How to Stop Tracking Macros and Eat Intuitively

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I became more confident in my choices. I became more confident in myself. I trusted myself more. I realized that I could listen to my body, and I could still maintain the same level of nutritional balance I had when I was tracking. And the best part, you guys, is when I finally got to this part of the journey with intuitive eating, it felt so freaking liberating. Because I was still hitting the goals that I had. I was still maintaining my body composition without the added mental burden of tracking every single bite.

Yo, yo, yo. What is going on, you guys? Welcome back to The WarriorBabe Show with Nikkiey Stott, co-founder of WarriorBabe. On this podcast, we talk about mindset, methodologies, and tactics that will help you lose body fat, build muscle, be strong, and feel insanely confident. I'm your host, Nikkiey Stott, and welcome to today's episode, episode 194. Today, I'm going to be sharing something that's been a major part of my own journey, and that is specifically how to transition from tracking macros to confidently eating intuitively.

So, as you guys know, for the past six, seven years, I have diligently tracked macros. And that gave me such an incredible and amazing understanding of food, of portion sizes, of what's on my plate, of what my body feels good with, what it doesn't feel good with, and what it needs to have the right fuel, to survive, to thrive, all the things. And that phase of nutritional understanding laid the foundation for something even more powerful, where I'm at now today, which is intuitive eating.

So today, in this episode, I want to walk you through that journey and offer you insights on how you, too, can trust yourself to eat intuitively without sacrificing your goals. I've said this so many times, or maybe this is your first time listening to the podcast, but when I teach macros, or our coaches teach macros, I want you to understand that it is a skill set that will serve you for the rest of your life. It's not another diet that you are following. And I also don't expect you to track macros for the rest of your life. I don't expect you to be carrying around your food scale, or to be whipping out your app when you're out to dinner with your friends.

Truly, my goal with you, with humans in general, is this. I understand that macros is a foreign concept for a lot of people. Whenever I talk to people or meet people, they're like, I have no idea what macros are. So my want and my desire for you is to understand what macros are, be able to apply them successfully, go through the ups and downs, and then eventually graduate into the world of intuitive eating. But, which is not sexy to say, it takes time.

For me to fully feel confident in my ability to eat intuitively, it took me upwards of six, almost seven years to be like, hey, I can do this. Some of you could do it faster, but some of you are not going to be doing it in the first year of your journey if you're coming from not understanding macros at all. So I just want to lay down that timeline, that perspective, so that as I go on throughout this episode, you can understand that just as building your body and building muscle and changing your composition takes time, so does this concept that you can fully trust yourself to lean out of tracking macros once you develop the skill set to go into intuitive eating.

But before we dive into intuitive eating and all the things, I want to acknowledge the power of tracking macros and how it builds an incredible foundation for understanding your nutrition and gaining insight on foods and portion sizes, so you can look at a food and be like, oh, this is protein. Or you can look at another food and be like, oh, this is mainly carb.

For those of you who may be newer to this concept and what tracking macros even means or entails: this is The WarriorBabe Show. I've talked about macronutrients all the way up through 194 episodes. It's the basis of this podcast. But maybe this is your first episode and you don't know what this concept is. It means monitoring your intake of macronutrients, that being protein, carbohydrates, and fats.

It's not all about calories. It's about ensuring that your body is getting the right balance of nutrients to meet your goals, whether that's muscle building, fat loss, or maintenance, any of those phases I've talked about, depending on where you're starting out. Typically, the majority of you have no idea what macros are. Tracking macros is like learning a new language. So some of you may be listening to this, and if you're at this stage, you may not even know what those phases mean: muscle building, fat loss, or maintenance.

Some of you just want to lose weight. Some of you have, quote unquote, five pounds to lose, which, when you enter the world of macronutrients, may mean that you have to go into the maintenance phase. I'm not going to dive into those concepts because I don't want to get lost in the sauce with you on that. There's definitely an episode I've recorded on what the different phases are, what they mean, and how they apply to where you're at in your journey. But the concept of tracking macros is making sure it's not just about calories. Say you're eating 1,800 calories in a day. What is making up those calories? That is your macronutrients. That is how much protein you're eating a day, how many carbohydrates you're eating a day, and how much fat you're eating in a day. And those add up to your overall calorie intake.

