The Non-Diet Approach, April 7, 2002

Lose weight without dieting? HOW?!?!

By getting to the root of why you overeat in the first place! "Why Weight," written by Geneen Roth, is a non-diet book that contains exercises designed to help compulsive eaters learn how to stop using food as a substitute for handling difficult emotions or situations. You'll also learn how to enjoy eating and still lose weight naturally. This program offers reassuring guidelines on:

-- kicking the scale-watching habit forever
-- learning to say no
-- discovering other pleasures besides food
-- learning the difference between physical and emotional hunger
-- listening to and trusting your body's hunger and fullness signals

Each week at least one exercise will be posted and you are encouraged to share your answers, thoughts, etc..

Please share any insight, ideas, articles or other information that you may have.

Join us in Breaking Free from Compulsive Eating!

Exercise 55, 56 & 57

Exercise 55: Playing with Food
If I decided to have fun with my food, I would:
1
2
3
4

Exp: Make a cake in the shape of the Empire State Building, create an all white meal
Suggestions:
Eat a meal with your fingers. Notice how your appreciation of the food changes when you touch it. Do you like it? Do you feel like a kid again?
One day a week, pick a meal and eat it blindfolded. Notice the taste, texture. What is it like to eat food and not be able to see it? What senses become dominant?



Exercise 56: Your Childlike Self

Take a moment and conside the qualities in you that are joyful and childlike.

The child in me is:
1
2
3
4
5



Exercise 57: Noticing the Lost Parts

What joyful parts of yourself have you given up as you’ve gotten older?

As I’ve gotten older, I’ve given up:
1
2
3
4

I have never wanted to play with my food. Of course maybe if I did I wouldn't stuff so much in my mouth

Hmmm. This is right up my alley, as I play games with everything in life, especially food.

Exercise 55: Playing with Food

If I decided to have fun with my food, I would:

1. As an extension of a thought I posted on another thread, I'd swim in the new dulce de leche milk ... maybe a bath would be better.

2. Make hors d'ouevres with peanut butter, jelly and thin bread and eat them in the bathtub (filled with water, this time, not milk).

3. Make a paste of a few drops of maple syrup, Scottish oats and a few drops of water and eat with fingers, pretending it is poi and I am at a luau on an exotic tropical island at sunset with my choice of companions.

4. Decorate an all-white room with orchids and eat vanilla cake, vanilla slimfast, cookies & creme bars, French vanilla cremora in milk, vanilla ice cream, etc., while dreaming of lovely vanilla beans slowly harvested from a forest of white and lavender orchids by ladies in white gowns.

I have actually done 2-4 more than once; however, a dulce de leche bath probably isn't in the cards!

Exercise 56: Your Childlike Self

The child in me is:

1. Weird
2. Creative
3. Sad
4. Resilient
5. Everlasting

Exercise 57: Noticing the Lost Parts

What joyful parts of yourself have you given up as you’ve gotten older?

As I’ve gotten older, I’ve given up:

1. Not a heck of a lot.
2. Hope for a personal future.

P.S. I often eat cookies & creme bars with my eyes closed (unless I'm driving, of course). Everything else benefits by being in plain sight ... I really like to appreciate the visual quality of what I'm eating.

If I decided to have fun with my food I would have theme parties where I would research the food being served and dress accordingly, that is, Kimonos at a sushi party--big fancy hats and gloves for afternoon tea, etc.
I get to do a bit of this kind of thing at work. Tomorrow night we're having someone do a travelogue on Siberia, so I've researched Russian food!
There's a delightful book out now called "The Secret Life of Food"---a great picture book. Check it out when you're in the bookstore--it'll make you smile!

I eat with my fingers whenever possible!!! But I have no desire to eat blindfolded--doing anything blindfolded is kind of nightmarish for me, actually!

The child in me is strong, confident, joyful, secretive and strange.
As I'm getting older, I'm loosening up and feeling all those things again!

CRONE, I love your elegant vanilla fantasy! How are you attired in this scenario? I know there's a tiara involved!

Eydie Oh I love that idea...I may make my family do that for some meal.

Thanks.

Eydie: I'm going to look for that book ... food really is more than just a collection of calories. I am fascinated by all things Russian, BTW, although I wonder about Siberian food ... what would that entail? I would be too cold to eat in Siberia, I think.

Rather than a tiara, I'd be wearing wispy cream-colored ribbons and a wispy white Empire dress and cream-colored satin slippers.

Sigh!

LLB: Thanks for giving me something cheerful to think about today.