Blogs About 'Holiday Eating'

How To Have A Guilt-Free Easter Holiday

Over the past few weeks, I have spent many coaching sessions talking about Cadbury’s mini Easter eggs. Clients have been sharing how difficult it is to stop eating them! I totally get it. I have lived the chocolate wars. Allow me to show you how this unfolds... Coach to Client: “What did you say to yourself before eating the chocolate”? I feel like chocolate. I shouldn’t have chocolate. Chocolate’s bad. But I really want some. Okay… but I can only have ONE. Client has one chocolate...

A Tale Of Three Eaters

A Christmas story of false promises, good fortune and common sense. Beth Beth spent most of the year on and off a diet. Feeling motivated and on high because she was “being good” followed by despair and disillusionment because she ate chocolate and she “blew it”. Most nights she went to bed assessing what she ate that day. Her eating determined whether she would feel proud or guilty. As the end of the year approached, she thought she would focus on losing weight before the holidays. She...

Your Eating Rights

As we approach Christmas with all the talk and focus on food. The Christmas table overflows with special foods that only come out at this time of the year. For some of us, these foods may invoke happy memories, yet unfortunately for many of us, the Christmas table is also full of diet talk and you might feel uncomfortable eating around others. Here are your 10 fundamental eating rights to help you let go of guilt around holiday eating so that you can enjoy this special time and be at peace with...

How to Navigate Festive Food Guilt

One of my favourite festive tunes is Andy Williams’ “It’s the most wonderful time of the year”. Yes, it can be. But for many people who have food and body image challenges, it’s difficult to “be of good cheer” when food is stressful. “When friends come to call” – deciding  what to eat or not eat – is tough. “Parties for hosting” and “marshmallows for toasting” can be a nightmare. Food and the festive season are fraught with anxiety and guilt for so many of us. If...

6 Tips To Overcome Holiday Food Guilt

All my best, Xen ✨ Ready to get coaching around changing your relationship with food? Book a free 30-minute mini session and let’s explore what challenges you’re facing and see how the coaching and courses I offer can support you. ✨ With Christmas approaching, do you need support with eating in the holidays? Check out my online course How to Handle Eating in the Holidays. I am offering it on a “pay what you can” gift economy basis.

3 Tips and 3 Questions For A Joyful Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is a few days away! Thanksgiving is meant to be a day of connection with loved ones. For some folks there might be much anticipation but for many people there may be feelings of dread as the day approaches. It can be a time of loneliness, stress and disappointment. The day comes with high expectations of a happy gathering enjoying a perfect celebration. Some of these ideals are difficult to live up to. Thanksgiving can be full of expectations of what we are supposed to feel...

How To Eat With Ease And Joy This Thanksgiving

Celebrations and holidays can be difficult when you struggle with food. The message we get from diet culture is to “be good” and restrict. There is another way to approaching food and eating in the holidays. The mindful eating way. Which is a gentler, kinder way. Here are some common obstacles when it comes to eating joyfully in the holidays and strategies on how to overcome these challenges. Thanksgiving: the build-up and anticipation. Before Thanksgiving there can be a lot of drama, discussion...

How To Enjoy Halloween Mindfully

Halloween is the start of the holiday season, a tricky time with food. Especially if you have food rules and forbidden foods. As an Intuitive Eating Coach, I believe that allowing ourselves all types of foods with no judgement leads to a more peaceful holiday season. Embracing Intuitive Eating and Mindful Eating teaches us how to become aware, listen and trust our body’s signals. The attitudes of mindfulness can help us approach eating during the holiday season with less fear. I so often hear “sugar...

Tips for Easter Eating

It’s hard to believe that the Easter Holidays are upon us, it feels like December was just the other day! Whether it’s Easter, Eid or Pesach or any other festival, remember it’s a holiday and over the holidays we tend to eat more than usual and it’s quite normal. Even people with a “normal” relationship to food eat more over the holidays. So expect to eat more at some meals. Some religions practice fasting or elimination of foods at this time of year, so we need to be mindful that...

How to Eat Intuitively Over Easter

Easter comes with the start of Autumn for us in the southern hemisphere. It’s an opportunity to pause, rest and have a break. When it comes to eating during the holidays, it’s normal to eat more when we are out of our daily routine and of course Easter comes with delicious treats like chocolate Easter eggs and hot cross buns. In the Greek tradition we have a delicious brioche type cake. Holiday eating can be stressful for people because we are out of our routine and so many activities revolve...