I'll go on a thought trip here, but some people focus on calories, and they could be eating all carbs and fats and little protein. But in order to meet some goals, whether that's fat loss, maintenance, or building muscle, you need more protein, moderate carbs, and low fat, depending on where you're at in your phases. So, to keep it at a high level if you've never heard of macros, and without diving into the sauce of the different phases and doing X, Y, and Z in those phases: you need to be giving your body protein, fat, and carbs in the right balance to meet your goals. It's not just calories. Okay.

So like I just mentioned, tracking macros is like learning a new language. At first it can feel overwhelming. It can feel tedious. You're measuring portions. You're logging every meal inside your app. I even say this to our community of WarriorBabes: at the beginning of your journey, it's going to feel like work, and it should. It's something you've never done before. It's like hopping on your bike for the first time with training wheels on. It's going to take you time to feel comfortable without the training wheels. Then you take them off and you're able to glide. So at first, tracking your macros is tedious. You're scanning barcodes. You're running around your kitchen. You're trying to put meals together.

And it could take you upwards of an hour or two at the end of the night to do that. But trust me, over time, as you develop an intuitive sense for what foods contain and how much of each macronutrient is in them, or if you're eating the same types of snacks every single day, that two hours, that one hour, is going to turn into 30 minutes. Then it's going to turn into 10 minutes. Then three minutes. And then you'll be able to go throughout your day not even worrying about tracking in an app, get to 4 p.m., and be like, okay, I need to log all my meals in my app. Because the app starts to recognize what you eat too. It's all saved.

So it may seem tedious at first, but it should. Okay? If it was easy, everybody would be doing it. But after years of doing this and tracking, you start to see food differently. You start to understand these concepts. You start to understand portion sizes. You start to know what foods contain and what's made up of protein, fats, or carbs.

You no longer need the food scale to know that a chicken breast on your plate contains about 30 grams of protein, or that a spoonful of peanut butter adds a good dose of fat. Two tablespoons is 32 grams in serving size, and that's about 16 grams of fat, which is your fat for some of your day. See, I can spitball that out of my head because I've been doing this for so long.

For me, those seven-plus years of tracking taught me portion control, nutrient awareness, and the effects different foods have on my body. I know that two tablespoons of peanut butter equates to this many grams of fat, or that three ounces of chicken breast equates to 24, 25 grams of protein. I can look at these things and eyeball them. And that education became the foundation for intuitive eating.

I can't tell you how frustrated I get sometimes when women think they are eating intuitively at the beginning of their journeys, and they haven't actually grasped what I just walked through. You can't eat intuitively without graduating from understanding macros. That education you gained from tracking your food, from logging your meals, from looking at portion control, from the awareness of the different types of foods you're eating on a daily basis, down to being able to say this is how many grams of fat is in this serving size.

You can't eat intuitively without graduating from those concepts and that skill set. You can't have intuitive eating without the skill set of tracking your macros, because that is literally the foundation you have to have before you can even move to intuitive eating.

Okay, so what is intuitive eating? Intuitive eating is an approach to eating that is based on listening to your body's hunger and fullness cues, rather than following strict food rules, or logging every single meal, or putting everything on a scale to see what it weighs, or X, Y, and Z. It's an approach to eating based on what your body needs and your cues, but also being able to roughly tally up where you are during your day.

Being able to say, okay, at the end of my day, I definitely ate around 2,000 calories today, focusing the majority on protein and letting the rest come from carbohydrates and fats. It's about eating when you're hungry. It's about knowing those cues. It's about stopping when you're satisfied, and enjoying the process without the guilt or the anxiety of I have to log every single meal, I have to be strict with my food. That's what intuitive eating is.

And again, a lot of people don't have that awareness when they're first starting their journey of what a hunger cue is, or what a fullness cue is, or the discipline to stop when they're satisfied. Or even recognize how much food they are eating in a day, so they can confidently say at the end of the day, oh yeah, I had 2,000 calories, I focused heavily on my protein intake, and the rest settled with carbs and fats. You can't confidently do that without logging and tracking and going through that phase.

