Muse*Practice*Allay Welcomes Local Yoga Teacher and Inspiring Blogger Kristin Adair!

Yoga and Mindful Eating

We yoga teachers talk a lot about taking yoga off the mat: breathing through a challenging traffic jam, practicing compassion towards an individual who is anything but compassionate towards you, engaging in selfless service. But what about eating? Even some of the most dedicated yogis may not think about practicing yoga at the dinner table. How can you begin to make your daily consumption part of your practice?

Messages about what to eat have gotten increasingly confusing in recent years, especially for those of us who are health conscious, socially conscious, or both. We should be eating locally, low carb, raw, meatless on Mondays, sustainable, organic, and more. Even the most committed among us may find it difficult to sort through all of these messages and decide what to prepare for dinner.

Yoga provides us with an array of principles to guide our daily lives, some of which can be applied to what we eat. Additionally, Ayurveda, the traditional discipline of Indian medicine and sister science to yoga, offers its own unique teachings on diet and nutrition.

Here are a few ideas to get you started in your practice of mindful eating:

Listen to your body. This should always be the first step on the path to mindful eating. Your body will tell you what it needs, and when. Bring awareness to these messages. If you don't feel energized and healthy when you eat a certain type of food, it may not be the best thing for you. For me, it was only after several years of chronic digestive problems, doctors, and prescription medications that I cut out dairy products. I quickly realized that for so long my body had been trying to tell me that these foods were not for me. I am now both happier and healthier without them.

Eat with the seasons. If you're anything like me, you don't crave hearty root vegetable soup in July or gazpacho in January. There's a good reason for this: Ayurveda tells us that energetic forces shift throughout the year.  Pitta energy, the energy of fire, is highest during the summer, and we are best suited to eat cooling, water-based foods during this time. Try cucumbers, avocado, and lightly seasoned foods. In the fall and winter, vata energy increases and we need more warming and grounding foods, like cooked vegetables and grains.

But if this doesn't make sense to you, revisit the first point: listen to what your body needs, because your unique composition may invite different eating patterns at different times of the year.

Consider your impact. As yogis, we believe that everything is interconnected. No matter what I do, my actions and intentions will impact the people around me, other beings, and the natural world. Ahimsa, one of the yamas (restraints) set forth in the Yoga Sutras, directs us to practice nonviolence and compassion, towards ourselves and others.

Listening to your body and eating more healthfully is an important way to practice compassion towards yourself. Eating food that is locally produced, seasonal, and/or organic can dramatically reduce your impact on the planet. You may also choose to remove some or all animal products from your diet to avoid contributing to the cruel and unsustainable practices of factory farming and reap significant health benefits. You should decide for yourself what ahimsa means to you and how it applies to what you eat.

Practice, not perfect. Committing to mindful eating doesn't mean that you have to give up a favorite indulgence for good. Even the most health conscious yogi may still have some french fries once in a while. You won't be able to fulfill your intention of mindful eating every meal, every day; modern life (and tempting treats) will most certainly get in the way. But that's okay. Let go and remember that yoga is a practice. Each day can teach us something about ourselves and bring us one step further on our journey.

And most importantly, when you sit down to eat, mindfully enjoy every bite.

About Kristin
By day, Kristin is an attorney with the non-profit Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine in Washington, DC, where she advocates for reform of federal nutrition policies. By night, she pursues her lifelong passion for yoga, teaching and assisting vinyasa flow classes around the DC metro area. Her classes incorporate the challenging flow sequences melded with powerful yoga philosophy that students can take off their mats and into their daily lives. In her free time, she loves to cook healthy dishes with vegetables from her organic garden.