Welcome to How to Love Your Body - on this week’s episode we are talking about Intuitive Eating Burnout. How to handle it. And what to do if you are feeling the overload.
Let’s first start off by discussing what Intuitive Eating burnout is- this is when you feel like your life feels consumed by trying to listen to your hunger signals, figure out if the diet mentality is talking or if it’s truly your intuition. It’s listening to every IE podcast, reading every book, and ingesting as much IE content as possible to “fix” yourself. 

Although it’s not dieting it may just feel like another obsession - although it may feel much better than dieting and constantly trying to lose weight - it still keeps your mind really busy, like it’s now the only thing you can think of - you still aren’t free. 

When you feel this - you may think - well, I better read ANOTHER book, listen to ANOTHER podcast, focus even more acutely on my hunger signals- do anything and everything to learn, learn, learn in the hopes of finally “fixing” the issue. 

Okay SO - if you feel this way - we get it, And guess what - it’s “normal” to feel this way. This doesn’t mean there is something wrong with you and you’ll never ever really truly embody IE. Not the case at all - 

What this does mean…. 

That instead of loading on more content and education - it may just mean that you need to take a break, take a step back, and start to trust your body that it knows more than you think it does. 

Yes, this may mean to stop forcing it and to let yourself be. 

If 

-listening to another podcast 

-reading another book 

-taking on every IE tip you read on IG 

-following more and more coaches/ counselors

-focusing even harder on the 10 IE principles 

-doing that free IE challenge someone is promoting 

… sounds exhausting and like it’s gobbling you up. It’s perfectly okay to STOP. To take a break and not put anything more on your plate. 

You may not need more. You may just need to turn off your brain and simplify things. To finally let your body have the chance to do it’s thing without constant thinking - we want to quiet the mind and let the feelings in our body take the lead. 

We aren’t suggesting to give up all support, all the community groups, all the books and podcasts you love. No, not at all. Those things are very much important to support you in your process - you’re listening to our podcast right now - and of course we want you to keep listening. 

But just like you are going to let your body signals do their thing - you can also listen to how your body responds to content - if it feels effortless, energizing, and inviting to continue to read the book you’re reading or listen to the podcasts, or do whatever IE work you’re doing by all means KEEP DOING IT. 

If it feels forced, draining, and overwhelming - STOP. Take a step back. Only continue to engage in the things that feel helpful and like you want to do it. 

And if every single thing you feels like a SHOULD here are the things you can do --- 

-Allow all food
-Listen to what sounds good to your body
-EAT
-Move on 

No overthinking, feeling guilty, or regretful. 

The only thing you are doing is listening to your body and eating the food - no more, no less. 

Give yourself space to just be in the flow of letting your body lead you and turning off your mind. 

Move through life with feelings not thoughts. 

This doesn’t mean you will never turn back on the thoughts or read another book or listen to another podcast or do the Intuitive Eating challenge or take the IE course - 

It just means you are taking a break to let your body lead - so you don’t have to take this all on by yourself - you don’t need to try so hard to make this IE thing work. You most likely just need to BE more - and things will start to feel natural and second nature instead of another obsession around food (even if it’s Intuitive Eating, any type of obsessive thinking is not an ideal way to live). 

Whatever happens - just let it happe