I recently completed a 7 day Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction retreat at the Omega Institute in Rhinebeck, New York. The retreat was based upon the 8 week MBSR course founded in the 1970's at the University of Massachusetts Medical School in Shrewsbury Massachusetts by Jon Kabat Zinn and Saki Santorelli.
Mindful Eating
Throughout the 7 day retreat many contemplative practices were addressed, including Mindful Eating. Mindful Eating is a process of paying attention, on purpose, to your present eating experience,without judgment.While this sounds simple, the process can be challenging to the modern day multitasker. Mindful Eating is endorsed as a positive weight management tool from Buddhist Sanghas in China to the internationally successful weight loss plan Weight Watchers.
As www.WeightWatchers.com states, "The challenge is to fit mindful eating into our daily lives. Experts say it’s not that hard. “We often kid ourselves about how busy we are,” explains Brian Wansink, Ph.D., professor of consumer behavior at Cornell University and author of the forthcoming Slim by Design: Mindless Eating Solutions for Everyday Life. “It takes just 15 minutes to really enjoy a meal.” Whether you’ve got fifteen minutes or five, experts agree you can eat mindfully wherever you are. You’ll starve if you wait until the perfect time and place to get into a mindful state of mind. “You can do it anywhere,” says Lilian Cheung, R.D., a nutritionist at the Harvard School of Public Health and co-author of Savor: Mindful Eating, Mindful Life.
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| A child practicing Mindful Eating |
In Meditation for Beginners, Jack Kornfield recommends practicing an eating meditation with three raisins. First, give yourself permission to slow down and practice mindfulness (moment-to-moment awareness) throughout the exercise, which can easily take five minutes. Then examine the raisins closely, contemplating where they came from and how they arrived on your plate. Touch them and feel the sensations in your fingertips. Lift the raisin to your ear and listen to the sounds it makes as it moves in your fingertips. Notice how your body is reacting to touching the raisin. You May notice you are salivating, feeling hungrier than before, or maybe your not interested in eating the raisin at all. All are okay as mindful eating is about witnessing your body's reaction to the present moment non judgment ally. Finally, raise your arm slowly and place the raisins on your tongue, observing the taste and other sensations without chewing. Close your eyes, chew the raisins slowly, and mindfully swallow them.
As I practiced Mindful Eating at the retreat, I noticed I was happier with more bland tastes, less sauces, and less condiments. I ate slower, and allowed the food to digest before jumping up to get more or do something else. All of these reactions result in healthier choices and indirectly to positive weight management. Although it is not an easy practice to remember to implement all of the time, I now choose one meal a day to eat mindfully.
