Reframing your relationship with food means letting go of the idea that food is a punishment or a reward.
The programming that you adopted in childhood/early adulthood will create your relationship to food. Your psyche may be attached to false narratives around food, if that's what you witnessed in those around you.
Here are some examples of the false narratives that cause body or food shame:
“I will never reach my ideal body weight” - Limiting Belief
“I am fine where I am, I just need to focus on being grateful” - Limiting Belief.
"I need to restrict myself in order to look good" - Limiting Belief.
In general, societal programming around food may teach us to deprive ourselves and then over-indulge, perhaps only while you are alone, or perhaps only while the presence of others.
Deprivation can only go so long before it results in over-indulgence. A cycle of deprive, over-indulge, deprive, over-indulge begins; which is very stressful on internal systems of the body. Though food may be at the core of this conditioning, this pattern can also spill over in your relationship to drinking, shopping, and other pleasurable things in your life as well.
Long stretches of “off” (deprivation) and the intense sections of “on” (indulgence) are coupled with guilt, shame, and regret. A recipe for suppressed emotional disaster.
Healing your relationship with food may require reframing your subconscious programming around food, which causes stressful habits that don't make you feel well. Food is nourishment and nourishing yourself is joyful. Your freedom from false narratives is key for healthy body image and sustainable health.
Explore the be guided page for healing coaching.
Book recommendations: The Archetype Diet, by Dana James part III.
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