Mindful Eating – Enjoying All Foods
You are probably not enjoying the food that you eat to its fullest taste and smell – yes, you are reading the first
sentence correctly; you may not be fully enjoying food, even though you may be eating more of it than you
want. Indeed, that is a significant part of the problem – you are not taking the time to truly savor all the benefits
of the foods that you consume. Instead, you are eating too fast and too much. It’s time to slow down and
involve all your senses in the art of eating.
Would you like to learn how you can enjoy eating more than you do now while not eating
as much as you do now? If so, read on.
Imagine yourself walking into a movie theatre to see an action flick at the early matinee show (it starts at
1:05pm). You and your partner are pleasantly surprised when you encounter a staff person standing near the
entrance of the theatre room where your movie is showing. The staff person offers you a free soda and an
extremely large container of popcorn for free if you would be willing to answer some survey questions at the
end of the movie. With joy, you and your partner accept the person’s offer, take the popcorn and soda, and
head into the movie. As you begin to eat the popcorn, you notice that it’s stale; in fact, as you chew it, you hear
the squeaking noise that you would hear if you were chewing on Styrofoam – it’s that stale! After the movie
ends, you and your partner head back up the hallway where the staff person is waiting to greet you, take your
container of popcorn, and ask you some survey questions. The container of popcorn was extremely large, so
even if you liked it, you couldn’t eat all of it, so you hand it to the staff person with some popcorn left in the
container. The soda was consumed while you were in the movie.
Now you are asked several survey questions, including the following two questions:
1. On a scale of 1 (strongly disagree) to 9 (strongly agree), would you answer the following question: I ate
too much popcorn
2. Some people tonight were given a medium-size bucket of popcorn, and others, like you, were given
these large-size buckets. We have found that the average person who is given a large-size container eats
more than if they are given a medium-size container. Do you think you ate more because you had the
large size?
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How would you answer these two questions; in other words, would you eat a lot of the popcorn and could you
be fooled by the size of the container? Before you answer, I will let you know that the popcorn was popped 5
days ago. So what do you think?
The situation you just read was an experiment that was done to 161 unknowing movie goers who were attending
the Mel Gibson action flick Payback at the 1:05 matinee in Chicago. The experiment was also repeated in
movie theaters in Pennsylvania and Iowa. In each setting, movie goers were randomly given a large container
of popcorn or a super larger container of popcorn (both containers had more popcorn than people could eat and
it was always 5 days old). Many of the individuals had just eaten lunch at home. What you would not have
noticed if you were in the study is that the staff person who collected your popcorn container quickly weighed
the container to see how much you actually ate. Now that you answered your own scenario, how do you think
the hundreds of people who actually participated in the study answered the two questions? Moreover, how
much popcorn did each person eat, on average? And, did people eat more if they were given the larger container
of popcorn?
Interested in knowing the results of the study? Keep reading
Brian Wansink, Ph.D. a professor at Cornell, was the mad genius who thought up the popcorn experiment. The
title of his book and research on the topic is Mindless Eating. Dr. Wansink was testing the idea that our eating
habits are so powerful and controlled by strong triggers; i.e., eating free popcorn in a movie theater, that we can
consume large quantities of food without being aware of what or how much we eat.
The term mindless eating is not quite accurate; in reality, your mind is involved in eating, but it’s the automated
side leading you to overeat, which is no longer in your consciousness. Remember that you can drive a car
without being aware of all the behaviors needed to drive the car and eating is even easier to do without your
conscious mind being involved.
The popcorn experiment was designed to test the idea that your senses can become numb when you begin to eat
through automation. How numb do you say? Enough to continue eating 5-day old popcorn? Perhaps?
Mindful eating is the term used to describe an eating pattern that can stop automation. If you are conscious
mind is shut off during automation, mindful eating turns it back on by stimulating your senses, including taste,
smell and touch. The tragedy of automated eating is that you don’t experience all the pleasures that food can
provide your taste buds or nose.
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So what happened to the hundreds of people tricked in the popcorn study? First, nearly everyone reported that
they did not eat too much of the popcorn. Further, nearly everyone who ate from the larger of the two
containers reported that they were not fooled or tricked into eating more popcorn than the movie goers who
were given the smaller container. The smaller container contained 120 grams of popcorn and the larger
container contained 240 grams of popcorn. The average person ate over half of the popcorn in the smaller
container (61 grams) and nearly 40% from the larger container (94 grams). People who had received the larger
container ate nearly 53% more stale popcorn than those who received the smaller container. In terms of
calories, people consumed 153 calories from the smaller container and 326 calories from the larger container.
And, most of these movie goers had lunch before going to the movie.
Would you like to approach the foods you love to eat? If so, keep reading
Mindful eating can be used to turn on all aspects of your brain as well as all your senses involved in eating.
You would have likely rejected the stale popcorn if you were listening to your taste buds, instead of watching
the movie. As you learned in prior modules, the first step is to remove as much clutter and distractions from
your brain as possible when you eat, such as turning off the TV or computer.
Visualize yourself finding a quiet place in your home or at work where cell phones, radios, TVs and computers
are off or out of the range of your site and hearing. Now visualize holding a bag or box of your favorite snack
foods. Select an item that you would truly like to eat right now. The snack food item can be popcorn (made a
minute ago, of course), fruit, potato chips, peanuts, donuts, cookies, sunflower seeds, ice cream, yogurt, raw
vegetables or other foods that you enjoy eating. Select a food item that you have been known to overeat
through automation. Do you have the food item in your mind? Now, think about the reasons you would like to
eat the food item in this moment. Run the idea through your mind and select the best idea for explaining why
you thought about this particular snack item at this moment. Your ideas can include hunger (your stomach is
rumbling), desire of taste (you are not hungry, but you would love to taste the food right now), or you can
identify an emotion that seems to be linked to the food (e.g., exhaustion, excitement, stress, sadness, or other
feelings). Do you have the primary reason in your mind? Now, state calmly and without judgment that you are
going to eat your snack food, because you are………………… The sentence helps to connect your brain to the
process of eating this particular food.
