Last week, at the suggestion of Christie at Honoring Health, I purchased the Intuitive Eating book by Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch.

I quickly read the book and I enjoyed it a lot!

Intuitive Eating is basically using your body's natural hunger signals and cravings to reach the healthy weight that you are meant to be. There are 10 principles outlined in the book and I summarized as to what I thought were the important things about them:

1. Reject the Diet Mentality: Diets fail 98% of the time. You may initially lose weight, but only 2% of all dieters are successful in keeping the weight off. Diets force you to restrict what you eat, when you eat, how you eat, etc. All this restriction leads to deprivation, hunger, and eventually bingeing. By rejecting the diet mentality and promising yourself you will always be free to eat what you really want, you allow yourself to honor your hunger and fullness.
2. Honor Your Hunger: Learn what real hunger feels like, and then eat when you are hungry! Deprivation only leads to extreme hunger, and once this happens you will most likely overeat.
3. Make Peace with Food: Learn what foods you love. Many people who have been restricting what they eat don't even know what they really like. There is no such thing as a bad or good food - these are only terms that make you feel guilty for what you eat.
4. Challenge the Food Police: Don't let the voices in your head telling you that certain foods are bad, or that you should restrict what you eat get the best of you.
5. Feel Your Fullness: Learn what it feels like to be full, and then stop eating when you are full. If you have rejected the diet mentality, you will know you can always have more later. Plus being overly full is uncomfortable if not painful!
6. Discover the Satisfaction Factor: Eat the food you truly crave. Be sure to keep lots of foods on hand that you love. Make time to really sit and enjoy the food you are eating and pay attention to taste, scent, etc.
7. Cope With Your Emotions Without Using Food: Learn what emotional eating is like for you and recognize before you eat that this is what you are doing. Address your emotions and do what you can to make them better without food.
8. Respect Your Body: Love the body you are in. We are not all naturally size zeros and we all have different body shapes and weights. The goal weight you have been lusting after all your life may be unrealistic for your body. You wouldn't try to stuff a size 8 foot into a size 6 shoe, would you? Also, be good to the body you have. Wear clothes that fit and stop the fat talk!
9. Exercise - Feel The Difference: Getting active and working up a sweat feels good. Don't have all or nothing thinking, any activity, like a 10 minute walk, is better than nothing.
10. Honor Your Health - Gentle Nutrition: Make nutritious choices because these choices will make your body feel the best. Eat carbohydrates, fruits and veggies, proteins, and a small amount of healthy fats 90% of the time and 10% of the time eat the foods your body craves.

Reading through this book, there are tons of examples, and several things that I thought: "oh my gosh, I blogged about that just the other day!" Lots of the parts were right on target and overall I felt the book was really, really helpful. However, I have come to a similar conclusion about dieting and weight loss that this book brings you to, but I have come to it without all the labels, charts, and nutrition guidelines.

Tomorrow I will be posting my critical analysis of the book and what bothered me about it, so check back tomorrow!