Whether you have been working on your intuitive eating journey for a while or you are just getting your feet wet, here are some tips to getting started or getting back on track.
1.Be aware of what you are influenced by
Diet culture is everywhere and reducing your intake can be huge when trying to break free from the dieting cycle. My biggest recommendation is to clean up your social media. Pay attention to what you are seeing and how it makes you feel. It can be so easy to zone out when scrolling on social media, but even if you aren’t fully conscious of it, it is probably influencing your body image and might be adding pressure on you to jump back into dieting.
Try and follow more accounts that show diverse bodies and maybe even different hobbies and interests of yours. It is also okay to mute a friend for a while until you feel more comfortable seeing their posts. And of course try and unfollow any accounts that are promoting weight loss or intentional body change.
2. Work on eating regularly
It sounds silly, but this is often how diet culture sticks with us. If you have been dieting for long you may no longer be in touch with your hunger cues AND you still need to nourish your body even if you do not feel hungry in order to regain that body knowledge.
Eating regularly is also a great act of self care. Try eating every 3-4 hours and pay attention to how it makes your body feel. If you ever experience an afternoon crash it could be because you are not eating enough.
3. Listen to your body
Now again if you have been dieting for a while you may not sense your hungry cues and if that is the case I’m not telling you just not to eat. I suggest eating practically (having meals or snacks every 3-4 hours or more often if needed) and pay attention to how that feels.
Once you start to challenge food rules and food fears, pay attention to how those feel as well. For example I had a client who would wake up regularly at night and binge. We worked on adding more carbohydrates into her dinner and she started feeling more satisfied and sleeping through the night. Even though she still was working on breaking the fear of carbs, she was more confident in why her body needed them, which helped her get over her fear.
4. Make a list of all of your food rules and fear foods
Write down every one you can think of even if you yourself never followed that specifically, it could still be having an influence on your decisions and some level of restriction. Look at these rules and feel without judgment and with curiosity. If your research is driven by fear you are going to read what you want to. Look at research deeper, often research for food is done in rat populations with insanely large amounts of said ingredient.
Challenging those food rules is going to be how you can break free from diet culture and find freedom in eating again. If you are having trouble challenging those food rules on your own find a coach or some support.
5. Be compassionate with yourself
Dieting is hard. Leaving dieting can be even harder, but it is so worth it! Imagine the life you want to live: going to social events with friends, not thinking about food, being comfortable in your body, exercising to feel good, being binge free. Use that as motivation.
Dieting uses guilt and shame as motivation to move forward, if you can shift your focus to the positives it can really help you reach your goals. Remember you have probably been influenced by diet culture since you were a child, you grew up in it. You won’t just magically be an intuitive eater overnight. It will take time and it will be a rollercoaster.
If you need a coach to help you reach your goals and the life you dream of check out our private coaching!
