Total Body Diet For Dummies

Chapter 14

Mindful Eating for Every Occasion

In This Chapter

Eating mindfully in various life situations

Training your brain to be more mindful

Building skills to conquer mindless eating

Mastering mindful eating

Mindless eating opportunities are all around us. There’s a candy dish at the dry cleaners, a platter of donuts and cookies tempting you at the office, free food samples at the grocery store, and indulgent snacks at your child’s soccer game. The cards are stacked up high for mindful eaters — and especially for those in training. Mindful eating and living requires practice, patience, and resilience. Perfection is not possible, but striving to do better is.

When you’ve embarked on the journey of mindful eating, every eating opportunity becomes a chance to craft your skills. You’ll lose the fear that comes from daily eating decisions — and make them joyfully, objectively, and without judgment.

In this chapter, you learn how to go into different eating decisions with the knowledge of internal hunger of when to start and when to stop eating. You’ll learn to eat with intention and gratitude for the food on your plate, as well as respect where and how it was made and grown.

Making Sure You’re Never Caught Off Guard

It’s easy to get caught off guard with food popping up everywhere. That’s why you want to wake up in the morning with a mindful eating mindset. By starting the day with a game plan — consisting of structured meals and snacks — and envisioning what the day’s events may bring, you’ll make mindfulness part of your everyday life.

Here are some simple ways to put on your mindful eating cap:

· Before your feet hit the floor in the morning say a mindful eating mantra (a simple phrase or sentence to keep you present in the moment of eating). For example, your mantra can be as simple as, “I am going to be present with my eating today” or “Tune in today.” By saying your mantra a few times before you get out of bed, it’s more likely to stick with you.

· If you have a setback, realign yourself right away. There’s no reason to fret about a cookie at work or cheese ravioli sample at the grocery store, but getting back on the right eating track is essential. Knowing what and when you’ve eaten is vital to building a mindful, long-term relationship with food.

· Plan balanced meals and snacks so that you don’t mindlessly munch throughout day. According to the book Mindless Eating: Why We Eat More Than We Think, by Brian Wansink, PhD, we have an “imperfect food memory,” and our stomachs are bad at counting calories, especially when we’ve wolfed down a bag of chips at the kitchen sink or eaten ice cream while watching our favorite TV shows. The solution is planning — the more structure to your eating, the less apt you’ll be to stray.

In the following sections, I offer tips on how to maintain your mindfulness no matter where life takes you — from vacations to holidays to parties to weekends.

Holding onto common sense on vacation

Time off from work to relax is a basic human need. It’s easy to throw in the eating towel when you’re traipsing around Europe or relaxing by a lake or at the beach. With delicious culinary choices and friends and family around, there’s more opportunity to eat and drink. There’s nothing wrong with that as long as you do it in a mindful way.

Planning your vacation time may seem counterintuitive. You want to go into your week away with looser reigns, but still keeping an eye on what I call your mindful eating compass — the inner sense or guide of what and how you’re eating. If your mindful eating compass is steering away from healthful foods like vegetables, fruits, lean proteins, beans, nuts, lowfat/fat-free dairy products, steer it back on course at the next meal or snack. Keep in mind, it’s not all or nothing — you have the freedom to make mindful food choices, even when you’re on vacation.

Here are some simple tips to reining in your eating while on vacation:

· Pack healthy snacks like whole fruits, nuts, whole-grain crackers, rice cakes, or trail mix on your vacation adventures.

· Stay hydrated with water. It’s tempting to drink more alcohol than you would normally, but alcohol can dehydrate you — and it packs a lot of excess calories. You can cut calories in alcoholic beverages by adding sparkling water to wine for spritzers or a splash of 100 percent fruit juice and cut-up fruit for a mocktail.

· Don’t skip meals. If you do, you’ll be ravenous and overeat foods that may not be the healthiest.

· Eat the foods you like, but just in smaller portions. If there are chips and guacamole or bread and butter on the table at a meal, put a small portion on a plate and eat that instead of grazing mindlessly. For dessert, choose a small sweet treat like a brownie square or a cookie. Savor and enjoy!

