When did “intuitive eating” become the Hunger & Fullness Diet? Can someone please explain to me why the world has forgotten the “intuition” part of “intuitive eating?”

Because let me tell you, “intuitive eating” does NOT mean “eating when you’re hungry and stopping when you’re full…or else.”

It means using that little voice inside of you—the same voice that reminds you to lock your door before you fall asleep, and not go home with that guy you met at some bar.

Your intuition is a product of your mind, body and spiritual knowing. It’s a part of your body—hence hunger and fullness play an important role in guiding it—but it’s not ONLY your body.

It’s also informed by logic, environment, as well as something entirely different — something metaphysical; something only you can know in yourself.

It’s the voice that tells you what to order at a restaurant when you’re not hungry at all, but want to enjoy food and festivities with friends.

(If you’ve emailed me and asked me what to do when “you’re not hungry” but have set dinner plans, you’re definitely on the “Hunger and Fullness Diet,” and not eating intuitively).

Bring the “intuition” back into your intuitive eating journey, and your world will change.

Not just your food—Your World.

Hint: Intuitive eating is practice for intuitive living, and vice versa. They can not be successfully separated. 

Like this post? Check out my free video training series and end the diet-binge cycle once and for all. 

We often hear “emotional eating experts” encourage women to “feel their feelings” instead of “numb out” with food.

Which is somewhat sound advice, as there is no doubt in my mind that getting in touch with your emotions is incredibly important for reasons that have nothing to do with whether or not you eat over them — I encourage my clients to feel their feelings whether they eat while doing so or not. 

That being said,  

thinking we can live a life without coping mechanisms is totally unrealistic — it goes against our biological instincts to seek pleasure and avoid pain. 

You will experience discomfort for the rest of your life, and you will reach for some kind of coping mechanism to deal with at least a portion of that pain.

Not to mention that coping mechanisms are what allow us to function during times of emotional duress. We need breaks from crying when trauma occurs. Feelings can’t be processed every moment of every day. We have to get out of bed, go to work, pick up the kids, do our laundry...

Coping mechanisms take the edge off so we can show up for life in the midst of our pain. 

Now,

when we need to pull out a coping mechanism (for whatever reason), humans usually go for the one that seems most appealing or soothing in the moment— which is usually determined by gut-instinct, not “logic.” 

The truth is, we’re not necessarily in control of which coping mechanism we choose when we’re experiencing discomfort (which is one of the reasons “taking a warm bath” doesn’t work).

But we do know one thing — dieting (i.e. trying to control our food/weight) — keeps food on the brain, so we’re more likely to turn to food as our “go-to” coping mechanism.

In other words,

The more we obsess,

the more we try to control food,

the more time we spend googling paleo recipes…

the more likely we are to turn to food for comfort. 

When we stop dieting, however, and let our natural, biological instincts around food take over without guilt, judgement, or attempts at control…we naturally start to develop new non-food-related coping mechanisms. We make space in our brain for new practices of self-care to emerge. 

People often ask me,

do you really never eat emotionally anymore?

To which I usually reply something along the lines of, “of course not, everyone eats emotionally sometimes…and anyone who tells you differently is either lying OR pretty f’ing crazy around food (read: restrictive).”

As my friend Wendy Shanker once said, “there are only 6 people who eat food righteously as fuel, and all six of them are Kenyan Marathon runners.”

More on that here…

Lately, however, I’ve been re-framing my answer to this question, because at this point in my eating career, I don’t really categorize my behaviors as either “emotional” or “for physical hunger” in my mind anymore.

The truth is, my food choices are rarely, if ever, either “emotional” or “physical.” They’re almost always both, just in differing degrees and combinations.  

Everything I eat affects me physically AND emotionally, by virtue of the fact that all food both affects my blood sugar and gives me sensual pleasure (i.e. makes me feel good).

And like all other evolutionary processes designed to make us feel good (cough *sex* cough), it’s incredibly difficult, if not impossible, to separate food from emotion entirely.

My relationship with food, like my relationship with sex, is always a dance driven by both physical and emotional desire. And labeling our food choices as motivated by one or the other is not generally practical or realistic in the long run. 

That being said, in the beginning of one’s anti-diet or “intuitive eating” journey, labeling our choices as being either “physical” or “emotional” can be helpful when trying to learn the language of our bodies — a practical tool for early non-dieters to re-learn what they’re bodies are actually calling for, particularly after years of ignoring them.

In the long run, however, we must acknowledge that this way of thinking about food is elementary at best — an oversimplification of a biological process that is much more complicated and nuanced than that.

Food is not “just fuel.” Just like sex is not just reproduction.

And honoring both our physical and emotional desires in all of our eating choices is an important part of not falling into the “hunger and fullness diet” trap.

My suggestion? Let your physical and emotional hungers work in tandem. Let them inform one another, rather than overpower one another. Don’t deny either — as that may easily lead to rebellion — but rather, explore different ways of satisfying and honoring both, in food and in life.

Like this post? Sign up here for free weekly(ish) coaching emails.

I’m getting a little bored of talking about how “relinquishing control” is the answer to your food problem…I’d much rather talk about how it’s the answer to your life problem.

Because heres the thing,

People don’t try to control their weight in a vacuum — they try to control their weight…to control something else.

When I’m thin, I’ll dazzle men everywhere and finally get a boyfriend.

When I’m thin, everyone will think I’m perfect and want to be my friend.

When I’m thin, people will take me seriously at work, be jealous of me, and I’ll get promoted.

When I’m thin, I won’t be lonely, because I’ll have the guy, the friends, the family and the white picket fence.

Trying to control our weight is really just an attempt to control the uncontrollable — primarily, but not limited to, what other people think of us.

Unfortunately, however, you can’t control how people feel about you with your weight, because you can’t control how people feel about you at all. 

No matter what you weigh, there will be someone who doesn’t like you.
No matter what you weigh, you will not be right for every part (or partner).
No matter what you weigh, scary, uncomfortable things will continue to happen to you.

There is nothing you can do about uncertainty in life…except stop trying to control it.

Let go or be dragged.

Like this post? Sign up here for free weekly(ish) coaching emails.