On my journey with food issues, self-awareness was the first step towards healing.

If you want to get rid of emotional eating you are going to HAVE to find the root. You are going to have to start being AWARE of your feelings and also the feelings or situations that trigger your emotional eating.

Here are 4 steps that help me curb emotional eating:

 

  1. Mindfulness – Mindfulness is my biggest weapon against emotional eating. I have realized that when I eat for emotional reasons, I am usually not really hungry, I eat very fast and I sometimes eat past the point of being full.

So the first step is to become aware of your thoughts and feelings. The next step is to start asking yourself questions. I usually ask myself these questions:

  • Am I really hungry or am I eating for an emotional reason?
  • If I am eating for an emotional reason, I ask myself what am I feeling and what triggered it?
  • Does the food that I am eating even taste good?
  • Do I really need to keep on eating or am I full?
  1. Focus – Multi-tasking is another factor that contributes to emotional eating and overeating. As stated above, unawareness is one of the contributing factors to emotional eating. Being focused on what you are doing is the exact opposite of being unaware.

A few things that I have incorporated to be more focused and aware of my eating habits; is not eating in front of the TV, putting away my phone while I eat and really being aware of every bite that I take. No multi-tasking, no distractions.

 

  1. Feeling my feelings – Someone who is an emotional eater uses food to numb their feelings. They avoid dealing with their feelings, by rather eating or focusing on food.

This is a tough one… The only way to get past this is to get real honest with yourself and start feeling what you are feeling.

If you feel uncomfortable, ask yourself why and sit it out, don’t avoid it. If you are sad/angry/bored, ask yourself why and sit it out, don’t avoid it. The most important thing is finding the root and most of the time this is really difficult, because emotional eaters are usually very disconnected with themselves and they struggle to pinpoint the emotions that they are feeling.

  1. Consistency – Being consistent with my training and eating healthy consistently is definitely one of the BIG factors that help me curb my emotional eating. I use exercise to get rid of extra stress and extra emotions that have been building up. My training is my ME time; it’s the time that I relax and unwind. Training helps me a lot with my moods, because I always feel better after a training session.

If I eat healthy consistently I am never ravenous and I am not tired, because my blood sugar levels are balanced. I also realized that if I eat a balanced diet with meals that are satisfying, I am less likely to have cravings.

I know A LOT of people struggle with emotional eating and if you are one, I hope that you can apply these steps in your life as well. I hope that these steps will also help you to overcome your emotional eating so that you be free.

If you ever have more questions or would like help in taking that first step, I am always available to talk. I don’t have the answers to all of it, but I do have an ear and always will look to help you find the answers if you are ready.

Have a great week, ya’ll and head into it strong and feeling like you can conquer whatever it is to set out to do this week. Baby steps consistently forward.

“How do you eat an elephant?  One bite at a time…..”  (I’ll talk about the elephants in our life in another topic, because that is something else I firmly believe)

- Rachel Plumage NASM CPT Boxing Instructor/Personal Trainer Ridge Fitness

To read about Rachel's personal experience with emotional eating, click HERE!

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