Why Smashing Diet Culture Can Change the World
When we’re caught in diet culture’s clutches, all of our free time and mental space is devoted to obsessing over food, exercise, and body size.
We’re not available for the things that really matter in life, which is why I call diet culture The Life Thief.
When we’re spinning our wheels about how many grams of carbs are in a particular dish or how many minutes we’ve spent doing a certain activity, we’re not showing up to fight for the things we believe in. We’re not putting our incredible minds toward making the world a better place.
Diet culture has distracted us to the point where controlling our food intake and body size often start to feel like our life’s work.
But when we can heal our relationships with food and reconnect with the internal cues about food and movement that we were all born with, we free our minds to focus on bigger and better things.
We become available for SO much more.
We free ourselves so that we can go on to change the world.
That’s why body liberation is about so much more than just being okay with your body.
As Laura Thomas, my guest on this week’s episode of Food Psych, puts it: “I see intuitive eating as a means to liberate us from diet culture, so that we can begin to do the real work of social justice.”
Intuitive eating is really just a means to an end—and that end is making our society a safer, more equitable place where everyone truly has equal opportunity to pursue a life that brings them joy.
Laura joined me to talk about her new book, Just Eat It; the problems with The Wellness Diet; why subtle levels of weight stigma are so hard to pinpoint and eradicate; why “emotional eating” and turning to food for comfort are falsely demonized in diet culture; why people in the nutrition field often struggle in their own relationships with food; and so much more.
Check out this amazing conversation right here!
And just a quick heads-up that my emails to you will likely be a little shorter for the next several weeks, because I'm now working on the revisions for my book(!!).
I’m psyched to report that my editor gave me the most incredible feedback on my first draft, and now I seriously cannot WAIT to share the book with you toward the end of this year. The final title is Anti-Diet: Reclaim Your Time, Money, Well-Being, and Happiness Through Intuitive Eating, and I’ll keep you posted here with lots more details as they become available 🙌💕
Here’s to getting back to our REAL life’s work,
Christy
P.S. If you’re ready to reclaim your time and mental energy for the things that reallymatter, come join my intuitive eating online course. It’ll help you stop obsessing over food and your body, so that you can free up space for changing the world.