Emotional Eaters: Give Your Body What It Wants

Just recently I’ve been thinking about Nantucket. I don’t know why, except my life is in the in-between dream state where one phase is ending and the next phase hasn’t yet begun. So in a way, anything is possible, and I set myself the task of day-dreaming about what I might like.

Which, when you are stuck in no-man’s land and you don’t know what you’d like, is very difficult. But I allowed myself to relax and asked myself what do you really want?

And the answer popped out. Nantucket.

Now I have to say I don’t even know where Nantucket is... well I do now because I looked it up for this article. But when Nantucket popped into my head I just had a vague New England feeling of painted clapboard houses, beaches and seagulls. And it felt good.

So I don’t know why, but Nantucket is saying something to me.

Oh, and I found out it’s an island (yes all you New Englanders, you can laugh, bet you don’t know where the original Boston is!) and my vision of painted clapboard houses with seagulls and beaches is reasonably accurate.

Now the same day that the vision of the north-easte
seaboard of the United States came to me, I also thought about avocadoes. And cream and salmon and olive oil. Every meal I had, for several days, had to be oil rich. With cream on the breakfast cereal, avocado salad for lunch and grilled salmon for supper I craved fatty foods. Then the fat yearning went away just as suddenly as it had arrived.

But for a few days, that’s what my body wanted. And as I am trying to be kind to myself this month, I decided to go with the flow and give my body what it wanted. I do like avocado and oily fish, though the cream craving was a bit of a surprise. But while I was feeding myself this way my body felt loved and cared for and I didn’t crave a lot of food, I just wanted those particular flavours.

And it was right. The avocado was right just as, in a way I really don’t understand, Nantucket is right. I’m going to follow my instincts on this one and keep Nantucket in mind, in a one-day-I-might-get-there sort of a way. Heck, I don’t even know if I like chowder, but I’m willing to give it a go!

So, what are your dreams? And can you listen to your body when it is telling you what to eat?

Try this exercise to get to the heart of what you want:

1. Relax and empty your mind. Just allow your brain to go into that day-dreamy state that means relaxation to you.

2. As you enter the dream state, check in with your body. How do you feel? If you are truly relaxed you may feel a definite sensation such as comfortable warmth somewhere within you. Or you may feel enveloped in warmth. Or coolness. Identify your comfort feeling.

3. Now ask ‘what would I like?’, relax further and note whatever pops into you head.

4. Whatever ideas you have are right. Ask yourself what these things mean to you, especially if it is food. You need to know what the food means, not in an existentialist Jean-Paul Sartre sort of way, but simply, are you hungry? Or is it the taste of the food? Or what it represents to you? An ice-cream cone with a chocolate flake on top might mean summer beach holiday (yes, I know, back to Nantucket again) rather than food.

5. Use these ideas straightaway if they appeal to you, or put them to one side for use in a future life, and not in the too distant future.

And feel free to day dream and enjoy whenever you want to get in touch with what you really want!

Trust in your body and it will tell you what it wants!

(c) 2009 Liz Copeland