Last week, I read six articles with variations on the good-versus-bad-food theme. Good food? Bad food? It’s funny how we attribute moral properties to what is, essentially, a glob of chemicals in a tasty package. Eating is supposed to provide nourishment and pleasure. But in our diet-obsessed culture, we have attributed to food a sometimes-sinister quality.

Here’s one example: “Annie” was so tormented by her fear of food that she avoided parties and dinner invitations, because she didn’t want to be tempted by the tasty treats. When she ate, she spent the entire meal adding and re-adding the number of calories she was consuming, and continued to do so well after she had finished the meal. She read labels obsessively, and could tell you the calorie count of almost any food–and usually the number of carbohydrates, fat and protein as well. At best, she regarded food with suspicion; at worst, it terrified her.

Dieters are most susceptible to this mindset, but they’re not the only ones. Other fear-inducing foods and ingredients include saturated fat, sugar, high-fructose corn syrup, trans fats, GMOs, gluten, dairy, soy, pesticides, refined carbs, wheat, diet sodas and anything that’s even remotely related to increased risk of obesity, diabetes, inflammation, heart disease or cancer.

It’s important to be wary of some of these. I’m a huge proponent of eating clean foods, and make my living writing about them. Will eating trans fats kill you? Perhaps. If you’re sensitive to gluten, should you avoid bread? Absolutely. But prudence and mindful choices can sometimes go the way of fear.

Think of how children eat. When you offer a child a cookie, he doesn’t think, “Dear god, that cookie was made with high-fructose corn syrup and trans fats! And it probably has 500 calories!” They think “Mmmm. Cookie. Sweet! Crunchy!” They eat the cookie, and have an experience of pure pleasure. Somewhere between the happily ignorant bliss of a child, and the ever-vigilant eye of a nutrition-savvy adult, there lies a middle path, one that doesn’t include worry, stress and fear.

If you find yourself from time to time (or frequently) seized by a fear of food, here are some ways to loosen the grip:

1. Confront your fears. It’s not the food you fear, it’s the potential effect of that food. Write down what really scares you, and carry it to the worst possible outcome. It may look like this: “I’m afraid if I indulge my sweet tooth, I won’t be able to stop. I’ll gain a lot of weight until I’m morbidly obese. I’ll be so fat, I wont’ be able to go on business trips any more, and my boss will fire me. Then I’ll be out of work, and I’ll lose my house, and be homeless.” Or maybe it’s as simple as “I won’t look good for my high school reunion, and my old friends will judge me.” Whatever your fear, when it’s on paper, it’s easier to then decide if it’s reasonable, or out of hand.

2. Get to know your food. When you’re eating, just eat. Don’t watch TV, work on your computer, read a book, drive, whatever. Look at the food on your plate, chew it slowly, really taste it. Be fully present, enjoy what you’re eating, and then move on to the next thing. You’ll soon find that even “off-limits” foods aren’t really that scary. And notice what that food feels like in your body. Do you feel lousy after eating it? Maybe it won’t be your first choice next time.’

3. Choose foods for the benefit. Rather than saying “no” to what you don’t want, try saying “yes” to what you do want. Instead of saying “I can’t drink coffee because it makes me jittery and makes my skin look bad,” try saying “I choose to drink green tea because it’s calming and makes my skin look healthier.” Same end result–but instead of rejecting what you don’t want, you’re choosing instead what you do want.

4. Eat for quality. There’s a lot of nasty food out there, and it’s reasonable to be careful. But if you choose foods for quality, you’ll eliminate many of the justifiable concerns, like agricultural chemicals, trans fats, sugar and so forth. If you enjoy cheese, choose organic varieties, and pay attention to how much you’re eating. If you like sweets, go for raw, unfiltered honey, instead of high-fructose corn syrup. And if you shop for foods without labels–whole fruits and vegetables, nuts, seeds, dried beans–it’s hard to go wrong.

5. Banish forbidden food. The concept, that is, not the food. Unless you have an overriding health concern–you’re diabetic, or allergic to nuts, for example–it’s really not necessary to outlaw any one food. When you make a food off-limits, you only increase the cravings. So if you love potato chips, but you avoid them because they’re fried and high in sodium, have a few potato chips when you crave them.

6. Trust yourself. Speaking of potato chips, are you afraid you’ll eat the whole bag? It’s a common fear. When we fear food, it’s not really the food we’re afraid of. It’s our uncontrolled reaction to it. A spoonful of ice cream turns into a quart, a few cookies turns into a whole bag. That may happen at first. But in my experience, when people allow themselves to remove the labels and indulge in a “forbidden” food, it soon loses its appeal. Once you see it as just another food, you’re on your way to being free.

