Episode 49: Honor Your Health with Gentle Nutrition with Colleen Christensen
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Episode Transcription
Participant #1:
Hello, guys. Welcome to the podcast. Today we are joined by a very special guest, Colleen Christensen. Colleen is a Rd who believes in the power of food freedom through her social media channels, her blog, her videos, and her incredibly popular membership community called The Society with an IEA T Y like eat. Very cute. She helps women to stop dieting and start fueling their bodies intuitively without food rules. As a dietitian, Colleen knows the importance of nutrition, but also that there's this unhealthy obsession that can be very detrimental to our health. So finding the balance we're all striving for isn't a mystical unicorn. It's 180% within everyone's reach. And Colleen guides and inspires others to find the style of food freedom that feels good both mentally and physically. Be sure to enjoy today's episode. Enjoy. Hello, everyone. Welcome back to another episode of The Upbeat Dietitians Podcast. Hello, everybody. Colleen, welcome to the podcast. Thank you guys so much for having me. I'm excited to be here. Oh, thank you so much. Well, today we really want to get into intuitive eating and more specifically, gentle nutrition. We know, Colleen, you're very passionate about that. You talk really great things about it on your Instagram page and elsewhere, of course. So we really want to get into that today. But before we do, kind of walk us through a Day in the Life, what you do for work, education, hobbies, all that fun stuff. Yes, I'll try to condense it as much as possible. The Day in the life now looks like me. I'm currently sitting in my basement office, my beagles over there somewhere on the couch. And I am a private practice dietitian. I have an online membership community, and I teach just like what you said, intuitive eating with a gentle nutrition focus, which I'm sure we'll dive into exactly what that means for everyone who's listening is like, what does that even mean? We'll get into it. But really, I do so many things. Today was an Instagram content day. I do YouTube, I do coaching, calls in the Society, creating new videos, all of these different things, writing. So I'm really aware of a lot of hats. And I think that's why I love my career so much. I was talking to my husband about this the other day when we were walking our dog, and I was like, I really just feel like this career makes sense to me. I was always a very creative person, even back in my childhood in high school. And I feel like it's all come together now. And I never expected my career to turn out this way. I went to school to be a dietitian, kind of on a whim. I've always liked food. I knew I didn't want to do anything that was too serious or punching things into a calculator or anything. Just what you think of like a typical job. I knew that wasn't up my alley, so my mom suggested it, and I was like, sure, let's go for it. So I kind of just went on a whim. Didn't know necessarily what I was going to do with that career. But the way it unfolded is I ended up working for about four years in inborn areas of metabolism. So very, very specific genetic disorders and very biochemical. So for everyone who's a dietitian that's listening and being like, I'm never going to need to know any of those things again. Yeah. All the stuff they said you didn't need to know was the stuff I needed to know, and I needed to know it like the back of my hand because lives were at stake. So it was a very interesting career, but I knew that it wasn't something that just lit me up. And the further along that I got in my own recovery from disordered eating, because it was really in College when I struggled and I get the question of a lot of did working to become a dietitian cause my disordered eating? And I don't think so. I think that it was just the perfect storm of my personality, being very kind of obsessive about things and type A, it was a coping mechanism for my stress. So I really struggled in College. And then when I started my career in metabolism is when I started really that healing process, really during my internship and during the earlier stages of my career. But then the further that I got along, I realized that, you know what? I think I have to step in and be the person that I didn't have during my own recovery, because the way that it kind of all unfolded is I just stumbled upon intuitive eating. And it was after a lot of trial and error trying to figure out how do I make this work? How do I tie in health and nutrition to this intuitive eating non diet framework? And like I said, I just really felt like I had to be the person that I didn't have because I could have sidestepped a whole bunch of stress and taking two steps forward, three steps back. So that's really how I got where I am today. I teach all about not having food rules with that focus on gentle nutrition. And that's my little spiel in a nutshell. I love how you say you stumbled upon it because same 100%. I think how I learned about intuitive eating and how I knew I wanted to do that as a dietitian myself was Instagram. Like, I saw other RDS doing it and talking about it. I was like, that's so different from what we learn in school for the most part, which is a whole other conversation, like the whole podcast itself, but same. It's just kind of cool how you can stumble upon that and then it becomes like this whole career. It's kind of crazy. Yeah. Also, it's so cool. I know there has to be a place for all dietitians and all different aspects of disease and whatnot, but in born metabolism just sounds so scary to me from the aspect of biochemistry and me, like, not friends.
