Beyond Chocolate
Chocolate for breakfast? Surely you can’t call this a diet?
Actually, it’s not a diet. It’s a revolutionary approach to thinking about the way we eat.
It sounds simple, but actually it’s not. We have spent so many years forcing ourselves to eat three regular meals a day, or five small ones, or cut out carbs, or meat, or green food, or blue food, or eat only brown rice while standing on our heads. The list of crazy food religons we subscribe to is endless. So to relearn how to listen to our bodies and to know when to eat is defnitely a challenge.
It’s handy then, that London-based sisters Audrey and Sophie Boss have developed a series of workshops and courses and published a book to help you along.
The basic premise is to focus on changing your personal relationship with food, and listening to your body and what it’s telling you. ‘We realised that we’d simply forgotten what it was like to listen to our bodies, to eat when we were hungry, and not eat when we weren’t. And to eat what we wanted, when we wanted it,’ explains Sophie, which literally means if you don’t feel like lunch don’t have any. And if you wake up craving a bar of chocolate with your morning coffee, then that’s what your body needs. So have it. Amazing.
Their book, Beyond Chocolate, takes you through the process chapter by chapter, and is a simple way to change your eating habits.
If you need something more rigorous, then their online course which runs over three months is a great option. Each week has a specific focus, and some small tasks for you to do, with info sheets, top tips and podcasts. The course is also seasonal – over Christmas I recieved a really helpful guide to not overdoing it on mince pies and turkey, for instance. You are also assigned a dedicated ‘chocolate fairy’ who you can email whenever you want, asking questions or advice.
They also run evening classes, where you can pop in for ten minutes or two hours, ask questions, listen to other people’s queries and share your experiences.
And there are weekend courses too which offer a more indepth one-to-one experience. These are a great way to meet the girls behind the idea, hear from them firsthand and explore your eating habits more fully.
It’s a simple concept, but does it work? ‘I’ve been a size ten for years now,’ says Audrey. ‘But I don’t think about my weight now, it’s not an issue because I eat what I want and need, when I want to. My body tells me what I need, and I trust it.’
Beyond Chocolate offers e-courses, London-based workshops, evening mini sessions and week-long getaways.
Image by FotoosVanRobin courtesy of Flickr
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