Mindful Eating – the Benefits

I have already written about the principles of mindfulness, the importance of mindfulness in everyday life and its potential benefits HERE. The Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) program has been used all over the world for years for good reason. It is therefore not surprising that the concept of mindfulness is also gaining interest among researchers dealing with… nutrition!

Have you heard about mindful eating? Or maybe you are wondering what benefits can be gained by using this concept and whether it can heal a disturbed relationship with food…? Let’s explore this fascinating issue together 🙂

 

Is There a Definition of Mindful Eating?

So far, no single official definition of mindful eating has been established. However, you can rely on the fundamental principles of mindfulness. In many places you will find information that mindful eating is nothing more than awareness of thoughts, sensations and emotions that accompany eating. This definition includes both physical experiences (e.g. feeling the salty taste of a given dish or physical symptoms of hunger in the form of stomach pain) and mental experiences (e.g. the feeling of guilt that occurs when eating foods commonly perceived as unhealthy such as sweets or fast food). You may have also come across the concept of intuitive eating, which fits into the idea of mindful eating.

In one of the latest studies, scientists summarized the most common behaviors and exercises involving mindful eating. They included, among others:

• paying attention to the appearance, smell, and consistency of food (enjoying meals),
• awareness of the sensations of hunger and satiety,
• the ability to recognize signals that promote food consumption (e.g. the sight of tempting cookies arouses appetite),
• acceptance of what we experience and a non-judgmental approach to feelings related to food.

 

 

Eating Disorders – a Growing Problem

Eating disorders (anorexia, bulimia, and binge eating) are a growing problem. Some Polish data indicate that almost a quarter of women may struggle with binge eating! Unfortunately, the COVID-19 pandemic has shown that it is also a huge problem among children and adolescents.

Although eating disorders and a disturbed relationship with food are not the same, very often a disturbed relationship with food leads to more serious problems. Therefore, it is even more worth seeking help if our eating behaviors and the way we eat start to worry us. What should alert us are, for example, the frequent consumption of very large amounts of food under stress, the avoidance of an increasing number of food groups (which makes the diet less diversified), or too frequent, obsessive thoughts about eating, making it difficult to concentrate and function on a daily basis. Of course, this is only a simplified description of what you may be struggling with, and diagnosis and treatment should always be done by a specialist. I would just like to point out that we should watch carefully what is happening to us and act in time, because food is supposed to give us energy and should not cause negative feelings 🙂 🙂

 

Mindful Eating – the Benefits

Scientists are unanimous that mindful eating is a promising area that requires further research. First of all, the role of individualization is emphasized: mindful eating exercises will not be suitable for everyone. For some people, focusing on eating (chewing food thoroughly, analyzing the smell and appearance of food) may be helpful to feel full in time and decide that it’s time to stop eating (with a sense of satisfaction and pleasant satiety). Others, in turn, may feel the negative effects of such an action (excessive focus on food will cause them to become frustrated and obsessively think about food, which is not conducive to a healthy relationship with food). Therefore, it is important to learn the exact mechanisms behind mindful eating and adapt its individual areas to individual needs.

However, there is already a lot of evidence which suggests that mindful eating:

• helps reduce some symptoms of eating disorders,
• may be helpful in the treatment of obesity in people who demonstrate an emotional eating style (i.e. they eat under the influence of strong, negative emotions such as fear, anger, stress, regardless of physiological hunger) and eat in response to the so-called external signals (e.g. they have difficulty coping with “temptations” – the sight of tasty products in their close environment),
• it can probably be an element of the prevention of excess weight and obesity, because it promotes slower eating and paying attention to the feelings of hunger and satiety, therefore it may contribute to effective body weight control.

 

Practical Conclusions

Implementing a bit of mindfulness into your life, not only in matters related to nutrition, can be helpful for many of us. We live in a world that is constantly rushing, and yet it is in those moments when we stop that we most often notice joy – also when celebrating meals. Eating in a hurry is not conducive to effective digestion processes (it is much easier to digest smaller, well-crushed pieces of food). Eating quickly often makes us skip the moment when we are full, and then we struggle with the unpleasant effects of doing so (a feeling of overeating, bloating and abdominal pain).

I don’t think I need to convince you that not only what we eat is important, but also the way we do it, and the first reports on mindful eating confirm this conclusion. 🙂

 

Bibliography:

1. Bąk-Sosnowska M. Interwencja psychologiczna w zespole kompulsywnego jedzenia. Psychiatria Polska. 2009;XLIII(4):445-456.
2. Lewandowska B. w roz. Style jedzenia i ich charakterystyka (s. 169-180). Psychodietetyka. pod red. Brytek-Matera A. 2021. wyd. PZWL.
3. Tapper K. Mindful eating: what we know so far. Nutr Bull. 2022 Jun;47(2):168-185. doi: 10.1111/nbu.12559.
4. Warren JM, Smith N, Ashwell M. A structured literature review on the role of mindfulness, mindful eating and intuitive eating in changing eating behaviours: effectiveness and associated potential mechanisms. Nutr Res Rev. 2017 Dec;30(2):272-283. doi: 10.1017/S0954422417000154.