“End Emotional Eating may be the beginning for you in a new relationship

with food and your feelings. Who hasn’t had a craving for food that came
from a sense of emptiness, anxiety, or anger? This book is filled with pow-
erful metaphors, empowering messages, and mental and emotional exer-
cises that will keep you from eating away at your feelings. Accessible,
intelligent, and compassionate, this book can help you find a new way of
experiencing and using emotions. You will find wisdom that you can use
every day. I highly recommend this book.”
—Robert L. Leahy, PhD, founder and director of the American
Institute for Cognitive Therapy, professor at Weill Cornell
Medical College and NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, and
past president of the Association for Behavioral and
Cognitive Therapies.

“If you struggle with emotional eating and want to end the battle, this is
the place to start. Based on solid scientific evidence, the author offers
carefully selected, elegantly described, bite-sized techniques to release
oneself from every aspect of the emotional eating cycle. The author did
the work for us in this impressive, comprehensive work, and now we just
need to begin. I highly recommend this book to anyone who seeks free-
dom from unhealthy eating habits and those who care for them.”
—Christopher Germer, PhD, author of The Mindful Path
to Self-Compassion and clinical instructor at Harvard
Medical School

“It’s a pleasure to see a book with a genuinely new perspective to offer the
countless individuals who struggle and suffer over the simple daily act of
eating. Well-grounded in scientific research, yet also written in a lively,
accessible manner with moving personal stories and plenty of specific,
explicit, practical advice, Jennifer L. Taitz offers plenty of new food for
thought about food. This will be a helpful and valuable read for anyone
who has let his or her eating be guided more by emotion than nutrition.”
—Roy F. Baumeister, PhD, author of Willpower: Rediscovering
the Greatest Human Strength
“I have spent my entire career educating people about what to eat to main-
tain a healthy weight. But if there is one thing I have learned, it is that
most people who struggle with their weight are not simply hungrier than
their thinner peers. They eat for reasons other than hunger: sadness, lone-
liness, anger, and frustration. Emotional eating is often at the core of the
poor choices people make when it comes to food. Jennifer L. Taitz has
made a major contribution to helping those who suffer from emotional
eating. She identifies the basic emotions that give rise to unhealthy eating
habits and offers readers the skills and tools to end emotional eating once
and for all.”
—Tanya Zuckerbrot, MS, RD, founder of F-Factor and author
of The F-Factor Diet

“Why do we eat? Seems obvious, right? —Because we have to eat to stay

alive! But many of us eat to feel better. We eat to push away feelings of
anxiety, sadness, and self-loathing. Jennifer L. Taitz can help us stop. Her
book, End Emotional Eating, helps us understand the link between emo-
tions and eating. More importantly, it helps us break those links so that we
have more healthy ways to regulate our emotions and so that our eating is
not driven by our emotional state. The strategies taught in this book are
innovative and powerful, and they have been shown to truly help people
end emotional eating.”
—Susan Nolen-Hoeksema, PhD, professor of psychology
at Yale University and author of Women Who Think Too
Much and Eating, Drinking, Overthinking

“Jennifer L. Taitz’s insight, compassion, and far-reaching clinical experi-

ence shine from every page.”
—Sharon Salzberg, author of Real Happiness: The Power
of Meditation
“Dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) is an effective treatment for a variety
of psychological disorders. Never before has the wisdom of DBT, as it applies
to emotional eating, been so clearly articulated. Authored by a master clini-
cian and talented writer, this book artfully describes how to transform your
relationship with food and life. I highly recommend that you read this book
if you want to gain a new perspective on your emotional reactions and
change the way you think about and respond to impulses to eat. This is not
a diet book; it is a book that will provide nourishment for your soul and
psyche. A genuine treat!”
—Dennis Greenberger, PhD, director of the Anxiety and
Depression Center in Newport Beach, CA, and coauthor
of Mind Over Mood

“This is not a weight loss book. It is something much, much better. If you
have tried over and over to control your weight and your eating, maybe it is
time to let go of that agenda. This is a book about changing your fundamen-
tal relationship with food and eating, and importantly, your relationship to
yourself! Imagine that you could come into a gentler, more compassionate
relationship with yourself and with eating. If you want to explore a kinder
approach, this is the book for you.”
—Kelly G. Wilson, PhD, cofounder of acceptance and
commitment therapy and associate professor at the
University of Mississippi

“Highly recommended. End Emotional Eating provides a sensitive and

thoughtful account of how emotions and eating become entangled in a
multitude of unhelpful ways, together with clear guidance for unraveling
them and moving forward using a blend of ancient and modern approaches.”
—Christopher G. Fairburn, MD, professor of psychiatry at the
University of Oxford and author of Overcoming Binge Eating
 e n d
emotional
EATING
Using
Dialectical Behavior
Therapy Skills To
Cope with Difficult
Emotions and Develop a
Healthy Relationship
to Food

Jennifer L. Taitz, PsyD

New Harbinger Publications, Inc.

 Publisher’s Note
This publication is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information in regard to
the subject matter covered. It is sold with the understanding that the publisher is not engaged
in rendering psychological, financial, legal, or other professional services. If expert assistance
or counseling is needed, the services of a competent professional should be sought.

Distributed in Canada by Raincoast Books

Copyright © 2012 by Jennifer L. Taitz

New Harbinger Publications, Inc.
5674 Shattuck Avenue
Oakland, CA 94609
www.newharbinger.com

All Rights Reserved

Acquired by Melissa Kirk; Cover design by Amy Shoup; Edited by Clancy Drake

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Taitz, Jennifer.
End emotional eating : using dialectical behavior therapy skills to cope with difficult
emotions and develop a healthy relationship to food / Jennifer Taitz.
p. cm.
Summary: “Dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) expert and clinical psychologist
Jenny Taitz presents End Emotional Eating, a comprehensive guide to overcoming the
emotional eating issues that are at the root of most overeating and binge eating diffi-
culties”-- Provided by publisher.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 978-1-60882-121-1 (pbk.) -- ISBN 978-1-60882-122-8 (pdf e-book) -- ISBN
978-1-60882-123-5 (epub)
1. Eating disorders--Treatment. 2. Dialectical behavior therapy. I. Title.
RC552.E18.T35 2012
616.85’26--dc23
2012008372

Printed in the United States of America

14 13 12
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 First printing
 Contents

    Acknowledgments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . v

    Foreword . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .vii

   Introduction: Marshmallows
and Mindfulness. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

1 Understanding Emotions and Eating . . . . . . 11

2 Accepting the Idea of Acceptance. . . . . . . . . . 37

3 Mindful Moments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63

4 Emotional Intelligence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89

5 
Surfing Urges and Developing
Realistic Confidence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117

6 Minding your Mind. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135

7 
Coping with Difficult Emotions
without a Second Helping. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151
End Emotional Eating

   8 Cultivating Self-­Compassion. . . . . . . . . . . . . 177

   9 Tasting Values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197

10 Ending Well and Beginning Again. . . . . . . 215

       References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229

iv
 Acknowledgments

I
thank divine grace for the sequence of events resulting in this moment.
With gratitude and sadness, I honor the memory of my maternal
grandparents, Emil and Sylvia “Ceiba” Seletz. What a blessing just to
meet humans like them, let alone have them in my family. From my birth
until their death they showed me unparalleled adoration. My grandma was
a model of selfless love and generosity. My grandpa was a neurosurgeon
and accomplished sculptor who taught me that patience and precision
matter most. As I matured I dreamed of finding a path on which I could
emulate his manner of healing mental difficulties using science and wit;
this eventually led me to pursue training in clinical psychology. My
grandma and grandpa made people many would not notice feel as though
they were Nobel Prize winners and showed me that loving and learning
matter more than all else.
My parents have generously raised and supported me and were kind
enough to encourage me when I announced I would write a book. My
mother, Jo, has modeled that a woman may embrace her career and also
live fully. My father, Emanuel, told me that if I am passionate about some-
thing, I will find success. I feel lucky to have people in my life who take my
dreams seriously!
I extend a lot of love and thanks to my sisters, Michelle, who was aptly
critical on edits and often hospitable with dinner invitations during this
process, and Rebecca; my aunt, Sonia Taitz, a brilliant and funny author
who kindly edited a lot of this book; my uncle Paul; my uncle Jimmy; and
my paternal grandparents, Simon and Gita, courageous Holocaust survi-
vors who lived purposefully. Kate Ballen feels like family and is a generous
friend and talented author.
End Emotional Eating

I experienced the clinical psychology equivalent of winning the lot-

tery when I met Dennis Tirch and began my long-standing collaboration
working with him and Robert Leahy at the American Institute for
Cognitive Therapy (AICT) in New York City. AICT is an internationally
known practice and training institute where advances in CBT are dis-
cussed and used therapeutically.
I would like to thank the following influential thinkers: Marsha
Linehan, Aaron Beck, Sharon Salzberg, Debra Safer, Christopher Fairburn,
Steven Hayes, Daniel Gilbert, Roy Baumeister, Zindel Segal, Susan Nolen-
Hoeksema, and the countless others whose wisdom I simply organized in
the pages ahead.
I am enormously grateful to Melissa Kirk, Jess Beebe, Nicola Skidmore,
Clancy Drake, and all of the people at New Harbinger who offered me this
opportunity and provided pointed direction.
The following people have been both friends and mentors: Batya
Rotter, Ana Benitez, Geoff Platt, Tova Gozdzik, Lisa Napolitano, Simon
Rego, Ilyse Dobrow Dimarco, Jonathan Kaplan, Laura Oliff, Danielle
Kaplan, Annalise Caron, Dennis Greenberger, Kelly Wilson, John Forsyth,
Josh Pretsky, Dan Goodman, Linda Dimeff, Rene Zweig, Lata McGinn,
Irma Hilton, Kelly Riley, and Poonam Melwani.
Balancing and binding postures in yoga continuously help me culti-
vate perspective, stamina, patience, and balance and experientially intro-
duced me to the mental elements I label today as “mindfulness” and
“acceptance.” I thank my many teachers, including Steve Ross and Scott
Harig. I have learned a lot about living according to my values from my
many spiritual influences, including the Adler family, Judy Millman,
Yehuda Sarna, and Shlomo Einhorn.
I acknowledge my wonderfully inspiring patients, and you, the reader,
for allowing me to move a bit closer to what really matters to me.

vi
 Foreword

O
ver the past two decades, the emergence of the third wave of
behavioral therapies has resulted in new, empirically supported
treatments such as dialectical behavior therapy (Linehan 1993a,
1993b), acceptance and commitment therapy (Hayes, Strosahl, and
Wilson 1999), and mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (Segal, Williams,
and Teasdale 2002). These therapeutic approaches expand upon earlier
treatments. The second-wave therapies (such as cognitive behavioral ther-
apy) added to the first-wave therapies (such as behavioral therapy) by call-
ing attention to the role of cognitions. The third-wave treatments then
added a metacognitive component, an awareness of thinking itself. These
treatments emphasize the development of mindfulness, or the ability to
experience the present moment with nonjudgmental awareness.
In End Emotional Eating, Dr. Jennifer Taitz clearly introduces key con-
cepts and principles from these recently developed treatments, including
adaptations that have been made specifically for individuals with eating
disorders. The text further offers useful and easy-to-understand exercises
taken from these therapies, so individuals struggling with emotional eat-
ing can readily benefit from them. This may lead to decisions to initiate
treatment with local practitioners who have been trained to deliver these
therapies—an especially important consideration for those with serious
eating disturbances. Others might choose to share the book with their
therapists to work on some of the proposed exercises together. As a clini-
cal investigator and psychotherapist applying dialectical behavior therapy
for binge eating disorder and bulimia, I appreciate Dr. Taitz giving clini-
cians such a useful, thoughtful, and easy-to-read resource that provides
End Emotional Eating

therapists and clients with a deeper understanding of often difficult-to-

convey concepts from the expanding field of eating disorder treatments.
What individuals suffering from emotional eating—or clinicians
treating these disorders—will find so inviting about End Emotional Eating
is how accessible it is as a guide to dialectical behavior therapy, acceptance
and commitment therapy, and mindfulness-based cognitive therapy. For
example, not only does Dr. Taitz explain fundamental concepts in com-
prehensible terms, but she also adds personal anecdotes—such as sharing
her experience during a five-day “silent” meditation retreat led by Dr.
Marsha Linehan in which a short exchange with Dr. Linehan led to sig-
nificant shifts in Dr. Taitz’s own understanding of mindfulness. In addi-
tion, Dr. Taitz culled through a considerable research literature to
introduce readers to some of the most exciting and pertinent studies that
support the theoretical implications of the third-wave behavior therapies.
She makes use of her extensive clinical experience working with individu-
als struggling with food to offer many practical and effective exercises.
In short, I found myself engrossed in Dr. Taitz’s End Emotional Eating,
and I believe it will be extremely useful to those wishing for a very clearly
written discussion of the latest empirically supported therapies and their
application for the treatment of eating disorders.
—Debra L. Safer, MD
Author, Dialectical Behavior Therapy for Binge Eating and Bulimia
Co-Director of the Stanford Adult Eating and Weight
Disorders Program
Assistant Professor, Department of Psychiatry and
Behavioral Sciences
Stanford University School of Medicine

viii
 Introduction

Marshmallows and
Mindfulness

W
hat do marshmallows teach us about mindfulness—­a quality
of awareness that facilitates living flexibly? In a landmark
study at Stanford University, four-­ year-­
olds at Bing, the
school’s research nursery school, were offered a marshmallow. They were
told they could either eat the marshmallow immediately or wait. If they
waited to eat the marshmallow that sat before their eyes until the
experimenter returned (about 15 minutes), they would receive two
­
marshmallows.
Walter Mischel, a psychologist studying delaying gratification, had
three daughters who attended Bing; they and their classmates participated
in the study. Over the years, he would ask his daughters about their friends,
and in doing so he detected a relationship between an ability to delay
gratification in preschool and excelling in adolescence. Mischel and his
colleagues located the participants in the initial study to more formally
track their progress as they matured (1989). They noticed that the chil-
dren who ate the single marshmallow right away were likely to have prob-
lems in the areas of behavior, friendships, and attention. In contrast, those
who were able to delay gratification had higher SAT scores and coped
better with stress. This study addresses the question of whether self-con-
trol is a skill we can learn.
Willpower, as it turns out, is less about will than it is about skill.
Mischel explains that willpower relates to the ability to strategically direct
attention. For example, teaching children to pretend the marshmallow is
just a picture transforms low delayers to high delayers. Obsessing and
End Emotional Eating

focusing on the marshmallow creates intense temptation, while bringing

attention to other factors or thoughts—­covering the marshmallow or
singing Sesame Street songs—­facilitates waiting (cited in Lehrer 2009).
In this book, you will learn to sit with temptation by paying attention
in a particular way. You will become able to cultivate habits that matter to
you. When you modify the ways you participate in a given moment, you
increase your ability to move away from obsessing over food, toward the
larger reward of eating and living wisely.
I would genuinely like to thank you for having the courage to pick up
this book. It takes strength to explore new ways to handle feelings and
eating habits. In the short term, it may feel easier to avoid the challenge of
changing our habits, even if we know deep down that our efforts to avoid
change will only make things worse. Challenges seldom resolve them-
selves, and even though you may have explored various solutions, you’re
willing to try something new by reading and working through this book.
If you struggle to live fully and joyously because of an unhealthy rela-
tionship with eating, my hope is that this book will offer you new freedom.
Eating is a part of life, and this book is about living in a way that is mean-
ingful and expansive. Unlike hundreds of other books, it will not tell you
what, when, how, or how much to eat. Instead, you will practice living in
full contact with the present moment, learning from your feelings, coping
with distress skillfully, and developing self-­compassion. These practices
build a powerful foundation for making choices about food that are loving,
joyous, and healthful.

Who Is This Book For?

We face food constantly. It is a fact of life: food nourishes our body and
fuels our mind. However, many of us have the experience that what sus-
tains us may also diminish us and engender a sense of shame and anxiety.
Perhaps you have noticed yourself eating without feeling particularly hun-
gry, a behavior that may stem from eating in response to emotions.
Emotional eating, eating in response to an emotion rather than a physiolog-
ical need, may quell boredom or stress and offer a sense of comfort in the
short term. However, when we come to rely on food to cope with difficult
feelings, it can interfere with our ability to use healthier methods of both

2
 Marshmallows and Mindfulness

learning from and dealing with feelings—­it keeps us from uncovering our
personal potential. Beyond this, such use of food can actually lead to our
feeling worse, both physically and emotionally. If you’ve ever noticed your-
self eating when—­and because—­you’re bored, anxious, lonely, happy, or
sad, this book will help you increase your awareness and acceptance of the
emotions you experience without needing food to help you cope with
them. Over time, weakening the link between food and short-­term emo-
tional consolation can allow you to gradually cultivate healthier and more
sustaining ways of responding to your emotions. And it can help you expe-
rience food in the most nourishing, nurturing, and satisfying ways.
This book may serve as a companion to traditional weight-loss meth-
ods, including weight loss books. However, this is not a diet book, nor is it
even exclusively for people who want to lose weight. Instead it aims to
address the psychological aspects of eating and food obsessing that are not
typically touched upon in conventional weight-loss books.
If you have an eating disorder (we’ll review eating disorders in chapter
1), this book is not an alternative to comprehensive treatment. Once you
are already in treatment with a professional, however, this book may serve
as a useful addition to your therapy. Whether you struggle with weight,
overfocus on food, or obsess about your body, End Emotional Eating will
help you deepen and broaden your life’s focus.
End Emotional Eating will introduce you to the latest tools found in
clinical and research psychology to help you manage emotions in a way
that lets you live in the present. If you are afraid of or uncomfortable with
emotions and find yourself trying to suppress them, this book will provide
you with practical skills to navigate them. After all, there is no alternative:
living means feeling.

Mindfulness and Acceptance

Let’s begin with the most important concepts in this book: mindfulness
and acceptance. Mindfulness describes present-­moment-­focused, flexible,
nonjudgmental awareness. It’s about experiencing the reality of where you
are now, rather than living in the abstractions of your thoughts about the
past or future. Acceptance means a willingness to experience thoughts and
feelings, even uncomfortable ones. It doesn’t mean endorsing things we

3
End Emotional Eating

don’t want to experience or running headlong into unpleasantness. When

we practice acceptance, it means that we acknowledge the reality of our
life’s circumstances, and we make space for the flow of the whole of our
inner world, without needlessly trying to defend ourselves against it or
escape it. We will spend a lot of time in later chapters exploring these
concepts.
More and more research has established that these principles, more
than anything else you can try (or have perhaps already tried), will change
your relationship with difficult experiences. By the way, many people
assume that acceptance is the antithesis of change. Not so. As you will
come to see, acceptance describes a stance that gracefully precedes, and
escorts, change.
What comes to mind when you hear the words “mindfulness and
acceptance”? Some people assume these ideas to be simplistic and insuf-
ficient for significant problems. They may lump mindfulness and accep-
tance into a “New Age”/ “not for me” category. I urge you to notice any
judgments that arise—­favorable, unfavorable, or neutral—­and hold them
lightly, not buying into anything (or rejecting anything) until you fully
experiment with these life stances.

Strategies Used in This Book

Many of the concepts we will explore in this book originate from scientifi-
cally supported therapies, which I will outline below. I don’t want to con-
fuse you with acronyms (or alphabet soup), but my main intention is to let
you know that the concepts in this book are not based on whim or on my
thoughts alone. These approaches are considered to be the latest advances
in cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and have been found helpful in
randomized controlled trials for a wide range of problems. In this book I’ll
present concepts and practices from three main modes of treatment.

Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT)

Marsha Linehan, a professor at the University of Washington, devel-
oped dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) to teach people how to manage

4
 Marshmallows and Mindfulness

emotions that feel overwhelming (1993a, 1993b). She noticed that pushing
people to change wasn’t as effective as teaching people to both change and
accept at the same time. This treatment synthesized elements from her
years as both a behavioral therapist and a student in the Zen tradition.
Some people experience emotions more deeply than others. If you have
never been taught how to accept or attend to your feelings, you may also
experience emotions more intensely. DBT has taught thousands of people
around the world how accepting emotions can help regulate emotions. If
you find that your emotions operate almost like a light switch with “on” and
“off” positions, DBT will help you learn to modulate your feelings, as a dim-
mer might better control the lighting in a room. Briefly, DBT will teach you
practical skills, including the following (Linehan 1993a, 1993b):

• Mindfulness: A “core” DBT skill, mindfulness involves being

in the moment and thinking nonjudgmentally in order to
experience freedom and participate in life.

• Emotion regulation: This skill involves learning the function

of emotions and improves your ability to describe, change,
and cope effectively with them, rather than letting them con-
trol you.

• Distress tolerance: Distress tolerance is an ability to manage

crises without making problems worse.

• Interpersonal effectiveness: Interpersonal effectiveness allows

you to attend to your own needs and improve your
relationships.

Originally, DBT was created to help individuals prone to self-­harming

and suicidal behavior due to emotional pain. Many world-­renowned psy-
chiatric hospitals now teach DBT to their patients. Studies comparing
DBT to other reputable treatments have found DBT to be helpful in treat-
ing individuals who struggle with difficult emotions, self-harm, binge eat-
ing, bulimia, and depression (e.g., Linehan 1993a; Telch, Agras, and
Linehan 2001; Wisniewski, Safer, and Chen 2007; Lynch, Mendelson, and
Robins 2003). DBT has also been used to address marital difficulties
(Fruzzetti 2006). In my clinical practice, I teach elements from DBT when
appropriate even to people who do not have notable difficulties with

5
End Emotional Eating

emotions but who want to live more effectively; these clients invariably
remark on how beneficial they find DBT skills.

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy

(ACT)
ACT is a treatment developed by Steven Hayes at the University of
Nevada, Reno, and his colleagues Kirk Strosahl and Kelly Wilson. ACT
teaches people to become psychologically flexible, to let go of rigid pat-
terns, and to build a life they choose, rather than a life based on avoiding
or fighting their feelings. ACT is about allowing yourself to experience
negative emotions if they arise while you are moving toward what matters
to you. Many unwanted experiences, including thoughts and feelings,
can’t be controlled, but you can still commit to actions that keep you liv-
ing in line with your personal values. Like DBT, ACT has been researched
extensively and has been found remarkably helpful in treating a wide
range of psychological problems. Recently, ACT has increasingly been
applied in the area of body image and eating (Forman et al. 2009; Pearson,
Heffner, and Follette 2010; Sandoz, Wilson, and DuFrene 2011).

Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy

(MBCT)
MBCT is a program developed by Zindel Segal at the University of
Toronto and his colleagues Mark Williams and John Teasdale (2002). The
treatment is strongly influenced by Jon Kabat-­Zinn’s mindfulness-based
stress reduction (MBSR) program (1990), and it teaches people to practice
mindfulness to get out of repetitive, distressing mental loops, which are
common in people who suffer from depression. After completing MBCT
treatment, participants have been shown to drastically reduce their risk of
falling back into an episode of depression (Segal, Williams, and Teasdale
2002). In fact, MBCT is as effective as an antidepressant medication in
preventing relapse (Segal et al. 2010). You might think of mindfulness as a
medicine you can create through mental exercises.

6
 Marshmallows and Mindfulness

Often, people who struggle with emotions and eating tend to get stuck
in mental loops of painful thoughts that create and exacerbate distressing
feelings. Many people who worry a lot about eating fluctuate between
obsessing around food and body size and eating mindlessly. Mindfulness
has been found helpful in the treatment of problems with emotions and
eating in that it facilitates sitting with an emotion in a way that short-­
circuits these cycles of distress and distorted thinking (Baer, Fischer, and
Huss 2005).
In this book, I will weave together the philosophical underpinnings of
these three styles of treatment with practical exercises, teaching the culti-
vation of compassion and wisdom as a means of ending emotional eating.

A Little about Me
I’m originally from Los Angeles and have spent many years living in New
York City. Since childhood, I have observed our culture’s preoccupation
with weight and shape. It was all around me—­classmates of mine in the
third grade experimented with the cabbage soup diet. I’ve also been infil-
trated with messages about the importance of stopping bad feelings and
trying to feel good at all times. We seem to live in a “birthday or wake, let’s
eat cake” culture—­and we all have thoughts and feelings and are vulner-
able. Like so many people, I am familiar with the experience of feeling
imperfect and flawed—­and of trying, usually ineffectively, to hide this
sense.
In my adult life, I have learned to practice mindfulness and accep-
tance skills and have found them to be enormously helpful in tempering
the strength and sway of these feelings of imperfection, worry, and shame.
I first tasted what I now call “mindfulness” and “acceptance” as a young
adult within the context of yoga. Then I began to understand these prac-
tices within a scientific context in my studies in psychology. In my early
training experiences, I worked with numerous clients and various thera-
peutic styles, even working with incarcerated populations. Initially, I felt
sickened by the pessimism I perceived in the field; it was difficult for me to
accept the bleakness of certain prognoses. I much preferred the idea of
wholeheartedly sitting with others with hope—­especially hope for relief
from conditions other professionals in my field deemed hopeless.

7
End Emotional Eating

Mindfulness and acceptance, rooted in compassion, aligned with my per-

sonal values and strong optimism.
I studied DBT extensively, undertaking intensive training in DBT,
completing a fellowship in DBT at Yale University School of Medicine,
and directing the American Institute for Cognitive Therapy’s DBT pro-
gram. More recently, I have studied and treated clients using ACT and
MBCT as well. I’m really enthusiastic about mindfulness-­and acceptance-­
based treatments because I’ve seen them work—­including for people who
insisted nothing would work.
Many of my patients who struggle with intense emotions, including
anxiety and depression, also struggle with eating problems. Many of them
really suffer around food, and it pulls at my heart, because although food
is something we can’t live without, too little or too much can be fatal. I
know many people who put their lives on hold as a result of problems with
eating, and I see how this can really thwart their ability to participate fully
in life. We can wait a long time for our circumstances to change, mean-
while missing opportunities (and feeling worse and eating worse). Or we
can pick up new tools that will allow us to move forward.

What Lies Ahead

This book introduces concepts of mindfulness and acceptance. I will show
you some practical tools for using these concepts to understand and man-
age your emotions, eating, and ways of coping with urges. In later chapters,
I’ll broaden the focus from managing feelings and eating to building a life
that matters, addressing self-­compassion and finding meaning in life.
In the pages ahead, you’ll encounter a lot of material, which will pro-
vide you with a range of choices. Each person is unique, so explore the
various tools and experiment with what resonates with you. This will
come alive when you apply what’s here, rather than merely reading. It may
be useful to keep a journal in which you write notes, answer thought-­
provoking questions, and keep track of the exercises you’ve practiced and
your observations on them. I spent many years thinking that mindfulness
seemed like a good idea and practicing it sporadically. I found that, as with
most experiences, there is a relationship between investment and return.
With routine, repetitive commitment, I have experienced greater rewards.

8
 Marshmallows and Mindfulness

I also notice that regular practice is often more helpful than massed prac-
tice. In other words, eating one meal mindfully each day and accepting
difficult feelings each day for ten minutes at work can generate greater
rewards than sitting mindfully for three hours once a week.
Notice your experience as you practice moving toward mindfulness
and acceptance. It may be useful to set up practice commitments or
appointments with yourself each day to eat one meal mindfully and prac-
tice accepting emotions in a specific situation. Take note of what has
helped you follow through with new habits. Often, setting specific, feasible
steps is very important. If you’d like a friendly reminder each day, Habit
Forge (habitforge.com) will send you e-mails for three weeks reminding
you to keep up with the goal of your choice. You may also enlist a willing
friend to join you in sharing mindfulness observations along the way. The
website stickK.com is another helpful tool to facilitate goals. The site
allows you to create behavioral commitments and choose what’s at stake if
you don’t follow through.
I find it helpful to remind myself that there is no trying: it’s doing or
not doing. My hope is that this book and, more importantly, your experi-
ential practices in mindfulness and acceptance will pave for you a path of
joy, compassion, and balance. And allow you to fully and patiently savor a
marshmallow.

9
 chapter 1

Understanding
Emotions and Eating

People have a hard time letting go of their suffering. Out of

a fear of the unknown, they prefer suffering that is familiar.
—Thich Nhat Hanh

I
n 1978, psychologists studying happiness examined Illinois state lot-
tery winners and also victims of devastating accidents, some of whom
were left paralyzed from the neck down (Brickman, Coates, and
Janoff-­Bulman). A control group of people randomly selected from the
phone book also participated. The researchers asked the participants
questions about their levels of past happiness, current happiness, and
anticipated future happiness. Individuals from each group were also asked
how much they enjoyed routine experiences, like reading a magazine and
talking with a friend.
The psychologists found, as you might guess, that the lottery winners
highly appreciated winning the lottery and the accident victims felt sad-
dened by their traumatic injuries. Now, here is what is remarkable. When
comparing the lottery winners to the randomly selected control group, the
researchers found no differences in happiness either at the time of the inter-
views (present happiness) or in their levels of expected future happiness.
The lottery winners were not happier than the non–lottery winners after
End Emotional Eating

the initial happiness associated with winning the lottery had passed. Most
interestingly, the winners experienced significantly less pleasure in daily
activities than did the members of the other two groups.
My intention is not to start this book off on a somber note, but to
consider whether we really know what will bring us joy. We may think, “If
I only had this sports car, a place in Maui, or cheesecake, I will have won
the emotional lottery!” Yet research—­and, if we pause to examine it, our
own experience—­show otherwise. Timothy Wilson and Daniel Gilbert
(2005, 131) explain, “People routinely mispredict how much pleasure or
displeasure future events will bring, and as a result, sometimes work to
bring about events that do not maximize their happiness.” How do we
know what to want? We often make decisions based on affective forecasts,
or predictions of how we will feel in the future (Wilson and Gilbert 2005).
Yet people are generally not great at predicting the intensity of future emo-
tional reactions. We may be wrong about how positive or negative our
responses will be in actuality.
Not only do we often mispredict how much pleasure we will experi-
ence, we also often overestimate how much pain we will endure. Do you
ever think, “I won’t survive this,” and actually cope better than you had
anticipated? Decisions about how to cope with difficult emotions, and
ideas about how much pleasure we may derive from eating, may be based
on predictions about our future feelings. And those forecasts are likely
inaccurate. In the pages to come, we will work to revisit some of our beliefs
about the downside of feeling and the upside of eating, learning to hold
these ideas and beliefs lightly and compassionately, without judgment or
fear, seeing them for what they are.

What Is Emotional Eating?

Most of us have a general, rational sense of what to eat and when—­there
is no shortage of information on the subject. Yet there is often a discon-
nect between what we know and what we do. We may have the facts, but
decisions also involve our feelings. Many people who struggle with difficult
emotions also struggle with eating problems. Emotional eating is a popular
term used to describe eating that is influenced by emotions, both positive
and negative. Feelings may affect various aspects of your eating, including

12
 Understanding Emotions and Eating

your motivation to eat, your food choices, where and with whom you eat,
and the speed at which you eat. Most overeating is prompted by feelings
rather than physical hunger. Individuals who struggle with obesity tend to
eat in response to emotions (Ganley 1989). However, people who eat for
emotional reasons are not necessarily overweight. People of any size may
try to escape an emotional experience by preoccupying themselves with
eating or by obsessing over their shape and weight.
Here are some examples of what emotional eating may look like:

• Snacking when you do not feel physically hungry or when you

are moderately full

• Experiencing an intense craving for a particular food

• Not feeling satiated after eating adequate amounts of healthy

food

• Anxiously gathering more food while your mouth is full

• Feeling emotionally relieved while eating

• Eating during or following a stressful experience

• Numbing feelings with food

• Eating alone to avoid others noticing

People who eat for emotional reasons often eat in an attempt to self-­
soothe or to experience momentary relief from difficult feelings. Some
people describe purposely eating certain comforting foods as a way to cope
with stress. Emotional eating is related to feelings of inadequacy (Waller
and Osman 1998). Emotions may seem so intense that we feel we need to
instantly manage them by escaping with food, or we may feel we lack other
tools to cope with distress.
Think about your own experience. Do you experience authentic or
lasting relief while eating? Or is relief fleeting or partial at best? Just as
when we compulsively watch television, drink alcohol, or shop, we may
wish to temporarily escape through eating. In later chapters, I will intro-
duce some more skillful means to cope with distress. In this chapter, you
will learn how to better understand emotions so that you will feel less
averse to or overwhelmed by your feelings.

13
End Emotional Eating

Understanding Eating Disorders

Emotional eating is not in itself a specific eating disorder, though emo-
tional eating occurs in eating disorders. Emotional eating is associated
with binge eating, obesity, and bulimia (e.g., Lindeman and Stark 2001).
You may or may not have an eating disorder, but from time to time I will
mention eating disorders to illustrate the ways emotions affect eating dis-
order behaviors. First, I’ll briefly clarify how the Diagnostic and Statistical
Manual of Mental Disorders—­Fourth Edition (DSM-­IV-­TR) categorizes eat-
ing disorders.

Anorexia involves overevaluation of shape and weight. People who struggle

with anorexia define their self-­worth largely based on their weight. In this
disorder, individuals maintain an abnormally low body weight (less than
85 percent of normal). To meet criteria for anorexia, a woman must lose
her menstrual period as a result of her dietary restriction.

Bulimia similarly includes overevaluation of one’s shape and weight and

rigid efforts to control one’s body. People who struggle with bulimia recur-
rently binge, or consume an objectively large amount of food, and experi-
ence a loss of control while doing so. In addition to bingeing, people with
bulimia engage in certain compensatory behaviors, or attempts to “make
up” for excessive caloric intake, by restricting food intake, vomiting, over-
exercising, or misusing laxatives.

Eating disorder not otherwise specified (NOS) is the most common eating
disorder. This category describes an eating disorder of clinical severity
that does not meet criteria for anorexia or bulimia. For example, a woman
who is a healthy weight but finds herself excessively preoccupied with con-
cerns about her shape may meet criteria for eating disorder NOS. A man
who is preoccupied with his shape and restricts his food intake but does
not weigh less than 85 percent of normal would similarly receive the eat-
ing disorder NOS diagnosis.

One form of eating disorder NOS is binge-eating disorder. Binge-eating

disorder describes recurrent binge eating in the absence of extreme efforts
to control weight, and this disorder often correlates with obesity—­though
it can also occur in people who are normal weight. Unlike anorexia or

14
 Understanding Emotions and Eating

bulimia, which overwhelmingly affect women and girls, approximately a

third of people who binge eat are male.
Let’s take a moment to differentiate objective binges from subjective
binges. An objective binge describes consuming an objectively large amount
of food, accompanied by a sense of loss of control. A person may consume
thousands of calories in a sitting in an objective binge. A subjective binge
involves feeling or thinking you ate too much. If you overindulge on
Thanksgiving, this would be a subjective binge if you ate what is normal
in that context but you still feel like you overate. Distinguishing objective
binges from subjective ones can help us begin to move away from seeing
our behaviors in absolute terms or engaging in black-and-white thinking
about those behaviors. Feeling or thinking you ate too much differs from
losing control and rapidly consuming excessive calories.
Most eating disorders share certain core features, and many people
who meet the criteria for one eating disorder end up meeting the criteria
for another eating disorder at some point (Fairburn 2008). For example,
someone who struggles with anorexia may eventually receive a diagnosis
of bulimia. Generally, people who struggle with eating disorders overevalu-
ate their shape and weight and are intensely preoccupied in attempts to
manage their size. Binge eating is also very common across eating disor-
ders. Conceptually, this makes sense. If you define yourself by your weight,
you may restrict your food, and restricting food often results in overeating,
as you start to feel deprived. After a diet people may tend to indulge in
foods they craved during the diet. People often also binge in response to
negative moods or to having a difficult day.

Eating and Emotions

People may either increase or decrease their eating as a result of distress.
For example, some people experience an increase in appetite when they
feel depressed, while others experience a decrease. Restricting food may be
a way to manage emotions, as may bingeing. You may find yourself indulg-
ing when you feel difficult emotions in order to soothe yourself, and then
putting yourself on harsh diets in an attempt to control your weight and
your feelings.

15
End Emotional Eating

Psychologists theorize that difficulty in managing emotions is the core

issue underlying both binge eating and bulimia. Binge eating and other
forms of problematic eating are often seen as behavioral attempts to influ-
ence, change, or control painful emotional states (Safer, Telch, and Chen
2009; Linehan and Chen 2005). People who don’t know how to manage
emotions, either positive or negative, may resort to binge eating and/or
purging as a way to manage emotions. Anorexia is similarly driven by
attempts to avoid emotion (e.g., Wildes, Ringham, and Marcus 2010).
Specifically, reduced awareness of emotions can occur in people with buli-
mia, and emotional avoidance is characteristic of those who struggle with
anorexia (Legenbauer, Vocks, and Rüddel 2008; Wildes, Ringham, and
Marcus 2010).
Emotions may affect eating in more subtle ways that do not register
clinically. For example, how many of us have dived into a tray of cupcakes
after a breakup? There is nothing wrong with enjoying food during a rough
time, but regularly depending on food to manage our feelings sends us the
unhelpful message “You can’t cope.” Plus, what does a cupcake do to honor
your feelings or to clarify what matters to you?
Research finds that difficulty in identifying and understanding emo-
tions, as well as problems in regulating them, influences binge eating more
than gender, food restriction, or overvaluing shape and weight do
(Whiteside et al. 2007). When people experience emotions intensely, or
have trouble identifying what their emotions actually are, they may feel
that they cannot cope with their feelings and may then try to avoid the
discomfort by distracting themselves with food.
You may notice that you simply jump from feeling any intense emotion
to eating, thus losing contact with the emotion. This may feel like a relief
at first, but it results in your missing the opportunity to experience the
feeling for what it is (this is something you can practice doing, as we will
see). It is inevitable that we will experience uncomfortable feelings, and
consistently avoiding them limits our ability to live both freely and wisely.
Certain people are more emotionally vulnerable, experiencing emotions
more intensely and feeling emotions for a longer time than others (Linehan
1993a). If you are emotionally vulnerable and were raised in an environ-
ment where you were not taught how to cope with feelings—­or worse,
were punished for showing emotions—­you may have learned to control
feelings with food.

