Mindfulness Mondays 64: Savor
November 29, 2010 by dr. lam · 7 Comments
As we enter the holiday season, I decided to read a book aptly entitled Savor that tries to help individuals lose weight and keep that weight off. It has been a steady two years for me in which I have continually lost weight down to an almost ideal weight for me without any yo-yo-ing except for 2 to 3 pounds. The book advocates that we approach food with mindful intention, as we should everything in life.
Too often we blame will power, where will power is basically a short-lived contrivance. When we force ourselves not to eat or have an adversarial relationship to food, we fail shortly thereafter. We cannot wage an ongoing epic battle of the bulge, as will power is only a temporary fix job. We must open ourselves to transforming our relationship with food so that we do not resist, fight, and binge.
For myself, I do not like overeating because it now makes me sick. Eating refined sugars and other processed foods no longer give me joy, as they once did. That does not mean I do not enjoy a dessert or some chocolate every now and then. However, I do not crave it or desire it with eager desperation. When we start to become more mindful in every arena in life, we become more mindful toward how we eat food.
In short, the author advocates that we consciously eat our food. Today we tend to scarf it down in a blink (of which I am still a culprit but am learning to let that go). We often live our lives in a multi-tasking mode with the Internet, the radio, the television, and various other distractions around us so that we do not mindfully even taste our food. Chewing each bite 20 to 40 times not only allows one to savor the taste but it also allows us to mechanically break down the food and help with important enzymatic digestion of every morsel.
This week, be mindful of your food and be present with it as you eat, savoring the taste, the nutrition, the labor that went into its preparation, the gratitude of having it and turn off the mindless distractions that would otherwise invade our presence of mind with that food like the Internet and other invasions.
Mindfulness Mondays 63: Martha Graham, Communicating From the Heart
November 22, 2010 by dr. lam · 4 Comments
I am on a plane ride back from St. Louis where I lecture a couple times a year. In my quest for ongoing improvement in my ability to communicate, I am a voracious reader of books that help me elevate my art. The books that have had the most profound influence on me include Garr Reynold’s Presentation Zen and Nancy Duarte’s Slide:ology. I am currently finishing Duarte’s new book, Resonate, that focuses more on the art of storytelling than on the rigors of slide creation, which was the focus of her first book.
A story that captivated me in her book recounted the life of Martha Graham, the iconoloclastic dancer who ushered in a new way of seeing and performing dance. Against all odds, she became a dancer: she was told she was too old, too heavy, too ugly, and too short. She said, “They thought I was good enough to be a teacher, but not a dancer.” Dance was her reason for living, Duarte explains. Driven by her burning desire for her art, she declared, “I did not choose to be a dancer. I was chosen.”
Her stark, blunt, gestural dance stood antithetical to traditional romantic, flowing movements of European dance that dominated until that time. Beating down the stereotypical chorus girl prototype, Graham was the brave, new woman who owned her own company and created a new expression. In 1930, she debuted her haunting solo dance called Lamentation. One of her first performances was in Brooklyn. Immediately after the performance a woman came up to her and with tears thanked her for how much her dance meant to her. Graham later found out that this woman had recently witnessed the death of her 9-year-old son who was struck by a truck in front of her and who had the incapacity to cry until that performance that gave her the vehicle and dignity to weep. Graham insisted that if her dance could touch one person in the audience that it would be worth it. She wanted her dances to be felt rather than understood.
I think her story is truly inspirational whether you love or hate modern dance. It is a story of a person who passionately followed her heart against all tormenters and naysayers. She pursued her art and wanted that art to speak to whoever was willing to listen and be receptive to it. I think we all can learn a valuable lesson when we hear the stifling looks of others who believe we are not worthy to pursue what we want in life because we do not meet whatever criterion or standard that the public has set for us. We can all follow our heart more than our minds and work to achieve greatness through our capacity to express ourselves and hopefully that expression will touch at least one other life.
Namaste,
Sam Lam