Mindful eating has more depth than most people think. It’s more than simply tapping into and noticing one’s senses.
We’ve rewritten the definition of the word diet. We define it, now, as a certain plan you follow for a set amount of time in order to lose weight.
The original, proper meaning of the word is overall what you eat on a day to day basis. It’s your lifestyle. Just like elephants have a diet and pandas have a diet, you also have a diet.
Diets, as we’ve come to define them, are often rigid and limiting plans featuring tons of restrictions and alternatives that you’ve never even heard of. They’re full of calorie counting, stress and conflicting information.
You probably switched to this new polar opposite lifestyle overnight, it probably had you starving and cranky. Seemingly impossible to stick to for extended amounts of time, it eventually ended about as abruptly as it started, leaving you to fall right back into your old ways that were never benefiting you.
What I want to offer you instead, is the idea of mindful eating. Mindful eating is not a diet but a lifestyle of noticing what you put into your body and how it affects you.
In letting your body guide you, you can make more sustainable changes and it’s far less overwhelming since it happens gradually.
Diets don’t work. Lifestyle changes do. If you’ve tried a hundred diets and none of them stuck for you, I’d ask: have you sat around and asked yourself “why?” What did they all have in common? Why did they fail?
They failed because they weren’t designed for your unique body and your personal lifestyle.
Food Journal
The first step in creating a mindful eating practice is creating a food journal. A food journal is the most effective way to practice mindful eating.
Keeping track of what you put into your body and how it makes you feel, can highlight problem foods and beneficial foods in your diet.
Knowing what is helping you and what is hurting you is the first step in creating a diet that works best for you and your body.
Slowly crowding out the bad with the good leads to small sustainable changes that can lead to lasting results in all areas affected by what we eat (which is essentially EVERY area of life).
Your food journal can be as simple or as complex as you’d like, depending on your in depth preferences. The most important things to track are:
- Everything you eat everyday.
- How it made you feel on a spiritual, intellectual and physical level.
Yes, I highly recommend all three. We’re multi dimensional beings, not just a body. If we’re not taking care of all aspects of ourselves, we leave space for negative manifestations to take hold and/or not be cleared.
We want all around, whole and balanced self care. Especially when it comes to diet. We are what we eat, after all.
Listen to Your Body
Mindfulness means being in the present moment. When applying it to diet, it means not only noticing your food as you eat it, but how it makes you feel now and later.
- Do certain foods or drinks make you bloated?
- Give you indigestion?
- Make you tired?
- Ramp up your anxiety?
Your body is always trying to tell you how to treat it. It speaks to you all day, everyday. Telling you what it likes, what it doesn’t like, what you need.
Mindful eating is a language of translation between the body and the consciousness. A tool to step into our truth and highest self.
When we listen to it and adjust accordingly, we feel better, have more energy and can more positively interact with our world.
Listen to Your Mind
When we start paying attention to how food makes us feel, we begin to realize that we knew what we should be and shouldn’t be eating all along (and that it wasn’t really as difficult as we were feeling it was).
We tend to live in denial about food because, well, it tastes good and we want it. Food is a very intimate part of our life and we tend to turn to it for comfort and fulfillment.
We write off our discomforts as “part of getting older” or “a fact of life”. The truth is, we tell ourselves these excuses because it’s easier to live in denial than it is to make changes to our lifestyle.
The bigger truth is, getting started in making these changes is the hardest part of it. Once you start, momentum grows and it becomes increasingly easier.
Don’t quiet or hush your thoughts. If you know you shouldn’t eat something, try and find the strength to pass on it. I know, self control around food is one of the hardest things we can learn to overcome. It can be an addiction, like any drug.
But know, mastering one’s self is the greatest of achievements and with mastery of self comes a universe of conquerable opportunities.
The satisfaction of making the healthy decision far outweighs the guilt from giving in to unhealthy desires (They are false and empty desires after all) and in experiencing this satisfaction, we can find true comfort and fulfillment.
Besides, we’re continuously wanting to focus on raising our vibrations, which means choosing the higher vibration options and they’re positive outcomes.
Listen to Your Spirit
Just as some food doesn’t sit well with our bodies, some food doesn’t sit well with our souls.
Take the meat and dairy industry, for example. Animals (living beings with souls of their own) are subject to horrendous living conditions and abuse for our consumption.
If you’re not into “save the animals”, “veganism” or the like and eating these poor creatures sits well with your soul (also, really ask your higher self if it truly does sit well with you or if you’ve just been conditioned to suppress any guilt), don’t let me lose you just yet.
Hear me out.
Everything and everyone is made of swirling energy that’s being continuously transferred from one place to another.
When these animals are experiencing these tragically inhumane conditions, it causes stress and all sorts of bad energy which stays within its products long after it’s gone.
When we consume this negative energy, it becomes part of us.
To live a more positive and higher vibrational existence, we need to surround ourselves thoroughly with only that which serves us.
If you refuse to 86 animal products from your diet (I’ve drastically cut back but still eat some meat) then rethink the way you do it.
Look for locally sourced, free range farms and humane alternatives. Hunt your own game and recognize and thank your prey (yes, like on Avatar).
Make conscious decisions based on how they affect not only yourself, but the world we all live in. In this way, you’re serving the greater good, which always sits well with your soul.
After all, how can we ever hope to live in a peaceful world with our fellow humans if we can’t even live in a peaceful world with animals?
Small Changes
Remember, we’re not trying to throw everything out over night. That’s exactly why most diets fail. They’re unsustainable, temporary changes in lifestyle which means you get unsustainable, temporary changes in yourself.
Also, remember that results take time. It takes several months of consistent effort before noticeable results will be seen. Be patient, be determined, be positive in what you’re trying to accomplish.
Focus on nutrition, not calories. It’s about how we feel, everything else will come as long as we stay in alignment with our highest vibrations.
Focus small, only on one or two things at a time. That’s how momentum is built and what is hard today will become simple as long as you stay in tune with why you’re doing this.
It’s not about perfection, it’s about progress.
Best Vibes Always, S.S.Blake
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Author
S.S.Blake; Spiritual Life Coach, Yoga + Meditation Teacher and Founder of Earth and Water
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