My mantra is authenticity.

I celebrate it. I live it. I teach others how to find it.

I just don’t eat it.

Until now.

Over the past 20 years or so, I have discovered the joy that comes from finding my truest self and living a life that honors that. I have worked to discover who I am, both the breathtaking parts and the challenging parts. I have learned to listen to guidance that comes from deep inside me about which decisions to make and path to take in order to align with who I am.

However, all of this self-discovery, intuition, and joy-seeking did not extend to what I put in my mouth or how I treated my body. I have been so focused on my inside transformation that I completely neglected the outside. I treated my eating as a “should” and followed the path set out for me by others—exactly the opposite of what I have been attempting to do in all other parts of my life.

Not authentic at all!

For 20 years, I have explored NutriSystem, Weight Watchers, Wildfit, Noom, vegetarianism, and keto. And I found no joy. Begrudgingly, I forced myself to follow each plan and never questioned why I lived so much of my life in “flow” except at the kitchen table.

Last week, I decided that I should do a cleanse and ordered a three-day box full of vegan soups and smoothies. I was supposed to begin right after a birthday breakfast with friends, where I planned to have a bowl of strawberries to start my cleanse day off right.

As luck would have it, my friend mentioned—as she ordered an amazing omelet—how she was now following the “F*uck It Diet.” I ordered the same omelet and asked her to tell me more.

“The F*ck It Diet,” she told me, “explains how years of restricting what we eat has caused our bodies to believe we are living in a famine state.”

This belief negatively impacts our cravings, metabolism, and mental health. The “F*ck It Diet” asks us to allow our bodies to learn that we are not in a famine state by allowing our bodies to eat.

With no restrictions.

On the “F*ck It Diet” we do not restrict foods or calories or the times we eat. We say yes to what we want, and we allow our body to feel safe and cared for until it feels free to begin to make choices in alignment with its true needs.

I was intrigued, downloaded the book by Caroline Donner the moment I got home, and read through the entire night as I ate my various bland soups. By morning I had a new outlook on food and a trashcan full of soup.

I decided to give the “F*ck It Diet” a try.

I can already tell you that, in just one week, I am amazed at what has happened. Out of the blue, I suddenly want a Devil Dog. In the past, that would not have been allowed because it is processed, devoid of any nutritional value, and high in calories and sugar. I would have thought about that Devil Dog for hours, if not days. Either I would have been miserable as I deprived myself or I would have eventually given in and then felt miserable after.

But in that new reality, I could tell myself I was allowed to have the Devil Dog. My initial reaction was that I did not feel like leaving the house to get one so I would get one another day because it is allowed.

And guess what? I stopped thinking about the freaking Devil Dog. And I was happy!

Then a few days later, I thought of the Devil Dog again. I popped into the convenience store to get one, but they did not have it. And guess what? I stopped thinking about the darn Devil Dog.

Last night, I finally bought a box of Devil Dogs. I ate one (and only one), and I thoroughly enjoyed it. And now the box is in my pantry, where I can reach for it and eat another one sometime since it’s allowed, instead of eating the whole box at once to get the forbidden thing out of my house.

This new normal feels much more peaceful!

I honestly am making food choices that feel less than nutritious to me. But I can already sense that as I allow myself to contemplate all the choices on the menu or on the shelves, I will eventually be able to tap into what my body authentically wants and needs.

Sometimes, it might be spaghetti carbonara, and other days it might be a harvest vegetable salad. I can sense that my body will want to feed itself the foods that will make it feel lightest, best, most open, and happiest. There will be a balance among all chosen foods.

I also am aware that it will take some work to accept that what feels best to my body may not look like the sample size I have coveted for years. I will need to get comfortable with the idea that happy and healthy for me may not be a size six, but is instead a little rounder and softer.

I will need to truly believe that I am at my most beautiful when I am being true to myself.

I have decided to give the “F*ck It Diet” a try for a year.

I have decided to give myself the freedom to choose food for a year. Any and all food. And in a year, I will see how I feel. Hopefully, I’ll be healthier, more joyful, and more in balance by eating with the authenticity that I value everywhere else in my life. Hopefully living in flow with food will bring me and my body our greatest joy.

I will check in with you in a year!

(Follow my journey and find your own inspiration, guidance, and transformation at my website.)