Get ready to learn about the endless benefits of mindful eating and how you can introduce some of these practices in your life.
Raise your hand if you’ve plowed through a bag of Hershey Kisses, potato chips, or another forbidden snack and can’t remember the first kiss, chip, or bite. That is trademark mindless eating and (obviously) the complete opposite of mindful.
The practice of mindful eating has endless benefits for your overall health, especially if you want to lose weight. It’s not some kind of voodoo, but it does require us to do something we’re not used to doing – slowing down.
What is mindful eating?
We eat for various reasons; true hunger, because the clock says so, or because we’re stressed, bored, anxious, etc. We rarely think about the ‘why’ of eating, just the act of it. Even at that, when we are eating, it’s distracted eating. When we eat standing up, driving, reading, watching TV, on the computer, or even with a group of friends and family, it’s distracted eating. We’re not paying full attention to the tastes, textures, smells, and sensations of food, let alone how the rest of our body feels. We are literally disconnected from the entire process of eating.
Mindful eating is just the opposite. Mindful eating asks us to take cues from our body and how it feels and responds to the food we eat. It’s understanding why continue to eat after we’ve had gut-busting meal or why we reach for chocolate and cupcakes for comfort.
At its essence, mindful eating is understanding “why” we eat for reasons other than hunger and developing methods that tune us into the emotional part of that “why”.
What do we mindlessly eat in the first place?
Mindless eating happens on two planes: physiology and psychological.
The best, balanced diets are those that consist of whole, minimally processed foods. Adding to that, when we hurriedly eat our food or eat while we’re engaged doing other activities, we don’t allow our brain time to make the connections that trigger satiety signals. The more quickly we eat, the more calories we tend to consume. This represents the physiological aspect of mindful eating.
On the other hand, when we reach for a tub of Rocky Road ice cream and a spoon when we’re sad or depressed, we do so because hyper-palatable food is comforting and release serotonin. Hyperpalatable means the food hits all the right taste buds in our mouths. Our brains do not recognize these foods to be filling, which is why you can down a who carton in one sitting. These foods also release serotonin, a feel-good hormone that stimulates the pleasure centers in our brain. This one-two punch keeps us going back for more and represents the psychological aspect of eating.
Our body doesn’t distinguish between the food we eat for comfort or the food we eat because we are genuinely hungry. It’s all calories. Once we’ve eaten as much as our body needs to sustain itself and provide energy for exercise or daily movement, the rest gets stored, typically in our adipose tissue.
In other words – mindless eating adds needless and excess calories to our diet.
What are some of the benefits of learning mindful eating?
There are endless benefits to learning mindful eating, from reduced calorie consumption to a better relationship with food.
Eating less calories
When we slow down to eat a meal or stop and think about why we’re reaching for a snack, we interrupt that automatic process and pay more attention to the “why,” we end up eating fewer calories.
Conversely, when you eat too quickly, you tend to eat more calories. What’s more, if you didn’t take the time to savor your food, you end up feeling less satisfied and more deprived. This leads to “Just one more forkful.”
Studies show that when meals are extended, you could reduce your calorie consumption by up to 15% – per meal.
Tune into your body’s fullness cues
Our nervous and digestive systems work together to process the food we eat. In fact, digestion starts well before food even hits your mouth. When you sidestep that connection by eating too fast or eating while distracted, your body doesn’t have a chance to catch up and say, “Whoa, hold on – I’m full!”
When we slow down and eat, we gain a better mind-body connection, so we know when we’re full or just about full. Scientific studies have concluded that it takes 20 minutes on average for your body to recognize that it’s full. Most Thanksgiving dinners don’t last that long!
Recognizing emotional eating triggers
I’ve often joked about eating cookie dough out of a sleeve. What I’ve learned is that stress, more than anything else, drives my craving for sweets.
In truth, stress eating or emotional eating doesn’t come up out of anywhere. The circumstances that generate the habit build or accumulate. What matters is what you do at the moment you find yourself reaching for the Rocky Road.
When you create a mind-body connection, you build awareness and bring attention to the process of eating. You can better recognize the triggers behind emotional eating, mitigate the damage, and develop a better relationship with food.