One of the key pieces to understanding-and changing-compulsive eating, overeating, binging or any other uncomfortable patterns with food is being deeply and fully in your body. We call that embodiment. “But,” you might say, “I’m always in my body. Where else would I be?”

It’s a good question. The answer is, “In your mind.” That’s where most people spend the bulk of their lives. The mind is bright, witty, cunning; it spins a clever yarn, makes up exciting stories about the future, dramatizes the past. Meanwhile, we drag the body around all day like a dog on a leash, paying attention only when something goes dreadfully wrong.

But until you’re keenly aware of your body, it’s hard to change your relationship with food. By listening to your body’s cues and attending to its needs, you can learn to feel — not think — when you’re hungry, when you’re full, and what you really need. You can stop binge eating, shift the way you use food, and make peace with your body. Some practices to try:

• Allow sensation over form. Have you watched the way toddlers move? They jump up and down, tiptoe then sprawl on the floor, roll about in the grass, arch and stretch; they touch their noses, grimace, yawn, stick out their tongues. They look silly and bizarre and wonderful. And you know what? They could care less (even about looking wonderful). They’re completely enchanted with the process of sensation.

That’s not how grownups work. We are encourage to craft our bodies and our lives a certain way. We are celebrated for material triumphs, for thinness, for beauty and youth; we’re all about the form. A life lived this way can appear quite spectacular yet feel empty to its participants. Trading form for sensation is rarely a good deal.

What happens if you let go of form, if you just allow sensation? If you focus on how your body feels inside, rather than how it looks to your co-workers, friends, siblings, lovers? When we heap upon ourselves the worries and cares of adulthood, it’s easy to forget how it feels to be a toddler in a body. See if you can remember; just notice the sheer pleasure of being in a body — embodied — no matter what its shape or size. Sense the temperature of the air on your cheeks, notice the texture of your shirt against your shoulders, feel the strength of your legs. And the next time you pass a mirror, don’t heap judgment on them, or wish them thinner or longer. Like any toddler knows, the body is really just a place for the soul to live.

• Be still. In our culture, we have impatience for discomfort of any kind. Thus we react. When we’re sad, lonely, bored, frustrated, unsettled, we rush to fix it. But there, at the edge of the discomfort, is where magic can happen.

Many years ago, I was in a long meditation retreat at an ashram. It was in the middle of an especially hot summer, and the windows were flung wide in an attempt to coax a bit of breeze into the room. The only thing that entered was a drove of flies. They crawled on our sweat-slick skin, and we swatted and flicked until the leader of the meditation commanded “Be still!” So my practice at that moment became tolerating the considerable discomfort of flies crawling purposefully across the bridge of my nose or along the part of my hair, while remaining perfectly still. And in that stillness in the face of discomfort, I found something new, a vast and quiet field that lay beyond the momentary flurry of reactivity.

Try this practice: when you’re emotionally uncomfortable, can you let your discomfort just be there, instead of swatting it away? Instead of turning to food to soothe your discomfort, can you sit still and let things just be as they are, without needing to fix or change them? An embodiment therapist I know says she gives herself simple and clear directions in these times: “Sit. Stay. Good girl.” It works every time.

• Downshift. If you ask ten people today how they are, at least six of them will say “busy.” Most of us live in a state of busy-ness and perpetual arousal; hyper alert, we’re ready to spring into action as soon as the alarm clock sounds. We rush to work, race between appointments and carpools, dash to the grocery store to buy fast-and-easy meals for dinner. Meanwhile, we’re thinking and planning for the next thing on our to-do lists. But when you’re racing about in your car and in your mind, you’re just not in your body.

Try this: the next time you find yourself rushing from or to anything, stop moving, take a deep breath and close your eyes. Feel the soles of your feet. Let your toes and jaw unclench, and let your belly relax. Take five deep, slow breaths, and consciously downshift inside. When you open your eyes again, resume movement at a decelerated pace. Apply this practice as you go through the day, and especially before you eat. Then eat very slowly, paying attention to every bite. This practice alone can transform the way you eat, think and feel about food.

• Make friends with your feelings. Early this year, I had a sudden and terrible loss that left me reeling and forced me to actually feel in a way I’d never done before. Once I became willing and stop resisting it, grief and anger and fear and pain washed over and through me, without direction, carving its own pathway through my soul. It wasn’t pretty, but it was real. And that raw emotion left in its wake a sweet openness — like emptiness, but more peaceful and friendly. My muscles stopped gripping my bones. My jaw unclenched. I came more deeply into my body than ever before.

What happens when you encounter strong emotions? If you’re struggling with food, those potent feelings may lead you straight to the kitchen, in search of solace. But what happens if you don’t go, if you just let yourself feel? Find a quite place to sit and notice your feelings. What is the physical sensation of anger? Where does it live in your body? Does it have a color? A voice? Surrender entirely to the experience, and let the transformative power of pure, raw emotion work on you. You’ll know when you’re done. And you might not even be hungry any longer.

