3 Tips to Reduce Mindless Holiday Overeating

With the holidays upon us, the temptation to eat is all around. Reduce the temptation to mindlessly overeat with these helpful tips.

Out Of Sight, Out Of Mind

A client was telling me that she kept mindlessly eating M & M’s because her husband had his candy jar out on the counter. He was great about self-control, but it seemed that each time she walked by the see-through candy jar, the multicolored M&M’s would grab her attention, her hand would go in the jar and the M&M’s would go in her mouth!

The solution? Put them out of sight. Either moving the candy jar into a cupboard or the pantry or using an opaque container to reduce the visual temptation.  Goodies are multi-colored and pretty for a reason – to get your attention!

Put It On A Plate

Did I eat my little bowl of chips or did I eat half the bag? Did I eat 2 cookies or half of the display plate? It can be too easy to overeat when we are don’t manage our serving sizes. So make sure to put what you intend to eat on a plate or in a bowl and then stick to it. Eat what you have mindfully and take the time to enjoy it – when you savor the flavor while you are consuming it, you can more easily resist the urge to go back for more.

Don’t Keep Serving Dishes on the Dining Table

How many servings of bread did I eat? I’ll admit that going gluten-free was a bit of a blessing in disguise as it gave me a hard and fast stop to continually munching on the endless bread basket while waiting for my meal at a restaurant. It’s too easy to just keep going when ample food is on the table. Am I right?

So while eating “family style” with all of the dishes on the table can be fun and festive, leaving the serving dishes out in front of you can lead to overeating. It’s just too easy to reach across and grab yourself a second or a third helping! Instead, plate the meal away from the dining table and keep excess food off of the table.

Even if you do decide to get a little more, use the walk from the table to the food to observe why you are going for more food and decide to consume it mindfully.

Enjoy the holidays!!! (just not too much!)