Rebuilding Our Relationship with Food

Overview

Class Central Tips

Have you ever made a conscious effort to change the way you eat (for health or other reasons) and then felt frustrated when your plans were derailed? You’re not alone. The best laid plans are often sabotaged by a food environment that makes it increasingly hard to make healthier food choices. This can leave many people feeling mistrustful of food or feeling that our relationship with food is somehow broken. In this course, we’ll explore the history of our changing food environment, the science behind cravings for unhealthy foods AND most importantly, you’ll learn some concrete strategies for rebuilding your relationship with food. You’ll learn to practice mindful eating and self-compassion (proven strategies for supporting healthier food choices) as well as designing a customized plan to protect your relationship with food and improve the health of your greatest asset - you! I can’t wait to start on this adventure together. Special thanks to: William Bottini, Sejal Parekh, Janine Van Schoor, Ann Doerr, Perry Pickert and the fantastic team at Friday Films.

Syllabus

What Happened to Our Relationship with Food?

In this module, we’ll examine how the commercial food industry separates us from our food and how this impacts our long-term health. We’ll explore how attitudes towards food can differ across different global regions and different cultures and how our attitudes toward food can affect our health. Finally, we’ll examine the ways in which food can support our optimal performance at work or at play.

Moderation, Balance, and Food

In this module, we’ll learn about why traditional, restrictive “diets” often fail us, how to begin reframing our thinking about food from “Am I allowed to eat this?” to “Is this food worthy of me?” and how our food choices can shape our food preferences.

How to Practice Self-Compassion and Moderation

In this module you’ll learn about the components of self-compassion, a practice that can be used to support healthier food choices and eating behaviors. You’ll also learn about how our taste receptors respond to quantity vs quality and how we can use this knowledge to maximize our eating experience while protecting our health!

Practicing Mindful Eating (Loving the Foods That Will Love You Back)

In this module, we’ll explore some of the ways in which we can rebuild a longstanding relationship with our food, by observing our own behaviors and developing customized strategies for letting go of habits that don’t serve us well. We’ll also learn more about the practice of mindful eating and how we can incorporate that practice into our daily lives.