Eating Enchanted is a game changing approach to creating a balanced and sustainable healthy lifestyle. The foundation of Eating Enchanted lies in approaching healthy eating as a gift. By embracing healthy eating as a daily gift to yourself, you are honoring yourself and are therefore, more likely to make conscious, healthy choices that nourish you for daily meals, snacks, and while shopping at the grocery store or farmer’s market.
By adopting a positive mindset around eating and how you think about what you eat, you free yourself from the negative headspace and guilt that currently surrounds food and eating in our country.
By changing the vocabulary you use regarding food, you embrace the power of positive thinking, and we know that many great things can be achieved by channeling positive thought. For example, it is common to hear someone say, “I can’t eat that, I’m being good today” or “If I eat that, I’ll be being bad.” Even the use of the terms “cheat day” and “diet” are inherently negative, I’m here to encourage you to break free of these negative terms and adopt more positive ones. Such as, instead of using the term “cheat day” or “cheating” , when you are out at a party or on a date, “give yourself permission” to eat what you want and feel good about the choice you are making. Then you’ll never have to feel or say again that you are “being bad”. When you think about the foods you know you should be eating daily, such as fruits, vegetables and lean proteins, consider them as the foods in your “healthy spectrum”. Most importantly, by creating a full circle positive approach to eating, you will never have the need for a diet again. Healthy eating and making real food choices will become second nature and thus you will be living a sustainable healthy lifestyle.
Let me explain what I mean here. When you put yourself first by viewing healthy eating as a gift, you are not only honoring yourself, you are creating a conscious connection with the foods you are choosing to eat. You will find yourself reaching for an apple rather than that bag of chips, because the apple has valuable nutrients that are a gift to you and your body. When you embrace healthy eating as the true gift that it is, you will want to be eating real nutrient rich foods as the bulk of your daily calories.
Daily eating is in a separate category from occasional celebration eating. Nothing to say that celebration eating can’t be healthy, but I’m a realist. We’ve all been in that situation at a party or at an event where we wanted to eat within our normal healthy spectrum of foods, but nothing offered was within that realm. In that case, give yourself permission to eat what is offered and know you will be giving yourself the gift of acceptance at that moment. This will create peace and balance in that situation, and you can continue the gift of healthy eating at your next meal. What I’m encouraging here is creating a complete, sustainable healthy lifestyle that makes everyday healthy eating a gift and allows for times when nutrient rich foods may not be available. This is a balanced, positive, full circle approach to eating, which fosters self acceptance and self love in all eating situations. What a positive and healthy way to live.