Keeping your head over the holidays

Mindful eating is tough around the holidays where socializing and food are closely linked. The holidays are notorious for weight gain, but recent research in the journal Physiology and Behavior reveals that the average American gains about one pound between November and January. That doesn’t seem like a lot, but over time that one pound a year of weight gain adds up. How can you keep your mind in the eating game when the season to eat and drink is upon you? Modifying your behaviors, especially at this time, can help fend off weight gain while still allowing you to enjoy all the fun of the season.

With family, social, and work gatherings a big part of the holidays, setting boundaries will enable more mindful eating at this time. Here are some ways you can make mindful eating a priority over the holiday season:

· Maintain your food, feelings, and physical activity logs. You’ll be more aware of the holiday extras that creep in, as well as the emotions that come into play with your eating events.

· Don’t give up your regular physical activity. Fitness fuels eating well and vice versa. Squeeze in your workouts where you have to, if time is tight.

· Be choosey about which events you attend. It’s okay to decline, politely — steering away from some events will keep you on your schedule of healthy eating.

· Savor the power of one. Don’t deny yourself your aunt’s holiday cookies or your brother’s famous truffle candies — take one and savor it. Think about the taste of it in your mouth, on your tongue, and seeping into your taste buds as you swallow it. Truly enjoy that one.

· Evolve your eating. Think about the bounty of good food that you’re fortunate to have access to, such as fruits, vegetables, whole grains, beans, nuts, seeds, eggs, lean meat, poultry, fish, and lowfat dairy foods. Evolve how and what you eat — your holidays will be more enjoyable for it!

Planning before the party

Who doesn’t love a good party? Whether it’s a birthday, engagement, retirement, wedding, or graduation party, eating and drinking are part of the fun. Whether you’re the partygoer or party thrower, it takes planning. Either role takes a good dose of mindfulness to balance your consumption before, during, and after the event.

Here’s a party planner checklist for the party thrower and the partygoer to create a mindful event:

Party Thrower	Partygoer
Don’t throw the party hungry. Eat regular meals (and avoid snacking on party food during the setup).	Don’t go to the party hungry. Eat regular meals and a snack within an hour of the party to satisfy hunger.
Plan healthy food options for guests like veggie platters and hummus, steamed spring rolls, salads, chili, soups, grilled meat, and chicken and veggie kabobs.	Circulate the room and don’t hang out by the food table. Instead, peruse the options, take a plate of food, sit down, and enjoy.
Hydrate with water before the party. Drink alcohol moderately. For overall health, it’s smart to drink responsibly — one drink for women and up to two drinks for men. (The more you drink, the more likely you are to mindlessly eat.)	Hydrate with water before the party. Drink alcohol moderately. For overall health, it’s smart to drink responsibly — one drink for women and up to two drinks for men. (The more you drink, the more likely you are to mindlessly eat.)
Exercise the day of the party to alleviate stress and keep your energy up during the party.	Exercise before the party to offset additional calories that you may consume.
Relax and enjoy your guests!	Enjoy the company and not just the food!

Waking up to healthy eating on weekends

You know the drill: You’re so on top of your eating during the week — keeping neat and tidy food logs; planning healthy, balanced meals and snacks; drinking plenty of water and limiting sugary beverages, alcohol, and highly processed foods. And then Friday night and it all comes loose. What’s the deal with weekends? So much is tearing you away from your mindful eating mantra: You sleep later, do more social eating (and drinking), and have less structured time and, thus, less planning.

Mindless weekends can easily lead to weight gain and stop weight loss, according to a study in the journal Obesity, which included 48 healthy adults, ages 50 to 60 years, comparing one year of calorie restriction and one year of daily exercise. The results showed that both groups were down in calorie balance on weekdays, but it was a different story on weekends. Both groups consumed more on the weekends and were less active, which halted weight loss in the calorie restriction group and lead to weight gain in the daily exercise groups. These results make the case for mindfulness on the weekends.

Get mindful on the weekends in the following ways:

· Start weekends in a healthy way with a balanced breakfast. Try these:

· Oatmeal, lowfat milk, and berries

· Whole-grain toast, a scrambled egg, and a sliced tomato

· Whole-grain cereal, plain lowfat yogurt, and sliced fruit

· A banana, berries, flaxseed, and kefir smoothie

· Get enough sleep, but not too much. Catching up on sleep on the weekends sounds like a good idea, but the reality is that more than nine hours of sleep a night just throws off your day. Stay on track by setting an alarm on weekends. Indulge yourself in bed by hitting snooze a few times for a few additional minutes of shut-eye, but get excited for the day ahead. You’ll feel better for it!

