I Like Eating

Did you know that there is option other than ENJOYING the food you eat? I read from one “weight-loss expert” that what worked for her was to make food boring. She went for a long time eating the same thing EVERY SINGLE DAY. She retrained herself to be bored with eating. She lost a lot of weight.

That line of thinking will NOT work for me. I enjoy eating. Someday soon, I’ll post some of my “before” pictures and you can see just how much I enjoyed eating. I enjoyed it way too much for way too long.

However, enjoying eating should be about enjoying the taste of the food. Unfortunately for me, I enjoyed it as comfort, appreciation, and companionship. Food should be enjoyed for the flavor, the texture, and the smell. Yes, it can bring warm feelings; but I am convinced that if we eat for the feeling alone, then we are heading down a dangerous and unhealthy path.

Oddly enough, one of the things I have learned is just how wonderfully good food tastes when you don’t eat it as much or as often. When was the last time you paused after putting a bite of food in your mouth and thought about how it tasted?

Let’s use chocolate to prove my point. Yes, chocolate should be the one exception, but it’s not. That first bite of chocolate is wonderful, isn’t it? It awakens your senses. Close your eyes. Think about the taste. Savor the experience.

Now, eat the second bite. It’s good, isn’t it; but not as memorable as the first. The third? Still good, but the newness is wearing off. OK, maybe for chocolate it would take more than three bites for the special wonder that is chocolate to start wearing off. But eat the fourth bite, the fifth, the sixth, and so on. I guarantee you (no matter your love for chocolate) that you would get to a point, and probably sooner than you would want to admit, where you are just going through the motions. You are putting the chocolate in your mouth because it is there.

One of my splurges – and you don’t have to understand it for me you to enjoy it – is a biscuit and gravy from Cracker Barrel. I don’t eat it every day, not even once a week. It wouldn’t taste as heavenly if I did. I get it periodically. It isn’t just a treat, it is divine. I take my time, think about the flavor, and savor it.

And when I’ve finished the ONE biscuit, I am satisfied. Any more than that, and I would just be eating from selfishness and greed. That is no longer an option.