The secrets to mindful eating

The secrets to mindful eatingIN BRIEF Mindfulness, a practice based on Zen Buddhism, has become popular as a way of self-calming and as a method of changing eating behaviors. Mindful eating is being incorporated into behavior change programs along with recommended dietary behavior changes. This article describes mindful eating and offers ideas for how to teach the basics of this practice.

Mindfulness is a term that has become embedded in our everyday language, but its meaning is more profound than how we use it in our driven, multitasking, social structure. This term has become popular because it urges conscious awareness of whatever the focus might be. It has become a method of encouraging someone to take good care of him- or herself. Likewise, “mindful eating” encourages us to gain awareness of our eating experiences.

Mindful eating (i.e., paying attention to our food, on purpose, moment by moment, without judgment) is an approach to food that focuses on individuals’ sensual awareness of the food and their experience of the food. It has little to do with calories, carbohydrates, fat, or protein. The purpose of mindful eating is not to lose weight, although it is highly likely that those who adopt this style of eating will lose weight. The intention is to help individuals savor the moment and the food and encourage their full presence for the eating experience.

Diets tend to focus on rules of eating (e.g., what to eat, how much to eat, and what not to eat), with the intended measurement of specific outcomes. These outcomes are most likely weight loss or, in the case of diabetes, improved blood glucose values and ultimately improved A1C. All diets have the potential of success or failure based on weight outcomes. People may know their outcomes are going to depend on their consumption and expenditure of calories and understand that this has to do with their behavior, but it is rare for individuals to sustain behavior change without seeing results on their outcomes. Their behavior change will be subject to daily stress and outside pressures and therefore difficult to sustain.

Mindfulness is a process-oriented, rather than an outcome-driven, behavior. It is based on an individual’s experience of the moment. The individual focuses on appreciating the experience of food and is not concerned with restricting intake. The person eating chooses what and how much to consume. It is not coincidental that, within a mindful approach, the person’s choices often are to eat less, savor eating more, and select foods consistent with desirable health benefits.

As mentioned earlier, diets for weight loss are usually successful in the short term, but many tend to fail over time. What determines success and failure with such diets? A common thread for those who are successful is the ability to pay attention to the diet and stick with the plan, whatever that plan might be. It might seem obvious, but this is the difference between “mindless” eating and conscious eating. Our suggestions have always been to pay attention to what you are eating, such as “Don’t watch TV while you eat,” “Serve the correct portions,” “Chew 32 times before swallowing,” and “Sit down while you eat.” These recommendations have always been about paying attention, just as one would through mindful eating. The difference with mindful eating is that it is not about rules or guidelines; instead, it is about individual experience. No one has the same experience with the same food every time. The idea is for people to have their own experiences and to be in the present while having them.

Practicing Mindful Eating

One of the most powerful meditation experiences I ever had was eating a raisin under the guidance of Kabat-Zinn (1). Here is the raisin-eating experience as I recall it. I invite you to do this while you read or to read about it first and then have your own experience without the distraction of reading. Try this regardless of whether you like raisins.

1. Get a raisin and set it down in front of you. STOP; do not throw a handful of raisins into your mouth. (OK, so there is a rule, but there is a good reason, which you will understand soon.)
2. Imagine you have just been dropped off on this planet, and you know nothing about where you are. You have never experienced anything from Earth. With no experience, there are no judgments, fears, or expectations. It is all new to you. Take a few deep breaths and relax.
3. Look at the raisin and pick it up.
4. Feel its weight.
5. Examine its surface—the various ridges, shiny parts, dull parts; really look for the first time at this strange object.
6. Smell this object and notice how you react.
7. Roll the raisin between your fingers and listen to hear what sound it makes. Notice its stickiness.
8. Notice what you are feeling about this object.
9. Place the raisin between your lips and just hold it there for a few moments. What do you notice happens inside you?
10. Let it roll back into your mouth, but do not chew yet, just roll it around. Is there a taste? Do you salivate? What do you want to do?
11. OK, bite down, just once. What do you notice?
12. Slowly begin to chew, noticing what each bite brings.
13. Chew the raisin until it is completely liquefied before you swallow.
14. After swallowing, close your eyes for a few moments to notice the consequence of what you just experienced.

The raisin experience is a wonderful example of what mindful eating can be, with its intention to focus on various aspects of the moment-by-moment experience. The focus on the sensual experiences of sight, sound, smell, touch, and taste brings about the full awareness of the food in the moment. This process does not tell you what you should experience; it only suggests that you notice your own experience. The exercise exemplifies mindfulness meditation by incorporating many of the attitudes that are practiced in each meditation.

Following are attitudes associated with mindful eating and living mindfully (1):

• Nonjudging. The first thing you encounter with this experience is your judgments about raisins. Do you like them or not? We have all had experience with raisins, and therefore we have judgments. To start the process of eating by setting aside our experience of the food is our first challenge. Awareness of our judgments is one critical element of mindfulness.
• Patience. It is obvious that one must be patient to eat mindfully. It takes time to be aware moment by moment. Rather than the usual method of eating raisins, which is to throw a handful of raisins in your mouth, chew a few times, and swallow, you are slowing your process dramatically for the full experience, letting the experience unfold rather than racing through it.
• Beginner’s mind. Approaching your experiences just as a baby does (taking one taste, having one look, feeling an object, smelling it, and listening to it) allows you to experience them anew and to be open to whatever they mean in the here and now.
• Trust. With full awareness of our own experience and acceptance of it as true for us, we develop more self-trust. This is our experience; we do not have to have the same experience as anyone else. By noticing and appreciating what we feel and our responses to different foods, we become more accepting of ourselves and therefore more trusting.
• Nonstriving. This is clearly in contrast to “diet minded,” which is all about striving for weight loss. Because no specific outcomes are being measured, you as an eater are allowed to be in the moment and to fully appreciate the experience. No effort is required to make something happen; whatever happens for the individual is what happens. There is no expectation of a particular outcome.
• Acceptance. Developing a willingness to notice what happens and accept it is at the core of the mindfulness process. This might mean accepting positive things like the amazing taste of just one raisin or accepting more challenging experiences such as our own judgments about our distaste for raisins as we place one between our lips. It is acceptance of whatever comes up in the moment—the difference between full presence and distraction. It is what it is.
• Letting go. Mindful eating involves letting go of past expectations such as letting go of resentment we harbor about being made to eat raisins as a child when we really wanted a piece of chocolate. Letting go of whatever we have become attached to allows us new experiences in the here and now without judgment based on past experiences.

These attitudes are interconnected and similar in ways that allow them to work well together. They are important in the practice of mindfulness and are essentially the foundation of mindful eating.