What is intuitive eating?

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You probably have heard of intuitive eating at some point. Maybe you thought it was just another fad diet, one that leads to temporary weight loss followed by gaining all the weight back (an outcome that happens to at least 80% of dieters). Despite the diety-sounding name, intuitive eating is actually not a diet at all, and it can offer a solution to people who struggle with persistent food noise.

Key Principles of Intuitive Eating

1. You have unlimited access to food.

This can feel unimaginable coming from a culture which teaches rigid self-control around food. It can feel like allowing yourself unlimited access to food will lead to a food rampage every time you set foot in the kitchen. Some people do feel out of control when they first switch to intuitive eating, especially those who are used to depravation (i.e. dieting) to control their eating.

However, as you become accustomed to having unlimited access to food, food becomes a reliable constant. You no longer feel the need to eat the entire bag of chips or the whole cake because chips and cake aren’t just available for one limited window of time in which you’re allowing yourself to be “bad”— they’re always available, in any quantity, anytime. Many people are surprised to learn that even with unlimited food access, intuitive eating has been linked to a reduction in binge eating.

2. You don’t need to chase a smaller body.

Intuitive eating teaches that bodies come in all shapes and sizes irrespective of diet. This is backed by research; as Harvard Medical School reports, “How your body burns calories depends on a number of factors, including the type of food you eat, your body’s metabolism, and even the type of organisms living in your gut. You can eat the exact same number of calories as someone else, yet have very different outcomes when it comes to your weight.”

A goal of intuitive eating is to help you reach your “setpoint,” which is the weight you can maintain without dieting or restricting. Your setpoint may be higher or lower than someone else of the same age, height, and gender.

3. Nutrition and movement should be gentle and joyful.

The last tenant of intuitive eating focuses on making choices that benefit health out of a spirit of self care and love rather than restriction and punishment. This might look like choosing to add more vegetables to your dinner plate or taking an evening walk with a friend around your neighborhood. The most important thing is that these choices feel good to you rather than following a prescribed version of “health” that doesn’t reflect your lifestyle, values, or interests.

Conclusion

Intuitive eating is more of a way to approach food and eating than it is an actual diet with rigid rules and restrictions. Its followers focus on turning inward to guide their decisions around food and movement, reaching a place of self-trust and stability in the place of depravation and food obsession.