OCTOBER: Bon Appetit!

Habit #2 for October

Bon Appetit: Clothing Souls, Not Filling Holes!

Your body is the marvelous garment that you dress your precious soul with -- food is the raw material that creates that garment. Only the best material will do! You are creating the garment that you wear before you put your clothes on; it can either make you feel and look your best or it can sabotage all your other healthy efforts.

If you were making yourself a set of expensive dress robes for a great occasion

would you spend hours selecting the perfect velvet and then just slap on a ratty old piece of burlap for trim?
would you pile on layer after layer of fabric until the robes became shapeless?
would you try to make the robes without having enough fabric to start with?
would you choose fabric that you knew would fall apart after just a couple of wearings?

No, you would take your time choosing just what you love and could afford from the enormous selection of fabrics, threads, trims and closings available and you would use nearly all of your senses to select these things. You’d look for shades that flatter you. You would touch the fabric, trying to judge how it would feel to wear. You would reject anything that didn’t smell quite right.

Time to start applying those same high standards to the food that you eat every day. Every eating experience should be savored. Focusing on texture, taste, and aroma should be second nature, not second thought!

This is not “the diet chapter.” There will be no charts, graphs, or tables, no colorful pyramids, no scales, no measuring spoons.

I don’t care if your favorite food is liver and onions or pumpkin pasties. Likewise, it doesn’t matter if you’re vegetarian or you shun all things green.

Perhaps you feel you need to lose weight. Perhaps you need to gain it.

You may have medical conditions that limit the choices of foods available to you and when you can eat them.

I don’t presume to recommend one collection of foods over another. You are all unique, and you are also quite capable of making your own choices.

What matters this month is not what you eat but how you eat it.

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We all know the basics of why we eat. Food provides energy to run the body’s many systems, the nutrients needed by those systems, and the fuel to maintain a more or less constant temperature.

It sounds so simple, and if our bodies were just machines it would be. But we all know that bodies and minds are infinitely more complex than even the most sophisticated machine. Your body’s nutritional needs vary every single day, often changing from hour to hour.

No single food comes close to providing all the things your body needs. The egg, for instance, may have excellent nutritional value but contains absolutely no fiber. Variety is essential for our well-being.

And food provides enormous emotional satisfaction that can’t be replaced by any pill or formula. Preparing and sharing meals carries deep layers of meaning in virtually every human culture

Nearly all life on our planet owes its existence to the abundance of plant life, and nearly all plants are created from sunlight. That spinach in your salad is a little slice of the sun, filling you with its energy and light. Light becomes leaves -- leaves become lunch!

All the living things that consume those plants become filled with a little of that light energy as well, and they carry it throughout the food chain. Herbivore, carnivore, omnivore – we are all alive because of the miracle of sunlight being translated into portable packets of consumable energy.

But energy alone will not allow us to survive and thrive. We also need some of the materials that our very planet itself is made of -- iron, potassium, zinc, chromium, etc. Mother Earth indeed!

Our goal for October is to put a little reverence back into our eating habits. And the easiest way to accomplish that is simplicity itself. We need to slowwwwwwwww down and enjoy our meals to the utmost.

I once attended a seminar at Beauxbatons on “Herbology and Nutrition” chaired by the famous French herbologist and wine enthusiast Mireille Guiliano. (Among Muggles she is known as the author of a book about why French women eat well yet tend not to put on a lot of excess weight.) Here are a few things she said about our relationship to food:

“When we taste wine, we swirl it in the glass, smell it then taste it. The first sip generally explodes on the palate. It is full of flavors and impressions, good or bad. You don't need a second sip to know if you want more, and the pleasure a good wine gives is not increased with the number of sips. The first few sips are generally the most telling and pleasurable. The same is true for food. I may want the fifth bite of dessert, but I get the most pleasure from the first few bites, and I like to stop there”

“In our high-speed world, we fall into the trap of feeling we must rush. It is a dangerous trap that compels us to accept stress, leading to unhappiness. We gulp down food without tasting it. Using our senses is really crucial. If you eat with your senses, you gain clues about living. Be aware when you shop in the market. Smell the aroma of your food in a restaurant; look at the dishes, appreciate them and prepare your taste buds for a delicious meal. It is a natural way to slow down, to stop from speeding to the next red light in your life, and enjoy yourself more.

Here come this month's 2 rules.

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Rule #3: Take time and really taste every bite of food that passes your lips.

We all need to become more conscious eaters, truly enjoying our meals rather than merely shoveling food down our throats. Every little slice of the sun should be savored. Remember, we’re

Clothing Souls, Not Filling Holes!

Have you ever been so anxious to eat something that you actually burned your tongue or throat on the first few bites?

How about eating something that didn’t taste good just because it was available? Let’s face it. If food is the fabric we use to create our body’s garment, then sometimes we eat burlap.

