Blogger: Lara Kulpa
Blog: Lady de la Luna
I remember a while ago, my aunt had told me that she’d been trying to practice “mindful eating”. Yesterday, I read an article in Shape magazine about letting go of the “diet mentality” and paying more attention to what your body’s really in need of in terms of nutrition and hunger levels, as opposed to counting calories eaten and burned.
Is this a new wave of thinking in terms of weight loss?
I’ve always said that dieting is rarely a matter of knowing what to eat, how much, and so on. That it’s rather an exercise in balancing your lifestyle. Sit at a computer screen all day? You’re going to need to do more exercise than someone who works at a construction site. Skip breakfast? It’s time to break out the mini-meals, and make them nutritious.
I don’t care who you are, or how much you may or may not have dieted in the past - you can instinctively tell the difference between something nutritious and not so. It’s not a matter of knowledge, but rather decision. (more after the jump)
The thing I feel is most annoying me right now, is the overwhelming amount of advice, books, and programs out there. It’s all about this diet or that program or this book, and I think that people are just feeling like they can’t try enough different things. When they fail at one, they try another - they’re spending more money on programs and plans than on food and exercise equipment!
I think my new plan of attack on this whole thing is going to be to pay more attention to what I choose to eat, in terms of the following:
- How all around nutritious is the food I’m about to put in my mouth?
- How much of the food in front of me do I really need to consume at this point?
- How can I get more exercise than I’ve been getting?
All of this kind of ties in with a bunch of other stuff floating around this whacked out head of mine. With the big 3-0 approaching, I’ve been noticing changes in my body - my hair and skin, mainly - and also feeling a little “cluttered” with life. I need to do some major cleaning up and eliminating the things that are literally weighing me down.
There’ve been times in my life where I was so organized with things it was almost scary. I’m feeling quite the opposite as of late, and it’s making me scared. Go figure.
What do you think about the idea of dropping the “diet mentality” yourself, and taking on a mindful approach to eating and exercising?
