Thursday, April 20, 2006

Eat slowly!

I've been in Malaysia/Singapore almost 3 weeks having moved from Scotland. Spent most of the first 2 weeks recovering from fever and indigestion. It's like the climate here is rejecting me! Trying to flush me out of the system... Of course, I fought back, using a method inspired by Mahatma Ghandi - abstaining from food. Ok, not that extreme, but I did cut down on my diet.

There were plenty of times that I wanted to eat more than what I've been eating. And to eat the things I want to eat. Doctor said I should stay away from dairy products, spicy food and sour food - which just about remove all the most "interesting" food! It does make me wonder how much do we actually need to eat?...(click here to read more)

I'm lucky that I'm not struggling to get my 3 meals a day. In fact, I can afford to eat more than 3 meals a day, and plenty of sides with them! Being forced to maintain a simpler diet does make me question how much do I actually need to eat everyday?

I don't expend plenty of energy during the day. Now that I'm not working, my brain activity has reduced (which I was told is a significant energy drainer!). As for physical activities, apart from my daily Tai Ji in the morning, I've got the occasional badminton and table tennis in the evenings. Nothing back breaking. So, how much do I really need to eat?

I've been experimenting with less food everyday, just to see how long I can last before hunger hits. I'm actually surprised that I can do with much much less than I used to eat! Almost half as much. Maybe it's the change in climate where a warmer climate does not need that much food to keep the core temperature up.

However, I have to say that most of the reason I eat more than I need is psychological! I don't need the chocolate fudge cake at the end of the meal, that's just too much. I don't need to eat at 11 o'clock at night, just go to bed! And sometimes when I do eat, I choose to eat more than what I intended because of all the temptations placed on the table!

So, I guess I can actually choose to eat less, but my toungue tells me otherwise. I can remove all the temptations on the table, but that'll be just rude to the others around the table. So, torn between heart and logic, is there no solution to this?

Inspired by a book i've read called "Slow", maybe we can slow down our food intake. This will let the tongue savour the taste longer and will also allow the food taken to be fully digested before more is taken in. We are actually allowing the stomach a chance to put up the sign saying "FULL" when it's full, not when it's almost full but a lot more is coming down the throat but got stuck in the digestive traffic.

If you do try this, let me know if it does work. Just don't eat when you're really hungry. Eat at the same time you ate yesterday, the same time as everyday.

Categories:

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home