I want to keep reiterating that, because it's a really frustrating thing when I hear women say, oh yeah, I eat healthy. What does that mean? Oh, well, I have X, Y, and Z in a day, and I can tally up that math in my head, and it's around 1,000 calories. I eat healthy, and I eat intuitively. But how long have you been on this journey, and how long have you been trying to get to your goals? And it's, I'm still struggling to get to my goals. Because the foundation you need to lay down for yourself first has not been laid down. And it all takes time. That's why I think a lot of people get frustrated. These concepts and skill sets aren't going to be built overnight. They take time, months, years, to get down confidently.

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That's the picture I wanted to paint for you in terms of what macronutrients are and how tracking macros begins your journey. But then, what is intuitive eating? What does it look like?

If you've spent the time tracking your macros and learning about portion sizes, you've already laid down the groundwork to transition into intuitive eating with confidence. What I will say is, for many people, even when you've grasped that concept and worked at it for five years, and this is where it came into my personal journey too, the idea of transitioning to intuitive eating can feel scary. For me personally, I relied on external methods like tracking apps, feeling confident that if I'm logging my meals in MyFitnessPal, I know exactly where I'm at at the end of the day, and that's guiding my eating on a daily basis.

So breaking that can feel scary, because you have to fully trust yourself that you have the discipline for the intuitive eating aspect. But like I said, if you've tracked macros for so long and you've learned what foods are, portion sizes, and nutrient awareness, then you've already laid down the groundwork. Now it's just about allowing and fully trusting yourself in your ability to transition to intuitive eating.

So this is what I want to share with you: how I transitioned from tracking everything I ate to trusting myself with intuitive eating. But know that sometimes, still on a daily basis, I will throw my eggs on the scale in the morning and weigh and log that. I'll do that for maybe 10% of my food items in a day. I won't do it for all of them.

And a side note: maybe a couple of weeks in the year, say I went on vacation and came back, or I feel like I'm a little bit off and I'm not eating enough in the day and I need to bring myself back to baseline and balance, eating 2,000 calories or more, then I will spend a week just tracking, getting back in the habit and reminding myself how much I need to eat in a day. That's part of the intuitive eating journey. 80 to 90% of the time you'll be eating intuitively, but maybe the other 10% is where you come back for a week here and there in the year, reminding yourself of the habits and giving yourself a refresher on the awareness of things.

For me, after meticulously measuring food, I noticed I no longer needed to rely on the food scale or the app. I had internalized this knowledge. When I looked at my plate, I could roughly estimate the amount of protein, carbs, and fats I was consuming, and I knew what a well-balanced meal looked like. And I could trust my body more to give me the cues and signals for what I needed.

After I ate a meal, I knew what being satiated felt like. If I lacked a little on carbohydrates, or mainly on protein, in a meal and I felt hungry 30 minutes later, then I knew, okay, let me go back and have a little more protein, because protein is what makes me feel full and satiated and stops the cravings for more food. So I internalized that knowledge, and you have to internalize that knowledge too. What that means for you is being able to do everything I just said: not only look at a plate of food and roughly estimate the protein, fats, and carbs, but also trust your body's signals and understand what your body is telling you. Sometimes that is really hard for people to do.

So the first step for me was letting go of the need to track every meal, and like I said, that can be scary because I relied on external validation from those tracking apps. So instead of going cold turkey, I eased into it. I started tracking only certain meals or certain days of the week, giving myself the freedom to eat intuitively on the weekends or during social events. This is how I typically go about it with my clients too. That gradual approach allowed me to test my ability to control portion sizes without the crutch of tracking.

So again, not going cold turkey. For example, I'm going to track Monday through Friday, and then on the weekend I'm going to eat intuitively. That doesn't mean, oh, it's the weekend, fuck it, I'm going to do whatever I want, not eat, or binge, or have whatever I want. You still have to have control over yourself. So I allowed myself to do that, and this is basically what I allow some of my clients to do, whom I've been working with now for four or five years. It took me about six years because I had to learn to trust myself on my own. But with a coach, like the women I still work with to this day, it's been three, four years and we're kind of there already. So you can cut the time in half when you're working with a professional who can help you understand this and ease into it with you, which I highly recommend.

Over time, with that approach, I became more confident in my choices. I became more confident in myself. I trusted myself more. I realized that I could listen to my body and still maintain the same level of nutritional balance I had when I was tracking. And the best part, you guys, is when I finally got to this part of the journey with intuitive eating, it felt so freaking liberating, because I was still hitting the goals I had. I was still maintaining my body composition without the added mental burden of tracking every single bite. That's what I hope happens for you too. You have to be willing and patient to go through this journey.

