Have you ever watched a toddler or young child eat? It’s fascinating! A baby will cry when they’re hungry and eat until they’re full. Toddlers eat all kinds of foods in different amounts throughout a day or week. They’re born as intuitive eaters, meaning they naturally trust their bodies and listen to their hunger and fullness cues. Some days, a toddler might eat only one thing on their plate, and the next day, ask for seconds. They adjust to their needs each day. But what changes? Diet culture and the parent’s own beliefs around food can influence and tarnish the natural abilities of their children around food.

Imagine you finally have time to yourself, alone. You can feel the urge to go to the kitchen to explore what snack options are available. You grab one of the snack bags out of the cabinet. As soon as you start eating, there is a peace and relief that is felt. Suddenly, you realize you ate more than expected, multiple bags are gone. You feel completely out of control and guilty for eating that amount of food.

Diets promote the idea that progress comes as long as you follow the rules. This promotes a perfectionist mindset and makes you feel that you need to follow all of the rules. If you mess up, your progress will go off track.

The mindset of approaching Intuitive Eating needs to be approached differently. There is a concept of the spiral of healing that at times, it will get more challenging before there is improvement. There is no failure but times of reflection and growth when challenges present.

You probably have heard of the phrase “Trust your gut”. When you have big decisions to make, you are told to go with this unexplainable feeling inside which is pointing you to one direction over another.

 Have you ever had an experience where you were guided by others to do something when your “gut” was telling you something different? This can be challenging to know what to decide to do with conflicting guidance of yourself and others. These experiences can make you trust yourself less and doubt can creep in with your decision-making skills.

Have you ever started a diet? You know, those strict guidelines promising health, increased self-esteem, and weight loss?  It is estimated that the diet industry has a net worth of $72 billion dollars, all profiting from the glimmering hope of health (Tribole, E. & Resch, E., 2012). Our society also highlights the importance of a healthy lifestyle such as exercise, eating nutritious food, and fitting into a certain weight. You may even hear messages about how to eat or achieve health from family or friends. You are told over and over that you are not trying hard enough or failed based on the results of you following these rules. This feels like a never-ending cycle of attempting a new way of eating, feeling awful about oneself, and not seeing any benefit. What if our approach is wrong?