· Get moving. Plan physical activity into your weekends. You don’t have to go to the gym, but you can walk to or from the store, take your kids to the park, walk your dog, take a bike ride — whatever you want and like to do, go for it.

· Plan to eat one meal out, but the rest in. It’s okay to eat out on weekends, just not every meal. Typical restaurant meals add up to excess calories, salt, and sugar. If you limit the dining out on weekends, you’ll save calories and money, too.

A Mindful Eating Toolbox for Total Body Wellness

There are a bevy of mindful eating tools that you can use in your everyday life for total body wellness — the key is knowing what they are and how to make them work in your life. Let’s look at things that you can throw in your mindful eating toolbox.

With the focus on building a healthy relationship with food and fostering long-term healthy eating habits, the Total Body Diet aims to teach you new ways to talk to yourself about food, soothe yourself without food, and recognize and tackle the emotional eating triggers that cause overeating by listening to your inner food guru — that little voice that tells you if you’re hungry or full.

Talking the mindful eating lingo

Have you ever thought about how you talk to yourself about food? Called mindful speech by Dr. Susan Albers in her book Eat, Drink, and Be Mindful, it’s a compassionate, empathetic, and kind way to talk to yourself. It may sound simple, but changing your lingo to muffle the critical self-talk that has seeped in over the years takes constant practice. With how and what you eat, what you say inside can set the tone for your day and overall life!

Mindful eating lingo that’s kind and compassionate sounds like this:

· “I don’t have to be perfect. I just need to keep trying.”

· “What I choose to eat is my personal decision.”

· “If I were one my friends, I’d forgive myself and move on.”

· “I need to pause, take a breath, and center myself again.”

Fill in the sentences below to practice your compassionate mindful lingo in your whole life:

· I am a good person because __________.

· My greatest talent is __________.

· My friends would say I am __________.

· I am proud that I __________.

Rewarding yourself without food

As you work on your mindful lingo with food, as well as your total body wellness, think about ways to pat yourself on the back when you’ve come through an eating challenge or worked hard to let go of old ways and forge new pathways. Small steps deserve praise and recognition — even if only in your mind. Picturing your goals in your mind’s eye and then a non-food reward once you’ve achieved it (for example, a new dress, diary, or book to read). Research has shown that children respond to nonfood rewards, such as stickers and verbal praise, and choose healthier foods as a result. Also, when you have something to look forward to, it makes day-to-day life happier!

Set up a monthly goal calendar and write in rewards to look ahead for. Here’s an example:

Week	Goal	Reward
1	Incorporate veggies at snack time daily.	Get a manicure or massage.
2	Bring lunch to work daily.	Go to the movies.
3	Eat fish at least twice this week.	Get a new book.
4	Have an ounce of nuts (almonds, walnuts, pistachios) every day this week.	Buy a new water bottle.

Here are some other ways to reward yourself besides eating and drinking:

· Getting a facial or a haircut

· Buying new clothes, shoes, or makeup

· Buying kitchen gadgets or culinary tools

· Taking a day trip to a nearby town

· Buying walking or running shoes

· Signing up for a 5K race

· Buying tickets to a musical, play, or opera

· Downloading new music

· Planning a vacation to visit friends or family

Saying farewell to emotional triggers

Feelings — both positive and negative ones — are naturally connected to food. Think of the foods that make you happy. They could remind you of social gatherings, holidays, or dishes your grandmother made with love. As a mindful eater, it’s great to identify with these feelings and appreciate them — and then step aside, allowing the nourishing aspect of foods to take the lead. For example, you love your grandmother’s shoestring fries and steak. It not only tastes good, but it offers your body vitamin C and potassium in the potatoes and protein and iron in the steak. But it’s not a good idea to eat this meal every week due to its high dose of saturated fat. So, when you do have it, relish the flavors, aromas, and positive feelings it evokes.