Know how to respond to peer pressure
How often have you been with friends or family who’ve offered “just one more helping” or “just one more bite”? Have you been sent home with leftovers you don’t want yet feel compelled to take – then eat for fear of it going to waste?
When you practice mindful eating, you learn to consider what your body wants and doesn’t want. Whether it be in the moment or the day after when you’re staring at the tinfoil-covered plate from the dinner party, you just attended.
Learning to pass on “just one more bite” or just saying no is not only empowering, it’s honoring your body.
What are some ways to practice mindful eating?
Mindful eating can easily be practiced in various ways and is a tool to be used in various settings and circumstances.
Eating slowly
Eating slowly sounds elementary and useless, but the benefits of are profound:
- You eat less without feeling deprived.
- Your mind has a chance to savor all that you’re eating.
- You look and feel better.
- When you eat more slowly, you chew more, and there’s less your digestive system must work to break down the food. This leads to less cramping and stomach bloating.
- You learn what ‘full’ feels like.
- Your brain gets an opportunity to send the chemicals that tell you, “I’m stuffed.” Instead of eating a bag of cookies, three might be enough.
Be forewarned; it’s awfully hard to do. You’ll have to work at it consistently. But once you have it down, you’ll notice impactful changes.
Eating slowly requires that you prepare yourself and that you eat in a specific way. Here’s how it works.
Set Up Your Environment
When you want a snack or a meal, sit at a table with no distractions. Put away your phone, your computer, and your books. It’s just you and your food.
Take a Breath
Before you take the first bite, pause, and take a breath.
Take One Bite of Food
Then, put your utensils down or wipe your hands. Take a sip of water. Take another breath.
Savor and Chew
Take the time to savor and chew each bite. The more you chew your food, the more nutrients you derive from it, the less work your digestive system must do, and the fuller you feel.
Observe
Before you take another bite, think about how the food tastes, how it feels in your mouth. Think about its texture. Is it crunchy, creamy, spicy, sweet, smooth, chewy?
Take Another Bite
Wash, rinse, repeat.
Keep a Mindful Eating Journal
In the same way that keeping a food journal can help you eat fewer calories, keeping a journal of “why” can help you recognize cues and triggers that cause you to overeat or binge.
When doing this, you’re not just thinking about what you’re feeling in the moment; you’re reflecting on several questions leading up to and occurring before, during, and after an eating episode.
- What are you doing?
- What are you thinking?
- What are you feeling emotionally?
- What are you feeling physically?
- Where are you?
- What time is it?
- Who is with you?
When you do this at intervals, you begin to reveal patterns and triggers that you can analyze to understand the root cause of an eating episode. In this way, you can find a different way to deal with the real problem that drove you to eat.
It’s tough to slow ourselves down and ask questions, just as it is to practice eating slowly. However, once mastered, you gain better control of your eating habit and improve your relationship with food.
Develop a social eating game plan
There is an undeniable social aspect of eating. We celebrate birthdays, holidays, weddings, and innumerable life events with food. Even small impromptu gatherings with good friends feature snacks or complete meals. Identifying this as a situation where unnecessary overeating can occur is the first step in developing a game plan.
Ask someone at the table a question or try to eat slower than the slowest person at the table. Seated with children? Try to match their pace; they’re some of the slowest eaters!
Have water with you at all times. Drinking more water at a meal helps you feel fuller, reducing the amount of food you’re eating. And proper hydration is never a bad thing!
Eat your most favorite foods in small portions and bypass those that are good but not spectacular. Walk away from the table when you’re done and move on to socialize in another room.
Most importantly, it is okay and yes – empowering – to say “no” to second helpings, dessert, or anything that doesn’t fit your goals. It’s not rude. In fact, I’d offer that you’re rude to yourself if you give in just because you’re polite to someone else.
Final Words
Every diet program you’ve ever tried lacks this one fundamental component – learning to eat mindfully, and as you can see, there are endless benefits to doing so.
Even if you’re not on a diet or not contemplating one, practicing mindful eating yields tremendous benefits to your physiological and psychological health. It’s free, and it’s not hard to practice in any circumstance or situation.