Participant #1:
Yeah. I just think that I like having that as my background because I understand the human body very well. I understand the way that our food digests very well. And I still advocate for this non diet approach. I've had years studying, like I said, the breakdown of everything. And it just goes to show you that, yes, this is still what I recommend, knowing all of that. Yeah. It's so interesting. Yeah. So cool. Well, that's a great segue, actually, into our first official question. So back in the day when we first started this podcast, Emily and I did an episode on intuitive eating, kind of walk through the ten principles, but that was forever ago and we love getting other perspectives. So, Colleen, walk us through what intuitive eating is and kind of explain like, is it just another diet? Is it just kind of like eating whenever you want it? What the heck is that? What is intuitive eating? Yes. Now, there's lots of ways that you can look at intuitive eating. And I think that one thing that's important to know is that it's going to look different for every single person. So we kind of take this. I take a zoomed out lens when I give kind of a definition and I say it is a Nondi approach to nutrition and health and the way we eat. And it's really looking for your own. You are in control. You are in the driver's seat of your food choices versus a diet which sets these guidelines for us, which tells us what we can cannot eat or we should or what we should not eat. And with intuitive eating, you are using your intuition. It's coming from you based on what you know, both. This is what my body wants. I'm hungry. I am craving XYZ. But also the biggest thing that people forget is that our brain is a part of our body, too. So it takes into consideration our health knowledge that we have. And the way that I like to kind of explain it is if we picture a Venn diagram, you know, those two overlapping circles. Intuitive eating is really the middle area between our internal wisdom knowledge, those cravings, desires, hunger cues with the external knowledge that we have. So the health information, you know, all of those things, nutrition information, intuitive eating, like I said, very, very summed up version is kind of the overlap of that we're taking both of those things into consideration in our food choices. Now there might be one time when our craving I just really want the chocolate. So then we have the chocolate. There might be another time when we're like, I just perfect example. I wanted something sweet and I'm obsessed you guys with these freeze dried mangoes from Aldi. They're so good. And I was like, you know, I want something a little sweet. Ok, you know what? I'm fine with anything. So I'll use a little gentle nutrition and get something with some other nutrient benefits in there with having the mangoes. So those circles, they can ebb and flow. They're not stagnant, but that's really kind of what it is in a nutshell. So a lot of people ask all intuitive eating. It's just not caring about nutrition or just eating whatever I want. And you can eat whatever you want. But it's not just impulse, right? I could have gone we also this weekend got some crumble cookies. I could have ate in all the crumble cookies that we have. But I'm also thinking what's going to make me feel good? What is going to make my body feel bad? And I didn't want to eat them. So yes, I could eat anything that I want to. But it's more of an empowered choice for me to decide. Do I want to have some of the cookie? Do I not want to have some of the cookie? So it's like I said, a non diet approach to nutrition. And I think the biggest thing is it's so much more complicated than what we see on Instagram. On Instagram, we just see those impulses. We just see you can eat the cookies, so eat the cookies. And I think that's what trips a lot of people up. And that is why I really have the focus on judge nutrition, because that's where I personally got really stuck too. Was cool. I can eat the Donuts and the pizza and the cookies and all these things. But how do we allow that nutrition side of things, that circle of the Venn diagram to come back into play without it totally taking over like it did for me for so long or kind of just Ping ponging back between these circles and not having overlap. So I hope that answered your question on what intuitive eating is in a little bit of a roundabout way. I feel like you also already started answering the next question too perfect, which is kind of what is gentle nutrition. But I think you did a really good job of everyone. I feel explained a little bit differently. I really like how you went about explaining kind of from the health standpoint and also talking about how when we are going to have those cravings, the different types of choices you can make, you don't just have to like, for example, you don't have to just eat the crumble cookies. If you're having something sweet, you're having the dried mango. That's something that I definitely agree, get lost a lot in the social media world because it's very much like advocating. There's a lot of advocacy. I don't