It is liberating. I can go out to a restaurant and be like, okay, this is protein, this is carbs, and this is fats, and this is what I need to consume. And this is how it should be anyway: at any restaurant, you're asking for more protein. I'll go to True Food and get a Korean noodle bowl, which is a lot of carbs, but it's delicious, and I attribute it to my carb intake for the day. But the protein is drastically lacking. There's supposedly three ounces, and ain't no way that's three ounces, it's definitely two. So I always ask for more, like a side chicken breast that I can mix into the bowl. You're probably going to do that for a lot of things, because a lot of restaurants, which is crazy to me, lack protein in what they serve.

So that's a little bit about how I transitioned. If you're currently tracking macros and wondering how to make the leap to intuitive eating, I have a couple of steps to help you transition with confidence.

First and foremost, and I've already laid this out for you: before you transition, make sure you have a solid understanding of macronutrients, portion sizes, how different foods affect your body, and what different foods are made of in protein, fats, and carbs. This knowledge is your safety net when you let go of tracking. If you can look at your plate and know roughly how much protein, fat, and carbs are there, you're ready to take the first step toward intuitive eating.

And I'm going to say again, that takes time. I just want to keep adding that little nugget, because it's not going to happen overnight. If you don't know what macronutrients are, like I said at the beginning, and you're just starting to get in the habit of tracking and logging all your foods, you need to do that confidently first. For me, being able to look at a plate of food and confidently know roughly how much protein, fat, and carbs were there took me at least two years. When you're there, you're ready to make the first step. But you have to build your nutritional knowledge, hands down, no questions asked.

Number two, I would say start small. Begin by eating intuitively for one meal a day or on specific days of the week. For example, you can choose to eat intuitively during the weekends, or at social events, or when you're traveling, where tracking might be inconvenient. But you need to pay attention when you do that. You still have to have awareness of the choices you're making and how they're impacting your body. Pay attention to your hunger and fullness cues, and practice estimating portion sizes based on your knowledge from step one.

And you also have to apply some type of discipline, because it's easy to be at a social event, see the desserts, and want to eat as many little cupcakes as you want. That's the first thing that came to mind. You have to be able to say, no, I'm only going to have one, and that's it. Okay.

Number three is trust your body's signals. One of the biggest shifts from tracking to intuitive eating is learning to trust your body again. Listen to your hunger. Listen to your satiety signals. If you're genuinely hungry, eat. If you're feeling satisfied, stop, even if there's still food on your plate. Like I said a little earlier, you need the discipline to say, okay, this is enough, I'm done, I'm satiated. You have to become aware of those two signals, hungry and satisfied, and reconnect with your body's natural ability to regulate food intake. It's a type of awareness. You have to be in tune with your body. This one was the hardest one for me.

The fourth one is letting go of guilt. Intuitive eating is not about perfection. When it comes to tracking macros, sometimes you'll find you have to be perfect to get your macros within plus or minus five in a day. Intuitive eating is not about perfection. There will be days where you eat more or less than you expected, and that is okay. Trust your body that it will balance itself out over time. This is where you need to remove the guilt associated with food and allow yourself the freedom to enjoy meals, but again, with control and self-awareness.

And the last one, which is where I'm currently at, full send, is stay mindful of your goals. For me, it's maintaining my body composition. Just because I'm not tracking doesn't mean I lose sight of that goal. It doesn't mean I'm going to gain 20 pounds. I still want to maintain my body composition. I still want to look lean and look like I have muscle definition, X, Y, and Z. So keep your fitness and body composition goals in mind and keep prioritizing them, and keep prioritizing eating enough of the right types of foods in your day to help you maintain that goal. Stay focused on that goal, fuel your workouts, and fuel your recovery.

