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5 Ways to Avoid Dieting Before the Summer

Finally! The weather is cooperating, it’s in the 70’s and I couldn’t be happier. The windows in my office are open, there is a slight breeze and I am just loving this spring weather.

But for some of the women in my online community, the warmer weather brings up mixed emotions. Their inner voices are screaming both “yay, I love this weather”, and “oh no, I can’t cover up in a coat any longer”. This means that they need to feel comfortable in the clothes they are wearing. Yet, that brings up another issue…

…their summer clothes aren’t fitting as they hoped they would. And vacations are coming, family reunions will be happening and weddings are scheduled. This is causing them to feel like they must go on a diet to lose weight or else …

“I’ll have the worst summer!”
“Everyone at the reunion/wedding will stare at me and think how fat I got!”
“I won’t be able to go on the amusement park rides!”

Can you relate to these thoughts and feelings?

These feelings are made worse by the “bikini body influence” that is surrounding you on a daily basis. From magazine covers, to radio advertisements, to T.V. commercials, you are being bombarded by tips and tricks to get in your best bikini body shape by summer.

What happens when you fall prey to all this bikini body marketing?

You start to bash your own body, you engage in body loathing every time you look into the mirror, and you start comparing your body to everyone else’s (and it never measures up, right?).

All this body hatred fuels the vicious cycle of dieting.

5 Power Thoughts to Chase these Diet Thoughts Away

1. Reality Check
Diets never worked for you, and never will. Let’s say you decide to diet for a few weeks before summer so you can fit into your summer clothes. Summer comes, you’re now wearing those cute shorts, but you are also hanging with your friends, going to outdoor concerts, and eating out in restaurants and lo and behold, you are overeating. Yes, the restriction you endured during the weeks leading up to the summer is coming back to bite you in the butt.

2. Dress for the Present
If you pulled your summer clothes out of the closet and you don’t feel comfortable in them, go shopping. You don’t have to spend a lot of money, just buy a few pieces that you can mix and match. Wearing comfortable clothes that aren’t pinching you and squeezing you will make all the difference on whether you spend your day bashing your body or respecting your body.

3. Thank Your Body
Your body is an amazing machine. Have you stopped recently to consider all the miracles it performs for you on a daily basis? From breathing, keeping your heart pumping, to being able to see the beautiful spring flowers, there is so much to be thankful for. All too often you get wrapped up in body negativity because it doesn’t “look” the way you want it to look, which is influenced by diet culture and the thin ideal society has you chasing after. Instead, start each morning with saying “thank you” to your body for working hard for you another day.

4. Recommit to a Diet-Free Life and Enjoy Each Moment
Using self-compassion, realize it’s okay to think at times “I want to lose weight”. But be curious about what triggered this thought and use self-compassion to recommit to your diet-free life and your intuitive eating journey. Then practice living in each moment and challenge yourself to stay present without judgement.

5. You are not alone!

Remember, others are likely feeling the same way as you. Sometimes knowing this makes all the difference! Reach out and support someone today! Not a member of my private intuitive eating support group yet? Join us here (it’s free!)

What thoughts about your journey fill your mind now that summer is here? Post below!

Intuitive Eating: I Don’t Know Where to Start

It’s Intuitive Eating Wednesday when I answer your questions and troubleshoot your challenges around intuitive eating and emotional eating.

This week’s Intuitive Eating Wednesday Question comes from Sandy, and it is:

“Bonnie, I have decided not to start a diet in the New Year! And while I’m excited about this, I just don’t know where to begin my intuitive eating journey. I have the original Intuitive Eating book, which I’ve read twice, but I just feel overwhelmed. Can you help me?”

Yes, of course, thank you Sandy for writing in to me.

As I started to put together some steps for Sandy, I thought about you.

Are you in the same place as Sandy?

Have you historically started a new diet or “healthy way of life” (a.k.a. diet) every January 1^st?

Have you decided that this year it will be different….no more dieting, but you don’t know where to start your intuitive eating journey?

