Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Let your senses guide you.

Don’t resist your natural knowledge. You know much more then you realize.  Use your senses to realize how amazing you are.

Sometimes when you decide to lose weight, eating seems to be the problem but, it's not. Eating without noticing what you notice or how your body feels leads to overeating.  Instead of seeing eating as an obstacle to losing weight, use the natural tools of your 6 senses to relax around eating. Then you can more easily recognize and respond to energy flowing from your senses and use it to be in sync with your body when you eat.

1. Notice messages from your body. Tune in. Are you hungry? How hungry? What do you feel like eating?

2. Notice your eyes. Look at your plate. What do you see? Does the food please you? Does it look enormous? Does it look fattening? Does it look boring?

3. Recognize your nose. Smell your food. Does the smell make you want to eat it?

4. Intuition is a connector.  It connects the messages from your senses, with what you feel, and what you know. Recognize the role of your intuition. Use it to pause, and breathe in and out, 3 times. This will relax you and aid your thinking and your digestion. Your body will burn calories more efficiently and you will eat less.

5. Make sure the portion is not bigger than your fist. If it is- remove the extra from your plate.

6. Use your senses of taste and touch. Eat slowly, and ENJOY your meal.

Make it easy to lose weight by not resisting what you know by using your 6 senses. In the beginning, this will seem like very little because you are not used to realizing what you notice. But by deciding to be open to what you notice, suddenly you will see the food on your plate from a new perspective.

In fact, you know what you feel like eating and how eating makes you feel. You have the answers. We are all part of things we cannot control. Still, you can see where you are and where you want to be, and point your self consciously in that direction by using your senses to guide your eating choices. This way, you can control your self.

See eating as the solution. Use your senses of taste, smell, sight, and touch and listen to your heart and mind. Intuitive eating is a choice to make to reach your eating goals for the best quality of life. Doing what is in your best interest makes sense.

Saturday, April 24, 2010

ATTITUDE CHECK

When you don’t believe you can lose weight and keep it off, this attitude is communicated to every cell in your being. A habit of being cynical, skeptical, or even indifferent, towards your body and your ability to be a healthy weight, cripples your 6th sense.  Habits shut us down.

In our fast-paced world, we forget to give our self, breathing room. The way to check in, and then change limiting attitude habits, is to give your self space.  Space is breathing room.

At meal time, slowly breathe in and out at least  3 times, before you even think about eating choices. It’s what I call doing the “intuitive pause”. You can think of this exercise as the way of pushing your own  "refresh" button.   

Take 3 long, slow, deep, breaths in, and 3 long, deep, breaths out, and give yourself the opportunity to take some time to tune in to your heart, body, and soul.  Then use your 5 physical senses to be clear about your eating choices from this re-freshed perspective.

If you are eating alone, write short answers to these questions when you take your 3 breaths. Doing this will connect you with defeating attitudes towards your self and eating that are habits.
            Breath #1: Who is the person I am feeding? 
            Breath #2: What do I really want out of this meal?
            Breath #3: What is my attitude about food and eating?

This is an opportunity to connect with your self-respect. Practice doing this and all of your effort will pay off. Visualize your ideal body and feed that body when you eat. 

As you fine tune your 5 physical senses, taste, smell, touch, hearing, and sight, you are tuning in to your 6th sense, your intuition. Because all of your senses are always working together, it happens naturally.

As you become firmly committed to respecting your whole self- body, mind, heart, and soul, you will discover that your attitudes evolve, and that your intuition about who you are, what you really want, and how you feel about your self becomes clearer. You will learn from experience how to create what serves your genuine desires. This happens over time.

You will discover this attitude change lifts the weight of fears and doubts from your being. Ridding yourself of the habits of self-defeating attitudes literally rids you of weight by connecting you with your natural intuitive voice.  Try it!


Wednesday, April 21, 2010

Traps, Tricks, and Rules

When have you felt trapped by your emotional appetites?  Share your story.

Every day eating challenges tend to be sneaky. They happen when you are vulnerable, due to exhaustion, both emotional and physical. Confronted with a huge plate of pasta or the option to have soda, habit tells us to eat. Then when we are feeling somewhat better, the overeating begins to feel bad. And so, we feel betrayed by our self. ouch!

Eating out of habit is a trap. The way to beat the trap is to follow the rule of intuitive eating. The rule is to use your senses.  When your plate appears, look at it before you pick up your fork.  Pause, and think about whether you really feel like eating it, or whether you feel trapped.  Listen to your intuition. Check in with your body. Trust you self. You know how you feel.

