Dr. Alexis Conason Discusses Mindful Eating with Erica Leon Nutrition on Facebook Live

I’m so excited to share the Facebook Live interview that I did with Erica Leon, friend, colleague, and anti-diet dietitian! We talked about mindful eating, intuitive eating, eating disorder recovery, Health at Every Size, and so much more. You can watch the full video here and check-out some of our key points below.

• Meditation doesn’t have to be a big, special ordeal! Taking a moment to bring awareness to our breath or to the present moment is all we really need.
• My program, The Anti-Diet Plan, is based on mindful eating and is an non-diet approach to healing our relationship with food. It’s about self-compassion, acceptance, and tuning into our internal wisdom with food. The next round starts this coming week on April 11th!
• Overeating problems are often actually related to undereating.
• Distracted eating and mindless eating is serving us in some way! Often it’s used as a way to soothe ourselves. But food isn’t always the best tool to meet our emotional needs… so how do we find other coping mechanisms that work better?
• We don’t need to be mindful at ALL times. You can start with one meal, one snack, one bite… whatever feels right for you.
• The beginning of my professional experience as a therapist, and how I eventually unlearned the internalized fatphobia I had learned throughout my life.
• How I found the Health at Every Size professional community, and how the medical community continues to perpetuate weight bias in healthcare.
• You can’t talk about mindful eating without talking about HAES! Mindful eating isn’t about weight loss. It’s about making peace with our size, no matter what.
• The common maternal concern about passing on our food and body preoccupation to our kids, and why that can be a powerful motivator to find healing.
• We have to prioritize our own well-being before we can worry about helping others!
• Lasting changes start small. Three minutes (or less!) here or there… start there, and don’t pressure yourself to make huge changes too quickly.
• How often do we stop and check in with ourselves to see how we’re feeling? We’re moving way too fast in this world.
• Allow yourself to experience pleasure!
• If we pay attention to our emotional needs, we might be able to prevent emotional eating before it even begins.

Check out the full video here! And if you want even more conversations with Erica, head over to our Conversations on Mindful Eating post on my blog.