16
 Understanding Emotions and Eating

Situation

Intense emotion,
possible difficulty
identifying or
understanding
the feeling, belief
can't tolerate

Eat to avoid or
soothe

Figure 1: Cycle of Emotional Eating

When you experience an emotion and eat in response, you may expe-
rience more of the same emotion, as well as other emotions that arise in
response to emotional eating. Eating to turn off feelings doesn’t fully
appease your feelings; instead it just adds more psychological (and caloric)
weight to the experience. Also, if you eat in response to feelings, you often
fail to appreciate the message the feelings relay. Notably, anger and sad-
ness are especially related to problematic eating (e.g., Fox and Froom
2009); many people also notice they tend to eat when happy, lonely, or
anxious. Eating Southern fried chicken may initially seem soothing, but
overindulging in comfort foods at a time when your emotions are powerful
can dampen valuable emotional information, as well as eventually lead to
shame and confusion.
Food may also be used to increase the intensity of an emotion. We
may, for example, use food to add to the ordinary experience of happiness,
attempting to take our joy up a notch. Gracie, a former client of mine,
struggled with an intense depression for a year. After a combination of

17
End Emotional Eating

cognitive behavioral therapy and medication, her mood improved and she
began to relish food. She described eating as relearning pleasure. Initially,
Gracie loved exploring new wines and cheeses. Eventually, she guzzled
wines and gobbled cheeses in search of an endless celestial taste experi-
ence. Gracie had gone too far. The simple joy of eating was replaced by a
manic insatiability. The short-­term benefits of becoming a cheese maven
and unofficial sommelier were now being negated by anxiety and shame
around her increasing weight.

Exercise: Noticing Feelings before

and after Eating
Grab your notebook and call to mind a situation in which you
recently overate or ate when you weren’t especially hungry. As
nonjudgmentally as you can, answer the following questions. You
are simply gathering information here; if difficult feelings come up
while you are doing the exercise, try to notice them and gently
return your attention to the question.

1. What was the situation (where were you, whom were you
with, what was happening, what was about to happen, or
what had just happened)?

2. As best you can, consider, now that you have some distance,
what emotions were present. What were you feeling?

3. How did the emotions affect your eating (for example, did you
eat more than you intended, or more quickly, or choose a food
you may not typically eat)?

4. Now bring to mind the emotions you experienced after eat-

ing. What were they?

When you mindfully notice the feelings that prompt eating,

you practice bringing your awareness, not your guilt, to your
habits. You can do this exercise again and again, always as
­

18
 Understanding Emotions and Eating

compassionately and nonjudgmentally as you can; the practice of

noticing will give you a helpful perspective on how your emotions
and your eating intersect. In a moment of emotional distress, it
may be difficult to hold on to that perspective, but over time you
will become more able to say, for example, “Ah, there is loneliness,
and there is that familiar pull to eat.” You will begin to have a
choice about how to handle the loneliness.
<

Why Do We Have Emotions?

Let’s step back for a moment and consider the functions in feelings.
Emotions furnish us with valuable information. The root of the word
“emotion” is motere, from the Latin for “to move.” Emotions quickly gener-
ate changes in our brain and spinal cord to initiate action—­our behavior
is often closely tied to emotion. An emotion is a brief signal promoting
survival behavior. Emotions motivate our behavior, provide us with valuable
information, and allow us to communicate with others (Linehan 1993b).
Let’s consider two common emotions and their functions. Say your
partner befriends a remarkably attractive colleague, and you experience
jealousy. Why? Because an emotion (jealousy) signals a threat, inspiring us
to formulate behaviors in response to that threat. When we feel jealous,
we are provided with information that our relationship is precious and
may be in danger. Jealous behavior communicates our uneasiness to our
partner; thus jealousy directs us toward protecting the relationship. If we
eat to suppress this emotion or to distract ourselves from it, we can’t learn
what the emotion is telling us, and we can’t react in an appropriate way,
such as expressing our feelings to our partner. Similarly, what is the value
in feeling happy? Happiness motivates us to continue pursuing an activity
or valued direction. The feeling provides information on what matters to
us. Happiness also communicates information to those around us, cement-
ing vital social bonds. Would a friend be as inclined to invite you to a
birthday dinner if you looked miserable at the previous event she hosted?

19
End Emotional Eating

Mario’s Story
When Mario came to me for therapy, he explained that he wor-
ried about everything. He was newly married and in the midst of
purchasing an expensive home that would require investing his
life savings, barely leaving money for the necessary renovations.
“Did I marry the right person? Am I going crazy? Is my mind
working? I seem forgetful. What if the plane I take to Miami
crashes? Will my father develop Parkinson’s like my grandfather?”
The worries were endless, and Mario noticed that the more he
worried the more he felt depressed. To ease his tortured mind, he
spent time distracting himself by eating.
Over the course of cognitive behavioral therapy with an
emphasis on mindfulness and acceptance, Mario began to learn
to not panic over his feelings of panic. He became able to bring
awareness to his worries as mental processes rather than get stuck
in his mind, where he would live in the worst-­case scenarios. He
practiced asking himself, “Is this worry productive or unproduc-
tive?” If a worry was productive, he came up with an action plan.
If it was unproductive, he noticed the feelings and thoughts in his
body and mind and practiced returning to the present moment.
When he noticed urges to reach for sweets and salty foods as he
tensed up, he chose to sit with his feelings instead, seeing his feel-
ings as meaningful.
What sat behind his worries? He deeply valued serving as a
provider, establishing a secure, loving home, and protecting his
father. His feelings reflected what mattered to him, though his
relationship with his feelings—­profound fear and confusion about
feeling too much and not understanding his feelings—­got in the
way of his willingness to accept and learn from his emotions.
During our last session, he said, “I feel because things matter to
me. I can talk to my wife about our difficulties, take action to
solve financial problems, and show my dad how much I care. That
tastes sweet in my heart.”

20
 Understanding Emotions and Eating

Exercise: Considering the Functions

of Difficult Feelings
Take a few moments to recreate the following chart in your note-
book. The point of this exercise is to practice considering, like
Mario, how your feelings provide meaningful information. Given
that negative emotions feel uncomfortable, it makes a lot of sense
that you may try to escape feeling them. By understanding the
functions of emotions, you may change your responses to your
emotions. This example shows how Mario might have used the
chart to discover his feelings, their value, and the actions he
might take based on them.

21
22
Situation Emotion(s) What does this What does this What action(s) Is this action (or
emotion commu- emotion commu- does this emo- actions) helpful?
nicate to me? nicate to others? tion motivate me
to take?
Mario gets an 1. Anxiety 1. I have many When I am 1. Figure out how 1. Yes
unexpected bill financial anxious and to start saving
End Emotional Eating

responsibilities, ashamed it is more, and do it

and it’s important hard for me to
to me that I meet talk to my wife.
them. I’ve told her that
2. Shame about when I feel this
lack of money 2. I believe that way, it’s hard to 2. Eat to soothe 2. No
in savings as the man of the open up and she myself
family I should reaches out to me.
be better prepared
financially than
I am.
 Understanding Emotions and Eating

Beliefs about Emotions

We all have beliefs about emotions—­for example, you might believe that
it is weak to feel sad or that it is weak to feel sad or afraid. Common beliefs
about emotions include:

• Negative emotions are bad.

• If I feel too happy, I may lose control.

• I don’t deserve to experience positive emotions.

• If I feel happy, I should take it up a notch.

• I need to control difficult feelings because otherwise I’ll feel

too much.

• It is depressing to feel sad—­I may not be able to pull out of it

if I let myself feel it.

• I may get sick from worrying.

• If I try harder, I can get rid of a feeling.

• No one else feels the way I do.

• If I hide my feelings, no one will know how I feel and I may

stop feeling this way.

• Distracting myself from an emotion is better than feeling it.

• I’ll never be able to figure out how I feel; there are too many
feelings happening.

• I’m not feeling the way I should feel.

What we believe about emotions affects how we feel and how we

behave when an emotion arises. Plus, remember that our hypotheses about
how we will feel in the future are often inaccurate. Emotions may feel
overwhelming when we assume that they will last forever or when we

23
End Emotional Eating

believe that we cannot cope with them, but is that really the case? People
who label emotions as bad or unhealthy may try to escape emotions by
binge eating (Leahy 2002). Take a moment to reflect: What are your
beliefs about emotions—­either in general, or for particular emotions?
What are your beliefs about your ability to manage emotions? How do
these beliefs affect your behavior? Given what you now know about the
function of emotions, are your beliefs helpful—­that is, do they lead to
helpful behaviors? The following exercise will help you answer these
questions.

Exercise: Thinking about Feeling

Often, our beliefs are long held and so deeply rooted that the
behaviors they trigger in us feel automatic. By bringing our aware-
ness to what we believe about emotions, we can give ourselves
more room to choose how we respond to the feelings when they
arise. Reproduce the following chart in your notebook, filling in
the lines for any emotion you have noticeable beliefs about. An
example follows.

24
 My beliefs about this How these beliefs Is this helpful? Alternative ways I
emotion affect me could think about this
emotion
Joy

Sadness

Fear

Anger

Shame

Other
emotion

25
Understanding Emotions and Eating
26
My beliefs about this How these beliefs Is this helpful? Alternative ways I
emotion affect me could think about this
emotion
Joy I don’t deserve to I feel guilty when I No; my feeling guilty Everyone deserves to be
be happy. experience happiness doesn’t help anyone. happy, including me.
or enjoy myself. I’m kinder to others
End Emotional Eating

when I’m happy.

Sadness When I feel sad, it lasts I worry a lot about No; the worry doesn’t Emotions come and go.
for weeks. being sad or giving in to make the sadness I have always recovered
sadness. disappear—it makes from sadness before,
it worse. sometimes in a short
time.
Other emo- If I feel love, I may I avoid dating. No; the loneliness It is true I might get
tion (Love) get hurt. hurts, too. hurt or suffer loss in
love, but I can cope
with difficult emotions.
Loving and being loved,
and sometimes getting
hurt, is part of being
alive.
 Understanding Emotions and Eating

The Freedom in Noticing and

Labeling Feelings
When we sit with our emotions—­that is, when we allow ourselves to experi-
ence them—­one of the first steps is to accurately identify and label the
emotion (e.g., Linehan 1993b). When we can accurately label an emotion,
we’re observing it without judgment. In noticing an emotion without judg-
ment, we are also accepting it. What is the benefit in noticing that we feel
“anxious” rather than identifying this emotion as just “feeling bad?” We
become separate from an emotion when we give it a name; we’re not judg-
ing it as “good” or “bad”—­it just is what it is, and it does not define us.
This helps us avoid being emotionally hijacked by it—­labeling ourselves
either “good” or “bad” along with the emotion. Labeling an emotion also
provides us with information on how to cope with it. If you can label your
emotion, and differentiate among your emotions, you can manage them
flexibly (Feldman Barrett et al. 2001). When you replace “I’m feeling bad”
with “I’m feeling anxious and experiencing shame,” you have more specific
information on how to deal with the feeling. To use a medical analogy,
treatment for a sinus infection is different from treatment for the stomach
flu. Similarly, the way you navigate loneliness differs from the way you
would manage anger—­ not least because emotions convey important
information, and the message of loneliness is very different from the mes-
sage of anger.
Thoughts may affect how we feel, and feelings may affect how we
think. We’ll talk in more detail about noticing our thoughts in chapter 6.
But briefly, it may be helpful to begin to notice how thoughts and feelings
may influence one another. A given situation may trigger a particular
thought, which then sparks a certain feeling; or it may happen the other
way around, with the situation engendering a feeling that then leads to a
thought. For example, we may find ourselves standing in front of a large
crowd before we present a speech. We may begin to think, “I can’t do this,”
and then experience a feeling of panic. Or we may simply begin to feel
panic, and then think, “I can’t do this.” Can you think of a situation where
your feelings influenced your thinking, and another where your thinking
affected your feelings? (I’ll address how to modify and manage thoughts
and feelings in the chapters ahead.)

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End Emotional Eating

Certain emotions are actually combinations of feelings and thoughts.

“Hopelessness,” for example, is sadness combined with a belief that the
situation will not improve. Can you think of another feeling that also
includes a thought?
Some people find it challenging to label emotions. If you find that’s
the case for you, it can help to familiarize yourself with categories of emo-
tions; with situations that may lead to certain feelings; with the adaptive
functions of emotions (that is, the ways an emotion aids in our survival);
and with how you may think, feel, and behave when you experience them.
Here are some common emotional categories.

Fear
Function: to protect us from immediate danger

Synonyms: fright, panic, uneasiness, terror

Typical prompting events: facing a threat; performing before oth-

ers; facing a new situation

Typical accompanying thoughts: “I can’t handle this”; “I’m going

to fail”; “I’m in danger.”

Common body sensations: racing heart, unsettled stomach, nau-

sea, lump in the throat, breathlessness, jumpiness

Common actions related to fear: running, freezing up, screaming,

crying, seeking safety

Anxiety
Function: to protect us from future danger

Synonyms: nervousness, worry, stress, overwhelm

Typical prompting event: thinking about or imagining a future

feared situation

28
 Understanding Emotions and Eating

Typical accompanying thoughts: “I won’t be able to handle this”;

“He’ll leave me”; “What if…?”

Common body sensations: difficulty relaxing, tension and muscle

tightness, sleeplessness, difficulty concentrating, racing heart,
queasy stomach, jitteriness

Common actions related to anxiety: avoiding people or places

that engender fear; seeking reassurance from others

Anger
Function: to allow us to respond to a violation

Synonyms: annoyed, irritated, upset, offended

Typical prompting events: feeling threatened; not getting what

you want; experiencing physical or emotional pain

Typical accompanying thoughts: “I don’t deserve this”; “I will not

tolerate this”; “It’s not fair.”

Common body sensations: body and facial tension, flushed face,

clenching fists, tightness in jaw

Common actions related to anger: defending, threatening, yelling,

withdrawing

Sadness
Function: to slow us down, allowing us to cope with the loss of a
person or desired goal

Synonyms: unhappiness, hurt, misery, sorrow

Typical prompting events: experiencing loss or rejection; feeling

powerless

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End Emotional Eating

Typical associated thoughts: “This is a big loss”; “There’s no hope.”

Common body sensations: loss of energy, urge to cry, heaviness in

the stomach, difficulty concentrating

Common actions related to sadness: lying in bed, self-isolating,

losing motivation or interest

Joy
Function: to prompt us to celebrate something we value

Synonyms: happiness, excitement, delight, enjoyment, gladness

Typical prompting events: feeling successful; receiving love or

praise

Typical accompanying thoughts: “This is wonderful”; “I’m so

lucky.”

Common body sensations: smiling, relaxed body, feeling

energized

Common actions related to joy: continuing activities engendering

joy, celebrating, acting silly

Guilt
Function: to prompt us to correct behavior that violates social
norms

Synonyms: embarrassment, remorse

Prompting event: disobeying a rule in your community

Typical accompanying thought: “I hope no one finds out.”

30
 Understanding Emotions and Eating

Typical body sensations: blushing, racing heart

Typical actions related to shame: hiding, attempting to repair the

damage

Shame
Function: to permit us to live according to our personal values

Synonyms: remorse, responsibility

Typical prompting event: doing something you believe is wrong

Typical accompanying thought: “I did something bad.”

Common body sensations: queasy stomach, difficulty relaxing,

muscle tension

Common actions related to guilt: apologizing, reflecting, chang-

ing behavior

Disgust
Function: to prompt us to move away from something or someone
contaminating

Synonyms: revulsion, aversion

Typical prompting event: facing something harmful

Typical accompanying thoughts: “This will make me sick”; “I

need to get away.”

Common body sensations: nausea, uneasiness

Common actions related to disgust: pushing away, avoiding,

expressing concern

31
End Emotional Eating

Interest
Function: to alert us to potential rewards

Synonyms: excitement, curiosity

Typical prompting event: participating in an experience that

grabs your attention

Typical accompanying thoughts: “This may be great”; “How can I

get involved?”

Common body sensations: widened eyes

Common actions related to interest: moving toward, getting more

information

Exercise: SIFTing through Emotions

Emotions create links between a situation, our interpretations of
it, feelings in our bodies, and tendencies to act. To practice famil-
iarizing yourself with your feelings, try to slow down in a situation
where emotions are arising and bring your awareness to how you
feel. Use the acronym SIFT (Situation, Interpretations, Feelings,
Tendencies) to work through the factors that affect your experi-
ence of emotions. If it’s helpful, grab your notebook and use the
following questions to examine the feelings you experienced in a
recent highly emotional situation.
First, notice what emotions you are having. Note the inten-
sity of your emotion on a scale from 1 (barely there) to 10
(extreme). Now SIFT your emotions:

S: What is the situation (the event or person that triggered an

emotional reaction)?

I: Do you notice interpretations or thoughts that relate to your

experience?

32
 Understanding Emotions and Eating

F: What feelings and sensations do you notice in your body?

T: What tendencies show up? Are you pulled to pursue particular

actions?
<

Labeling an emotion (even one that is not your own) helps you regu-
late your emotions. When you label an emotion, you treat emotions as
objects of attention, promoting a certain amount of distance. In a study at
the University of California, Los Angeles, David Creswell and his col-
leagues (2007) showed participants photographs of emotionally expressive
faces and instructed them to either label the emotion (e.g., sad) or choose
a gender-­appropriate name (e.g., Bob or Sue) for the person in the photo.
Participants’ brain activity was recorded using functional magnetic reso-
nance imaging (fMRI). The alarm center of the brain was less active when
an emotion label was attached, compared to a name label.

Noticing All Feelings

At times, certain emotions can feel so intense that they overshadow oth-
ers. Doug Mennin and David Fresco (2009), experts in the area of emo-
tion regulation in anxiety disorders, describe this experience as trying to
listen as a cacophonous tuba drowns the pitch of a modest flute. As we
contemplate flying to visit a family member, for example, we may feel
afraid to the point that we lose contact with our subtler feeling of joy. Or
we may feel immersed in self-­hate to the degree that we fail to notice other
emotions and their messages. Like the tuba, a tub of gelato—­and the emo-
tional consequences of indulging in it—­may distance us from the full
range of our emotions.
Do you notice a particular emotion that often drowns out other feel-
ings that may be present? For example, does fear obscure your experience
of excitement? Does sadness rapidly melt into anger? When an emotion
feels incredibly intense and impossible to regulate, it may be helpful to
practice distress tolerance, which we will discuss in chapter 7. Meanwhile,
use the following exercise to map out the full range of emotions you expe-
rience within a particular situation, including their relative intensity.

33
End Emotional Eating

Exercise: Noticing All Feelings

When you overeat, are there particular emotions that seem so
powerful that you can feel nothing else? For this exercise, compas-
sionately consider a situation where an emotion felt very intense,
and you turned to eating in response. Did other feelings whisper
alongside the strong emotion or emotions? In your notebook,
write answers to the following questions, practicing bringing your
awareness to all emotions you experienced in this situation.
First, notice what emotions you are having. Note the inten-
sity of your emotion on a scale from 1 (barely there) to 10
(extreme). Now SIFT your emotions, as in the earlier exercise:

S: What was the situation (event or encounter) that led to

emotion?

I: What interpretations or thoughts did you notice that relate to

your experience?

F: What feelings and sensations do you notice in your body?

T: What tendencies show up? Are you pulled to pursue particular

actions?
<

When an emotion gets you stuck, overshadows other emotions and

experiences, and pulls you away from the moment and what matters to
you, it is skillful to be able to notice and label this process and return to
the present. Consider: is there an emotion you struggle with that fre-
quently moves you away from what matters to you? If so, and you can
identify it, just sit with it gently for the time being. I’ll address accessing
the present moment more thoroughly in chapter 3 and clarifying what you
value in chapter 9.

34
 Understanding Emotions and Eating

Summary
As Robert Frost simply stated, “The only way out is through.” In this chap-
ter, you began learning to systematically and nonjudgmentally notice your
thoughts and beliefs about emotions and the ways those thoughts, beliefs,
and emotions can link up with behaviors. You learned that, for many peo-
ple, emotions may seem too difficult to bear or to understand and that this
can lead to eating to soothe and escape (among other compulsive self-­
soothing behaviors). Learning to appreciate the functions of feelings,
explore your beliefs about feelings, and notice and label feelings are the
first steps in breaking the chain linking your feelings with food.

35
 Chapter 2

Accepting the Idea

of Acceptance

The curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I

am, then I can change.
—Carl Rogers

W
hat is truly behind emotional eating? It is our unwillingness to
accept, or sit with, our emotions. But when we eat for emo-
tional reasons, we don’t ever actually rid ourselves of our emo-
tions. Rather, entering into and accepting our emotions is the doorway to
freedom and joy, as well as relief from the cycle of emotional eating. But
this can be hard to hear. Even my most gracious clients shudder when I say
the word “accept” in the context of emotions and eating. Who wants to
accept difficult feelings or pain, or accept a weight that feels unacceptable?
It can feel like I’m advising giving up. I humbly suggest that this very pro-
cess, a soulful new paradigm, is the key to a new and kinder relationship
with food. Diets, food plans, mixing and matching, supplementing, and
depriving may temporarily help. Accepting, moment to moment, is a long-
term solution. Far from being painful, acceptance is a form of kindness:
you acknowledge your truths and where you are in this moment of your
life. Will your weight go down as your mind expands? Maybe. Will your
End Emotional Eating

suffering decrease? Yes. As you will read in this book, acceptance will not
preclude change; rather, acceptance accompanies change. Fighting your
body brings stagnation. Acceptance brings flow.

Understanding Acceptance
Have you ever eaten to cope with feeling fat? Too often, people want to
lose weight yesterday and get frustrated when their weight-loss attempts
seem to go slowly. The process of weight loss has become more like a dis-
ease treatment than an adventure to pursue. One might argue that obesity
is a serious health problem, or eating for emotional reasons rather than
hunger cues is problematic. At the same time, would we encourage a per-
son with depression to achieve better mental health by dwelling on how
low his mood is, or would we encourage him to accept his mood—­not in
the spirit of despairing of ever improving, but of creatively and enthusiasti-
cally seeking original solutions? The nature of this ongoing journey
requires constantly returning to an acceptance of self and of setbacks and
new challenges.
The origin of the word “accept” is the Latin for “to take.” This is fit-
ting because, paradoxically, the only way to reduce suffering is by taking pain.
The basic equations are:

Pain = Pain

Pain + Nonacceptance = Suffering

Acceptance is not resignation. It does not necessarily include liking or

condoning pain. But if the word “acceptance” is making you itch, you may
replace it with a term like “expansiveness.” Acceptance is purposely adopt-
ing an open, nonjudgmental, receptive stance, even when faced with chal-
lenge. This includes accepting our emotions, thoughts, sensations, body
shape, and reality in general, just as it is in this moment. Nonacceptance—­
fighting reality or our emotions—­limits our awareness and extends our
struggle. Imagine holding onto one end of a scarf as I hold onto the other
end. If the scarf symbolizes your weight, what is your relationship with it?
Are we relaxed as we hold the scarf together, or is there tension—are we
pulling in opposite directions? For a moment, consider the physical and

38
 Accepting the Idea of Acceptance

emotional experience involved in a tug-­of-­war. It monopolizes our atten-

tion and energy. Is it worth it? What is the alternative? We could let go of
the fight, dropping the pull and freeing up our hands and energy.
If we are willing to participate only in situations that feel good, what
is our life about? When we are unwilling to accept our reality, we drasti-
cally narrow our options. That being said, we can determine how to meet
and accept situations. Acceptance, in the sense I am using the term, is
about compassion and self-­respect, not masochism. It is complex and
dynamic—an ongoing series of choices that relate our thoughts and
actions to our deep values. Values describe what deeply matters to you or
what you want your life to stand for (we’ll address values in detail in chap-
ter 9). You may choose to accept engaging in a challenging relationship
with a loved one if doing so relates to your value of supporting your loved
ones (“I will visit Mom at Christmas and help her clear out the attic”),
while also doing what you need to do to in the service of your value of
protecting and caring for yourself (“I’ll stay at a hotel so I have my own
place to go to if things start getting rough”). If you are able to accept the
realities of a situation, rather than hoping or fantasizing things will some-
how be different this time, you can take actions that honor both sets of
values. Similarly, you may accept both your current shape and the emo-
tional and behavioral commitments required to change it. You may accept
your feelings and simultaneously change the way you respond to them
(Linehan 1993a). You do not have to accept constant hunger and
self-­torture.
Often, when we experience pain, we find ourselves angry with others,
blaming ourselves, or reacting impulsively. I recently found myself waiting
in the service line at my mobile phone service provider. I noticed a woman
next to me telling a story about how the company had wasted her time and
requesting a free iPhone case to compensate her. She told the story repeat-
edly—­to the salesperson, assistant manager, and manager. I noticed she
became more tense, loud, and exasperated—­and lost more time—­with
each repetition. Eventually, she began to threaten canceling her phone
service, which I could foresee would create even greater agitation for her.
I felt my heart soften both for her and for the employees who were dealing
with her, who experienced pain in the encounter. She was stuck on prov-
ing her point rather than accepting certain facts, and in the process, she
experienced more pain and lost time and also caused others distress.

39
End Emotional Eating

When we are ambushed by our emotions, it can be a challenge to slow

down and notice whether our feelings are based in reality and whether our
actions are serving our well-­being and our values.
Acceptance entails recognizing reality as it is, nonjudgmentally under-
standing the causes of this reality, and engaging with it rather than fight-
ing against it (Linehan 1993b). Acceptance means pursuing effective
behaviors rather than getting stuck in judgments regarding what is “right”
or “wrong,” “fair” or “unfair.”

Radical Acceptance
Acceptance is an active process entailing being open to the experi-
ence of what is, as it is, at each moment. “Acceptance without commit-
ment is a shallow victory, and commitment is not sustainable without
acceptance” (Zettle 2007, 13). Acceptance is psychological as well as
behavioral, involving accepting with both our mind and our actions.
Accepting our reality entirely—­the only really effective form of accep-
tance—­is called radical acceptance (Linehan 1993b). It is difficult to accept
what is in the moment entirely; however, only partially accepting our real-
ity will not help our suffering. Imagine that you “accept” your mother-­in-­
law, though when you see her you incessantly think about how awful she
is as a person. What does this sort of acceptance accomplish? You may
intellectually accept her, but you still feel tense and stressed when she’s
around, and you can barely stand to speak to her. If you radically accept
your current weight or shape, you are neither grimacing when you look in
the mirror nor resigning yourself to doing nothing about it.
Acceptance means noticing without judgment. This does not mean
you are not allowed to have a thought like “I can’t stand the way I look”—­it
just means you are able to notice it when you have it (“that’s a thought”).
This labeling can allow you to simply have and notice the thought without
having to attach despair or shame to it. You don’t suppress the thought,
and you don’t dwell on it—­you watch it come and you watch it go. In this
case, you’ve had a judgment, but you didn’t judge the judgment—­you just
noticed it—­and this dulls its sting and may also allow you to look at the
content of the judging thought. As you might imagine, this is a practice
that no one ever gets perfectly—­we are all human—­but once you begin

40
 Accepting the Idea of Acceptance

doing it, it’s always there and available for you to use as you are able. (We’ll
talk about this process more later in this chapter.)
Imagine yourself, again, in front of the mirror. Acceptance also
involves approaching the situation with both a literal and a figurative pos-
ture of willingness—­perhaps literally relaxing your neck and shoulders,
smoothing your forehead, and unfolding your arms as you look in the mir-
ror. This can help you notice the thought “I can’t stand the way I look”
without buying into it. There is a feedback loop between our physical pos-
ture and our brain; again, in order to move toward acceptance, it is impor-
tant to do so with both mind and body. If your mind accepts something
while your body tenses, signaling rejection, are you radically accepting
your reality? The following exercise will give you practice in noticing the
relationship between your body and your mind when it comes to
acceptance.

Exercise: Practicing Radical

Acceptance
You may either think about or write about a distressing fact in
your life. Don’t feel obligated to select the most challenging.
Instead, choose something that seems difficult yet possible to
accept.

1. What is the situation? Just think about or write down the

facts, noticing them without judgment or opinion.

2. Practice tensing your body as you think about this situation.

Try raising your hands so your forearms are at 90-degree
angles to your upper arms and clench your fists and facial
muscles by raising your eyebrows and pursing your lips. What
do you notice about how you feel about the situation?

3. Now practice letting go of the tension while thinking about

the situation, opening your hands, releasing tension in your
forehead, and relaxing your body as you sit with the reality of
the situation. Relax your face, slightly turning up the corners

41
End Emotional Eating

of your mouth. Sit for several minutes like this. What do you
notice about your emotions around this situation?

Example:

1. I weigh fifty pounds more than I would like. I’ve steadily been
gaining about two pounds a month over the last two years. It’s
hard for me to lose weight without changing my eating.

2. As I tense my body, I feel even heavier and more uncomfort-

able. The fifty pounds seems to weigh more in my mind and
body.

3. As I release, I feel like I’m beginning to move forward. I look

at this fact more openly. I feel less heavy and more ready to
commit to a plan.
<

Returning When the Mind Has Moved

away from Acceptance
When you move toward acceptance, you don’t land at once at your
destination. Rather, you may accept a situation, notice that the urge to
fight reality arises, and turn again toward the recognition of reality, over
and over again (Linehan 1993b). Part of practicing acceptance is accept-
ing the process itself. When you notice that you are not accepting, that is
a moment of awareness and an opportunity to begin again in the practice
of acceptance. You can accept your nonacceptance as well. Use the follow-
ing exercise to practice returning to acceptance.

42
 Accepting the Idea of Acceptance

Exercise: Practicing Returning

to Acceptance
This exercise is intended to help you notice nonacceptance and
practice returning from nonacceptance to acceptance.

1. Choose a food that you really enjoy, and make the decision to
practice portion control for this food during a single meal. Put
a normal-­sized serving of the food on your plate.

2. Before you begin, pause a moment to fully accept the process

of sticking to this serving size and accepting any discomfort
that may visit.

3. Eat slowly enough that you have time to notice the thoughts,
feelings, and sensations that arise. Finish the serving and do
not serve yourself more. You may notice judgmental thoughts,
such as “I can’t control myself.” You may notice tension in
your body, or your mouth watering as you put down your fork
after the last bite. Accepting entails noticing it all and not
fighting, whether by choosing to exceed your intended por-
tion or by suffering as you move away.

4. Write down the thoughts and emotions you had as you

accepted that you wanted more while deciding not to indulge,
or as you allowed yourself to eat all of a normal-­ sized
portion.

5. Notice what it feels like if you move away from acceptance; is

there tension in your mind or body?

6. Can you turn again toward acceptance when you find your-
self moving away? You may find yourself doing it repeatedly.
Write about how this process felt for you.
<

43
End Emotional Eating

Willingness vs. Willfulness

Acceptance includes having an attitude of willingness, or openness,
around choosing to accept what is, rather than fighting, evading, or
attempting to control reality. If we are willing to experience the feelings
and sensations that come with what’s happening, we can then accept
them. Without willingness, we aren’t truly accepting our situation.
Willingness is akin to wonder and has a proactive quality. Willfulness—­
the intent to have our own way—­resembles intolerance and passivity.
Gerald May (1982, 6) defines willingness as:

a realization that one already is a part of some ultimate cosmic

process and…a commitment to participation in that process. In
contrast, willfulness is the setting of oneself apart from the funda-
mental essence of life in an attempt to master, direct, control, or
otherwise manipulate existence. More simply, willingness is say-
ing yes to the mystery of being alive in each moment. Willfulness
is saying no, or perhaps more commonly, “Yes, but…”

For example, if you embodied willingness as a novice dancer in an

advanced dance class, you would continue to participate with enthusiasm—­
even if you made mistakes—­rather than standing on the side or leaving
the class when it started to get challenging. You would not get stuck in
your mind in comparisons between your poise and that of a former princi-
pal dancer in the New York City Ballet. Leaving the class or getting stuck
in your mind is willfulness, the stance of rejecting reality. How often have
you said, “I will try”? If you stood on the outskirts of this dance class (or
your life), what would “trying” look like? The choice is really between
doing and not doing (Eifert and Forsyth 2005).
Willingness is persistently practicing acceptance regardless of the out-
come. You don’t have to feel willing to behave willingly. If you are driving
behind a person moving twenty miles below the speed limit and cannot
change lanes, willing actions include relaxing your face and body, driving
slowly, suspending judgment as best you can, and staying alert to an oppor-
tunity to change lanes safely. Unwilling actions include cursing, slamming
on your horn, and tailgating.
Acceptance entails a willingness to experience whatever thoughts,
emotions, and sensations arise, rather than avoiding them. Willingness is

44
 Accepting the Idea of Acceptance

making the compassionate choice to participate in the moment. The

alternative—fighting reality—reinforces a sense that you cannot cope,
which is neither compassionate nor empowering. And unwillingness to
experience an emotion, rather than the emotion itself, often leads us to eat
comfort foods (Evers, Stok, and De Ridder 2010).
You may wish to end emotional eating, lose weight, or rid yourself of
difficult emotions, but are you willing to actively accept what is in this
moment and in each step of the process? Willfulness is similar to wishing
your problems away; willingness is accepting what is and actively partici-
pating in the process of change. Remember, though, willingness is a prac-
tice, not a state of being; no one is ever perfectly willing all the time. The
more you turn toward it, though, the more you will experience it and the
freedom it brings. The following exercise will give you some structured
practice.

Exercise: Practicing Willingness

1. Think of a situation that you will face relatively soon and that
will create emotions—­perhaps seeing a difficult person or
being offered tempting food.

2. Now think of an emotion or sensation that you find difficult

to sit with, that you think will arise in the situation, and that
you would like to practice willingness to experience. Next,
choose a length of time that you are willing to experience it.
For example, you might choose to experience the feeling of
deprivation, or the feeling of boredom, for 10 minutes.

3. Notice how you feel as you go into the situation in which you
have decided to experience this uncomfortable emotion or
sensation. Are you judging? Nervous? Resentful? Hopeful?
Just notice the feelings; don’t try to change them.

4. When you begin to feel the emotion or sensation you are

practicing with, start timing yourself. As the time passes,
keep track of your levels of willingness and how the emotion
changes over time. What do you want to do in the face of this

45
End Emotional Eating

emotion or sensation? How does your urge to act change over

time? What actions do you choose to take, and what emo-
tions arise as you act or don’t act?

5. If you wish, once you have finished your time, you can switch
to being willful. If it’s acceptable in the moment, choose to do
an action you held off from during your practice. If you do,
notice how you feel before and afterward. Compare your
period of willingness practice with a return to willfulness.
What is your experience of emotion plus willingness? What is
your experience of emotion plus willfulness?
<

Honest Willingness
Here’s a pitfall to be mindful of: are you practicing willingness to
increase your flexibility, or instead to try yet another strategy to control
the way you feel? If we use willingness and acceptance as attempts to con-
trol the way we feel, to feel less intensely, or to feel better, then we’re not
truly practicing willingness and acceptance. There is a difference between
acting “willing” in the service of feeling less pain (which isn’t really accep-
tance at all; it’s an avoidance strategy) and practicing radical acceptance
in the service of living life fully. In reality, acceptance may initially engen-
der pain, especially if we’ve been running from pain. Honest acceptance
includes practicing radical acceptance—­returning when your mind moves
away from acceptance, and adopting an attitude of honest willingness. For
example, you can accept that you cannot continue to eat as you currently
eat if you want to learn to manage emotions. And you can adopt a stance
of acceptance and return your mind toward acceptance when you experi-
ence urges to avoid feeling by eating.
Right now, check in with yourself. Are you willing to participate in the
process of feeling emotions without using food to cope, as well as returning
your mind toward this goal whenever you move toward unhealthy habitual
behaviors? Are you willing to change your relationship with food?

46
 Accepting the Idea of Acceptance

Exercise: Noticing Feelings and

Practicing Acceptance
For this exercise, choose a situation you’ll soon encounter where
emotions will come up for you. Then, while you are in the situa-
tion and the feelings come up, practice noticing them without
judgment. Practice bringing awareness to all emotions that arise,
and honestly consider how willing or unwilling you are to sit with
these emotions. Next, notice sensations and urges that accom-
pany each emotion. After the experience, briefly note how you
practiced acceptance. (Note this is a modified version of the emo-
tional SIFTing process you learned in chapter 1.)

Situation: Write down the facts about an event or person that led
to emotional reactions.

Interpretations: Did you notice interpretations or thoughts that

relate to your experience?

