“Does intuitive eating work?” As I work with women who struggle with food, weight, eating, and body image, this is a question that keeps coming up.
Simply put, intuitive eating is an evidence-based technique that involves listening closely to your body’s physiological needs and then directly responding to them. When I talk about this concept, women want to know if it REALLY works. It sounds too good to be true.
Does intuitive eating work?
“You can eat whatever you want, whenever you want?” they ask.
No — this is one of the biggest misconceptions surrounding intuitive eating.
“So, how does it work then?” they want to know.
The goal of intuitive eating is to become more in tune with (turn up the volume too) your body’s cues about your hunger and satiation.
You start to notice when you’re truly hungry, and even what you’re hungry for. You also begin to learn when you’re tempted to eat out of boredom, frustration, or other feelings and emotions.
Ultimately, you begin to eat what your body is actually craving when you crave it. Sometimes that’s ice cream. Sometimes it’s broccoli.
We ask ourselves questions about what we really want when we want it, and how much of it we need.
Intuitive eating is not a diet.
The scary truth about dieting is that it comes at a terrible cost. Sure, there’s a financial component to dieting, but the emotional toll it takes is even greater. In this post from earlier this year, we discussed how the real cost of dieting comes down to much more than just money and time. It’s the full-blown quality of life we sacrifice!
We constantly feel like we’re failing on the dieting journey. There has to be a better way.
Enter intuitive eating.
Can you fail at intuitive eating?
Here’s the most incredible thing about this concept: you cannot fail at it!
If you’ve dieted in the past, you’ve probably felt that feeling of “failure” if you didn’t hit the number on the scale you had hoped for.
Weight loss is not the goal of intuitive eating.
With intuitive eating, success means becoming more in tune with your body and mind’s needs over time. There is no number or dress size to reach. It is simply about being more aware of the cues your body is already giving you that you may not have been listening to all this time.
If you’ve been chasing weight goals, calorie goals, macronutrient goals, you’ve likely experienced the grief Perfectionist Patty can cause. It’s time to let go of your pursuit of perfectionism! Here’s how.
Each day, you have the opportunity to learn about your body. You cannot fail at this.
In my last post, I shared several questions you can ask yourself to help determine what your body and mind really need. See a list of them here.
Yes — intuitive eating works. It works by making you pay attention to what your body is telling you. There is no success or failure when you practice intuitive eating.
So, if you’re still wondering, “does intuitive eating work?” it won’t take long to realize that you’re trusting and respecting your body in a way you never have before.
How does it work?
Now that we’ve answered “does intuitive eating work?” we’re ready to move on to how it works.
In our next post, we’re going to explore Intuitive Eating 101. We’ll cover in further detail the basic principles of this concept, and HOW it works. I’ll also share with you my NYSER method, a tool for not only tuning in to your body’s hunger but honoring it by eating.
Check-in for future blog posts where we explore intuitive eating and other ways to guide you from weight worries, frustration and self-doubt to self-acceptance, food freedom, body confidence, and peace of mind.
Are you ready to talk more about eating intuitively? Click here for a free Body Joyful Breakthrough Session.
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