Food and I go way back.
Seriously. I've been eating since I was born.
(Okay, hah, hah, cute joke… but not really.
Because this is actually a fundamental concept of the intuitive eating approach. Eating is natural. Nourishing yourself is an inborn instinct. More about that here.)
I’m also a registered dietitian/nutritionist (RDN) of 20 years, and a trained life coach. Oh, and official menu planner and chef for my family of 6.
So how did I make the journey from dietitian to intuitive eating coach? Here’s my story.
It was early in my career as a nutritionist that I began to feel stuck. People would come to me for a diet or a meal plan; they’d walk into my office and say, “Aliza, help me lose 30 lbs.” Or, “Tell me what I’m allowed to eat and when.” They’d look to me for that magic formula that would once and for all solve their weight problem, and grant them thinness for life.
But here’s the thing: despite all my training in meal planning and calorie counting… I knew it didn’t work! Again and again, I would see how diets failed – they failed my clients, and they failed me.
I had never managed to keep off weight long-term with any kind of diet. So how could I responsibly tell my clients that all they had to do was follow this meal plan, and measure out their set portions of protein and carbs at each meal, and - voila! - they would never have to worry about their weight again?
My instinct told me that the key to success lies inside each individual. That it has to do with making sustainable lifestyle changes that make sense for me, rather than by imposing external rules to get me down to some desired number on the scale. But I was at a loss as to how to actually help others figure this out; I didn’t even know how to figure it out myself!
I decided to go to a life coach for help. It was an incredible eye-opener for me; through my work with my coach, I gained a completely new insight into myself, my beliefs about food, and how my relationships with others impacted my eating. I learned that once I succeeded in distinguishing between physical hunger and the emotional sensation of wanting food, I was able to take care of that emotion rather than silencing it by eating.
I had finally released my struggle with food.
The experience was so life-altering for me that I knew I’d found my answer.
This was the missing link I’d been searching for to help my clients. So I trained to be a life coach, and since then I’ve combined my two fields of expertise to help my clients with both nutritional guidance and internal exploration - to truly achieve the goal of lifelong healthy eating.
About Intuitive Eating
So, what is Intuitive Eating? I like to break it down into 3 basic components:
1. Giving yourself unconditional permission to eat.
So many of us have been given the message that certain foods are bad, or that eating is an act of out-of-control indulgence. The first step is to hit DELETE on those thoughts. Eating is a natural, life-sustaining act of nourishment. You are allowed to eat! Yes, even a chocolate bar!
Giving yourself unconditional permission to eat means getting rid of that biological response of restriction and deprivation - i.e. that internal dialogue that goes like this:
‘Food police: “Don’t even look at that cream cake! You’re not allowed to have it!”
‘Diet rebel: “But I want it! I want to eat it ALL! Starting tomorrow, I promise I’ll never eat another piece of cake again!”
Say goodbye to those voices. From now on, when you see food, you start with the basic premise that you are allowed to eat it. Then you come to the next step:
2. Listening to your body cues of hunger and fullness.
Once you’ve realized that you are allowed to eat the slice of cream cake, you must ask yourself, “But do I want it right now?” Not, “Are my eyes popping out from those frosted, feathery cake layers, and does my heart palpitate at the thought of that creamy, gooey thing in my mouth?” But: Am I hungry right now? And if you are - Is this the food I want to satisfy my hunger?
Making this decision involves learning to listen to your body cues - your physiological feelings of hunger and fullness. Become an unbiased observer of yourself and your eating choices. It’s a fascinating journey in getting to know yourself and why you make the decisions you do – in a refreshingly guilt-free and judgment-free way.
3. Learning how to cope with your emotions without food.
Okay, I know what you’re thinking. Physiological body cues are nice, but what do we do with that big, hairy monster roaring “Your boss said WHAT to you?! Aaaah! Chocolate! NOW!”
We can’t ignore emotional eating. Both my personal and professional experience have shown me that it’s not lack of knowledge that causes people to make unhealthy eating choices; it’s those pesky emotions. Anger. Depression. Anxiety. We’ve taught ourselves to drown our emotions in food; becoming an intuitive eater means learning skills to cope with those emotions that don’t involve triple scoop hot fudge sundaes.
You cannot imagine how good it feels to be liberated from the emotional eating monster!