How to Practice Mindful Eating Over Passover

“Gam zu l'tova. This too is for the good.” – Nachum Ish Gamzu, Talmud, Taanit, 21a – “When things get "hard" it reminds me that this too is for the best and I need to reorient my thinking to this realization.” – Rabbi Yitz Greenman – Thank you to all my Jewish friends and clients for sharing your Pesach food challenges. I have selected the most prominent difficulties with food and suggested a different way of approaching them with a mindfulness point of view. This one specifically...

Three Ways To Show Yourself Grace After Christmas

Christmas is now over. If you had a joyful and happy gathering, that’s wonderful! If you are feeling bad about your Christmas celebrations, this is for you. If you are judging yourself for how you ate. If you are thinking of restricting to make up for what you ate. If you are thinking of exercising more to make up for what you ate. If you are promising to be “good” from today and only eat a little. If you are thinking, “I’ll start again in January.” If you are blaming yourself...

My Christmas Wishes For You

I wish for you the gift of love. May you be surrounded by people who love you and that you love back. May you learn to love and accept yourself as you are. May you learn to love your body and take care of it exactly as it is right now. I wish for you the gift of peace. Peace with whatever may arise in your life. Peace with your relationship with food. Peace with your body at the size, shape and health it is right now. I wish for you the gift of kindness. May you treat yourself...

8 Tips for Eating Mindfully This Rosh Hashanah

This is certainly going to be a different Rosh Hashanah from all others. It has been such a strange year for all of us. A year filled with challenges, anxiety, fears, insecurity, the unknown, isolated from family and friends yet also some positive aspects for some people, like time at home, less commuting, more time to do things around the house. Perhaps you are disappointed that this year Rosh Hashanah won’t be the same as other years or maybe you are relieved? You might be concerned about...

Let Us Welcome The New Year

“Year's end is neither an end nor a beginning but a going on, with all the wisdom that experience can instil in us.” — Hal Borland — If you live on this planet, chances are you’ve had a challenging two years. So many things are different now as we reach the end of 2021. It’s so easy to discredit this time, what would it take to rather look at the past year through a different lens? To some degree we are all feeling some apprehension not knowing what lies ahead in 2022. With or...

The Intuitive Eater's Holiday Bill of Rights

As we approach Christmas and the festivities with all the talk and focus on food. The Christmas table overflows with special foods that only come out at this time of the year. These foods may invoke happy memories. Unfortunately for many of us, the Christmas table is also full of diet talk or you might feel uncomfortable eating around others. Here are your rights to let go of guilt around holiday eating so that you can enjoy this special time and be at peace with food AND yourself! Evelyn Tribole,...

So This Is Christmas…

After almost two years the pandemic is dragging on and our resilience is dwindling. Christmas is approaching and many of us want and need togetherness with our loved ones more than ever before. We’re in the middle of a bumpy ride and just as we come up for air, it seems that there’s more turbulence around the corner. In addition to this, preparing for the festive season can be stressful. This is the second Christmas that will be different for many of us. If this Christmas is likely to be easy...

Plan and Prepare For Your Holiday

The holidays are approaching. This is a time to relax and connect with friends and family. Yet this time also comes with stress and anxiety. The December holiday season can be a difficult time for people. It’s a busy time. Working with clients over the years, I have seen that most feel really anxious about food and social events over the holidays. For those of us with food and body image challenges, holidays can be even more difficult. The rushing and shopping, the social events, the focus on food...

The Power of Gratitude

Many of my clients say that Thanksgiving is their favourite holiday and that they plan for it months in advance. For some people though, the time between Thanksgiving and the New Year can be complicated at the best of times. This year, chances are it could be even more complicated, given that the pandemic continues. When there is still so much up in the air, it is hard for us to focus, especially if we are feeling depleted. How do we nurture and nourish ourselves this holiday? One of the many...

Recipe: Crustless Pumpkin Pie

You may not know this, I live in South Africa. We don’t celebrate Thanksgiving here - I wish we did! But we do LOVE pumpkin! In preparation for Thanksgiving, I am sharing my favourite pumpkin pie recipe. When I make this, it doesn’t last long in my house! You can download the recipe here. Happy cooking! ✨ Do you struggle with food and eating in the holidays? Check out my How To Handle Eating In The Holidays Online Course. ✨ If food is controlling your life, I would...