First, let me congratulate you for making the commitment to yourself to not diet in 2018! That is huge! I realize that it might have been a difficult decision with all the diet ads and marketing of the ‘right’ way to eat and exercise to shrink or sculpt your body (into something that is not sustainable anyway)!

Second, I feel your overwhelm. There is so much information on the internet about how “to do” intuitive eating, but often these suggestions contradict one another.

Most of my clients that finally reach out to me for help have already dabbled in intuitive eating. That dabbling can look like a few things:

They’ve read the book Intuitive Eating by Evelyn Tribole and Elsye Resch.
They’ve taken an online course in intuitive eating.
They’ve been receiving support in the myriad of free private Facebook groups that offer intuitive eating support (by the way, if you’re not a member of my group yet, click here).

So the question is, with all this ‘dabbling’, why are you still feeling overwhelmed and questioning “where do I start”?

I believe the answer lies in the following reasons:

You’ve read the intuitive eating book, but are having trouble implementing the principles because while reading the book helps you become familiar with intuitive eating, for most people (I’m not saying all people, but most people), they need more structure and coaching to help implement the principles into their daily life. Is this you too?

You’ve taken an online course but admittedly didn’t show up for yourself by taking appropriate action. Or, the course lacked the private coaching that you really need to take this to the next level. Or, the course was marketed as an intuitive eating course, but in fact once you got into it, it was really dieting.

You’re a member of a number of free Facebook groups but you aren’t receiving individualized coaching by certified intuitive eating counselors in these settings, nor should they be giving you coaching for free. This would be a disservice to you and to their clients who have invested in themselves. The free groups can only take you so far.

So what’s your next ‘first’ step?

Grab your freebie here: 5 Steps to a Body You Love Without Dieting. This will give you the step-by-step approach I take my clients through.

Then, if you want me to walk you through this step-by-step journey, contact me here.

Mastering Intuitive Eating

My client, Amanda, who is working with me on intuitive eating, walked into my office, sat down and starting crying. Once she was able to stop crying, she told me how she recently had a breast cancer scare. Her doctor called her and told her she needed to go for a second mammogram, they “saw” something on the first one. After the mammogram, a biopsy needed to be done. The results came back as benign, and she was crying of happiness.

What a sigh of relief.

Now, her focus shifted back to taking care of herself since in the 2 weeks prior while she was going through what seemed like torture and waiting for results, she found herself soothing herself with comfort foods.

Isn’t it crazy how life often throws you curveballs? They come with no warning and can sweep you off your feet.

These curve balls can often make it difficult for you to stay focused on your intuitive eating journey. You may come face-to-face with various obstacles you don’t expect, and feel like you have no support, even when you need it the most.

In theory, you should be able to use the techniques you learned throughout your journey, but training is one thing; practice, support and accountability is another. It can be extremely beneficial to continue to have support while you start integrating your intuitive eating training into your daily life.

This is where my new membership program Intuitive Eating Mastery Circle can play a role. This program will provide you with the support and accountability you need while you embark on integrating your intuitive eating practice into your daily life. You will have my support as well as the support of a group of wonderful women who are all on the same journey.

With this membership program, we meet twice every month for live, small group coaching calls on the phone and during open office hours in our private Facebook group. During these calls and during open office hours, we work through any lingering diet mentalities you may have, bust through your limiting beliefs and, most importantly, deal with challenging times in your life without falling back to using food to cope.

The best part of this Mastery Circle is that what we focus on and discuss depends on YOU. Whatever obstacle you may face or struggle you may have, you can ask me and your new family for support and we can help you through it. You will always have someone on your side.

Head on over to IntuitiveEatingMasteryCircle.com for all the details and to get started right away. Register by midnight Eastern on Wednesday September 13th and SAVE 50%.

If you have any questions about the program, please email me at Bonnie@DietFreeRadiantMe.com so I can help you and see if this program is a right fit for you.

I look forward to seeing you in our Mastery Circle!

