Your Values
Create a list of your values and understand how exactly your relationship to food aligns with them. This helps us understand our motivations and behaviors. Try to connect your actions with eating and food to your values and see if they support your life values or not. A great example of this is honesty. If you value honesty, but you aren’t honest with yourself about your food intake and preferences, there may be a tension that grows and harms your relationship with food.
Cultural & Social Connection
Include social and cultural connections in your practice of eating. If your habit of eating healthy only focuses on the nutritional aspect of food, you may find yourself thinking about food all day long. This is because you’re missing some of the key ingredients: comfort, satisfaction, and social connection. Expand your interpretation of healthy eating by including these into your meals whenever you can!
Describe Your Food
Find adjectives to define your food besides “healthy” and “unhealthy.” A great way to think more in touch with your diet is to get creative with how you feel about and describe your food. Usually, we categorize our food into two groups, healthy and unhealthy. These labels can promote a pattern in which you think you shouldn’t have certain foods because they are considered harmful and consume too much if deemed acceptable. They can also start a cycle of guilt when you indulge in foods you consider less nourishing. Instead, use words like melty, crunchy, and savory as often as you can. Get descriptive; it will help you discover your true food preferences.