Hello love,
I wanted to talk a bit about meditation and what I specifically use with clients to help them resolve their emotional eating.
Emotional eating is whenever we use food to soothe or cope with any discomfort or uncomfortable emotions. This pattern usually develops in childhood where we weren’t modelled how to deal with our emotions or regulate ourselves. This leaves a gap or hole and we then fill it with food. Food makes us physiologically feel good and it acts as a bandaid.
The emotional eating pattern is multilayered and multifaceted. What I see is that it boils down to a dysfunctional relationship to food, our body and our emotions and so we need to transform these relationships to a more functional one.
This is an important place where the meditations I do with clients come into play. I will give you general overview. There are so many modalities out there and I personally love to go deeper and use specific ones that do this.
My perspective of emotional eating through working with clients is that it develops in childhood and is a result of trauma. Trauma is when we experience a situation that left us feeling emotionally unresolved. Trauma is on a spectrum from little “t” to big “T” trauma.
I use somatic meditations with clients and a combination of psychotherapy tools like parts and inner child work, etc. to get to the root of the pattern. Of course when I work privately with clients I can guide them more specifically. While we are all similar there are nuances that we each need.
Why meditation is important and brain development
The reason that mediations are so important in this pattern is that it is very automatic. This is why you feel you have no control over the food or yourself and why you feel taken over. This pattern is so deeply rooted into your being especially from a young age.
Even if you don’t remember it consciously what I find with clients as we move through the layers is that it goes back to childhood.
This makes sense to me…
From the ages of 0-7 our brain is in theta and alpha wavelength. This means we are very open and take in pattern whether functional or dysfunctional easily with no discernment. This creates the foundation for how we relate to the world and to survive.
This means that this pattern becomes deeply imbedded and plays out with stressful situations. The emotional eating pattern also becomes more complicated as we add in diet diets and exercise and all the other solutions sold to us to resolve this pattern. They actually complicate it more.
Our society is not set up to go deeper but to slap on bandaids and quick fixes.
The power of the mind
Our conscious mind that wants to do the quick fixes is only 5% of our “mind power” and subconsciously where this pattern is 95%. Think about breathing and driving – we want to have subconscious patterns running the show but in the direction we consciously want. So we can use our conscious mind for a few decisions and not for constant willpower.
We need to work with this 95% and this is where mediations come in. Caveat it is not about just any meditations it’s about being specific. When I work with clients we are working on this specific pattern which of course ripples out in to other areas of life.
When I was going to talk therapy which is more about he mind (5%) I was able to see some patterns but it doesn’t get to the root. Therapy was more general and I didn’t have a focus.
In my program, I work specifically with the emotional eating pattern because it’s the biggest issue coming up. Of course as you heal this pattern it ripples out into other areas of your life as well.
We use the mediations to get to the root of the pattern, where it started and resolve it. This creates integration and space to create a new powerful way forward. This is trauma informed.
We do this with mediations because we get to a more open state to work with the pattern. In day to day life we tend to be protected.
What I find with all the bandaid solutions is that you have to willpower your way because you are not getting at the root. So the diets, exercise, surgery, positive thinking, etc take a lot of energy but this is not creating true transformation.
When we get to the root and meet the needs we clear it, we transform it and put in a new way. When we pile on the bandaids it’s like adding ice cream on top of poop and that feels tense in the body. There is resistance.
Conversely, my clients experience relief with the meditations because it is on a body level. We are also working on this pattern on multiple levels with true nourishment and body acceptance.
The meditations are great to get to the sticky resistance that has been holding you back from creating true change. Once the pattern is resolved you can move forward powerfully, feeling confident in your body and around food.
If what I have shared is resonating with you I invite you to check out more about The Emotional Eating Evolution Program which is my step by step methodology with lots of support, guidance and somatic mediations to help you resolve your emotional eating from the root. You can also book in an Emotional Eating Assessment call here if you are committed to resolving this pattern.
To a new way forward,
Michelle
Certified Holistic Nutritionist + Emotional Eating Expert
