10 Steps to Mindful Eating in the Workplace

by Nicole Paulie, Psychologist and Co-Founder of MyMoodandMe

Mindful eating is eating with the attention necessary for you to enjoy and savour the flavour. Mindful eating encourages you to choose food for both enjoyment and nourishment and provide you with the awareness of the physical and emotional cues. 10 initial steps to get started in mindful eating include:

Eating Slower
Eating slower allows you to become more connected with your food and allows your food to be digested more easily. One way of doing this is after every mouthful put down your knife and fork on the table and wait until your food is fully digested until picking them up again

Shut off all Technology
The world is full of technology nowadays, which means a lot of distractions. It would be ideal to make a rule that at lunch time all technology is switched off. Savour the food and have time to yourself or with your family enjoying the moment.

Eating in silence
This may be difficult to do when sitting down in the canteen or out for lunch, but the next time you’re sitting down for lunch or another meal on your own, try sitting in silence for a little while you eat. 

Know the origin of your food
The main reason for mindful eating is to re-kindle your relationship with food. It always a good idea to find out where your food came from.  Additionally, if you make food from scratch, you also know every part of what makes up your dish. This can also help you to be more educated on what is actually in your food.

Notice the flavours
When you’re eating your food slowly, take a moment to fully notice the flavours: Does your food taste tangy, spicy or sweet? If you’re eating with other staff members or friends, maybe even ask them what flavours they notice.

Pay attention to how you feel after eating
Sit back and relax after your lunch and pay attention to how you feel. Do you feel tired, groggy, irritable, etc. Or do you have more energy and feel good. Whatever you feel like take note of it in your food diary and be aware how these foods make you feel. This can help you to also plan meals better when you know you’ll need some energy.

Eating to stomach hunger only
Try asking yourself when you are hungry if it’s because your stomach wants food, or if it’s for other reasons such as boredom or feeling upset. Also notice how your hunger level changes as you eat. Once you notice you’re actually satisfied (not full or stuffed) stop eating. You can always leave the remaining bit of food as a small snack later so it doesn’t go to waste.

Safeguard your environment
You may say to yourself, “oh I think I will have a biscuit now while the kettle is boiling”. If you remove access to these biscuits in your office, then that is one great step in avoiding these occurrences.

Making people aware
Tell your work colleagues, friends, partner & kids that you are trying to eat in a healthy way, making them aware will encourage support and will help you in achieving what you want to achieve.

An awareness tracker
Take note of what time of the day you are eating, what food satisfies you, who is around when you’re eating and how you were feeling before eating. Keeping track of these will help you become aware and becoming more mindful when eating.

About the author
Nicole Paulie (Reg. Ps.S.I Psychol.) is a Counselling Psychologist and Co-Founder of MyMoodandMe, an online corporate wellness programme aimed at helping employees to Move, Nourish and Inspire.

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