The truth is, not every meal will be a gourmet experience. Many of us have limited menu choices. If you live at home you’re probably going to have to eat what’s put in front of you, whether or not you like it. If you buy lunch at school the cafeteria menu will limit your choices. People on a tight budget have fewer choices than people with loads of cash.

Fortunately, you do sometimes get to eat the things that you really love to taste. That makes it even more important to savor the experience. That delicious Tira Misu will be gone in just a few minutes. Take your time and make it memorable!

A great way to start every meal is by pausing to recognize that you are fortunate to have any food to eat at all -- that you are not one of those many poor souls in the world who are forced to go hungry. That thought alone improves the taste of any meal.

There are many appreciation strategies that you can teach yourself to follow. All of them help us focus on savoring and enjoying our meals to the fullest.

Homework alert: For this month pick just one or two strategies below and resolve to apply them to every bite you eat - INCLUDING BREAKFAST! Every month after this try to incorporate at least one new strategy to your repertoire.

Eat when you’re hungry. Waiting until you’re ravenous will probably make you eat more once you do sit down.
Try not to pre-eat dinner while you’re cooking it! Your samples should be just that – a tiny bite to test the flavor.
Avoid distractions during meals, including reading, watching TV, playing games, or doing paperwork
When dining out, ask for your take-home box before you start eating. Remove the food from your plate while it still looks palatable.
If you’re ravenously hungry, down a few ounces of water before you start your meal.
Never Super-Size. Get a glass of water to sip with your Mega-Meaty-Burger instead.
At a buffet play the Gourmet Game. Take tiny samples of many foods and then rate them.
Sit down to eat, preferably with someone else.
Take five full seconds to actually look at your food and breath its aromas before you start to tuck in.
Arrange food in the middle of the plate; don’t pile it to the rim.
Dish out a smaller portion than you think will satisfy you. If you really want more, get “seconds.”
Have a particular food obsession? Don’t keep more than a single serving of your temptation in the house.
Use a smaller utensil to eat with; for instance, use a tea spoon not a soup spoon for soup or stew.
Absolutely DO NOT take another bite of something before you’ve finished swallowing the first.
If you cannot say an intelligible word with the food in your mouth, then you took too big a bite. Try a smaller one next time.
Occasionally give yourself a reverse time limit to finish a meal, and try to stretch out the experience.
If you tend to gobble your food, learn to put your fork or your food down between bites.
Sip a tiny bit of water between every few bites to clear your palate and enjoy the foods’ flavors all over again.
Close your eyes about midway through your meal. Evaluate how full you feel without looking at your plate!
An “All-You-Can-Eat” buffet just means you have choices. It is NOT an eating contest.
Don't automatically eat something just because it's in front of you.
Put your fork or spoon down while you chew. Don't pick it up again until you swallow

Occasionally you'll be stuck having to eat lousy food or you'll have to eat in a rush. Really examine how you feel after you wolf down that burger while driving to soccer practice or you mindlessly gobble a huge muffin at your desk while doing paperwork. Is your stomach full while your satisfaction level is empty? Use the experience to firm up your resolve to keep mindless eating to a minimum from now on.

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Rule #4: You must eat something for breakfast every day.

*Sighs*

I don’t need to be a mistress of legilimency to sense that about half of you just squinted your eyes and clenched your jaw and mentally said “No.”

All I ask is that you keep an open mind and give it a try.

Let’s start by facing one fact. Human beings are designed to need breakfast. While we sleep many of our bodily functions are suppressed so that our minds and bodies can rest, repair and rejuvenate. But soon after wakening all those functions are up and running again. And we need to be up and running too!

Breakfast sets up your metabolism for the day. If you want to have a steady supply of both physical and mental energy you need to start your day right. (Yes, your brain actually requires sugar to operate!)

Here are four things that prevent many of us from having the optimal breakfast.

“I don’t really feel hungry first thing in the morning.”

“I don’t have the time to eat breakfast.”

“I don’t have anything easy to prepare on hand.”

“If I eat breakfast I’ll gain weight.”

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LACK OF HUNGER

If you just don’t feel hungry first thing in the morning then check to make sure you’re not sabotaging your body’s hunger mechanism.

Do you down a big cup of coffee or tea within minutes of your feet hitting the floor? Caffeine will tend to dampen your appetite, particularly if you use a lot of sugar, cream, creamer, or milk. And the fluid content will make you feel temporarily full even though that won’t last for long. If you really love your morning cup, can you hold off long enough to have it with your meal rather than before it?

Do you smoke? Nicotine can act as an appetite suppressant. In fact, some smokers don’t want to quit because they’re afraid they’ll gain weight. If you’re a smoker, you’ll need to enforce your own special rule – no cigarette until after breakfast! When you prove to yourself that you won’t gain weight by eating breakfast you might be able to use this kind of rule to start eliminating other smoke times.

