How to Stop Mindless Eating

I eat mostly because I'm bored. What can I nosh on all day that will be a good distraction but not make me crave sweet or salty foods?

Thank you for your great question because it’s something that most of us struggle with at some point in our life our week or our day!  

To most people, your question may appear to be a food related issue, but hidden between the lines is something much deeper, which is. … “why are you so bored?” So rather than simply answer your question about what to nosh, I hope you don’t mind if I dig a bit deeper to try to figure out what’s going on in your life (or not) so we can find out why you need to distract yourself by eating.  

Believe me, I’ve been in your shoes many times as have most of us so you are in good company! But food is rarely the real problem. Figuring out our life is. Like you, many of us eat when we are bored, stressed, upset or frightened. Isn’t it interesting that we rarely turn to food when we are happy or busy or in love? That’s because when we are happy, fulfilled and feeling loved we really don’t have much time or interest in eating all the time! Right?  

So here’s my suggestion to try and get you off the noshing train and into living the life of your dreams. Get out a pad and paper and on one side write down all the things you love about your life, your job, your relationship(s), your home, your body and on the other side of the pad, write down all the areas of your life where you would like to see some improvement. Once you have these two lists done, congratulate yourself on all the things you like about your life but then also compare the two lists to see where you might want to make some changes! Don’t try to change everything all at once, just pick one thing that makes you feel giddy with excitement when you think about doing it or having it. It doesn’t matter what it is as long as you get excited by the thought of it.  

And then, make it happen in any way you can. Take baby steps at first because we all know that change doesn’t happen over night. But I can pretty much assure that once you are turned toward something that you love, you will start having more fun, and will soon be so in love with your life that you will have little interest or time to nosh!   
In the interim, if you want to stop craving sweets, just add more protein to your diet, if you want to stop craving chocolate, just add a magnesium supplement to your diet (and protein) and if you want something to crunch on that is low calorie, I would suggest eating baby carrots or chopped up celery because they are easy to pop into your mouth and make a nice loud crunching sound when you bit into them.  

But frankly the most important thing has nothing to do with noshing or with food but rather with life itself. So I encourage you to take a much bigger BITE out of life — and watch the miracles unfold! Best of luck and keep me posted.  

Warmly,
The Naughty Nutritionist