In Journalism 101, we learned the importance of the Five Ws (and one H) in gathering information. Answering the Ws (and H)–who, what, where, when, why (and how)–is considered essential in understanding the full story. What would happen if you applied them to your weight loss goals? Some Ws (and an H) to consider:

1. Who is it that wants to lose weight? Who is the “you” that’s dieting? Another way to ask this is, who are you, inside your body? The bottom line is, your body is a place for your soul to live. That’s it. Should it be comfortable, healthy, happy? Absolutely. But losing 10 pounds is not the call of your soul. It’s the call of your ego.

I once knew a woman who could light up a room just by walking through the door. Her eyes literally sparkled. When I spoke to her, her attention was so fully and completely on me, that it was as if no one had ever spoken before. I knew she would remember every word I said–and she did. She was so vibrant, deep, warm, compassionate, that it was a very long time before I noticed she was what some people might call “heavy.” Actually, I don’t think she ever noticed she was what some people would call heavy.

Likewise, I knew a woman who was wildly self-assured, sexy, vibrant, alive. She was in her mid 40s, tall, big boned; she weighed close to 185 pounds, and she literally turned heads walking down the street. Her secret: Inside, she loved herself, she was healthy and she felt good. That was enough for her. She knew who she really was, and that her body was comfortable, well-nourished–even if it wasn’t petite.

2. What would happen if you never lost weight? We set so many conditions on our love for ourselves. Unconsciously (or not) one of those conditions may be our weight. “I’ll feel better about myself when I’ve lost 20 pounds,” or “If I can just get rid of this last 5 pounds, I’ll be able to get on with my life.” As far as you know, this is the only life you have, and it’s happening right now. What would happen if you lived it right now, as you are, weighing what you do and wearing the size you wear? Can you love yourself anyway? Pause here, take a deep breath, close your eyes, and ask yourself that question. See what comes up. If the answer is “no,” it may be that learning how to love yourself is a bigger priority than losing 20 pounds.

3. Where do you want to be in ten years? Answer that question, and you’ll have a better sense of your reason for being here. Write down where you’ll be in terms of physical health, family, relationship, spiritual practices, career, home, travel–whatever comes up for you. Chances are really good that “I’ll be X pounds lighter” will come up on your list. That’s okay. Just recognize all the other things that are on your “where I’ll be” list.

How much time, mental energy and passion are you devoting to those aspects of your life, compared to counting calories and obeying the bathroom scale? Maybe you can see where weight loss falls on your list of dreams, goals and visions, and maybe you can assign it a different priority. Losing weight is not your life’s work. Your life’s work is to love, to serve, to be honest, to develop personal integrity, to be kind, to raise healthy children, to grow spiritually, to adore yourself. Which is not to say you can’t choose to shed some excess baggage. You’ll just do it with a sense of perspective.

4. When will it be okay? I once worked with a man who slaved tirelessly to lose 15 pounds. He exercised obsessively, starved himself, became a fanatic about supplements, drank diet soft drinks and coffee throughout the day to blunt his appetite, even took up smoking to blunt his appetite. Sounds crazy, doesn’t it? But here’s what’s really crazy: once he lost 15 pounds, he wanted to lose another 5. (I should pause here to tell you that the term “crazy” was his, not mine). He felt that being 5 pounds under his goal gave him a buffer, in case he gained a few pounds back.

I realized then that, no matter how much weight he lost, he wasn’t going to be satisfied. It would never be okay, because it wasn’t about his weight, or his body. It was about his sense of self; he was depressed and dissatisfied with his life, and no amount of weight loss was ever going to make that okay.

When will it be okay for you? Ask yourself that question, then listen softly and quietly for the answer. It might surprise you.

5. Why do you want to lose weight? Ask yourself with gut-level honesty: why do you want to lose weight? Is it because the doctor told you your weight was harming your health, or because that little red two-piece swimsuit went on sale at Neiman Marcus? Is it for your wife, your health, your ego, your high school reunion, your best friend’s wedding? Is it because you’ve decided the ten extra pounds around your middle no longer serves you, or because you still want to fit into the size 4 jeans you wore in your senior year of high school? Once you’re honest with yourself, you can decide just how important it is to you to lose weight and where it fits in the grand scheme of your life.

6. How will shedding pounds serve the world? We’ve already touched on how it will serve you. Now, take it to a deeper level: how will losing weight make a difference in the world around you? Perhaps being lighter and slimmer will boost your health, and make you feel more confident, inspired, energetic and passionate; in turn, that will positively affect your children, your mate, your co-workers. There’s no right answer here; it’s just about being aware and exploring possibilities, and perhaps understanding how your own personal goals fit into the grand scheme of life.