• Like any diet, intuitive eating is a habit you develop. The times you eat every day affect when you will feel hungry. Eating out of habit is different from emotional eating because you’re teaching your body when to be hungry.
• What you eat can perpetuate hunger. In particular, refined carbs and processed foods with lots of sugar will mess up your hunger cues. Learning how to structure your meals with the proper ratio of macronutrients and calories allows you to control your hunger — rather than letting it control you.

Just because you aren’t counting calories when eating intuitively doesn’t mean they don’t matter anymore.

And even if you eat mindfully, it’s really easy to overconsume foods when you have no idea how many calories are in them — regardless of if you’re eating “healthy foods.”

For example, nuts like almonds and cashews are great foods for providing nourishment and satiating your hunger. But each nut packs a wallop, and you can quickly eat 400–500 calories of them without even realizing it.

=You can just as easily consume way more than you burn just from what you drink on any given day. If you’re not tracking calories, you might have soda, juice, smoothie, or another calorie-laden drink just because you’re thirsty.

You can respect, love, and honor your body at any size. Your self-worth as a person has nothing to do with weight or aesthetics.

But health is another matter. Obesity is irrefutably linked with the increased risk of a host of health issues like heart disease, diabetes, and cancer.

By sticking with small calorie deficits and taking a break every month to two to eat at maintenance, you can gradually reach your health and fitness goals without developing a toxic relationship with food or feeling deprived.