Busting through 5 Common Myths about Intuitive Eating

By now, the concept of Intuitive Eating is not new. More and more people are hearing about it, but quite a few really don’t know what it’s all about. There are a lot of myths and misconceptions about Intuitive Eating and today, I’d like to bust through some of them.

5 Myths about Intuitive Eating

1. Intuitive Eating will help you lose weight if you eat when hungry and stop when full.

Not necessarily! Intuitive Eating is NOT a weight loss program. Unfortunately, some of the Intuitive Eating language had been co-opted by diet culture and is being used to sell weight loss programs! Ideas such as eat when hungry and stop when full, or eat mindfully is framed in a way to promise weight loss.

Intuitive eating is a self-care eating framework to help you heal your relationship with food, mind and body. Focusing on weight loss interferes with mending this relationship. Therefore, it’s in your best interest to ignore those messages of diet culture and using Intuitive Eating for weight loss if you truly want to find true peace with food.

2. The main focus of Intuitive eating is on instinct and your gut.

False! I’m sure you’ve heard the phrase “trust your gut”. And I do believe in trusting your gut instinct in many things, including eating. But Intuitive Eating isn’t ONLY about trusting your instinct. Intuitive Eating also interconnects emotion and cognition.

For example, if you want to eat ice cream but you have thoughts swirling around in your mind that is shaming you for wanting this ice cream, this is a product of diet culture. What you want to do is challenge these distorted thoughts while honoring your desire to eat the ice cream.

Thanks to diet culture, there are a boatload of cognitive distortions running rampant in your mind. Part of the Intuitive Eating work I help my clients with is to learn how to reframe these irrational thoughts into more rational, realistic thoughts and beliefs.

3. Intuitive eating means you can eat whatever you want, whenever you want.

Not at all. I always tell people that Intuitive Eating is NOT instant gratification. See it, want it, eat it! Nope! One of the principles of Intuitive Eating that often gets misconstrued is—”giving yourself unconditional permission to eat”. People often assume this concept means to eat anything and everything at any time. However, this is far from the truth!

When you first start the Intuitive Eating journey, this concept of “unconditional permission to eat” can often cause you to have intense cravings and feel “out of control”. But this is quite expected as you’ve been depriving yourself of these foods for so long.

Intuitive Eating encourages you to stop and ask yourself questions before choosing and eating a food. “Am I hungry? Tired? How did this food make me feel last time I ate it”, etc.

This is far from see it, want it, eat it.

4. Weight gain is expected with Intuitive eating.

False! No one knows what your body will do once you give up dieting and embrace Intuitive Eating. Only your body knows this!

Some people gain some weight (generally if they came in to this process at a weight below their set point and/or with an eating disorder); some people lose weight, and some people stabilize their weight, meaning they are no longer weight cycling.

Weight is not a factor in Intuitive Eating. While I know this might be hard for some people to accept, it is important to come to terms with it. It’s impossible to create a healthy, neutral relationship with food AND focus on weight loss. The goal and focus are COMPLETELY opposite.

5. There is no structure to eating with Intuitive Eating.

No way! The truth is there is structure, but that structure is determined by your inner wisdom NOT by dieting.

With traditional dieting there is a “rigid structure”. Someone, or something is telling you what to eat, when to eat and how much to eat. Follow this structure, and you will lose weight (their promise – but as we know, that’s a false promise because the results are short-lived).

While there is no rule book with Intuitive Eating in regards to when, what and how much to eat, it is important to consistently nourish yourself as part of your self-care. For people new to the Intuitive Eating journey, putting a nourishing flexible plan in place might be needed to ensure you are meeting your body’s basic needs. Note the key work there – flexible!  This flexible structure will allow the natural rhythm of your body to shine through, and you will find your “natural structure” for eating will form.

Want to learn about more Intuitive Eating myths? Join me today at 12:15 pm EST for a Facebook Live training where I will unveil even more myths. And, you will have an opportunity to ask me anything about Intuitive Eating! Join me HERE.