know if that's a word advocate, advocate. It is now for any cravings, but there isn't kind of that aspect of our mindset around what we're choosing to eat and whatnot. Yes, something that I say because it can get confusing. Okay, when do I implement genetic? When do I not and really kind of summarize that up again, genetician is a non obsessive way to go about nutrition information. It is just that it is gentle. Right. So one thing that I like to say is you could almost put your choices through a filter and you could ask yourself, okay, would implementing jets nutrition? So let's say the cookie or the mangoes? Would that take away from my satisfaction and enjoyment with this eating experience? For me just now, the answer was no. Like, I just want something sweet. I'm going to be satisfied with either of these options. So sure, I'll implement the judge nutrition. But there was a time earlier today where I did want some of the cookie. And if I would have said, okay, I'll have the mangoes in the name of, quote, unquote health, I was probably going to probably eat way more of those past fullness trying to hit the spot with something that's not going to hit the spot and probably would have gone back to the cookies anyway because I had to satisfy that craving. So I like to kind of use that question as a filter of when do I implement jumps nutrition? Because it can get confusing. And another thing that we should know is the focus on jumps nutrition is not where we start. And I'm sure any of the listeners have heard your previous episode on intuitive eating. They know, okay, jet nutrition is saved for later. And that is true, the focus is saved until later in the journey. But I don't think that means you can't ever think about nutrition in the earlier stages of intuitive eating. And I think that's something that I love and hate social media like so many of us do because it really, really oversimplifies intuitive eating. Yes, we want gender, tradition, the focus to be later in the journey, but in the beginning, especially as we're establishing our hunger and fullness cues, that is one of the first things that I teach is we focus first on the biological side of things. So giving our body carbs, fat, protein, enough energy throughout the day, and there is a little bit of gentle nutrition that we need to think about there. For example, macronutrients, are we having those at each meal? Are we getting enough food overall? And then we switch to more of kind of a psychological side of food. So breaking our food rules, overcoming emotional eating, not having that be our only coping mechanism. And then we get to more of the focus on June nutrition. So June nutrition can be seated a little bit throughout. But the key thing, another key question to ask yourself with gentle nutrition is to say, for instance, let's go back to the cookie and mango example. If I were to have the two options and I were to say, okay, I'm going to have the mangoes for a little gentlerition in my day, you have to ask yourself, would I feel guilt, stress or anxiety if I were to have the cookie? That signals a food rule, not a food preference for jets nutrition. And in that instance, which is where a lot of people start with intuitive eating, we need to work on making peace with the cookies and allowing ourselves to eat them, removing that guilt before we can really shift to jumps nutrition, because if we don't do that, we're kind of just avoiding the cookies and avoiding that food rule. And I kind of describe it like you're kind of building a house with no solid foundation that's been poured. It's all just going to come tumbling down, like maybe eating a cookie or we go out to dinner or something like that, and we only have an option that we think is, quote, unquote bad. All that work is going to kind of come tumbling down. So we really need to lay that solid foundation first and then focus on judge nutrition. But I want everyone to know that that's kind of in my mind, the goal we want to get you to at least I want to get everyone to implementing judge nutrition because I'm a registered dietitian. I care about your health. I care about people feeling good with intuitive eating. And that is one thing I hear over and over and over again is, okay, I'm doing intuitive eating. I'm eating all the cookies, I'm eating the pizza. It's great, but I feel like crap. And I was in that place, too, and it sucks. And my response is, oh, man, I feel you. But the good news is that you're not totally eating intuitively because you haven't gotten to gentle nutrition. And that's a good thing. That means you have more learning to do. That means there's kind of this hope for this. So I kind of get excited when I'm not excited that people aren't feeling well. But I get excited because I'm like, cool, there's more to learn, there's more room to grow here. And that's really I think what ties it all together is jump nutrition after you've made peace with food. I'm getting excited right now because that's the secret sauce. That is where everyone envisions being where you're like, cool. I can have the crumble cookies on my counter, and I can still snack on the carrots and hummus if I want to. It's that quote, unquote balance or moderation that everyone's looking for. But it just comes easy because you don't have to strive for it with gentle nutrition. The way I teach it is a feeling based approach versus a telling approach. And I think that's