Ex-squeeze me?! What do you mean food and exercise have nothing to do with it?!

Hear me out. If you eat when you’re hungry and stop when you’re full, you can still achieve your natural weight—even if you’re eating hamburgers all day. Although, I don’t think anyone really wants to eat hamburgers all day.

Maybe in the beginning you will. But after a while, I think you’d get sick of it. (Ever seen Super Size Me?) And if you are truly listening to your body, I don’t think anybody really wants burgers all the time. Maybe just once in a while. That’s how I like to enjoy them.

No no. I’m the ONE person—the total freak—who would actually eat burgers and never stop if I let myself eat that way.

Once I started coaching, I was actually shocked to learn that most people feel this way. Except no one talks about it because we’re all convinced that we’re the only ones! And this is what diet culture has done to us. It has shamed us out of eating.

I promise that, as someone who has personally struggled with compulsive eating—with “eating well” all day only to shovel entire sleeves of cookies into my face at midnight—you really do “get over” eating the “bad food” once you start listening to your body. (You won’t even call it “bad food” anymore.)

You’ll go through some stages on your way there, like the Rebel Binges (no fun, but a rite of passage), and then you’ll emerge like a damn phoenix, rising from the ashes and feeling normal around food. Able to eat one cookie and stop, or eat many cookies and stop before you feel uncomfortably full. Because cookies are always allowed!

So you’re telling me that I can eat burgers and cookies and still lose weight?

Yes, I am. But you might be missing the point of Psycho-Spiritual Wellness. The point isn’t just to lose weight and look good and THEN feel food. The point is to learn how to feel bad so that you can deal with the uncomfortable feelings (like loneliness or anxiety) that trigger compulsive eating to begin with. The point is to learn how to feel any feeling without being swept away by it—that way you can listen to your body regardless of how you feel.

Sounds like a lot of listening and feeling. Will that airy fairy stuff really work?

Oh baby, yes it does! But there’s a formula that looks slightly different for everyone. Generally speaking, first you need to get reacquainted with your body. Get back in touch with hunger and fullness. Practice eating exactly what appeals to you and also practice stopping when you’re full. The Stop, Drop, & Feel helps A LOT with all of this, but it can be difficult! Fortunately, it gets easier with time and practice.

Oh also, no dieting or food rules. All foods are allowed and equal. This is extremely important and cannot be skipped.

Yeah you just lost me. Because if I stop dieting, won’t I gain weight?

Maybe… at first. See the second stage of giving up dieting—the “rebel binge” phase. Super scary, but a rite of passage for everyone. Before you run off, because this isn’t what you signed up for, please know that after Stage 2, your weight will start to normalize and, if you were overweight before, you’ll naturally lose weight as your body finds balance.

But can’t I do this without gaining weight at all?

Most people who have been restricting their diet for years (even decades) HAVE to go through the rebellion binge phase (stage 2 of giving up dieting). Everryyooneee does, including me. And yes, I gained a little weight, and yes I lost all that weight, plus a little more.

But the goal of Psycho-Spiritual Wellness isn’t just to lose weight! It’s to learn how to feel normal around food first and foremost. But since everyone gets panicked about weight gain, I will share the way to reduce the magnitude of the rebellion binges.

How? Tell me the secrets.

By practicing the Stop, Drop, & Feel relentlessly. All the time. All day every day. 

You can even do the Stop, Drop, & Feel when you AREN’T about to binge. In fact, emotional check-in’s like that are a great way to 1) develop emotional awareness, 2) continue developing emotional tolerance, and 3) prepare for the heavy onslaught of emotions that bubble up after you stop dieting and begin to feel your feelings.