Starting to Untangle from Emotional Eating

Welcome to Day 5 of the Untangling Draining Habits challenge.

Over 7 days, we are bringing awareness to different habits that cause undue stress or anxiety in our lives. At the end of the each post, we share with you one simple step you can take to start to breakup with the draining habit.

So far we have brought awareness to Overcommitment, Blame, Continual Sense of Lack and Self-Doubt.

Today we are going to focus on the habit of emotional eating.

Draining Habit #5: Emotional Eating

Sound familiar? You are tired, haven’t eaten since breakfast and have so much to do. It is time to stop for lunch, however you can’t. There are people asking you to make decisions and the report needs writing. So you reach for that sugary drink or bar. An hour passes by and you end up feeling more tired and irritated than you did before.

You need something to wake you up and interrupt the autopilot you are experiencing.

Challenge: Starting to Untangle from Emotional Eating –

Before you reach for that sugary snack or drink, why not try the following STOP technique?

This technique helps you to interrupt the ‘automatic pilot’ by bringing you back to the present moment. Then you can choose to respond rather than react out of habit.

• S – stop and interrupt your ‘automatic pilot’ by concentrating on the present moment
• T – take a breath and bring your experience of the in-breath and the out-breath
• O – open to observation. Connect to the experience of this moment and inquire with a sense of curiosity –
  • What am I seeing?
  • What am I feeling?
  • What am I sensing?
  • What am I hearing?
  • What am I smelling?
  • What am I thinking?
  • What do I really need right now?
• P – proceed and reconnect with your surroundings and with your activity in the moment.

Would love to hear you go with this. Feel free to share your progress below in the comments section or on our Facebook page here.

If you are ready to take yourself on the adventure of getting to know yourself (your true self), why not join the Toolkit? A place where I share tools, inspiration and ideas to live a courageous and openhearted life.