Now, place a small portion of your snack food on a plate and outside of the bag or box, if it was in a container.
If it is a piece of fruit, just place it on the plate. First, identify how you feel in the moment. You can start by
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saying, I feel………………. Like the other verbal statement, the feeling statement helps your brain to connect
with your emotions while you are eating (instead of distracting your brain from being aware of your feelings).
Next, describe what you see in terms of colors and shapes of the food. Oranges are round, chips are flat and
light colored (or dark with spices), donuts are round and about three inches wide, and so on. If you can, use
your fingers to describe the food in terms of its feel (e.g., an apple may feel smooth, potato chips may feel
rough, and carrots may feel hard with a somewhat coarse surface). Next, begin to smell the food and try to
identify all the potential smells that come from the food. For example, potato chips may have multiple smells
from the spices and cooking oils, sunflower seeds may include hints of salt and other scents, and popcorn may
include buttery smells or burning smell if some of the kernels overcooked in the microwave. Concentrate on
identifying the smells and using descriptors that other people would understand. Again, the idea is to orientate
your brain to the experience. At this point, you should be able to identify changes in your mouth created by the
touch and smell of the food. You are likely increasing salvia in your mouth, as your brain and mouth anticipate
eating the snack. You may also feel changes to your stomach as it prepares to receive the food. Can you also
feel any changes in your breathing as you anticipate eating the food? Can you feel your breath getting shorter
or longer and deeper as you touch and smell the food? Finally, what is the rate of beats of your heart and is it
changing as you approach eating the snack food. You may notice that your heart rate increases with certain
foods, like sugary treats, and decreases with other foods (e.g., a calming affect). Now, slowly eat small bites of
the snack item and chew it slowly. As you chew, identify all the flavors that your taste buds are experiencing.
Like the smells, concentrate on all the potential flavors that are being released as you chew. Now describe the
texture of the food as you chew; e.g., is it chewy, like gum, soft, like pudding, or moist like water. Finally,
identify how it feels to pass through your mouth, into your throat, and to your stomach.
As you visualized this activity, did you notice that you actually experienced physiological changes to saliva,
breathing, or heart rate? If you did, you just completed your first exercise in mindful eating. Just think how
enjoyable it will be to try this technique with your favorite snack food.
You can alter or reduce the steps noted above. Any of the techniques described in mindful eating can disrupt
automation and turn on your brain as well as your taste buds. Here are some guidelines for disrupting
automation:
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Of all the techniques, we recommend always including the verbal statement of why you are eating
before you begin to eat and how you feel
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•
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Tailor the techniques to the food items you like the most, including drinks, such as coffee or wine.
Coffee has a powerful smell that can be calming, so focus on your sense of smell and taste for coffee.
Raw vegetables tend to have a weaker smell, but more texture, so use your hands and vision
Consider some behavioral techniques to disrupt automation to remind you to slow down, such as
o switching your fork or spoon to the opposite hand while eating,
o flipping your fork over and try and pick up the food (you can also try chop sticks),
o use small utensils to eat your food, such as a shrimp fork or a sugar spoon for your food,
o place potato chips in a sealable freezer bag and seal the bag after you take one chip at a time,
o cut up donuts, burgers or pizza slices into several small bite size portions, and
o switch your high calorie snack foods to lower calorie options that require you to chew more
(potato chips are easy to eat, but carrots or celery take longer; oranges take a lot longer to eat
than orange juice)
Other helpful tips can be found in the book Eating Mindfully, second edition (2012), by Susan Albers.
Assignment.
Now comes the homework assignment you have been dreaming about, but never got to do with your deprivation
diets - focus on eating what you love to eat. Start by creating a log or journal where you can write down your
experience. A basic note pad will work. Select three groups of foods to practice mindful eating over the next
week. The three groups can include:
•
•
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healthy treats, such as fruits, yogurt (low in sugar), raw vegetables, granola, or seeds (sunflower) – pick
foods that you already enjoy eating, but don’t seem to eat enough
savory or comfort foods, such as pizza, spaghetti, soup, or a roasted chicken dinner with stuffing
decadent foods, such as bacon, ice cream, potato chips, homemade apple pie, cookies, or pudding
For each group, identify the purpose of eating in the moment and the feelings that you are experiencing as you
approach the food. Remember to minimize judgment of yourself as you select the foods. Try to approach each
food item as a food tasting researcher trying to learn about the quality of each item on your senses.
Log the time it takes you to complete the exercise and aim for longer periods of time – the goal is to expand the
eating experience and natural pleasures that come with it while minimizing the amount that you eat.
Write down as much information as you can based on the steps noted in the mindful eating exercise in this
module, such as what you saw in the food, how it felt to the touch, what you were able to smell, and all the
flavors you were able to identify.
Write down how you felt before and after the exercise. You may find that you felt something that you did not
expect from the exercise - the hint is that there is a subtle benefit to any mindfulness exercise.
Finally, mindful eating and other mindfulness techniques take practice. You may find it difficult to stay
focused on the steps as you try this on your own. Don’t worry; everyone struggles to focus on the exercise,
which is one reason why you tend to overeat; i.e., your mind is distracted with multiple topics.
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