One of the foundational elements of food freedom is that in order to be completely *free* you need to have not only access to the foods you want, you need to give yourself permission to eat them.
That might seem scary at first, so I recommend starting with simple exposure therapy to get used to having previously forbidden foods around you. When you first do this, it might feel like the food is calling to you from the cupboard (cabinet, refrigerator, freezer, pantry… wherever it is!) and you might answer that call each and every time. Which is totally okay. You have to get used to the food being around, and in the beginning this might cause some out-of-control feelings.
So let’s pose the question: is there a food that you don’t keep in the house because you feel like if you keep it around you won’t be able to control yourself around it?
Step 1: that’s the food we are going to focus on right now.
Spend some time having that food around to get used to its presence. You will intuitively know when you are ready to evaluate jumping into step 2.
Step 2: In order for you to neutralize foods that have a hold over you like this, you need to give yourself FULL permission to eat them. Not just having it in the house – having permission to eat it whenever.
This is you removing deprivation and introducing abundance. Naturally when we allow ourselves to experience things in abundance, we can chill out about wanting something over and over and over and over again.
It might be uncomfortable to give yourself what you really want. The first step is truly believing you can have this food at any time. Until you do that, you’ll continue to feel deprived in your eating.
What food comes to mind for you? What are we buying at the store this week? Drop it below!