5 Powerful Questions Before Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is a week away! In the week leading up to Thanksgiving, I am going to be sending you some tips and tools to support you. Thanksgiving is meant to be a day of connection with loved ones. For some folks there might be much anticipation but for many people there may be feelings of dread as the day approaches.  It can be a time of loneliness, stress and disappointment. The day comes with high expectations of a happy gathering enjoying a perfect celebration. Some of these ideals...

Let us welcome the New Year and New Beginnings

“There are years that ask questions and years that answer.” – Zora Neale Hurston – I think many of us are entering the New Year with hope that it will be better than 2020. Some of us may worry it will be the same or even more challenging than this year. To some degree we are all feeling a bit of trepidation about the uncertainty and not knowing what lies ahead. I believe each year has its joys and its sorrows. Each year has both ease and difficulty, happiness and sadness, success...

Christmas in the Time of Covid

“A silent night, a star above, a blessed gift of hope and love.” Christmas is a time of good cheer and a season “to be jolly”.  This may be the case for many people but for some, it can be a time of stress and anxiety, especially during a global pandemic and at the end of a chaotic year. This Christmas most of us have to overcome big or small obstacles on a practical, emotional and spiritual level, with many people experiencing a sense of isolation and loneliness. Families and friends...

The Gifts of Gratitude – Happy Thanksgiving! (free gift inside)

I am blessed to have readers all over the world. Thanksgiving is a tradition celebrated in the USA but the meaning of this holiday is valuable to all of us around the world. Many people say Thanksgiving is their favourite holiday and that they plan for it months in advance. For some people though, the time between Thanksgiving and the New Year can be complicated at the best of times. This year, chances are it could be even more complicated, given the restrictions around contact with friends and...

Eat, Drink And Be Mindfully Merry This Festive Season

“Christmas means fellowship, feasting, giving and receiving, a time of good cheer, home.” — WJ Tucker — Are you feeling anxious about the Christmas holidays? Concerned about all the food and worried about how you are going to handle the abundance and variety of foods? Are you looking forward to spending time with family or are you dreading it? The December and Christmas holidays can be a special time of the year filled with anticipation but so often, for many people, this time of year...

Joyful Eating in the Holidays: enjoy the foods and festivities with peace and joy!

This is the time of year when we start to feel stressed and anxious about all the year-end parties, entertaining and going away on holiday. Many of us are worried about overeating, family pressures and obligations. Let’s examine some of the common triggers to overeat during the holidays and some suggestions on how to overcome them. 1. The anticipation of the events and holidays Stay in the present as much as you can. Perhaps this year it’s time to do things differently and put...

Joyful Eating During Rosh Hashanah: Enjoy the Food with Ease, Grace & Mindfulness

“And now let us believe in a long year that is given to us, new, untouched, full of things that have never been, full of work that has never been done, full of tasks, claims, and demands; and let us see that we learn to take it without letting fall too much of what it has to bestow upon those who demand of it necessary, serious, and great things.” ― Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters of Rainer Maria Rilke, 1892-1910 ― Are you feeling stressed and anxious about Rosh Hashanah and the three day...

Merry and Mindful Holiday Eating

It’s hard to believe that the year is coming to an end and the holidays are upon us! The holidays are like assorted sweets – there are some we like and some we don’t. For many people this time of year is difficult: we are out of our routine, we're spending time with people we don’t normally spend time with, there are pressures and stresses around social engagements, there is much travelling and shopping. There is so much focus on food at this time of the year that many of us also struggle...

7 Easy Tips to Deal with “Friendly” Food Pushers

We all have them in our lives: a friend, an aunt, mother-in-law, colleague, a sister… They mean well, but they like to push us to eat more food.  As mindful eaters, we like to stop eating at a comfortable point but this is hard when food is being pushed on us. Food pushers are especially active over the holidays and at family gatherings – it’s their moment to shine! They mean well and are most likely showing their love for you through food or want to please you with food.  The scenario: You...

How To Survive The Holidays

Food, Family, Friends and Frivolities: The Full Catastrophe! "Have yourself a merry little Christmas, let your heart be light. From now on our troubles will be out of sight. Have yourself a merry little Christmas make the yuletide gay. From now on our troubles will be miles away” — Frank Sinatra — The holidays and Christmas can be the most wonderful time of the year, with the promise of good cheer, peace and togetherness but so often this time of the year ends in irritation, conflict...