What do you do when certain foods are emotional triggers (foods that cause you to overeat for other reasons besides hunger)? Positive emotions (like happiness, contentment, and joy), as well as negative emotions (such as loneliness, sorrow, and anger), can cause you to eat — and potentially overeat. There’s nothing wrong with an occasional chocolate or potato chip indulgence, but when it becomes a regular occurrence, there may be an issue.

If you want to rid yourself of emotional food triggers, look at your food choices differently. The operative word is choice. You have the power to choose to eat that food or not. Instead of putting the power on the food or beverage, take back the power to choose. In her book, Eat.Q.: Unlock the Weight Loss Power of Emotional Intelligence, Susan Albers, PsyD, points out that subtle words like can’t, should, ought to, and must drive you to want craved foods more. Think about it: If you say, “I can’t have chocolate,” it takes away your power to choose and you want the forbidden chocolate. But if you say, “I choose not to have chocolate now,” it’s not a permanent directive — it’s more flexible, which enables you to maybe have some later, or not. Find words that are empowering rather than victimizing when it comes to food.

If you’re feeling emotionally powerless with food, seek advice from your primary care physician, a mental health professional, or a registered dietitian nutritionist (RDN) who specializes in eating disorders.

Saying Goodbye to Saboteurs

Your environment is a complex place filled with people, places, and things that can sabotage your efforts for total body wellness. It’s easy to shed saboteurs, if you have a mindful mindset.

Dining out smart

Many restaurants have websites where they list current menu items, nutrition information, and recipes. A myriad of websites are devoted to restaurant nutrition information. For example, check out www.healthydiningfinder.com.

Here’s a checklist of ways to be a mindful eater when you dine out:

· Avoid the “get your money’s worth” buffet syndrome.

· Don’t go to the restaurant ravenous.

· Look at everything on the menu before making your choices.

· Downsize — don’t super-size.

· Incorporate low-calorie and filling vegetables.

· Ask for bread or chips to be removed or not brought to the table.

· Share desserts with others.

· Always ask for sauces, gravies, and dressings on the side and use them sparingly.

· Ask the waiter to hold the cheese or go easy on the cheese.

· Avoid menu items that are fried, crispy, creamed, au gratin, breaded, or scalloped.

· Reduce the mayonnaise, nuts, bacon, sour cream, butter, guacamole, and other high-fat condiments.

· Watch out for liquid calories (alcoholic beverages, regular sodas, and juices).

· Eat slowly. Chew your food carefully and put your utensils down between bites.

· Stick with lean cuts of meat, such as fish, chicken, turkey, bison, beef, or pork tenderloin.

· Ask for a to-go box when the food is served. Then put half of what’s on your plate into the box — before you start eating.

Restaurant menus are designed to lure you into ordering foods that you imagine will taste good for a higher price, according to research by Brian Wansink, PhD, author of Slim by Design: Mindless Eating Solutions for Everyday Life. It doesn’t hurt to ask the wait staff for lighter menu items that get the most raves.

Creating a new work environment

Whether you’re a new hire or a tried-and-true employee where you work, you can always change up your work environment to a more mindful eating space. One of the biggest complaints I hear when I see weight loss clients is that co-workers are bringing in unhealthy treats and filling up candy dishes to tempt the office. You can be the beacon of change in your workplace by instigating new mindful eating rules of conduct (if for no else, but yourself!).

Mindful eating rules of conduct at work might include the following:

· Choose fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, and lowfat yogurt as snacks at work.

· Limit dining out by bringing a healthy, balanced lunch to work. Sit and eat it away from your computer or phone.

· Eat a snack midafternoon (around 3 or 4 p.m.) to avoid getting too hungry before dinner and stopping off on the way home from work.

· Sip water (still or sparkling) throughout the day. Limit your soda (regular and diet), gourmet coffee drinks, and juices.

· If possible, take a different route to the bathroom, boss’s office, or exit if you have to pass the candy dish, vending machine, or cafeteria. Or replace the temptations with a fruit bowl and get the whole office eating healthier.

· Seek out an accountability partner. By asking someone else to join in your efforts, you can set goals together and follow up with each other.

When healthy foods are more convenient, attractive, and normal to consume, you’re more apt to eat those foods. In the journal Psychology and Marketing, a study found that when foods are placed in a convenient place on the counter in attractive packaging and its normal to eat (like produce in front of the fridge or on the counter), it was eaten more often!

