Do you have a healthy food relationship? Do you enjoy your food?  Do you enjoy eating out?  Do you like to “treat” yourself with foodie treats?

Almost all the women who join us on retreat enjoy their food, in part its often one of the reasons why they choose to join us here at The Body Retreat.  Food is such an important part of every Body Retreat that one of our pillars of wellbeing is Menu.   For us Menu is about choice and variety of food as this is very important part of health…no tired lettuce leaves…no tasteless clear soups…. no eating the same thing day in day out here at The Body Retreat.

Welcome Foodies!

We welcome foodies on every retreat and we strive to make sure that our menus have something to surprise and delight every guest.

Of course our menus are based on clean eating principles but no whole food groups are excluded.  Our daily menus are balanced to suit the activity levels of the retreat as well as the individual dietary requirements of the guests.  Very few of our guests experience true physical hunger on retreat ( that is not to say that some don’t experience hunger at times but very often its a desire to eat something to feel different …not the same as hunger at all)

But one common term comes up again and again… how do you treat yourself when you are trying to eat clean.  If you spoil yourself with a foodie treat does it mean that you spoil yourself, spoil your motivation to shed the weight that is unnecessary for you?

Is That Treat Really Treating You Well?

Many of the women who join us on our Weight Loss Retreats for example will have already spent years if not decades trying all sorts of diets… Weight Watchers, Slimming World etc etc  … and these Diets all have something in common… Treats!  Often they are horrid little bars of “Frankenfoods” covered in a chocolate tasting coating .. you know the kind of thing I mean.  Of course these treats simply train you to eat sweets and when on the diet you eat the “Frankentreat” but when you stop the programme …which of course always happens… the behaviour of treating oneself remains.  Only now you move up to the real chocolate or some other non -diet treats.

Its a depressing future that doesn’t contain treats….enjoying the odd delicious bite from time to time whether that be a pudding, a snack or a whole afternoon tea is a part of life.  Rightly so.

We should all enjoy delicious foods, foods that make us smile, foods that lift our day.

I’d like to think that we can enjoy these foods regularly, after all life is too short to not take enjoyment from the foods we choose to eat.

Im a real foodie, I enjoy reading about food, watching food on tv, eating out, eating in, cooking for friends or just playing in the kitchen.  Not everyone has the time or inclination to spend as much time on food as I do…but they still want to enjoy the foods they eat.

Developing a Healthy Food Relationship One Plate at a Time

We have just finished our Conscious Cook & Tone Weekend in Somerset.  It has to be one of my favourite retreats.  Its all about developing a healthy loving relationship with food.

Over the course of the weekend we have had workshops on meal planning, shopping to develop a healthy kitchen and larder, we also had tutorials on The Anti-Sandwich Lunch (getting hands on making  non bread portable lunch options), one on Juices & Smoothies and finally Healthy Treats and Snacks.  Getting ideas, recipes and experience of how to rustle up quick and healthy food at home, food that feels as though you really are treating yourself.

The highlight of the weekend for me is our Gala Dinner…so often our retreaters fear eating out or going to celebrations as it seems that they are in conflict with the commitment to eat healthily…not so!!!  Our Gala Dinner starts with cocktails & canapés and we even enjoy some organic wines with the four course meal.  “Its such a treat…can it really be healthy?”  “Will I put on weight”?  Some of the retreaters are sceptical at first… but the great thing about this Gala Dinner is that it is our Conscious Cooking Principles in practice.

Learning how to enjoy food without guilt or angst.  When it comes to achieving the body and health that you deserve then having a healthy food relationship is the place to start.

Its time to ditch the diets, time to let go of the guilt and time to embrace real food.  Imagine feeling good about food, never feeling deprived, never worrying that if you eat just a little “treat” that it means that every thing is spoiled and that you may as well then just keep on eating.

Cultivate A Healthy Food Relationship

1. Embrace the flavours and textures of real food.  When was the last time you took time to really taste your food?  When we slip into automatic eating we rarely taste what we are actually eating.  Taking time to reconnect with food.
2. Avoid Frankenfood.  On no account think that you are treating yourself with Frankenfood.  You are actually setting yourself up for a dysfunctional ongoing relationship with food.  Much better to eat a little of real foods, regardless of the calorie, fat or sugar content ( I know you are hearing me say that) eating real food is always the better choice.
3. Ditch the Guilt. Often we grow up with mixed messages about food, this leads to us feeling a sense of guilt when we eat certain foods that we feel we should or should not be eating.  Keep a journal, see a therapist, or talk it out with friends. It’s hard to get away from certain cultural food pressures, but you have to decide for your yourself how you want to deal with that pressure.

Regardless of what your current relationship with food is it is possible to make significant changes, our retreats prove that time and again.

So if you are a foodie who is ready to regain a loving healthy food relationship then get in touch.