We constantly hear what people think intuitive eating is on social media and most of the time it couldn’t be farther from the truth! When we had Evelyn Tribole on our podcast who is the founder of intuitive eating, she said that if you want to be confused about intuitive eating go search #intuitiveeating on social media and you will be very confused!
This is SO true! We see people all the time talking about intuitive eating but have no idea what it is. They are just going off of what they see on social media, and they have no formal training in it.
So, I figured it was time to debunk 3 of the biggest myths about intuitive eating…
MYTH #1: Intuitive Eating is just eating ALL the things, ALL the time
We hear this a lot from clients that we work with. They try and dabble with intuitive eating before they come and work with us and feel they are out of control around food, can’t stop eating, or they are addicted to food.
However, food freedom is not about just saying yes to food all the time – it’s also about having the ability to say no to food because you simply just don’t want it!
Intuitive eating gets you out of your head and gets you into your body and listening to yourself. Intuitive eating is not about just eating all of the things until you feel SO physically unpleasant, it’s about making peace with food and knowing you have the unconditional permission to eat.
If you are beginning your intuitive eating journey and you feel out of control around food… take a deep breath. This is normal and is because you’re allowing yourself to eat foods that you’ve been restricting for years, and we promise that this will not last forever. We have to go through this period of eating all the foods, all the time to learn how to get out of our brain, get back into our body and to trust ourselves again.
MYTH #2: Intuitive Eating is anti-vegetable or anti-nutrient dense foods
This couldn’t be further from the truth. The 10th principle of intuitive eating is to Honor Your Health with Gentle Nutrition. This principle is about learning to make food choices that honor your health and taste buds while making our body feel physically pleasant. However, we do not get into principle #10 until we make peace with food and have fully rejected the diet mentality.
Even if we wrote you the fanciest meal plan with all of the macronutrients, micronutrients, vitamins and minerals, you would not follow the plan if you were still feeling guilt and shame associated with food. This details the entire intuitive eating process and journey. Until you remove the guilt and shame of food, we don’t need to talk about nutrient density. You will get there!
Once you make peace with food and become an intuitive eater, you can actually find yourself saying “Oh my god I’m actually craving a crunchy salad right now”. However, you could also say “ I would really love a chocolate frosted donut with rainbow sprinkles” and both of those are okay! There is no moral value attached to these foods whatsoever. For more on Gentle Nutrition, click here to listen to our podcast episode titled: FAQ: Can I Focus On Increasing My Nutrient Density With Intuitive Eating?
MYTH 3#: Intuitive Eating is anti-human beings losing weight
Now this is the BIGGEST myth we see with intuitive eating. The majority of our clients have been in the pursuit of shrinking their bodies through dieting for 10, 20, 30, 40, 50+ years. The reality is many of them have yo-yo’ed their entire lives between gaining weight and losing weight, and in the long run, they’ve actually gained more weight over the years compared to when they started dieting.
With intuitive eating, you can break that cycle. You can say “I’m not going to chase smaller body anymore. I’m going to start chasing the act of taking care of myself and trusting myself”.
We are not against a person that loses weight in an intuitive eating process. However, it cannot be the focus of your intuitive eating journey. As soon as we turn our focus from trusting our bodies, listening to our bodies, being really present in our bodies to shutting all of that off and focusing on the number on the scale, we completely lose trust with our body.
We’ve had clients that have lost a lot of weight with intuitive eating. We’ve also had clients that have gained weight with intuitive eating. We’ve even had clients not lose or gain a single pound with intuitive eating. What’s most important is that their mindsets have shifted, and they are now the happiest, healthiest versions of themselves that they’ve ever been.
If you’re new to intuitive eating and want to learn more, I’d encourage you to take some time and explore the following resources:
If you’d like to continue this conversation about these myths around intuitive eating, I encourage you to give our podcast episode Top 3 Myths of Intuitive Eating a listen!
If you want additional help outside of these free resources and you are ready to take steps toward ditching dieting and gaining food freedom after reading this blog, we have a dietitian team who would love to work with you. Click here to get started and check out our FREE beginners Intuitive Eating training.
