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TAKE THE POWER BACK!
4 Ways to Combat Emotional Eating

You’ve committed to the Think and Grow Thin program, you’ve gone shopping for all the right foods and you’ve bought a treadmill or joined the gym, but you still have to go out and face the world each day, and you’re taking “you” with you wherever you go. As I’ve demonstrated throughout this book, success is more mindset than mechanics. In order for the physical diet and exercise program to work, you need to go on a mental diet. Take the following steps to get your head where it needs to be!

How many times have you caught yourself opening the fridge after a yelling match with your spouse or children, even though you weren’t hungry? How many times have you been sitting in front of the TV, poking your finger around for crumbs at the bottom of the bag of potato chips you’d just opened, telling yourself you’d have only a few? How many times have you dipped a spoon into a container of ice cream for a tiny taste, and then kept going back for more and more?

For a person who struggles with weight, there is almost always an emotional component tied to food. Mindfulness, a technique that involves paying attention to the present moment in a nonjudgmental manner, is a helpful way to reduce the impulsivity associated with emotional eating. Here are some mindfulness techniques that, if practiced consistently, will help you find the power to harness the emotions that sometimes drive your eating behavior.

imageBe aware of your “state.”
Ask yourself how you’re feeling when you feel compelled to eat and it’s not time to, especially if you know you cannot logically be hungry. Are you stressed, angry, fearful, bored or excited? Interrupt yourself before you start shoving food in your mouth, take a deep breath and count to 10. With a little fore-thought, you can halt a mistake that could cost you a whole day or week’s worth of great behavior!

imageRespond to events instead of reacting to them.
You might think these words mean the same thing, but there is a big difference between responding and reacting, and you need to start being very conscious of this distinction. When we respond to a situation, we look at it carefully and make decisions based on this careful consideration. When we react to a situation, our emotions cause us to act, and do so immediately and unconsciously.

This principle is often taught to those with anger management issues. I believe it is just as appropriate for those who react to their emotions or environment by eating as it is for those who lose their cool and erupt angrily at those they love. When we react instead of responding, we aren’t even reacting to the current situation in reality; we’re reacting to our interpretation of the event in the context of a past experience. Making quick and irrational decisions based upon something that’s not real is never a good idea. As Austrian psychiatrist Viktor Frankl said, “Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”

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ELIMINATING DISTRACTIONS IS ONE WAY TO HELP YOU AVOID OVEREATING.

imageSlow down!
The first step to stopping the process of behaving unconsciously is to go about your day in a slower, more planned way. That’s one of the reasons you have to decide on just one food choice for each meal in my Scary-Easy Weight-Loss Plan. Forcing yourself to make the decision ahead of time will help to train you to think before you eat. By not allowing options initially, you’ll learn to make eating much like getting dressed in the morning – a necessity without much emotionality tied in.

imageSavor each bite.
If you’ve ever polished off a bag of chips in front of the TV, I’m willing to bet that that bag was gone before you knew it! This lack of awareness of hunger and satisfaction is one of the main causes of overeating. If we slow down and pay full attention to the smells, textures and flavors of each bite, as well as our thoughts and the messages our bodies are sending us, we will avoid overeating, enjoy our food more and our digestion will improve.

Here are some tips to help you practice mindful eating:

image Before eating, take note of your emotions and how hungry you are

image Sit down and eat at a table – eliminate distractions such as TV, cell phones, etc.

image Take a moment to be grateful for your meal

image Appreciate the way the food looks and smells

image Focus on each mouthful and chew slowly

image Listen to your body and stop eating when you feel 80 percent full (at this point you are actually full; your body just takes a little while to recognize it)

image Pay attention to how you feel when you’ve finished eating