Taking on a Tough Challenge
Amongst all the reading I'm doing, one idea stuck with me and I'm trying it out. Chew each bite of food at least fifty times. This is way more difficult than what it seems. I've made it to forty, most of the time only getting to twenty-seven or twenty-eight chews before I have to swallow, so fifty is most definitely a challenge. I am determined to continue trying, though, as I've realized just how mindless I have been about the actual act of eating. Trying to chew a bite fifty times has forced me to pay attention to what is happening with my mouth, my tongue, my teeth, and my throat. The reflex to swallow is something I simply don't think about. I just do it. In being more mindful about each bite that is in my mouth, I've noticed the impulse to swallow. The urge to swallow happens before I even reach the count of nine or ten. That's quite a ways from fifty, so I can't swallow, and I pull all the food back up, continue chewing. At first I tho...