In Zen we’re instructed, “When hungry, simply eat.” Each time we eat or drink now we have the chance to show our consideration to the vivid readability of this very second of expertise—if we take time to simply eat.
Too typically we really feel that consuming is one thing to recover from shortly whereas we multitask. We eat whereas speaking on the cellphone or engaged on the pc. It’s the simplicity of simply that we have to flip towards.
This second is the one place the place we’re alive. Our authentic buddhanature, our pure thoughts, just isn’t in another place or another time. It’s, because the Shangpa custom of Tibet says, “So shut you may’t see it, so easy you may’t consider it.”
The extra time we spend in moments of alive-ness, the better ease and satisfaction we are going to expertise in our lives. Conscious consuming provides us many alternatives to be totally current and expertise the liveliness that continually arises within the huge subject of open consciousness.
In conscious consuming, we intentionally direct our full consciousness to that liveliness, within the type of the bodily sensations, ideas, and feelings that come up and disappear as we eat. Most necessary, we do that with out criticism or judgement. We deliver clear consideration and curiosity to the colours and shapes of our meals (as if appreciating a murals), to the altering fragrances and flavors, to the textures and even the sounds of our meals.
Consuming could be a dharma gate, as a result of once we are really current with something we open the gate to Nice Presence, which is an inexhaustible supply of true nourishment. Listed here are 5 steps you may take to observe conscious consuming throughout each meal.
1. Start with Gratitude
Start your meal with a standard grace, maybe one from childhood. Or you may take a number of silent moments to bring to mind all of the folks (farmers, packagers, grocers, checkout folks) and different life types (bugs, bees, earthworms) whose life vitality has contributed to the meals you might be about to eat.
Visualize all of them gathered at your desk and thank them. Analysis reveals {that a} small ceremony earlier than consuming helps us eat extra mindfully and in applicable quantities.
2. Be Type to Your Abdomen
Too typically we stay at a distance from our our bodies and ignore the teachings they provide us in each second. Earlier than you’re taking your first servings of meals, deliver your consideration to your abdomen. How a lot quantity wouldn’t it be snug working with? One cup? Two cups? Three cups?
Serve your self two-thirds of that quantity to start. After you may have eaten it, test in along with your abdomen once more. How full is it? The tongue could say it needs extra tastes, however does the abdomen actually need extra quantity to work with? We will study to make such each day life selections not from need or compulsion however from overarching consciousness. Consciousness brings alternative, and selection brings freedom.
3. Take Conscious First Bites
Take a couple of minutes to savor the primary few bites of meals or sips of liquid. It helps to shut your eyes and convey full consciousness into your mouth. Take note of altering flavors, temperatures, and textures. Midway by means of the meal, pause and have one thing to drink with a view to refresh your palate. Pauses like this allow you to savor the freshness of extra “first few bites.”
4. Gradual Down
It takes twenty minutes for satiety hormones to be launched and attain the mind, signaling that now we have had sufficient to eat. Slowing down may help us eat extra appropriately and expose our conditioned habits.
Attempt consuming along with your non-dominant hand. It’s enjoyable and humorous. Or attempt placing down the utensils between bites. Don’t take one other chunk till the primary chunk is totally chewed, loved, and swallowed. If you wish to eat much less and luxuriate in it extra, decelerate.
5. Feed the Multitude Inside
There are extra dwelling organisms in your intestine than there are human cells in your physique. This “second genome” of 100 trillion beings is concerned in lots of points of our well being, together with immune perform, extra weight acquire, coronary heart well being, and even psychological well being. (Word: the useful micro organism thrive on “actual meals,” not processed meals.)
So after you eat, deliver your consciousness to the universe of tiny beings inside your stomach. Ship them loving-kindness and a want for his or her good well being and persevering with help of your physique, coronary heart, and thoughts.
Lastly, widen the sphere of loving-kindness with the prayer “Might all beings be equally properly nourished, each with foods and drinks and likewise with essentially the most satisfying meals—the meals of dharma.”