So those are some of the ways I would transition if I were you. As a general rule of thumb, I would say you need two to three years of tracking your macros consistently, gaining the knowledge and understanding of it, and also building the confidence and trust in your ability to transition. So step one, building the nutritional knowledge: if I'm looking at timelines, that's about two years. Then for the next year, and ideally you're working with a coach at that point because that person is going to hold you accountable, you'd move into starting small, practicing a day or a meal. Honestly and truthfully, that could take you six months to a year. Steps two and three go together: starting small and estimating portion sizes is about six months, and trusting your body's signals is the other six months. And through all of this you're learning number four, which is letting go of the guilt. Then maybe at year three or four of your journey, you can confidently try to full send it, trusting your ability while staying mindful of where you are with your goals, because by this time you should have already accomplished some of the goals you had in mind for yourself.

After saying all that and giving you those steps, I even feel like it's a little intimidating and overwhelming. Transitioning to intuitive eating can feel intimidating, especially if you're worried about losing control. Those are some of the common fears I personally had, and some of the common fears I've heard from my clients too. What if I overeat? What if I gain more weight? How will I know if I'm eating enough to maintain the goals I have for myself? So I want to talk about those specific concerns a little bit here.

The fear of overeating: if you've spent years tracking your macros, your body is likely very good at self-regulation. That's what I've noticed in myself specifically. My body is really good at self-regulation. The fear of overeating often stems from a lack of trust in your body's signals. I know there have been times in my intuitive eating journey where I've definitely eaten more than I should have, but I'm aware of my body's signals, so I trust them, because I get to a point of feeling really uncomfortable and I'm like, I'm done, I've had enough. Once you practice tuning into that, you'll find that your body naturally says, hey, stop. It naturally balances itself out.

So I want to acknowledge and validate that intimidating feeling in transitioning, and I understand there may be a fear of overeating. But if you've laid down the foundations and you have the knowledge and you're aware of things, your body will balance out.

For me, along my journey, I had the worry of whether I was eating enough in a day. There have definitely been times in my intuitive eating journey where I've eaten only around 1,200 calories in a day. But if you've already trained yourself to prioritize protein, even without tracking you can continue to focus on protein-rich meals, knowing you're fueling your body with the nutrient it needs to support your goals, whether that's muscle growth or fat loss. If there's any macronutrient to focus on 110% when you're eating intuitively, it's making sure you're getting enough protein in the day, because that keeps the goal in mind and keeps you focused on your body composition goals.

And the last little tip for these concerns: intuitive eating isn't an all-or-nothing approach. You can still return to tracking temporarily if you feel like you're getting off track. That's what I talked about a couple of minutes ago. If I'm worried I'm not eating enough, I check myself and track my meals for a week so I can remind my brain and my body and my cues and all the things: this is what this feels like, this is what this looks like. It's not like you have to go full send intuitive eating and never track again, or never bring awareness to the foods you're eating or use the apps as a benchmark to see where you're at. You can allow yourself to return to tracking temporarily if you feel like you need it. The goal is to stay flexible and trust yourself to make balanced choices over time.

That is the benefit and the amazing thing about intuitive eating. It's flexible. You're trusting yourself, you're making balanced choices, and you're staying in control and self-aware about the food you decide to eat, the decisions you make, and the signals your body is giving you.

So all in all, the most important aspect of this journey from tracking macros to intuitive eating is trust. It's trust in your knowledge. It's trust in your body. It's trust in your ability to make balanced choices without the need for external tools. And it's a gradual process, and it's okay to take small steps toward that freedom of intuitive eating. It's not just about letting go of all structure. It's about using the foundation you've built from years of tracking to make confident decisions in your nutrition. It's about listening to your body and honing in on what your body needs, while staying mindful of the goals you've set out to accomplish for yourself.

And again, I don't expect you to be tracking macros for the rest of your life. It is a skill set that will serve you for the rest of your life if you lay down the foundations of it, and you can transition confidently to intuitive eating after laying those foundations.

So guys, thanks for tuning in. I hope you enjoyed this podcast and take away the insights you need, especially if you're in year two or three of your journey and you're like, what's next? I hope you've applied consistency and patience, and you're at this part of your journey where you're like, I don't want to have to track macros anymore. Maybe you feel some type of way, like you're being confined to the scale, confined to the tracking app, and there's a certain point where you feel burnt out because you're doing the same thing over and over again. And there's a trust in you saying, yo, I can do this, just let me try it. I just want you to try it and see what it's all about. If you're worried, take this episode to your coach and say, hey, I'm two years in, I want to do this, and then work up the game plan to do it.