Use mindfulness to get out of your daily rut
Chomp...chomp...“Ugh! Why am I always in so much of a hurry? I always seem to be bolting my food down...there’s never enough time...eating like this can’t be good for me...gotta finish this and get back to work...”
Sally was in a hurry at lunchtime - again - and was hardly chewing her food at all. It never felt right eating like this and it often made her stomach feel somewhat unsettled afterwards. She knew that it couldn’t possibly be good for her and yet she always seemed to do it again and again...
I’m sure that you have had one or two experiences that are similar Sally’s. Everyone knows that chewing your food more thoroughly is good you, and taking your time over a meal in general is just way better and more pleasurable than the hurried state in which we often consume food.
Chewing thoroughly breaks down the food more which makes it easier to digest. This means that you are going to gain more benefit from whatever it is you are eating (provided you are eating something healthy) and feel more satisfied.
So let’s look at three simple exercises to encourage a mindful approach.:
Slow down
Follow the food down
The coffee meditation
Slow down
Before you start eating, take a few seconds to look at what it is you are about to eat, savour whatever food is in front of you. Notice the smell - what different aromas are there? You don’t have to spend long at all over this process, but even a few moments will help you to be more mindful of the food and how you eat it. When you start to eat try to consciously chew the food a little more thoroughly than usual. You don’t need to chew each mouthful X times, just be aware of the whole eating process and you will be more likely to slow down.
Follow the food down
As you are eating, try to follow the whole process of the food moving from the plate, into your mouth and then into your body. Usually we are completely unaware of this unless we eat something we don’t particularly like, or something too cold, hot or spicy. This might actually prove to be really interesting to observe.
The coffee meditation
This doesn’t have to be coffee, it could be any drink you are about to consume. For this exercise you are going to deliberately consume part of your drink a lot slowly than you normally would. For the ‘slow down’ exercise you were encouraged to eat a little slower than normal, but for this you are going to slow right down. You might be pondering what the value of this is, however, we can find insights into ourselves in everyday activities if we sometimes do them in a completely different way to normal. “Slow down and direct atten- tion to your food and drink.”
Wrap up
For each part of the process, whether picking up your cup, sipping the drink, swallowing the liquids remaining in your mouth etc. try to make it twice as slow as you normally would. It might even feel a little uncomfortable at first, and you may want to do this by yourself if you think you are going to become self-conscious by doing this in a public place. Afterwards, reflect for a few moments on how you felt it went.