mindset Archives - Diet Free Radiant Me | Intuitive Eating | Emotional Eating

3 Ways to Reframe “I Can’t”

When it comes to making changes in your life, your self-talk makes all the difference. And learning to stop dieting is no different.

Do the words “I can’t” sound in your head?

You probably developed this mindset following years of dieting. Diets are full of rules and restrictions that set you up for failure. When it comes to eating intuitively, you may also feel like you “can’t” do it because programs have not worked for you in the past. However, intuitive eating is not a diet, and those restrictive rules do not apply.

While you are on your intuitive eating journey, you are working on reframing your mindset. You are changing the way you think about your body, food, and the way you eat.

You can get rid of your “I can’t” by reframing your mindset.

Change your “I can’t” to “I am”, “I can”, and “I will”.

I am

When you’re working towards stopping the binge eating, your gut reaction may be “I can’t do it.”

Change this thought to, “I am no longer binge eating!”

Even if you still have an occasional binge, repeat this statement to help rewire your neural pathways in the brain.

I can

Incorporating gentle movement into your life can bring up fear if you’re used to exercise bootcamps for the purpose of burning calories and losing weight. Moving to more gentle, joyful movement might bring up worries such as “will I gain weight?” This will keep you stuck in diet mentality.

Instead, acknowledge the challenge and reframe the “I can’t just do gentle movement” into “I can do gentle movement and feel great”.

By changing your self-talk, you will see how easy it is to progress forward.

I will

Taking action is key! When you say, “I can’t”, that stops you in your tracks.

Instead, acknowledge that learning to become an intuitive eater is a process and it takes time. Do yourself a favor and reframe this thought into a more realistic self-talk.

I will be an intuitive eater again, just like I was born!

Simply reframing your mindset will help you get “I can’t” out of your vocabulary and you will feel great doing it!!

Intuitive Eating on Vacation

Have I mentioned yet that summer is my favorite season? Yes, it is!

The hot weather, spending time outdoors, longer days, time off…I can on and on. I just love it.

Whether you’re planning a weekend away, a visit to a tropical island, or a staycation, food and eating challenges might come up, especially for those who are in the process of recovering from dieting. If this is you, then keep reading!

If you feel the urge to say, “I’m on vacation, I’ll enjoy myself and start over when I get home”, then please know that you’re not alone. This is what’s called the “vacation mindset.” When you’re on vacation, the sneaky diet mentality and food police might join you.

This never pans out well. So, let’s discuss how you can continue your intuitive eating practice while you’re soaking up the sun!

Avoid the All or Nothing Mindset

If you go into vacation thinking “I won’t eat anything I shouldn’t, or “I’m just going to eat and deal with it when I get home”, you’re thinking in extremes. Instead, commit to staying fully present while on vacation, and continue to make purposeful food choices, just like you’re doing at home.

Pay Attention to Your Fullness Signals

Go ahead and explore new foods and enjoy familiar ones. Remind yourself to check in mid-meal to see how you are feeling. As you become more satisfied, remind yourself that you can come back and order this food again. You don’t need to eat it all, to a point of being overfull and uncomfortable. That just takes away from the whole experience.

Listen for Hunger

When you’re out and busy trying to jam all the activities you would like to do into a short time frame, you may forget to stop and eat lunch and then feel overhungry by dinner. Throughout the day check-in with your body and listen for those hunger cues. Make sure you carry snacks with you so you can answer the hunger when it calls.

Make Movement Fun

Going to the hotel gym on vacation may not be your cup of tea, and that’s okay. However, there are many movements you may enjoy doing, that you can do while vacationing. Or you may want to try something new, such a hiking as local trail, or kayaking in the clear waters. Find an activity that is appealing to you, and remove all expectations. Just have fun!

We all need a break, and the summer is a great time to take a vacation! Tell the food police they are not welcome and enjoy yourself while making memories!

The Truth About Weight Loss that you NEED to Know

Fear of weight gain is one of the biggest obstacles people face when they are deciding whether to begin their intuitive eating journey. And I understand this fear!

If you’ve been dieting for years working hard to lose weight to achieve a body shape and size that you’ve wanted for so long, the idea of NOT dieting anymore is very scary.

I uncover the truth about weight loss in this episode of the Diet Free Zone Show.

If you haven’t yet subscribed to my YouTube channel, you can subscribe HERE. New shows coming!

And if you have a suggestion for a topic, just comment below and I will add it to the show content roster.

“Eat a Tiny Piece of Cake, I Won’t Tell!”

The title of today’s blog says it all. Diet culture is like a poison, once it gets into your blood, it takes a strong antidote to get rid of it. We’ll talk about that antidote in just a few minutes. But first, let’s look at a prime example of how the diet mentality is a force to be reckoned with.

Yesterday was my birthday. I had wonderful happy birthday wishes from many of my friends. Among the many wishes were comments such as:

“Happy birthday…fat free cake?”

“Happy birthday! Are you allowed to eat a teeny slice of cake today? I won’t tell your clients!”

“Happy birthday! You can have my slice of cake, I won’t tell!”

