The Best Way To Stop Cravings and Mindless Eating
What is mindless eating?
Mindless eating is something that most of us have done at some point, or at least been tempted to do. This doesn’t mean we’ve gone through extended periods of time where we’ve eaten much more than we could handle, but perhaps you’ve been at a party or sat at home with a take out meal after a break-up, and you’ve eaten and eaten without really thinking. This is mindless eating, and it involves eating foods without concentrating on what we’re eating or how much we’re eating.
Mindless eating doesn’t necessarily involve only eating junk food. People think about binge eating and mindless eating and believe it can only happen when you’ve got large quantities of chocolate, crisps, cakes, pizza and other high-carb and sugary foods. However, you can eat anything and not really think about it, and while healthy foods are better to binge on, it’s not necessarily good for you.
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Mindless eating vs. mindful eating
When it comes to eating it’s important to know how to distinguish mindless eating and mindful eating. And if you regularly eat mindlessly, finding the difference between the two might be a little more difficult. But there are clues you can look for to help tell the two apart.
The signs of mindless eating can be any or all of the following:
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Eating on autopilot or while multitasking
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Eating to fill a void like stress or depression
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Eating junk or comfort food
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Eating food as quickly as possible
The signs of mindful eating can be any or all of the following:
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Focusing all of your attention on food and the experience of eating
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Eating only to satisfy physical hunger
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Eating nutritionally healthy meals and snacks
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Eating slowly and savoring every bite
Mindful eating can also help you distinguish between emotional and physical hunger, which can increase your awareness of food-related triggers and gives you the freedom to choose your response to them.
How to practice mindful eating
In order to practice mindfulness, you need to participate in an activity with total awareness. So when it comes to mindful eating, you’ll want to eat with all your attention rather than on autopilot or while you’re doing something else. Here are a few simple steps to get started with mindful eating, with each step having powerful benefits of their own:
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Eat slowly and don’t rush your meals
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Chew thoroughly
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Eliminate distractions by turning off the TV and putting down your phone
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Eat in silence
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Focus on how the food makes you feel
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Stop eating when you’re full
Try practicing mindful eating for short, five-minute periods at first and gradually build up from there. You can also begin mindful eating when you’re making your shopping list or browsing the menu at a restaurant, it doesn’t have to start when you’re already eating.
What are cravings?
A food craving is an intense desire for a specific food. This desire can seem uncontrollable, and the person’s hunger may not be satisfied until they get that particular food. Food cravings are very common and can be caused by a variety of physical or mental factors. They may be a sign of hormonal imbalances, a suboptimal diet, high stress levels, or a lack of sleep or physical activity. Food cravings are often a sign that you’re lacking the nutrients found in that food.
Food cravings are often for junk foods and processed foods high in sugar, salt, and fat. Though every person experiences cravings differently. Food cravings can also be a major roadblock for people trying to maintain a healthy weight or switch to a more healthful diet. Food cravings can be a frustrating and overwhelming feeling that you might think you can’t control. But more often than not, you can control a food craving if you spend some time to sort out its cause.
Causes for cravings
Food cravings can be caused by several factors, which can usually be split into the two main categories of physical and mental. Being aware of them may help you identify which factors specifically trigger your cravings.
Some of the physical causes for cravings could be any of the following:
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Dehydration
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Highly processed foods
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Lack of sleep
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Pregnancy
Some of the mental causes for cravings could be any of the following:
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Stress
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Anxiety
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Mood
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Eating context (ex: popcorn with a movie)
Similar to mindless eating, cravings can hijack your wellness goals and make it hard for you to feel like you can get back on. So that is why I want to give you some tools and skills around managing your cravings and mindless eating.
Tools & skills to manage cravings & mindless eating
So I know in my own personal life there's certain foods that I really love. I really like to eat ice cream and I have a sweet tooth. And sometimes I would find myself eating those foods mindlessly or sometimes I would get cravings for them. I would then often feel guilty around that, or I would feel overwhelmed and not quite know how to manage cravings. I didn’t know how I could actually enjoy those foods but not get overwhelmed by eating it or having too much of it, without having to experience that loop of feeling guilty afterwards.
So I want to give you a little bit of wisdom and help around how you can enjoy your favorite foods. How you could not feel guilty eating those foods that might be considered cheap foods, and show you that you can re-integrate them back into your life. I want to show you that there doesn't have to be foods that are good or bad, or anything you really have to fear around eating.
What do cravings feel like?
So the main thing that I like to ask people when they are finding themselves in that circle of cravings, is to first get in touch with what it feels like to have a craving. A lot of times clients will come to me and they will be like "So how do I manage cravings?" and my first question to them is,
“What does a craving feel like for you?”
I know for me, a craving feels like this urgency in my stomach, heart, and throat. It's almost like this line where I get this feeling of my heart beating really fast, I think about food, and then my stomach starts to get really tight and then my throat starts to get a little tight. And then my head starts to pound a little bit, and all of a sudden there's this feeling of I must have this food. And I like to call this urgency.
Urgency and cravings
Naming an emotion and naming an emotional experience that is happening really helps to take away some power from the experience that might be overwhelming to you, or you think might be something that's going to take away some control or some power. So the first thing that I say is to name what's going on, and what I like to say is that urgency is happening.
Then you’ll want to look at the food that you want to crave. Is this food sweet? Is this food salty?
And you can ask yourself “What is the taste of the food that I'm looking for?”
If it’s sweet, maybe there’s some emotions underneath that you might have to tend to. If it’s salty, maybe there’s some physiological things, and simply having a glass of water could be helpful. However, sometimes it might be something more emotional rather than simply being physiological. So you want to ask yourself if that emotion is there,
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Is there loneliness?
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Is there anger?
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Is there sadness?
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Is there frustration?
So see if you can understand what emotions are currently present or that you know become present when you start to have cravings or experience mindless eating.
How to distinguish between physical and emotional hunger
Then ask yourself if you are physically or emotionally hungry. Because the emotional hunger would be the feeling and the physical hunger would be the physical sensations of hunger like growling of your stomach or lightheadedness - which is different than that urgency, pounding of the head where your emotional body is driving the car.
If you regularly use food to deal with your feelings, finding the difference between the two might be a little more difficult. But there are clues you can look for to help tell the two apart.
The signs of emotional hunger can be any or all of the following:
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It comes on suddenly
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It feels like it needs to be satisfied right away
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It craves specific comfort foods
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It isn’t satisfied with a full stomach and forces you to overeat
The signs of physical hunger can be any or all of the following:
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It comes on gradually
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It can wait to be satisfied
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It is open to options, lots of things sound good
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It stops when you’re full
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The two tips to take away are to name the feeling sensation of craving and then to ask yourself if you are physically hungry or emotionally hungry, are there emotions under the taste that you are craving And once you do this, it will help you to bring together this craving because the craving is really just there to show you what your body heart and spirit want you to pay attention to. So once you do this you will be on your path and on your journey towards integration and heart centered wellness.
Extra tips for mindfulness & cravings
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Don’t let yourself get too hungry. Eating several meals through the day may help to control cravings and even binge eating.
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Remember to take care of yourself. If you take good care of yourselves day to day, you may be less likely to feel stressed, angry, and unhappy, and therefore less likely to crave sugar and other foods.
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Try taking a few deep breaths before eating a meal or snack to quietly contemplate what you’re about to put into your body.
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Ask yourself how well the food you’re eating makes you feel after you’ve eaten it. How much better do you feel after eating? How much more energy and enthusiasm do you have after a meal or snack? Asking these questions can be extremely helpful.