Emotions and willingness: List any emotions you are experienc-

ing and their intensity on a scale of nearly none (1) to extremely
intense (10). For each emotion, also note your willingness on the
same scale, with 1 being extreme unwillingness and 10 being
complete willingness.

Feelings in my body: What feelings or sensations do you experi-

ence in your body?

Tendencies and urges: What tendencies or urges show up? Are

you pulled to pursue particular actions?

How I am practicing acceptance: What skills or qualities did

you call on to practice acceptance in the moment?

Here’s an example:

Situation: Went to a friend’s birthday dinner at my favorite res-

taurant, where I recently overate for emotional reasons. Felt anx-
ious about potentially emotionally eating. I also felt quite angry
over a recent conflict with my brother.

47
End Emotional Eating

Interpretations and thoughts: I don’t want to dwell on the fight

with my brother. If feelings come up about my brother, I can
accept them and bring myself back to the moment. It’s okay to
have urges to eat for emotional reasons; cravings don’t have to
dictate my behavior.

Emotions and willingness:

1. Anxiety—­50, Willingness—­80: I felt anxious about eat-

ing though pretty willing to feel anxious.

2. Anger—­70, Willingness—­20: I really didn’t want to feel

angry.

3. Joy—­60, Willingness—­90: I was happy to see friends,

though I was a tiny bit unwilling to seem overly happy.

Feelings in my body: I recall feeling tension in my head and chest

when I think about the fight. My heart raced a bit as I look at the
menu.

Tendencies and urges: I was pulled to order what I enjoyed last

time and to complain to my friends about the fight with my
brother.

How I practiced acceptance: I nonjudgmentally noticed my

emotions, thoughts, and feelings. I accepted them without trying
to wish they weren’t there. I practiced relaxing my face and body
and accepting the discomfort of not ordering dessert when I
wasn’t physically hungry.
<

We all struggle with significant challenges in life, and we may have

adopted inefficient strategies for coping with these challenges, such as
avoiding difficult emotions. When we increase our willingness around our
experience, we become able to drop our sense of suffering and reach new
heights.

48
 Accepting the Idea of Acceptance

Practicing Acceptance in
Your Breath
I don’t want to underemphasize the difficulty of practicing acceptance and
willingness. To begin, it may be helpful to “practice acceptance with your
breath”—­that is, practice breathing in a manner that embodies accep-
tance, and then notice what happens with your mind. I noticed that when
I pack or unpack from my frequent travels, and feel irritated or worried
about time, I sound like I’m gasping for air, and when I breathe rhythmi-
cally, I feel more at ease. Sharon Salzberg, a remarkably practical medita-
tion teacher and one of America’s leading insight meditation teachers,
explains that placing the body in a meditative sitting position is one of the
best ways to practice meditation, because when the body is relaxed and
stable, the mind will follow. When we hyperventilate and tense our facial
muscles, we strengthen our anxiety response.
Mindful breathing relates to the practice of acceptance in several
ways. When you move away from acceptance, you will generally experi-
ence a change in the depth and rate of your breathing. For example, when
you are angry, you may notice your breath coming out in short bursts.
When we face challenges, our breathing often becomes constricted; pay-
ing attention to our breathing and deepening and slowing it can facilitate
acceptance and willing action. One way to practice accepting the present
moment is by bringing complete awareness to your breath, one breath at a
time. This is called mindful breathing. Breathing is available to us anywhere
and anytime, and it can serve as a reminder to accept this moment with
this breath—­in essence, to accept the here and now.
When you focus awareness on your breath, you will notice urges to
move your attention away from your breath—­for example by following
your thoughts or emotions. When this happens, you can choose to bring
your attention back to your breath. Just as learning to practice acceptance
in other ways entails noticing when we have moved away from acceptance
and choosing to return to it, breathing with awareness entails noticing
when our attention moves away and having the willingness to gently
escort our awareness back to the breath. Gentleness and a willingness to
return, again and again, are important—­forcing the mind to return to the
breath with an attitude of hostility and choosing to engage with

49
End Emotional Eating

interesting thoughts rather than attend to the breath are both ways of
choosing nonacceptance over acceptance of the present moment.

Exercise: Mindful Breathing

To get a sense of what mindful breathing is like, read the instruc-
tions below, and then set a timer for anywhere from 5 to 15 min-
utes to practice. When you have finished, take a few moments to
remember what you noticed as you were practicing.

1. Settle into a comfortable sitting position, with your spine

erect. You may sit cross-­legged if this is comfortable, with your
knees below your hips, or sit upright in a chair, with your legs
uncrossed and your feet resting flat on the floor. Your hands
should rest comfortably on your knees, palms facing upward;
this embodies openness.

2. You may focus your attention on a single point on the floor or

ahead of you. Or you may close your eyes if that feels
comfortable.

3. To begin, bring your awareness to physical sensations, such as

your seat resting on the floor or your hands contacting your
knees. Spend several moments paying attention to sensations
in your body. In noticing sensations, we are simply observing
with acceptance, one moment at a time, rather than thinking
thoughts such as “Ugh, that pain in my knee will never go
away.” (Though if that thought comes, notice it without judg-
ment and label it as a thought, and bring your attention back
to sensations.) If you notice tension in your face, neck, or
shoulders, relax those muscles.

4. Now move your awareness to the sensation of the breath in

your body. Notice your breath as you inhale and as you exhale.
Notice sensations of the breath moving in through your nos-
trils to your abdomen. Notice sensations of your breath as
your abdomen expands like a balloon on the inhale and
deflates on the exhale. Observe the breath moving up through

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 Accepting the Idea of Acceptance

your diaphragm. In noticing, you are in a sense letting the

breath breathe itself, rather than forcing it or willing it in any
way.

5. Your mind will wander away from your breath. That is what
minds do. When your mind wanders, accept the wandering
with kindness and compassion, and return your mind to par-
ticipating fully in breathing.
<

If you’d like to experiment with mindful breathing, you may practice

it in situations where you struggle with acceptance, and notice what hap-
pens when you begin “accepting with the breath.” For example, say that
you are facing a plate of comfort food, knowing you are about to eat
because you’re feeling sad and not because you’re hungry. In lieu of getting
caught up in wishing that reality was different (for instance, that you had
more willpower or weren’t so sad), practice contacting reality as it is, relax-
ing your face and body and breathing mindfully as you notice what is in
the moment.
When we practice like this, attending to the breath is not intended to
distract or move us away from what lies before us. Rather, the breath may
help us make contact with and accept the fact that we have choices.
Breathing deeply and actively choosing which actions to pursue is very
different from engaging in habitual, mindless behaviors. In one of her
talks, Sharon Salzberg described attending to the breath as analogous to
noticing an old friend in a large crowd: the breath may serve as a friendly
reminder of our freedom to accept the moment and choose our actions
consciously. Jon Kabat-­Zinn (1990, 2) beautifully explains, “In this learn-
ing process we assume from the start that as long as you are breathing,
there is more right with you than there is wrong, no matter how ill or
hopeless you may feel.”
Now that we’ve explored the value in acceptance, let’s get a sense of
why acceptance is the only viable choice.

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End Emotional Eating

The Heaviness of Nonacceptance

Eating to avoid emotion may be a deliberate strategy or a habitual pattern
that is almost unconscious. In other words, you may experience an emo-
tion, wish to control it, and, consciously or not, use food to avoid or alter
it, implicitly reinforcing the notion that you just can’t cope with your
feelings.
Experiential avoidance, or attempts to avoid, suppress, or change nega-
tive events, including feelings, thoughts, and bodily sensations, underlies
both emotional suffering (Hayes et al. 1996) and emotional eating.
Pain is a part of living. We are all faced with difficult emotions, pain-
ful memories, and obstacles. Many individuals describe their struggle with
emotions as greater than their experience of physical pain. Dissatisfaction
with one’s shape and size may include a combination of emotional and
physical discomfort. How do you cope with uncomfortable thoughts, feel-
ings, and sensations?
Avoidance and control strategies can bring advantages. Our ancestors
survived, in part, by taking precautions and gaining some degree of con-
trol over their situations. These coping strategies are thus in our DNA,
and they are, in themselves, neither good nor bad. They are, however,
sometimes ineffective in our daily lives. When are attempts to control our
situations effective? If we need to concentrate on an important project, it
is effective if we remove distractions. If we want to lose weight, it is useful
if we limit the amount of sweets and processed fatty foods in the home.
But attempts to control situations often fail, and this usually happens when
they are too rigid and/or when we try to use them in situations where they will
not work. For example, if you decide to pursue a highly restrictive diet in
which you drastically reduce your intake of calories, you are likely to binge
at some point because you will feel deprived. Control is also not feasible
when we try to radically alter inalterable aspects of the body, such as the
aging process. The next exercise is designed to give you some practice
discerning when control strategies might be effective and when they might
not be.

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 Accepting the Idea of Acceptance

Exercise: Control or Let Go?

1. Spend a moment writing about or thinking of three examples
of situations where your efforts at control seem not to work.

2. Taking each situation in turn, think of aspects you can con-

trol and aspects you cannot.

For example:

1. I can’t control the fact that I experience food cravings.

I can’t control what other people think of me.
I can’t totally control how much I enjoy various activities.

2. I can make sure I purchase only healthy food items for my

home, but I cannot control what my family members or guests
choose to bring over.
I can do my best to be a nice person and be myself, but I can-
not control the fact that other people may or may not like me.
I can pursue activities I tend to enjoy and that often make me
feel better, but I cannot control how much I enjoy them on
any particular day, nor can I guarantee that they will dramati-
cally improve my mood.
<

You Can’t Turn Off Feelings

I love pithy sayings and here is my favorite: the problem is the solution.
In other words, the problem is the way we try to get rid of feelings, not the
experience of feeling itself. For example, if you struggle with panic, the
actual feeling of anxiety will likely not handicap you as much as the behav-
iors you use to avoid panic, such as avoiding traveling, staying close to
home, and overeating. A more helpful strategy is to experience those feel-
ings, rather than trying to turn them off.

53
End Emotional Eating

Certain strategies we employ to “fix” our feelings will inevitably cause

us to feel them more intensely. Even the proverbial “control freak” will
often fail when it comes to managing his emotions—­you can organize
your closets and subdue your children, but it is a lot harder to suppress your
own inner life. Still, most of us try to fix our feelings. Who wants to feel
fat, anxious, sad, or lonely? But our best efforts to subdue emotional pain
often create additional suffering.

Exercise: Letting Go of Strategies

to Avoid
1. Take a moment to think about ways you have tried to manage
your emotions. Have you ever avoided the pain of being alone
by keeping the television on, incessantly snacking, or using
other avoidance behaviors? List as many strategies as you can
that you have used to try to avoid or change your feelings.

2. What are the feelings you find most challenging to

experience?

3. How might you practice accepting those feelings?

<

Imagine that you are wearing your favorite pair of suede shoes, and
you are walking down the street on your way to an important meeting.
Suddenly, it starts to pour. You wait under an awning for several minutes,
but wishing the rain away or remaining under the awning will not change
the weather. You wait and worry and become physically tense. Your shoes
will be ruined! But if you continue to wait and miss your meeting, the lost
opportunity may equal the cost of several pairs of shoes.
Trying to control emotions is like trying to keep your shoes dry in a
rainstorm. You may try, and certain techniques may even work in the
short term—­if you are caught in a rainstorm, it may be useful to step
inside for some time. But what if you chose to walk—­even to dance—­in
the rain? What if the deluge became part of your day, an anecdote for the

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 Accepting the Idea of Acceptance

meeting, something (among the many things life throws at you) that
couldn’t stop you?
We can’t control our emotions any more than we can control the
weather. Let’s try this: Get really happy right now. Tough, isn’t it? Try
harder! What do you notice? Joy, sadness, confusion, loss—­none of these
can be turned on or off at our command. Willpower is simply not helpful
here. In fact, efforts to switch melancholy into the “all joy, all the time”
channel will generally magnify your sadness into real misery. Why set
yourself up? Why “fail” at something that is not possible?

Mark’s Story
Mark was diagnosed with attention deficit disorder (ADD) as a
child. Understandably, he still struggles with organization and
concentration. Mark works in sales, and given his ADD, he has
strategically developed a plan to overprepare for meetings, thor-
oughly considering any potential obstacles.
One day on the way to a high-­stakes meeting, Mark began to
sweat. He tried to force himself to stop sweating by thinking about
how humiliating it would be to be visibly dripping in front of his
colleagues. This only led to more sweating. Worse, Mark felt so
uncomfortable and anxious that he actually bought himself a
large cold beer and a cheeseburger, despite the facts that he was
on his way to a business meeting and has high cholesterol.
Mark’s efforts to manage his anxiety and control his body
were backfiring, and it wasn’t the first time. He had a very well-­
conceived plan in place to handle meetings, but he still felt
exhausted before and after important meetings. He increasingly
tried to soothe himself with comfort foods, television, and alco-
hol. As you can imagine, the more effort he invested in control-
ling his body and avoiding his anxiety, the more anxious he
actually felt and the less efficient he was in his work. And on the
day I’ve just described, the more he sweated emotionally, the more
he sweated physically—­a strong metaphor for how ineffectual our
attempts to control the uncontrollable can be.

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End Emotional Eating

Hiding Feelings Causes You to

Feel More
While you may inhibit the ways you express an emotion, physiologi-
cally you experience increased sensations in parallel with any attempt to
suppress your emotions (Gross and Levenson 1997). For example, if you
try to avoid feeling anxious, you may reduce the look of panic on your face
to some degree, but your heart rate will increase as a result of your trying
to fake calmness. So inhibiting your expression of negative emotions does
not provide relief from your experience of the feeling, but does the oppo-
site. Researchers (e.g., Wegner, Quillian, and Houston 1996) also suspect
that trying to inhibit emotions limits your ability to organize information.
Think about it: if you’re focused on managing your expression, it’s difficult
to concentrate on and attend to what’s happening around you. In Mark’s
situation, he may sometimes be so attuned to his attempt to appear calm
that he fails to notice how engaged his colleagues are with his presenta-
tion. Suppressing emotions may also affect your relationships with others.
If you rigidly control your expression, will people in your life be aware of
your struggle? And with your attention absorbed in managing how you
appear, will you have much of a chance of seeing what is happening with
them? Not likely, and the combined result is that you will probably feel
more and more isolated and less likely to elicit or express supportive and
loving behavior.

Feel Less, Eat More?

How does suppressing emotion lead to increased eating of comfort
foods? One possibility is that the act of suppression is itself emotionally
depleting. You may be expending energy on stifling your feelings, leaving
you with few resources when it comes to monitoring food (Vohs and
Heatherton 2000). Interestingly, if you are not on a diet, you are less likely
to indulge, as there is less pressure surrounding food choices.
So here is the sequence: You start feeling sad. You don’t express the
emotion, but try to stop feeling it. You now have less control when it comes
to choosing what you eat and are more likely to eat unhealthy comfort
foods. Then, you feel guilt when you do turn to comfort foods—­another

56
 Accepting the Idea of Acceptance

negative emotion! Any bets on what happens when you suppress the guilt?
When you maintain rigid standards of perfection, or are not willing to
accept yourself as you are, food serves as a temporary escape (Heatherton
and Baumeister 1991), but escaping once makes it that much more likely
you’ll be driven to seek escape again, and again, forgetting that this strat-
egy doesn’t actually work in the long term.
So what might happen if you didn’t need to escape your self with food?
What might happen if you compassionately acknowledged and addressed
your sadness?

No Body Is Perfect
If you have a tendency to be perfectionistic, or are unwilling to accept your
body, you will always find imperfections. Tara Brach (2003), a clinical psy-
chologist who specializes in teaching self-­acceptance, writes in her semi-
nal book, Radical Acceptance “Imperfection is not our personal problem—­it
is a natural part of existing.” Not being willing to accept imperfection
creates imperfection. Inflexible preoccupation with your body shape keeps
you struggling around food—­and often leads to eating disorders (Fairburn
2008). When you define yourself by your shape and are unwilling to accept
certain aspects of the way you are, you are likely to resort to harsh efforts
to control your body by restricting your food or by overexercising. Ironically,
rigid dieting may lead to loss of control over eating—­and this happens for
both psychological and biological reasons. Many people tend to overeat
after skipping a meal or ending a restrictive diet: both the body and the
mind seek to compensate for the deprivation.
What have you tried in your attempts to change your shape or size?
Has any approach led to the desired goal, or did it lead to another futile
quest for perfection? Consider what you think you may achieve in your
quest for perfection. Personal appearance may seem more controllable
than other aspects of life; perhaps that is why it is so tempting an avenue
for self-­improvement.

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End Emotional Eating

Anne’s Story
Anne spent every morning on the stair climber for an hour. She’d
run to her job, skip lunch, and return to the gym after work to lift
weights and run. Did the extra workout boost her confidence? It
did not.
In her free time, she’d study restaurant reviews and select
places to dine. Dinner was her time to savor the food she craved.
Anne spent nearly as much time on her looks as she spent at her
job. She was her own full-­time makeover coach. She spent hours
a day on her hair, makeup, and clothing selection. But what was
the payoff for all this effort? Did Anne actually feel any better
than she had when she wore jeans or sweatpants and a T-shirt to
her college classes? Not really.
In fact, the more Anne pursued “perfection,” the less con-
tented she felt. What was Anne running to, or escaping from?
What feelings were pursuing her? Her time was so consumed with
her appearance that she was able to dodge her emotions, at least
temporarily. And there were other benefits. Anne did earn some
positive attention from others. She was often asked on dates, even
though she couldn’t say she felt good about herself. The feelings
she was trying to avoid always made themselves known in the
form of a nagging unhappiness. Anne’s worries about her appear-
ance distracted her from the intrusive thoughts that there was
something wrong with her.
In therapy, Anne engaged in an exercise called mirror expo-
sure (G. Wilson 2002). She nonjudgmentally observed and
described the entirety of what she saw in the mirror. She shifted
from automatically seeing her body through a perfectionistic,
judgmental lens to developing acceptance of the basic, true facts
about her appearance. When Anne learned to accept her appear-
ance and—­just as important—­to realize that she was more than
her appearance, she began to feel peace. Through learning helpful
ways to regulate emotions, developing flexibility and willingness

58
 Accepting the Idea of Acceptance

to be in the moment, and exploring what really mattered, Anne

finally gained a sense of ease.

Anne is not alone in her struggles with how she looks. People of vary-
ing sizes and shapes wrestle with accepting their bodies, especially in our
youth-­oriented, media-­dominated world, in which the ideal shape for
women is seemingly pencil-thin. Interestingly, overconcern with shape
and weight often occurs independent of the culturally defined attractive-
ness of one’s actual shape and weight (Eldredge and Agras 1996). In other
words, even people who look like they should be happy with their shape
and weight (by our cultural standards) are often unhappy with their shape
and weight. In our culture, individuals whose weight is in the healthy
range often wish to weigh less, and others judge themselves based on their
shape and relationship with food more than by their relationships, hob-
bies, work, and family. Much of this anguish is in vain: the pattern of body
fat distribution is largely a factor of genetics (Bouchard 1995); further-
more, the body tends to maintain a particular set point, making it difficult
to drastically modify weight (Keesey 1995). In other words, you can’t really
change your waist to hip ratio—­at least, not without surgery, and often
not even with it—­and your body has its own reasons for maintaining your
weight and shape within certain parameters.
If excessive concern regarding shape and appearance is generally
unhelpful, and magnifies the weight of weight in your life, what does
appropriate concern look like? Of course, it is important to problem solve
if you have difficulties around food and eating, but there is a difference
between problem solving and obsessive or compulsive thoughts and
actions. Everybody checks their body to some extent, but people who
obsess about their appearance may scrutinize their bodies in a way that
maintains suffering. Many people compare themselves to models and
actresses who must conform to a certain standard or lose their livelihood
(and who endure starvation, excessive exercise, and surgery to maintain
their looks). Often, we compare ourselves to a select group of remarkably
thin or “beautiful” people (as determined by strict modern standards)
rather than the average person or every other person we see. Consider for
a few moments your own body-­checking habits:

• How often do you check your weight?

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End Emotional Eating

• How often do you look in the mirror?

• Do you observe yourself as a whole? Or do you scrutinize cer-

tain parts?

• Do you notice with critical eyes or kind eyes?

• What are you looking for when you check your body?

• Do you ever feel better after studying your body?

Exclusively focusing on parts is avoiding the whole—­your body as a whole,

your life as a whole. We may gaze at ourselves critically, like judges at a
beauty contest, or lovingly, like a museumgoer in front of a curvaceous
female nude. We are all beautiful in unique ways. Artists know this; those
with calipers and scales miss the point. Mirrors are misleading, and what
one sees depends a lot on how one looks at them (Fairburn 2008). We are
seldom entirely objective when we look at ourselves.
Some people who struggle with their shape cope by avoiding looking
in the mirror, forming intimate relationships, going to the beach, or buy-
ing new clothes. People may avoid weighing themselves or acknowledging
their weight as a health concern. Some waver between extreme concern
about weight and complete avoidance of the issue, like Joel.

Joel’s Story
Joel would spend hours tanning, picking out expensive clothes,
working with a personal trainer, and following a rigid diet—­or
he’d flip to the opposite extreme. When he wasn’t being “good,”
he would wear old sweats, grow a scraggly beard, cancel his gym
membership, and eat anything and everything. His friends mar-
veled that the Joel they saw could weigh either 170 pounds or 250
pounds; he was rarely in between. Some probably wondered
whether Joel was being kind to himself or to his body and whether
this tortured ambivalence was sustainable.
When Joel’s yoga teacher shared the mantra “You have a
body but you are not your body,” something shifted for Joel. He
practiced whispering to himself gently when judgmental thoughts

60
 Accepting the Idea of Acceptance

came up, “You have a body; you are not your body.” He found that
reminding himself to accept his shape, and to also accept that he
was more than his weight, was helpful in maintaining balance in
both weight and life.

Summary
We’ve spent this chapter learning about control and avoidance as coping
mechanisms. When it comes to our feelings, research (and our own expe-
rience) shows these strategies are worse than ineffective: they actually
backfire on us and magnify our suffering. Instead, acceptance is the only
viable path to coping with pain and distress and experiencing life in full.
In this chapter, you had the opportunity to practice experiencing willing-
ness and acceptance around some issues you find painful. You learned to
breathe mindfully, using your breath to experience acceptance and to
remind you what that experience feels like. You may have had some
insights into the things you avoid or try to control and the ways those
strategies are or are not working for you. The movement from old ways of
coping to newer ones can feel dangerous—­research shows we more often
choose a painful occurrence we’re familiar with over a less painful, but
new and unpredictable one (Badia, Harsh, and Abbott 1979). Be bold, and
be gentle with yourself. Practice, but don’t hold yourself to a standard of
perfection. You can continually choose to accept your thoughts, feelings,
sensations, and current situation. The switch to acceptance may seem
exhausting, but you will find that it actually increases your vitality.

61
 Chapter 3

Mindful Moments

Usually we feel that there’s a large problem and we have to

fix it. The instruction is to stop. Do something unfamiliar.
Do anything besides rushing off in the same old direction,
up to the same old tricks.
—Pema Chödrön

I
magine that you agree to participate in a research study and at times
throughout the day, you are asked what you are doing, what you are
thinking, and how you are feeling. You might think that what you are
doing would determine how you feel. You may predict you’d feel happier at
the beach than in a business meeting. Harvard researchers checked in
with 2,250 adults through iPhone applications, asking them numerous
times a day, “Are you thinking about something other than what you are
currently doing?” The researchers found that when people spent time
thinking about events other than those occurring in the moment, they
were less happy; wandering minds are unhappy minds (Killingsworth and
Gilbert 2010). Thinking was more related to happiness than was doing—­in
other words, when your mind is not on whatever it is you’re doing, it’s hard
to experience joy or purpose. Thinking comes at an emotional cost. In this
chapter you will learn to be where you are both when you eat and more
generally.
End Emotional Eating

Practicing mindfulness may affect your eating in several ways. It can

increase your awareness of your emotions, thoughts, and sensations, and
you may find yourself more able to experience life events without using
food to cope. Also, if you practice eating mindfully, you are more aware of
your eating. Many people who struggle with food describe a loss of control
when eating. Eating mindfully is a way of regaining flexibility and aware-
ness. When you eat mindfully, you notice what you are eating bite by bite
and you are able to experience more pleasure and satisfaction. Throughout
this chapter and those that follow, mindfulness serves as a foundation
from which to observe emotions, eating, and thinking and, more generally,
to participate wholeheartedly in life. In this chapter, we will explore how
to begin to notice judgments, practice mindfulness, observe your state of
mind, and bring mindful attention to both eating and your experience of
hunger.

What Is Mindfulness?
Mindfulness is a core practice in the Buddhist tradition and other Eastern
meditative traditions. But mindfulness is not tied to any specific religion;
it describes a quality of attention consistent with all religions. For exam-
ple, theological historians describe a meditative tradition present in
Judaism since biblical times (Kaplan 1985). When you practice mindful-
ness, you practice living with intention. It’s the opposite of being a slave to
habit and indulging impulses.
In 1979, the Stress Reduction and Relaxation Program at the
University of Massachusetts Medical Center began integrating mindful-
ness into Western medical practice. Since then, mindfulness has been
extensively researched and found useful in treating a wide range of both
medical and psychological problems. In his seminal book on mindfulness,
Jon Kabat-­Zinn (1990) introduced an exercise in which you practice eat-
ing a single raisin with full awareness (I’ve included a version of this exer-
cise at the end of this chapter). Eating a raisin with full attention illustrates
the manner in which we may slow down and savor even the most banal
food. Mindfulness is helpful for people who struggle with both eating (e.g.,
Safer, Telch, and Chen 2009; Thich Nhat Hahn and Cheung 2010) and

64
 Mindful Moments

sitting with difficult emotions (Linehan 1993a; Hayes, Strosahl, and

Wilson 1999).
Practicing mindfulness is like turning on the lights in your life—­
though mindfulness is not instantaneous. You don’t get mindful; you prac-
tice mindfulness over time, building skill and patience. Mindfulness
increases mental flexibility, opening new options to you, and actually
thickens the middle prefrontal cortex of your brain, facilitating acting in
accordance with your goals (Siegel 2010). However, mindfulness is not
about achieving anything, as the practice is based on acceptance. Still,
many people notice that mindfulness may reduce suffering, increase joy,
and allow us to experience reality as it is in each moment. (Linehan 1993b)
How does mindfulness reduce suffering, increase joy, and facilitate
contact with reality? As we’ve touched on in previous chapters, we can
really suffer if we are not only awash in the pain of the present, but also
consumed by past problems and potential difficulties in the future.
Learning to sit with the now can free us from that additional weight, dras-
tically reducing our suffering. In the same way, mindfulness increases
joy—­it is virtually impossible to enjoy something if we aren’t fully in con-
tact with it. If you are on vacation worrying the trip will end, are you rel-
ishing this moment? Finally, if we aren’t fully present in each moment, we
may find ourselves responding to events that aren’t actually occurring. A
good way to understand this is to consider a common mindless experience—­
say, waking up on a Saturday (your day off) concerned you overslept and
are late for work. You may even find yourself getting dressed hurriedly
before you realize, “Hey, it’s Saturday!” You may find yourself in similar
situations throughout the day when you are caught in the alarms of your
mind, unconscious of the reality of the moment.

Mindfulness Defined
Mindfulness is the awareness that stems from paying attention, on pur-
pose, in the moment (Kabat-­Zinn 2003). Mindfulness practice entails pay-
ing attention in a particular way to one’s emotions, thoughts, sensations,
and experiences. It requires letting go of our tendencies to judge and con-
trol. We all possess the capacity for mindfulness; we simply have to bring
ourselves back to this home within us. The practice includes choosing a

65
End Emotional Eating

stance of openness and honoring our experiences with compassionate

awareness. One component of the practice is self-­regulation, allowing you
to direct attention toward the present moment; another component is a
stance of curiosity, openness, and acceptance (Bishop et al. 2004). Our
minds may veer off from the present, and when we are mindful of this we
kindly shift our focus back to now.
Mindfulness can be (and has been) defined fairly precisely, but it is
best understood experientially, through practice. We can talk a lot about
the mechanics of skiing, but you won’t get a real feel for the experience
until you actually ski. So I’ll briefly break down Jon Kabat-­Zinn’s formula-
tion of mindfulness (paying attention, on purpose, in the moment, with-
out judgment) and then you can begin practicing. You’ll find that being
mindful is about being, not doing or figuring out.
Paying attention on purpose means you are focusing on what lies before
you. When you practice mindfulness, you attend to only one thing at a
time. You may shift your attention from the sky to the sound of birds, but
this is quite different from the fragmenting quality of multitasking, where
your attention is split so it’s neither fully on the birds nor fully on the sky.
When you practice mindfulness you are neither avoiding nor grasping.
You are letting go of attempts to control. This doesn’t mean you don’t
care—­quite the contrary; this quality reflects caring wisely. Mindfulness
describes awareness in this moment. Of course, your mind may be accus-
tomed to moving away from the moment. Minds jump around a lot, and
it’s a challenge to see clearly with a jumpy mind. It is, however, helpful to
notice this jumpiness. When you notice that you aren’t in the moment,
that is itself a moment of noticing and an opportunity to begin again.
Mindfulness is noticing without judgment. What are judgments? When
we make a judgment, we superimpose thoughts on facts. This may move
us away from being aware moment to moment and can result in our over-
looking important information. For example, thinking, “Sam didn’t return
my call. He hates me” is not mindful. We have no idea why Sam didn’t
return the call, and it doesn’t really matter. The judgment “He hates me”
narrows our attention and may get in the way of noticing the sunset before
our eyes. I’ll never forget a chief psychologist yawning during my job inter-
view. I was sure I would not be hired. An observable yawn is factual, yet
concluding he was unimpressed by me was a judgment. Days later, I was
surprised to receive a job offer. Judgments, as this example suggests, can

66
 Mindful Moments

create unnecessary pain and can affect how you feel about both yourself
and the people in your life. Anger generally occurs around judgments
about how people “should” act.
Many of my clients argue that it’s “normal” to judge. And yes, of
course we all make judgments. The issue here is about how effective judg-
ments are. At times, it is indeed helpful and effective to make snap judg-
ments based on past experience. At other times, judgments pose problems,
particularly when judgments are so habitual we fail to differentiate them
from facts. Just because you think you are ugly does not mean that you are
unattractive. Mindfulness includes awareness that thoughts are not facts
(we’ll explore this concept more in chapter 6). It may be useful to replace
judgments with facts or statements of preference or consequence. For
example, replace the judgment “I’m unattractive” with the statement of
fact “Beauty is subjective.” Replace “I’m a failure because I’m single” with
the statement of preference “I would like to be in a loving relationship”;
replace “I can’t change” with “Change may take time.”
Many people have held particular judgments about their bodies, emo-
tions, and eating for a long time. These judgments may seem so true given
how long they have been with you that they feel real. Would you be willing
to bring your attention to judgments that seem familiar and spend a
moment noticing they are judgments? The following exercise is designed
to help you practice this around the issues of food, emotions, and the body.

Exercise: Noticing Judgments

Write down some beliefs you notice often in relation to food, your
emotions, and/or your body. In which situations does each thought
arise? If the thought is a judgment, replace it with a more accurate
fact or a statement of preference. Any time you encounter a judg-
ment, you may use this quick exercise both to understand when
and where the judgment comes up and to replace it with a more
effective statement of fact or preference.

67
End Emotional Eating

Where and When Judgment Statement of Fact or

Preference

<

Cultivating a Mindfulness Practice

You may practice mindfulness formally or informally. Many people find a
combination helpful. In practicing mindfulness formally, you may learn to
notice the usual places your mind goes; this can pave a path to bringing
mindful awareness to other parts of your day. When practicing informally,
you bring present-moment awareness to routine activities throughout the
day.

Formal Practice
Cultivating a formal practice is a bit like scheduling an appointment
with yourself to practice mindfulness. Formal practices may involve taking
time away from your regular daily activities to sit and be aware of your
breath. You may decide to sit in a particular place, in a chair or on a cush-
ion on the floor, from seven to seven fifteen every morning. It’s helpful to
sit in a way that is conducive to practice. Sitting in full lotus position may
be impossible, yet sitting too comfortably may lead to you (or your feet)
falling asleep. Find a middle path. Find a location where you are not dis-
tracted, or choose something nondistracting to focus on—­sitting in front
of a computer or clutter may fill you with the desire to “do” rather than
“be.” (If you would like to begin a practice and have difficulty with follow-
through, you may set an alarm to remind you to practice each morning, or
sign up for e-mail reminders at habitforge.com.)

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Informal Practice
An informal practice involves applying mindfulness to your life more
flexibly yet still deliberately. This may include going to a concert and really
listening, or turning off the TV, closing your book, putting the iPhone
away, and sitting at the table to eat with complete awareness. You may
practice mindfulness when you shower, listen to music, or talk with a
friend. If you choose to practice talking with a friend mindfully, you fully
participate in the conversation, noticing when distracting thoughts arise,
observing thoughts without fighting or holding on to them, and returning
your attention to your friend. If you decide to shower mindfully, you attend
to the sensations in the shower (the water, the temperature, the feeling of
soap in your hair); you are not engaging in worries about your business
meeting. When that thought arises, notice it, and return your attention to
the water pressure.

Eric’s Story
Eric told me he could not stop thinking, and feelings were too
painful. He numbed himself with marijuana, fast food, and alco-
hol. When I asked how these behaviors were working for him, he
said, “They aren’t.” He had long considered himself a failure. He
spent a lot of time and money trying to quiet his mind with loud
music and mood-altering substances. And his mind got louder
and his life got smaller. We discussed experimenting with mind-
fulness. Eric began to sit and meditate for three minutes each day
at noon, and he also brought awareness to eating his dinner. After
practicing for several months, he wouldn’t say he felt better or
liked slowing down—­it still felt downright scary—­but he noticed
that, over time, he had become less afraid of his feelings and more
aware of his thinking patterns. Eric is most proud of being less
enslaved by habits. Some days are easier than others.

If you’re willing, it may be helpful to commit to practicing mindfulness

formally and/or informally for several weeks. Notice the experience.
Mindfulness is a lot like weight training in that it requires consistent
repeated efforts; over time, mindfulness changes the brain (e.g., Siegel

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2010). As you consider starting a mindfulness practice, you may notice

thoughts like “That’s just not my personality; I can’t be in the moment”
and “I don’t have time.” Are those thoughts, or are they facts?

Exercise: Journaling Your Experience

Keeping track of your practices may both help you remember to
practice and also provide you with information. You can use the
following format to record how you practice mindfulness, whether
formally or informally.

Date How I Practiced What I Noticed

Many people find that a combination of practicing formally

for a specified period of time each day (even for five minutes) and
practicing informally can be helpful. I find formal mindfulness
practice more challenging than informal practice: I prefer to run
around rather than sit quietly. Sitting formally has been a useful
practice for me, and when sitting feels too difficult or sleep-­
inducing, I practice observing my breath while walking mindfully.
<

How Are We Mindless in

Our Eating?
For any number of reasons we may find ourselves distracted while eating.
Research suggests that distraction during a meal both increases food
intake during that meal and leads to increased food intake after the meal
(Oldham-­Cooper et al. 2011). Part of our experience of feeling full has to

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do with remembering that we ate, and it’s difficult to recall eating when
our focus has moved away from really noticing and tasting the food.

Multitasking
Often, as a result of learning or lifestyle, we are accustomed to TV
dinners. And I don’t mean instant dinners in little microwavable trays. I
am referring to the pairing of TV (or another distraction, such as a book,
computer, or newspaper) and food. Our attention is captivated by the
screen or page and diverted from the food before us. The society we live
in, which confuses multitasking with productivity, supports this kind of
distracted eating. And it’s understandable that, when we are busy, it is dif-
ficult to move away from work or other activities, slow down, and eat with
complete awareness.
There may also be an emotional component to distracted eating. If we
experience anxiety or guilt in the context of eating, we may find ourselves
avoiding the emotions that arise during meals by occupying ourselves with
other activities. If this resonates with your experience, mealtime may be an
ideal time to really practice the willingness to notice and accept your feelings.

Eating Too Quickly

From an evolutionary perspective, eating quickly before the available
food is consumed by others is adaptive. However—­thankfully—­as mod-
ern people our next meal may reasonably be available within minutes.
Eating quickly often relates to busyness. When our attention is diverted
from the act of eating, our eating speed increases (Andrade, Greene, and
Melanson 2008). For many of us, eating has become a mechanical activity:
we chew like we type, the faster the better. It’s true that we are busy peo-
ple, yet eating hurriedly may be analogous to driving too quickly: we are
likelier to lose control. I notice that I tend to eat more quickly when I’m
dining with a fast eater. It feels contagious, and slowing myself down
requires awareness.
Again, eating quickly may also relate to trying to avoid emotions that
arise while eating. Some patients have told me that on some emotional

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level, they feel that if they eat something “forbidden” quickly, it doesn’t
count. However, when we eat quickly to dodge our emotions, we may lose
the opportunity to experience joy or other positive emotions in eating.
And, of course, we may inadvertently eat too much.

Eating at the Fridge or on the Run

Eating on the road or at the counter is often associated with multitask-
ing and eating too quickly. Consider for a moment the difference between
sitting down to eat a meal at a restaurant and eating from a take-­out con-
tainer while you’re standing with the fridge door open. It’s hard to imagine
you’ll eat with full attention while standing in front of the refrigerator. It
may be helpful to seek out a situation conducive to eating wisely—­a nicely
laid table, for example, rather than the driver’s seat of your car.

