Memorize the first 10 bites challenge
NovusDies
Posts: 8,940 Member
This may or may not help anyone but I think it is a good exercise/experiment to try.
The challenge is designed to promote mindful behavior. I used some mindful techniques when I first started but most have fallen by the wayside. This is an idea I had this morning that I intend to try myself and I encourage you to keep an open mind and at least try it once. I can't possibly do it for an entire meal so I am going to try for 10 bites. If that is too much I will try for 5 and at least 1.
The way it works:
Place the food in front of you.
Close your eyes.
Try to detect the smell by breathing in 3 times focusing on breath and smell.
Place a bite of food on your utensil. Take note of how it feels to scoop it, cut it, place fork tines into it, etc.
Visually examine the bite from every angle as if you intend to sketch it. Make note of variations in color, contour, shape, and any shadows.
If appropriate feel your food as if you intend to make a clay model.
Bring the food closer to your nose and smell it again. Think of the words you would use to describe it as if you had to write a poem about it.
Listen to it. If it makes a sound how would you describe it?
Lick it to determine the temperature. It is hot, cold, room temp?
Lick it to determine the flavor. Is it spicy, sour, bitter, sweet, salty, earthy, or a combination?
Place it in your mouth and feel the texture. Is it crunchy, soft, chewy, or a combination.
Try to identify all the flavors before chewing.
Chew it and think about how it feels in your mouth.
Swallow it and think about how it feels going down your throat.
This is a 3 day challenge. You do not need to describe your food here but I would be interested if it changes your mealtime in a positive or negative way.
The challenge is designed to promote mindful behavior. I used some mindful techniques when I first started but most have fallen by the wayside. This is an idea I had this morning that I intend to try myself and I encourage you to keep an open mind and at least try it once. I can't possibly do it for an entire meal so I am going to try for 10 bites. If that is too much I will try for 5 and at least 1.
The way it works:
Place the food in front of you.
Close your eyes.
Try to detect the smell by breathing in 3 times focusing on breath and smell.
Place a bite of food on your utensil. Take note of how it feels to scoop it, cut it, place fork tines into it, etc.
Visually examine the bite from every angle as if you intend to sketch it. Make note of variations in color, contour, shape, and any shadows.
If appropriate feel your food as if you intend to make a clay model.
Bring the food closer to your nose and smell it again. Think of the words you would use to describe it as if you had to write a poem about it.
Listen to it. If it makes a sound how would you describe it?
Lick it to determine the temperature. It is hot, cold, room temp?
Lick it to determine the flavor. Is it spicy, sour, bitter, sweet, salty, earthy, or a combination?
Place it in your mouth and feel the texture. Is it crunchy, soft, chewy, or a combination.
Try to identify all the flavors before chewing.
Chew it and think about how it feels in your mouth.
Swallow it and think about how it feels going down your throat.
This is a 3 day challenge. You do not need to describe your food here but I would be interested if it changes your mealtime in a positive or negative way.
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Replies
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I tried this last night but we had a rather non aromatic dinner !....I did like feeling the different textures of the food...I am going to try this for a few days....mindful eating!0
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Hmmm....reading back through old posts and I don't think I've read this one before.
There are moments when I take in well over 1000 calories in well under the time it would take to do this exercise. Perhaps I have to make an agreement with myself to try this every meal and that every bite of high calorie snacks always get this treatment?2 -
There does exist an issue when high caloric value items get consumed fast. Ask me how I know!
Mindful eating practices seem to slow things when applied
I used to use pre logging, location of eating (sitting down only and not at the kitchen, i.e. come get and transport the food), how much at a time (15 to 30g portions of 100 to 200 Cal per goodies baggie), and delay / stalling "rules" between extra baggies when I first started out.
And it worked.
Opening a tin of cookies and eating them by the scale until full ... does not work as well for me, not if I'm after a caloric maximum. Would work great to increase a minimum, but my hamsters 🐹 don't often run into that issue!🤔😹2 -
I'd read this post with interest during my first trawl of the group when I first joined - I've slowed my eating as a consequence, though I still eat faster than I should.
I remember once watching one of those trashy comparison shows on TV, when they compared the eating behaviours of a 'naturally slim' person and an overweight person over two weeks, using hidden cameras in their homes, offices and cars (and even using surveillance when they were out and about running errands).
Apart from all the usual take-aways (pun intended) from that type of shallow analysis - i.e. that the 'naturally slim' person actually moved a lot more and ate a lot less than they appeared to be doing, and consequently burned more and consumed less calories than the overweight person....the main thing that really stuck with me after the programme ended was one particular quirk of the slim person.
Every single thing she ate at home (which was most of her food because she was a stay-at-home-mom) - apple, bar of chocolate, packet of crisps, sandwich, packet of Maltesers - she put the food item on a plate and sat at the dining table to eat it.
It was bizarre (and seemingly unconscious) behaviour. I have never - before or since - seen anyone unwrap a bar of chocolate and eat it from a plate before. Let alone a packet of Maltesers.
I've often thought of her since, and wondered if that one small quirk of behaviour was a factor in her slimness...1 -
When I am eating healthy I do eat slower….when I binge, I just shovel the food in as fast as possible!1
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My brain erases anything I eat fast. It’s like it never happened. I like the idea of putting everything on a plate! Makes it an official act of eating.3
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Plate. Wow. I'll try that. The very thought brings about a brain cringe.2
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Proof: chocolate eaten off a plate. Mind boggling.
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I’m putting a designated snack plate on the kitchen counter. Maybe it will curb some of the fast grab and snarf eating when passing the refrigerator. Worth a try. Seems to be working for the skinny chick in the photo! 😇2
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My thoughts exactly Yooly!2
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I guess if you take a bite, and savour as you chew, you need to put the rest of the treat down somewhere so that your hands are free to enjoy the taste sensation!
This also means allocating the time to eat your little bit of decadence properly.
And you must also serve yourself a tea or coffee and make it an occasion.
Wow. It is a lot of work being skinny!!!!3 -
I know! Whereas if you just scarf your treat down in two seconds flat you don't have time to dirty a plate or make yourself a hot drink to accompany it!
There's NEAT calories to be burned in all this plate fetching, drink making malarkey!3 -
When I was a kid, I would open a Hershey bar ( 5 cents ) and melt it on the sidewalk inside the wrapper and then eat the melted chocolate with my finger!….I guess that would make it last longer!2