one really big differentiator between genes, nutrition and a diet. I might be giving you similar advice honestly to what the diet is telling you. For instance, I'm obviously not going to tell you you have to eat XYZ, but fruits and veggies are great for our bodies. Right. A diet that you follow may also tell you that. But I think the biggest difference is, again, you're in the driver's seat. You have full control over not touching a vegetable ever again in your life. You have the power to do that. But do you want to? And that's where I think it's really important to connect the way we feel with the way that we're eating. Okay. If we're eating Donuts every day and it doesn't feel good. Ok, let's pocket that nugget of wisdom. What would make it feel good? Right. You have this innate drive desire to implement just nutrition because you understand the way that it makes your body feel, the way that it impacts your body. And I just nerd out. I'm rambling on, but I just nerd out about this stuff because it's so fascinating to me. And I personally never thought that I'd be able to get to this place where I wasn't swinging on the pendulum from super restrictive hashtag clean to literally binge eating like everything that the CVS store on my College campus had. I never thought I'd get to this place. So anyone listening, if you're like, that sounds great, but it's never going to happen for me. It can. It literally happens for thousands of people every single day. And it can happen for you, too. I'm like getting giddy at you. Getting giddy. I just love it so much. I love it so much. That was so well put. I especially love the part how you mentioned that the gentle nutrition part kind of comes later, but we have to kind of do it in the beginning a little bit too. Like when I see clients one on one, if I were just like, okay, just eat whatever, good luck. Like listen to your body. They wouldn't really learn much from that. Although it's true they do get to whatever they want and listen to their body. They're not learning about how, at least for me in that instance, that would have happened. They wouldn't be learning about how protein keep them fall and how getting lots of fiber would be good for their bowel movements and that sort of thing. And so we do have to incorporate it a little bit, like you said, but it can be hard to fully embrace it when you haven't figured out the other parts of intuitive meeting first. Yes, absolutely. Yeah. I think that is I loved everything you said specifically. I really liked kind of the thought process you took us through of like deciding the food choices. And you're in the driver's seat because that's something that we haven't really gone in that much depth on here at any point. So I'm really glad you were able to kind of talk that through because I feel like a lot of people, their minds are going to be blown. I love talking to us. So I am one of those people. It's funny, this might be a little controversial, but I do full days of eating, and I know that some people love them, some people hate them. And I think if you can do them the right way, they're very beneficial. So the way that I do them is literally just like that. I don't focus on how much I'm eating or necessarily what I'm eating. I intentionally keep, like, portion sizes and whatnot ambiguous. And I talk about, hey, you know what? It's lunchtime. Maybe it's more of a craving that I'm satisfying. Why did I pick this meal again? All my work, I ask myself what would have really helped me when I was trying to figure all of this stuff out? And I think that if someone could kind of showed me, like, it's not necessarily one thing of this is why I'm eating this meal. It's kind of this like I said, we kind of put things through filters. We have to think about what we have on hand, what is accessible. Yes, nutrition, also our cravings. I love doing that. Just kind of like walking people through it, because for me, it happens. And I think that that's important to note, too, is that all of this stuff, like, if you're thinking right now, maybe you're in the beginning of your journey or you're just thinking, okay, I think gender nutrition is what I'm missing. If you're thinking, oh, my gosh, Kellen, I have to ask myself all these questions every time I have a meal like that is so overwhelming, it gets automatic. So what I really like to do is take that. Okay, what took me 2 seconds to make that choice that I was going to have leftover pasta for dinner or for lunch, let me dissect that for you and show you kind of like how I got to that food choice. And then you can see I love doing this in my Instagram stories to the days where I have a cookie. This is why I had that. This is why I had the frozen mangoes. Because I think when we see, especially on social media, if someone snacked on mangoes, they just think, okay, mangoes are good. Mangoes are what I should be doing too. But there's so much more nuance to our food choices. And like I was going to say, it's going to look different for every single person. So let's say I had a medical need. Let's say I had celiac disease and I had to restrict gluten. Right? You can be an intuitive eater and still have those. Right? I like to see it again. That's your piece of gentle nutrition. That is your empowered choice to say, you know what, I'd really like it if my stomach didn't feel like I got torn apart. So I'm going to not eat the gluten. Right. Same thing