Lack of Awareness of Satiety

For a host of reasons, it may be difficult for us to know much about our
experience of hunger or our experience of feeling satiated. Brian Wansink
describes in his book Mindless Eating (2010) how he and his colleagues
devised a scenario where pipes below a dining table continuously refilled
diners’ soup bowls. People did not notice they were consuming three bowls
of soup!
Eating is often influenced by emotional, social, and cognitive vari-
ables, rather than solely by physiological hunger. A history of dieting, over-
eating, and emotional eating can obscure our awareness of our physiological
appetite. Often, we are most familiar with the extremes of hunger and
satiety—­the growling stomach and the faint feeling when we are fam-
ished, and then the distending fullness, when it feels difficult to breathe
and our pants need to be unbuttoned.

Lack of Awareness of Our Emotions

If you are in the habit of eating to stop feeling, you may confuse emo-
tional pain with hunger. As we saw in chapter 1, eating may serve as a way

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to avoid or escape emotions. When you bring awareness to your emotions,

you may choose how to respond rather than habitually reacting.

Lack of Knowledge about What

We’re Eating
Many of us buy prepared meals or eat in restaurants. It may be difficult
to find out nutritional information or control portion size. We can’t really
fully participate in the moment of eating when we don’t know basic facts
about what we’re eating. Recently, several restaurants in my area began
posting nutritional information. I was shocked that a piece of cake could
have 800 calories! Still, this is valuable information from the point of view
of mindfulness. Knowing what an item contains and how many calories it
has means that we can accept the reality about that food and make a
choice from there. And that choice doesn’t necessarily have to be “too
many calories—­no cake for me.” There is a wide middle ground between
meticulously counting every calorie, or depriving ourselves of calorie-­
dense foods, and entirely avoiding thinking about the nutritional informa-
tion in food and just going for it. Eating a piece of cake while obsessing
over its calorie content is not very mindful. A more workable stance
involves having general knowledge of what the food contains in terms of
ingredients, nutrients, and calories; flexibility in attitude and judgment
about the food; attention to portion size; and a willingness to slow down
and savor taste.

Exercise: How Am I Mindless in

My Eating?
Take out your notebook and bring to mind one or more instances
of mindless eating in the last week.

1. Without judgment, factually describe the behaviors you’ve

noticed or can remember that got in the way of eating with
your full attention.

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2. What emotions did you notice while eating unmindfully?

3. Describe briefly how mindless eating affected your experience.

<

Larry’s Story
Larry was busy. He worked, assisted his elderly parents, and was
an avid golfer. Often, he ate at his desk, consuming his lunch in a
maximum of four minutes while also checking his e-mail and,
occasionally, returning calls. During a therapy session, we consid-
ered how his food was arranged and all the minute details involved
in preparing the bread, deli meats, lettuce and pickles, chips, soda,
and banana. He sat for several minutes appreciating the people
involved in his lunch, including the farmers, shippers, and gro-
cers. Generally, we fail to attend to the process as well as the sight,
taste, smell, and feel of each bite of food. We feel too hurried to
savor the moment in all its depth and complexity. When Larry
brought attention to his lunches, he heightened both his enjoy-
ment of the food and his satisfaction after eating. He noticed he
felt full after mindfully eating a sandwich and did not need to also
eat the banana and chips at lunch; he began saving them for later
in the day. Slowing down also made him realize that his soda was
too sweet and did not quench his thirst. Larry also sought more
knowledge about what he was so speedily consuming. He thought
the “#6” was a tasty take-­out order at the deli. When he decided
that, as part of his expanding awareness, he’d research the nutri-
tional information of his sandwich, his mouth fell open: the three
layers of corned beef, chopped liver, and Russian dressing in the
#6 delivered more calories and cholesterol than his cardiologist
recommended for the entire day. Acting on this awareness, he
discovered he felt satiated by a sandwich with two layers of corned
beef and dressing and liver on the side.

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 Mindful Moments

What Is Mindful Eating?

You can chomp your food, or you can cherish it. Mindful eating describes
the practice of bringing your full awareness to your experience while eat-
ing. Have you ever noticed the discrepancy between the time and effort
involved in food preparation and the speed of food consumption? Mindful
eating cultivates both gratitude and gratification in eating.

Find a Seat
When I was in grade school, a teacher took us out to celebrate the end
of the year at an ice cream store. Several people stood around eating. Mrs.
Smiles (yes, that was her actual name) authoritatively instructed us, “My
friends, we all need to find chairs. Animals eat while standing; we are
kings.” Just as it is helpful to adopt a posture conducive to formally practic-
ing mindfulness, it’s important to sit in a manner consistent with eating
mindfully. Chairs are everywhere: take a seat!

Give Thanks
Taking a moment to notice your food before eating, and taking a
moment to notice your sensations after eating, may bring meaning and
even sanctity to a moment that you may associate with shame. I love
reminding myself that food didn’t just land on my plate and that I am so
fortunate to be able to eat when so many people have too little food. This
practice is not about judging ourselves or feeling undeserving or sorry for
the hungry; it’s about really noticing what lies before us, just for a moment.
You may give thanks to a higher power, horticulture, Häagen-­Dazs, or
your host, if this is a helpful practice for you.

Take a Picture!
Maybe you thought food photography was just for foodies. Many pro-
grams designed to combat binge eating encourage keeping food logs, and

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a food record is an important tool for taking inventory and increasing

awareness around food consumption. However, after a long day, it can be
hard to remember precisely what we ate, and it’s often hard to maintain
food logs because of the time, energy, and potential shame involved. In
a 2008 study, Lydia Zepeda and David Deal from the University of
Wisconsin–Madison encouraged participants to photograph their food
before consuming it. People who photographed food before eating it were
forced to slow down and consider their choices before eating. Delaying
eating to take a photograph provides a moment of opportunity to consider
our emotions and urges before we act. A combination of slowing down,
taking a picture (quick and easy if you have a camera in your phone), and
reviewing your daily eating to notice emotional eating can be remarkably
effective in increasing your range of choices about your eating.

Slow Down
You can practice mindfulness, no matter where you are or whom you
are with, by slowing down as you eat. We begin to feel full only about
twenty minutes after we have eaten our fill—­it takes that much time
before our brain and stomach can agree that we feel satiated. If we slow
down, we can observe our degree of physiological hunger and eat more
only if we are actually still hungry. Putting your fork down in between
bites is a good way to slow down a bit. Eating more slowly will require that
you cultivate acceptance and practice turning your mind back to the pres-
ent moment when you have urges to eat too quickly, multitask while eat-
ing, or otherwise pay little attention to the meal.

Bring Awareness to Each Bite

Imagine that you are eating a salad with many ingredients—­lettuce,
tomato, avocado, turkey, feta cheese, corn, and a rich, creamy dressing. Do
you notice the colors of the lettuce or the shapes of the tomato? Do you
notice the various tastes in your mouth? Are you aware of each bite? Do
you notice each distinct sight, taste, texture, smell, and sensation as you
raise your fork to your mouth, chew, and swallow? If someone asked you to

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identify what you ate after a large forkful, would you be able to pinpoint
the bit of corn in that particular bite? Often, we eat so quickly that it’s dif-
ficult to attend to our eating. Again, it’s interesting that it may take hours
to prepare food that may then be gobbled up so quickly we hardly notice
the taste of our efforts. Given that eating can be so enjoyable, why do we
rush the process?

Exercise: A Single Mindful Bite

One way to practice eating mindfully is by eating a single food
item (a marshmallow, a Hershey’s Kiss, a raisin, a fresh strawberry,
a mint, or some other bite-sized food of your choice) as though
you have never seen or tasted it before, seeking full awareness in
the present moment, without judgment. As with previous mind-
fulness practices, to do this one, assume a comfortable seated pos-
ture and set a timer for three to five minutes. Of course your mind
may wander, and that is a moment to return to your food. (The
first part of this exercise is inspired by Jon Kabat-­Zinn 1990.)

1. See: Take the food you’ve selected and rest it in the palm of
your hand. Spend some time fully observing it. You may
notice the color, where the light hits it, and the features of its
surface.

2. Touch: Touch the food with your finger, attending to its tex-
ture as you touch it. You may notice subtleties of its tactile
qualities (soft or firm, tacky or slick, rough or smooth, moist
or dry) as it sits between your fingers.

3. Smell: Bring the food below your nose and smell it. Try mov-
ing the food away from your nose and then back, bringing
awareness to smells you may notice as you do so.

4. Taste: Place the food on your tongue, and just let it rest there
for a while before you chew. Notice any tastes that arise before
chewing begins. You may notice the urge to swallow or chew.
Try moving the food to one side of your mouth and bringing
your awareness to the sensation of it sitting against your teeth.

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5. Chew: Begin to chew the food with deliberate attention.

Notice tastes that emerge; notice the texture as it may change
over time. Notice any urges to swallow and, when you do
swallow, continue to bring deliberate attention to your
thoughts, emotions, and sensations.

Now reflect on your experience, using your notebook to answer

the following questions as briefly or expansively as you wish.

1. What did you notice when you ate in this very deliberate,
attentive way?

2. How do you think this practice differs from the way you nor-
mally eat?

3. Would you be willing to practice eating a single meal or snack

with mindful awareness? If so, describe the meal, the setting,
and the ways you will practice attending to your food and
your eating.
<

Pay Attention to Nutrition

You may bring awareness to eating by learning more about what you
consume. At times, people make decisions about food based on thoughts
or feelings rather than facts. A client of mine, for example, convinced
herself that a smoothie had fewer calories than a bagel and cream cheese
and felt very deprived as she drank her smoothie while dreaming of a New
York toasted bagel. When we reviewed the facts, we discovered the calo-
ries were comparable. It can be helpful to gather nutritional information
by exploring the extensive food listings on www.livestrong.com or www
.myfitnesspal.com, or by consulting with a professional.

Pay Attention to Your Appetite

It may be hard to truly know what hunger is (in a physiological sense)
when so often we associate it with feeling an uncomfortable emotion. If

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 Mindful Moments

you don’t notice when you’re hungry, how can you notice when you are
full?
Mona described purchasing pretzels each time she passed the vending
machine at work, rationalizing that she felt tired. “Tired” and “hungry”
are different feelings, though eating often diminishes both. Many other
feelings or circumstances prompt us to eat, and they obscure our experi-
ence of hunger. We may be prompted to eat when a coworker brings in
brownies or we feel bored. We may decide how much to eat according to
the amount we are served, even though portion sizes often vary depending
on where we eat—­and portion size may have little to do with our own
experience of fullness. In this case, slowing down and tasting one bite at a
time may help you get more in touch with how much food is filling, regard-
less of the portion before you.
Linda Craighead (2006) developed the concept of training people in
appetite awareness. We can reorient ourselves to the whispers of our appe-
tite by bringing mindful awareness to our levels of hunger and fullness and
training ourselves to respond to moderate levels of hunger and moderate
levels of satiety instead of the alarms of starvation or overeating. Again,
we are practicing moving away from thinking in all-or-nothing terms—­
where hunger is “starving” and fullness is “stuffed.” A more middle-­ground
approach involves attending to what moderate hunger and moderate full-
ness feel like and using those sensations to guide us.
It’s important to eat when you notice moderate hunger. If you wait
until you are starving, you may find yourself overeating. It’s also important
to respond to moderate levels of satiety rather than eating until you feel
entirely full—­remember, we often don’t register fullness until twenty min-
utes after we’ve eaten our fill. The two work well together, but each is
helpful on its own: even if you eat in response to an emotional cue for
hunger, you may attend to cues of moderate fullness to stop overeating.
If you anticipate that noticing hunger or satiety signals will feel impos-
sible due to habitual eating for emotional reasons, you may start out by
setting up times to eat three meals and several snacks, so that you do not
go for long periods without eating. Planning and scheduling creates a situ-
ation where eating is influenced by a plan rather than a mood. In prepar-
ing meals and snacks, choose your portions wisely and practice eating
mindfully. Several practices noted earlier may similarly help you create

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conditions that foster eating in moderation, including sitting while eating,

slowing down, and taking a picture, even mentally, before you eat. It can
be difficult to eat in moderation when you eat habitually and according to
emotions. Emotions may persuade you, for example, to take a second serv-
ing while you are still midbite. A reasonable plan can help you circumvent
emotional reasoning.

Exercise: Mindfulness of Hunger

and Fullness
If you would like to practice appetite awareness, you may grab a
notebook and keep track of how hungry or full you are both when
you start to eat and when you finish your meal. Practicing bring-
ing awareness to your hunger and fullness may help you find your
eating “sweet spot.” Use the format below to record your observa-
tions of your hunger and fullness around a meal or snack. Use a
scale from 1 to 7 (with 1 meaning totally famished and 7 meaning
stuffed to the point you may need to loosen your belt) twice—­
once to record how you felt before you started eating, and once to
record how you felt after eating. If you are taking photographs of
your meals, you may also note this information alongside your
food photos.

Time/ Hunger Satiety How Was I Observations

Place Level Before Level After Mindful?
(1–7) (1–7)

<

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 Mindful Moments

Mind Your Emotions

In addition to noticing physiological hunger, noticing your emotional
landscape while eating provides important information. You may practice
observing and labeling your emotions as you did in chapter 1.
Beyond noticing specific emotions, you may also notice when you find
yourself in a place, or state of mind, where emotions govern. We all ride
between various states of mind, and we can practice mindfully noticing
the state we inhabit in any moment. No single state of mind is always
ideal—­the optimal state depends on the situation, as we’ll discuss in the
following section.

States of Mind
As we well know, eating can be influenced by emotions. Eating—­and
much of our thinking—­may similarly be affected by our state of mind.
When we are unaware of what our state of mind is, and of how it may be
affecting our thoughts and feelings, we may act unmindfully in accordance
with this inner state. Mindful awareness of our state of mind gives us more
capacity to act with intention: if we discern that we are in an emotional
state, we may choose to slow down and take extra care of ourselves; if we
are exuberant, we may choose to enjoy the mood, but also to realize that
plans made now might be overly optimistic; and so on.
Daniel Siegel (2010), clinical professor of psychiatry at UCLA School
of Medicine, calls awareness of our inner workings mindsight. When you
practice mindsight, you may notice that there are times you are in “reason-
able mind,” where logic governs; times you find yourself in “emotion mind,”
where decisions are ruled by emotions; and times you have the capacity to
merge reason and emotion, arriving at a state called “wise mind” (Linehan
1993a).

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End Emotional Eating

Reasonable Wise Emotion

Mind Mind Mind

Figure 2: States of Mind

In reasonable mind, we make decisions intellectually, using facts to

influence our choices (Linehan 1993a, 1993b). Operating in reasonable
mind, we may make the decision to eat based on facts, such as “It’s din-
nertime.” Similarly, in reasonable mind we might base a decision about
where to live based on logistics.
In emotion mind, emotions govern our mind and behavior (Linehan
1993a, 1993b). We may be in emotion mind when we look at a painting or
engage in intimacy. We may also be in emotion mind when we hit the
snooze button even though we know we need to wake up. It’s emotion
mind that guides us to procrastinate on our work project by shopping on
the Internet.
Of course, it isn’t always that clear-­cut. For example, if you were an art
critic, you might be in reasonable mind when examining a painting. If you
are prone to anxiety, you might be in reasonable mind in a moment of
intimacy, analyzing your behavior or trying to evaluate your partner’s
experience. You may fluctuate between reasonable mind and emotion
mind in the same situation. Similarly, you may begin eating based on rea-
son and continue to indulge out of emotion. The aim of mindsight is to
allow you to notice the state of mind you are in.
Wise mind describes the state of mind in which both emotion and
reason join, perhaps creating a sense of intuition (Linehan 1993a, 1993b).
An example might be when we’re house-­shopping and we visit an open
house that makes sense reasonably—­it’s in an optimal location and within
our budget—­as well as emotionally—­we like how it looks, and it feels like
home. Head and heart coalesce when we are in wise mind; it is our inter-
nal compass. Certain situations call for reason, others call for emotion,

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 Mindful Moments

and some decisions require the union of reason and emotion. Wise mind
can facilitate making optimal decisions about such important matters as
career, friends, and spiritual path.
At times, we may make decisions more wisely by consciously adding
reason to emotion or emotion to reason. For example, if you are depressed,
emotionally you feel tired and don’t want to do anything. When you invite
reason into your decision-­making process, you consider how you will feel
over time, or the fact that you may feel more energized by taking a walk.
Or, if you are thinking about pursuing a project and reasonably you know
it will take both time and money, you may call on emotion to get perspec-
tive about how you will feel engaging in the activity. Combining the two
presupposes that you have been able to discern your dominant state of
mind and therefore can more easily choose not to act out of that state of
mind. For example, my lovely client Elaine was considering taking a course
on teaching adult literacy to incarcerated populations. The course would
take time and money, and Elaine is seventy-six years old and was con-
cerned about the logistics. In our work, she mindfully considered the emo-
tional experience of reading with an adult who had little freedom, and this
persuaded her to move forward. She did not have to ignore her very rea-
sonable concerns about time, money, and logistics, but she was able to
decide that, on balance, these concerns were not enough to stop her.
So: mindfulness allows you to notice your state of mind and to make
choices based on awareness. Are you in emotion mind when reasonable
mind would actually be more appropriate? Noticing, “Hey, I’m in emotion
mind,” while you’re trying to have a reasonable conversation about an
emotional topic might reduce impulsive speech. Even labeling your state of
mind “emotion mind” can help you access reasonable mind, because rea-
sonable mind is what does the labeling. The following exercise will give
you a sense of what it’s like to notice state of mind.

Exercise: Noticing Your State of Mind

Grab a notebook and call to mind, as best you can, each of the
following. Describe each situation nonjudgmentally (just the
facts).

1. A time you made a decision in emotion mind.

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2. A time you acted in reasonable mind.

3. A time you used wise mind.

4. A time you found yourself in a state of mind that wasn’t espe-

cially effective. Describe how you might have noticed your
state of mind and practiced accessing alternative
perspectives.
<

Many people worry they don’t have a “wise mind” or perceive themselves
to be either overly logical or too emotional (Linehan 1993a). But all
humans have a wise mind, and accessing it just takes practice. Marsha
Linehan (1993a, 215) uses this analogy: “The fact that a patient cannot
see her heart doesn’t mean she doesn’t have one.”
Can you think back to a time when you made a wise-­mind decision?
It doesn’t have to be a major decision. You may remember the time when
you made an appointment with a physician even though you felt anxious
because of your long-standing fear that you may have cancer. Though your
emotion mind—­your fear and anxiety—­may have rationalized not mak-
ing the appointment (“It’s probably nothing”), perhaps your wise mind
stepped in to say, “I should get it checked out anyway.” When you notice,
“I avoid medical appointments when I’m in emotion mind,” you are more
free to pursue wise-­mind considerations the next time you have a health
concern.
Wise mind may be hard to access when emotions are intense—­if you
are driving during a storm, it’s hard to see a couple of feet ahead, let alone
see your destination. You may need to slow down and use tools to keep
yourself safe (to extend the driving metaphor: driving slowly, turning on
your GPS, or even pulling over until the weather calms down) until you
have the wherewithal to access wise mind. Keeping yourself safe while in
emotion mind might include things like not having foods in the house
that you tend to binge on and making sure you have a healthy stew or soup
in your freezer at all times for when you feel like just eating ice cream for
dinner. (We’ll spend a lot of time on the subject of coping with intense
emotions in chapter 7.)
Many people experience wise mind as a place of calm within a storm.
Still, slowing down to contemplate what is wise can feel scary, since it

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 Mindful Moments

requires sitting with a sense of uncertainty. Practice helps. The following

exercise will give you some practice accessing wise mind.

Exercise: Accessing Wise Mind

Use the following questions to work your way toward a decision
that requires both head and heart.

1. Identify a current situation where you would like to make a

decision or take an action using wise mind.

2. Now sit somewhere quiet (or where you won’t be disturbed)

for a few minutes.

3. What decision or action are you pulled toward in this situa-

tion? Does that decision or action arise from emotion mind or
reasonable mind?

4. What possible decisions or actions can you think of that

would reflect another state of mind (i.e., if you are pulled
toward reasonable-mind actions, what does your emotion
mind say, and vice versa)?

5. Can you think of an action or decision that is a synthesis of

emotion and reason and that your intuition feels drawn to?
This may be an action or decision that is rooted in wise mind.
<

Eating, Feeling Fat, and States

of Mind
Habits, including habits around food and eating, are routine and may
seem almost automatic; mindful awareness is a freedom from routine.
Thus if you find your eating habits are causing you distress, it may be

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useful to practice noticing your emotions when you eat. Noticing can give
you enough distance from your habits to provide you with flexibility. If you
find yourself preoccupied with food or your body, bringing attention to
your state of mind around these issues can also help. Both practices—­
noticing emotion and state of mind—­can provide you with more aware-
ness and more freedom to make healthy decisions, by allowing you to be
more present in the moment.
When you use reasonable mind, you may eat when you are hungry or
eat at a particular time—­say, in the morning—­even if you don’t feel hun-
gry, so that you won’t feel famished later. Reasonable mind may direct you
to start eating when your hunger level is moderate and to stop eating when
you experience a moderate level of fullness.
How might wise mind affect your eating choices? Perhaps you are at a
birthday party and, reasonably, you know you are trying to cut back on
sweets. Everyone else is eating birthday cake, and your host is not taking
no for an answer. In wise mind, you might take a mindful bite or two of the
cake, noticing any permissive thoughts you may have, such as “Now that
I’ve already had a bit of sugar, why not enjoy the parfaits and truffles too?”
Yet you may still make the choice not to indulge in more sweets, instead
simply noticing your feelings of craving, which will eventually pass.
Alternatively, you may be in wise mind when you politely but firmly say no
to the host and notice a feeling of pride and strength.
Reasonable mind may be helpful when grocery shopping. Reasonably,
we all know the temptations that will arise when we take certain foods
home. A famous example of using reasonable mind to avoid temptation is
in Homer’s Odyssey, when Odysseus, knowing that when he hears the
Sirens he will be too weak to resist steering the ship to pursue them,
requests that his men bind him to the mast, allowing him to sail past
temptation rather than dashing his ship on the rocks and jeopardizing his
voyage home (his long-term goal). Similarly, we can free ourselves up by
preparing, using such tools as sticking to a list, not shopping when we are
hungry, and choosing planned rewards or treats (rather than impulsive
ones).
At times, during or after eating, people feel a sensation of fullness and
may conclude they have overeaten or are fat (Fairburn 2008). Any of sev-
eral events may prompt this conclusion, including a physical sense of full-
ness; thoughts that you have eaten too much; the feeling of your clothing

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being tight; or perceiving your abdomen as being distended. It is important

to remember that thoughts and feelings are not always factual and that
thus it’s not true that you are fat just because you think or feel you are. For
example, if before the meal you felt fine, and afterward you felt fat, the fact
is that it is impossible to gain a substantial amount of weight at one meal.
So this feeling of “being fat” can fluctuate independent of changes in your
actual weight—­the experience of feeling fat is often a product of emotion
mind. Also, even if in fact you are overweight, getting caught in emotion
mind around feeling fat will not move you forward.
Do you ever notice feeling fat? What other thoughts and emotions are
occurring when this thought arises? Many people feel fat when they are
sad, lonely, or bored. You may also feel fat as a result of comparisons or
around such sensations as bloating. It may be helpful to bring awareness to
feeling fat; the following exercise is designed to help you do so.

Exercise: Noticing Feeling Fat

Think of a situation where you got caught up in feeling fat, and
use the following questions to help bring your awareness to other
factors in the situation.

1. What was the situation? (Just the facts: where were you,
whom were you with, what events happened, and so forth.)

2. What state of mind were you in? What emotions, compari-

sons, or perceptions did you experience that might have con-
tributed to your feeling fat?

3. If you were in that situation again, what might you try to

attend to the fat feeling and possibly change the way this
experience affects you?
<

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Summary
Henry David Thoreau wrote discerningly, “Only that day dawns to which
we are awake.” That is to say, we can appreciate moments (and morsels)
only when we awaken and attend to them.
In this chapter on the concept and practice of mindfulness, we exam-
ined the ways emotions, states of mind, and the judgments that flow from
them can keep us from experiencing present reality. We saw how emotions
and habit can distort the ways we perceive our feelings of hunger and sati-
ety, and we practiced slowing down and paying attention to physiological
feelings. We explored how different states of mind can operate in different
situations and practiced ways to notice our state of mind and how it affects
our decision-­making and perspectives around eating and body image.
Bringing awareness to whether we are in emotion mind, reasonable mind,
or wise mind can help us change not only our behavior but even our feel-
ings about our shape.
Distraction from the present moment is not always and eternally
undesirable—­there are times you want to distract yourself, like when you
are getting a root canal. But living our lives out of habit and routine,
driven by unexamined states of mind, means we miss experiences we may
relish, whether meals or moments with loved ones. We may fill our bellies
with a lot of food and very little awareness or with a lot of awareness and
enough food.

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 Chapter 4

Emotional
Intelligence

Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that

space is our power to choose our response. In our response
lies our growth and our freedom.
—Viktor E. Fr ankl

Y
ou’re standing in the checkout line in the grocery store. Your
shopping cart is full of food. The line is long, your patience is low,
and a small child behind you is ramming a cart into your calf. The
day has been rough—the weather bad and the traffic awful. Plus, you’re
hungry and tired and you hate the grocery store. Your phone rings and it’s
your critical cousin. She’s predictably calling to berate you. What do you do?

A. Answer, act polite and apologetic, and erupt inside.

B. Curse at her and hang up.

C. Ignore the call, listen to the message, and dwell on how miser-
able you feel.

D. Take a deep breath, explain this isn’t a good time, and tell her
you appreciate her understanding that you’re busy.
End Emotional Eating

E. Pick up a chocolate bar and add it to your groceries. Your

patience was spent on not yelling at the cart-­shoving child’s
dad, and the call from your cousin was just too much.

Often, choices A, B, and C relate to choice E. When we suppress emo-

tions by acting disingenuously, reacting angrily, or ruminating, emotions
can feel overwhelming and we may lose contact with the moment and
with our freedom to choose our behavior. In this chapter, we will begin to
explore how to sit with emotions with both acceptance and skill.

Understanding Emotions
Emotions may be triggered in many different ways, including changes in
your experience, behavior, and physiological response system. Emotions
unfold in a particular sequence. If we understand and accept the building
blocks of an emotion, we can change the emotion by changing a part of the
process. In this process, we are both accepting an emotion and moving
toward change, when change is useful (Linehan 1993a, 1993b).
Basically, an emotion arises when we experience something (a situa-
tion, a memory, a thought); we evaluate it (appraisal); and then we notice
changes in our bodies and feel a pull toward taking an action in response
to that feeling (Gross and Thompson 2007; Linehan 1993b). We get a rude
phone call, think about how bad our day was, have the thought that life’s
not fair, feel tense and hot and feel a pull to suppress the emotion, yell at
someone to release it, or indulge in a sweet treat to ameliorate it. Our
thoughts and behaviors affect how we feel, and our feelings affect our
thoughts and behaviors.
As discussed in chapter 1, emotions often serve important functions.
At times, however, you may feel as though you aren’t able to manage cer-
tain emotions, and feelings may hurt more than help. This is particularly
true when you experience emotions more intensely than is helpful in a
situation. For instance, experiencing tremendous anxiety about your eat-
ing may actually get in the way of your eating skillfully and increase the
likelihood that you will use food to cope.
In this chapter, we’ll explore ways to both reduce the vulnerabilities
that make us more susceptible to intense feelings and manage emotions by

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changing situations, practicing mindful attention, noticing appraisals, and

altering the response components of emotions (Linehan 1993b). In the
example above, you are more susceptible to feeling agitated by your angry
cousin because you’ve had a bad day and feel hungry and tired. Plus, your
history with your cousin and her snide remarks makes you more likely to
interpret her comments as an attack. Your appraisal, “Life’s not fair,” and
an avoidant response such as suppressing your feelings while on the phone
and buying a chocolate bar, affect the way you experience your sadness.
Many of the ideas introduced in this chapter will be expanded on in later
chapters. Before we jump into the specifics of changing an emotion you
would like to change, we’ll explore emotions, and the concept of emotional
intelligence, more generally.

Emotional Intelligence Equals

Awareness and Flexibility
We react to circumstances and events—­we’re not highly trained, stoic
guards at Buckingham Palace! And the fact is we will never be able to
experience freedom if we are always running away from our feelings. We
will never experience meaning when our chief objective is to not feel bad.
Feelings arise, and when we are aware, accepting, and flexible, we are able
to respond according to choice, setting a deliberate course rather than
rigidly following a narrow path prescribed by our fear of feeling bad. This
is the path to freedom and meaning.
In 1995, Daniel Goleman published the best-selling book Emotional
Intelligence, in which he argues that awareness of one’s own emotions and
the emotions of others, as well as the ability to manage emotions and
impulses, influence the ways we experience our lives. He further argues
that these emotion-­related abilities are worth considering when we think
about the concept of intelligence—­that they actually constitute their own
kind of intelligence. And, according to Goleman, we can increase our
emotional intelligence.
What comes to mind when you consider emotional intelligence?
Social psychologists John Mayer and Peter Salovey (1997) define emo-
tional intelligence as the ability to:

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1. Accurately perceive emotions in oneself and in others

2. Understand emotions and signals conveyed by emotions

3. Use emotions to enhance thinking

4. Manage emotions to achieve goals

Let’s see how these play out in real life.

Pamela’s Story
Pamela, a forty-two-­year-­old, newly divorced photographer, came
to therapy to work on understanding her emotions and feeling less
overwhelmed by them. She arrived at one of our weekly sessions
beaming with pride, saying she’d had a difficult encounter and
that she practiced using some of the skills she had worked hard to
master. She told me she’d felt slighted when Greg, a new acquain-
tance whom she had gone out with a few times, canceled their
Friday night date at the last minute, saying vaguely he “wasn’t
feeling great.” She was aware of such thoughts as “He doesn’t like
me” when they arose in her mind, and she was able to not take
them as facts. Pamela also noticed her heart began to race and her
face tensed when she heard his news. She noticed a pull to revisit
previous situations of disappointment in romantic relationships,
but instead she returned to her current emotions about the can-
celed date: uncertainty about how to spend the evening and a fear
her fond feelings for Greg were unrequited. Initially, she thought
about ordering some Chinese food for comfort, crying, and calling
Greg to cancel plans to go watch the football game with him later
that week. Her thoughts, in essence, were: “Well, if he canceled
on me, I’ll show him! I hate football anyhow…”
Instead of acting on these thoughts, however, Pamela sat with
her feelings. She realized that deep down she wanted to continue
to get to know Greg better and that it would therefore be unhelp-
ful to react impulsively. After all, her deeper values included

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connecting with people, being kind, and feeling empathic. Pamela

also prioritized self-­respect, and so she chose to pursue activities
on Friday night that mattered to her, including being present with
her six-­year-­old son.
On Saturday morning, Pamela called Greg to see how he felt.
Using warmth and a gentle tone, she stated her preference for
open communication. Though she sensed his discomfort as she
broached the topic, she maintained her warmth rather than pull-
ing away or changing the subject and inquired whether the last-
minute cancellation reflected feelings of disinterest. Greg
explained he was coming down with a cold and also that he pre-
ferred to take things slowly by waiting until they spent more time
together before they went out to dinner on a Friday night. Pamela
noticed her anxiety growing as a result of the ambiguity, but
maintained a sense of openness and interest, which conveyed
itself to Greg. She was successfully able to communicate to Greg
that she would like to continue to get to know him.

What is emotionally intelligent about all of this? Situations where we

feel pain may prompt us to pursue quick fixes involving unhealthy “com-
fort” foods or impulsive reactions. Pamela, by contrast, was able to sit with
her feelings, learn from them, make more mindful choices about how she
would proceed, and express herself warmly yet honestly to Greg, increas-
ing her self-respect. She was able to treat herself, her son, and Greg with
care and attentiveness.

Primary and Secondary Emotions

In addition to learning to label feelings, it is helpful to notice whether
an emotion is primary or secondary. When we experience an emotion that
arises automatically, that is a primary emotion. Secondary emotions are
those you experience in response to the primary emotions—­feelings about
your feelings (Greenberg and Safran 1987; Linehan 1993b). You are in a
situation where you feel endangered, so you feel afraid. Fear is primary.
Then, you may mull over the feeling, create such judgments as “It’s weak

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to feel afraid,” and end up with secondary emotions of more fear, shame,
and self-­loathing. That is to say, you were simply afraid, but then you begin
to think: “There is something wrong with being afraid. It’s humiliating.”
Now, you’ve added shame to what started as fear. Here are the equations:

Fear + Acceptance = Fear

Fear + Nonacceptance = Fear, Shame, Self-­Loathing, More Fear

Do you ever feel anxious and then feel ashamed about feeling anx-
ious? Depressed about feeling depressed? Sad, and then angry about it?
When noticing an emotion, bring particular awareness to whether the
emotion is primary or secondary.
One of the ways to bypass an avalanche of secondary emotions is to
notice what emotion you experience first and attend to thoughts and feel-
ings about that emotion. By validating, or acknowledging how you feel with
acceptance, you may be less likely to generate secondary emotions (e.g.,
Linehan 1993a). Validation includes normalizing your emotion, such as
thinking: “It makes sense that I’d feel sad that I didn’t get that promotion.
It’s normal to feel that way.” Validation is not to be confused with treating
yourself as fragile or validating unskillful behaviors (such as “It makes
sense that I yelled; I was really angry,” if you are committed to working on
your anger).
Invalidating responses include judging or not accepting your emotions.
In the supermarket, in the example from earlier in the chapter, if you were
to notice that you felt sad, you might acknowledge to yourself, “Given the
events of the day, feeling sad makes a lot of sense.” Alternatively, you
might think, “I’m all worked up about that stupid call. I’m too sensitive
and pathetic.” What sorts of secondary emotions may follow from such an
invalidating response? Probably more sadness and shame will arise.
It may be useful to step back for a moment and think about a time you
experienced an intense emotion and spoke to someone about it. Can you
think of a time you felt better after sharing? What did the person do or
say? Can you think of a time you spoke about your emotions and felt worse?
I’d be willing to wager that when you felt better after sharing an emotional
experience, it was because another person validated your feelings. When a
friend listens with acceptance or normalizes your emotions by saying,
“Anyone would feel the way you feel,” you feel validated. In contrast, being
interrupted or told “You’re too sensitive; get over it” leads to feeling

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 Emotional Intelligence

invalidated. The same circumstances that make us feel worse when talking
to others about our emotions arise within when we invalidate ourselves.

Exercise: Identifying Primary and

Secondary Emotions
Think about a situation where you noticed emotions and also
noticed having feelings about your feelings.

1. What was the situation? What emotion did you first notice?

2. Do you notice any thoughts or feelings around your emotion?

3. What secondary emotions arose from the thoughts or feelings?

<

Exercise: Noticing an Emotion and

Adding Validation
Either in the same situation you described in the exercise just
above, or in a different situation, notice your feelings and practice
validating yourself—­ accepting the way you feel with
understanding.

1. Notice an emotion you experienced. Where were you?

2. Now, spend a few moments genuinely validating your experi-

ence: “Given         , it makes good sense I
felt         .” To do this, it may be useful to con-
sider either how you might respond to a friend in the same
situation or how an understanding friend might respond when
you share your feelings.

<

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End Emotional Eating

When you practice self-­validation, you provide yourself with a sustain-

able way to cope with primary emotions and circumvent secondary emo-
tions. When I think about validation, I think about the horse trainer
Monty Roberts. He demonstrates beautifully how treating horses with
understanding and validation is most helpful in training them. Horse
training with whips doesn’t compare to the practice of providing valida-
tion. So too, with ourselves, treating yourself the way you may treat a loved
one helps you manage emotions and live productively.

Emotion Regulation
There you are, home alone again on a Saturday night. You may enjoy your-
self, relishing the coziness and quiet. Alternatively, you may find yourself
stuck in such judgments as “I’ll be alone forever,” while your spoon is stuck
in the peanut butter. If you feel sad, you may feel pulled to jump into bed
and cry yourself to sleep. Or you may notice sadness and urges related to
feeling sad, then actually change the way you feel by acting in ways that
are opposite to sadness, like blasting some music and dancing or watching
a funny film (Linehan 1993b).
Difficulties in managing your emotions may affect your moods and
relationships and may lead to problematic behaviors. Emotion regulation is
the term for processes that influence which emotions you have and when
and how you experience those emotions (Linehan 1993a, 1993b; Gross
and Thompson 2007). Many people use food to manage emotions or
employ such strategies as suppression or avoidance, which may increase
the intensity of an emotion. We’ll begin to explore a range of choices to
regulate emotions in more helpful ways. One of the important steps in
regulating an emotion helpfully is noticing and labeling it as you are hav-
ing it, and considering its function, as discussed in chapter 1.
In the pages ahead we’ll address how to reduce vulnerabilities, modify
situations, practice mindful awareness, and act opposite—­all skills that
will allow you to change the way you experience an emotion while it is
unfolding. Figure 3, below, illustrates how any of these factors (vulnerabili-
ties, situation, attention, appraisal, or response) can give us the opportu-
nity to change our emotional experience.

