You Might Want To Sit Down For This…
Sit down to eat for weight management success. It often seems like a luxury that you can’t afford but the truth is, you can’t afford not to. We are all just so BUSY! What if sitting down to optimally enjoy your meal was really at the top of your to-do list?
Here are five superior reasons to sit down and eat off of a plate:
You can savor the flavor. Digestion actually starts in the brain. By concentrating on your food, your body starts to release enzymes to break it down for optimal digestion. It’s best to put away all distractions, including silencing your phone or turning off the television. When you are distracted, it takes more food for your brain to feel satisfied. Good things take time!
By eating off of a plate, you are less likely to overeat and feel stuffed or regretful. The “smaller plate study” at Cornell University showed that if you eat off of a smaller plate, will typically eat about 20 percent fewer calories than if you use a larger plate. Larger plates make food portions appear smaller. Known as the Delboeuf Illusion, it is an optical illusion that causes us to make inaccurate estimates. Interestingly, I have patients who are missionaries in Croatia. When they originally moved there, their American dishes wouldn’t fit in the cabinets. They had to get smaller plates!
You can invite others to join you. Isolation has a huge impact on health. Although we are connected via social media, many people have no real social connectedness. Strong social ties have a direct and positive impact on health, according to study after study. Eating with friends or family reduces stress and stress-related illnesses are a major reason that people visit their primary care physician
You will naturally eat more slowly and feel more satisfied: Eating slowly is correlated to health. Participants in a study who were instructed to eat fast ( a nine-minute meal) ingested 15 percent fewer calories than those instructed to eat slow (taking 29 minutes to eat). Those eating more slowly reported more satisfaction after the meal.
You can take more time to chew your food. Students in an Iowa State University Study who chewed each bite 40 times were found to eat 12 percent fewer calories at a meal than those who chewed just 15 times. The hunger hormones are involved here! They found that less ghrelin, a hormone related to feeling hungry, is produced in the group that chewed the most.
Sit down to eat for weight management success and greater enjoyment of your food. It just makes sense! START SOMEWHERE today evaluating how you eat before you worry about what you eat. You can do it. I will help you!