When Eating is a Non-Issue and Food Decisions Just Happen

When you want to get into a routine and build something new into your life, one way to do so is to schedule and plan. As a chronic dieter, this was (or maybe still is) also true for you when it comes to eating for weight loss (a.k.a. dieting).

You schedule the number of meals you’ll eat that day based on when the plan tells you to, and you restructure your life around that plan. You find that you’re constantly thinking about what you’re supposed to be eating next, will you be eating it “on time” and if you didn’t pack it with you, will you be able to find something comparable. You find the only thing you are thinking about is food.

I want you to remember a time where you weren’t worrying about your weight or your food. You lived your life and when you were hungry you ate, you stopped when you were full and you weren’t frantically wondering if a food fell into your plan if you wanted to have it. For many of you trying to get back to this memory, it might take you all the way back to your childhood days—and that’s OK.

When you were younger and there’s less to worry about, that carefree attitude translated easier to food. Eating was just something you did in between all the other fun things you did each day. And you enjoyed every bite you took.

This is intuitive eating at its finest….when

…..Eating is a Non-Issue and Food Decisions Just Happen

Now that you are older and have been influenced by the diet culture that surrounds you, well, it hasn’t been so easy for you to return to the way you were born.

I know you have this deep desire to become an intuitive eater again. I know this because I have spoken to hundreds of you wishing it were easier. I know how easy it is to fall back into diet mentality, and I also know how important support is for you on this journey.

Free Training

Join me tomorrow, Thursday September 7 at 8 pm EST for a Facebook Live training where I will discuss how you can make intuitive eating second nature again.

I’m going live in my private Facebook group, so if you aren’t yet a member of our group, click here now to join us for free.

Here’s what you’ll learn during our Facebook Live training:

The #1 reason you struggle with implementing the intuitive eating principles
What it really takes to make intuitive eating a part of your being
How you can be at peace with food and yourself so you can enjoy life to the fullest

Oh, and if you are not on Facebook and want to watch the replay, just send me an email to Bonnie@DietFreeRadiantMe.com and I’ll send you the recording.

Celebrate NO Diet Day

Have you skipped a meal because a “diet” told you to? Have you replaced meals with shakes or avoided entire food groups? Do you restrict your favorite foods or force yourself to eat foods you don’t like because your “diet” says you should?

You may have fallen prey to the many fad diets out there, but you don’t have to anymore.

Let’s celebrate International NO Diet Day tomorrow, May 6^th by stopping the diets. Use this day to celebrate body acceptance, body shape diversity and to raise awareness of the harmful effects unhealthy dieting can have. The goal of International No Diet Day is to teach people how to have a healthy relationship with food and ditch restrictive eating habits.

Effects of Dieting

Diets can be filled with restriction, deprivation and cravings, which may lead to bingeing, emotional eating and guilt. This can move you further away from having a healthy and balanced life.

Diets can cause you to ignore your internal hunger signals that your body naturally gives you for when and what it wants to eat. This can lead to an altering ability to recognize these signals and affects how you feed yourself. The change in mindset also alters the “brake” system your body has in place to avoid overeating. If you restrict, you are more likely to binge.

Remember, a diet provides you with a set of rules about what you can or cannot eat. They are a short-term strategy to reach long-term goals. Fad diets, diet products, and the way body image is portrayed in the media are detrimental to forming healthy eating and lifestyle habits. Body discrimination can be seen all around, from advertisements showing off thin models to the current “fat acceptance” movement which is quite the opposite and celebrates curves while shaming smaller physiques.

Here are 3 tips to help you break the never-ending diet cycle:

Become an attuned eater. Choose foods based on an internal sense of hunger, appetite and satisfaction. This will help you learn more about what your body craves and help avoid overeating.

Eat without distractions. Chew thoroughly and enjoy what you’re eating. Listen for the internal cues your body will give you as you reach satiety.

Do not deprive yourself. Instead, eat what you want and savor it. Avoiding deprivation will help limit the temptation “avoided foods” have.

