Radical Permission: The First Step to Dissolving Food Obsession
Many of my clients come to me for help with dissolving food obsession (it's what Intentional Eating is all about). I hear my old story in their mouths and it goes like this: "Every time I eat a 'bad' food, I feel horrible about myself. I go into a shame spiral, then I feel like I have to make up for it."
It's a vicious cycle: one "bad" choice leads to hours, days, weeks of shame-based restriction, which inevitably leads right back to "bad" food choices or binges. All because of the way we talk to ourselves when we make that one "bad" choice.
The number one priority to break the shame spiral is - ironically - to give oneself radical permission. What that means is that no food can be off limits. We replace "I'm bad" with "This is a singular choice that means nothing about me as a person."
The point of radical permission is to come back to a place where CHOICE reigns supreme.
This is the beginning of food obsession falling away; where we realize that our food choices are not a reflection of who we are. They are just choices, independent from our worth and from each other.When we start with radical permission, we separate each choice from the next. We make way for our physical experience to guide our choices instead of our ideas about what the choice means about us.Eventually, instead of shaming ourselves into restrictive choices, we gauge how we want to feel in our bodies and let that inform our next choice. Without guilt. Without desperation. And gently, gradually, we release our grip on each food choice needing to be perfect.This step cannot be taken gingerly. You have to dive in head first. No halfsies about it.That said, it will not be perfect either. Even if you dedicate yourself fully to radical permission, you will still produce a shame response sometimes... maybe all the time for a while. You won't heal this all in a matter of days. What matters is what you choose to focus on.
By giving focus to the shame, you feed it.
When you focus instead on your dedication to permission with full belief that only this will free you from the grip of shame, you starve it.
While I'm never one for starving, I say let that shame shit shrivel up, baby. Shame ain't got no place in your world anymore.It's not hard to start with radical permission - it comes in the realization that shame does nothing but keep you in food obsession and pain. It happens in the decision - and commitment - to do things differently than you've ever done them; to break free. If you want help with this commitment (you shouldn't have to do this alone), check out Intentional Eating. It could be just the level of support you're looking for.xo Amy