Intuitive eating is a mindful eating approach that focuses on honoring your hunger and enjoying your food. Read on to learn more about this intuitive eating approach and how it can help you develop a healthier relationship with food and your body.
1 What is Intuitive Eating?
Intuitive eating is a diet approach developed by nutritionists Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch. It encourages a more positive eating style and a healthier attitude towards food and your body image.
With intuitive eating, you rely on your body’s hunger cues and eat until you’re satisfied. It’s about eating with personal mindfulness, not forcing yourself to continue eating when you’re already full.
Intuitive Eating
2 Principles of Intuitive Eating
According to Alissa Rumsey, an intuitive eating counselor and owner of Alissa Rumsey Nutrition and Wellness (US), the principles of intuitive eating should be applied systematically and carefully, one step at a time.
Eat When Hungry
Listening to your body is the best way to recognize your body’s necessary food needs. Nutritionist Cording suggests rating your hunger on a scale of 1-10 to help determine your hunger and food needs.
Eat When Hungry
Eat for Health with Nutritious Choices
Intuitive eating is based on your body’s signals and nutritional knowledge to help you make appropriate food choices. Instead of strict diet control, you can enjoy your meals based on your personal eating needs and necessary nutrition.
Eat for Health
Pay Attention to Your Body’s Hunger and Fullness Cues
Your body will signal when it’s hungry or full. Starving yourself will lead to physical weakness and fatigue and can have further consequences. So, when your body signals hunger, choose light and appropriate foods to eat.
Similarly, when your body has had enough energy, it will signal you to stop eating.
Listen to Your Body
Ditch the Diet Mentality and Be Flexible with Food Choices
To build a healthy relationship with food, you need to let go of the diet mentality when practicing intuitive eating. This way, you’ll be more accepting and trusting of your body and make more nutritious food choices.
Be Flexible with Food Choices
Eating is Enjoyable
Eating is a journey filled with joy and interesting discoveries, so you don’t need to force yourself to follow any strict rules. As a result, your body and intuition will adjust the amount of food to a reasonable level for your body’s needs.
Eating is Enjoyable
Respect Your Emotions but Don’t Indulge Them
Eating based on your emotions is a way of indulging and temporarily coping with emotional hunger. For example, if you’re stressed, try dealing with it through walking, meditation, etc., instead of eating to satisfy fake hunger caused by stress.
Respect Your Emotions
Respect Your Body’s Beauty
Emotional eating won’t make your body more beautiful as you desire. Instead, it’s a method to help you develop a more positive relationship with food. As a result, you can establish healthier eating habits.
Respecting your beauty, even with physical imperfections, will help you love yourself more and make better food choices.
Respect Your Body’s Beauty
Exercise to Feel Stronger
In addition to eating, light exercise will help you stay young, beautiful, and healthy. You don’t need to follow any harsh exercise rules. Instead, consider exercise as a factor that makes you more positive and energetic.
Exercise to Feel Stronger
3 Understanding the Different Types of Hunger
There are two types of hunger: physical hunger and emotional hunger, also known as fake hunger.
Physical Hunger
This is your body’s real hunger. With this type of hunger, your body usually sends signals like a growling stomach, fatigue, or irritability. When these needs are adequately met, the signs will gradually disappear.
Physical Hunger
Emotional Hunger
Emotional hunger is your body’s fake hunger. When your body is stressed, sad, or experiencing any negative emotion, it creates a desire to eat. At these times, you can distract your body by walking, meditating, etc. to eliminate the desire to eat.
Emotional Hunger
4 Benefits of Intuitive Eating for Your Body
Research on intuitive eating is ongoing and developing. So far, studies have shown that the main benefit of intuitive eating is improved psychological health.
In addition to improved psychological health, the physical appearance and quality of life of those participating in intuitive eating research have also improved significantly.
Furthermore, studies on the behavior and attitudes of intuitive eaters show that they are less likely to have eating disorders.
Benefits of Intuitive Eating
We hope this article provides you with the necessary information about intuitive eating so that you can apply it and develop healthy eating habits along with a suitable nutrition plan for yourself.
Source: Thanh Nien Electronic Newspaper