Remember, dieting is about restriction which can lead to feelings of guilt and ultimately alter your relationship with food and your body. Stop the diets by accepting your body where it is now. With acceptance comes admiration and you will naturally feed your body better and avoid restricting to provide your body with all the nutrients it needs.

Celebrating and loving your body and yourself is the drive behind much of the work I do. Rather than restricting yourself, focus on nourishing yourself. I stress this to all my clients. Self-care and loving yourself go hand-in-hand. Please stop comparing yourself to others! Embrace your uniqueness and celebrate your body by treating it with nourishing foods and mindfulness.

If you need help celebrating your body, head over to www.TalkWithBonnie.com and request a time to chat!

Take the “International No Diet Day Pledge”. Repeat the following as many times as you need to:

“I will accept myself just as I am.
I will feed myself if hungry.
I will feel no shame or guilt about my size or eating.
…and I will LOVE MYSELF for who I am, not who I feel pressure to be!”

Intuitive Eating…No Willpower Required

This week’s Intuitive Eating Wednesday’s Question is:

“I’ve been trying intuitive eating, but I just don’t have the willpower to stick with it. How can I strengthen my willpower backbone?”

I just LOVE this question. But before I get to the answer, let’s get clear on your dieting history. It probably goes something like this:

You’ve tried them all. Weight Watchers, Atkins, Weight Watchers, the Blood Type Diet, Weight Watchers. the Scarsdale Diet, Weight Watchers, the HCG Diet, Weight Watchers. Oh, did I mention Weight Watchers?!

It is SO easy to get sucked into sensational claims that come with each of these diets. But what you are finding is that they don’t work. Well, they do “work” if by working you mean losing weight, only to gain it back.

Yes, I won’t disagree. All diets can work in helping you lose weight. But can we agree that they ultimately don’t work, seeing you are here looking for another way?

Throughout all the diets you’ve been on, you’ve tried SO hard to have SO much willpower so you can resist your favorite food that the diets deem bad for you. And, the reason you’ve been sucked into many fad diets is because you only have to endure them for a short period of time and therefore only need to have a little willpower until the diet is over.

Many diets proudly state “Lose 30 pounds in 30 days”, or “6 weeks to flat abs”. I know this is very tempting. And you think to yourself “ok, I need to have willpower for 30 days (or 6 weeks) and that’s it…I’ll reach my goal and the diet and misery will be over.”

But we know that you can only resist your favorite food for so long. Maybe you can last the 30 days or 6 weeks. Or maybe you can’t. Either way, what happens? When your willpower weakens and you have an emotional trigger, you cave and have the very food you’ve been longing yet been restricting. And now you don’t just have a serving, you have several servings, and it eventually turns into a binge.

Next thing that happens >>> feelings of guilt, shame, hopelessness, failure and the negative self-talk and body bashing.

Well, the good news is this.

In the practice of intuitive eating, there is no willpower required. Yay! You learn to take all the conditions off your food and when you do, the power those foods hold over you are no more. Even better, once you learn to trust in your inner signals as your guide to eating, you will no longer need to rebel against the diets that are telling you what to eat and not to eat.

Because YOU are in charge!

So, back to the original question that came in from one of my readers:

“I’ve been trying intuitive eating, but I just don’t have the willpower to stick with it. How can I strengthen my willpower backbone?”

There is no willpower in intuitive eating. What I want you to recognize is if you are still relying on willpower, then you are still harboring a diet mentality. And this will cause you to continue to stumble on your intuitive eating journey.

Give thought to how many times a day or week you think to yourself that you need to have willpower to resist a food.

How many times do you call up your willpower before heading out to a party or dinner with friends?

Call yourself out on it. Recognize it. The more you do and the more you remind yourself that you don’t need willpower in intuitive eating, the more you will see the diet mentality dissipate.

Grab this freebie that I have for you and you’ll be well on your way to never falling into the willpower trap again: Your 3 Step Plan to Shift Out of Diet Mentality and the Willpower Trap.