When you feel trapped, ask for another plate and place ½ of everything on the second plate. Have the 2nd plate removed. Then, eat slowly. See if you can recognize what you are feeling in your body and through your emotions. Tune in to your senses. Remember, you only need your feed your body - not your emotions.  Appetites are driven by dreams, fears, and fashion as well as by physical need.  The trick is to rely on your 6 senses to recognize your hungers and balance your appetite.

When we stay clearly in touch with the present by using the tools of our senses it becomes obvious what is pushing our buttons around food and eating.  Hunger buttons are not just physical.  Our emotional response can put us in an eating mode where we feel trapped.  When this happens, you can outsmart the emotional trap by fine tuning your senses.

Saturday, April 17, 2010

Hitting the weight loss wall?

Sometimes the reason you can’t achieve weight loss goals is because you’re so used to following the old rules about eating that you’re are in a rut, hitting a wall. It's a mental trap. Really connecting with what you see, taste, smell, touch, and hear, will re-fresh you, and bring a new perspective about diet and eating.

Everything you know about dieting comes from eating experiences accumulated over years of trying to lose weight. In fact, following the same old rules brings the same unsatisfying conclusions. You are not the same person- physically or emotionally you were a year ago. Old solutions only work with old problems. Your eating challenges are brand new. Today is not your past. This is your ‘now’.

Sure you may still find sugar sexy, a jar or mayonnaise seductive, or a quart of ice cream irresistible. But you are thinking differently now. That’s why you’re reading this. Connect with self-respect and listen to what your 6 senses tell you. Visualize your body the way you want to see it. Treat it the way you want to be treated. It’s intuitive to protect and respect your self.

When you hit your weight loss wall, tune in to your senses, and everything else will follow. Fine tuning by noticing what you are seeing, hearing, tasting, touching, and smelling, frees up your mind to wander, and puts you in the present when you sit down to eat. It's liberating!

Fine tune your senses and you will open your mind to your dreams.  Staying in the present means being clear about your eating priorities.  Eat to be healthy and feel good. Walls will be gone.

Thursday, April 15, 2010

Say Hello to your Heart!


When you think about eating only in terms of body and calories, you are by-passing the core of who you are. The core of who you are beats 24/7, and is the source of your dreams.  Say Hello to your Heart!
 
Your intuition is a natural part of who you are, just like your eyes, ears, taste, touch, and sense of smell. It is your 6th sense and part of your heart connection. Intuition is your way to sense being complete and balanced within your self. Trusting your intuition is how to recognize eating priorities that work for your body and your heart. 

Your 6th sense automatically responds to messages from your 5 senses and to what is happening in your body.  At the same time your amazing intuition balances what you know, with what you feel. The job of your intuition is keep you clear about your priorities. As you recognize your 6th sense, you feel complete from head to toe. It becomes obvious that your body depends on your heart, and that your heart depends on your body. When we eat, feeding our heart and our body, our priorities are good health, and abundant energy. 

The-Intuitive-Diet is an eating lifestyle that nurtures your heart by being good to your body. In fact, by keeping your body in shape and a weight that is healthy, you are honoring your heart.

Before you eat, take a deep breath in and a long breath out, and notice the beating of your heart. Your heart is always working for you, to achieve your goals and dreams. Remember this, and use your senses, including common sense, when you eat.

When you start to trust your intuitive connection, you say Hello to your Heart!





Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Emotional Buttons and the Heart

Emotional hot buttons create self-doubt. To lose weight using your intuition, you need to know and trust your self.

Trusting your intuitive voice removes the confused energy of self-doubt, and opens opportunities for you to make choices that feel good to your body, and your heart. Your intuition is always kind, and allows making and correcting mistakes. Eating mistakes are generally the result of emotional confusion around food and eating.

As you fine tune your senses, you are constantly renewing a unique human connection within your self. This connection will keep you in the present, providing clarity and focus about what matters. Your six senses will help you recognize the power not only of your physical appetite, but also of your emotional appetites. When you are clear about these, you are in control, and eating choices are easier.

The habit of "dieting" create pools of emotions based on self-doubt. Doubt pushes deep emotional buttons that are experienced as fear, envy, anger, desire, vindictiveness, ambition, and even stubbornness. These negative emotions are ones we turn on our selves, and they always create some kind of renewed self-doubt and fear. Fear exaggerates our emotional buttons. Choosing to make your intuitive connection makes fear tiny.

