8 Ways to Implement Intuitive Eating During the Holiday Season

We’ve all been there! Denying ourselves of our favorite holiday treats, and then craving them even more only to overeat on them later on. This overeating typically turns into overwhelming shame and guilt that we typically associate with eating these “bad” or “forbidden foods.” We think these particular foods are going to make us fat or cause us to gain weight if we eat them. What a depressing way to live life! Ditching that diet mentality and finally creating peace with food and our body can lead to greater well-being and increased life satisfaction. What better time to begin a practice like this then during the holiday season?

Holiday Eating Don’ts

There are a few common habits that I often see during this time of year that are deeply rooted in diet culture, and it’s important to be aware of them while you’re trying to transition into an intuitive eating way of life.  With that said, I invite you to become aware of these common habits, and request for you to resist the urge to partake in these diet culture habits. I go more in-depth with all of these points, but in short:

• Try not to save up calories, as in, eat very little leading up to the holiday party or Christmas dinner. As you’ll hear me say often, restriction fuels binging.

• Do not, I repeat, do not exercise profusely in order to make up for the extra food consumed. This will only create a poorer relationship between you and the process of moving your body.

• Avoid planning a month-long fast for the month of January, or any fast or restrictive diet for that matter. Diets with the intention of controlling our body weight are unsustainable, harmful, and flat-out do not work.

And now, here are 8 Ways to Implement Intuitive Eating During the Holiday Season:

1. Learn what Intuitive Eating is all about

Intuitive eating is a self-care framework of eating that has 10 defined principles and promotes a healthy relationship with food, mind and body. It is evidence-based and has more than 175 studies to date to back it up. It teaches you not only to get in tune with your inner wisdom like honoring your hunger and fullness, but also how to incorporate all foods back into your diet in a healthy and balanced way. It also teaches you to respect the body you have and improve your overall relationship with movement so it can become a sustainable practice. Intuitive eating isn’t a food plan or diet, but rather a mode of living that allows you to ditch diet culture for good.

Learning intuitive eating is most certainly a worthwhile shot, especially if you’ve been one to get caught up in food rules, restriction and rebound binge eating, and feeling guilty after every holiday outing, year after year after year. It will help you get off the crazy yo-yo diet cycle for good.

The benefits of intuitive eating include:

• Greater body appreciation and satisfaction

• Greater life satisfaction

• Lower odds of binge eating

• Lower odds of emotional eating

• Lower odds of disordered eating

• Greater motivation too exercise

• Less loss-of-control eating

• Lower blood pressure

• Lower cholesterol

• Higher self-esteem

• Higher well-being and optimism

• Higher variety of foods eaten

• Higher HDL cholesterol (good cholesterol)

2. Avoid All-or None Thinking

This type of thinking involves viewing what you’re doing to nourish your body as either all “good” or all “bad.” When you aren’t eating “perfectly” you feel like a failure. Or when you’re trying to eat “healthy” and end up giving into your cravings for cookies, you throw in the towel and give up completely.

When we’re accustomed to avoiding certain foods year after year, whether due to dieting or just avoiding our so-called “bad” foods, it can become a habitual process to think in terms of all-or-none. You’re either on a diet or off a diet; you’re either following the rules or not following the rules; you’re either working out every day or not working out at all.

Intuitive eating is all about living in the grey area. There are no “good” or “bad” foods. Food is just food and no single food can make you healthy or unhealthy. All foods fit, therefore it’s about finding that grey area that allows you to balance the Christmas cookies with the foods that make you feel physically pleasant (nutrient dense food). But how do you start to do that? This brings me to number 3…

3. Check in with Your Body Periodically

It is very easy to lose track of how your body feels, especially when you’re busy rushing around trying to get all the holiday errands done. SLOW DOWN! Breath. And check in with yourself throughout the day. This prevents you from becoming overly hungry at the end of the day when it’s time to decompress. Here, intuitive eating is about reconnecting with your body’s hunger and fullness cues and really getting in tune with the emotional and behavioral reasons behind our eating habits.

Being able to tune out the chaos at a holiday party can definitely be a challenge, but it will serve you well in order to eat more mindfully and really tune in with your body. I recommend using the hunger and fullness scale. A rating of “0” means you’re painfully hungry, and “10” means you’re painfully stuffed. You want to avoid reaching either of those levels. The sweet spot for hunger is eating when you are at about a “3” or a “4” and stopping when you reach a “6” or a “7.” However, if you feel like eating past that comfortable fullness (6 or 7), intuitive eating is about allowing yourself to do that. In time, your body will balance out and that urge to overeat will dissipate.

