Diet Pressure

The diet mentality is something incredibly stressful.

The pressure to eat or not to eat this food or that. The conversation running underneath it all of whether it is “deserved” or not. The view of food as the enemy, something that will make you gain weight by just looking at it.  The running questions on how do I look or how many pounds did I lose or how many calories did I burn? All of this will just manage to put us under so much stress that we then experience an increase in cortisol. Now here is the thing-cortisol actually contributes to weight retention. The body has been signaled to retain weight because other things are more important such as running away from the tiger that you must be facing during a cortisol-fight-flight response, when in reality you are looking at a piece of cake.

Take a deep breath, reexamine the way you are eating.

Are you present in the moments you eat? Are you eating because you are compensating for something else? How about exercising because it makes us feel good? How about eating because it tastes good? We don’t need huge amounts of food to enjoy the things we eat.

Enjoy what you eat-but eat it slowly-savouring every bite of nourishment! Then take a moment, feel your body and let yourself experience gratefulness for your meal or snack.

Some books to consider on the topic-

Intuitive Eating by Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch

Weightloss for people who feel too much by Colette Baron Reid

http://weightloss.colettebaronreid