Aware Consuming: The Raisin Exercise and Guided Meditation

Have you ever ever discovered your self reaching for a bag of chips or a sweet bar with out even realizing it? Or possibly you’ve eaten a complete meal whereas distracted by your telephone or tv? Right here’s a conscious consuming guided meditation.

It occurs to us all! One technique to apply conscious consuming is thru the “raisin” exercise, a conscious consuming guided meditation that may assist you grow to be extra conscious of your consuming habits.

Keep in mind that meals is a lot extra than simply the bodily nourishment for our our bodies, it’s additionally about enjoyment, connection, custom, social expertise, cultural expertise, inventive expression, and pleasure! It’s regular for us to expertise consuming alongside feelings or distraction. 

Aware Consuming: The Raisin Exercise and Guided Meditation

Many people wrestle with senseless consuming or consuming with out being absolutely conscious of what we’re placing in our our bodies. However there’s a resolution: conscious consuming. By practising mindfulness whereas consuming, we are able to study to savor and luxuriate in our meals extra absolutely, construct a extra balanced and peaceable relationship with meals, and even enhance our general well being. 

This train is a unbelievable technique to apply conscious consuming and it may be finished with any meals!

I realized this apply from my current coaching in MBSR (mindfulness-based stress discount). The raisin exercise is a standard mindfulness train used within the context of conscious consuming. Whereas it isn’t solely clear who first developed this exercise, it’s typically attributed to Jon Kabat-Zinn, a professor of medication and the founding father of the Mindfulness-Primarily based Stress Discount program on the College of Massachusetts Medical College. Kabat-Zinn is well known as one of many pioneers of recent mindfulness apply and has contributed considerably to its integration into mainstream medication and psychology.

What Is The Raisin Exercise?

The raisin exercise is a guided meditation that includes utilizing your whole senses to mindfully eat a single raisin. This train is designed that will help you decelerate, take note of your meals, and savor each chew.

Once more, in the event you don’t take pleasure in raisins or don’t have them readily available, use any meals you want and have.

Right here’s easy methods to do the raisin conscious consuming meditation: 

1. Begin by discovering a snug and quiet place to sit down. In case you have a particular or devoted meditation area in your house, use this area. Be sure to gained’t be disturbed for the subsequent 10-Quarter-hour.
2. Take a number of deep breaths and focus your consideration in your physique. Really feel your toes on the bottom and your again towards the chair. Enable your self to calm down and let go of any pressure.
3. Take a raisin and maintain it within the palm of your hand. Study the raisin along with your eyes, being attentive to its form, coloration, and texture. Discover any ridges or wrinkles on the floor.
4. Carry the raisin as much as your nostril and take a deep breath. Discover any scent or aroma that the raisin offers off.
5. Slowly place the raisin in your mouth, however don’t chew it but. Discover the feeling of the raisin in your tongue and the within of your mouth. Enable it to sit down in your mouth for a number of seconds.
6. Start to chew the raisin slowly and mindfully, being attentive to the feeling of every chew. Discover the feel and taste of the raisin.
7. Swallow the raisin and see the feeling of it happening your throat.
8. Take a second to replicate in your expertise. How did it really feel to eat the raisin mindfully? Did you discover any new sensations or flavors that you simply wouldn’t have observed in any other case?

The raisin exercise is a robust device for practising conscious consuming. By bringing your full consideration to the act of consuming, you possibly can domesticate a deeper appreciation to your meals and develop a more healthy relationship with it.

Why Follow Aware Consuming?

There are numerous advantages to practising conscious consuming. For one, it may assist you grow to be extra conscious of your starvation and fullness cues, permitting you to higher regulate your meals consumption and preserve your distinctive balanced weight.

Aware consuming may also assist you take pleasure in your meals extra absolutely and cut back emotions of guilt or disgrace round consuming. Moreover, practising conscious consuming may help you grow to be extra conscious of your emotional triggers round meals and develop more healthy coping mechanisms.

Ideas for Practising Aware Consuming

Along with the raisin exercise, there are numerous different methods to apply conscious consuming. Listed here are a number of tricks to get began:

1. Eat with out distractions: Keep away from consuming whereas watching TV, utilizing your telephone, or working at your laptop. As a substitute, focus your whole consideration in your meals.
2. Decelerate: Take your time whereas consuming, and chew every chew totally. This may assist you savor the flavors and textures of your meals.
3. Take note of your physique: Examine in along with your physique earlier than, throughout, and after consuming. Discover how these sensations really feel in your physique with no judgment and plenty of self-compassion.