4. Be Sure to Include the Foods You Enjoy

Planning to enjoy your favorite foods during the holidays allows a few things to happen…or not happen. For one, you’re able to fully enjoy your holiday, while not obsessing about the foods you’re missing out on. Allowing yourself to enjoy what you want, when you want it communicates to your brain that you aren’t restricting yourself anymore. If you’re someone who is used to restricting your favorite foods, or the so-called “bad” foods, this can take some time. In the beginning, it might still be a challenge not to overeat on your previously restricted foods. Remember, restriction fuels bingeing.  Remember that in time, that urge will dissipate, all foods will become neutral, and you will be able to stop at comfortable fullness (at a “6” or a “7”).

5.  Do Not Restrict in Order to Overindulge

If you’ve made it a habit to only eat “light” during the day or days leading up to a holiday feast, chances are you’ll be tempted to do so again this year. Do not, I repeat, DO NOT RESTRICT YOUR INTAKE in order to save your calories and overindulge at a holiday party or feast. Restriction fuels bingeing. When we restrict ourself from energy, the body has many biological mechanisms in place to make you crave more and more, the further you restrict. That being said, once you do allow yourself to enjoy those rich desserts you’ve been avoiding, you’ll very likely get to a point of uncomfortable fullness, feeling so out of control, you don’t even enjoy the eating experience. This is typically followed by guilt that consumes the rest of your evening and you’re left not enjoying the holiday as fully as you could.

6.  Partake in Gentle Movement

Move when you can. When it comes to exercise, intuitive eating is all about celebrating the joy of movement and doing activities that you enjoy and which make you feel good. Just as it is important to find the grey area within how we eat and balance our nutrition, it is also important to find the grey area with movement. What I mean by this is finding just the right amount of movement for you. Aim to set some realistic exercise goals for the season, such as breaking up sit time more often (if you sit for long periods at a time), or going for short walks throughout the week. And keep in mind, this should not be with the intention to burn off calories or earn your Christmas cookies. Staying in motion, even in the tiniest of ways, can lead to feeling good with more energy and decreased stress.

If you are someone who has always coupled exercise with dieting or undereating, chances are, exercise hasn’t been a very enjoyable process and it’s something you don’t think very fond of. However, it's important to become familiar with a new and refreshing approach to movement. And that includes the notion that all movement is beneficial movement. Additionally, just as intuitive eating is about allowing yourself unconditional permission to eat, it is also about giving yourself unconditional permission to rest. Listen to your body… if it needs rest, give it rest.

7.  Avoid Diet Talk

Diet talk is all around us, all the time. And it tends to be brought up at the dinner table. Resist the temptation to chime in on this talk. Whether your aunt is talking about the latest fad diet, or your sister is talking about how much weight she recently lost, this talk can be triggering to many people whether they are aware of it or not. I especially recommend filtering this type of conversation with kids present, as it can be subconsciously harmful in the long run for many children growing up in diet culture. 

8. Practice Self-Compassion

Beginning a new practice, or upgrading your habits in ANY way will likely take some time. For most of us, we’ve been enveloped in diet culture for many years of our lives, whether that’s because we’ve chosen to go on diets, or we’ve simply been trying to eat “healthy” and in turn, avoid eating certain foods for fear that it will make us “unhealthy.” Either way, intuitive eating is a fluid process and should not be looked at as a diet. The principles and guidelines are just that, they are not strict rules to follow. Diet culture has instilled a very all-or-none way of thinking, so living in that grey area can feel challenging at first. So, when you feel like you’re not doing it the “right” way, give yourself grace and compassion, and know you are on the right path.

Intuitive eating doesn’t mean controlling every bite of food that goes into your mouth. Quite the opposite actually. It’s all about eating for enjoyment, listening to what your body is communicating to you, and responding with awareness. If that includes eating past fullness because you consciously choose to do so, that is A-Okay. Just remember, if you fall back into old habits, that is perfectly normal. Intuitive eating is a practice, which means it takes some time. But with plenty of self-compassion, it can certainly be a journey well worth venturing. Your body and well-being will thank you.

Are you ready to start your intuitive eating journey? If so, click here!