Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works QUOTES

1 " So Where’s the Chocolate Group? As we have said, we’re not going to pull a fast one. There are no forbidden foods, because deprivation doesn’t work. All of the above guidelines are intended as a balance over time—which means even if you eat a candy bar, it will eventually average out. When you have let go of the diet mentality and have made peace with food, you will discover that you sometimes have a desire for food that has no nutritionally redemptive powers. We call this food play food. We prefer this term to one of the most commonly used terms to describe what’s considered unhealthy foods—junk food. The term junk food implies that there is no intrinsic value in this food—in fact, that it probably should be thrown in the garbage can. But we feel that this thinking is unwarranted. There are times when a piece of red velvet cake or a stick of licorice is just the food that will satisfy your taste buds. And eating these types of foods doesn’t mean you are an unhealthy eater. "

― Evelyn Tribole , Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works

2 " Dichotomous or black-and-white thinking can be dangerous and is often based on the premise of achieving perfection. It gives you only two alternatives, one of which is usually neither attainable or maintainable. The other then tends to be the black hole in which you inevitably fall after failing to get to the first. You set your sights so high, constantly chasing an ideal that you can grasp only moments at a time. When the standard for being okay is this lofty, you’re destined to feel lousy most of the time. And we know that when you feel lousy, you’re bound to end up going off the deep end in your eating behavior. "

― Evelyn Tribole , Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works

3 " Above all, do not bribe, reward, or attempt to comfort with food. Food is for hunger, satisfaction, and nourishment. Help your children learn how to endure feelings. Let them know that their feelings are real and valued and that there are ways to be comforted without using food. "

― Evelyn Tribole , Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works

4 " Talking to a child about future health issues is also not the correct course. First of all, it can scare the child and make her have excessive worry about herself. Unfortunately, we hear parents tell their children that they will get diabetes or have heart problems if they don’t lose weight. Secondly, the concept of future heart problems is too abstract, even for an adult, let alone a child. Worry about future health issues does not have the power to motivate behavior change. Feeling physically better in the moment has far more impact. "

― Evelyn Tribole , Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works

5 " If you don’t love it, don’t eat it, and if you love it, savor it. "

― Evelyn Tribole , Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works

6 " Make food choices that honor your health and taste buds while making you feel good. Remember that you don’t have to eat a perfect diet to be healthy. You will not suddenly get a nutrient deficiency, or gain weight from one snack, one meal, or one day of eating. It’s what you eat consistently over time that matters. Progress, not perfection, is what counts. "

― Evelyn Tribole , Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works

7 " Accept your genetic blueprint. Just as a person with a shoe size of eight would not expect realistically to squeeze into a size six, it is equally futile (and uncomfortable) to have a similar expectation about body size. Respect your body, so you can feel better about who you are. It’s hard to reject the diet mentality if you are unrealistic and overly critical of your body shape. "

― Evelyn Tribole , Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works

8 " Having a healthy relationship with food means you are not morally superior or inferior based on your eating choices. "

― Evelyn Tribole , Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works

9 " When you rigidly limit the amount of food you are allowed to eat, it usually sets you up to crave larger quantities of that very food. "

― Evelyn Tribole , Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works

10 " Just because someone makes an inappropriate comment does not make it true! "

― Evelyn Tribole , Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works

11 " The Japanese have the wisdom to keep pleasure as one of their goals of healthy living. In our fury to be thin and healthy, we often overlook one of the most basic gifts of existence—the pleasure and satisfaction that can be found in the eating experience. When you eat what you really want, in an environment that is inviting, the pleasure you derive will be a powerful force in helping you feel satisfied and content. By providing this experience for yourself, you will find that it takes much less food to decide you’ve had “enough. "

― Evelyn Tribole , Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works

12 " Throw out the diet books and magazine articles that offer you the false hope of losing weight quickly, easily, and permanently. Get angry at the lies that have led you to feel as if you were a failure every time a new diet stopped working and you gained back all of the weight. If you allow even one small hope to linger that a new and better diet might be lurking around the corner, it will prevent you from being free to rediscover Intuitive Eating. "

― Evelyn Tribole , Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works

13 " Listen for the body signals that tell you that you are no longer hungry. Observe the signs that show that you’re comfortably full. Pause in the middle of a meal or snack and ask yourself how the food tastes, and what your current fullness level is. "

― Evelyn Tribole , Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works

14 " Dieting may cause stress or make the dieter more vulnerable to its effects. Independent of body weight itself, dieting is correlated with feelings of failure, lowered self-esteem, and social anxiety. "

― Evelyn Tribole , Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works

15 " Call a truce, stop the food fight! Give yourself unconditional permission to eat. If you tell yourself that you can’t or shouldn’t have a particular food, it can lead to intense feelings of deprivation that build into uncontrollable cravings and often, bingeing. When you finally “give in” to your forbidden foods, eating will be experienced with such intensity, it usually results in Last Supper overeating and overwhelming guilt. "

― Evelyn Tribole , Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works

16 " In fact, groundbreaking work by therapist and dietitian Ellyn Satter has shown that if you get the parents of overweight kids to back off and let them eat without parental pressure, the kids will eventually eat less. Why? The child begins to hear and understand his own inner signals of hunger and satiety. The child also knows that he or she will have access to food. According to Satter, “Children deprived of food in an attempt to be thin become preoccupied with food, afraid they won’t get enough to eat, and are prone to overeat when they get the chance.” We have found this to be true for adult dieters as well. Only for adults, the Intuitive Eating process has been buried for a long time, often years and years. Instead of having a parent loosen up the pressure, this loosening of pressure has to come from within and against society’s myth of dieting and distorted body worship. "

― Evelyn Tribole , Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works

17 " You have forgotten what you really like to eat and instead eat what you think you “should” eat. "

― Evelyn Tribole , Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works

18 " Children deprived of food in an attempt to be thin become preoccupied with food, afraid they won’t get enough to eat, and are prone to overeat when they get the chance. "

― Evelyn Tribole , Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works

19 " We define healthy eating as having a healthy balance of foods and having a healthy relationship with food. "

― Evelyn Tribole , Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works

20 " Find ways to comfort, nurture, distract, and resolve your emotional issues without using food. Anxiety, loneliness, boredom, and anger are emotions we all experience throughout life. Each has its own trigger, and each has its own appeasement. Food won’t fix any of these feelings. It may comfort for the short term, distract from the pain, or even numb you into a food hangover. But food won’t solve the problem. If anything, eating for an emotional hunger will only make you feel worse in the long run. You’ll ultimately have to deal with the source of the emotion, as well as the discomfort of overeating. "

― Evelyn Tribole , Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Program That Works