Come join me on Facebook Live today, Wednesday at 1:30 pm EST for a free training on this very topic! We will be LIVE on my business page right at this link >

https://www.facebook.com/BRGDieteticsandNutritionPC/

Here’s What to Do to Lose Weight Forever

Anyone who works with me knows that self-care is a major part of my work. Between taking an extra few minutes for yourself each day, fueling your body with nourishing foods, and knowing when to ask others for support, there are many ways you can put your self-care in the forefront of your life.

The process of improving your self-care may be slow starting and its okay to take baby steps to help yourself.

You may have started by giving yourself a few minutes to de-stress each day and eventually moved to learning how to prioritize your activities so you are doing what you enjoy most.

I have seen a lot of great turnarounds over the last year; people like yourself who have taken their self-care from the back burner to the front and center of their life. Making this shift is a major step on your intuitive eating journey.

Yet, what I am finding is that many of you are stopping there.

You are not taking the process to the next level.

You are seeking out free resources to help you become an intuitive eater, yet you are still spinning your wheels.

You are taking 3 steps forward, 2 steps backward.

Sure, if you continue at this pace, you may eventually get to where you want to be (an intuitive eater) but why wait that long?

You can accelerate the process by partnering with the right person who will guide you using an organized proven system.

I am that person for you. And I have the system for you.

It’s the Freedom to Eat Forever™ Program, a 5 step intuitive eating process that will enable you to enjoy guilt-free eating and a life free of dieting.

But you know what? You have to step up to the plate and invest in yourself and your future. It’s when you invest in yourself that you see the results. I did it, and so can you.

Check out this cool video. Then email me or Facebook message me if you want to see if it’s your time for Freedom to Eat Forever™.

Hurry. Class starts February 22, 2017. I don’t want you to be left out. Take your intuitive eating to the next level.

Can I Fail on My Intuitive Eating Journey?

I was thinking about a conversation I had with a new client a few weeks ago. She was really fed up with dieting and was looking for a solution to help her finally be at peace with food and her body. We talked about the process of intuitive eating and it resonated with her greatly, but she had one big fear: would she fail at this process, like she failed at dieting?

Her fear of failure was initially holding her back from saying yes to embarking on the intuitive eating process. So we talked about that fear and one of the things I helped her to understand is that you cannot fail at intuitive eating.

You see, dieting is something you go on and you go off. Dieting is what actually triggers overeating. Dieting is what causes the feelings of failure.

With intuitive eating, there is no failure. Intuitive eating is this process where you’re learning to become an intuitive eater, which is an ability you are born with. That ability is already within you. Every step along the path, is a lesson learned. Every experience you have will be another lesson learned.

So what you might have thought of as a “failure” or “setback” on your diet, is now going to be thought of as a lesson learned. Its growth and progress.

If you can view the process of intuitive eating from this place, a place of growth, a place of learning new things and new experiences, it will help propel you forward towards reclaiming being an intuitive eater. Here you will realize that you will always learn something from the process and you will never fail.

Once my client realized that she is not embarking on another diet, she realized she cannot fail on this journey. This process is not something that ends. You learn to live as an intuitive eater, it’s a practice.

And so when there is no endpoint, there’s no failure and no fear that’s attached to that.

Once she was able to let go of that fear, she was able to say “YES, let’s do this. Let’s go on this journey together so I can reclaim being an intuitive eater”. She’s on that journey now and really enjoying it.

I say the same to you.

There are lessons learned in every experience you have on this intuitive eating journey.

If you come upon an obstacle or you think you have fallen off the wagon, let’s change that thought process and just think of it as a lesson learned that’s given you growth so you can continue along your journey.

As always, if you need me, I am here.

There’s No All or Nothing in Intuitive Eating

I recently had a client share her success story. Let’s call her Susan. Susan was at an office party when two delicious looking cakes were served. She knew she wouldn’t be able to resist trying the cakes, so she took a small piece of each on her plate. She ate a few bites of the chocolate cake, then a few bites of the white cream cake, and something amazing happened!

