Does Your Diet Need a KonMari Intervention?

Marie Kondo's infamous cleaning and decluttering method has come to Netflix, which means that everyone is talking about it. If you haven't heard of this organizing guru, she's famous for her book called 'The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up'. Although I read it a few years ago (and did some things with success), it occurred to me while watching her new series that many of us could benefit from applying the KonMarie method to our diet!

It's all about Joy

I'm not really giving away any secrets by sharing her signature question when deciding whether or not to keep a household item. "Does this bring you joy?" is what you must do when deciding whether to keep a sweater, book, or piece of art. Or anything else that you're applying her sorting method to.

I think it can work with food as well. As an intuitive eater, I'm constantly checking in with myself about hunger, fullness and satisfaction. And, I think we can make the leap to say that satisfaction = joy! Food needs to be nourishing, but not perfect. And, if your food choices don't bring satisfaction they won't bring joy either.

Diets and diet culture often ignore satisfaction in favour of nutritionism, urging us to "like it anyway" because it's good for us. But, you can only choke down a spinach-kale-coconut water-flax-chia-protein powder smoothie for so long before thinking "why am I doing this"? Chances are you've fallen into the nutritionism trap

Nutritionism is a paradigm that assumes that it is the scientifically identified nutrients in foods that determine the value of individual foods in our diet. In other words, it's the idea that the nutritional value of a food is the sum of all its individual nutrients, vitamins, and other components. But food is so much more than that!

Don't get me wrong. Food matters. We should be choosing foods that support our health, but not if we don't enjoy them. We deserve, and need to find pleasure in food. You don't have to choke down any food if you don't like it, even kale. ;) There are always other choices.

Find joy - in food and in life. :)

Interested in learning about Intuitive Eating?