Intuitive Eating Explained
The intuitive eating concept has become more and more widespread and accepted in nutrition practice in recent years. We hear about intuitive eating approaches all the time—here at Abigail Nutrition, we emphasize intuitive eating and mindfulness. But what does it mean to eat intuitively?
The intuitive eating concept was first introduced in a book written by 2 registered dietitians, Elyse Resch and Evelyn Tribole in 1995. Now in its 4th edition, the intuitive eating book/concept has reached millions and has become a widely accepted tenet of nutrition practice.
Intuitive eating was conceived as a way for individuals to regain control over their diet, diet patterns, and feelings surrounding hunger. The main principles of intuitive eating are:
Reject diet culture/the diet mentality.
Honor hunger.
Make peace with food/remove the black and white thinking.
Challenge the food police.
Find satisfaction in food.
Tune into fullness.
Cope with emotions with kindness.
Move joyfully.
Respect your body.
Honor your health with gentle nutrition.
As you can probably tell, these tenets were conceived to combat toxic elements of diet culture that form unhealthy, rigid rules surrounding food and create a destructive body image/relationship to food. Think about any fad diet that you have tried or wanted to try—many of them detail what foods are “good” and “bad,” some detail when you can and can’t eat, and there are many conceptions about what portions are “right” or “wrong,” and what amount and type of exercise is best.
The problem with diet culture/fad diets is that it causes us to lose touch with our natural cues for hunger and satiety, confuses us as to what is “right” vs “wrong,” and makes it challenging to have a positive or even neutral relationship with our bodies. Intuitive eating aims to remove food rules, reinstate intuition regarding hunger and fullness, and promote body and food neutrality. The main goal of intuitive eating is to help individuals figure out what works best for them.
Let’s break down what each tenet means, and how we use it in nutrition practice:
Reject diet culture/the diet mentality: the first principle of intuitive eating is to leave everything you learned from diet culture at the door. In order to regain intuition about food/your body, you’ll need to start from scratch. There is no space for rigidity and rules when it comes to intuitive eating—there is no “right” or “wrong,” “good” or “bad,” black or white.
Honor hunger: eat when you’re hungry! This principle instructs us to listen to our bodies and eat when we feel hungry, even if it’s not a generally recognized meal time. If you feel hungry at 11am, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t eat lunch or a midmorning snack. We are all different, and therefore our bodies will all need something different. Additionally, our bodies need different things on different days—some days we are more hungry than others, and that’s ok. Pushing off hunger fuels the vicious cycle of bingeing and restricting set by diet culture, and we want to break this cycle!
Make peace with food/remove the black and white thinking: this emphasizes an all foods fit approach and helps us tune into cravings. All foods have a place in the diet—there are foods for clinical health, emotional health, social health, pleasure. Remove the black and white thinking about food and recognize that you are allowed to have whatever sounds most tasty to you. A mindful approach we use in nutrition practice is to think about what flavors, textures, and temperatures sound good to us in the moment—this will help you to mindfully enjoy all your favorites.
Challenge the food police: again, remove food rules! In social situations, reclaim your control around food by allowing yourself to eat what you crave while removing the stigma surrounding “good” and “bad” foods.
Find satisfaction in food: this principle relates to principle 3 in that we want to focus on foods that will be best for us in the moment. Don’t eat a plain salad if you don’t love or want salad because diet culture told you it’s the “healthiest” option! What tastes, textures, and temperatures sound good to you in the moment? When you tune into cravings and learn to eat what you love, you’ll find more satisfaction in meals. That being said, we also want to focus on protein, healthy fat and fiber at every meal and snack to help balance our meals and improve satisfaction/satiety.
Tune into fullness: just like we listen to our bodies when we’re hungry, we need to listen to them when we’re full. Take breaks in between bites, breathe, and eat without distractions. Pay attention to how full you feel during and after meals, and check in with a level of fullness that feels good to you after meals.
Cope with emotions with kindness: allow yourself to make mistakes. Change the language in your head surrounding overeating, and eating “good” vs “bad” foods. Know that one occasion of overeating doesn’t affect your progress—instead of beating yourself up for something like overeating, check in with that feeling of fullness and understand that the feeling made you uncomfortable, but that you’ll learn from this experience to check in more intuitively with yourself next time. The more you allow diet-culture-influenced negative thoughts to lead your thoughts about food, the more you damage your food relationship. Be kind to yourself!
Move joyfully: just as there are no “right” or “wrong” foods, there are no “right” or “wrong” ways to move. You don’t need to do 5 HIIT classes a week or run every day to be healthy. Joyful movement is movement that brings you joy and releases those endorphins. Find out what form of movement is right for you—is it jogging, yoga, pilates, dance, walking, swimming? There are so many ways to move, but the only “right” way is the one that’s right for you!
Respect your body: you don’t have to necessarily love your body, but try to respect it. Celebrate what your body can do through joyful movement, rather than punishing it through exercise. Focus on neutral language when talking about your body, and wear clothes that make you feel comfortable. A great way to help garner neutral/positive body image is to focus on what your body did for you that day—little things count!
Honor your health with gentle nutrition: this goes back to balance. We want to allow all foods in our diet, but we also want to prioritize balance with protein, fiber and healthy fat. “Clean” eating has no place in an intuitive diet, but balance and putting health first does!
Hopefully this quick breakdown of intuitive eating helped you to better understand what it means and how you can put it into practice.
Have you tried intuitive eating/will you try it?
By Jessica Kaplan