Making healthier convenient choices

As mentioned earlier in this chapter, if healthy foods are convenient, you’re more apt to eat them. Society is plagued by unhealthy convenience foods, so how do you make healthier foods easier to access? There are key ways to make healthier foods top of mind. Sometimes even the most mindful eaters can miss the healthier options, if they aren’t apparent or a more enticing food catches their eye first.

Here are some surefire ways to make healthier foods more convenient:

· At home: On the center of the counter, put a fruit bowl. In the center of the fridge, place cut-up veggies, lowfat yogurt, and kefir and fruit squeezes and ground flaxseeds.

· At the office: Put a fruit bowl at the reception area. In the kitchen, stock healthy snacks like nuts, yogurt, and fruit.

· On the go: Bring fruit, homemade trail mix (almonds/walnuts, raisins, and lowfat granola), and baggies of popcorn or rice cakes.

Craving Healthful Foods First

Some foods are hard to resist. Why are food cravings (intense desires for a specific food that is difficult to resist) associated with three key ingredients: sugar, salt, and fat? These flavor sensations activate the reward centers of the brain, according to the book The End of Overeating, by David Kessler, MD. Craved foods like cake, pizza, and fried foods activate pathways in the brain to want more of that food while it’s being eaten.

Food cravings among overweight and obese people have been studied using a tool called the Food Craving Inventory (FCI), which is made up of 28 food items and ranks the frequency of the cravings, which are self-reported by research subjects. With everything from chocolate, which scores high in the list, to pasta to hot dogs to candy, craved foods run the gamut in the sugary, salty, fatty realm. And people with a healthy body weight have food cravings, too, because the brain is set up to desire these highly palatable foods.

Instead of fighting unhealthy food cravings, you can thwart the cravings with some good-for-you swaps. Imagine an intense desire for rice cakes and hummus or pistachio-crusted baked chicken breast or roasted vegetables and quinoa. By retraining your palate to want less sugar, salt, and fat, you’ll soon discover that your cravings will start to turn that way.

Turning food cravings into healthy food moments

The whole gist of eating with intention toward health, happiness, and inner peace falls in line with transforming your cravings into healthy foods moments. Stopping to ask yourself some real questions while in the throes of a food craving is vital. What if you could trick your brain into wanting more healthy foods by making them delicious to your senses? Thinking on your feet to make healthy food swaps can be challenging, but it’s effective.

Here are some food craving swaps to add more filling vegetables, fiber, whole grains, and healthy fats:

Food Craving	More Healthy Craving
French fries	Baked sweet potato fries
Pepperoni pizza	Veggie pizza with whole-grain crust
Linguini alfredo	Angel-hair pasta with pink tomato sauce (made with part-skim ricotta cheese)
Chocolate cake	Dark chocolate cake pop
Bacon cheeseburger	Turkey burger with avocado, lettuce, and tomato

Allowing small indulgences and moving on

It’s difficult to swap every one of your cravings. The key is to put a halt on giving in to them too much. If you don’t, your whole body will feel the overindulgence — and over time it will lead to excess inches, pounds, and potential health risks. However, savoring small cravings, like an ounce of dark chocolate or ½ cup of ice cream or a mini-burger, puts the craving in its place — as a smaller part of your world.

Mastering the art of small indulgence is truly a craft that you have to hone and develop over time. It does work — as your mind and body become more aligned to what you need. As much as you need to make room for healthful foods, you need to leave space for a few indulgences. Relegate the sweets and treats for a small part of your caloric intake because they take up prime nutrition real estate that more quality calories could be occupying.

Here’s how to allow room for small indulgences:

· Practice taking smaller bites of cake, cookies, candy, chips, and fries. The smaller your bites, the more you’ll savor it and enjoy eating less.

· Share desserts with others.

· Pair fruit with a drizzle of chocolate, such as pears or strawberries. You still get your chocolate fix, but in a small dose.

Writing it down

I have a client who emails me her food logs every night. It’s a simple act with no bells or whistles. It’s just the food and then a sentence or sometimes just a phrase about her feelings for the day. She finds solace in writing it down. Picture reading your food diary five years from now. You’ll see how far you’ve come with your emotions, feelings, and relationship with food. It’s insightful and empowering to see your progress. Not only does the act of writing help you in the present, but it sets a tone for the future. It allows you to look back and realize how far you’ve come.