She didn’t feel the need to eat more! She was shocked. She was practicing mindfulness around her eating and she savored each bite and she was satisfied before she polished off both pieces.

This. Never. Happened. To. Her. Before.

How did she do this you ask?

By using the intuitive eating strategies that I am teaching her, she is learning to move away from the all or nothing way of thinking. She didn’t feel guilty for indulging in a food she wanted. She has made peace with food and has reaped the benefits which is showing up in so many ways in her life.

Had she found herself in this scenario a few months ago before we began working together, the outcome would have been different. The all or nothing thinking is part of a diet mentality and usually leads to overeating, followed by guilt, unhappiness, dieting, restriction, overeating etc. It’s a vicious cycle.

Intuitive eating is tuning into what your body wants, even if it’s a slice of cake, and giving it what it wants. If you listen to your body, you won’t feel the need to overeat and have guilt afterwards. Your body will be happy it can enjoy the foods it wants.

You may be asking yourself, “How do I get myself to this point?” The answer is to change your mindset. You have to step away from the diet mentality of restricting certain foods or entire food groups.

The way to make peace with food is to give yourself unconditional permission to eat what you want. I know, this sounds like an opportunity to eat uncontrollably. And to be honest with you, some people use it as an excuse to do just that.

It’s a process my dear readers. It does not happen overnight. Those who work through the process with the support, encouragement, positive attitude and patience are the ones who will experience what Susan did. The intuitive eating process can help you transform your relationship with food, where you end the battle with food and your body and achieve great pleasure in eating once again.

Here are two steps you can take today to become and intuitive eater and change your mindset:

Commit to saying goodbye to the dieting mindset! It is time to recognize that you can have your cake and eat it too. It doesn’t have to be all or nothing.

Start tuning in and listening to your body. Your body gives you signals when it starts to get hungry and full. Tune into these signals to know when and what you should feed your body. You’ll learn to eat what your body craves without overeating.

I am here to help you embark on this journey and break out of the dieting mindset.

If you’d like further individualized support, just fill out this risk free request form at www.TalkWithBonnie.com.

3 Reasons Why I Will Never Diet Again, and Neither Should You

I will never diet again. I say this with confidence. I know that diets don’t work. I also know that in my younger years, whenever I was on a diet, I was miserable. Oh, yes, I always lost weight on the diet, but then I gained that weight back.

If you are reading this blog, I bet you can relate. You are a dieter, a chronic dieter. Perhaps you are reading this after breaking your current diet and you are desperate to find another way. Or, you are reading this and you are at your goal weight, having lost the excess pounds by starving yourself, drinking shakes or eating “clean” but tasteless food.

Here are 3 reasons WHY I will never diet again and neither should you:

1. Diets cause you to think about food ALL. THE. TIME. What did I eat yesterday, what did I eat before, what am I eating now, what will I eat later, what will I eat tomorrow. Whew, that’s exhausting. Food should not be the center of your day, food should not encompass your entire brain. There is so much more to life that you can be doing than thinking about food all the time.

2. Diets cause you to feel guilty when you eat something you think you should not eat. The diet lists foods for you to choose and those to avoid. But what if you happen to want to eat a food that’s on the “avoid” list? Well, what usually happens when you are told you cannot have something? Yep, you want it more (everyone always gets this question right!) You can deny your desire for only so long. So you indulge and the guilty feelings and harsh self-talk start. Isn’t it time to put that to bed?

3. Diets cause you to lose trust in your own food decisions. Well, last I checked, I am the owner of my body, of my inner signals and my thoughts. I can certainly make decisions about what I want to eat. Don’t you think you should too?

These are only 3 reasons I will never diet again, and why you shouldn’t either. There are plenty more that perhaps I’ll discuss in another blog.

In the meantime, I would like to hear from you. Do you resonate with any of the side effects of dieting I discussed above? How will you break this vicious cycle? Let me know in the comments below.

And, come and join the discussion in my free private Facebook group where you’ll join women and men who are giving up dieting too. Click here to request free access.

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