Intuitive eating is a style of eating that is not influenced by modern diet culture. As someone who was heavily influenced by toxic fitness influencers ways of eating and weird "food rules" I gave myself as a result, I really think intuitive eating is something all of us should aim for.
It's not about greed or eating as much as you can or only eating junk. The idea is that you eat intuitive amounts of food that is appropriate for you at that time. The way you eat isn't guided by the number of calories or an aesthetic aspiration. Most fitness influencers you see make a conscious effort to hit X calories or X grams of protein, or restrict carbs because they want to look a certain way etc. That's not intuitive eating as you're tuning into external influence rather than just going with the flow. People assuming intuitive eating means always eating cake and fizzy drinks is a gross misconception. Intuitive eating to me is not restricting my food or deliberately changing the way I eat because I had a big meal on the weekend. It's the idea that starving yourself throughout the day to "save calories" for a big evening meal is ridiculous because you still need food to get you through the earlier parts of the day. It's about giving yourself permission to eat maybe the less healthy options at special occasions and not feel guilty about it. It's about not obsessing about needing to eat the lowest calorie/lowest fat/highest protein option too because you appreciate that one important purpose of food is to also nourish the soul and sometimes your food choices need to honour that. Yes, it should also be about eating healthily but not in the extreme, I-need-to-weigh-every-gram-of-butter-I-spread-on-my-toast, Myfitnesspal obsessed way that you generally see on social media.
Thanks for listening to my TED talk.
If it’s a tool or mechanism to overcome EDs or disordered eating patterns then I can understand giving it a name like “intuitive eating”. But to me it sounds exactly like eating sensibly, in moderation with balance. Which is what has been preached for decades by health pros and science and as someone else has commented, people have been doing without calling it “intuitive”. But I guess eat with common sense doesn’t sound ground breaking or catchy (fair enough, because it isn’t) and that’s where my disdain for terms such as “intuitive eating” being pushed by non professionals with a following on Instagram comes from. Especially since their engaged following are probably vulnerable women with food and body image issues already and taking advice from someone with questionable qualifications and practices (her “intuitive eating” only comes into play when she shares her “naughty meals”, and she shows nothing to balance that, which gives a very distorted message).
This is all just common sense. However, I don’t believe that allowing yourself to indulge in high calorie and junk foods DAILY (when you know it’s not good for your overall health) is being intuitive at all. She’s completely lost the whole meaning of ‘balance’ and has gone from one extreme to the other, that’s the problem.
I don’t know if she eats junk, highly processed, high calorie stuffed with refined sugar and artery clogging stuff everyday, but as someone that preaches “Intuitive Eating” it sure does seem to be pretty one way from her content as she never shares her balance.
No one will ever get away from science - input vs output, with regards to nutrition. Hence her content is actually harmful to anyone looking to lead a healthier lifestyle. But then again, anyone wanting to make lifestyle changes with regards to their health based on what someone with zero qualifications says online needs a good wobble.
Also, if I have indulged on the weekend, I do make more sensible choices during the week with regards to food. That’s not called restricting, or punishing. It’s called common sense. I cannot continue binging throughout the week as well without seeing adverse affects on my overall health.