Every day, set the intention of at least writing down a thought, feeling, or association between food and you. It could be any of the following:

· What and how you ate at your meals (for example, “Moderate plate of pasta with clam sauce in record speed — rushing to get to the theater”)

· Why you ate what you ate (for example, “Hot fudge sundae at a kid’s birthday party”)

· Emotional triggers that day that lead you to overeat (for example, “I was on a tight work deadline so I ate an entire bag of salt and vinegar chips at my computer; didn’t feel great about that choice later, but it didn’t define my day”)

Now grab a notebook, scrap of paper, or your smartphone and jot it down. If you write it down, you won’t forget it — and chances are, you’ll learn a thing or two about yourself!

Budgeting for Extras

As part of your calorie accounting measures, your Total Body Diet ledger should factor in extras — like an ounce of dark chocolate or a few crackers with an ounce of cheese or a small vanilla latte. Your energy balance (calories in versus calories out) won’t be thrown off if you factor in extras along with moving more. The key is to do it mindfully and know going in that you have to eat slowly and savor what you eat.

If you gulp down your food without chewing enough, it’s almost like it never happened. So chew consciously and thoroughly. You’ll enjoy it more!

Choosing healthful foods and less (unhealthy) extras

It makes you feel better to know that you can have a couple of small extras every day. However, factor in that pudding cup after you’ve had plenty of nutrient-dense foods. Ask yourself, “Have I had fruits and veggies today?” Consciously make a decision to eat those foods first. You almost crowd out the unhealthy choices with the healthy stuff.

Try not to make a loaded extras decisions first thing in the morning. Instead, enjoy a healthy breakfast of a slice of whole-grain toast with a tablespoon of peanut butter and a small piece of fruit or a cup of whole-grain cereal with lowfat milk and berries. Typically, you know you’ll want an extra fix after lunch or after dinner, so wait and make the decision based on the nutrient-density of your food choices overall that day.

Budgeting your calories (with your finances)

If it was as easy to burn through calories as money, waistline watching would be a breeze! One of the greatest ways to look at your calories budget is like your financial budget. It’s like balancing your checkbook. Do you think hard when you spend $100 extra a day or do you just do it, record it in your check ledger, and know you have X amount of money left to spend? Like extra money in the bank — saved for a rainy day — saving calories provides you with the security of not overdrawing your energy account and allows you more to spend (or expend — as in physical activity) later. It’s a balancing act that provides stability, as in body weight and fiscal status.

For example, say you spend 300 extra calories today on a candy bar. Could you have saved those calories or even spent less by forgoing the candy bar or having a mini candy bar instead? Balance comes in with expending the extra calories. So, if you know you’re going to run two miles or bike to and from work and burn those extra calories, then go for it! But if you’re just sitting around, the extra calories may pack on extra pounds over the long run.

Saving calories and money

A great way to save calories is to eat more volume. Penn State University professor Barbara Rolls, PhD, calls it volumetrics, or consuming higher volume foods for less calories. If you’re adding high-fiber, high-water-content foods to your diet, like fruits and veggies, as well as broth-based soups and hot whole-grain cereal, chances are, you’re filling up on fewer calories, as well as saving money over the long run. If you think about long-term healthcare costs of managing heart disease or type-2 diabetes — two diseases where the risk goes up with poor eating habits — it makes sense to choose healthful foods to save big bucks later (as well as extend the quality of your life). You may think you’re saving money at the cheap fast food restaurants now, but you may be paying the healthcare price later!

You can eat 2 cups of grapes or ½ cup of raisins for the same calories. Which would satisfy you more? The grapes, of course.

Nature has a way of helping out our natural appetites — as well as fending off disease — because the most satiating, water-filled foods are also high in fiber and plant-based nutrients.

The following fruits and vegetables contain 90 percent or higher water:

Broccoli	Eggplant	Sweet peppers
Cabbage	Grapefruit	Tomatoes
Cantaloupe	Spinach	Watermelon
Cauliflower	Strawberries	Zucchini

So, it behooves you to get at least 2 cups of fruit and 2 to 3 cups of vegetables every day!