for someone who might have lactose intolerance. You can go eat as much ice cream as you want. You have the power to do that. Someone with a peanut allergy, you could go eat all the peanuts that you want. The question is, do you want to go into anaphylactic shock that's really you get to decide, is this something that I want to do? You are really in the driver's seat. So like I said, it's going to look different for everyone. It's going to look different day to day. And I think sometimes that's what's really hard about it for people to wrap their mind around because we're so used to just give me what to eat, just give me a diet. And I always like to tell people, I'm not going to tell you what to eat. I'm going to teach you how to eat. And I think that's really what a lot of people are missing is how do I eat again. Yeah. I saw another Rd coin her what I eat in a day as a why I eat in a day, which I just love because like you've been saying, why we make the choice is so much more important than what the choice actually is. It's going to be different for every single person. And I also want to say that I love the phrase empowered choice that you keep mentioning. I really love that. I love it, too. Yes. And I think that that's really what we're needing. I mean, we need to just take the power back from dieting, take the power back from food and allow yourself to make your own choices. Yes. We need to feel empowered around food, our bodies, nutrition, all the things. Yeah. I always talk about with clients how good it feels to be in the driver's seat. Like we want to feel like we're actually in control of our choices rather than the other way around. When we just feel like we're scrambling. We have no say. It's just like a madness. It just feels so good to be in that driver's seat. But Colleen, we want to hear or I know our listeners definitely will want to hear how they can incorporate or even start incorporating gentle nutrition into their life. Do you have any easy tips, gentle nutrition, for starters. Just so everyone is probably a very different place. Yeah. I got you here. So I'm getting excited. So I think, like I said, it's really like a pyramid. So the base of the pyramid, like I said, is you have strong hunger and fullness cues. We're not restricting any food groups. It's not like we oh, my gosh, I can't touch bread with a ten foot pole. We want to make sure we overcome that. Before we get into the genetician. But really there's a couple of really four pieces that I recommend, starting with gentle nutrition. And the first one is going to be macronutrients. So carbs and protein, do we have those at each meal in some capacity? And then at snacks, I usually like to recommend two out of the three to give your snack a little more staying power, give you a little bit longer lasting energy. So trying that. And then we have fiber. Fiber is also a really more basic piece of junk nutrition that you can start with. That can be fruits and veggies, that can be whole grains, that can be beans, but just kind of adding a little bit of fiber in there. I love fiber, you guys. I like nerd out fiber. And vitamin D might be randomly like my most favorite nutrients, but fiber really makes such a big difference for me and my meals, keeping me feeling full and satisfied for longer. So seeing what you can't add in there to give your meals or your snacks a little bit of a fiber boost. Also great for gut health, great for regularity. It's great for things like our cholesterol levels, so many things. But just trying to get a little bit of fiber in there. The next thing is color. This is a really easy piece of gentle nutrition because it does so much so color a lot of the different foods, fruits, veggies. Part of the reason why they get the different color is some different nutrients in there. So if you can just look at your plate or look at not even your plate, but if you could just Zoom out to your day and ask yourself, did I get a couple of different colors in there, that's a really good place to start. One thing that I do, I make this breakfast. I call it smoothie cereal. I know it sounds really weird, but guys stick with me. It is like fruit. And then yogurt. I use I like fiber. One cereals, get me a little fiber on there, and then I put some peanut butter on there and then you pour milk on top of it. I think yogurt is too thick for a bowl and I think just milk is too thin. So I mix them together. But one thing I do, gentle nutrition wise there is every week or so, I try to buy different fruit from the store and get myself a mix of that color in there. Easy piece of just nutrition. And the last one is satisfaction. So we want to make doing the previous things sound good, right? We want to enjoy them. Also. One thing about color, it's going to increase your mindfulness in the meal. So that's really great tip there. But allowing ourselves to add satisfaction is that taking the veggies or the fruit and adding something on top, maybe you add a dash of cinnamon to your banana to make it taste better or everything, but the bagel seasoning to your broccoli or roasted broccoli parmesan cheese is also really good on that. What can I do to add a little bit of satisfaction? So if you're like, okay, Kellen, what are those things you can use? The little phrase my friend Colleen suggests macronutrients fiber color satisfaction. I also have a link to a download. I can get that to you guys if we can share