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 Emotional Intelligence

use
reduce notice mindful change choose
vulnerability situation awareness interpretations response

vulnerabilities situation attention appraisal response

Figure 3: Skills for Changing Emotional Experience

Vulnerability Factors
Our history and recent experiences affect our vulnerability to emo-
tions. Imagine, for example, that you were just insulted by a family mem-
ber, and then a friend did not return your call. Would you maintain your
equanimity? How about if you were in a fabulous mood when your friend
did not return your call? Vulnerability factors are our emotional states that
prime how we may react to a given situation (Linehan 1993b). We are all
affected by our temperaments and our histories. We all experience emo-
tions, but we don’t all experience them the same way. You may be more
prone to experiencing a particular emotion—­ or all emotions—­ more
intensely than other people you know. Some people describe feeling
primed for guilt, while others may not have a particularly sensitive guilt
detector. If you tend to experience emotions more intensely than most
people, you are emotionally vulnerable. Individuals with emotional vulner-
ability often experience their emotions taking over and may feel powerless
to shift their emotional state (Linehan 1993a).
If you have loved ones who are critical of emotions and use food to
cope, it makes good sense that you are more vulnerable to using eating to
cope when you experience emotions (notice: that was an example of vali-
dation!). After all, you have been told (whether implicitly or explicitly), “It
is weak to feel and okay to eat.” If your father struggled with rage, you may
find your own anger scary, and consequently you may try to avoid express-
ing any anger and instead eat when you feel angry.
In addition to our histories affecting our vulnerabilities, lifestyle hab-
its and recent events can affect our susceptibility to certain feelings. Lack
of sleep or too much sleep, insufficient or excessive amounts of food, mind-­

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altering substances (including caffeine), physical illness, and recent rela-

tionship chaos all magnify the volume of our feelings (Linehan 1993b).

Starvation or Overeating
Too little food is an emotional and a physical vulnerability for prob-
lematic eating. As a DBT therapist, I often receive calls from people strug-
gling with intense emotions. One of the first issues I assess is recent eating
behavior. At times, a client has eaten too little or too much in the midst of
an emotional crisis. It’s hard to tease apart which comes first—­does the
intense emotion lead to abstaining or indulging, or is an emotion experi-
enced more intensely as a result of insufficient caloric intake or a recent
binge? When we don’t eat enough, our brains lack enough glucose, and we
possess less willpower to make reasonable choices (Baumeister and Tierney
2011). Too much food also affects energy (Zhang et al. 2008), and many
people feel sad, irritated, and ashamed after overeating.
Many people try to limit calories after they believe they have eaten too
much. This strategy may make sense in the moment as a repair of sorts,
but in reality, it creates emotional and physical vulnerability. Experts in
the area of binge eating recommend resuming normal eating at the next
scheduled meal to avoid a cycle of overeating and restricting. Dieting often
leads to preoccupation with food and eating, bringing anxiety, and binges
often arise in response to urges that arise from restricting (Fairburn 2008).

Exercise: Awareness of Your

Vulnerabilities
Ask yourself the following questions:

1. Which emotions/situations make me vulnerable to eat for

emotional reasons?

2. What habits make me more vulnerable to eat for emotional

reasons?
<

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 Emotional Intelligence

There are numerous preventative behaviors that may help you reduce your
emotional vulnerability. Of course, you can maintain a healthy sleep
schedule, eat the right amount of healthy foods, make sure to eat every few
hours so you don’t find yourself famished, abstain from mind-­altering sub-
stances, and seek treatment for any physical illnesses you may have
(Linehan 1993b).
You can also increase your awareness around your particular emo-
tional vulnerabilities. Knowing that you tend to get sad if you overeat, and
that you eat in response to fatigue, may allow you to pay special attention
to sleeping and overeating. In other words, use your awareness of your
vulnerabilities to reduce your vulnerabilities.
Another thing you can do is practice validating your feelings. Telling
yourself, “Hey, I’m exhausted and just overate; of course I’m feeling sad,”
may ameliorate and demystify your sadness and can help you sit with the
emotion rather than spending time ruminating or beating yourself up for
your feelings.

Adding Positive Emotions

Increasing activities that are pleasing to you, both in the short and in
the long term, reduces your level of vulnerability. Just as making deposits
to your bank account prepares you for financial setbacks, so too deliber-
ately adding positive emotions to your experience can serve as a buffer for
experiences that take a toll on you emotionally. Often, people who eat for
emotional reasons lack other ways to self-soothe. Purposefully adding
pleasant events to your life may reduce your emotional vulnerability, help
you learn to manage emotions in other ways, and broaden your focus
(Linehan 1993b).
Zindel Segal, the founder of mindfulness-based cognitive therapy,
introduced me to a particular way we may assess our vulnerabilities. Take
a moment to consider your daily routine, and jot down today’s activities
and responsibilities. Now, review your daily activities and label each either
N for nourishing, a task that gives you a sense of vigor or restores you, or D
for depleting, a required duty that seems to wear you down, physically or
emotionally. What is your ratio of nourishing to depleting activities? It
may not be realistic to expect to have a perfect 1:1 ratio of nourishing to

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depleting activities, but if the ratio is weighted much more heavily to

depleting activities, adding more nourishing activities can help you feel
more engaged in and rejuvenated by your life. Adding nourishing moments
such as taking the time to listen to the rain fall or to eat a slow lunch, tast-
ing each bite, can help buffer stress and difficult emotions. In my own life,
I’ve noticed that waking up early to practice yoga, even when my mind is
screaming, “Sleep in,” and walking slowly to my favorite coffee place miti-
gates my daily hassles.

Show Up for Pleasant Events

Purposefully adding nourishing activities to your life may reduce your
sense of depletion, and participating in pleasant events may actually
engender joy. It’s good to plan pleasant events: to enjoy them, it’s helpful
to show up mentally too (Linehan 1993b). When you are mindful, you are
participating fully in the experience. Can you think of events you may find
pleasing? At times, we may feel so down that it is difficult to predict that
anything will actually be fun. It may be worthwhile to consider activities
that you may enjoy, and then simply experiment, letting go of judgments
or expectations. Wishing something was more enjoyable will make it less
pleasant.
Generally, it is helpful to pursue events that are enjoyable both in the
short term and in the long term. Planning a day to see a movie is nice. At
the same time, it’s useful to also schedule events that will reduce vulner-
ability in the long run, such as keeping in touch with supportive friends.
What sorts of nourishing activities might you enjoy? Many of my cli-
ents find volunteering, taking a weekly class, or joining such a group as a
book club or shared interest meeting (you might visit www.volunteer
match.org or www.meetup.com) helpful in terms of structuring positive
events to occur regularly. You may also consider a daily pleasant event
such as taking a walk, sitting in the bath, buying flowers for your desk,
reading, listening to music, dressing up… Can you think of seven poten-
tially nourishing activities to add to your week? Use the following exercise
to keep track of your experience of them.

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 Emotional Intelligence

Exercise: Adding Emotional

Nourishment
Schedule several pleasant events. Afterward, if you find it helpful,
use this format to organize your observations on these activities in
your notebook.

Day Pleasant What I Mindfulness Enjoyment Observations

activity actually (0–10) (0–10) on how
planned did activity
affected
emotional
eating

<

Create Mastery
In addition to doing things we enjoy, it is helpful to purposefully create
opportunities to experience a sense of accomplishment (Linehan 1993b).
Persistently creating opportunities to experience a sense of competence
will serve as a safeguard against feeling helpless. As a trader, Bruce spent
the entire day in front of four computer monitors watching the stock mar-
ket. He felt underwhelmed, bored, and purposeless. “I did not pursue three
advanced degrees to watch the market, lose my mind, and snack,” he com-
plained. What is the message in his boredom? Bruce is a person who values
challenge and accomplishment. He decided to take a course in Japanese
and studied each night, which gave him a sense of accomplishment. He
also began to explore karate, where he felt enthusiastic about the prospect

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of progressing to more advanced belts. Bruce is brutally judgmental, and

initially he tended to judge himself harshly during his extracurricular mas-
tery pursuits. But these new activities gave him the opportunity to practice
mastering a nonjudgmental stance. While Bruce felt hopeless about the
economy and his ability to advance in his work, challenging himself and
progressing in other areas diminished his vulnerability to feelings of worth-
lessness, which had often contributed to his soothing himself in the eve-
nings with high-­calorie snacks or food from local take-­out restaurants. We
will spend more time on mastery in chapter 5.

Cope Ahead
How do we generally prepare for an emotionally charged event? Many
of us imagine the worst or worry endlessly, but a technique called coping
ahead is an effective alternative (Linehan 1993b). Rather than drowning
in the nightmare in your mind, why not consider realistic challenges and
plan ahead to reduce your vulnerability? I imagine that expecting the
worst actually increases your vulnerability.
Imagine picturing a future difficult situation—­a Thanksgiving dinner
with your family, a run-­in with your ex. How does the story your mind cre-
ates usually go? Generally, we envision the worst-­case scenario. You are
anxious about flying, so you picture the plane crashing. Do you ever imag-
ine a more realistic, safe landing? Could you picture going to a family din-
ner where you anticipate there will be stressful conversation and imagine
coping well?
If you know you are going to have trouble sticking to reasonable por-
tions when you attend that upcoming buffet brunch, is it helpful to worry
while you look in your closet for your elastic-­waist pants? What might be a
way to cope well? Research has found that athletes improve their game via
mental rehearsal (Atienza, Balaguer, and García-­Merita 1998). Similarly,
individuals who rehearse being assertive in advance of a particular situation
are more capable of asserting themselves (Kazdin 1982). Basically, we use
the same area of our brain to imagine doing an activity as we do to actually
engage in that activity (Jeannerod and Frank 1999). Why not practice cop-
ing well instead of preparing yourself for the worst? You may consider ways
to cope ahead with food-­related triggers as well as challenging emotional
situations. What is one upcoming eating-related event or emotionally

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charged encounter you are anticipating? How might you cope ahead? We
actually improve performance and learn a new set of skills by rehearsing.
Rather than mulling over the infinite possibilities of what may go
wrong, consider your part in making things right. In addition to visualiz-
ing a scenario going well, you may also plan ahead: realistically anticipate
what will likely occur, and visualize the steps you will need to cope well.
For example, imagine that you are anticipating that you will feel lonely
after your dinner with a friend who is visiting from out of town. As you are
finishing your meal the waiter asks you whether you would like to take
home your leftovers. In this situation, coping ahead might include the
awareness that later you may feel lonely and feel pulled to overeat. Stimulus
control involves understanding that behavior is prompted by the presence
or absence of a stimulus. Leaving your unfinished food on your plate
instead of asking for a doggie bag may thus help you lessen the likelihood
of eating emotionally. Coping ahead involves seeking awareness of poten-
tial obstacles and creating specific plans to help you deal with them.

Exercise: Coping Ahead

For this exercise, take out your notebook and go through the fol-
lowing steps to help strengthen your coping ahead skills.

1. Imagine a situation in which you anticipate experiencing

intense negative emotions. Explain what may happen, in a
paragraph or so, including the events you believe may lead up
to your feelings of discomfort.

2. Write down a plan for ways you might cope ahead to manage
your emotions and behaviors. What choices can you make
both prior to the event and in the moment to lessen the
intensity or discomfort?

For example:

1. Coming home from work on Monday night after seeing my

sister. I will feel sad that she is going back to Chicago. It will
be relatively early in the evening. I’ll be tempted to order
unhealthful food because I feel sad and bored.

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2. I will make sure to eat regular meals today so I am less vulner-

able and I will go to the Overeaters Anonymous meeting in
my neighborhood for additional support. I’ll buy a magazine
that I always enjoy at the corner newsstand. I will plan to
cook, which I know will be satiating and will be an opportu-
nity to build mastery: the recipe is somewhat complex. I can
visualize coming home, surfing my urges [you will learn more
about this in chapter 5], and turning to my magazine or call-
ing a friend.
<

So far, we’ve covered ways to reduce the vulnerabilities that may affect
the way we experience emotions—­these ways include being mindful of
our vulnerabilities, adding nourishing activities, and considering ways to
build mastery and cope ahead. Now let’s move to what we do once we face
the situation.

Mindfulness of the Situation

Let’s return for a moment to the example we started this chapter with,
in which you’ve had a bad day, but let’s back it up a bit. There are a number
of points at which you might choose different actions based on acknowl-
edging that you’re emotionally vulnerable today. You might decide to wait
until tomorrow to go shopping. Or, you may decide you’re able to handle
shopping, but not talking with your cousin. On seeing her name come up
on your phone, you might acknowledge: “I feel sad. This is not a good time
to talk to her; I’ll call back when I’m in a better place.” By making mindful
decisions based on what we know of our emotional vulnerabilities, we can
face situations when we have the inner resources to deal with them in a
positive manner.
We may expose ourselves to situations out of habit rather than based
on our inner wisdom or values (for more on values, see chapter 9). For
example, if you often find yourself in a restaurant with limited healthy
food options—­mostly because your friend likes the place—­this is a habit
that you might decide to modify, perhaps by suggesting another restaurant.
If you are deeply dissatisfied with your job or a relationship, you may simi-
larly consider ways to problem solve and mindfully modify the situation.

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Mindfulness, here, means letting go of judgments or predictions and focus-

ing on the reality of the situation; noticing your emotions; and bringing
awareness to your objective. If you aren’t mindful, you may fall into routine
or get stuck in thoughts that affect your ability to move forward.

Exercise: Noticing and Modifying

a Situation
1. Briefly describe a situation you regularly face that can bring
up difficult emotions and urges.

2. If you notice any judgments in your thoughts about the situa-

tion, replace them with facts or preferences.

3. Consider several ways to modify the situation.

4. Chose one modification as a first choice, and another as a

backup plan.

For example:

1. Staying home on Saturday night makes me feel sad, lonely,

and like a loser, so I eat ice cream.

2. Staying home on Saturday night is often a situation where I tend

to feel sad and lonely because I’d prefer to go out or be with oth-
ers. [Notice that the term “loser” is omitted; it is a judgment and
an appraisal that makes your emotions more intense.]

3. I can call a friend on Tuesday morning to see if we can see a

movie or I can read the book I’ve been interested in, which would
make me feel more productive. I can make sure to have healthy
snacks and a single portion of ice cream rather than a pint.

4. I’ll call the friend and also think of other activities I may
pursue alone.
<

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Mindful Awareness
In addition to modifying our situation, we may practice mindful aware-
ness when facing difficult experiences. Mindful awareness includes present-­
moment awareness and acceptance, and willingness to participate in this
moment, just this moment, one moment at a time. If you are spending
time with your brother and your relationship with your brother is painful,
you can think, “I can’t believe I’ll be here for another three days,” and
mentally review the entirety of your painful past history with him.
Alternatively, you might bring your attention to the present moment, just
this one moment, and adopt a nonjudgmental stance. The moment is dif-
ficult enough without reviewing the pain of the past and worrying about
the future. Breaking a perceived massive situation into strands of moments,
thoughts, and feelings is a powerful tool for changing through acceptance.
Let’s see how adding mindful awareness might work in the grocery
store scenario. As you stand in line, you might focus on one breath at a
time rather than reviewing your daily hassles, judging the situation
unpleasant, and incessantly checking your watch. Adding mindful aware-
ness to going to the grocery store may give you a mental vacation from a
trying day. If you are mindfully noticing your steps or nonjudgmentally
observing details of products on the shelves or of the background music,
you are not rehearsing the pain and sadness you’ve just been experiencing—­
they lose their power, even if only for a moment (and then another…and
another…). Use the following exercise to practice staying present
mindfully.

Exercise: Staying in the Moment

1. Consider an upcoming situation that feels overwhelming.

2. How might you break the scenario into moments, one moment
at a time?
<

Mindful awareness also includes noticing and labeling your emotions

with acceptance. When we are mindful of our emotions, we may notice

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that, like waves in the ocean, feelings rise and fall. You will not feel the
exact same way you feel now forever, or even an hour from now. Mindful
awareness is the antithesis of impulsiveness or reactivity. It gives you
choice and space between a situation and your response. You are able to
notice tension in your body, or feelings of sadness, and accept these with-
out reaching for the chocolate bar.

Exercise: Mindful Awareness

of Emotions
1. Notice your emotion without judging it, suppressing it, or
dwelling on it. Gentle labeling helps, either silently or softly
spoken (“sadness”; “anxiety”).

2. Bring your attention to where you experience the emotion in

your body.

3. Remember that you are not your emotion, no matter how

intense the emotion may feel.

4. Practice accepting your emotion, one moment at a time—­

allowing it to intensify or lessen, stay or pass, simply noticing
it and its effect on your body.
<

Noticing Interpretations
Our thoughts and beliefs about an event and our appraisals of it—­that
is, our interpretations—­affect how we feel. You may find yourself in the
exact same scenario and feeling differently depending on your interpreta-
tions. Imagine that your friend Alex has succeeded in losing fifteen
pounds. If your interpretation is “I’m proud of Alex,” how do you feel? If
your interpretation is “Everyone has it easier than I do,” how do you feel?
Are you mindful of your interpretations? Many people go from an inter-
pretation to a feeling so quickly that it’s hard to notice that an interpreta-
tion is just that—­an interpretation.

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Stephen Covey, author of the best-selling book The 7 Habits of Highly

Effective People (2004), described riding a New York subway and noticing a
man and his rambunctious children. As the children yelled, the man
appeared oblivious. Given the interpretation that these children are out of
control and this parent is irresponsible, how might you feel? Covey felt
incensed, as we may imagine ourselves feeling. How could a parent shirk
responsibility like that? Eventually, Covey gently approached the man and
encouraged him to manage the situation. The man responded, saying that
his wife had died an hour ago at the hospital, and he wasn’t sure how to
manage. Covey’s anger melted as his compassion surfaced. If you realized
the man had just lost his wife and these children had lost their mother,
you might reflect, “These children are having a terribly hard time,” and
feel empathetic. Same situation, different interpretation.

Exercise: Noticing Interpretations and

Replacing Them with Facts
1. Describe a situation.

2. Notice your interpretations.

3. What emotions would each interpretation create?

4. Replace your interpretations with either a new interpretation

or just the facts.

5. What emotions do you notice when you sit with your new
appraisal?
<

James Gross, a psychology professor at Stanford and an expert in the

field of emotion regulation, has examined the way reappraisal, or con-
structing an interpretation to change a situation’s emotional impact,
affects well-­being. Reappraisal means changing an interpretation, and it is
not to be confused with emotional suppression, which means trying to man-
age and conceal an emotion by masking the way you feel.

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 Emotional Intelligence

Gross and John (2003) compared the effects of reappraisal as an emo-

tion regulation strategy to those of suppression. People who engaged in
reappraisal of their situations were found to experience greater positive
emotions and fewer negative emotions in their lives. Reappraisal requires
an active and optimistic attitude. People who suppressed their emotions
were less aware of their emotions, less able to repair bad moods, and more
likely to view their emotions as unacceptable.
Reappraisal also relates to better interpersonal relationships. In the
story earlier in this chapter, Pamela was more present with her son when
she reappraised Greg’s cancellation. Rather than viewing it as proof that
she was unlovable or Greg wasn’t interested, she successfully reappraised it
as a situation that would allow her to spend quality time with her son.
More generally, reappraisal is more strongly associated with well-­being.
One reason it’s a more effective strategy than suppression has to do with
timing. Think about the sequence of an emotion: usually, the point at
which we will appraise our emotional experience comes sooner in the
unfolding of the emotion than the point at which we will suppress the
emotion because it has become too painful. We can affect the way we feel
and behave by considering our interpretations even as the emotion begins
to unfold. We do this by bringing nonjudgmental attention to our vulner-
ability factors and our interpretations. We’ll more thoroughly address the
way thinking affects feeling and how to disengage from attachment to
thinking in chapter 6.

Do the Opposite
All emotions make sense. Yet at times, fully expressing our emotions
is unhelpful. For instance, you may have perfectly good reasons to feel
annoyed with your boss. But you also want to keep your job, which means
fully expressing your feelings of annoyance may not be your best course of
action. If you would like to regulate an emotion because acting on the feel-
ing does not serve you, or because you feel so intensely that your emotion
is getting in the way of acting skillfully, it can be useful to practice oppo-
site action. Opposite action means noticing an urge related to an emotion
and then doing the opposite (Linehan 1993b). Interestingly, doing the
opposite actually changes the way you feel: changing your behavior can

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change your brain! When you feel fear and act on it (say, you run away
from a barking dog), you maintain and exacerbate the fear. When you feel
fear and stay with it (say, you approach the small, barking dog), the fear
lessens and even dissipates.
Doing the opposite is a skill my clients always report finding both
incredibly challenging and remarkably useful. In fact, engaging in new
behaviors that are independent of your mood is one of the main ingredi-
ents in scientifically supported treatments for depression, anxiety, and
marital conflict (e.g., Martell, Dimidjian, and Herman-Dunn 2010;
Antony, Craske, and Barlow 2006). When a person is depressed, she wants
to self-isolate, sleep, and avoid activities. Doing the opposite of feeling sad
by purposely becoming active reduces depression. You will also need to
practice mindfulness as you take action. For example, if you feel depressed
and do the opposite by calling a friend for coffee, it will be hard to change
the way you feel if you can manage to think only depressing thoughts
while you’re with her (“She’s only having coffee with me because she feels
sorry for me”). In this case, mindfully continuing to check on your inter-
pretations and reappraise will support your feeling better.
Another example of doing the opposite is around anxiety. Anxiety
motivates you to avoid whatever makes you anxious. Yet treatments that
are helpful for people who are anxious always include approaching and
sitting with what makes them anxious. In marriages, when people begin to
experience conflict, they move away from acting lovingly. Acting in a lov-
ing way, the opposite of indifference, actually increases loving feelings.
When I’m listening to a lecture and I notice I feel bored, I’ve practiced
sitting up close to the lecturer, acting interested, and asking thoughtful
questions; I then find myself feeling genuinely interested.
Notice that these examples describe situations in which acting oppo-
site to the emotion makes sense. If an emotional urge serves an adaptive
function, I would not prescribe doing the opposite. Feeling sad after a loss,
running during a robbery, and distancing yourself from a partner who is
hurtful are functional behaviors, and those are not times to practice doing
the opposite. However, if you are so afraid during a robbery you can’t run
because you aren’t breathing, some amount of doing the opposite of what
you feel—­for example, slowing down for a moment and breathing—­makes
sense. Choose when to do the opposite after mindfully considering whether the
action related to your emotion is effective.

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 Emotional Intelligence

If you feel shame though you haven’t done anything that compromises
your values, you may act opposite to shame. The first step in doing so
would be really noticing shame and what actions it pulls you toward.
Shame often makes us want to lower our head, avoid eye contact, and
criticize ourselves harshly. Doing the opposite of shame might include
standing straight with your head held high, making eye contact, and forgiv-
ing yourself. When you love someone who is not reciprocating, or who is
not a person you can love given your values, you may choose to do the
opposite of love. Love pulls us toward investing time and energy in a per-
son, connecting with, talking about, and thinking about that person.
Doing the opposite may include keeping away from the person and moving
away from thoughts about him or her. If your general habit is to avoid or eat
when emotions are intense, doing the opposite would involve sitting with
your feelings and taking special care to eat mindfully (Linehan 1993b).
If your annoyance stems from your boss not giving you a bonus, your
interpretation may be that you are not appreciated and you may experi-
ence significant anger. Opposite action, including releasing tightness in
your jaw, letting go of angry thoughts, and acting kindly toward her, may
change the way you feel (and this does not prohibit you from eventually
discussing the matter with her). If the fact is that you are unappreciated,
showing appropriate disappointment may be useful. However, if your anger
is off the charts in magnitude, and fully expressing your anger will lead to
your losing your job or jeopardizing your relationship with the person you
need as a reference, doing the opposite may be useful.
We’ve reviewed examples of doing the opposite of fear, sadness, love,
shame, and anger. Can you think of a way to do the opposite in your life to
change your emotional experience? You may use the following exercise to
plan ahead for an upcoming situation, review a previous situation and how
you could have acted opposite in retrospect, or practice acting opposite now.

Exercise: Doing the Opposite,

Step by Step
1. Notice and label your emotion and pay attention to the
actions your emotion is pulling you toward. How intense is
the emotion on a scale of 1 to 10?

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2. Decide whether acting on the full intensity of your emotion

would be harmful or not in your best interest.

3. Do the opposite of your emotion urge, all the way, with your
face, body, and thoughts. What does this look like? Describe
the choices you make.

4. What do you notice about your emotions after doing the

opposite?
<

Emotional eating is often an action consistent with an emotion (Safer,

Telch, and Chen 2009)—­not with doing the opposite. As noted earlier in
this section, the way you act affects the way you feel. If you feel an emotion
and the way you experience it includes eating, eating adds to that emo-
tional experience just as running exacerbates fear. Given this idea, it
makes good sense that emotional eating may not really help you change
the way you feel. It may be similar to lying in bed when you feel sad. It’s
part of your behavioral repertoire when you feel a certain way. Overeating
when you’re sad may be a response consistent with sadness; eating when
you’re angry may be part of being angry; eating in particular ways when
you feel guilty may be a way to punish yourself. When eating is not related
to acting on a particular emotion, food may serve as a means to avoid an
emotion and thus prolong it rather than changing it. Doing the opposite—­
meaning not using food to cope with an emotion—­ is a powerful
alternative.
One way to do the opposite and change the way we feel is to change
our facial expression of emotion. Our faces naturally change when we
experience an emotion. According to the facial feedback hypothesis, facial
movements influence how we feel. In a fascinating neuroimaging study,
participants imitated facial expressions before and after receiving Botox
injections in the muscle used in frowning. During their imitation of angry
facial expressions, Botox decreased the activation of brain regions impli-
cated in emotional processing and emotional experience in the amygdala
and brain stem, compared to activations before the Botox injection
(Hennenlotter et al. 2008). These findings show that facial expression
modulates emotional processing. You may actually change how you feel by
relaxing your facial expression. It is helpful to express difficult emotions in

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 Emotional Intelligence

order to garner support from those around you as well as to indicate con-
cern. Still, if the intensity of the emotion is not helpful and you would like
to change the way you feel, it may be worth looking at your expression and
gently adopting a more relaxed face.
Half-­smiling is a specific technique for managing emotions and embody-
ing acceptance (Linehan 1993b). A half-­smile entails relaxing your fore-
head and jaw and ever so slightly raising the corners of your mouth. If you
experience any tension, you are not doing it correctly. Consider a pouty
expression or a fake smile: both entail facial tension. A half-­smile is not
intended to be phony. To half-­smile, adopt an expression of relaxed accep-
tance, releasing any facial tension and not forcing a big, toothy grin. After
all, if you feel unhappy about your appearance, clenching your teeth and
furrowing your brow while looking in the mirror will only fuel sad emo-
tions. Relaxing your expression may help alleviate your discomfort.

Exercise: Mindfully Half-­Smiling

While Walking
One way to practice mindfulness is to walk mindfully. In this
exercise, you may bring attention to the practice of willingness
and acceptance as you walk. You may choose to practice this exer-
cise on a walk you typically associate with tension, such as walk-
ing to work, running errands, or going to medical appointments.

1. Go for a walk. You may choose to walk somewhere scenic or

somewhere routine; the walk may be short or long, whatever
you choose.

2. Begin to bring attention to the fact that you are walking.

Bring attention to the sequence of actions involved in each
step: shifting your weight, lifting your foot, and placing it on
the ground.

3. Notice any sensations in your shoulders, and roll your shoul-

ders back to walk in a dignified, upright manner.

4. Next, bring your awareness to your face.

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5. Notice any tension in your forehead, eyes, eyebrows, or jaw.

6. Release any tension in your face.

7. Ever so slightly raise the corners of your mouth so that your

face adopts an expression of willingness and acceptance as
you walk.

8. Notice your breath as you inhale and exhale while maintain-

ing a half-­smile.

9. Shift your attention from your body and feet or your breath,
to sights and sounds as you walk.

10. When you notice that you have moved away from the half-­
smile or from a state of present, accepting awareness while
walking, that is okay. It is an opportunity to begin again,
returning to accepting with your body and your mind.
<

Half-­smiling is a way to act opposite in difficult situations. You may

experiment with bringing to mind a person you dislike while half-­smiling.
You may notice differences in your feelings as you sit with the person,
before you or in your mind, while assuming an expression of acceptance.
When you suppress an emotion, you are restraining the feeling and
not practicing acceptance. When you change an emotional expression,
you are accepting your emotion, relaxing your body, and modifying your
experience and expression of the emotion. There’s a difference between
the two strategies, and it has to do with acceptance. Acting opposite is not
faking; rather it’s noticing urges to act in a certain way, then deliberately
choosing to change your thoughts and behavior, all with a quality of
acceptance. Half-­smiling is not insincere; it’s noticing when your face con-
veys nonacceptance and changing your expression to a more accepting
one. Imagine when someone asks you to smile for a photograph. I’d bet
your face feels quite tense and uncomfortable, especially if you hold it for
a while. Try that for a moment if you will: adopt a big, toothy, inauthentic
camera smile. When you release the face, take a few moments to let go of
any tension you may experience in your face. Then, deliberately release

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any tension in your forehead, bring your attention to this moment, and
ever so slightly raise the corners of your mouth. Notice the difference?
Changing your emotional response is a commitment to engage in a
behavior that relates to what matters. Avoiding or suppressing is commit-
ting to trying to feel less. The distinction is subtle. For example, if you feel
anxious at a party, you may accept your anxiety and choose to act opposite
by lifting your head up, making eye contact, introducing yourself, and half-­
smiling, even if a thought arises that makes you anxious and you don’t feel
perfectly comfortable. Suppressing is going to the party and trying to look
cool and calm. Acting opposite may actually increase your anxiety ini-
tially, though over time, opposite action will change the way you feel.

Exercise: Bringing It All Together

Consider an emotion you experienced or anticipate experiencing
and consider ways to use some emotion regulation skills to iden-
tify and reduce your vulnerabilities, modify the situation if neces-
sary, practice mindful awareness, change your interpretations,
and act opposite.

1. What is the emotion, and in what situation did you (or will
you) experience it?

2. Notice your vulnerabilities: what are (were) they? What are

some ways to reduce these vulnerabilities?

3. Would it be helpful to be mindful of the situation? How might

you cope ahead or problem solve?

4. How might you practice mindful awareness around your emo-

tion and the situation?

5. What are (were) your interpretations? Is there another way to

think about your interpretations or, in other words, to reap-
praise them?

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End Emotional Eating

6. What is (was) your response? What urges does (did) this emo-
tion pull you toward? Would doing the opposite be appropri-
ate? How might you do the opposite?
<

Summary
In this chapter, you read about practicing emotional intelligence skills to
manage emotions more flexibly. You considered how primary and second-
ary emotions differ from one another and saw there is a range of options
to choose from to affect how you feel. Learning to regulate your emotions
will help you choose other ways to cope with feelings besides eating. More
importantly, learning to manage emotions will improve your relationships
with others and with yourself. Emotional intelligence allows for intelligent
living.

116
 Chapter 5

Surfing Urges and

Developing Realistic
Confidence

To stay with that shakiness—­to stay with a broken heart,

with a rumbling stomach, with the feeling of hopelessness
and wanting to get revenge—­that is the path of true
awakening.
—Pema Chödrön

D
o you find that the more you crave, the more you cave? There you
are, patiently standing in line for coffee. You see a fresh cranberry
muffin and begin to ponder: “If I don’t buy it, I won’t stop think-
ing of cranberry muffins all morning. I had breakfast, but I still feel hungry.
Probably because I didn’t sleep that well. In fact, I need some sugar to boost
my energy. Anyway, it’s not worth starting the day disappointed when I
kind of loathe my job.” Soon your mouth is full of cranberry muffin.
Urges may be physical, psychological, or some combination of the two.
The muffin scenario is both. And once our emotions are involved, they
may affect both our physiology and our appetite. Have you noticed anxiety
leading to an experience of shakiness that you perceive as hunger? It may
End Emotional Eating

be worthwhile to slow down, step back, and consider your current

emotions—­and whether satisfying a momentary urge (however strong)
relates to what you value—­to what you want your life to really be about. Of
course, if you are physically hungry, valuing your health translates to eat-
ing healthfully. On the other hand, if you feel sad but also care about
learning to cope with negative emotions meaningfully, it may be worth-
while to observe the “hungry” urges and what they really indicate. Are you
trying to manage unpleasant feelings by munching them down? Will this
approach work in the long term, or even in the short term (after the food
has gone down the hatch and regret sets in)?

What Goes Up Must Come Down

In our minds, a greater urge equals a greater need to indulge. This is an
illusory correlation. An example: even if you noticed that all your acquain-
tances who are five foot eight wear glasses, it would be inaccurate to
assume that height and impaired vision were related. Similarly, just because
you have a strong urge for a candy bar, this does not mean that your need
for one is any stronger than normal. What would happen if an urge got
stronger and stronger and you just noticed it, without reacting? An old
college friend of mine smoked several packs of cigarettes a day. His family
lived in Singapore, and flights between New York City and Singapore are
eighteen hours long—­or, in his terms, thirty cigarettes’ worth of time!
When asked how he managed his cravings on the long smoke-free flights
when he visited his family, he explained, “They get real bad, and they pass,
and they get bad, and they pass.” In being forced to endure his urges with-
out acting on them, my friend (though unwillingly) experienced the fun-
damental principle of urges: they swing up and they swing down.
The fact is that often, we simply forget our cravings (and we also forget
this fact!). Have you had urges that simply escape your memory? Take a
minute to think about urges you experienced yesterday. You may have had
urges to say something, indulge in a sweet treat, or snooze. What hap-
pened to these urges?
There are also urges we escape due to circumstances. Can you bring
to mind an urge that you experienced intensely that you did not satisfy?

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 Surfing Urges and Developing Realistic Confidence

You so badly craved lemon sorbet; your mouth watered. When you got to
the gourmet shop, you found that that zesty palate cleanser was sold out.
What happened next? Chances are, you felt a twinge of disappointment
and drove home. Lemon sorbet lost its luster for the time being.
By contrast, what happens when we indulge a craving? The more we
give in to our urges, the more we crave and the weaker our ability to resist.
To put it simply, consequences influence behavior. The more we indulge in a
habit, the more habitual it becomes. Ever work in an office with a candy
jar? It may be more manageable to never stick your hand in the candy jar,
instead of reaching for a gummy bear on your way to the copy machine—
otherwise, before you know it, it’s as though eating a gummy bear is part
of the copying process. Have you ever had one gummy bear and felt satis-
fied? (Note that this is possible with mindful eating.) Now add stress to
the equation. You feel stressed, and there are gummy bears to console you.
Eating gummy bears becomes part of the stress loop. You feel stressed, you
eat gummy bears, you feel stressed as well as bad about the gummy bears,
you feel more stressed, and you eat more gummy bears.
It’s important to notice that indulging food urges is reinforcing on
multiple levels. Laurie, a thirty-­four-­year-­old woman, loathed her work as
an attorney and often brooded anxiously about other potential careers
that would afford her the opportunity to pay off her Ivy League loans. In
the meantime, she was understandably reticent to complain and was dili-
gent in her work at a prominent law firm. Before major deadlines, Laurie
worked fifteen-­hour days, and her expression of stress and anxiety was
apparent to all who passed the glass walls of her office. Her shoulders
slumped and her face tensed. Her paralegal, Jack, knew Laurie’s tastes in
comfort food. When he noticed her head fall into a pile of papers on her
desk, he stepped out to buy her the delicacies she seldom ate on her low-
carbohydrate diet: gnocchi, biscotti, and a mocha latte. Laurie looked
euphoric as Jack approached with her treats. She also felt indebted to Jack
and obligated to enjoy them. Her appreciation was contagious, and Jack
was grateful for her warmth.
Notice, there are several layers of reward here. First, there is a positive
reinforcement to eat. In other words, eating adds something pleasing to the
situation. Food is reinforced internally and socially. Laurie enjoys eating
her “forbidden” foods as a treat, and she also enjoys pleasing Jack by show-
ing her enthusiasm. How often have we pleased our grandmothers by

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End Emotional Eating

eating their chicken soup? In addition, there is also a negative reinforcement

attached to eating here; that is, it is pleasing because it removes a negative
state. Laurie’s impromptu feast means that she gets a break from the legal
nightmare and its emotional effects. As we can observe, eating for emo-
tional reasons is rewarding on a couple of levels.
Now that we understand the benefits in emotional eating, let’s better
understand some of the consequences. While the food is delicious and
temporarily energizing, when she uses it, Laurie fails to learn other ways to
cope with emotions. Also, soon enough, perhaps mid-­bite, Laurie begins
to feel guilty and anxious about loading up on empty calories and carbs,
leaving her not only stressed and anxious about work, but stressed and
anxious (and guilty) about eating unhealthfully.
In summary:

1. Stopping emotion X by eating leads you to mistakenly believe you

cannot otherwise manage X.

2. Managing emotions through food may create secondary neg-

ative emotions.

3. The more frequently you use food to manage emotions, the

more ingrained this habit becomes.