“Happy birthday! Eat a healthy salad for dinner so you have no guilt eating the cake later”.

Grrr! Honestly, I’m immune to these comments already, well sort of. I truly love my friends and know they mean no harm. What gets me is they know my philosophy on dieting and labeling food as good and bad. Yet, they still make comments like this. It just shows me that as much as they “agree” with my philosophy, the diet mentality comes out in their talk and actions without them even realizing it! Yes, diet culture and the resultant diet mentality is a force to be reckoned with.

I eat cake! I eat cake and have NO GUILT eating cake. You know why? Because I have given up demonizing food and I realize that food does not have as much power as people give to it. Once you learn to eat with attunement and trust your body, you no longer have to live by external food rules.

Do I eat cake every day? No, I don’t. Not because I “can’t”. But because my body doesn’t feel good when I do. I get to make this choice, not some arbitrary diet or health guru.

The Antidote to Diet Culture

If you’ve been poisoned by diet culture, I have the antidote. It’s called Intuitive Eating.

Intuitive eating is a mind-body health approach created by two registered dietitians, Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch. “Intuitive Eating is a personal process of honoring health by listening and responding to the direct messages of the body in order to meet your physical and psychological needs”, says Evelyn Tribole.

When you embark on your intuitive eating journey, it’s not just about eating when hungry and stopping when full. As a matter of fact, as a dieter, this will be challenging to do at first as most likely your signals have silenced somewhat, and your diet mentality will have you second guessing yourself. So the first step is to work on your mindset.

You’ll find as you begin to pay attention to your thoughts, that the dieting messages will rear their ugly head in many situations. Just like the comments from my friends. But it’s important to call them out for what they are, the more you do, the less they will come.

I’m not saying this is an easy process. But it is a process well worth the effort if you want to be cured of diet culture’s poison.

Any questions, I’m here to answer. Just comment below.

If you’re interested in starting your intuitive eating journey to finally make peace with food and your body (or you need support on your already started journey), read more about my intuitive eating program here.

Pushing through Intuitive Eating Resistance

Something I’ve heard several times from potential clients is “I’ve tried intuitive eating already and it didn’t work”. And so, the search for the next diet continues.

I get it. With all the messages swirling around you about the body you “should” have, the weight you “should” lose for your “health” and the false promises that once you lose the weight your life will be all sunshine and rainbows, it’s no surprise that when you “tried” intuitive eating before, you treated it like yet another diet.

It’s not your fault! If you’ve been dieting for years or even decades, your mindset around food and your body is that of a dieter. You are battling food at every meal and have come to have a love-hate relationship with food.

The Reason for the Resistance

Intuitive eating is not a weight loss method. If you’ve tried intuitive eating with the hope that you would lose weight, then more than likely that’s why you were disappointed.

Intuitive eating is a practice of listening to your own body signals when making decisions around food, rather than listening to external sources telling you what, when and how much to eat.

When beginning your intuitive eating journey, it’s most important to shelve the desire for weight loss. Now I’m not saying to forget about this desire, just acknowledge it’s there but you aren’t acting on it right now. In this way, you are paving the way to changing your relationship with food without a hidden weight loss agenda.

Bottom Line

If you’ve “tried” intuitive eating but still secretly hoped you would lose weight, then you didn’t “try” intuitive eating.

This small tweak can make all the difference.

Ready to give it a go? Just head on over to www.TalkWithBonnie.com and request a complementary phone call.

I’ve Already Tried Intuitive Eating, and It Didn’t Work

I’ve heard it many times! Women who are skeptical about intuitive eating. They tell me they’ve tried it and it didn’t work. But did they really try it?

Or, were they just treating it like another diet?

You likely know by now that there are no rules in intuitive eating. As a matter of fact, one of the first things I do with my clients is help them kick all those diet food rules to the curb. However, it’s possible that, unbeknownst to you, you have created rules around intuitive eating.

I must eat ONLY when I am hungry.

I must ALWAYS stop eating when I am satisfied, and not full.

I must ALWAYS feel my feelings.

I must ALWAYS eat at the table without distraction.

And, you think:

If I don’t do these things all the time and do them perfectly, then I have failed at intuitive eating.

This sounds like a diet to me, with a long set of rules (oh, there are a lot more, I just kept it to these 4 for now!).

This is the Intuitive Eating Diet!

I don’t blame you. Many times, women (and of course some men) tell me they are ready to give up dieting and work towards intuitive eating. And to them, that means eating when hungry and stopping when full. They ask me to teach them how to do this again, because they haven’t heard their signals in a long time.

That is all well and good, and I am happy to help these women reacquaint themselves with their inner signals. The issue is that we cannot start at this point of hunger and fullness, because then it becomes the “Hunger-Fullness Diet”, aka The Intuitive Eating Diet.

So, where do you need to start?

At Step One – Shift Your Mindset

Shifting your mindset means moving away from the dieter’s mentality. And, this takes time, especially if you’ve been dieting for MANY years. And, that’s okay! There is no rush! Gift yourself with the time and patience to understand how your mindset got to where it is today and to learn the strategies you need to make this shift.

