How You Eat
What is it’s not just about what you eat – but the way you eat, that affects your health
The Way (Dao) of eating is:
Overfilling yourself with food will impair your vital energy
And cause your body to deteriorate
Over-restricting your consumption causes bones to wither
And the blood to congeal
Original Tao, 4th century BCE
One thing I love about Chinese medicine is its devotion to the middle path in life.
Very things are labeled as ‘bad’ in the Chinese diet. It is more concerned about how the food is consumed, for example, the quantity, frequency, time of day, time of year, the locality in which they came from. Also, the manner in which a meal is consumed plays a huge role in how the food will be digested.
How much food to eat
Chinese medicine wisdom says only to eat until you are three-quarters full.
Only eating until are you are almost full allows for space for the stomach to churn up the food and the digestive juices to have enough space to access all the food consumed.
Also, the quantity of food we eat in a day is also important to well-being and our longevity.
The stomach needs time to rest and digest the meals, and cell renewal happens when the digestive system is clear not clogged with food.
We use one-tenth of the energy of the food we eat digesting it, which shows that the process takes a lot of energy from the system. Think about it – its alchemical process – you are turning an orange into a human being! Everything you eat your body has to break down and transform into you. You really are what you eat.
Eating the correct amount of food for the energy output each individual does is key to a healthy body and mind.
“Always rise from the table with an appetite, and you will never sit down without one”
William Penn, 1644, 1718
We are conditioned by centuries of a time of living when it was difficult to obtain enough nourishment.
Today however we have to retrain ourselves to not feel afraid of being hungry.. to know that we are never far away from our next meal and moderate our level of hunger to activate when we genuinely are hungry. Not just feel like ‘something’ which is often an indication of a sugar imbalance and not true hunger.
This way we start to connect in more deeply with our body’s needs, and know when and what to eat by our own body’s intelligence. We know when we have enough, or what food we want to or don’t want to eat.
Chewing our food
Your digestion starts in your mouth. This is why it’s so important to chew slowly for the saliva to start creating digestive enzymes, which start your gastric digestive enzymes into action to begin the digestive process. Without this enabled, digestive function will be sluggish and incomplete.
There is an old saying that goes
“Chew your food, your stomach doesn’t have teeth”
Which is such a correct statement – as humans, the only thing that breaks down food once it has reached the stomach is the digestive enzymes and stomach acids.
Chewing also brings out the sweetness in the foods, which will cure the craving for sweet food. Grains and some vegetables when chewed correctly release their natural sweetness which satisfies our hunger for sweet foods.
It takes approximately twenty mins for the food in the stomach to reach the small intestine which is where you get the messages of satisfaction and a feeling of fullness. Therefore, eating in a hurry there is a tendency to overeat and then sometime after the meal suddenly feeling very full and sluggish.
Eating slowly will give your body time to indicate when you have had enough to eat, and with enough warning, for you to eat just to three-quarters full.
How you eat and how you feel when you eat
Taking time to eat in a relaxed manner will support proper digestive function.
If you are rushing, or distracted with other activities, your body will be activated in the sympathetic nervous system – which is not the system you want for digestion.
The digestion is most effective in the parasympathetic nervous system – the ‘rest and digest’ functionality of the body’s system.
Eating whilst standing, walking, driving, working at a desk or any activity of the like will hinder the digestive process, and not only that but as you are not being mindful with your eating your brain will not fully register you have eaten a meal – which is likely to lead to overeating, and potentially snacking later.
The traditional way of sitting down to eat, taking a moment of gratitude for the food in front of you, smelling it, and chewing in a slow and mindful way will support not only digestion but also increase the pleasure and enjoyment of eating the food.
Taking a moment after the meal has completed too will enhance the process, rather than rushing us and interrupting the relaxed state of the nervous system too quickly.
Being in a relaxed state of mind also is of upmost importance when eating, feeling overly emotional will knot or hinder the Qi in the stomach and the digestive process and will lead to insufficient digestion and discomfort after eating. Relaxing your mind, connecting to your breath in your belly, feeling safe and relaxed, the body can relax and focus on the job at hand which is digesting your meal.
Eating at regular times
If you eat a regular time – the body will start to prepare your digestive enzymes ready to receive the food before you actually eat.
This means that eating at regular times is a great way to optimise the digestion process.
Also eating at regular times ensures we allow sufficient time to process a meal before we consume another one.
Posture after eating
Lying down after a meal is an inefficient posture to take for optimal digestion. It goes against the natural forces of gravity and renders the digestive function as food gets stuck in the stomach or curves of the intestines instead of going downwards through the digestive tract.
For optimal digestion, (after a sufficient resting period), taking a gentle stroll after dinner will help to promote the downward flow of food to support the transformation process of the food into energy.
“Eating to satiation and then lying down causes the hundred diseases including indigestion and energic blockages”
Nourishing Inner Nature and Extending Life, 7th/8th centuries
