Mindful Eating

Part of my commitment to improving myself  this 2015 is to stay healthy. 

From August 2013 to September 2014 my great achievement was that I was able to lose a  very significant amount of weight in a span of one year. Prior to August 2013, I failed my annual physical medical exam since my blood pressure keeps  on shooting up. I was not in good health that time as I was also dealing with gout and was not living a healthy lifestyle since I was spending more time working at the office and less me time and time for having real workouts and physical exercise.

I was able to lose weight by changing my eating habits, making healthier food choices when eating out, cooking and eating more home-cooked, low-sodium and healthy dishes, avoiding deep-fried and processed food, drinking more water(drinking around 10-12 glasses per day), giving up drinking high calorie drinks likes sodas and sweetened drinks, and eating more vegetables.

There are so many salad choices you can have,  all you need to do is to be open to trying
 out new and healthy salad dishes and opt for low calorie dressings.

Losing weight is not such an easy thing to do considering that there are so many temptations around me and considering that I am also a foodie who enjoys trying out new restaurants it really was such a challenge for me. It really required a lot of patience, discipline and mindful eating on my part. Plus, I also had to deal with people who were not very supportive of my lifestyle change and were trying to persuade me to eat not so healthy stuff several times and I simply had to say "No" everytime.

I think the level of commitment I had to lose weight was similar to the experience of a person veering away from drugs ha ha ha...but in my case unhealthy food was the equivalent of it.

I have read a book entitled "Mindful Eating" recently written by Rachel Bartholomew and Mandy Pearson. The book focuses on Mindful Eating which helps one to fall in love with real food, which nourishes your health, vitality and well-being. After all, losing weight or staying at a healthy weight is also a "mental game" in such a way that you always have to remind yourself to be mindful in choosing the food that you will eat.

Through "Mindfulness", one is wide-awake in whatever he or she is doing and it also is about paying attention in the present moment without judgements. Mindfulness puts you back in control and enables one to live with purpose. This is linked to having a positive impact on one's health and well-being.

Another interesting part in the book is that you get to think about the type of eater that you are. There are several types.

1. Busy eater - who gulps down and rush everytime they have a meal
2. Fuel eater - who eat to live and are not interested in food
3. Convenience food junkie - who always get take-out food from convenience stores/ fast food outlets
4. Reluctant chef- who does not enjoy cooking
5. Social eater- who does not eat much when they are alone
6. Fussy eater - who only like certain food types
7. Grazer - who graze constantly for snacks and tends to taste the food while cooking
8. Problem eater - who has a constant battle with food
9. Comfort eater - who eats when they are unhappy
10. Habitual eater - who eats the same things at the same time on the same day every week
11. Yo-yo dieter - who tried every diet but could not keep off the weight
12. The chef - who lives to eat and whose life revolves around food preparation and eating
13. Treat eater - who treats food as a favourite way to treat oneself when they need a lift
14. Calorie controller - who knows the calorific content of every food that they eat

I think in my case I gained weight before since I  really did not work out much and I was both "the chef" type of eater and sometimes also a "treat eater" such that I like to go for really nice restaurants and sumptuous meals when I feel that I need to treat myself to de-stress after a long day at work. I also use to have lots of snacks at home and most of which were not really healthy treats.

Some useful tips from the book are as follows:

• Be in the moment and allow yourself to switch from "doing" to "being". 
• Focus on Gratitude as the true path to happiness is appreciating what you have.
• Enjoy the "Now" and pay attention to the present moment.
• Live on Purpose and remember that you can always choose your response. There is such a thing as "response-ability" or taking the ability to choose how you respond to a situation.
• Know that you always have the choice to change.
• Make the food choices you want and take control of your eating.
• Become fascinated by your food
• Understand what constitutes healthy food for you 
• Improve your relationship with food
• Connect with your inner wisdom

Mindful Eating as the authors have mentioned is about enjoying preparing food, cooking and falling in love with food again. It is also about you, your health and happiness and those around you.

Start your day with a healthy egg white omelet with veggies and a salad.

The book also reminds one that the following are key to achieving a healthy weight:

1) Set a GOAL - This could be the ideal and healthy weight you want to achieve or going down to a certain dress or clothing size.
2) Action Plan  - Prepare an action plan and take action
3) Measurement and monitoring - "What get measured gets done" so monitor your weight during the process of changing your food choices and lifestyle but do not obsess on losing the pounds too much as what matters is you lose the inches from the waist especially.
4) Get organised - This is important so as to stick to your action plan. Plan your meals, organise your kitchen cabinets and refrigerator and "spring clean your space" by taking out unhealthy food from your home pantry/ kitchen,

The very first thing I did when  I decided to go on a healthy lifestyle and lose the weight was to take out all the unhealthy food stuff from my house. Remember that if you do not see these unhealthy stuff then you are already helping yourself stay away from eating unhealthy food.

Creating  healthy dishes like a mixed greens, beets and pear\
salad would be a good start.

To start a journey towards a healthy weight you need to start by understanding your food, health and body. By doing this, you become more mindful of your eating habits.

The authors also mentioned that you need to "Plan for success". You need to let go of old beliefs and choose new, empowering beliefs. Positive thinking is needed and lots of it as it is not easy to lose weight especially if people around you are not healthy eaters.

Remember that your health is important. You need to make it a priority to spend time nurturing the things that are most important in helping you reach your goals and have a better quality of life.

Stay positive and choose to be healthy! Cheers!