Mindful Eating
Blog post by Lindsay Mustard, Holistic Nutritionist
Picture this, you are at your friends house for dinner midweek, despite being three days deep into your new diet. You’re supposed to be cutting out dairy, gluten, sugar and alcohol, but she serves you deep dish pizza and your favourite red wine, and, well, the rest is history. So you stumble along for the rest of the week eating tidbits of everything that are supposedly “off limits” only to find yourself feeling guilty, ashamed and like you’ve failed yourself before you even got the chance to try to change. This is when intuitive eating sweeps in to save the day allowing you to hit all of your health and wellness goals, without having to sacrifice your favourite foods or flavours. Yes, we’ll be sharing all of the secrets for how you can have your vegan, dark chocolate cake and eat it too! In this blog post, we’ll be introducing you to intuitive eating - how to eat based on your body’s cues without ever stressing over what foods are good or bad. Ready, set, intuitively eat!
Intuitive eating is exactly as it sounds. Eating when you’re hungry, stopping when you’re full and not feeling an ounce of guilt for what you consumed. Most individuals are used to sticking to a meal plan or food routine that determines their portion sizes for them. We’ve become accustomed to being able to clear our plate because it “fits our macros” or because we had a hard workout. But what if, what if we ate until our body said, “hey friend, I’m good now! Thanks for the food.” It’s a crazy idea right? Except for the minor detail that we used to follow intuitive eating for years before technology and dieting apps evolved.
The next time you’re in a situation where the elements are beyond your control, take a deep breath and begin. Listen to your hunger cues, take small bites and chew until your food is the consistency of applesauce. If you’re hungry, have a second serving or scoop, if not, politely pass and carry on the conversation. If you’re hungry when you get home, make something else! When you wake up the next morning, don’t automatically jump back into your food routine. Wait until your body gives you the cue that you’re ready for more food and then get right back into your normal way of eating!
For anyone looking to lose weight or just gain a better understanding of how their body works, intuitive eating is the way to go. It’s more than just eating when you’re hungry and stopping when you’re full. It’s about tuning into your meals during meal time and taking a moment to set your fork down and enjoy your food for once. It’s about recognizing and being able to separate true hunger from eating out of boredom.
There are three reasons why we as humans eat: 1) out of boredom, 2) for emotional reasons and 3) because we are tired or under-rested. Anyone else guilty of eating while working on your laptop or while watching tv because you want to be more productive? It’s a bad habit that most of us have because we are all so busy and its one of the top reasons why we overeat!
If your goal is to lose weight, it doesn't have to be so complicated, we choose to make it that way. We choose to shovel the extra cookies, cakes and ice cream into our mouths instead of dealing with the painful feelings surrounding our last relationship. We choose to continue eating past the point of fullness to fill a void or a gap that we think food can fill. It won’t. Food will never be able to fill anything besides true hunger. Let this quote sit with you for a moment, it holds power and weight that will leave a lasting imprint on you each and every opportunity you have to eat.
Eat to fuel your body, not feed your emotions.
Food is fuel, nothing more, nothing less. It is meant to be enjoyed and for you to take pleasure in consuming, but it was never meant to be your sympathetic friend after a long day at work or a fight with your spouse.
The next time you get the urge to continue to overeat and ignore your hunger cue, try asking yourself the following questions:
Have I drank any water today?
Did I sleep well last night? (If not, can you go for a nap?)
Am I eating to fuel my body or my emotions?
What do I truly want or need right now?
Listening to your body doesn't have to be a battle and a half. It can be as simple as taking a deep breath in, tuning the world out for a moment and asking yourself what you need. As easy as it is to say the phrase “eat intuitively,” it takes practice to tune into your body’s cues and be able to choose to nurture it with the wholesome foods it is asking for. Treat every meal as an opportunity to practice eating in alignment with your body’s wants and needs. Sometimes it will crave dark chocolate, cake, ice cream and pie. We are human, but other times it will crave kale, green beans, raspberries and bananas. Listen carefully, eat slowly and when you feel your body whisper softly, “thank you, I’ve had enough,” listen to it. There is and always will be more food to enjoy tomorrow.