Intuitive eating focuses on enjoying food for quality of life. Using your intuition, you stay clearly in the present, and recognize the experience of your emotional hunger, and the need to feed your physical hunger. As you feed your body intuitively, notice how you feel- when you open your eyes in the morning and throughout the day- about your self, about your body, and about your choices. Even though eating relates to nourishing your body for strength and health, making your intuitive connection is a choice that connects with your heart.

Your intuition will never desert you. There is always another chance to listen to your inner voice and do the right thing. Choose to feed your dream body. Be true to your heart.

Monday, April 12, 2010

Connect with Pleasure

Eating is a way to connect with pleasure in your life. Of course you eat to survive, but the gifts of your senses also encourage and allow you to enjoy the tease of colors, sights, smells, textures, and tastes. That’s one reason why it’s nice to eat slowly and in an environment where you are physically comfortable. Why not enjoy the tease?

As you fine tune your five physical senses, taste, smell, touch, hearing, and sight, you are tuning in to your sixth sense, your intuition.
Your intuition gives you the distinct pleasure of knowing your self.

Connecting with your intuition happens naturally because, in fact, all of your senses are always working together. Being aware of this, keeps you clear about what matters to you when you eat. This is comforting and reassuring, and a form of being in control. Being in control means you are clear about what you are doing when you are eating. If you sit down to eat confused, or ignore what you are sensing, then misunderstanding happens, and the result is overeating, or eating for the wrong reasons, or eating what makes you feel physically or emotionally bad about yourself. This is the opposite of pleasure.

Do you know that expression: Wake up and smell the roses.”?  The point is that there are flowers blooming in your life all of the time- even while you’re asleep, or eating. The other point is that your nose enables you to enjoy their sweet scent. Have you ever walked in a room and smelled cookies baking, or someone’s perfume? Your sense a smell is a tool to use when you chose what to eat.

Each sense serves as a pleasure center.
Your eyes tantalize by revealing beauty and potential.
Your ears bring words and songs to encourage, lift and entertain.
Your sense of touch is the key some of your most tender and most erotic sensations.
Taste and smell work together as a constant source of satisfaction.
Your intuition pulls it altogether.

Trust and respect your senses. As you recognize your senses working in unison, you will receive the most satisfaction of your life. Satisfaction is the foundation of pleasure. When you sit down to eat, think of the pleasures in front of you.

Eat less, chew more, and let yourself enjoy the tease.

Saturday, April 10, 2010

Eating Habits

At a party last night, someone told me he thought eating three times a day- even if you’re not hungry- was normal. It’s not. Eating if you’re not hungry is how to gain weight fast. Eating for satisfaction is intuitive. Your intuition guides you to satisfy hunger and keep your body fortified. When eating becomes a habit, it’s time to wake up.

Your intuition always leads to your best interests. That doesn’t mean it’s easy because none of us are brought up being told to trust our intuition. So to be an intuitive eater, we have to change our habit of ignoring ‘that little voice’.

Ignoring messages from your body and censoring that little voice means being out of touch with your self. The result is you take your self for granted. Ouch. Being taken for granted feels bad.

Eating habits are like sleep-walking because habits are unconscious. Habits leave you in the dark. Some eating habits are emotion driven, and so do take time and effort to recognize. Emotions that create doubt are habits that stop you from achieving your eating goals. Emotional habits can feel like boredom, anger,or depression. As you fine tune your six senses, you won't be prey to these culprits.

Eating when you’re not hungry is clearly not in your best interests. Eating has to be an honest response to your body to nurture you. When you eat what feels good to your body, and satisfies your desire for physical pleasure (taste), and emotional need (comfort and self-respect), you will not eat what you don’t want, and you will not eat when you’re not hungry.

Eating out of habit is the opposite of being a sensuous eater. Why not skip a meal now and then and use that break in habit to wake up your ability to recognize what your body is really hungry for.

Then, eat for satisfaction.

Friday, April 9, 2010

Lose weight without thinking!

Intuition is not a way of thinking. It is a way of being tuned in to your self. You are born much more capable and complete then the most advanced computer. It's mind blowing to even begin to think about what goes on 24/7 with your body. Every cell is reproducing itself, your heart beats, your eyes see, your mind thinks, your lungs are always in motion- and that’s all stuff you don’t have to think about!

