Clear up sacral chakra blockages to heal emotional eating

Written by Delilah Bisase, RD

Thankfully the whole low fat craze is a thing of the past, and for the most part people now appreciate and embrace the importance and benefits of including adequate fat in a diet. But I’m not talking abut the good ol heart healthy fats like olives avocados. No. I’m talking about donuts, pizza, chips, or deep fried treats from the fair. People typically call these foods “cheat” foods however; I call them “fun” foods. More on that below.

Before I dive in, here’s just a quick FYI from the nutrition perspective. Our body uses fat in a variety of ways. It helps us absorb fat soluble vitamins (which are vitamins A, D, E, and K), we need it to synthesize hormones, and fat also signals satiety to our body. That last point about satiety is what I will be focusing on with this post. 

FATS FOR THE SACRAL CHAKRA

It might be helpful for me to start by pointing out which part of our energetic body fats are correlated with. Fats nourish our sacral (swadhisthana) chakra (so does water, but not talking about that in this post). Our sacral chakra is all about emotions, pleasure, joy, creativity, sexuality, sensuality, and having healthy flexibility to go with the flow of life. The part about emotions, pleasure, and joy bleeds into our eating habits and attitudes about foods. Foods that we typically associate with indulgence (and thereby pleasure) are usually pretty rich in fats, for example desserts of all kinds (ex: cookies, ice cream, pastries), fried foods, and anything buttery (or coconut oil-y for the vegan version).  

PLEASURE IN FOOD

A healthy sacral chakra has a positive impact on our relationship with food. Clearing up sacral chakra energy blocks removes the fear of allowing yourself to enjoy food. Not only that, our emotional honesty of the sacral chakra allows us to decipher physical hunger from emotional hunger or when we’re eating just for fun. While eating is a necessary part of our survival, it is also an activity that sparks joy and pleasure. Each and every single piece of food we eat does not need to be gold star nutrition. There are what I like to call fun foods, which offer little to no nutritional value, however they play a role in pleasure and enjoyment. Basically desserts and junk food are what I like to call “fun foods”. In order to have a healthy relationship with food, it’s important to get a point where you allow yourself to simply enjoy these fun foods without any guilt, shame, excessive rules or punishment associated with them. If there is guilt or shame associated with eating fun foods, that’s a signal for you to do some introspection and find out what’s really going on, on a deeper level, and to understand why you’re so uncomfortable with allowing yourself to experience pleasure and joy this way. 

TRUSTING YOURSELF

I imagine you might be thinking, “Well, if I were to let myself just have whatever my body wants I’ll go overboard and I’ll lose control!”. Whoa now, calm down for a moment. Remember, fats signal satiety. This means that they help our body recognize when we’ve had enough, when we have been satisfied to our liking, when we have been pleased. If we are truly listening to our body it would not get to that point of excess. Emotional honesty (which comes from the sacral chakra) also supports this innate ability we have to enjoy fun, fatty foods to satiety. If we are truly acknowledging our feelings & emotions, it won’t get to the point of excess because you would realize when you’ve gone past the points of satisfying physical hunger and pleasure, and entered the realm of emotional eating. It’s at that point where you would need to intervene and make the decision to address the emotional issue with a strategy that will actually resolve it (which does not include food). It could be that you’re feeling alone and need a listening ear to speak to, or that you’re feeling unhappy about a certain situation or upset with a certain person. 

You might have gathered by now that what I’m describing is essentially intuitive eating. I support the intuitive eating approach because it honors our body’s innate ability to maintain balance and it prompts us to be emotionally honest with ourselves. The take home message here is that we don’t need rules and regulations (or “cheat days”) to enjoy fun foods. Trust yourself, listen to your body and you will be able to find a healthy balance. 

I have a whole chapter about the sacral chakra, as well as the types of foods that correlate with it, in my e-book “Feeding the Body and Soul”. Check it out here!