How I Changed My Relationship With Food

October 13, 2015 Stephanie

I often get asked how I changed my relationship with food once and for all. While the full answer to this question would be best answered with quite a long list of things, I am going to share with you today the one thing that I believe had the BIGGEST impact on changing that relationship for good. And that one thing is actually a pretty basic thing – a journal. I touched on this briefly in this post, but today I’m going to go a little deeper and let you know just how this journal changed not only my relationship with food, but ultimately with my life and myself.

You see, this is the thing with diets; they suck up all of your time and energy and ultimately your identity (similar to a dementor from Harry Potter) 🙂 When you are a chronic dieter like I was, the diet becomes who you are. It and it’s rules and outcomes start to define how successful you are as a person, your worth as a person, and act as a benchmark for how you are to relate to the outside world and others. When this happens, you will inevitably get to a point where you realize that you no longer know who YOU actually are. You no longer know what you like/don’t like, what foods your body truly wants and needs or how to even listen to your body anymore. And let me tell you friends that this is a scary place to wake up. If you find yourself here or approaching a place that resembles here, this is where the journal can come in as a lifesaver. It’s where it started to do its work for me.

When I realized I had gotten to this ugly place I had a bit of a panic attack. What started as an endeavor towards a healthy lifestyle morphed itself into an obsession, which created a weird unrecognizable version of myself. In order to start undigging the real version of myself and re-learning how to listen to my body, I needed to turn my focus outwards and re-establish a sense of reality. This is where I began my journaling. So what did/do I write about?

I started with simply stating things I was grateful for…every single day, no exceptions.
Personal goals for the day (Eat 2 out of 3 meals mindfully without distractions, chew eat bite 20 times, Relax for 10 minutes, etc.)
Writing what I envisioned my perfect relationship with food looking like (Going through the day not thinking or worrying about my next meal, not counting, measuring or weighing my food, knowing how to trust my body, knowing when I was full, to be able to eat foods I truly craved, etc.)
Writing what my thoughts would consist of with my freed up mental space that used to be full of food thoughts (what were my dreams/passions or things I’ve been wanting to do or accomplish…for me, that turned out to be becoming a Health Coach)
Making a list of things that bring me joy (afternoon walks, good conversations with my husband, reading a good book, time with friends and family, watching movies, cooking new and fun meals, etc.)

In addition to working on these areas every day, I also began doing morning devotionals (currently going through this one). I find them to be extremely grounding and centering and it allows me to start my day from a place of peace and truth. Now don’t get me wrong, this journaling wasn’t any overnight miracle. It took time before I started to see it working in my life. But I promised myself that I was going to be vigilant about it and on those days where I was frustrated or thought it was pointless, I reminded myself of that promise and keep my nose to the grindstone and did it anyway…and you know what, it made my day marginally better each and every time.

Another awesome thing about journaling is that it has served as a great benchmark for me. There were so many times in this journey where I felt like I had made no progress whatsoever with Intuitive Eating and personal goals. In those times, all I had to do was go to my old journal entries from when I first started and I would be immediately humbled, motivated and re-energized by seeing just how far I had actually come.

So there you have it, the one thing that I believe changed my relationship with food, my life and myself. I’m curious…what has your experience been with journaling? Has anyone else found this practice to be life changing?