The brain is active and plastic. We strengthen neural connections

underlying our behaviors when we engage in repeated actions. In contrast,
refocusing and changing behaviors alters the brain. Rebuilding neural
pathways is a process. The good news is that over time, the link between
the behavior and engaging in the urge will be weakened. Jeffrey M.
Schwartz, a renowned psychiatrist at the University of California–Los
Angeles, is well known for his work in treating obsessive-­compulsive dis-
order (OCD). While you may not suffer from OCD, if you can understand
the way behavior changes one’s brain, you will learn something important
about coping with your urges.
People with OCD struggle with intrusive, anxious thoughts and may
engage in habits, such as checking or hand-washing, to reduce their anxi-
ety. Schwartz developed an effective treatment for OCD as well as other
problematic habits. He noticed three main differences in brain scans
between individuals with OCD and those without it. The orbital frontal

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cortex, part of the frontal lobe, fires in awareness of mistakes and is more
active in an obsessive person. The cingulate gyrus emotes a “mistake feel-
ing,” causing an experience of panic, which is also heightened in OCD.
Lastly, the caudate nucleus allows our minds to shift focus, but in OCD,
the caudate nucleus seems to get stuck, causing a lack of mental flexibility
(Schwartz and Beyette 1996). In other words, a person suffering from
OCD becomes “caught” in intense feelings of making a mistake, in physi-
cal symptoms of anxiety, and in difficulty shifting attention. These
changes are apparent in neuroimaging studies. Schwartz’s treatment
changes brain circuits by modifying the neurological links involved. He
encourages patients to “manually” (that is, deliberately) shift attention and
focus fully on another (pleasurable) activity when urges arise. First,
patients are taught to label their experience, so rather than thinking for
example “Germs!” and feeling “fear, panic, anxiety!” they reinterpret these
thoughts and feelings as “OCD.” This act of relabeling creates some per-
spective. Next, the patient is taught to refocus in the moment and deliber-
ately engage in a pleasant activity.
In this therapy, the doing is more important than the feeling. How
does this work given our discussion of reinforcement? Not engaging in the
urge weakens the reinforcing principle of an urge, while engaging in a new
behavior becomes reinforcing in itself. Simply put, this process leads to the
creation of new brain circuits, which compete with the existing ones.
When Schwartz examined patients after such treatment, the three areas
of the brain that were previously “locked,” or inflexible, had begun to fire
in a normal way.
Brain scans similarly illustrate that emotional eaters and nonemo-
tional eaters differ in their caudate nucleus response when presented with
a chocolate shake or other temptation. This suggests that emotional eaters
may be more sensitive to some of the rewards of food. Also, emotional eat-
ing relates to increases in expectation of enjoying food, as well as increases
in the pleasure of eating while in a negative mood (Bohon, Stice, and
Spoor 2009). These multiple rewards make sense given what we know
about the complexity of emotional eating. Food can be reinforcing on mul-
tiple levels, giving immediate pleasure as well as relieving emotional pain.
However, Schwartz’s research points to the possibility of changing neural
pathways. If Laurie (our ambivalent and overfed attorney) were to stop,
observe the force of her emotions, and then—­ instead of

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eating—­deliberately relax her shoulders, release her facial tension, slow

her breathing, and listen to her favorite music, she may, over time, simi-
larly change her obsessive habit. (She’ll have to have a gentle talk with
Jack, too.)
Urge surfing, a term coined by G. Alan Marlatt, director of the
Addictive Behaviors Research Center at the University of Washington,
describes a technique to observe the rise and fall of a craving. In 1985,
Marlatt established the concept of urge surfing to help individuals who
struggled with substance abuse. Urge surfing has since been generalized to
help people who struggle with food cravings, preoccupations, and binges.
The metaphor of surfing is wonderfully apt. Just as ocean waves rise and
fall, our urges wax and wane, as do our emotions. Even the tallest wave
must subside. Skilled surfers ride above waves and maintain balance in
every circumstance. They demonstrate a fluidity and artful flexibility that
may be described as dancing on water. (I like the image of water dancing,
which speaks to the complexity as well as the adventure involved in the
activity.) Kelly Slater, the nine-­time world champion surfer, advises that
surfing requires knowing the water and which waves to ride, maintaining
balance, and embracing failure. Why not, then, view an urge as a refresh-
ing ripple to appreciate rather than a problem to be solved?

Living and Longing

There is no way to completely extinguish desires, and often the
attempt to do so creates more suffering. To surf urges, cravings, or preoc-
cupations with food, you must let go of judgment. Wishing you did not
think about jelly donuts will not make them (or the wishes) disappear. In
fact, being unwilling and negativistic is a recipe for becoming stuck.

Blair’s Story
Blair struggled with binge eating and obesity. She worked dili-
gently to avoid “triggers” by eating only at health food restaurants
and seldom dining with other people. However, in New York City,
there is food everywhere. Blair angrily panicked when faced with

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food carts, pretzel stands, ice cream trucks, and a city full of peo-
ple eating on the go. “In a country full of obesity, there should be
no food trucks!” she raged. When Blair encountered an ice cream
truck on the first day of summer (after rigorously abstaining from
stumbling upon “binge foods”) she became negativistic, believing
it was “unfair”; she felt she could not cope, and she “knew” that if
she did not satisfy her urge she would feel worse. Often, her binge
eating occurred while she was walking. She would notice the food
truck, feel anxious and depressed by her weight, and sense her
urges mount. Blair wrongly believed that abstaining would lead to
a long-standing sense of deprivation and would exacerbate her
depression. Learning to notice her emotions as well as the tran-
sience of her urges was instrumental in Blair’s letting go of binge-
ing. She began to consider as she walked: “How long does an urge
actually last? Can I actually regulate food truck locations? This
may be a moment to practice acceptance and self-compassion.”
The combination of reminding herself that urges pass and expand-
ing her awareness by paying attention to her feet on the ground,
her breath, the architecture of buildings, and the people around
her cured her myopic focus on the food truck parade.

Indulging Your Urge

While it is futile to judge urges as “good” or “bad,” it is worthwhile to
determine whether acting on an urge is helpful or not. Urge surfing
requires mindfulness, the ability to be present and observe. We have urges
all day long. An urge for chocolate does not necessarily have to afford you
the opportunity to urge surf. If you wish, you can enjoy the chocolate and
use your urge as an opportunity to be mindful of the pleasant sensations
that go along with eating something that tastes good. The key is to make
the decision with intention, rather than indulging mindlessly or out of a
feeling of defeat. Use your judgment to follow a middle path where you
savor enjoyable foods in moderation. One way to determine whether a
behavior is helpful is to consider how you will feel not only the moment

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you indulge, but also over time. For example, enjoying a slice of your
father’s eightieth birthday cake may be something you remember fondly.

Urge Surfing vs. Willpower

Many people subscribe to the myth that the ability to resist an urge is a
limited resource, like an energy supply—­hence the term “willpower.”
What are your thoughts? If you resist an urge now, are you less able to
resist later? In a DBT group I run, I encouraged participants to practice
mindfully urge surfing in the room by noticing the rise and fall of urges to
move around. One participant commented after the practice, “I have
enough real urges I have to stomach all the time, so why should I use my
energy on one that doesn’t really matter?” This is a brilliant question that
begs another question: is there a particular amount of urge resistance we
all have that gets used up? In movies, this “limited supply” of resistance is
often depicted. The married female lead has been attracted to her gar-
dener for two years, and finally, she can no longer suppress her desire and
begins an extramarital affair. In a commercial, a person tries to stick to her
diet, but after a while, the chips look so damn good, it’s impossible.
Experimentally, too, self-­control has been shown to be a limited
resource. If you exert control in one paradigm, you may have less ability in
a situation shortly after. In a study by Mark Muraven, Dianne Tice, and
Roy Baumeister (1998), asking participants to regulate their emotional
responses to an upsetting movie led to decreases in physical stamina.
Similarly, if you are in a negative emotional state, managing your mood
depletes you of energy and you may have less self-­control as a result. As
you may know, dieters are more likely to break their diets if they are expe-
riencing a negative mood (e.g., Greeno and Wing, 1994). Practicing mind-
fulness and acceptance of urges is quite different from trying to fight or
suppress urges, as people often do when trying to exercise self-­control. We
have more energy and less emotional suffering when we accept urges.
Additionally, urge surfing may be helpful in minimizing the amount of
self-­control you anticipate you need. Knowing that an urge will pass keeps
you from becoming caught. You may be mindful of your emotional state
and soothe yourself in other ways—­until your metaphorical self-­control
power supply is replenished.

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Urges and Emotions

You may be wondering, if difficult emotions are linked to urges, how
will you manage urges if you keep struggling with difficult emotions?
Emotions, like urges, rise and fall. I was raised by my beloved grandma,
and for most of my life, my greatest fear was her death. I vividly remember
losing her: As I stood in the waiting area of the hospital, I felt sad, hope-
less, anxious, and every other negative emotion. I actually began to believe
I would never be able to move. I had the thought I might never be able to
see a client again because of my pain. I was miserable. And my misery
ebbed and flowed. While I still feel twinges of pain when I think of my
grandmother, these are now linked to a softer sense of gratitude that I had
her in my life.

Urge Surfing Step by Step

When you are in the midst of struggling with an urge, here are some
things you can do to decrease your discomfort.

1. Slow down your mind and body. We often act on automatic pilot,
and slowing down can help us notice our thoughts and feelings
and make mindful choices about them.

2. Let go. Nonjudgmentally observe the urge. Where do you

sense it in your body? What is your mind telling you? If you
could rate the urge on a scale of 1 to 10 in terms of intensity,
where is it now?

3. Refocus. Where are you? What are you feeling? In the long
term, how will you feel if you indulge the urge? How will you
feel in the long term if you surf the urge?

4. Choose. After you make space for the urge and let go of judg-
ing, you have some room to decide. Where is the urge now? Is
it slowly mounting? Are you willing to watch it rise? If not,
can you practice letting the discomfort exist for just a little
while longer than you might otherwise, before you give in to
it?

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As always, be dubious of anything I suggest until you have experi-

mented and found the practice helpful. Would you be willing to try urge
surfing? The following exercise is designed to give you some experience of
it. After the practice, you may generate some ideas of situations in which
you tend to notice urges to eat for emotional reasons, and then experiment
with urge surfing in those moments.

Exercise: Urge Surfing

1. Focus on an urge you have right now, such as shifting in your
chair, logging on to your favorite social networking website,
letting your mind wander, or scratching your back.

2. Sit with that urge for a few minutes, observing it without act-
ing on it.

3. Try describing the urge, either in your head or by writing it

down. What does it feel like? Where do you feel it in your
body? What is your mind telling you about the urge? On a
scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being extremely uncomfortable, how
would you rate the urge right now?

4. Sit with the urge for another minute, and then rate it again.
Has the level of discomfort changed?

5. Practice not giving in to the urge for as long as you are able.
How long were you able to do it? How did the urge change or
shift as you paid attention to it? Did you finally give in? How
did that feel? If you didn’t give in, how did that feel? Observe
your reactions without judgment.

Do this exercise any time you want to practice your urge

surfing.
<

Aikido is a Japanese art of self-defense in which you blend the motion

of the attacker and the redirected force of the attack, rather than con-
fronting it head on. This requires mental as well as physical strength.

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Relaxation and flexibility are fundamental. Similarly, you may garner the
most strength by flexibly relaxing, accepting, and rolling with what comes
your way. Weave and surf; don’t throw punches. With practice, you will be
able to maintain your balance throughout the inevitable onslaught of life
and its resultant urges. Remember, new neural pathways are not created in
an instant! But if you can master this mental aikido of urge surfing, you
can stare down any cranberry muffin.

Developing Realistic Confidence

Urge surfing isn’t easy. However, building realistic confidence may increase
your sense that you can in fact cope with urges. If we consider confidence
a general attitude, developing skills in a broad range of areas in your life
may boost your self-­assurance when you’re facing urges. Plus, accomplish-
ing goals improves your mood. You may struggle with urges for particular
foods, urges to instantly gratify yourself by avoiding feelings, and urges to
quit your plans to practice mindfulness. Through deliberate attempts to
pursue activities that require effort, you can chip away at beliefs you hold
about yourself and what you can and can’t do.
Now! Drum roll, please, for the question every motivation-­eliciting
pep talk includes: what is the difference between those who succeed in
accomplishing a goal, such as urge surfing, and those who do not? I don’t
want to presume I have the answer to this complex question. So let’s slow
down and wonder together: What thwarts action? What would potential
remedies include?
Imagine that one of your long-standing goals is to run a marathon,
twenty-­six miles. What steps are necessary to get to the physical fitness
level you need to achieve before you can run a marathon? According to
Olympic athlete and running coach Jeff Galloway, to prep for the mara-
thon, you begin by running or walking for thirty minutes, twice a week,
and you methodically build your endurance over time. In twenty-­nine
weeks, you can go from being unable to run more than three miles to run-
ning twenty-six miles. This is not a late-night infomercial; this is a pro-
gram thousands of people like you and me have followed to make marathon
running a realistic ambition. In order to build a sense of realistic

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confidence in a goal, then, break a task into manageable chunks. To

develop a sense of confidence more generally, regularly challenge yourself.
We are all faced with challenges. Mastery means doing things that
make you feel competent and confident (e.g., Linehan 1993b). Self-­efficacy,
or your beliefs about your ability, has a major impact on your life. You build
your sense of self-­efficacy through mastery. Some people wait until they
feel confident to begin a challenge. What is the alternative? Build compe-
tence by deliberately identifying goals that are both difficult and possible. Ask
yourself, “Where is my goal on the continuum from effortless to unattain-
able?” Mastery is all about being in the middle of that spectrum.
Almost any effective program in which you change an existing behav-
ior includes some reasonable step to engender hope to take the next.
Think about Alcoholics Anonymous, whose motto is “One day at a time,”
not “Don’t drink for the rest of your life.” Chances are the latter sentiment
would breed anxiety and thus perhaps lead to drinking, while the former
seems manageable and increases the chances of abstinence. A patient of
mine once described developing mastery as “tricking the brain” by circum-
venting paths that lead to resistance. I see taking workable steps as the
only way to build optimism, adequately preparing you for change in the
relationship between your emotions and food.

Mastery and Urge Surfing

Urge surfing requires a sense of mastery, and surfing urges builds mastery.
Knowing you have trained enough that you can run a marathon provides
a base of realistic confidence in other areas: “Of course I can ride the urge
to order nachos; I’ve ridden many urges to quit running!” Similarly, repeat-
edly surfing the urge to order nachos may also establish both a general
sense of self-­confidence and the confidence that you can resist the next
food pitfall.
When your mind sends you the message “Give up! Why bother?” you
can thank your mind for that thought. Thanking your mind for a thought
is observing the thought without judgment, rather than responding to the
thought as though it is a factual alarm. Then, you can cheer yourself on by
reminding yourself of difficult urges you’ve experienced and surfed.
Similarly, practicing urge surfing builds mastery. By repeatedly noticing,

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labeling, and riding urges, you will build your sense of confidence in your
ability to give yourself more space between urge and action.
You may be wondering, “This is a book on emotional eating—why are
we addressing mastery in areas other than eating?” Many people who
struggle with eating problems make eating the focus of living. Yet it is
often helpful to focus on living more broadly so that eating becomes a part
of living rather than the focus of living (we will address this more in chap-
ter 9). You may feel like you’ve worked really hard to abstain from emo-
tional eating. Perhaps stepping back and noticing how you excel in other
areas will engender renewed realistic confidence that you can end your
emotional eating. We have little incentive to pursue goals if we don’t have
a sense we will accomplish them.
Building mastery in various areas of your life may reduce your vulner-
ability to intense emotions and urges. Let’s say your desire to offer the
wittiest toast at your brother’s wedding is creating a lot of stress. Taking a
course on public speaking with the goal of mastering your public speaking
skills and conquering your fear may reduce the anxiety you experience. In
addition, when you problem solve and take steps to build your confidence,
you may be less likely to turn to food to cope with your nerves about the
speech. And knowing you can sit with discomfort (for example, surfing
the urge to feign laryngitis to avoid giving the toast) may spill over and
influence your sense of mastery to sit with the urge to eat.
The hopelessness that may arise when we’re faced with the arduous
task of changing must be replaced by a growing sense of accomplishment.
Purposefully engaging in activities to build mastery is a key ingredient in
cognitive behavioral therapy for depression, a treatment that has been
found to be as effective as antidepressants. When you are depressed, you
may experience negative beliefs about yourself, your future, and the world.
The experience of accomplishing a relatively challenging goal both chal-
lenges negative beliefs and engenders realistic hope. Some people wait
until an opportunity presents itself to pursue an activity or socialize.
Developing mastery is about purposely scheduling activities that engender
a sense of confidence.
Carol Dweck (2006), a psychology professor at Stanford University,
has been studying motivation and achievement for almost forty years. She
determined that our self-­theories—­what we believe about what we can
achieve—­affect what we set out to accomplish. The good news is that you

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can change your self-­theories. Dweck explains that people may have either
fixed mindsets or growth mindsets. This means that you may see yourself as
either a lost cause or a work in progress. Mastery begins with a state of
mind. I believe that developing mastery in one area may affect your overall
self-­theory. Would refining your artistic prowess by taking a watercolor
class improve your feelings about your ability to manage emotions and
food? Chances are, when you notice that your ability to paint improves
with practice, you may develop a more growth-­oriented mindset in other
areas as well.

Pain with a Purpose

Building mastery muscles requires resistance training. Let’s be frank.
Running to increase your mileage each week is (literally) no walk in the
park. Instant gratification is not the game here (nor will it take you far).
Mastery, by definition, will not be instantaneous.
In the short term, mastery requires perseverance. In the long run,
mastery will improve your mood and reduce your vulnerability to negative
emotions. Over time, engaging in challenging actions purposefully will
improve self-­esteem and reduce feelings of depression. These behaviors
give feedback to your brain, rewiring it and dismantling previously held
beliefs. People often describe feeling more joy from accomplishment than
from seeking instant pleasure. You may be struggling with low self-­esteem,
questioning your ability to experience a sense of accomplishment, and eat-
ing to manage your nerves. As discussed earlier in this chapter, you may
change your brain by modifying your behaviors. That is, you may change the
way you feel by doing. When thoughts attempt to convince you not to
bother with surfing your urges, dealing with your emotions differently, or
improving your musical abilities, notice those thoughts—­and let them go
by like so much background noise. By changing your actual behaviors, you
will get unstuck. Eventually, the raucous dissonance in your mind may
begin to quiet. Ultimately, you run the marathon with your legs and not
your thoughts. It would be nice if your mind helped you along the way, but
it is not required. Would you be willing to move your body toward what
matters deeply and bring your attention there?

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Individuals may travel to a Zen ashram to develop spiritually. They

meditate. They also sweep floors. You spend money, travel to a hillside, sit
in silence, and scrub toilets. A couple of years ago, I had the opportunity
to participate in a meditation retreat with Marsha Linehan, the psycholo-
gist who created DBT, in Tucson, Arizona. I envisioned relaxing in the
sun, savoring the vegetarian meals, cultivating mindfulness, and becom-
ing a more patient person in a mere five days. I did not expect a 5:30 a.m.
wake-­up, sitting for six hours a day facing a white wall, and sweeping. All
these tasks required mental mastery. After a day of staring at the wall, I
broke the practice of silence and asked Marsha if it would be possible to sit
outside facing the cacti. She said something along the lines of “Life is
about what happens when you’re faced with white walls.” Anticipating
only pleasure, or at least pain-­free steps toward growth, may hinder our
progress. Thus, the chores we face along the way may be therapeutic.
Room service and a concierge will not change your mood in the same way
accomplishments change your experience and your sense of self.

The Motivation Myth

“You cannot urge surf or train for the marathon until you are moti-
vated.” That statement is a common myth. Motivation is like winning the
lottery; it is tenuous and is no guarantee for an enriching life. You are
probably thinking you know yourself and you work only when motivated.
Do you go to work or do your laundry? Do you feel motivated to do those
tasks on a regular basis? Often, even when we experience a surge of moti-
vation, the inspiration is fleeting. Waiting to feel different than you do will
mean waiting a long time. Deliberately acting, again and again, will lead
to mastery.
Let’s get this straight:

1. Motivation is not a prerequisite for action.

2. Action leads to action.

3. Motivation would be nice.

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Exercise: Developing Mastery

Step by Step
1. Plan to do at least one thing each day to build a sense of
accomplishment. You may practice meditation, take a new
dance class, read a classic you’ve started and stopped since
college, or urge surf.

2. While engaging in mastery muscle building, be mindful.

Notice what you are doing and stay in the moment with it.
Mile three is simply (and perfectly) mile three, not a count-
down to mile twenty-­six. You don’t need to analyze your per-
formance. Let go of judgments. This is a time to increase your
range of what you believe is possible. Cheer yourself on.

3. Gradually increase the difficulty of the goal you pursue over

time.
<

Practicing Nonjudgmental Mastery

Nonjudgmental mastery may sound like a paradox—­how are you
aware of advancing and becoming increasingly competent if you don’t
judge? Similarly, not judging urges may seem counterintuitive. Well, facts
are the antithesis of judgment. “I ran five miles this week and last week I
ran four miles” is not a judgment, it’s a matter of fact. Observing, “I sat
with my emotions,” is also a statement of fact. Describing facts is not judg-
ing, and it can be free of the psychological side effects of judging. When
you label yourself as having had a “bad” run, how likely are you to either
return to the track or notice your mood improve? Similarly, labeling urges
as “bad” will increase your struggle. However, considering, “Is engaging in
this urge effective?” may facilitate positive action.
Mastery is not achieved to get rid of a negative emotional state or
prevent a new one. Trying to force yourself to feel other than you do will

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maintain feeling X and add feeling Y. You feel sad and you work on a New
York Times crossword puzzle, wishing you could feel better, and then you
feel sad and frustrated. The alternative is noticing you feel sad, accepting
the feeling, and fully engaging in the crossword puzzle for the sake of mas-
tery, not to minimize your sadness.

Summary
As this chapter comes to an end, let’s review a couple of main principles.
Urges and emotions are part of living, and both of them ebb and flow. We
can step back and notice how they change in magnitude over time. We get
ensnared when we seek instant fixes, such as eating to get rid of difficult
emotions. The ability to observe our emotions and urges builds our sense
of mastery. And the more we change our behaviors, the more habitual this
will become, widening our options. Surfing urges creates mastery. Mastery
requires surfing urges. Don’t get me wrong—expanding your comfort zone
is not easy. But the results may be exhilarating. The world is your mara-
thon, and day by day you can make the decision to master the miles and
surf the pain.

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 Chapter 6

Minding your Mind

It is far more difficult to murder a phantom than a reality.

—Virginia Woolf

M
any people who struggle with difficult feelings and with eating
problems engage in thinking that is judgmental, categorical,
and repetitive. Are you aware of holding on to thoughts that
no longer serve you? We’ve reviewed how thoughts or interpretations can
create feelings and influence behavior. In this chapter, we’ll explore the
possibility of freeing yourself from difficult emotions by changing your
relationship with thinking.
Have you ever observed a gentle elderly man as he watches children,
perhaps his own grandchildren, playing in the park? How might he watch
the children play? If a child began struggling with difficult emotions, would
the older man approach and scold, “You’re upset about a stupid sandcastle.
Do you know what alimony means?” The prospect of that occurring is so
absurd it’s humorous. An elder watching children play would likely notice
with so much kindness, wisdom, and perspective.
In the most respectful way, I invite you to consider the prospect of
noticing your thoughts as you’d imagine an elder would watch a child play-
ing in the sand—­with curiosity, distance, and wisdom. Of course many of
your thoughts serve you. At other times you may find yourself caught in
End Emotional Eating

unproductive, painful mental traps that feel imprisoning, when the ability
to release yourself lies within you.

The Problem with Thinking

Only humans can bring negative events into any setting at any moment.
You may be on a wonderful vacation, when suddenly you think of a lost
loved one, and experience pain. When you think about food, even when
it is not in your presence, you may notice your mouth water and you may
find yourself struggling in deciding whether or not to eat. In the absence
of physical hunger, you may notice fantasizing about food, feel stuck on
this fantasy in your mind, and go out of your way to eat.
Language and cognition are based on the capacity to relate events to
each other. While speaking and analyzing are often instrumental to many
aspects of our lives, they may also prove detrimental. You may find yourself
making arbitrary connections, and because the process of connecting is so
essential to how our brains work, you may lose contact with the fact that
your connections aren’t necessarily true. Yet your mind may hold on to
such ideas and relationships as factual. You may decide nothing will work
because your efforts so far haven’t succeeded. Simply having the thought
“Nothing will work” may engender feelings of helplessness and get in the
way of your pursuing behaviors to move ahead.
What is the thought “Nothing will work?” In a sense it’s just a combi-
nation of words and letters. Yet relating to that thought as though it were
valid and meaningful can lead to painful feelings and urges to give up,
which can in turn drive behaviors that shape your life. How often have
you noticed yourself caught up in thoughts and later realized the thoughts
were simply untrue? Years ago, as a student, I frequently experienced worry
thoughts around failure. During my orientation as a doctoral student, our
dean told us that several people would not pass the first semester. I imme-
diately began to think, “Oh no, what will I do next semester?” And this
sort of thinking often came up without any evidence to substantiate my
fears. A thought is a thought, an idea that evidence may or may not sup-
port. In contrast, a fact is substantiated with evidence. To differentiate
thoughts from facts, it may be useful to ask yourself, “Would this hold up in
a court of law?” Would a jury unanimously conclude, “Nothing will work?”

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There is a big difference between noticing thoughts and believing thoughts.

The first is mindful and opens up many possibilities for choosing behaviors;
the second is not mindful and can lock us into habitual behaviors.

Exercise: Thinking vs. Believing

1. For a moment, consider a thought that comes up often, and
regard the thought as simply a thought rather than a fact.

2. If you treated this thought as a fact, how might you act?

3. If you actually believed that this thought was simply a thought,

how might you act?

4. What would happen if you were to let go of some of your other

thoughts or begin to change your relationship with your
thinking?

It’s important to bring awareness to your thoughts around

your ability to sit with feelings and to your thoughts around food
and your shape. Do you believe any of the following common
thoughts?

 If I am thin, I’ll be happy.

 I need to wait until I have better control over my feelings and
eating before I can be social.

 I can’t help but sabotage myself.

 If I say no to eating something someone made for me, I will

hurt his feelings.

 If I don’t finish what’s on my plate, I am wasteful.

 I have no control over my life if I can’t control my eating.

I need to wait until my body is perfect before I can

 
        .

 I can’t do anything until I’m motivated.

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 I don’t deserve to buy nice clothes that make me feel com-
fortable until I am a size         .

 Feeling fat means I’m worthless and lazy.

 I can’t control my impulses.

 If I messed up, there is no point in trying to turn it around. I

might as well enjoy giving up until tomorrow.
<

You may notice all the thoughts in the checklist in the preceding exer-
cise are similar in that they are categorical—­that is, they exemplify all-­or-­
nothing thinking, lacking flexibility or awareness of alternative vantage
points.
If one of the thoughts listed above is a thought that you notice often,
can you notice how the thought may not be a fact? If you experience a
thought that is extreme, what may be a more flexible way of thinking
about the same subject? For example, you may replace the thought “I can’t
control my impulses” with a more flexible statement, such as “Sometimes
it feels hard to sit with impulses.” You can change your relationship with
thinking by noticing extreme thoughts and considering more flexible
interpretations or simply by changing your relationship with thinking by
taking thoughts less literally.

Common Thinking Traps

Many people struggle with particular types of judgmental thoughts. It may
be helpful to notice when you begin to engage in some common thinking
patterns, described below.

Comparisons
Comparing aspects of yourself, including your body, to someone else
can often lead to negative feelings. When you compare, there is often a

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judgmental quality in your attention. Have comparisons ever been helpful

to you? Interestingly enough, comparisons may be useful if you compare
your current situation to a time you struggled more, or if you compare
yourself to others who are less fortunate. That sort of comparison can
cultivate gratitude.
However, often comparisons entail judging yourself against someone
especially thin or attractive, perhaps a celebrity or the most beautiful per-
son you know. You may fail to notice the average person. Whom do you
compare yourself to? Does your reference point set you up for disappoint-
ment? If you find yourself stuck in the habit of comparing yourself to oth-
ers, you may notice when you are comparing, then practice mindfully
returning to the moment by letting go of judgments. If this seems too dif-
ficult, you may practice moving away from extreme comparisons toward
ones that are more sensible. Many of my affluent clients actually complain
a lot about not having enough money. They compare themselves to their
wealthiest friends, who own four homes, rather than noticing where they
stand across the full spectrum of people, including people who are strug-
gling financially or homeless. Similarly, you may notice that you compare
yourself to a unique group rather than to the average person or every
fourth person you see. When you compare yourself only to people who
appear perfect, how do you feel? If you compared yourself to every fourth
person you noticed, how might you feel?

Exercise: Noticing Comparisons

1. Is there a particular situation (like going to the beach, eating
a meal with others, or sitting with difficult feelings) where you
find yourself consumed with unhelpful comparisons (“No one
has it as bad as I do”)?

2. Practice bringing awareness to the fact that you are compar-

ing. Simply notice the fact, label it “comparing,” and practice
letting go of judgments, perhaps by focusing on your breath.

<

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Perfectionism
Many people hold on to thoughts about needing to be perfect—­and
also tightly hold on to certain narrow definitions of perfection. You may
hold yourself to very high standards in terms of appearance or goals to
achieve. Do you judge yourself according to how much you achieve and
find yourself thinking a lot about your performance? Certain behaviors
closely relate to thoughts about needing to be perfect. For example, you
may repeatedly check how you are doing or spend a lot of time trying to
analyze how you are doing compared to someone else. Some people who
aim to do their very best find themselves avoiding tasks out of fear that
they won’t do well enough. If you are a perfectionist, you may see things in
all-­or-­nothing terms—­you are either perfect or a failure. There is also a
tendency in perfectionism to catastrophize—­in other words, you may see a
single event as more than just a single event. For example, if you eat for
emotional reasons, you may consider yourself a “total mess.”

Exercise: Sticky Notes

For this exercise you’ll need both small sticky notes and a sheet of
paper (inspired by the chessboard metaphor in Hayes, Strosahl,
and Wilson 1999).

1. Bring to mind thoughts you often have about yourself, both

good and bad.

2. On different small sticky notes, write down the thoughts you

have. For example, one note may say “good friend”; another
may say “emotional eater”; another may say “crazy mom.”

3. After you write the thoughts that you notice often—­we’ll call
them sticky thoughts—­on sticky notes, place all these sticky
notes on a sheet of paper.

4. Now spend a minute trying to figure out which sticky note on

the paper really defines you. Using the example above, are
you “emotional eater” or “good friend”? Who are you really?

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Do your positive thoughts reign? Or do you identify more

with your negative thoughts about yourself?

5. What if you stepped back for a moment and considered that

these sticky notes aren’t really you? What else might you be?
What if you are the piece of paper, rather than a single sticky
note? A helpful way to change your relationship with thoughts
about who you are and how you need to be is to see yourself
as more than just thoughts, feelings, or accomplishments.
Thoughts pass through us, but we are not thoughts, no matter
how sticky the thoughts may feel.
<

Rumination
Rumination describes a way people try to cope with distress and entails
repeatedly thinking over a negative thought or memory. “Rumination”
stems from the Latin ruminari, meaning to chew over, like a cow on its
cud. Both feelings and thoughts typically arise, peak, and fade—­unless
you cling to them or ruminate on them.
Rumination is a recipe for depression and disordered eating. The men-
tal act of chewing over results in the physical act of chewing! Rumination
is actually a form of avoidance—­when you ruminate, you are less focused
on directly experiencing and expressing the current emotion and are more
caught up in an abstract story. You can think of rumination as a way to try
to analyze and control thinking. Does it help? It may often be as pointless
as worry, to which it is similar. Worry anticipates problems in the future,
whereas the content of rumination is the past. For example, rather than
attending to how you feel in this moment about an argument with your
partner, when ruminating you are instead overcome with such thoughts
as: “No one treats me well. Since we’ve been together I’ve never been a
priority. This reminds me of how I felt as a child…” Rumination builds a
mountain of evidence for hopelessness; consider it the opposite of active
problem solving (Nolen-­Hoeksema, Wisco, and Lyubomirsky 2008). What
if after an argument with your partner you walked the dog, bringing your

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full attention to sensations in your body and observing details outside

yourself on your walk, and when your emotions came down, you consid-
ered practical ways to problem solve with your partner? Or, you may rec-
ognize in the aftermath of an argument that emotions are colored by
conflict—­ and bring that awareness into the present. Susan Nolen-­
Hoeksema, a psychologist at Yale University, has pioneered research on
rumination and discovered that it impairs problem solving, predicts
depression, and erodes social support (Nolen-Hoeksema, Wisco, and
Lyubomirsky 2008). Who wants to hear the same story over and over?
Even you yourself should not be subjected to that.

Leila’s Story
Leila is an actress who struggles with feeling depressed. She thinks
a lot about how she has failed to meet her aspirations and accu-
mulate accolades. At one time, Leila enjoyed watching TV to
relax and as a means of generating ideas to write and produce.
Eventually, however, seeing other actors on TV accentuated
Leila’s pain over not working herself. At a certain point, Leila
found watching sitcoms painful and avoided TV. This ultimately
led to her spending more and more time trying to figure out why
she was depressed. And this led to Leila’s seeking the instant grat-
ification of unhealthy foods. But the foods did not stop her endless
thoughts. Leila continued to ruminate on disappointments and
pains, starting from childhood and ending in this moment (her
weight gain offered another source of pain). She also figured that
it would be worthwhile to share her pain. So she would repeatedly
tell her husband, Ben, how unsuccessful and unworthy she felt.
He tried as best he could to be patient and helpful, but Leila’s
reassurance seeking exhausted him. “How can you love me given
no one wants to work with me?” she’d ask. “Well, you’re a great
partner and fantastic person.” “Maybe you just don’t know me
that well,” she’d retort. Ben, understandably, grew frustrated with
her persistent negativity. Then Leila began worrying about Ben’s
being annoyed with her. Now she was “failing” at work, at eating

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sensibly, and at love itself. This sort of thinking became the men-
tal equivalent of riding the teacups at an amusement park: a fast,
nauseating ride going nowhere.

Do you ruminate on food and your shape? You may start by ruminat-
ing on feelings, then eat in response to your own ruminations, and then
ruminate about eating. Rumination is an activity that easily finds a topic.
“I can’t find a job. It’s not fair that I have a slow metabolism and can’t eat
enough to fill me up. I’m hungry but yesterday I ate a bit too much. I won-
der if I should skip a meal or if that will slow my metabolism. Things usu-
ally don’t work out when I try; why should I bother?” Notice how circular
thinking is unclear? To be frank, rumination is ruination!
It is no coincidence that rumination is strongly related to suppression,
avoidance, distress, and binge eating. Studies have found rumination to
predict bulimic behaviors and binge eating in adolescent girls (Nolen-­
Hoeksema et al. 2007). Eating disorders are characterized by rumination,
the belief that rumination is helpful, and avoidance of experiences (Rawal,
Park, and Williams 2010). Ruminating on shape, weight, or food can serve
to distract you or help you avoid difficult emotions or relationships. It may
be easier to think a lot about food instead of a painful past. The problem
is that you then experience pain around food.
Lucy tried to explain a recent episode of emotional eating: “A few days
ago I ordered a burrito, and there was a minimum delivery order of two. I
thought it was stupid to order two since I’m trying to count calories and it
seems like a lot and I don’t love them. Then I was bored and had the sec-
ond burrito I meant to have tomorrow, though I wasn’t hungry. I can’t stop
eating when I’m bored if food is around…. My mom was like that too. I
figured it makes no sense to keep track of food since it’s usually like this. I
have no control and have too much weight to lose and I’m not willing to
wait. Why bother?” Notice how thinking and analyzing entrap her?
Problem solving or fully contacting the present moment rather than get-
ting stuck in stories is often more helpful. As Voltaire said, “Let us work
without theorizing, ‘tis the only way to make life endurable.”
Do you notice when you are ruminating? Often, when you find your-
self in a place where emotions govern thinking, you may find yourself
ruminating. Noticing and labeling “emotion mind” or “ruminating” may
be helpful in bringing you back to this moment. One way to let go of

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rumination is to look at thoughts, rather than from thoughts. Practice this

with the following mindfulness exercise.

Exercise: Mindfulness Practice—­

Leaves on a Stream
1. Assume a mindful seat in a chair, with your spine upright and
your feet either flat on the ground if you are sitting in a chair
or folded comfortably if you are sitting on the floor or a
cushion.

2. Close your eyes and bring your full attention to your breath-
ing, just attending to one inhale and exhale at a time.

3. Next, bring your attention to where your body touches your

seat.

4. Notice that there is no effort required in practicing being

where you are.

5. Now, bring to mind a beautiful park.

6. In this mental image, notice a tree in the distance.

7. Imagine walking toward the tree, becoming more present in

the moment with each step.

8. Imagine that there is a river beside the tree.

9. Can you picture yourself sitting beside the river on a warm

autumn day watching leaves float downstream?

10. Now, bring your awareness to your thoughts.

11. Each time a thought or an image arrives in your mind, gently

place the thought or image on a leaf.

12. Try to sit and be with the tree, and when a thought arrives
that takes you away from being fully present (“Am I doing this
right?”), place that thought on a leaf.

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13. If thoughts aren’t arriving, notice that thought, “I’m not hav-
ing thoughts,” and place it on a leaf.