Maybe you just need a little more time than others to feel the hunger signal. I know I’m not ready to eat anything when I first stagger into the kitchen at 6 am. (Can you tell I’m not a morning person?) So I get all my other morning preparations done and eat just before I leave the house.

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LACK OF TIME

Do you feel like you don’t have time for breakfast? You only need a total of 5 minutes in the morning to make and eat an adequate breakfast and we all have those 5 minutes to spare if we just know where to look for them.

For those rare people whose lives are very organized I have bad news. You might have to get up 5 minutes earlier.

For the rest of us here’s all we need to do:

Choose tomorrow’s clothes tonight, even down to accessories. If you tend to change your mind a lot, then lay out a choice of three outfits, and in the morning pick from those three and only those three! No going back to the closet!

Have all your other things packed and ready to go and keep them near the door you leave by. That includes backpacks, briefcases, books, shoes, coats, gloves, and boots as needed.

Check your calendar for the next day and prepare for anything it reminds you to do.

Leave yourself a reminder if you need to do something special in the morning (get lunch from the fridge, turn thermostat down before leaving, check pet’s water bowl, etc.). Put it somewhere you are sure to spot it.

Do all of this AN HOUR OR MORE BEFORE YOUR BEDTIME and then forget about it completely.

Many people dislike doing these preparations. It’s especially loathsome to take care of them last thing before bed, and it can be particularly difficult on Sunday nights. One secret to a peaceful evening and morning is this: the earlier in the evening you get it done, the less painful it is! For instance, I usually set my automatic coffeemaker while I’m cleaning up after dinner. Now that it’s a part of an early evening routine I rarely forget to set it anymore.

Face it, these are all things that WILL have to be done before you leave in the morning. Better to take care of them rationally and peacefully the evening before than to rush around madly at the last minute and risk forgetting something important.

Voila! You now have time to eat breakfast.

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LACK OF MATERIALS

Now that you have the time and the appetite to eat breakfast, you need to have the materials as well. Making sure of that should take a grand total of about 12 minutes per week. That breaks down to one 5-minute session and seven 1-minute sessions.

I now do my 5 minutes of weekly breakfast/lunch planning on Saturday, so that's when our email reminder goes out. If that doesn’t work for you pick any time that’s convenient.

When I say "planning," I don’t mean working up elaborate menus or figuring out your entire grocery shopping list for the week. Just look in the fridge and the pantry to make sure you have easy breakfast choices for the next few days. This could be hot and cold cereals, eggs, fruit, breakfast bars, bread, bagels, or what-have-you. (Cold pizza, anyone?) Quickly check your calendar for the week and decide what days might require special planning. This shouldn't take more than 5 minutes, and will often take less.

The other 7 minutes? Take 1 minute every evening to make sure you actually have something to eat for breakfast tomorrow. This can be part of your daily routine of laying out clothes, etc.

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FEAR OF WEIGHT GAIN

This is just about the easiest objection to dispel – at least in theory!

Study after study after study shows that breakfast eaters are almost universally more successful at arriving at and maintaining a healthy weight than breakfast skippers. Rather than bore you with a string of statistics here I’ll dole them out to you one or two at a time in your emails this month. Let me just summarize them by pointing out that eating a well-rounded breakfast gives you steady energy for the first part of the day and prevents you from snacking too much or stuffing yourself at lunchtime.

In my experience, the best breakfasts are a lot like the best dinners. They contain a little bit of every major food group. I’m not suggesting that we all down a big American farm breakfast of fried chicken, mixed vegetables, biscuits, and gravy first thing in the morning! (That is, of course, unless you work on a farm.) But even those of you who want to eat lightly can still balance your morning meal.

Cooked oatmeal with sliced fruit and a glass of milk?

Single-serving-sized bagel with a cube of cheese and a handful of strawberries?

Cold cereal with nuts, raisins and soy milk?

Scrambled egg and buttered toast with orange juice?

One of the keys to breakfast success is to make sure that you have a small amount of lean protein in the meal. Meat eaters might choose a slice of Canadian bacon; vegetarians could have a serving of nuts.

The absolute worst things you can eat for breakfast are donuts, muffins, and pastries. Starches and sugars go through your metabolism like wildfire and will set you up for a roller coaster ride of energy for the day. I guarantee that you’ll feel more hungry two hours later than if you had no breakfast at all! The effect is worsened if you have a caffeinated beverage along with it. Donuts, muffins, and pastries are dessert, not breakfast.

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Our relationship with food and eating starts forming the minute we're born, and is consequently one of the most difficult areas to make lasting changes to. By the time we are in our teens and twenties we have developed a myriad of eating habits and preferences both positive and negative. Continue to add new strategies from the list above each month and you will be pleasantly surprised at the differences you'll see by the end of the year.

Don't forget to keep drinking enough water too. :) Bon Appetit!

"If hunger is not the problem, then food is not the solution!"

"FlyLady" Marla Cilley