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Self-Deprivation Mindset: No Pleasure in Eating

Emotional eaters often feel enormous guilt about eating – and especially enjoyment of eating. This may seem like a small matter, but in fact guilt-free enjoyment of food is a key factor in recovery. From my book, Normal Eating® for Normal Weight:
Our modern society views enjoyment of eating in much the same way as Victorians [...]

Stopping When Full

There are many reasons that people continue eating after they are no longer hungry. Here’s the short list:

You don’t recognize satiation cues. You don’t recognize that you’re no longer hungry until you are past full.
It bothers you to leave food on your plate. The reasons for this can run deep, as you’ll soon see.
The food [...]

How Other People Affect Your Eating

Most of us don’t live in isolation. The people closest to you usually know all about your struggles with weight and eating, and can have a profound effect on your Normal Eating journey.
When you’re coming from the diet world, you’re coming from a world in which it’s assumed that you don’t have the self-control or [...]

Eating at Meal Times and Eating from Habit

Do you eat because it’s time to eat, whether you’re hungry or not? A lot of people do, and then feel crappy afterwards.
If the goal is to eat when you’re hungry, does that mean regular meal times are out? No, it doesn’t mean that at all. But figuring out how to make your hunger coincide [...]

5 Secrets to Turning Resolutions Into Reality

The end of the year is a time to review and take stock. The news media recounts the major events of the last 12 months, and makes lists of the public figures who have died. And we, as individuals, think about our own lives. What happened to us over the last year? What went right? [...]

Are You an Emotional Eater? Take the Test!

Are you an emotional eater? If so, what are the reasons you eat? Are you mainly soothing negative emotions, or do you eat primary to distract yourself from the real problems in your life? How does being fat affect your view of yourself, and perhaps even serve you?
Take the test and find out! After [...]

Eating Candy and Feeling Guilty

Today is the day after Halloween and candy leftovers abound. Are you locked in a war with yourself about eating it? Here’s how to take the power out of the candy and put it back in you, where it belongs.
The crucial shift is in your attitude. You must know on a deep level – not [...]

Change Your Thinking, Change Your Body

Last night I went to hear Deepak Chopra talk about his new book, Reinventing the Body, Resurrecting the Soul. The book was just released yesterday and we all got copies, so I’ve got it hot off the press. The talk, sponsored by the New York Open Center, was held in the magnificent Riverside Church, which [...]

What Is “Normal Eating”?

Since everyone else today seems to be asking “What Is Normal Eating?” (Psych Central blog, New York Times Wellness blog, Feed Me I’m Cranky blog), I figured I should address it here – at the official “Normal Eating” Web site.
“Normal eating” means eating according to body wisdom – which then begs the question, “What is [...]

5 Reasons Emotional Eaters Shun Mindfulness

There’s been a lot of discussion in the forum lately about mindful eating – generally how much people don’t want to do it. It’s ironic that emotional eaters who claim to love eating find it so hard to just eat – to focus only on eating when they’re eating. It seems the only time that [...]