14. Without any struggle, thoughts arrive and depart.

15. Notice what it’s like to watch thoughts from this more
detached place, where you look at thoughts rather than from
thoughts.

16. After a few minutes of watching leaves float down the river,
bring your awareness back to your breath. Breathe deeply.

17. Begin to let go of this image, bringing your awareness back to

your sensations and surroundings in the present moment as
you open your eyes.

18. Can you carry this sense of awareness of thoughts as you

move through your day?

(Adapted from Hayes and Smith 2005)

<

The Problem with Trying to

Control Thinking
The alternative to either holding onto thoughts (ruminating) or flexibly
letting go of thoughts (accepting) is trying to rigidly stop thoughts (sup-
pressing). What are your beliefs about thoughts? Do you believe that you
must keep negative thoughts under surveillance? Deliberate attempts to
stop thinking are not effective. Notice what happens when you try not to
think about RED VELVET CUPCAKES. Trying not to think of RED
VELVET CUPCAKES is in fact a thought about red velvet cupcakes.
Suppression includes constant monitoring, or engaging with the thought,
preparing us to notice it more. Studies (e.g., Wegner 1994) have found that
suppression actually increases the frequency of the thought one is trying to
suppress and also increases the level of distress around the thought.

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Ironically, thought suppression both causes and maintains depression,

general anxiety, social anxiety, and obsessive-­compulsive disorder (Purdon
1999). How do you relate to your thoughts?
Do you ever try to suppress thoughts around food? Often, people who
diet try to suppress thoughts around food. This is counterproductive in the
end. In fact, suppressing food thoughts predicts food cravings and binge
eating (Barnes and Tantleff-­Dunn 2010). When energy is expended trying
to control thinking, less is available to regulate behaviors. Food may be a
way to escape from thoughts, especially if you are suppressing them and
then experiencing a whole family of the thought returning with more
strength and momentum. Alternatively, you may have some flexibility
around a thought. If you let go of trying to control thinking, paradoxically, you
retain control.

Accepting Thoughts
Interestingly, a helpful way to manage thinking is by accepting thoughts.
If you struggle with worry, it can be helpful to be willing to have worry
(Borkovec and Sharpless 2004). What would happen if you changed your
relationship with worry by noticing thoughts as events rather than alarms?
In one scientifically supported treatment, individuals who struggle with
painful intrusive thoughts are encouraged to sing their thoughts (Foa and
Wilson 2001)!
Imagine singing “There’s something really wrong with me” to the tune
of your favorite Beatles song. How would you feel? Now consider how you
would feel if your life’s purpose was to avoid facing that thought and you
also stopped moving toward what you care about because of the thought.
There are ways to change your relationship with both thoughts and the
stories you may tell yourself so that they do not govern your mind and body.

Reigning with RAIN

Many Buddhist teachers describe RAIN, a helpful mindfulness tool
that may promote sitting with thoughts as well as feelings or urges.

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R—­Recognize what is happening. Notice thoughts, feelings, and

sensations in this moment. What is happening now? This may be
a gentle reminder to return to this moment with curiosity and
openness.

A—­Accept or allow life as it is. This includes allowing thoughts,

emotions, and feelings. When you fully accept and stay in the
present moment, it’s not possible to ruminate, suppress, or judg-
mentally compare. Acceptance may be challenging when you
notice you face something aversive. You may ask yourself, “May I
sit with this in this moment?”

I—­Investigate inner experience. Investigation includes a sense of

nonjudgmental interest: “What thoughts am I buying into? What
am I feeling?” This requires slowing down rather than automati-
cally reacting. Rather than getting caught in the thought or feel-
ing, you’re noticing it and aware of subtle changes in your body:
“I’m having the thought that I can’t sit with this urge to eat. I
notice my mouth watering.” When investigating, there’s a quality
of kindness in your awareness, quite distinct from an “Oh no, not
again” attitude.

N—­Not identifying with the thought or feeling. You are not your
thoughts and feelings. Your sense of self is broader than the stories
of your mind. As in the exercise earlier in the chapter, you are the
paper—­larger than and distinct and separate from small and
impermanent sticky notes. When you perceive yourself as more
than transient thoughts, sensations, or desires, you have more
power to live with choice.

Jared’s Story
When Jared feels lonely and stressed after a long day of classes, he
often stops at a drug store and stocks up on chips and cookies.
When he doesn’t have plans or thinks he has little choice, if he
has intense thoughts around food, he feels as though he has to
eat. With practice, Jared begins to recognize thoughts, feelings,

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and sensations as he leaves his evening class and walks home. He

notices such thoughts as “I need to eat”; feelings including loneli-
ness and anxiety; and also tension in his body. He allows these
thoughts and feelings to pass without trying to indulge or get rid
of them. Upon slowing down, he investigates, discerning that this
is part of what his mind and body do after class when he feels
lonely and food thoughts arrive in his mind. Jared practices not
identifying with the thoughts. He doesn’t feel attached to them or
controlled by them; he simply notices thoughts and feelings and
practices expanding his awareness to notice where he is in the
moment, the temperature in the air, people walking on the street,
and his breath. By expanding his awareness, he notices the full
landscape of his experience instead of developing tunnel vision
around a particular sticky thought.

Exercise: Practice RAIN

Describe a situation where you feel caught up in your thoughts
and apply RAIN.

R—­What do you recognize in this moment?

A—­How are you practicing acceptance?

I—­How might you nonjudgmentally investigate your experience?

N—­How might you expand your natural awareness to not define

yourself by thoughts or feelings?
<

Summary
Marcus Aurelius said, “The soul becomes dyed with the color of its
thoughts.” The main problem with thinking is when we fail to see the

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process of thinking as just that—­thinking. Similarly, it’s helpful to also

notice that feelings are feelings and that remembering is just remembering.
This is the benefit in practicing mindfulness. You can remember that
thoughts are thoughts, not actions or facts. A lot of suffering arises when
you narrow your awareness and get lost in the painful stories in your mind.
Watch the children play in your mind’s playground with kindness and
perspective. You can’t choose what arrives in your mind, though you can
choose how you pay attention to internal events and also how you respond.
If you host a party and some unwanted guests arrive, would you rather
spend the night consumed with anger about the party crashers, watching
them roam from room to room, or enjoying the rest of the party and con-
versing with people you care about? You can better enjoy life’s party when
you’re not weighed down trying to control unwanted visitors who may
actually leave, if you neither taunt them nor seat them, after a few
minutes.

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 Chapter 7

Coping with Difficult

Emotions without a
Second Helping

Things falling apart is a kind of testing and also a kind of

healing. We think that the point is to pass the test or to
overcome the problem, but the truth is that things don’t
really get solved. They come together and they fall apart.
Then they come together and fall apart again. It’s just like
that. The healing comes from letting there be room for all of
this to happen: room for grief, for relief, for misery, for joy.
—Pema Chödrön

Y
ou are sitting in a brightly decorated ice cream parlor. Your friend
owns the dessert bar; it’s his store’s first anniversary party, and you
are feeling remarkably anxious as you greet a crowd of sweet-­
toothed strangers. Waiters offer you a milkshake to drink and you’re
encouraged to line up for ice cream. Vanilla lavender, green tea, Belgian
chocolate—­the options seem endless. You may either drink the milkshake
or refuse it, but it looks like you’ll need to participate in the ice cream tast-
ing. If you drink the milkshake, will you eat more or less ice cream? Will
End Emotional Eating

you choose a lighter option or go for multiple scoops? Put yourself in the
situation: what would you do?
In a 1975 study, researchers C. Peter Herman and Debbie Mack told
women they were analyzing “taste” and offered them the choice of con-
suming zero, one, or two milkshakes. Later, the women were allowed to eat
as much ice cream as they wanted. Unbeknownst to the participants, this
study actually looked at eating habits rather than taste. For the most part,
women who had the milkshakes ate less ice cream during the “taste test.”
This makes sense, given that they may have felt satiated by having had
some ice cream in the milkshake. However, the women who were on diets
ate more ice cream after they consumed a milkshake. Researchers call this
the “disinhibition effect.” People who try to limit what they eat may feel
quite guilty, paradoxically prompting them to actually eat more. In other
words, you engage in a behavior, feel bad, and end up engaging in more
behaviors that may make you feel worse. Also, if you eat for emotional
reasons, you may continue to eat to avoid experiencing emotions. Eating
even serves as a way to cope with negative emotions that arise from eating
(Herman and Polivy 2004).
Now add intense emotions to the scenario. When you feel intensely,
break a diet rule, and experience more intense emotions around eating,
this may culminate in more emotions and more eating. In this chapter, you
will learn ways to cope with intense emotions without reacting impulsively
or reaching for more ice cream after you drink a milkshake.

Impulse: Do Bad Moods Make for

Bad Decisions?
On a rational level, adding up impulsive behaviors or making mood-­driven
decisions makes little sense. However, emotionally, you may notice the
tendency or drive to engage in impulsive behaviors when you experience
negative emotions.
Numerous patients over the years have told me they “self-­sabotage”
and believe that this tendency to engage in self-­defeating behaviors derives
from an unconscious desire to fail. Is this really the case? When we con-
sider what happens when we respond to difficult emotions with risky

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 Coping with Difficult Emotions without a Second Helping

behavior, this impulsivity makes sense, even in the absence of complicated

analytical theories.
Often, when we are upset, we may deliberately choose to pursue a risky
behavior because we have placed a premium on ridding ourselves of a diffi-
cult emotion. For example, in the face of loneliness, people may resort to
calling a complicated ex in hopes of zapping the loneliness of the moment.
In negative mood states, the focus is often myopic, with your attention on
the goal “Get me out of here.” You might fail to consider how you may feel
the day after you spend time with the ex—­or how you may feel if your
advance is unreciprocated. When you face a difficult emotion, such as lone-
liness, you may find yourself so determined to rid yourself of that feeling that
you don’t really think through the costs of such briefly distracting behavior.
We don’t wish to “self-­sabotage”; we wish to “self-­soothe” and “feel
better,” yet the ways we do so—­nonacceptance of emotions and impulsive
behavior—­actually make us feel worse over time. When people are in a
bad mood, they are more likely to engage in risky behavior. In a study,
when participants felt embarrassed, they were more likely to participate in
a high-­risk, high-­payoff lottery than a low-­risk, low-­payoff option (Leith
and Baumeister 1996). In choosing a high-­risk choice, you face a reduced
chance that you may actually win money and escape a negative mood. You
also face the increased chance that you won’t win anything and will end
up feeling worse than when you began.
Negative emotions are not the problem—­they are emblematic of being
alive. It’s what you do when they arrive that can create unnecessary pain.
Nonacceptance is the culprit again! As explored in chapter 2, nonaccep-
tance increases emotional suffering. Now, we’re expanding our under-
standing, and clarifying emotions may not be as problematic as
nonacceptance of the emotion and the behaviors symptomatic of nonac-
ceptance. These behaviors—­calling the ex or grabbing the spoon—­are
what actually make things worse.

Poor Mood, Poor Thinking

Often, negative mood states affect thinking. It is helpful to keep this
in mind given what we know about the tendency for moods to affect
impulsive behaviors. Psychologists who measure intelligence take into

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account the fact that when someone is notably depressed or anxious, IQ

scores fall. This again reflects the concept that “emotion mind” is distinct
from “reasonable mind.”
In one study (Baumeister, Nuss, and Twenge 2002), researchers con-
vincingly (and falsely) told participants that they would end up alone later
in life, then had them take intelligence tests, to look at the effect the
thought of being alone (a disturbing notion for most people) has on intelli-
gence. Participants scored significantly below their capacity on measures of
intelligence after hearing the depressing prediction made. The authors the-
orize that the subjects’ spending mental energy suppressing feelings or rumi-
nating on being alone made less mental energy available for other tasks.
When we’re struggling with notably difficult feelings, such as those
engendered by the thought “I will end up alone,” it can be important to
remember to consciously slow down. Otherwise, your energy may be
depleted managing your emotions, and your thinking may not be helpful
in problem solving. A client of mine described a police officer pulling her
over for erratic driving, assuming that she was drunk. Her friend had just
tragically and unexpectedly died. There was no alcohol in her system, but
sorrow similarly steered her thinking away from the road.
The combination of painful emotions, difficulty sitting with emotions,
and urgency to escape feelings while thinking unintelligently may thus
lead to impulsive actions—­and yet more painful feelings.

Nonacceptance:
Negative Emotion


Difficulty accepting
emotion



Distress: Eventually Unwillingness:
experience negative Inability to sit with the
feelings and consequences feeling
from behavior
Escape: 


Behavior to
avoid feelings;
less-than-clear
thinking
Figure 4: Cycle of Suffering

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 Coping with Difficult Emotions without a Second Helping

Grace: Pain with Poise

In any emotional situation we face, there is an opportunity to cope with
emotions with grace. I love the word “grace.” It implies willingness and
wisdom; quite different than “impulse.” We all face the choice of accept-
ing reality or emotions with grace or trying to escape our feelings, perhaps
through indulging our impulses.
One of the main premises of this book, and the essence of much of the
research that supports the ideas we’ve reviewed, is that people who strug-
gle with difficult feelings tend to use food to cope. In this chapter, you’ll
learn to slow down around difficult emotions with graceful action. When
you accept pain, you suffer less. When you avoid pain, you exacerbate it
and experience secondary emotions and may engage in problematic
behaviors that create more pain.

What Is Distress Tolerance?

Distress tolerance refers to the ability to accept and cope well with dif-
ficult emotions given that we can’t avoid pain and that impulsive behav-
iors will increase pain (Linehan 1993b). Distress tolerance refers to both
your perception of your ability to sit with physical or emotional pain and
also the behavior of tolerating difficult feelings (Leyro, Zvolensky, and
Bernstein 2010).
When I say “your perception,” I don’t mean you need a mass of confi-
dence. As reviewed in the last chapter, the five letters in the phrase “I
can’t” won’t thwart you unless you let a couple of words govern your mind
and body. You may instead hold on lightly to stories about what you are
and are not capable of and commit to thoughtfully acting consistently
with your values. Of course, this feels challenging, and it requires skill and
practice.

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Exercise: Examples of Difficulties

with Distress Tolerance
If you are wondering whether you struggle with sitting with
intense emotions, use this checklist to help you consider your
thoughts and feelings surrounding them. Do you agree with any of
the following statements?

 My feelings overwhelm me.

 I can’t accept painful emotions.

 I can’t stop thinking about my problems or painful feelings.

 When I feel strongly, I lose control and act very impulsively.

 I notice I go from feeling bad to feeling terrible because of the

way I cope.

 I am embarrassed by my intense feelings.

 No one else feels the way I do.

 Distracting myself from an emotion is better than feeling it.

<

In the preceding checklist, notice the relationship between difficulties

with distress tolerance and not accepting emotions or coping with them
flexibly. A lot of what we have explored in previous chapters acts as foun-
dational steps in the complex dance of distress tolerance. In the dance of
distress tolerance, steps include acceptance, mindfulness, noticing emo-
tions, and surfing urges. Distress tolerance is impossible without cultivat-
ing mindfulness in order to notice emotions, notice urges, and accept
pain. You can’t prevent a crisis from building without awareness and
acceptance. Also, since distress tolerance has to do with your perception
of your ability to cope, it’s helpful to bring a lot of awareness to your
thoughts. Finally, awareness of your values (which we’ll discuss in chapter
9) and commitment to the values you choose sets your range of responses.

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After all, behaviors you might engage in while in emotional distress are
problematic when they move you away from what matters to you.
How is distress tolerance any different from emotion regulation? In
both cases, again, each step requires mindfulness. Emotion regulation
applies to the ordinary experience of emotion; distress tolerance pertains
to emotions that feel extraordinarily overwhelming. Distress tolerance
requires all the tools you’ve learned in previous chapters. Emotion regula-
tion requires coordination; the choreography of distress tolerance is trick-
ier and the music less melodious. A greater degree of pain requires more
precise coordination, and later in this chapter you’ll learn that the coordi-
nation required is actually a graceful slowing down.
When you notice emotions that are high (say, above 7 on a scale of 1
to 10, where 10 is extremely intense), this is when you know distress toler-
ance is needed. It can be challenging to notice emotions and consider how
strongly you feel, given that emotions climb quickly.

Exercise: Noticing Intense Emotions

Reflect back on this week or your recent history and notice for a
moment situations where your emotions felt overwhelming. In
addition to noticing the emotion, you can also bring to mind
urges associated with the experience. Next, you can note how you
feel now about either engaging in the action associated with the
strong emotion or choosing to surf the action urge.
For example, looking back on the week, you notice feeling
anxiety at the level of 8 when thinking about having to give a
presentation at work. Your urge included overeating and procras-
tinating, and you both binged and procrastinated on the task by
surfing the Internet for hours. Now, you feel aware that those
behaviors did not serve you, as you had to stay up all night and felt
sick to your stomach, making it more difficult to prepare and
present.
In noticing, you are not judging—you are simply noticing
with the wisdom of perspective which actions intense emotions
move you away from or toward.

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1. Describe the situation.

2. What was the emotion, and how intense was it, on a scale of
1 to 10, with 10 being extremely intense?

3. What action urges did you experience? What actual actions

did you take?

4. What are your nonjudgmental thoughts and feelings on the

actions you took?

Every person experiences emotions uniquely. One person’s

heartache may feel like heartbreak to another. Here we are talk-
ing about how you feel, not what you perceive as “normal.” Some
people describe feeling overwhelmed and impulsive when facing
extraordinarily positive emotions, such as joy or love, as well as
negative ones. When emotions feel overwhelming to you, you
might need to focus on tolerating distress by practicing accep-
tance and self-­soothing as a first step in preparation for regulating
emotions. Opposite action, noticing interpretations, confronting
a friend about a disagreement, or practicing a formal mindful
meditation of the breath often feels impossible in the midst of an
emotional avalanche, when the mind races aimlessly. Distress tol-
erance allows you to recharge before reacting.
<

Distress Tolerance and

Emotional Eating
If you believe that you cannot cope with difficult emotions and
urgently want to get rid of pain, then understandably you may overly rely
on eating. You want an instant emotional fix; food is an instant source of
both distraction and pleasure—­it’s everywhere. This is a recipe for eating
to cope. Relying on eating to cope with emotions may interfere with culti-
vating alternative ways to cope, and lack of coping tools maintains

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problematic eating. Notice (as reviewed in earlier chapters) that how what
we use to solve a problem often maintains the struggle. Emotional eating
is like trying to lift the stain of a pen with a thick, permanent marker.

Practicing Distress Tolerance

So far, we’ve explored how difficulty sitting with extraordinary emotions
can lead to behaviors that actually make things worse over time. If crises
are maintained by nonacceptance of emotions and resulting behaviors,
distress tolerance entails learning to slow down to accept what is and at
the same time learning to improve the moment in the absence of crisis-­
generating behaviors (Linehan 1993b). You can’t control thoughts and
feelings, though you can choose how you greet them.
You may apply distress tolerance in all of the following scenarios:

1. Sitting with overwhelming emotions

2. Coping with emotions that arise in response to behaviors

you’ve engaged in

3. Accepting the pain that stems from letting go of routine

behaviors

For example, when you feel jealous of a friend who seems to enjoy all
life’s riches, you may practice distress tolerance to sit with those feelings. If
you did not practice distress tolerance at that point, and you impulsively
overate, you may practice distress tolerance to cope with both your feel-
ings of envy and your guilt around eating. At any point, you may practice
distress tolerance in sitting with the discomfort of not engaging in an urge.
Many people understandably struggle with overwhelming feelings,
thoughts, and sensations when changing routine behaviors. If you give up
smoking, you may similarly practice distress tolerance in sitting with dif-
ficult feelings when they arise. You can also practice distress tolerance if
you do smoke a cigarette, to help you stop before you smoke a pack. And
of course distress tolerance is needed to cope with the discomfort of nico-
tine withdrawal.

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Gia’s Story
Gia is a mother of hyperactive twins with learning disabilities.
She often finds herself flooded with irritation. Often, she finds
binge eating the only activity she can engage in to cope with her
frustration when the boys refuse to do their homework and whine.
She finds herself angry about feeling impatient and turning to
eating. Then she feels sad about overeating and feeling fat and
“out of control.” When she feels overwhelmingly sad, she’s unable
to help the boys with their homework and retreats to her room,
saying she is unwell. Then she feels anxious about being a “neglect-
ful” mom and goes to bed, asking her babysitter to take charge,
then snacks more the next morning. “Why bother trying?” she
ruminates. “I’m angry, lazy, and out of control.”
In learning distress tolerance in therapy, Gia learned that
coping with overwhelming emotions was not an all-­or-­nothing
feat. She committed to practicing accepting the irritation that
inevitably arose. When she didn’t catch herself judging her emo-
tions and exacerbating them, but ate for emotional reasons, she
practiced soothing herself in ways that were helpful in getting her
back to the boys before she retreated to her room. She found that
rubbing her forehead with a cold towel she sprayed with a eucalyp-
tus scent was a refreshing and quick break that didn’t get in the
way of her values as a mom. Gia described feeling empowered,
knowing that her emotions would not dictate her action, which
challenged her long-­ held belief that “experiencing emotions
equals being snatched by them.” She became more flexible, notic-
ing contentedly times she did not retreat after eating but stayed
present with the boys.

At any point, practicing distress tolerance might save you from emo-
tional quicksand. And the way you practice distress tolerance is similar to
the way you might get out of quicksand—­slow, deliberate movements.

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Acceptance: Practice
Negative Emotion


awareness and acceptance
of the emotion



Choose Grace: Willingness:
Actively practice Practice opening
acceptance and yourself up to sitting
self-soothing with discomfort

Notice:


Slow down to
observe urges to eat
or to avoid, and also
to bring awareness to
what you value

Figure 5: Cycle of Self-­Compassionate Slowing Down

Tools to Tolerate Distress

Coping with a crisis can feel like standing on your head. Interestingly,
in order to stand on your head, you actually bear no weight on your head.
Grounding your forearms and engaging your abdomen, back, mind, and
breath provide full support to carry your weight upside down. Similarly, in
a crisis situation, connecting with your breath, core values, and mindful-
ness skills is more effective than deliberately applying pressure with your
head. You cannot think your way out of a crisis. You can possess the wis-
dom to know it’s time to engage all your tools until you are in a mind state
conducive to problem solving.
Now, let’s review specific skills to cope with a crisis with grace, just as
you’d engage all your muscles intelligently to stand on your head. Many of
these skills are based on Marsha Linehan’s (1993b) teachings on distress
tolerance, and thousands of people have found these strategies remarkably
helpful. Distress tolerance skills entail a complete synthesis of accepting
and soothing.

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Accountability
Many thoughtful people over the years have asked me why we focus
on soothing if soothing may serve as a distraction. Is soothing the same as
avoiding? While soothing may feel distracting, functionally, it’s different
from avoiding. You’re not running away or escaping your feelings. Rather,
you notice pain, accept pain, and mindfully choose to take care of yourself
in the service of moving forward. You may think of using soothing skills as
making a pit stop: it’s a needed pause but not a final destination. Also keep
in mind that employing these tools throughout your travels may facilitate
your traveling well. This is analogous to stopping for gas on a journey or
taking a moment to catch your breath. If you’re participating in athletic
training, you should train in a way that allows you to move forward each
day; train too hard and you risk injury.
This may also be a matter of degree. For example, if you feel really sad
and choose to take a break from your obligations, listening to a couple of
peppy songs may be soothing. Listening to music for forty minutes, how-
ever, may entail avoidance. If you feel lonely and want to soothe yourself
and feel connected, you might check your e-mail for twenty minutes.
Checking your e-mail and surfing the Internet for hours and “forgetting”
about the Pilates class you signed up for is clearly avoidance. Taking a nap
after a red-eye serves as self-­care, and this differs from sleeping for hours
during the day to escape sad feelings. Similarly, eating may invigorate or
fatigue, depending on the portion. Soothing as a distress tolerance tool
requires mindfully noticing and honestly holding yourself accountable: is
this moving you toward or away from what matters?
Accountability is relevant to distress tolerance skills, given that engag-
ing in a “soothing” behavior can get you further stuck in distress.
Procrastinating, overeating, compulsive spending, and pursuing promiscu-
ous sex exemplify the ways “escapes” escort us toward crises.

Acceptance Revisited
As discussed throughout this book, acceptance and willingness are
essential in coping with both ordinary emotions and extraordinarily dif-
ficult ones, as well as with urges of all magnitudes. Now, we’ll explore

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additional opportunities to practice acceptance; opportunities that often

feel challenging in a crisis.

Accepting Food Cravings

Evan Forman and his colleagues (2007) at Drexel University studied
ninety-­eight college students who described enjoying chocolate. The stu-
dents were given a clear box of Hershey’s Kisses and told not to eat them
and to return them to the experimenters after forty-­eight hours. (One of
the reasons this example is in this section is because seeing a chocolate in
a store may spur urges; imagine the cravings you’d encounter in carrying
chocolate on you for two days!)
The experimenters cleverly marked each chocolate so they would
know if someone replaced the chocolates with ones from the store. The
students were told that the purpose of the study was to learn more about
how people cope with “forbidden” foods. Next, students were randomly
divided into three groups—­one group received tips on coping by changing
thoughts about eating; one was given lessons on acceptance; and the third
group received no training. Students in the coping group learned ways to
try to control cravings through distracting themselves or changing
thoughts that came up around the need to eat the forbidden chocolate. In
the acceptance group, students learned that trying to control urges to eat
the chocolate wouldn’t be helpful. Rather, they might notice their experi-
ence with mindfulness and willingness. The students who did not receive
any training were simply told to try not to eat the chocolate. The accep-
tance training was associated with better outcomes for people who were
most sensitive to intense food cravings.
The aim in practicing acceptance is to recognize that trying to control
an unwanted experience is not helpful. Far better is an increased awareness
around sensations and the willingness to sit with everything that may arise.
Accepting food cravings includes not doing anything to directly control
foods you encounter, and also not actively trying to experience urges less.
In crises, we face urges to seek quick fixes to change our mood. When
you face urges, are you fighting, trying to think your way out, or giving in?
Often people try to think their way out of cravings and rationalize indulg-
ing, or they mindlessly consume. Acceptance when urges arise requires
less effort yet brings more benefit.

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Accepting Setbacks
Failing to accept setbacks means facing more setbacks. G. Alan
Marlatt coined the term abstinence violation effect to describe the way
attributing a setback to some internal factor, such as something wrong
with you beyond your control, and thinking of setbacks in all-­or-­nothing
terms both lead to relapse (Marlatt and Gordon 1985). For example, if you
decide that eating cake reflects your weakness, and if you consider a slice
as sinful as a full cake, you are more likely to finish off the cake; you’ve
really put yourself in a hopeless place. Alternatively, you may kindly notice
that behaviors aren’t all or none, then notice the ways you make sense of
the action. You may notice that the cake looked really good and remind
yourself that a bite is not a whole cake. Failing to accept your human fal-
libility and concluding that you are “out of control” can lead to giving up.
The abstinence violation effect nicely explains why the dieters we
started this chapter with ate more ice cream and why eating may lead to
more eating. If someone struggles with alcohol, has a drink, and decides
that he is a failure and weak, he may drink more. Accepting setbacks and
noticing thoughts is an alternative to holding rigid standards of self-­
discipline. Both self-­soothing (as we will explore in the pages to come) and
accepting your feelings, thoughts, and urges when you’ve slipped will help
you take a step forward.

Accepting Hunger
Of course, depriving yourself of regular meals is unkind, unhelpful,
and inconsistent with the message of this book. However, people often
struggle with feeling afraid of experiencing any hunger. People may eat for
emotional reasons due to fear of or unwillingness to accept the possibility
of facing hunger. Many people who struggle with emotional eating per-
ceive hunger in all-­or-­nothing terms, associating mild hunger with tre-
mendous discomfort. The failure to accept hunger might maintain
emotional eating. Judith Beck (2007) suggests purposely skipping a meal
to keep track of the actual discomfort experienced rather than getting
stuck in hypothetical, catastrophic fears.
However, if you are in the middle of overwhelming emotions, do not
skip a meal if you can help it. If you are struggling with emotions and, for

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whatever reason, you are unable to get something to eat, you may at this
point practice accepting hunger until food is available.
At times, I find myself booked for hours and hours with patients. I
generally prefer to eat every few hours. However, when I am unable to eat
due to a combination of poor planning and clinical duties, I find that
accepting my feelings rather than either fighting or obsessing is more help-
ful in sitting with hunger and participating in the moment.

Costs and Benefits

In a crisis, as research reviewed earlier in the chapter points to, accept-
ing both the costs and the benefits of a behavior is a challenge, as we tend
to focus on the here and now rather than long-­term goals. In practicing
accepting both costs and benefits, you slow down to notice that any behav-
ior you choose has pros and cons.
If you notice that you tend to pursue the same behavior repeatedly
when you face intense emotions, you may consider writing out the benefits
and costs of the behavior at a time when you are in a reasonable state of
mind (Linehan 1993b). For example, a benefit of emotional eating might
be distraction, while a cost might be extra calories. A benefit of sitting
with emotions (not engaging in emotional eating) is building a sense of
mastery, while a cost may be discomfort. It is helpful to specify whether a
benefit or cost affects you in the short term or long term.

Exercise: Considering Costs

and Benefits
Identify a specific behavior that you experience urges to engage in
when you experience intense emotions, then list the benefits and
costs of engaging in that behavior and of not engaging in that
behavior. For example, you may list the benefits and costs of emo-
tional eating and then the benefits and costs of sitting with emo-
tions. Next to each benefit or cost, you may note an S if the effect
of the behavior is short term, or an L if the behavior affects you in
the long term.
<

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Soothing
One of the most helpful ways to stop engaging in mood-driven or
impulsive behaviors is to thoughtfully soothe yourself in a strategic man-
ner. In fact, one of the main tools to tolerate overwhelming distress is
learning self-­soothing (Linehan 1993a, 1993b). Thinking clearly while you
feel strongly is a challenge. You may want to think about and productively
plan soothing activities to cope ahead for a time when you may face over-
whelming emotions. To soothe, you may need to do the opposite of feel-
ings of engaging in impulse. Soothing is a step between emotion and
emotional action that allows you to alleviate some distress without creat-
ing more problems.
In general, it’s helpful to try to soothe mindfully, one moment at a time.
If you immerse yourself in a warm bubble bath with burning candles on
the rim of your tub and ruminate on your failures over the past decade,
how helpful is that? When you face intense emotions, accepting the emo-
tions moment to moment is the only way to cope well. Anticipating, “I’ll
feel this way forever,” adds a lot of unjustified pain.
You may soothe by purposefully bringing your attention to naturally
occurring pleasant events you may have overlooked. It’s hard to relish the
fun stuff when we are weighed down by emotions. After a stressful day, I
noticed that a gym instructor played a song I loved years ago and hadn’t
heard in a while: hello, four minutes of bliss. (This example isn’t especially
notable, though it did entail my taking note.) A potential challenge we all
face when we experience momentary joy involves wanting the event to
last. Please play my song three more times! Oh no, it’s coming to an end!
It’s also important to soothe with a number of activities. If you planned
a trip to Miami for a week, would you plan only to swim at the beach?
What if it rains? Just as a trip may be most enjoyable when you consider a
full scope of pleasures, so too practicing soothing with a range of options
is effective. If you fear flying, and you rely on music and food to soothe,
and as you take off the steward instructs you to turn off your music, and
you didn’t have time to purchase food at the airport, you may panic. Build
a reservoir of options. Learn to soothe yourself with all your senses
(Linehan 1993b).

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Sound
Noticing sound diverts your attention from difficult emotions. You
may notice sounds of nature, such as birds, wind, and rain. You may listen
to a soothing voice or the sound of your own breath. Many people find
listening to music a soothing activity. Music may calm, comfort, excite, or
organize us. Music may even have therapeutic potential for people with a
range of neurological conditions, animating people who struggle with
Parkinson’s disease and relaxing people disoriented by Alzheimer’s or
schizophrenia (Sacks 2007). When soothing through music, remember to
select music that soothes rather than music that amplifies your current
mood.

Sight
There are countless ways to move your focus away from suffering
within to notice the soothing sights around you. You may consider looking
at photographs of loved ones, noticing people around you, appreciating
nature, or observing art or architecture. When I find myself on stalled
subways, bringing attention to the people on the train relaxes me, while
worrying and tensing increases my panic.

Touch
From the time we are born, touch is essential in soothing us; it even
affects human development. Soothing yourself by massaging your hands or
getting a massage, wearing soft, comfortable clothes, enjoying the sensa-
tion of a warm bath, applying lotion, playing with pets, rubbing sore mus-
cles with a topical relaxant, holding a stress ball, feeling your feet grounded
on the floor and your seat in your chair, placing a warm washcloth on your
face—­ there are endless creative options. The website www.officeplay
ground.com is one of many stress ball retailers. If you search the Internet,
you’ll find stress balls that emit an aromatherapy scent. Many of my clients
who struggle with overwhelming emotions find that holding an ice cube as
it melts provides a distraction from painful thoughts and urges. The ice
may not feel soothing so much as it escorts your attention from your mind
to present sensation—and that in itself may feel like a break.

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Exercise: Frozen Orange

First, freeze an orange and leave it in the freezer until needed.
Then, in a situation where you feel overwhelming emotions, if it’s
possible, start by noticing and labeling your emotions and their
intensities as well as your urges, as described in the Noticing
Intense Emotions exercise earlier in the chapter. Then, take the
frozen orange in your hand.

1. How does the orange feel in your hand? You may notice the
temperature and texture. You can squeeze it as you would
squeeze a ball. You may notice the smell. What do you notice
about its appearance?

2. If you notice your mind wander, can you return to the orange
in your hand?

You may sit holding the orange for a few minutes and then
pursue other ways to self-soothe, or notice whether your urges
shift as you contact the present moment by attending to the
orange with your full awareness.
<

Taste
We all know that bringing our attention away from our minds to
pleasant tastes may alleviate pain. We commonly soothe ourselves with
comfort foods. Are there other ways to savor taste? You may simply notice
flavor in a cup of tea. Personally, as I am writing, I am taking breaks to sip
cinnamon spice tea. A flavorful ginger chew, mint, or kumquat may also
be a subtle way to move your attention from your mind to your tongue.
Which tastes can you think of that may bring you to the moment but don’t
lead to emotional eating?

Smell
Taking time to smell a scented candle, your favorite perfume, flowers,
wood burning in the fireplace, aromatherapy oils, and other scents can

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 Coping with Difficult Emotions without a Second Helping

ground you in the moment. Be aware, though, that some scents may exac-
erbate your pain. For example, you may notice that certain smells such as
the cologne of a lost loved one or the scent of chocolate may move you
toward sadness or intense urges. Can you think of scents that may be help-
ful to you?

Exercise: Scented Spa Towel

Soak a small towel or washcloth in a bowl of one cup cold water
and two drops eucalyptus oil, then neatly roll the towel and place
it in a resealable bag in your refrigerator.

1. In a time of difficult emotions when you seek comfort food in

your refrigerator, notice and rate your emotions and urges,
using the Noticing Intense Emotions exercise found earlier in
this chapter.

2. Take out your towel and place it on your face.

3. While continuing to notice your emotions, bring your aware-

ness to the sensation of the cold, scented towel on your face.
Notice the feeling and the scent. Inhale deeply and exhale
fully. You may place the towel on your forehead or toes or the
back of your neck and bring your attention to breathing
deeply as you notice any sensations.

4. After self-­soothing with the towel, rate your current emotions

and current urges. Did they increase? Decrease? Stay the
same? Did self-­soothing help you move away from engaging in
any impulsive behaviors?
<

Beyond soothing yourself with your senses, you may also cope with
difficult feelings by getting active, eating wisely, seeking meaning, giving,
cheerleading yourself, praying, and seeking support.

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End Emotional Eating

Get Active
Getting active can shift your attention away from entrapping thoughts.
If you feel intense sadness and move your attention from thoughts about
your worth to gardening or reading for a short period of time, your per-
spective may shift. Remember, changing your behavior changes your
brain! Exercise you enjoy may serve as a fantastically meaningful activity
if it falls under treating yourself kindly and taking a break from your mind.

Eat Wisely
Glucose provides fuel to your brain. Low blood glucose is linked to
poor self-­control, and restoring glucose to a sufficient level is one way to
increase self-­control (Gailliot and Baumeister 2007). Eating slowly and
wisely when you face physiological hunger is an important step in coping
with overwhelming emotions. If you know you will face a situation prompt-
ing strong feelings, you may pack a healthy snack to both reduce vulnera-
bility caused by hunger and improve hunger-­ weakened self-­ control
(Linehan 1993b).

Seek Meaning
Finding meaning in pain may facilitate acceptance and willingness
(e.g., Linehan 1993b). If you frame pain as something you experience in
the service of living according to your values rather than simply as pain,
you may change your relationship with your experience. Moving away
from emotional eating may not be a deprivation as much as an opportu-
nity to live according to the path you choose.
All people experience a deep sense of imperfection. If I asked you to
simply experience others noticing your flaws, you might feel quite dis-
traught. If you are someone who deeply values relationships with others—­
including, perhaps, parenting—­you may find meaning in your experience
of pain as something that actually connects you—­because it allows you to
empathize with others, as we all feel imperfect at times. Would you be will-
ing to sit with this sense that something is not completely right with you,
so that when your child came home with this feeling, you’d really get it?

