We at SFINE, the creators of the Smile Food System, believe in eating, all types of food, from smiles to frowns, and everything in between. Food is energy. Food is essential to health, growing, doing, and living. It can often bring much joy and pleasure!
Telling people what exactly to eat, and what not to eat, is difficult and possibly futile. People will want to eat as they , and they will make their own idiosyncratic choices. We realize that many people try diets of either specialized food choices (Category I) or temporary restrictive diets (Category II). You can read about these in our article, “Quick Explanation of Most Well-Known Diets,” but we are not promoting any of those, merely sharing facts and explaining each diet. We believe in eating, plain and simple. What exactly is simple eating, or, normal eating?
Well, perhaps the best term for this simple approach to food consumption is “intuitive eating.” So, we explain intuitive eating here, for you to see if it is how you eat now, or if it might be a sensible approach for you moving forward. Combining intuitive eating with the Smile Food System, which provides a nutrient-based rating of your food choices, might be a powerful toward happy eating and good health.
Intuitive eating is a relatively simple idea that has grown in popularity in recent years. To avoid the restrictions and harms of diet culture, intuitive eating encourages people to be at peace with food, listening to one’s body and its hunger cues. It focuses on tapping into your body’s natural cues for whether foods feel right for you and listening to your ability to distinguish between when you are hungry versus when you are satisfied. Many times, diet culture strives toward a single goal of weight loss and being thin, despite leaving people feeling hungry, unsatisfied, and bitter towards many foods. Looking at foods as good versus bad, or allowed versus restricted, creates a charged atmosphere around food, rather than celebrating it and what it can do for us physically and mentally. Intuitive eating rejects dieting and diet culture and gives individuals the freedom to eat what they want, listening to what their bodies need and striving for a healthy attitude towards food and body image.
Intuitive eating has been around for years but was popularized by Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch, who co-authored Intuitive Eating: A Revolutionary Anti-Diet Approach. The book, first published in 1995, rejects diet culture and looks to rebuild a healthy body image and make peace with food. To intuitively eat, they outline 10 basic principles to follow.1
10 principles of intuitive eating:
- Reject the diet mentality: Completely throw out diet culture, which gives you the false hope you’ll lose weight quickly, easily, and permanently. Leave behind lingering hopes that a new diet will work for you in order to fully embrace intuitive eating.
- Honor your hunger: Keep your body fed to avoid the feeling of excessive hunger that makes you over- and unconsciously eat.
- Make peace with food: Give yourself the freedom to eat what you want, without restrictions and depriving yourself of those “forbidden foods.”
- Challenge the food police: Chase away that voice in your head that says you were “good” today for eating fewer calories and “bad” because you ate dessert.
- Discover the satisfaction factor: Enjoy the pleasure and satisfaction that can happen from eating, leaving you to feel content and able to decide when you’ve had enough to eat.
- Feel your fullness: Listen to your body and the signals it gives you telling you that you are full. Eat slowly and pause while eating to think about how hungry you are.
- Cope with your emotions with kindness: Find healthy ways to deal with the emotions, such as anxiety, loneliness, and boredom, that may cause you to emotionally eat.
- Respect your body: Accept your body for what it is, no matter its shape or size, being realistic about expectations and creating a wholesome mindset to love who you are.
- Movement—feel the difference: Get active and focus on how good it feels to move your body, rather than working on calorie burning and weight-loss goals.
- Honor your health: Eating healthy doesn’t mean eating perfectly. You want to eat to feel good and enjoy the food while being consistent with food choices over time.
Benefits of intuitive eating
Scientific research has shown several benefits from intuitive eating. One study found that intuitive eating was associated with reduced levels of shape and weight concerns, suggesting that those who intuitively ate and recognized both their hunger and their fullness had more positive body images than those who did not intuitively.2 Another study looked at people with and without an eating disorder and found that the ones in both groups who intuitively ate more often had a stronger ability to accurately recognize their own body signals (interoceptive sensitivity).3 Interoceptive sensitivity is a key component of intuitive eating, as one has to have the ability to listen to what their body is telling them. Aside from an improved body image, a comfortable relationship with food, and the freedom to eat what you want, intuitive eating has other physical and mental health benefits: improving cholesterol, improving metabolism, raising self-esteem, lowering stress, reducing emotional eating, and increasing satisfaction in life.4
While intuitive eating can be beneficial for most, it is not for everyone. Individuals with medical conditions that require them to follow a certain diet (such as Celiac or heart disease) should follow the diets recommended by their medical providers.
In summary, the 10 principles of intuitive eating are insightful and sound, and the health, medical, and scientific communities converge in agreement that most people can rely on them as part of a healthy and happy approach to eating and living. Here are a few additional tips to reinforce the main principles.
Additional intuitive tips:
- STOP WHEN YOU ARE FULL, OR, EVEN BETTER, JUST BEFORE. The Japanese have a phrase for this special moment that comes a little before full satiation: hara hachi bu. It roughly translates “eat until you are 80% full.” It originated in Okinawa, where people are known to live long. The concept has precursors in ancient China and India, but today it is widely associated with Japan. For many people, hara hachi bu may seem natural and comfortable. If stopping before a full stomach seems forced or restrictive to you, however, then it is not consistent with your intuition and natural body cues of hunger and satiation. It will not be your way, and that is OK.5
- LISTEN TO YOUR BODY AND ATTEND TO FOOD AND DRINK CUES. When you “tune in” to yourself, and “tune out” distractions and impersonal messages from your environment, you will be able to trust yourself and know when you need hydration, protein, salt, vegetables, fruits, and so on.
- ENJOY LEFTOVERS. When preparing to eat a meal, serve out your portions of each food item onto your plate at the beginning, using your “eye” and “gut” to select an intuitive quantity. You can then put the serving bowls/platters in the refrigerator, to save the food leftovers for a future meal. When eating at a restaurant, you may feel satisfied before you have finished all the food in front of you. Take the leftovers home! Cool people ask for “doggie bags.” You will get a second meal when you only paid once!
HAVING SECONDS OF YOUR FAVORITE FOODS IS OK. Taking seconds from a serving bowl/platter may be necessary sometimes if you still feel hungry. All the principles and tips for intuitive eating are guidelines, not absolute rules, so give yourself freedom to shake up your style when it feels right! If you feel like a second helping of a smile or half-smile food, even better!
References
- 10 Principles of Intuitive Eating. Intuitive Eating. Accessed May 17, 2022. https://www.intuitiveeating.org/10-principles-of-intuitive-eating/
- Keirns NG, Hawkins MAW. The Relationship between Intuitive Eating and Body Image is Moderated by Measured Body Mass Index. Eat Behav. 2019;33:91-96. doi:10.1016/j.eatbeh.2019.04.004
- Richard A, Meule A, Georgii C, et al. Associations between interoceptive sensitivity, intuitive eating, and body mass index in patients with anorexia nervosa and normal‐weight controls. Eur Eat Disord Rev. 2019;27(5):571-577. doi:10.1002/erv.2676
- Studies. Intuitive Eating. Accessed May 17, 2022. https://www.intuitiveeating.org/resources/studies/
- Blue Zones—Live Longer, Better 2021 – Blue Zones. Published June 30, 2021. Accessed May 19, 2022. https://www.bluezones.com/