it. It's got like a screen saver that you can put on your phone to remember those things. So that's where I really recommend starting. And then, I mean, guys, we can nerd out about things like the specific types of fiber, like beta glucan and all of those things, different types of dairy. But we'll reel it in here and that's where I'd recommend starting. I'm obsessed with my friend. Doing that is so awesome. That worked out so perfectly with your name. It did. Oh, my gosh. I have to ask, what came first? Like, you figuring out those four components, or are you thinking of like, the acronym? I came up with the components first, and that's where I feel like my career just worked out somehow. How could we get creative with this and make this fit? So I'm glad it worked out. That's awesome. I love that. And it's so cool that you have like a screen saver if you're not able to share that, or even if you have a link to it, I'll get to share. So we can direct people on over to that because I'm sure people will be just as excited as we are. That's so cool. Okay, Colleen, so one more question for you on the gentle nutrition topic. Are there any times when our listeners or individuals in general should not utilize this part of intuitive eating? Yes. I think that it's important to not use it if it would take away from your satisfaction or enjoyment with the deal. I think ask yourself that question is going to be important, but there's also going to be times when we can't. Right? We don't always have control over things. Accessibility is a huge thing, too, if you are in a I was just talking about this on my Instagram stories yesterday about yogurt. Yogurt is such a confusing topic for people. I think it's because there are so many options out there, and there's one always coming on the market that's quote unquote better than the last, and it can get confusing. So let's talk about yoga as an example. So someone might, if they are fine with either, it wouldn't take away from their satisfaction and their enjoyment with the yogurt. And they are like, okay, cool. I'm fine with a lower sugar yogurt. I have access to that. That is fine for me. But someone else, maybe their store doesn't have the fancy lower sugar option. And that's a real thing that I think a lot of people need to kind of discuss. Or if we go to a work lunch and we get boxed lunches and all the sandwiches are on white bread and not whole wheat bread, we can't control that. Right. And I think those situations are really where we start to understand, okay, is this true gentle nutrition preference or is this a food rule that I have been kind of disguising as gentle nutrition and I'm now being I have to face it. So seeing if there's any guilt, stress or anxiety that comes up in that. I had that happen to me yesterday in the grocery store. I was buying hamburger buns and I was like, you know, I would prefer a whole wheat hamburger bun for me. I like that they're a little heartier. I like that there's some fiber in there that's going to keep me full longer. There's other different nutrient benefits there, but they only had plain white ones. I'm not going to freak out about it. Right. It's fine. So I think that if it would, to answer your question, don't implement judge nutrition. If it would take away from your satisfaction or enjoyment with the meal or not implementing it would cause you guilt, stress or anxiety. But also if you just can't. Right. If it's going to cause you literally don't have the access to it or it's going to cause you a bunch of mental stress, don't influence it. I feel like that's one of those times in but a really big perk up. Nothing on a diet is that you don't have to stress about getting the white instead of the wheat. I've heard some people say they have to be like this white whale diet. Really don't get anything white, like white bread, white rice, whatever. And so I was thinking of that when you were telling that story. And I'm like that person would not have been able to maybe get to that trip because they couldn't have gotten the Brown bread instead of the white. And that could have been like a whole day just like ruined because of that. So the beauty of intuitive eating is, like, as long as it doesn't impact you and your taste and your satisfaction and all of that, get the white. That's totally fine. You can get that fiber elsewhere and still be totally fine. Exactly. There are other ways that you can implement nutrition. I love making air fried carrots. They're so good. I can have some of that with it. That can be a form of gender nutrition. It's not an all or nothing thing. It's not like I have to implement everything that Coleen said or none of it. There are some days when maybe I don't have a ton of color in my meals. That's okay. Or if I were to have the fiber cereal when I really wanted the Fruit Loops, right, then it's okay. It's not an all or nothing thing. It's gentle. I think our last question for you though, is if you have any advice for how our listeners can get started on their intuitive eating journey. Just in general, we always get asked about first steps and what do I do first? I feel like there's so much to it and not really a distinguished like this is step number one or this is where you should start and want to hear your thoughts and kind of where people can get started, what they can do. I'll spell all the tea for you right now, the exact five steps that I recommend. And first