The Center for Mindful Eating

About the issue

As the fullness of winter arrives here in the northern hemisphere, we naturally begin to turn inwards to reflect on our own journeys, physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually. In considering our program and publications for 2017, we chose to offer a path of practice the begins with basic principles and moves through various tools and approaches to help a person develop, or deepen an existing, mindful eating practice. Beginning with this issue of Food for Thought, entitled xxx, we offer our readers guidance in starting their own mindful eating path or practice.

Cultivating a mindful eating practice and moving away from the diet mentality in our fast-paced society can be quite challenging, writes Sharon Theroux, Ph.D., in “Establishing a Mindful Eating Practice. ” She describes how accepting the sensation “craving” as it is, and not immediately trying to deny it or give in to it, you can begin to investigate, “What am I really, really hungry for?”

Caroline Baerten, RD, offers significant insights on the importance of a formal mindfulness practice as the foundation of mindful eating. She writes, “A mindfulness practice is not only beneficial for the health professional. Clients benefit and learn from seeing mindfulness embodied in the teacher.” Caroline has been an essential force behind the development and creation of TCME’s Good Practice Guidelines (available at www.thecenterformindfuleating.org/principles.) Becoming a mindful eating professional consists of multiple stages of preparation, study, training, practice, and direct teaching experience. As providers, “when we are aware of our own feelings of anxiety or inadequacy, we can choose to remain present with the needs of the client, instead of being caught up in our own stories or emotions.”

Our educational handout is on the BASICS of Mindful Eating, a concept developed and shared by Lynn Rossy, Ph.D. “BASICS is an acronym for a complete set of guidelines that walks you through the eating process from beginning to end. These are not rules and you don’t need to be perfect at them.” She warns us that mindful eating could change the way you eat forever!

We bring this issue to a close with a new feature for our Food for Thought magazine, a led practice for us to use to bring mindful eating alive, in the present moment.

As always, thank you to our writers, and to our members, for supporting this and other Food for Thought.

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