Intuition is your sixth sense and it filters and clarifies everything that you are, in a way that is protective, and also gives you pleasure. This is why intuitive eating works to lose weight and to maintain your healthy weight.

When you eat, you are laying the foundation for your future. Eating connects with much more than losing or gaining weight. Eating connects with your sense of personal satisfaction, your physical comfort, and the energy you have- to deal with stress and to create pleasure in your life. Eating impacts your sex drive, the color of your skin, and the way you perspire. Intuitive eating is totally natural and easy- just like breathing. That’s why letting intuition to guide your eating choices makes sense.

You can recognize your intuition by noticing what you notice. Being determined helps. Be determined and you will begin to remember to recognize what you are seeing when you sit down to eat. Stay determined to use your intuition to lose weight, and notice how your food tastes and smells. Notice how your body feels when you eat. Be determined to connect with your self to be the best that you can be. That is all you need to do to connect with your sixth sense. You don’t need to think about it.

Be determined. Don't think. Just make the choice.

Wednesday, April 7, 2010

Allow your dreams.

Look at your self in the mirror and see inside your heart.
Allow your self to dream.
See your body the way you dream it.

As you fine tune your senses and listen to your intuition, you will realize that you know what you want. It sounds pretty amazing doesn’t it?  And yet, it works. It has been said that Truth makes all things possible. Connecting with your six senses connects with your truth and your dreams.

Tuning in to your intuition is tuning in to your natural power base. It is the power of clarity that connects with your five physical senses and guides you to make wise decisions about food choices. Because your intuition connects with your truth, listening to it works to improve your life.

You can loose weight without suffering. Don’t give up because this is not familiar. Instead, give your self a chance to have what you want. Dream that you are in control of what you eat and that your body looks and feels good. Then use your six senses and let it happen.

Don’t Give Up.
There is no reason not go around the corner.
There is no reason not to trust what you see, hear, taste, touch and feel.
There is really no reason not to reach for the moon.
Experience teaches that mistakes happen, that your heart hurts, that
Hunger is real and the mind darkens. Yes, Life is hard, and then things change.
If you believe you are not good enough to be your self, or
If you’re ashamed of who you are, or of who you are not-
Remember-
Experience shows that everything changes.

Give your self a chance to become your ideal weight.  Fine tune your senses at the beginning of every meal and you will notice that your body is responding. Allow your dreams.

Tuesday, April 6, 2010

Don't be afraid.

Changing habits is not easy because habits feel ‘normal’. Fear around eating and weight gain is a habit. Fear is a habit that feels like doubt. Doubt is a roadblock to getting what you want. Ouch!

A feeling of fear, when it comes to eating and losing weight, is the result of confusion. Confusion makes us think that by ignoring our feelings or our desires, we will lose weight. When we buy into this kind of confusion, we are fighting with our self, our body, and our emotions. Sound familiar? Yep, and it feels really bad.

Give your self space to be wrong about past eating choices. Choose to tune in to your sixth sense. Today is the beginning of the rest of your Life. The way to start over is to realize that everybody goes through this. Then take a deep breath in, and a deep breath out, and decide to forgive your self. Until you forgive yourself, you will be plagued by another nasty habit- punishing your self. Let go of it, because punishing your self won’t help you lose weight. Remember, the past is history.

Right now, you can use your intuition to stay in the present.
Connecting with your intuition keeps you clear about the present which means you can tune in, to your self, your body, and your emotions, by using your senses to recognize what you really want and what you are really eating.

Your intuition connects the input from your 5 senses with your brain and your body, and balances them with your emotions. It’s always there for you to depend on. In the beginning, you can open the door to your sixth sense by being aware of how it works.

Here are some tips to flatten the habit of fear around eating:
Recognize that you feel worry or fear around your eating
Look at what you are eating with your eyes.
-Notice if your food looks good, if it looks healthy, and if the portion is about the size of your fist or the size of your head?
-Use your intuition to take that information to your brain and you will know how much of it to eat.
Smell and taste a bite.
-Notice if it tastes good, salty, sweet, fresh?
-Use your intuition to relay that info to your brain and you body, and you will know if it makes sense to eat.
Swallow.
Does it go down well, does it sit comfortably in your stomach?
Relay that to your brain and you will know how much you want to eat.
Recognize that you are respecting your self by connecting with your intuition. 

Notice that you are in control, and notice that
you feel good.

