Savor Every Bite by Lynn Rossy

Author:Lynn Rossy
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: New Harbinger Publications
Published: 2021-03-03T19:39:28+00:00

26.

Waking Up Before You Bite

“I don’t even think; I just eat.” I hear this from many people who lament about the lack of thought before and while they eat. Jack said, “My logical thinking gets hijacked. I have a vague awareness that I’m allowing an impulse to take over. The thoughts come afterward.” Miriam said, “I notice all the time that I don’t think at all until that junk is inside me. Only then do I acknowledge what happened.” And Jody said, “I have a complete lack of thought when eating. Suddenly I look down and my plate is empty. Like, where did that go?”

Mindless eating has many causes, including eating while focusing on other things—watching TV, replying to emails, reading, and even driving. And the impact of this distracted eating can be quite profound. Distraction affects not only your ability to register fullness, but also your memory of what you ate and your tendency to eat more later. In one interesting study, half of the participants were distracted by playing computer solitaire while eating lunch; the other half of the participants were not distracted. The ones with divided attention felt less full after the meal, and thirty minutes later had significantly greater difficulty remembering what they had eaten. In addition, when offered cookies as a snack thirty minutes later, those who had played on the computer while eating ate twice as many as those who had not.

Even if you’re not distracted by other activities, as I mentioned earlier, it is estimated that we are fully present only about half of the time. So it’s not surprising that people report not thinking about or being aware of reaching for food and putting it into their mouths. Eating is a routine activity, and food is abundantly available. When we travel on airplanes, my husband asks me to take the cookies and pretzels away from him before he finds his hand throwing the food into his mouth. We are a little like robots: See food. Eat food.

My husband listens to me talk about mindful eating all of the time, so he is aware of the temptation of food sitting on his tray table. However, we are generally unaware of all of the food-related decisions we make on a daily basis—many due to external factors in the environment (like stewardesses handing us snacks!). For instance, if you are given a larger serving, you will tend to eat more. If the food is convenient and visible, you are more likely to reach for it. Dim, softer lighting in a room promotes eating for longer periods of time. The type of label on a packaged food influences whether you want it. And the list goes on. In fact, it is estimated that we make more than two hundred food-related decisions a day, which often lead to unconsciously eating without considering what or how much we select and consume.

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