thing, I think we need to really understand why diets. I go to the stats first. I go to looking at the data, because to me, that lays a solid foundation that gives you motivation to actually do all of this stuff. So I have tons of resources on my blog. I'm sure you guys have others that you can recommend for where to start. But I think that looking at the cold, hard facts of dieting and what it actually does to our body, what actually does determine our health is really important. And also getting into what I talk about a lot, the set point weight theory, and how we don't actually have as much control over our weight as we think in terms of how are we going to live our healthiest lives. And I think when we can start to really come to terms with those things and wrap our heads around it a little bit more, that's really laying kind of the solid foundation. So that's the first step that I teach in the society, which is my intuitive eating community. And then that's when we then go on to more of the biological side of things. So getting strong hunger and fullness, he's back, eating enough. A lot of people talk about the question I get asked is what about my metabolism? Everyone's so obsessed with metabolism. It's such a big buzzword. And this is really the process of kind of quote, unquote revving our metabolism, basically getting our body back to functioning properly. I want people to think less about where is my metabolism at and more of is my body adequately fueled, is my body functioning properly? That's all we really need to focus on. So eating enough, getting those basic carbs, fat and protein in there, getting strong hunger and fullness cues and understanding what foods, what types of foods, what amounts of foods are satisfying to you. So really focusing on the biological and then moving on to the psychological. So making peace with the chocolate cake, making peace with eating two slices of bread. And I can't stress this enough because I did not do it this way. And it caused me to Ping pong back and forth. I always talk about this story of I was in College and I was like, I'm done with dieting. I'm going to break my food rules. And I went right for the chocolate cake. There I'm specifically thinking of this one chocolate cake. And that was kind of my first step. And I think a lot of people do this on Instagram. Like, hey, I'm going to go to the store and stock my pantry. I don't recommend doing that because let's think about it for a second. Of course, I'm not going to know how to stop eating the chocolate cake if I have no sense of my hunger and fullness cues. If my body is screaming for energy because it's been restricted for so long, of course I'm not going to know how to stop. And then it just made me feel so out of control. So do the stepwise process. And then even when we get into breaking our food rules, do that step wise, start with the easiest one, then work to the hardest one, and then we get into gentle nutrition. So I think that the first steps are to do a little bit more learning. And I think everyone should read the actual intuitive eating book, because that really helps kind of weed out the misinformation that's on Instagram a lot of the time. So I always tell people, even if they work with me at all, I'm like, okay, I will tell you everything you need to know, but it's going to hit differently if you actually read the book, too. And that is one thing that I've noticed. People who make the most progress the fastest are those who take the time to say, okay, I'm going to learn everything I can and read the actual intuitive eating book versus just do what I'm being told to do. Like I said, I think the way they explain it, it's a little different than the way I explain it. And it gives you some different perspectives, and it allows you to come to your own conclusions versus just doing what someone tells you. So those are my little roadmap that I'd recommend. That's a really good starting point. I'm very realistic. I always talk about realistic goals. I feel very realistic to start off with. And definitely reading the book will help a lot. I understand kind of the why. Yes. It's not the most sexy approach, I always say. I mean, the sexy thing to do is go to the store. I'm going to get all the for me, I'm thinking of like those Little Debbie Oatmeal pies. I'm going to buy the ice cream. I'm going to buy all of the things. And that is typically too overwhelming for most people. It's exciting, yes. But it is just going to be a little bit too much of a shock to the system for most people. So I don't recommend doing that. Yeah, same. We'll link the book below. You guys know what we're talking about. We talk about it all the time, Emily and I do. But yeah, the one we're talking about, we will be sure to link. Okay, Colleen, we like to have our listeners excuse me, our guests, when they come on and they really get into their topic, be able to kind of sum it up for listeners if they happen to, for some reason. Fast forward to the very end. If you could kind of put it all in, like a few sentences or a few thoughts, what would you kind of say about this topic? I think for me, intuitive eating should be freeing. It should allow you to enjoy life, but it should also feel good and support your physical health as well. It's really about tying those things in. Intuitive eating should feel good. That's summing it up in a nutshell. And if it doesn't, whether it is mentally