"How to Eat" in Steps

We'll talk more this week about the whys of eating competence, but I thought you might be interested in a bit of how, in case you're excited to begin.

First of all, it isn't very complicated.  Perhaps all you needed was the permission to eat and enjoy your food.  If so, don't screw it up with rules.

But perhaps you have a sneaking suspicion in the back of your mind that all this "enjoy your food" stuff is just a trick to get you to eat less, like "chew your food twenty times before you swallow" or "French Women Don't Get Fat".  (Oh yeah?  This is Collette, who wrote Gigi.)

Well, repeat to yourself: "This isn't to trick myself into eating less.  I can eat as much as I want, I just have to settle down."  If that doesn't help, you can use the steps Satter (Secrets of Feeding A Healthy Family) recommends for learning how to tune into your internal regulation.  Remember, this is not a ploy to get you to quit eating sooner.  (If after each step you start feeling like, "I should stop eating now" then catch yourself and ask if you want to stop.  If you don't want to, then don't.)  This is not a way to eat less.  This is not a diet, a trick, or a weight-loss method; it's just a way to learn to hear your appetite and fullness.

The steps are:

1. Center and give permission before eating.  Try for meals with foods you like.  In other words, pause for a moment and be thankful, and remind yourself that you can eat as much as you like, of food you like.  This might feel weird, or scary, or overindulgent--we tend to think that people who don't think much about what they eat are somehow being virtuous, and that time spent eating is wasted time--that you should do other stuff at the same time.  That's why

2. Increase the frequency of step 1 is it's own step.  When you can do step 1 half the time, Satter says to move to

3. Do step 1, plus pay careful attention to each mouthful for 1 minute.  Again, this might feel weird or overindulgent, because good food is intensely pleasurable.  There is nothing sinful about experiencing the pleasure in food.  On the other hand, it might feel uncomfortable because of issues you have with specific foods or even with the act of enjoying food.  It also takes a lot of concentration, so just do as much as you can for a bit.  Stay at this step until you're doing it half the time or more.  Just notice how the food feels, tastes, and what it's like in your mouth, and ignore the next bite in favor of the one you're experiencing.  (Like, "mmm, pie is good and the crust tastes like butter".)

Remember, this is NOT a trick to get you to eat more slowly so you will eat less.  No, no, no.

4. Do steps 1 and 3, plus have a focused snack daily.  Use the focused snack, which should take only a couple of minutes to eat, as a time to practice paying attention to each mouthful for 2 to 3 minutes.  You are likely feeling, reading this, that this will make you into a glutton.  It won't.  Just keep giving thanks for the food.

5. Continue with steps 1 and 4 and increase step 3 to 2 minutes.  Keep yourself at each step until you are doing it half the time or more.

6. Identify your stopping place.  (Satter's advice for this one is so good I won't paraphrase it.  I'm hoping that by plastering links to her book all over my blog and telling you all that it's a book I think everyone should own, they won't mind.)  "If you are systematic about pacing yourself through the steps, you will discover your stopping place--the place where you truly feel satisfied and ready to stop eating.  This will feel entirely different from stopping because you think you should or stopping because you are too full to take another bite.  Depending on how uch you have struggled with your eating, you may experience finding your stopping place as an epiphany--an inutitive grasp of your innate capability with eating.  On the other hand, you may find it helpful but not particularly thrilling."

One clarification she makes which I thought was particularly helpful was that you are NOT to consider the end of hunger as your stopping point.  It's more like considering satisfaction and satiety your stopping point, the point where you are happy and the rest of the pie loses interest for you.  Comfortably full.  The image that comes to my mind is Homer and Mr. Burns enjoying A Good Sit.

Again, this is NOT a trick to eat less.  Maybe your satiety will dictate you eat an entire pie and half a turkey.  How in the heck will I know?  I'm not you, and who knows what your body had to do today.  It might require that many calories.

Just thought I'd put the steps out there, so that if you want something concrete to do while we continue to talk about theory, you can start.

I know I'm impatient like that...

Cheers,

Breanna

P.S.  Did you pick up on my subtle indications that it's ok to eat pie?