Allow Yourself to Receive
love • madeleines • satisfaction (IE principle #5)
Love is…allowing yourself to enjoy food and eating
Years before I learned about Intuitive Eating, I decided to do an experiment, just stop dieting. Stop the mental calculator of calories, carbs, and transgressions. Figure out what I really wanted to eat and, sit down and enjoy it. It was wonderful! But holidays were still challenging for me, mostly the candy. It is “bad" isn’t it? Not exactly healthy?
Intuitive Eating brought me freedom from food moralizing (“good/bad” thinking) and the I-want-it-I-can’t-have-it willpower battle, which is so detrimental to mental health. I could see beauty in the Valentine’s candy, especially the chocolates made with care by my friends Wlady and Shannon Grochowski of La Châtelaine. I could eat, not to eat, or decide to wait until later. No drama. No guilt. No making it disappear so I could move on to “perfect eating”. Holiday candy became fun again.
Eating is in-the-moment receiving—satisfaction to hunger, but also a delight for the senses—if we allow it.
Bake Something Wonderful
If you’re in the mood to bake this week, consider this Madeleine Cake or these Madeleines, adapted from Daniel Boulud (both smell divine as they are baking!):
Intuitive Eating Principe #5: Discover the Satisfaction Factor
Intuitive Eating helped me tune into my senses. With the freedom to choose what delighted my senses and what I wanted to eat, I experienced satisfaction which helped eating become a rewarding cycle—hunger, desire, eating, satisfaction. The feeling of satisfaction helped me put an end to non-stop grazing, which isn’t very satisfying and has undesirable consequences, unless you like that tight waistband feeling.
Food is meant to be a pleasure in life. Eating is as well. It’s like a dream come true to not diet, to realize that it is okay to be excited about food and eating, and to make the connection between choices and their consequences.
Smooth Sailing, Fix Your Food Relationship in 2025!
So this is week 6 of what I’m calling Smooth Sailing, how to fix your food relationship in 2025. I’ll keep posting every Monday. Please subscribe and share. Thank you so much for being here!
Here’s a recap so far, since the beginning of January:
About Love & Cookies, homepage
Week 1: Food Addict? Or Something Else?
Week 3: Sugar “Addiction” and Primal Eating
Week 4: One is Never Enough…because None are Allowed
Hope you have a wonderful week.
