Enough is Enough!

Do you know who Joey Chestnut is? If you love hot dogs, you need to know who Joey Chestnut is. Joey captured his 10th 'Mustard Belt' award from Nathan’s hot dogs because he ate 72 hot dogs and buns in 10 minutes. Yup, it’s true. There is some mind-blowing accolades in the world of competitive overconsumption.

Here are just a few more —

25.25 ice cream sandwiches in 6 minutes.
22 oz. Slurpee in 9 seconds (hello ice cream headache!!)
47 Pizza slices from a 16-inch pizza in 10 minutes
Joey Chestnut does it again! 4.375 3 pound apple pies in 8 minutes!

Source - http://www.majorleagueeating.com/records.php

It’s an impressive website if you want to feel grotesquely curious about the human condition…

It makes my tummy hurt.

I hope his gastrointestinal tract was soothed by the $10,000 cash prize. Where does our fascination for these types of events come from? I was theorizing that it was an American indulgent, bigger, better, faster mentality but while researching I discovered that the Japanese bring their 'A' game to the competitions and host many in their salubriously celebrated country. BTW, Tokeru Kobayashi is the one to watch. At 128 pounds, Tokeru ate 110 bunless weiners in 10 minutes. He’s Joey’s major competition.

I definitely don’t want to rag on hot dogs. They are delicious and hold their place in the all American BBQ. The purpose of this blog is to initiate a deeper conversation with our bodies and minds about eating. It’s a serious endeavor. It’s especially serious when $10,000 cash prize and bragging rights are on the table…

Our 37.2 trillion cells are very interested in what is going in our mouths. Will they be able to heal and regenerate to give us the best day ever? The body and mind connection around food is fascinating to me. I have had my own struggles with compulsive over eating so this could be the reason why these eating contests blow my mind. The one pound bag of chocolate chips wreaked havoc in my body but in the moment my mind was wonderfully pacified.

Steps to Mindful Eating

Ritualize your meals.
In other words, make eating a practice that requires your full attention. Eating on the go means we are multi-tasking and not connecting to the wisdom of our bodies while we are eating. Try to make time to truly enjoy the exchange that you have with your food. It’s a multi-sensory experience so do your best to make time for this. Start with setting the table. We like to do a gratitude circle where we all hold hands and share one thing we are grateful for before we dig in. Take in the colors, the aromas, the textures; it can be a multi-sensory experience or a feeding trough experience. You decide!
SLOOOOOOOWWWWW Down.
After raising my sweet little babes, I had to seriously change how I experienced dinner time. Our young ones were fussy in their baby years, especially fussy at dinner time. This meant mommy got to shuffle some food in her mouth while holding a nursing babe (my “pacifier”). It was horrible and I distinctly remember feeling unsatisfied, bloated and malnourished after dinner. After learning about Macrobiotic theory, I knew things had to change. My children are older now so dinnertime means relaxing, enjoying and CHEWING my food at least 30 times. The Macrobiotic way suggests 50 - 100 times. Wow! Try it. It’s actually amazing. Your digestive system will be forever grateful. Easy peasy going down, absorbed and maximally utilized to heal, energize and cleanse your body just by chewing! The enzymes that we release when we masticate amp up the power of our digestive system exponentially. I shutter to think of all the half chewed pieces of broccoli, steak, etc., that I forced my poor system to break down. No wonder my tummy hurt! This is a big one - make soup in your mouth with your food before you send it down the hatch.
Put your utensil down between bites.
Simple..this one is easy and doable, right? I appreciate it because it easily invites the first two steps into our meal time naturally. 50 - 100 bites takes at least 30 seconds… Drop that utensil, sit back and savor the moment.