Monday, April 5, 2010

All About You

You are very special.

As you use your intuition, you will become aware of how special you are. The ten tools of intuitive eating are your private source of reinforcement to achieve your eating goals. Each intuitive tool is custom designed for you.

Face it, eating is an intimate act. You are putting stuff into your body. The food you eat impacts the way you look, duh!, and also the way you feel and the way you will feel when you wake up tomorrow. Eating and appetites are personal. The-Intuitive-Diet shows you how to enjoy it all.

Your intuition is like your fingerprints and your DNA. No two people have the same fingerprints, or the same DNA. Every person’s intuition is completely unique. Your intuitive diet is a response to who you are, what you want, what you know, what you feel, and to your dreams.

That’s right, your 6th sense connects with your dreams as deeply as it connects with your senses of seeing, hearing, tasting, touching and smell. As you become an intuitive eater, many emotional buttons around eating fade away. You will begin to eat to enjoy food. When you eat to feel good, you do. Importantly, you feel good about your self.

Today, take time when you eat to look at what's on your plate. If you're feeling fat, remove 1/2 of it and then slowly eat what is left. Use your senses when you eat- taking time to see what you are eating, to taste, smell it and to feel what your are eating, will be surprisingly satisfying.

Using your intuition puts you in control of your body and your decisions. The-Intuitive-Diet is all about you.

Saturday, April 3, 2010

Making a choice.

Classic dieting doesn't work. It's a fact that 95% of dieters re-gain their weight. Intuitive eaters maintain their weight.  They use inner courage to connect with their intuition

As I was talking about courage, a woman asked me, what about risks?
Risks are part of living. We take a risk when we cross the street, or go out on a blind date. Really living puts us in touch with risks every day. Risks are about danger. Being courageous is a form of inner resolve.

Eating with courage is not dangerous, so it’s not taking a risk. It is choice based on trusting your intuitive wisdom to guide your eating. When you make the choice to be an intuitive eater, you begin. Yep, it's that easy. Doing what you really believe takes courage. Making the choice is like turning a corner. The fact is: eating intuitively is a choice.

Intuition puts you in control of your eating because it gives you clarity.  When you make eating choices based on using your 6 senses, your emotions don't rule, you do! When clarity is the foundation for your efforts to be your healthy weight, it happens. 

Everything you do takes effort, and every effort you make creates results. Be clear about your eating goals, and you will achieve them.  Make the choice.


“Life is the sum of all your choices.” Albert Camus

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Thursday, April 1, 2010

Change your body?

“We cannot change anything unless we accept it.” Carl Jung

Last night I had dinner with a woman who told me that she had tried to love her body, but she could not. She had been told to love her body to lose weight, and this put a lot of pressure on her. Ouch. Fortunately, she doesn’t have to love her body to lose weight, but she does have to stop fighting with it. The first step toward change is acceptance. Acceptance means you will work with your body to achieve your weight goals. When you accept your body, you trust your self. It is not automatically easy, and it takes courage.

The result of not trusting your self is, you lose self-respect. Then, you feel cowardly. Then, you get mad at your self, and act in a self-destructive way. You may eat mechanically, out of anger, frustration, or boredom. Then, eating is not about physical hunger or appetite, it’s not a response to your senses, it’s a self-destructive habit. Self destructive behavior is an example of fighting with your body.

Does this mean you have to love your body no matter what you see in the mirror? Absolutely not. When you use your eyes and look at your body in the mirror and it looks out of shape, it doesn’t feel good. When you accept your body, then you are free to choose to do what feels right to change it. Instead of fighting with your self by condemning your body, you can decide to work with your self, to pay attention to how your body feels, what messages you are getting from your six senses, and what you know, to achieve a healthier body.

When you don’t accept your self, you are creating stress inside. When you don’t like your body, you are condemning yourself. You are creating hostility inside that will bug you and press your buttons every time you look in the mirror. The result is- you will unintentionally, punish your self by self-destructive eating.

Change won't happen over night or even in a week.  What will change overnight is your attitude.  Once you stop fighting with your body, you won't look at food the same way. Instead of resenting your body, you will work with it, doing what you know and feel is good.  In fact you will be using your intuition, and your body will respond.  That's a guarantee.

When things are not ideal, it is not easy to face them. But it’s a fact that not dealing with reality will not change it! Instead it’s helpful to realize that the present is the foundation for the future, and that accepting what is real means you can change it.