This is more than just knowing what diet food rules never worked for you. This is delving into your belief system. Really challenging yourself to understand what beliefs you’re holding onto that might be causing you to self-sabotage….over and over again.

These beliefs were born from messages you were given years ago. You’ve assumed them to be true, and they have been driving your actions all these years from your subconscious mind. Once you can change those beliefs, you will see and feel the mindset shift that is so key for your intuitive eating journey.

Is this difficult to do?

You may think so. And, you may say it’s just easier to go on a diet (even though diets have never worked for you, and you’re pretty sure they never will). But it’s safer. If this is the case, can you now understand why saying “I’ve Already Tried Intuitive Eating, and It Didn’t Work” doesn’t hold any water?

If you are ready to do the deeper inner work necessary to change your relationship with food and your body, just head on over to http://TalkWithBonnie.com and let’s set up a time to speak.

Have you been on the ‘Intuitive Eating Diet’? Comment below!

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/

Getting Rid of “I Can’t” with Intuitive Eating

I have had many clients who are stuck in a negative, diet mentality. They often come to me with lists of things they can’t do and never mention anything they can do.

I can’t stop dieting.

I can’t lose weight.

I can’t change my eating habits.

I can’t listen to my body.

I can’t exercise.

When a client comes to me with this mindset, I like to tell them a story about my son’s third grade teacher.

For homework one night, my son had to write a list of all the things he can’t do. Naturally, I thought this assignment made no sense. Why would his teacher want him to do this? Shouldn’t he make a list of all the things he can do? Nonetheless, we still worked on his homework and came up with a list of things he can’t do.

When he came home from school the next day, I asked him what his teacher did with his list of “I can’ts”. He said his teacher had them march out to the playground, dig a hole and bury their “I can’ts”.

I was astonished. This is brilliant.

Why didn’t I ever think of this idea for my clients?

Well, now I do use this concept for my clients, and you!

This activity falls right into the practice of eating intuitively. While you are on your intuitive eating journey, you are working on reframing your mindset. You are changing the way you think about your body, food and the way you eat. This activity is a great way to help you solidify why you want to change your mindset.

You can get rid of your “I can’ts” by reframing your mindset.

Change your “I can’ts” to “I am”, “I can”, and “I will”. Look at them as challenges that you will overcome, which will lead to success.

Here is an example: You can reframe “I can’t exercise” to “It’s a challenge for me to exercise, but perhaps I can start with a 5 minute walk each day”. By changing exercise to a challenge instead of an “I can’t”, you are recognizing the fact that you can overcome this challenge.

Simply reframing your mindset will help you get “I can’t” out of your vocabulary and you will feel great doing it!!

If you want to learn more about how you can reframe your mindset, you can contact me here. I am here to help you.

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.

5 Steps to Eating Intuitively While on Vacation

Many clients express the stress they feel right before going on vacation about the weight they “inevitably” will gain. They talk about going on a “diet” to lose a few pounds before they go away, since they’ll be eating differently.

Does this sound like you? If your mindset is wrapped around being good or bad, on or off, what you can and can’t eat, you will likely overindulge on vacation and you will feel guilty afterwards.

Yes, it is true we all expect to eat differently while on vacation, but that doesn’t mean you need to eat like it’s your last supper. Use your intuitive eating strategies to help you respond to the change in your eating pattern and adjust. You CAN eat the dessert you crave by learning to savor it so you don’t go for seconds. If you trust in the process, you’ll be able to keep your body and mind happy.

Here are 5 steps you can take to eat intuitively on vacation:

Tune into your body.

If you are craving that Pina Colada or frozen margarita, have it! If you want dessert, have it! If you are truly listening to your body, you won’t overindulge and you’ll be able to stop eating or drinking when you want too.

Trust your body.

Trusting your body and the intuitive eating process will help you enjoy your vacation even more. You will most likely eat more than your used too because you’re trying new foods, but you need to trust that your body will respond intuitively and tell you when you’ve had enough.

Make time for breakfast and lunch.

Vacations often mean sleeping late, missing breakfast and an overall erratic eating schedule (except dinner). But, your priority should be starting your day off with breakfast and packing a lunch to take with you, or planning a lunch stop in your itinerary. It’s easy to get caught up in all of the activities, but if you skip a meal, you’re more likely to overindulge at dinner. It’ll be harder for you to listen to your body telling you its full.

Be mindful when you eat out.

Vacations generally mean eating out at restaurants, and that also means more courses and larger portions. New foods and more choices does not mean you need to eat like there is no tomorrow. If you’re listening to your body, you’ll eat until you are satisfied with the new flavors. You may eat a few more bites, but you’ll be able to stop yourself before you overeat.

Pack your favorite snacks for a busy day.

It can be easy to forget to pack snacks when you’re busy with activities, but it is important. Take the few extra minutes before you leave to pack a goodie bag of pre-portioned snacks. It can be almonds, fruit, veggies, etc. Your body will thank you when you’re not starving heading into lunch or dinner.

Your vacation is a time for relaxation and happy times and should not coincide with “giving up” your intuitive eating practice. Be mindful and always listen to your body and your vacation will become even more enjoyable.

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

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