Mindful Eating

Mindful eating stresses the importance of focusing on the present moment and being aware of your senses while consuming food.

Use all your senses to fully experience your food and drinks.

How many meals, snacks, coffees, calories have you bolted down without noticing? Paying close attention to the smells, textures, sounds, colours and tastes of our food increases our enjoyment of food and can help prevent overeating.

Mindful eating Exercise

To get you started with your mindful eating practice, I have a simple exercise for you to try. I want you to use all your senses to enjoy a small bit of food. This can be any small piece of food such as a raisin, a square of dark chocolate, a blueberry or an almond.

Sit in a comfortable position and follow these steps:

  1. Hold it in clean hands and examine it. What do you see?

  2. Next, notice how it feels in the palm of your hand. What is the texture like?

  3. Now, bring it to your nose and inhale. What do you smell?

  4. Next, bring it to your ear, moving it back and forth between your fingers. What do you hear?

  5. Finally, place it in on your tongue. Slowly move it around your mouth, noticing any feelings or sensations that arise. When you’re ready, begin to chew slowly, noticing the taste and how it changes over time, then swallow.

You can record your findings in your journal. With practice, bringing mindful awareness to your food can bring greater enjoyment of food, and can become an effective, long term weight loss strategy.

It can also be an effective weight-loss strategy.

How many calories do you consume throughout the day without realising it?

Slowing down, and paying attention to your food allows you to really taste and savour your food, and teaches you to follow hunger cues.

Bring awareness to your meals with these mindful eating tips:

Make a conscious decision to eat.

Before you eat, ask yourself, “How hungry am I right now? Am I eating out of hunger, habit, boredom or emotion?” If you find that you’re not actually hungry, consider getting a glass of water or a cup of herbal tea and distract yourself for a few minutes by taking a short walk or doing a puzzle.

Eat slowly.

Pause and put your fork down between bites, chew slowly, and avoid eating on the run. This is not always easy as a busy mum and there will be times that you have to rush through a meal to get to an activity or an appointment. But if you can allow more time for your meals you will appreciate your food more, and give your body time to tell you it’s full.

Avoid distractions while eating.

For many of us this is easier said than done! Numerous studies have found that it leads people to overeat because it reduces your awareness of how much you’re consuming and prevents you from recognising your body’s fullness signals.

So turn off the TV and put away your phone, laptop, books and magazines until you are done.