, some research indicates that dieting might actually be worse for weight loss than even a healthy diet plan because many people end up regaining the weight.
Body-Led Eating
Here’s the truth: your body already knows exactly what it needs.
Of course, your body and brain can be trained to grow accustomed to less healthy foods, but at our cores, our bodies know when to prompt us to eat. In order to eat intuitively, you pay attention to your body’s cues, eating when you’re hungry and stopping when you’re full.
Focusing on Pleasure
Intuitive eating also focuses on the pleasure of the foods you’re eating. It emphasizes ingesting foods you enjoy and taking the time to savor your food.
After all, when you do this, you’re focused on the positive attributes to your food, and you’re more likely to naturally know when you’ve had enough because you won’t feel compelled to eat it any longer.
Intuitive eaters are also encouraged to be gentle with themselves when it comes to nutrition. It encourages you to make food choices that both satisfy your taste buds and are considerably healthy, but it doesn’t try to dissuade you from eating the occasional treat, either.
As you eat, you’re also encouraged to feel yourself growing full, which is another one of your body’s cues.
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Treat Yourself Kindly
So many times, when people start their weight loss journey, they blame themselves for not doing it perfectly or for not making the progress they’d like to see.
Yet, this is often counterproductive and leaves people with a low sense of self-esteem. This makes people less likely to want to pursue a healthy lifestyle, which hurts them more overall.
Intuitive eating encourages you to treat yourself kindly during your health and fitness journey. Know that it’s okay to eat what you want without judging yourself. Throw out self-destructive language. Refuse to call yourself a failure or “good” or “bad” based on the things you eat.
Your worth has nothing to do with the food you consume, and there’s no such thing as failures within intuitive eating, only people taking steps toward their own healthy lifestyles.
In fact, being kind to yourself even promotes another important aspect of your overall well-being–your mental health.
How Does Intuitive Eating Benefit You?
Intuitive eating benefits you by working with your body’s natural system of asking for sustenance to inform your eating choices. This will ultimately help you feel more satisfied with your food choices as well as keep you healthy and strong.
In addition, intuitive eating fosters a more psychologically healthy approach to wellness. People should never feel shamed for the food they eat, even by themselves. When you eat intuitively, you’ll learn how to stop blaming yourself for what you do and do not eat and focus making choices that make sense for your body.
This ultimately will help you stick with your wellness journey for longer, giving you better results.
Ready to Start Intuitive Eating?
So, what is intuitive eating?
Intuitive eating consists of eating according to your body. It encourages people to honor their body’s hunger, listen to its cues, and support themselves mentally as they embark on their wellness journey.
If this sounds like a dream to you, it doesn’t need to be. You can start on your intuitive eating road today, and our food services can help. If you have any questions about our services or menu items, contact us!