Recognizing Hunger

Hello, and welcome to lesson two of Mindful Eating. Today we're going to be talking about hunger. Checking for hunger before eating is an essential first step as we learn to eat mindfully. But what does checking for hunger really mean? It means learning to identify the physical sensations that the body sends us when we need more energy. Checking for hunger begins with taking a few deep breaths in and out through the nose. Sometimes anxiety and stress can cause sensations in the belly that feel like hunger. So when we pause and breathe, the body relaxes and we're less likely to confuse one with the other. Okay, so, are you really hungry? After breathing, the physical signs of hunger to look for are things like emptiness, growling, or rumbling in the belly. If you've waited too long to eat, you might feel low energy and fatigue, or even irritable and have a headache. If you don't notice any of these signs, you might discover there are other reasons you're reaching for food, like boredom, anxiety, loneliness, sadness, or the mere fact that food is there in front of you. When practicing mindful eating, generally we try to stick to eating when we notice the signs of physical hunger. Of course there will be times when we choose to eat when we're not physically hungry, and that's okay. We might eat at a celebration, to soothe ourselves, or because something just looks really delicious. The key here is not to make ourselves feel guilty for eating when we're not hungry, but to be aware of why we're reaching for food so we can make conscious choices about what and when we eat....