Health
Habits
Food
Weight 
Better Than Butternut: Roasted Delicata Squash Recipe
10 Simple Ways To Eat Less Without Noticing
Juicing: Stupid and Pretentious or Nourishing and Enlightening?
10 Tasty Carbs That Won’t Make You Fat
How To Start Working Out When You Don’t Like To Exercise
Focus More on Your Brain and Less on Your Diet if You’re Serious About Losing Weight
Home Court Habits: The Secret to Effortless Weight Control
10 Reasons You Aren’t Losing Weight When You Think You’re Doing Everything Right
How To Burn More Calories Without Breaking A Sweat
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Foodists
How to Turn Theoretical Health Goals Into Practical Habits
Getting inspired is easy. A great article, book, or documentary can be incredibly powerful in sparking a desire for a new direction in your life. But no matter how desperately you want to change, internalizing a new philosophy enough to permanently modify your behavior can feel impossible.
This is how Anne used to feel when she would read Summer Tomato. After several years of striving to have the “perfect” diet that eventually destroyed her relationship with food, she was ready to embrace joy in eating and prioritize her own happiness (in addition to health).
But she would read articles like How to Eat Half a Donut and think that while it sounded amazing, there was no way she could ever do something like that. Clearly I (Darya) was fooling myself into using willpower and not thinking it’s really willpower, or was a different breed of human altogether. Normal people don’t eat half a donut.
Anne had her doubts she was capable of truly leaving her old habits behind, but she kept trying because she knew she couldn’t go back to her former restrictive mindset.
Today she’s called in to proudly share her success story of how she was finally able to build up a set of positive experiences that gave her the confidence and ability to choose foods based on her needs and values, rather than her fears and impulses. She no longer believes that willpower and restriction are necessary for her to control her own behavior, and can easily walk away from an unfinished donut or cupcake if it isn’t bringing her the joy she expected.
She explains the exact steps she took that led to her transformation and enabled her to finally internalize the foodist mindset she only understood intellectually, but not emotionally, until this year.
If you’ve been struggling to believe you’re capable of leaving your restrictive dieting mindset behind for good, Anne’s story will give you both the hope and practical advice you need to get there.
Wish you had more time to listen to the podcast? I use an app called Overcast (no affiliation) to play back my favorite podcasts at faster speeds, dynamically shortening silences in talk shows so it doesn’t sound weird. It’s pretty rad.
Related links:
The Worst Thing You Can Do if You’re Trying to Lose Weight – Self-worth and the bathroom scale
The Omnivore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan
Food Inc. documentary
Summer Tomato Book Review: The China Study
The 4-Hour Work Week by Tim Ferriss
Goals are for Losers: The Life-Changing Advice No One Tells You
Use This Mindful Eating Placemat to Remember to Slow Down and Enjoy Your Food
9 Simple Tricks To Eat More Mindfully
How To Avoid Drinking Too Much In Social Situations Foodist podcast
Listen:
If you’d like to be a guest on the show, please fill out the form here and tell us your story.
Hey Darya!
Just finished listening to this incredible podcast…To put it bluntly, I think this was quite possibly the very best one I’ve ever listened to. Anne’s insight and offerings make her the perfect example of what your Foodist philosophy puts forth. You should HIRE this woman! Very enjoyable listen during my dinner and clean-up! Top!
Hi Darya,
Thanks for sharing Ann’s story. It’s truly inspiring and help to gain confidence that one can still change their own eating preferences.
I have listened your podcast, the one thing I liked the most is how Ann convinced herself although she has mentioned that all her suggestions are not for all people. I like the way how she understands her own body and personalizes the things around to be safe foodiest. This what inspiring the people like me.
Thanks for sharing the helpful content and podcast.
Keep up the good work.
I loved listening to Anne’s story. Her candor and sense of humor make her storytelling not only laugh-out-loud entertaining, but also very genuine. This is important because, as she pointed out, it can be hard to believe that success for myself is possible even if others have succeeded.
Her humility also contributed to persuading me that I don’t need to be Wonder Woman in order to experience success and gradually absorb successful episodes into my regular habit.
“Getting inspired is easy” Exactly.At a moment when we hear something or read some books, we get inspired, but that wont last too long.That s the main problem with many, including me.
I don’t know if listeners go back to older podcasts (or read the comments from the blog link) but I recorded this podcast almost 2 years ago, and there are some things I say in here that make me cringe to hear them now, so I wanted to give a little update for anyone who may view this later.
I no longer view getting the swine flu as “a blessing in disguise that got me in the habit of weighing myself regularly”, I see it as what triggered a 7 year period of disordered eating that I was just starting to work my way out of at the time of recording this podcast. I was lying to myself that I saw the number on the scale as a neutral data point. I became attached the the identity as someone who had made healthy changes and lost weight as a result. My relationship with food and quality of life has continued to improve tremendously since recording, and ditching the scale has been essential to that success. I haven’t weighed myself for over a year and it feels amazing. Micromanaging my body into a smaller size isn’t how I want to spend my time on this planet. My body has changed, I’ve bought new clothes, and that’s okay. My life is no less awesome because my jeans are a size larger. My relationship with food is completely neutral. I don’t binge, ever, the urge has completely disappeared. I still eat vegetables. I still pack my lunch. Sometimes I finish a whole meal at a restaurant. Sometimes I throw away half a cookie if it doesn’t taste that great. I still value my health, but I also value pleasure and joy and fun, and I make decisions in line with all of those values. My identity is not tied to my body size or health status and it feels great.
Thanks so much for the update, Anne. I’m so happy for you and your new freedom.
I also really appreciate your insights and honesty, and hope others can see the wisdom of your words.
Cheers,
Darya
Thanks Darya! I also want to note that much of what I say here I do stand by! Practicing mindful eating and learning to be more present continues to support a healthy relationship with food and my body. These practices add value to my life beyond a number on the scale!
I don’t know if listeners go back to older podcasts (or read the comments from the blog link) but I recorded this podcast almost 2 years ago, and there are some things I say in here that make me cringe to hear them now, so I wanted to give a little update for anyone who may view this later.
I no longer view getting the swine flu as “a blessing in disguise that got me in the habit of weighing myself regularly”, I see it as what triggered a 7 year period of disordered eating that I was just starting to work my way out of at the time of recording this podcast. I was lying to myself that I saw the number on the scale as a neutral data point. I became attached the the identity as someone who had made healthy changes and lost weight as a result. My relationship with food and quality of life has continued to improve tremendously since recording, and ditching the scale has been essential to that success. I haven’t weighed myself for over a year and it feels amazing. Micromanaging my body into a smaller size isn’t how I want to spend my time on this planet. My body has changed, I’ve bought new clothes, and that’s okay. My life is no less awesome because my jeans are a size larger. My relationship with food is completely neutral. I don’t binge, ever, the urge has completely disappeared. I still eat vegetables. I still pack my lunch. Sometimes I finish a whole meal at a restaurant. Sometimes I throw away half a cookie if it doesn’t taste that great. I still value my health, but I also value pleasure and joy and fun, and I make decisions in line with all of those values. My identity is not tied to my body size or health status and it feels great.