Tuesday, April 30, 2013

IE Principle 1: Reject the diet mentality


I am a very blessed woman. After my update yesterday I had an outpouring of messages from friends and family telling me to keep fighting the fight. Others reached out to let me know that they are experiencing the same things in their own weight loss journey. While I wouldn’t ever wish this struggle on anyone, it was so comforting to know I am not alone. I want to assure you all that I am not giving up, I am just examining my options. I feel like I am on the wrong path and it is time for a course correction. The issue lies in that I am not sure what my path should be. It will take some time but I am committed to figuring that out.

The other day I mentioned the concept of Intuitive Eating, for some reason this is really resonating with me. It consists of 10 principles that I want to examine more in depth beginning today with principle 1.    If you want to check out the website it is: www.intuitiveeating.org  

Intuitive Eating Principle 1: Reject the Diet Mentality

The basic premise of this principle is that you have to dismiss and dispose of all books, articles, magazines and websites that you have access to on the topic of weight loss. I have a freaking library….no word of a lie! Many of these books have never been read and many have been read over and over again. I call it my library of dreams. What the people behind these principles say is that these tools are lies and it is time we get angry at all of the lies and misinformation we have been fed. Every new twist, every new gimmick, every new diet is just another way to prey on people desperate to lose weight. This is a big business and for good reason, we keep buying what is being sold.

This is the first principle because if you even allow one small hope linger that a new and better diet might be around the corner, you have no chance of truly discovering intuitive eating. Holding onto the dream of the quick fix simply makes learning to eat this way impossible. I get it, I really do but my god does it scare me! My whole life has been centered around my weight. I am a professional nutritionist AND a professional dieter….how messed up is that?  The hope that the next thing I try will be the miracle is what keeps me fighting the fight. If I ever stopped searching I always feared that would mean I was giving up. This is not me giving up.  This is me giving up on the false promises, this is me no longer buying the bullshit that so called “experts” are selling, this is me looking internally for the answers rather than externally for the solution but this is NOT me giving up on being a slimmer, healthier woman.

This is going to take some work.  There will be white knuckling for sure. I will have to unsubscribe from numerous blogs/newsletters I get. I will have to get rid of my books (book burning anyone?) because I don’t want to pass this poison onto anyone else. I will have to stop looking at the magazines at the grocery store checkout (go screw yourself “First for Women”).  This might be extra difficult for me because I work in an industry where weight loss is a big part of it. Nutrition is my livelihood and my passion. I just have refocus my energy from researching all things weight loss to all things health. Ultimately I will have to quit Weight Watchers to forge the path on my own but I am not there yet.  I still feel that glimmer of the “next big thing” in the back of my mind. Like I said, this is going to take some work but I am not afraid of a little hard work.

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