A new Book called The Mindfulness diet seems to be jumping on the bandwagon to help with weight loss. It's actually got some great advice. I know that because they are advocating exactly what I have been teaching my weight loss clients for the past few years!

The book, by Dr Patrizia Collard and Helen Stephenson, is called a new approach to eating which gives you the power to take control of your eating and think yourself to a better body and soul. Stars such as Meg Ryan and Goldie Hawn have spoken about how mindful eating has helped them and you can follow the same advice to help you lose weight and feel healthier and fitter.

The concept behind the Mindfulness Diet teaches you to appreciate food , nutrition and healthy eating, as well as how to deal with the kind of cravings that hamper many diets and healthy eating drives. Alongside the advice the book also contains recipies. Of course recipie books are interesting because most of them just stay on the bookshelf in the kitchen gathering dust..and grease.

The techniques of eating mindfully that are talked about in the Mindfulness Diet are the same ones that I teach my clients. When we start to eat in a mindful way we can ejoy our food and when we enjoy it, it no longer becomes about just eating for eating sake.

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Eating mindfully,  will train your body to know what it needs and Patrizia said the diet’s biggest advantage is “being truly connected to this moment, enjoying every meal as if it is your wedding feast, fully and truly getting all the benefits out of it by savouring the moment”.

Here are their ten tips... I have to agree with how well these work because they are pretty much the same tips on the worksheet I have given to my clients for years. Have a read and then think about how they could help you to lose weight...Mindful eating...

1. Listen to your body. Are you hungry? If you are, how hungry are you?

2. Use smaller serving plates and bowls. Studies have shown our satisfaction is tied in to “relative” portion sizes. So, if we have a very small plate piled high with food, we’ll feel much more satisfied than if we have a large plate with a small amount of food.

3. Be flexible when eating out. There is no obligation to have a starter, main course and dessert. Why not have starters instead of a main course?

4. Serve up at source. When serving food at home, try to plate it up by the oven or hob, rather than at the table. If the excess is on the table in front of you while you are eating, that’s where your mind is likely to be. Studies have shown you are likely to eat faster with the excess in front of you. Presumably this is prompted by some survival instinct from the past, when we weren’t sure where the next meal was coming from.

5. When you eat, just eat. If you sit down at a table with a large box of chocolates and no distractions, you are unlikely to polish off the entire box. But when you’re watching TV or involved in another activity, this awareness can be drowned out.

6. Learn what a portion size is. As a general rule, a “cup” is about the size of a large tennis ball, 85g of meat is about a deck of cards and 30g cheese is the size of a domino.

7. Think little and often. Try to maintain a stable blood-sugar level and moderate level of satiety by eating small meals throughout the day rather than a couple of ridiculously large meals.

8. Have a salad as a starter. Be smart and eat raw vegetables or salad to burn off that extreme hunger before the meal itself.

9. Have a glass of water before eating. Sip a good-sized glass of water in the 10–15 minutes leading up to a meal. This way you can be sure you are serving up only what the body actually needs.

10. Shop smart. Bulk buying foods can often enable you to pick up great bargains. If you are unable or unwilling to break those down into smaller portion sizes when you get home, consider the possibility of buying smaller versions. While you may not get the same value for money, think of the cost (financial, physical, mental and emotional) of overeating large portions of food.

You can read all about my approach to helping you to end diets forever and lose weight that you keep off for life here: http://www.markpowlett.co.uk/slimmeryou.html

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