Ep.21 Emilia Thompson: Diet culture, mindfulness and body confidence

The Health Scientist Podcast

Emilia Thompson is a Registered Nutritionist with the Association for Nutrition, is an online nutrition consultant and educator and lecturer in Sports Nutrition. With a PhD in Exercise Physiology and Life Coaching Diploma, Emilia supports individuals with an evidence-based holistic approach to improve health, food relationships and body composition. In addition, Emilia previously competed as a bikini athlete as part of PCA Team GB and won second place at British Finals 2017.

Emilia's Instagram

Emilia's Website

In this episode we cover:

• Emilia's experiencing competing in Bikini competitions and how it helped her develop her practices around food
• The importance of disassociating body image with self worth while allowing people to change their bodies if they want to
• The importance of self work in improving one's body image over time
• The difficulty in navigating social media because of the risks of people comparing themselves to images they see online
• How being authentic and honest on social media is essential to promote better messages
• The importance of the Health At Every Size movement along with the danger of taking extremist views
• How intuitive eating and eating intuitively are two different practices and their relevance for diet culture
• The importance of being comfortable with one's self and letting go of a reliance on scale weight
• The role of a period of food tracking in helping to establish good food habits in some people
• When and how Emilia might help someone move away for calorie tracking
• Mindful eating and how it's something very few people practice these days
• The evidence-based benefits of meditation for promoting mindfulness
• How Emilia's practices have evolved over the last 10 years and how she's come to put a priority on self-compassion