or physically, then maybe we're not fully eating intuitively. So let's dive into that a little bit deeper. Love it. Love it. Yeah. Okay, let's get into the bonus question. Yay. We love this part of the episode. It kind of takes away from what we do all day talking about nutrition, which we love. But it's fun to talk about other things sometimes for our listeners who are just tuning in. If you're a fan of Colleen and you kind of found us that way, our bonus question is where we kind of have a little debate, a little mostly just us giving our opinions. But our bonus question today, and we let our guests go first. So, Colleen, chicken tenders or chicken Nuggets, which one would you prefer? And kind of the why I'd say too. I would go chicken tender. I sometimes feel like chicken Nuggets have too much. The ratio is off of breading to chicken. I don't know. I just like chicken tenders. I think they're also like more fun. And I also feel like sometimes chicken Nuggets can be awkward. Like, do you do it in one bite? Do you take multiple bites? Do you then double dip? I don't know. So I feel like chicken tenders for me, a part two that you did not prepare for. But what dipping sauce is your favorite for chicken tenders? I'd say honey mustard. I have to agree with you on that one. It's pretty close between honey mustard and barbecue sauce. But I just think that a good honey mustard done right. Or I have a recipe on my blog for Copycat Chickfila Sauce. That is really good because you kind of got both of those things in there. True. Yeah. Maybe that copy catching choice, that would be like a good combo of those two. So good. That sounds so good. Okay, Emily, how about you? What's your choice? I don't know. It's about you. So I'm excited to hear your answer. I am also team chicken Tenders because I like the texture a lot better. I feel like they're normally crispier when they're chicken tenders. And I really like that aspect of it. I don't know. I agree the ratio. I feel like it's a bit better. I don't know specifically about what, but chicken tenders. They also like sometimes the shakes kind of freak me out. What am I looking at? But definitely chicken tenders. And then my favorite sauce is honey mustard, too. Well, this might be the first ever three for three with a guest. I have to agree with the chicken tenders and actual honey mustard too. That's hilarious. That has never happened in the history of this podcast. I will say though, if a chicken nugget is shaped like something that's a game changer. If it is like a diet chicken or like a star or a Crown or something like that, it's kind of like when any food is like holiday colored or something like that, it immediately makes it more fun. Even I'm thinking of tortilla chips when they get like red and green ones around Christmas time. That goes into guys the satisfaction of it. It doesn't always have to be just about the actual food that you're eating, but just kind of even presentation of foods just can play a huge role in our enjoyment with the meal. Emily and I are pumpkin spice fanatics, so like come August, we are like dope. So that just proves the point that just the marketing of that can improve the satisfaction for us in that way. Yes. So we like to give our guests the floor at the end of our episode and kind of share with our listeners where they can find you if they want to hear more, because he and I really enjoyed our episode today. But people want to hear more about kind of what your thoughts are or whatever, or even if they want to work with you, kind of give us that info where they can find you any links and whatnot. Well, we're going to link everything you've said, too, but just kind of right now, if you'd like to share. Yes, I feel like I am all over the place on Instagram at no Food Rules and you can follow the Society, which is my intuitive eating membership community at the Underscore Society, spelled E-A-T-Y because we are a community that actually eats. And then on YouTube, Colleen Christensen TikTok at no Food Rules. Lots of fun stuff there. So you can also go to my website, Colleencistionnutrition.com. Tons of resources there and we can link, like I said, that gentutrition cheat sheet. And then I also have a fun quiz. But I'd love to hang out with you guys. You can find me 99% of the time on my Instagram stories, dancing in my kitchen with my dog. So it's always a fun time. Well, Colleen reaching out. Thank you enough for being on to this. It's an amazing episode. We know this is going to love it. I actually have a client who I recommended you to her. I told her that we were having you on the podcast, and so I know at least one person is going to love this. If not, hopefully like tons of others. But again thank you so much for being on today. Yes, thank you guys for having me. It was a blast. Yeah, of course. Emily. I'm so sorry, Colleen. Emily and I have this running thing where Emily always gets stuck doing the outro and for some reason it's always a struggle. I can never do it right. Thank you everyone for tuning in for today's episode. We hope you took something away from us. You learned at least one thing about gentle nutrition tutoring. Otherwise definitely be sure to go check out all of Colleen's social media and links and everything we're going to link below and whatnot otherwise, we will talk to you next week and see you then. Yes. Thank you guys so much for listening. See you next week. Bye.
