The Challenge this week is:
Eat only until you are 80% full. Then stop.
This theory comes from the Okinawans who were once the longest-lived people on earth. They practiced a principle they called “Hara Hachi Bu”: which means eat until you are 80 percent full.
Most of us are in the habit of eating until we are full or worse, making sure we finish everything on our plate and then we are past full.
Why would we eat until make ourselves sick?
Do you feel good when you do this?
When you eat until you are full or past full you feel sluggish and tired. If you will stop just before that you will feel light and energetic.
You will get to eat again...it's not the last meal of your life.
Start paying attention to your body and how it communicates with you. You will start to realize you've been ignoring some pretty important messages it's been trying to send you.
Don't eat out of obligation.
Don't eat so as not to "waste" food. How much more money will you spend in trying to get off the extra weight? Just save the food for later or throw it away. Your hips and your heart will thank you. :)
This New York Times article has a lot of really great information on nutritionism and how our Western Diet has come to be. It's long, but well worth the read if you get the chance.
80% full then stop.
It's time to listen to your body.
5 comments:
This is great Dixie! I was thinking about this just recently...you've now answered my question. I usually try to eat until I feel full and I feel proud of myself if I can pull myself away from the table...80% is going to be a challenge indeed! I love to eat.
Thanks for the challenges Dixie. They have been helpful.
I enjoyed the NY Times article too. I'll admit I did skim a little at the end but it's a nice reminder that eating healthy doesn't have to be so complicated.
I'm happy to see that you and your family are doing so well. This is a great blog!
Well, this should be interesting. I just don't know what THAT feels like, so it'll be "fun" to figure out stopping before the yuck comes in.
Great challenge, Dixie. I love the variety with which you give each challenge. Since I'm following the challenges, I love to see what is next, too. You are an awesome motivator. And you're hot, which is nice.
If you liked the article, you would probably like both of Pollan's books, The Omnivore's Dilemma and In Defense of Food. We've been working to implement a lot of his principles into our daily diets so it was cool to see this as one of your challenges.
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