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Finding meaning requires both mindfulness and flexible thinking. In

Man’s Search for Meaning, a powerful book on this topic, Viktor Frankl
(1959) uses the example of a man mourning the unexpected death of his
wife. In finding meaning for this tragedy, he noticed and accepted his
pain. The widower appreciated that in his wife’s dying first, she was spared
outliving him, which would have caused her tremendous pain. Loving
means losing. This widower, then, found meaning in seeing his loss as a
contribution to his wife. She did not die alone and would therefore be
spared the pain of widowhood. How have you found meaning in disap-
pointing or painful experiences?

Give
Moving your attention from your pain to an awareness of others may
serve as an opportunity to practice both mindfulness and meaningfully
contributing to the lives of those around you (Linehan 1993b). If you face
sadness over a job loss or simply feel depressed, noticing your sadness,
accepting and acknowledging your feelings, and giving yourself permission
to bring your attention outside yourself to someone else may not make you
feel better, but it may help you live bigger. You cultivate a more expansive
awareness.
A psychologist I adore struggled with heroin abuse and suicidal
thoughts earlier in his life. He recalls that the only job he could find was
bathing people with developmental disabilities. At the time, he thought of
himself from a narrow vantage point, believing his being alive was causing
people pain. In bathing others, he could shift his awareness from what was
wrong with him to this other person, and this moment, rather than his
own painful emotional conclusions. In a moment of bathing a person
mindfully, he accepted his pain and for the first time saw he could actually
live in a way that mattered (K. Wilson 2010):

I spent so many years dead certain that I was a drain on the uni-
verse. Getting near me would wear you out and cause you dam-
age. The closer you got, the more damage you would take. Mostly
people did not realize it until it was too late, but eventually they
always did. That was the story I inhabited…

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End Emotional Eating

But there on my knees, in that steamy bathroom, I found

myself useful. I did not know that I could be useful. And, I cannot
express how much it meant to me on that day, in that bathroom,
on my knees, finding myself useful. And, now, remembering it all,
my eyes fill with tears of gratitude.

It’s helpful to remember that, in giving, you’re not minimizing your

pain or judging yourself or others. You are expanding your focus and get-
ting out of minding and into living.

Cheerlead
Remember, distress tolerance relates to your perception of your ability
to cope with distress. When emotions overwhelm you, notice distressing
thoughts, and kindly support yourself the way you might offer support to
someone else you care about. A wise client of mine noticed reminding
herself after twenty years of struggling with obesity and continuing to try
new programs and diets that saying “I don’t give up” is a fantastic alterna-
tive to getting caught in “I’ve tried everything” or “Nothing works.” You
may also cheer yourself along by bringing awareness to times you struggled
and coped well (Linehan 1993b). The point isn’t to develop false confi-
dence or replace “bad” thoughts with “good” ones. This is about cultivat-
ing an environment that is helpful to moving forward according to what
you value. You may think of a couple of inspiring quotes or phrases such
as “Breathe deeply and live fully” and “One moment at a time.” I love
Eleanor Roosevelt’s recommendation, “Do one thing every day that scares
you.”

Pray
Taking a moment to open your heart to pray to a higher power can
facilitate coping (Linehan 1993b). And you need not subscribe to a par-
ticular faith to do it: the wise psychologist mentioned above, Kelly Wilson,
describes himself as an atheist who prays. Any prayer consistent with
acceptance is helpful. You’re not praying for pain to go away; rather, you
may pray for the courage to accept or connect with truth or wisdom.

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Prayer may promote healing in a time of suffering. Through the practice of

prayer, you may develop faith that possibility exists. Prayer provides a sense
that you are not alone—­you are connected either with the divine or with
a wise place within. When despair creeps up, prayer illuminates.
In a time of distress, you may pray for others who struggle, shifting
your focus away from yourself to attend to another, which might feel quite
meaningful. Praying for another synthesizes the skill of giving with the
practice of praying. In times of distress, remembering that you are part of
a shared humanity feels comforting. There have been times I have felt
alone in my pain, and when I brought to mind and considered others simi-
larly struggling, and I devoted attention to wishing them freedom from
suffering, I noticed myself feeling both more connected and less caught in
my perception of my own pain.

Seek Support
Social support is a huge buffer against stress and can be quite powerful
in a time of pain. You may gather support by calling a friend, meeting with
a psychologist, attending a support group, calling a helpline, listening to
messages on your voicemail from people you care about, or thinking about
people you care about. Of course, certain “supports” may exacerbate stress.
Consider what sorts of support may feel most helpful in your specific situ-
ation. We’ll spend more time on relationships in the next chapter.

Preparing a Graceful Plan for Soothing

As we all know, coping when emotions engulf us can feel impossible.
Doing what you can now in preparation for the time when emotions and
urges feel overpowering will increase your ability to cope well.
You may start by thinking about collecting mementos to keep with
you that will help you access mindfulness and wisdom as you move through
the day. You may also prepare similar reminders that you keep in your
home. You may prepare different coping plans depending on the emo-
tional experience, as you may cope with urges to eat and with feelings of

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profound fear differently. Collectively, these meaningful objects, spaces,

and practices of using them are called soothing savers.
Claudia carried with her a small toiletry case to help her with emo-
tional eating. Inside were a couple of important photos, several inspiring
quotes, a meditation bracelet, a list of the pros and cons of emotional eat-
ing, a small laminated pie chart of her values (which we will review in
chapter 9), a pleasing scent, a strong mint, a low-­sugar granola bar for
physical hunger, and a list of alternative activities she finds helpful. She
also created a list of inspiring songs to listen to while breathing. At home,
when she felt urges to eat for emotional reasons, she went to a corner she
had set up in her home office where she had a comfy chair, a small desktop
fountain to watch and listen to, a display of greeting cards she had saved,
a whiteboard she used for her gratitude list to challenge her sense of depri-
vation, a list of helpful activities to pursue at home, and another list of
costs and benefits around ordering take-out.
Each of us is unique in what we find soothing. For this technique to
be helpful, your reminders to accept and soothe rather than fight and act
impulsively need to be specific to you.

Exercise: Gathering Soothing Savers

Spend some time identifying situations likely to cause mood-
driven behavior. You will need a number of index cards.

1. Identify at least two particular emotions or urges that you aim

to cope better with in the situations you are thinking of.

2. For each emotion or urge you identified, create a set of eleven

index cards. At the top of each index card, label the emotion
or describe the urge. You will dedicate one card to each of the
following categories:

a. My ways to practice mindfulness

b. My ways to eat wisely

c. My ways to soothe with sounds

d. My ways to soothe with sight

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e. My ways to soothe with taste

f. My ways to soothe with smell

g. My ways to cheerlead

h. My ways to pray

i. My ways to notice meaning

j. My ways to practice giving

k. My supports

On each card, list several category-specific practices that

you are willing to try in order to cope with the emotion or
urge. Create separate sets of index cards for each emotion or
urge, because what you find helpful in dealing with food crav-
ings may differ from what you find helpful in coping with
intense fear, for example.

3. Highlight several practices from your lists that you will com-
mit to using this week. You may even start by practicing on a
less intense emotional experience to get in the habit.

4. After using a practice, notice whether it helped you align

yourself with acceptance and commitment to what you care
about.

5. Modify your lists as necessary, so that they contain the most

helpful and effective practices.

6. Now prepare a final list for each situation you’ve identified.

Remember that the purpose of soothing savers is not to feel

better—it’s to live better. You may actually feel better when you
overeat. Compared to overeating or other unhealthy coping meth-
ods, these soothing savers have a potentially lower payoff in the
short term. Yet over time, practicing using them may help you find
freedom in a range of options.
<

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Summary
This chapter explored ways our strong emotions can affect our behaviors,
including how bad moods may veer us away from the path that matters to
us. This occurs both because emotions can get in the way of clear thinking
and because not accepting our emotions may lead to impulsive behaviors.
Learning to mindfully accept our emotions, urges, and setbacks while also
soothing ourselves in an adaptive way can allow us to gracefully face temp-
tations ranging from the ice cream buffet to the fleeting desire to abandon
an important aspiration.

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 Chapter 8

Cultivating
Self-­Compassion

Compassion is probably the only antitoxin of the soul; where

there is compassion even the most poisonous impulses
remain relatively harmless.
—Eric Hoffer

I
love research on parenting, because what we know about what helps
us raise children who are able to manage emotions, play well with oth-
ers, and pursue meaningful activities provides us with rich informa-
tion on how to develop ourselves.
In considering the most helpful way to raise a child or, for our pur-
poses, to advance yourself, consider the following choices.

1. Low on expectations, high on warmth

2. Low on expectations, low on warmth

3. High on expectations, high on warmth

4. High on expectations, low on warmth

End Emotional Eating

You may think about expectation as what you aim for and warmth as
how much you accept and understand your experience and emotions
throughout the process. For example, low expectations and high warmth
may mean you don’t push yourself and understand that you need to take it
easy. High expectations and low warmth may look like a coach interacting
with an athlete mid-­game: “I don’t care what it takes. WIN!”
Which of the choices listed above most reflects your style in dealing
with yourself? Do you have a sense of which approach works best? Take a
moment to think about your experience: you may reflect on people you’ve
learned from, which of these stances they embody, and which fostered
achievement in you. Research indicates that choice 3—­the combination
of setting aspirational goals (high expectations) and also attending to your
experience with kindness (high warmth)—­relates most strongly to mas-
tery (Baumrind 1971).
Simultaneously aiming to excel and understanding that you are
human exemplifies self-­compassion. By contrast, assuming that you won’t
succeed and lowering your expectations is neither considerate nor kind—­
these can be thoughts to notice mindfully, but not to act on. High stan-
dards don’t relate to suffering; self-­critical judgments do. Self-­criticism,
more than perfectionism, relates to anxiety, depression, and eating disor-
der symptoms (Dunkley et al. 2006). There is such a difference between
when you pursue a task chaperoned by self-­acceptance and when you
decide that your performance defines you. A challenge we all face involves
maintaining our equanimity in the face of pursuits that matter.
If you struggle with emotional eating, you may try to plan your meals,
eat mindfully, and also accept your emotions and setbacks. You may notice
wisely, “I’ll do my best to sit with emotions and eat right—­and I’ll never
wear a size 2, given my body type.” Or, “It makes sense I ate an unplanned
snack given that this is a tough habit to break. I will also make sure to slow
down the next time I face urges.” This is quite different from the harsh “I
overate, I need to skip a meal”; the permissive “It’s okay, I’ll change when
things are easier”; or the passive “Why bother?”
Life is hard. When you face a setback such as eating for emotional
reasons, receiving negative feedback, gaining weight, or experiencing the
painful end of a relationship, do you judge yourself harshly, experience
shame, or give up? All too often, when circumstances challenge our core,
we get critical and rely on donuts, drugs, or dear friends. Honing your own

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capacity to comfort yourself will provide you with enduring benefits. As

discussed in previous chapters, getting critical, drowning in shame, or not
accepting that you are human are all habits of mind that get you more
stuck. Self-­compassion nourishes you, protecting you against emotional
distress and promoting your health.

What Is Self-­Compassion?
Self-­compassion entails “being open to and moved by one’s own suffering,
experiencing feelings of caring and kindness toward oneself, taking an
understanding, nonjudgmental attitude toward one’s inadequacies and
failures, and recognizing that one’s experience is part of the common
human experience” (Neff 2003, 224).
To break this down, self-­compassion includes:

1. Practicing self-­kindness and understanding

2. Seeing your experience as part of being human

3. Noticing your thoughts and feelings mindfully

All of these processes relate to one another and fall under the broader
category of mindfulness and acceptance. While we have talked about
acceptance in the context of accepting our circumstances, in practicing
self-­compassion, we direct acceptance toward ourselves. When you prac-
tice self-­compassion, you understand and accept your setbacks and your-
self. You notice that, as a person like all other humans, you are not perfect
and you experience life’s challenges. Self-­compassion is valuable in itself,
and it’s like currency—­you can use it to acquire other valuable things. For
example, self-­compassion both builds on the skills covered in this book,
including mindfulness, emotion regulation, and distress tolerance, and
serves as the basis for those skills.
I would venture to guess that you and every person you know share
the human experience of feeling there is something not quite right with
you. You can change your relationship with this experience by noticing
that it is so human, so universal. In lectures attended by psychologists,
when the audience is asked whether they have the experience of feeling

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uncomfortably flawed, every person raises a hand. And I doubt this is just
a problem among psychologists. This awareness of shared human experi-
ence can connect you with others.
When you practice providing yourself with warmth, you create
responses within yourself that resemble those activated by a soothing
other (Gilbert 2009). When we activate self-­compassion, our soothing sys-
tem starts operating, which can feel more useful than getting stuck in guilt
and self-­incriminating thoughts.

Annabelle’s Story
For most of her life, Annabelle struggled with negative judgments
about her body. She worried a lot about dating and spent years
avoiding dating entirely. The thought of making herself vulnera-
ble by facing judgments from a potential romantic partner seemed
intolerable. After a brief relationship that ended painfully ten
years ago, she decided to stop dating. Occasionally, she tried to
meet new people, but she found herself stuck in thinking that no
one could love her and blaming herself when she did not hear
back from others. “I’m not good enough, or pretty, and I’ve heard
it’s impossible to meet someone after forty,” she concluded.
If she did go on a date, she censored herself and would never
make any requests, believing this might jeopardize her chances.
After a couple of first dates that didn’t turn into seconds, she
decided to put off dating until she lost thirty pounds. After learn-
ing about radical acceptance, Annabelle proudly announced that
she now used the skill of acceptance to soothe her pain around
the idea that she would never find a partner. I clarified that accep-
tance relates to kindness, and of course you may accept that you
are single, but what Annabelle labeled “acceptance” was truly
hopelessness.
We talked about how compassion is so different from giving
up, and we worked on noticing the desire to give up. Caring about
yourself means you allow yourself to feel what you feel and want

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what you want rather than drowning in shame and letting go of

what matters to you. So many people struggle with insecurities
around dating, especially when dating experiences have felt
painful.
In therapy, Annabelle and I spent time moving away from the
particulars of her situation to consider how she might respond if
her niece and goddaughter, Cara, shared the same struggle.
Annabelle told me Cara was shy and felt insecure around her high
school peers; she didn’t feel as smart or as popular. “Of course I’d
encourage her to go to her prom,” Annabelle said emphatically.
We noticed the discrepancies between how she treats herself and
her approach to Cara.
Annabelle acknowledged her pain around feeling lonely and
also acknowledged that wanting a companion was not selfish or
demanding, but human. We created a plan to bring kindness to
her experience, both accepting her current single status and also
initiating contact with people who seemed interesting. She
learned to cheer herself on and also to notice thoughts that got in
the way of her treating herself with compassion. It helped her to
bring herself back to the values she would impart to Cara.
She also practiced bringing the same kindness and under-
standing to herself around eating. When she ate a “forbidden”
food, she acknowledged her slip with acceptance and soothingly
coached herself to continue toward her goal. Eventually, she real-
ized that marking foods as forbidden was cruel, and she allowed
herself to taste in moderation the foods everyone craves. She
noticed that she actually ate less when she gave herself
permission.
While dating and sitting with feelings take effort, Annabelle
noticed that she felt energized by her new approach and con-
cluded that even if she neither met “the one” nor lost the thirty
pounds, she would accomplish something meaningful by treating
herself well.

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Self-­Compassion vs. Self-­Esteem

Self-­compassion and self-­esteem differ. A fundamental difference is that
judgments generate self-­esteem, while self-­compassion reflects acceptance.
Generally, we obtain high self-­ esteem by succeeding. Our self-­ worth
depends on our success. To decide, “I’m great” or “I’m better than most,”
you judge—and judging yourself, albeit favorably, simply sharpens the skill
of judging. This makes you susceptible to negative judgments. As soon as
you earn praise, you may find yourself struggling to retain the temporary
honor. You work hard to win, only to then work harder to defend the
championship. Implicitly, if you need to be “better than” to be worthwhile,
you maintain the core belief that you are not good enough as you are.
You may do all sorts of stuff to pump up your self-­esteem, and you may
in fact improve your self-­esteem. But the side effects of trying to build self-­
esteem include being self-­absorbed and alone, as well as facing more emo-
tional and physical problems (e.g., Crocker and Park 2004). Needing to
feel a certain way about yourself can create a lot of stress and not really
increase your achievement. If your self-­esteem is on the line, you may drop
a goal in order to avoid losing your good feelings about yourself. This limits
your opportunities to learn and master new tasks. Additionally, when your
self-­esteem is in jeopardy, you may feel overwhelmed and cope by overeat-
ing (Tice and Bratslavsky 2000).
Self-­compassion can provide some of the positive feelings associated
with self-­esteem without the side effects. Self-­esteem is like pumping your-
self up with helium—­you get bigger, but not in substance; instead you are
more vulnerable to a loud and painful pop when your self-­esteem is pierced.
Self-­compassion is more substantive and authentic.

The Science of Self-­Compassion

Often, the idea of self-­compassion is received as something that “sounds
nice” but is “too touchy-­feely.” For a moment, notice thoughts that come
up around practicing self-­compassion. What are your thoughts? Do you
believe any of the following?

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 Cultivating Self- ­Compassion

• Treating myself kindly will make me lazy and/or selfish.

• Being tough is what keeps me in line.

• Treating myself kindly leads to indulging (e.g., overeating).

• Given my history, I won’t be able to do this.

I find it thought-­provoking that presenting as “self-­deprecating” is a

virtue associated with modesty, while the practice of loving-­kindness or
self-­compassion may engender judgments. So often, in our minds, personal
growth relates to competition, consequence, and criticism, while we asso-
ciate self-­compassion with indulgence. Now that you are aware of your
thoughts around the practice of self-­compassion, let’s explore some facts
that may relate to your concerns.
Interestingly, self-­compassion, not self-­condemnation, cultivates
change. Each operates in a self-­reinforcing cycle.

Hold on to painful
judgments about yourself.

Avoid
Feel alone.
(example: eat to cope).

Have difficulty connecting

with others or pursuing
what you value when
caught in painful thoughts
and feelings.

Figure 6: The Self-­Critical Cycle

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End Emotional Eating

Practice treating yourself

kindly, noticing what
matters, and pursuing
mastery with warmth.

When you face a setback, Notice thoughts and

you bring kindness to feelings that arise when
your experience and you face challenges,
begin again. without getting caught.

Connect with others,

knowing you are not
alone, and move toward
what matters.

Figure 7: The Self-­Compassionate Cycle

Self-­compassion actually improves your ability to manage emotions

and urges. Self-­compassion changes the way you cope with distress. People
with more self-­compassion ruminate less and experience more positive
emotions than people low in self-­compassion. When you face a setback or
a negative event, if you respond with self-­compassion, you tend to be more
able to accept your behavior without feeling overwhelmed (Leary et al.
2007). A lot of this may sound familiar if you think about some of the
examples from chapter 7 on coping with pain without a second helping.
It’s easier to both learn and move forward when you accept that slipping is
human and that your setbacks do not define you.

Self-­Compassion and Mastery

Let’s say you struggle with a serious smoking addiction and depend on
nicotine physically and emotionally. What might be helpful in quitting?
Popular strategies include listening to scary pep talks replete with

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 Cultivating Self- ­Compassion

photographs of diseased lungs, methodically keeping track of your smok-

ing to cut back strategically, applying nicotine patches, and engaging in
hypnosis. Notice that those strategies suggest that you need to get busy
and take action and change. Interestingly, practicing accepting yourself
actually facilitates change in smokers. People who struggled with smoking
addiction who were taught to practice self-­compassion reduced their smok-
ing more quickly than groups using other well-­established smoking cessa-
tion techniques, even when they felt less ready to change smoking habits
and felt critical of themselves (Kelly et al. 2010). Similarly, when students
who did not perform well on exams practiced self-­compassion, they were
more able to access acceptance and emotion regulation and move toward
mastery. In other words, self-­compassion is one of the best ways to zap
avoidance and unnecessary distress (Neff, Hsieh, and Dejitterat 2005).
The idea of studying while stuck in negative thoughts seems unhelpful,
while self-­compassion fosters the mindfulness necessary to pursue tasks
you might ordinarily wish to avoid.

Self-­Compassion and Eating

We all know that comfort foods like macaroni and cheese, home fries,
and matzo ball soup soothe. As we’ve explored in earlier chapters, and as
you well know from your experience, comfort from food is fleeting. Relying
on food means depending on something outside you for coziness. If eating
serves you as an escape from negative emotions, self-­compassion is a viable
form of awareness. You may access ease at any time without depending on
a temporary external fix, though this source of comfort will take skill and
practice.
In one study, researchers studied the tendency to restrict and feel
guilty about eating in a group of nearly 100 women in college. The
researchers explained that the study would look at eating and television
watching. Each woman received a donut, and after eating the donut, each
woman was asked to taste-­test candy. As you may recall from chapter 7,
people often feel inclined to overeat in response to breaking a diet rule.
Before the study, researchers compassionately told a group of randomly
selected women, “Everyone eats unhealthily sometimes, and everyone in
this study eats this stuff, so I don’t think there’s any reason to feel really

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bad about it.” Women who were provided with the compassionate expla-
nation before the study did not eat more during the taste test, even if they
were dieting (Adams and Leary 2007). Compassion reduced distress and
led to improved eating. In other words, when you practice acceptance, you
are more able to get back on track.
Self-­compassion means you forgive yourself. When you feel guilty
about eating, that often leads to more eating.

Exercise: Creating a Compassionate

Coach
Often it is challenging to cultivate self-­compassion. It may be
helpful to bring to mind an image of a compassionate other to
help you experience self-­compassion.

1. Spend a few moments bringing to mind an image of a com-

passionate person. It may be a person you know, such as a
grandparent, teacher, or friend. Or it may be someone you
don’t know personally.

2. Once you have selected a person who really epitomizes kind-

ness in your mind, attend to certain details of this person: in
your mind, notice his or her countenance, appearance, voice,
and posture.

3. How do you feel as you sit with this person in your mind?

4. Now, write a supportive letter to yourself from the perspective

of the compassionate person. What might he or she say to you
when you face a challenge? You may choose a specific chal-
lenge, such as eating for emotional reasons or feeling anxious.
What would this person say or do upon seeing your struggle?
After you write this letter, read it aloud in a compassionate
tone.

5. When you next face an urge or difficulty, visualize this

image—­the warmth, the understanding, the strength. Then,
act toward yourself the way the compassionate person would

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 Cultivating Self- ­Compassion

act toward you. This may entail saying something he or she

might say to you, rereading the letter, or embodying a sup-
portive posture by rubbing your shoulders.

6. Allow yourself to really experience the compassion.

7. In practicing self-­compassion, notice if self-­critical thoughts

come up, and use them as an opportunity to return to
compassion.

(Adapted from Gilbert 2009)

<

Self-­Compassion vs. Self-­Absorption

Sharon Salzberg (2005, 17) explains that using the language of “‘I, me, and
mine’ isn’t the same as loving ourselves, just as shallow martyrdom where
we only think of others and never care about ourselves isn’t really generos-
ity, because both are coming from the same wrong intention. Loving our-
selves points us to capacities of resilience, compassion, and understanding
within that are simply part of being alive.”

Self-­Compassion Paves the Way

for Closeness
Directing kindness toward yourself may provide enduring comfort and
also facilitate closeness with others. When you practice treating yourself
with ease, gentleness, and validation, these manners develop, and you may
apply this kindness toward others, helping build meaningful, lasting rela-
tionships. Self-­compassion relates to healthy relationships (Neff 2006).
Honing the capacity to treat yourself with understanding can facilitate
your ability to give to and understand others. It’s hard to contribute to
meaningful relationships if you feel depleted and emotionally exhausted.
It bears repeating that if you wonder whether these practices work,
you need to experiment with them over time. To begin exploring

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self-­compassion and connecting with others, you may participate in the

mindfulness practice below. When you direct attention and kindness
toward yourself and others, you don’t need to force love. You are simply
bringing awareness. If the term “loving-­kindness” feels overwhelming or
not right, you may replace it with “kind interest.”
You may practice the exercise either in a mindful seated posture (spine
upright, eyes focused on a point or closed, feet flat on the floor or legs crossed
comfortably in a lotus position). You may also practice loving-­kindness as
you walk. As you walk, you may notice your steps and also direct your atten-
tion to the practice. Often, when we walk, our minds run elsewhere.
I learned this practice from Sharon Salzberg, who adapted it from her
teacher in Burma. Sharon practices loving-­kindness whenever she is wait-
ing or traveling. Imagine if waiting no longer meant losing time, but pro-
ducing love and regulating your emotions. When you speak with Sharon,
loving-­kindness emanates from her. The benefits of practicing loving-­
kindness are supported by science. Neuroimaging studies find that loving-­
kindness enhances our ability to manage our emotions, especially during
times of distress, and also increases our empathic response to another’s
distress (Lutz et al. 2008).
I’ve noticed that when I practice bringing awareness to people I may
not usually think about (the operator who calls me when I receive an
emergency page from a patient, the unseen person who delivers my pack-
ages, the grocer, the bank teller), I accumulate positive emotions and build
mastery in my level of connectedness. I also create a sense of community,
which I value.

Exercise: Mindfulness Practice—­

Loving-­kindness for All
1. When you are ready to begin, offer kindness to yourself by
silently repeating: “May I be safe. May I be happy. May I be
healthy. May I live with ease.”

2. Continue to repeat each phrase with awareness, at a pace that

feels gentle, and in a tone that embodies compassion.

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 Cultivating Self- ­Compassion

3. When thoughts and feelings arise, notice them and return to

your ever-­present guide, your breath. Then refocus your atten-
tion on the phrases of loving-­kindness toward yourself.

4. After several minutes, bring to your awareness the image of a

person who has helped you or inspired you. Spend several
minutes allowing this person’s image to exist in your aware-
ness and offering this person the phrases of loving-­kindness
(“May he be safe,” etc.).

5. Next, bring to mind a person you know who struggles or faces

a challenge. This may be anyone from a store clerk to some-
one you recognize from your commute to a close friend. Bring
your awareness to offering this person phrases of loving-­
kindness for several minutes with your full attention. When
your mind wanders, you may reorient your attention by focus-
ing on each word.

6. Last, bring your attention to a person you find difficult. Not

the person you hate the most, but someone moderately diffi-
cult. Offer this person loving-­kindness as your face and body
remain relaxed.

7. Return to your breath for several minutes, again directing the

phrases of loving-­kindness toward yourself.

<

If you practice self-­compassion, you may notice that you create meta-
phoric space in your heart, making room for yourself and others. Again,
the practice is not about forcing kindness; it’s about bringing attention. At
times, when we focus our attention and change the way we attend to it,
our ability to be aware of the goodness in the moment expands.

Self-­Criticism and Connection

Self-­criticism may get in the way of close connections and leave you
vulnerable to relying on food for comfort. It’s hard to imagine opening

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yourself up to connect with others when self-­criticism seeps through you.

If you are caught up in critical thoughts, it’s hard to really hear someone
else and pay attention to them. Self-­critical thoughts, like replaying your
eating setbacks, distract and capture our attention, interfering with our
ability to connect with others. Often, my patients who struggle with shame
around eating or anxiety in social situations report that people perceive
them as cold or aloof. Knowing them, I know that, like Annabelle, these
people value relationships highly and want to get close, but getting caught
in self-­critical thoughts can get in the way of their connecting.
Perceptions of rejection can lead to self-isolation and eating for emo-
tional reasons. If you notice the thought that others don’t like you—­or in
fact another person dislikes you—­you will not live better if you are unnec-
essarily tough on yourself.
If you struggle to treat yourself with understanding, you may feel overly
dependent on others for reassurance and support. Relying on someone to
carry you differs from asking someone to hold your hand. We all cherish
compassion from others. Exclusively relying on someone else to provide
you with support may overwhelm the other person and also not fully meet
your needs.

Kelly’s Story
Kelly is thin, and she struggles with binge eating when she feels
fat. She described to me a recent bingeing episode that was trig-
gered when she was with a group of friends waiting outside a hip
new nightclub. As her group waited anxiously to go in, the
bouncer allowed only her friend Nicole inside. Kelly was sure the
only reason Nicole was invited to party had to do with her being
“the skinniest.” Kelly felt ashamed by her appearance and ended
up bingeing later that night after concluding, “I’m lame.” My
humble thought about the night was that Kelly wasn’t admitted
because she was underage. Regardless, even if it had to do with
her appearance, her judgment, more than the facts at hand,
resulted in her emotional eating and also her decision to distance
herself from Nicole. In therapy, we focused on gaining perspective
about negative judgments and bringing awareness to the habit of

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 Cultivating Self- ­Compassion

taking such judgments personally. In addition to moving away

from the fog of her thinking, Kelly learned to use such a situation
as an opportunity to practice self-­compassion.

Exercise: Learning Self-­Compassion

to Face Self-­Critical Thoughts
Often, self-­critical thoughts can feel like facts, or we might simply
experience them so often that it’s hard to notice they are there—­
they’re like a sound you fail to notice because you’re habituated to
it. In this exercise, you will bring mindful awareness to self-­critical
thoughts and learn to practice self-­soothing with words intended
to replace your inner critic with a compassionate voice. If writing
is helpful, use your notebook.

1. Notice a self-­critical thought that arises often.

2. Add kindness. You may offer kindness to yourself by wishing

yourself compassion in a tone and demeanor that reflects
kindness. Choose a phrase that resonates—­create your own
or use one from the mindful loving-­kindness practice earlier
in this chapter.

3. As you offer yourself kindness, do so mindfully with your full

attention on the words and practice. What do you notice?
<

On a personal note, several months ago, I attended a large event

alone. Going to this celebration reflected my values, but it was not easy
logistically or emotionally. I found myself approaching the party stumbling
in my heels and getting stuck in worries. I practiced turning my attention
to phrases of loving-kindness such as “May I be at ease” and “May I be
filled with loving-kindness.” Moving my attention to the words, adopting
a slow deliberate breath, and relaxing my face into a half-­smile reminded
me of why I was there and helped me actually participate fully without

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getting stuck in self-­critical thoughts that had the effect of punishing me

for living according to what I value.

Self-­Compassion and Asking for What

You Want
You may treat yourself kindly by asking others clearly for what you
want. Interpersonal effectiveness and asking directly for what you want are
core DBT skills that facilitate managing emotions and building a life that
matters (Linehan 1993a, 1993b). So often, people who are self-­critical or
believe from past experience that others can’t be trusted may struggle with
assertiveness. If you find yourself caught in thinking that you are not wor-
thy or worrying a lot about what others may think, it makes a lot of sense
that it would feel challenging to clearly ask someone for something that
you want. Asking clearly for what you want in a respectful way will not
only help you—it will also improve your relationships. Many people notice
that not asking for what you want clearly leads to distance in a relationship
or to eventually feeling frustrated and blowing up.
Think back for a moment to the case of Annabelle. Annabelle truly
believed that if she asked for anything, she would burden someone. She
didn’t ask her friends to fix her up on dates, thinking they’d feel annoyed
and wouldn’t know what to say. She also had a very hard time telling men
she met that she had certain dietary restrictions. Since Annabelle saw
herself as not worthy, she acted as though anything she needed was too
much. Eventually, after she had done a good amount of work on accep-
tance and self-­compassion, she asked her friend Sarah about fixing her up,
describing her situation, feelings, and request candidly, without apologiz-
ing. She said something like, “Sarah, I’ve been thinking I’d like to date
and I know you know many people. I would love to meet one of Robert’s
friends since Robert seems to surround himself with smart guys. Can you
ask him if he knows of anyone I may like? I hope at some point we could
all go on a double date!”
Annabelle felt anxious approaching Sarah with this request. But in
making the approach, she practiced self-­compassion, mindfulness, and
opposite action, choosing to see the request as an opportunity to build
mastery. And Sarah and Annabelle grew closer by connecting over

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 Cultivating Self- ­Compassion

dating—­the opposite of what Annabelle had feared would happen if she

asked for anything from a friend. Annabelle also was able to tell a date
about her dietary restrictions. She enjoyed herself more in a restaurant she
felt comfortable ordering in, and while the date wasn’t perfect, she felt less
anxious and more able to focus on the conversation. She found that dating
with self-­compassion felt like a hobby, while dating with self-­criticism
reminded her of interviewing for a job.
As social beings, we understandably need to (and want to) rely on oth-
ers from time to time. If you notice thoughts that you are not deserving,
practicing asking for something may serve as both a practice in self-­
compassion and a practice in improving your relationships. If assertiveness
feels like a challenge, grab your notebook and prepare to practice this skill
using the following exercise.

Exercise: Treating Yourself Kindly by

Asking for What You Want Clearly
1. Bring to mind a situation where you find yourself struggling
to make a request. This may range from asking a café in your
neighborhood to offer soymilk to asking a person in your life
for something big. What is it that you want? Choose a situa-
tion that seems important but not overwhelming.

2. How might making this request build your self-­compassion?

3. You may practice coping ahead by jotting down the specifics

of how you will assert yourself. Ask yourself:

a. How may I present the facts of the situation?

b. How may I share my feelings appropriately?

c. How may I state clearly what I’m asking?

d. How may I offer some word of appreciation or reward for

fulfilling my request to increase the likelihood the person
I ask will oblige?

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End Emotional Eating

4. As you prepare to make the request or cope with the response,

practice self-­compassion by practicing mindfulness and self-­
validation. What might this look and sound like?
<

Many people who struggle with eating have a difficult time asking
clearly for what matters, and this in turn has an impact on relationships.
Improving relationships, both with others and with yourself, relates to
improving your eating (e.g., Rieger et al. 2010). Learning to make requests
and developing self-­compassion are tools in improving relationships, and
both take practice. Remember the idea of combining high demands and
high warmth. The goal in practicing asking for what you want is not nec-
essarily to get what you want (though that’s always nice) but to treat your-
self with kindness.

Self-­Compassion vs. Reassurance

Seeking
Often, when you obsess over eating or your weight, it’s tempting to ask
others for feedback on whether you’ve lost or gained weight. It can also feel
natural to worry about any comment on your appearance—for example,
noticing that the last time you saw someone she said you looked good, but
today she said nothing. Both asking for a lot of feedback on your appear-
ance and scrutinizing others’ comments may get in the way of treating
yourself kindly. If someone often comments about your appearance or eat-
ing in a way that isn’t helpful, this may be an opportunity to practice ask-
ing for what you want—­for them to stop this sort of commentary. Before
you decide to make such a request, consider whether this would reflect an
act of self-­compassion or would improve the relationship. Alternatively,
you may bring kindness toward yourself by noticing your urges to ruminate
on others’ comments or on your own urges to ask, then letting go of these
habits by choosing to participate in the moment.

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 Cultivating Self- ­Compassion

Summary
As you well know, you can’t change your past or your parents, but you can
modify the way you treat yourself to affect your present experience. This
chapter highlights how self-­kindness can pave the way for connecting,
managing emotions, and improving eating. Expecting either too much or
too little of yourself is not kind. Neither is treating yourself indulgently or
restrictively.
There is an idea in Judaism that I love. Sages explain that by forgiving
someone wholeheartedly, you atone for your own sins and amass the other
person’s virtues. Regardless of your faith, you may notice that when you
forgive both yourself and others, you let go of affliction and open yourself
up to blessing. In the words of Pema Chödrön (1994, 128), “When you
begin to touch your heart or let your heart be touched, you begin to dis-
cover that it’s bottomless, that it doesn’t have any resolution, that this
heart is huge, vast, and limitless.”

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 Chapter 9

Tasting Values

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s

life. Don’t be trapped by dogma—­which is living with the
results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of
others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most
important, have the courage to follow your heart and
intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want
to become. Everything else is secondary.
—Steve Jobs

T
here is a Zen story about a man riding a horse at a gallop down the
road. An observer on the road shouts, “Where are you going?”
and the rider replies, “I don’t know, ask the horse!” (Thich Nhat
Hanh 1998). Not knowing what matters to you can create a lot of chaos,
like driving in traffic and heavy rain with no destination in mind.
My client Reed decided at a young age he wanted to work as an attor-
ney in legal aid. He pursued internships and volunteered in ways that
would build his resume for law school admission. He worked after college
as a paralegal and studied intensely for the LSAT. But there was some-
thing about Reed’s enthusiasm about this career course that seemed inau-
thentic. At times, I felt he was trying to convince me, and he seemed
End Emotional Eating

uncomfortably anxious. Eventually, he noticed he didn’t want to be a law-

yer. He wasn’t sure how it was that he had come to believe he did want it;
he thought it had a bit to do with others encouraging him from a young
age and also his own actions—­he really acted the part of an aspiring law-
yer. It felt uncomfortable for him to sit with the realization that law was no
longer a career goal.
In our own ways, we all struggle with falling into goals, habits, and
stories that may not actually really matter to us. We find solace in their
familiarity. We may feel unclear about what really matters to us. Initially,
it feels comfortable to hold on to familiar beliefs, behaviors, and feelings.
Our familiar perceptions of ourselves give us a sense of coherence and
predictability. Social psychologists notice that people are motivated to
make their behaviors conform to their views of themselves. According to
self-­verification theory, our allegiance to our stories about ourselves is quite
powerful (Swann 1983).
Rather than mindlessly fall into traps of untruth and routine, in this
chapter you will notice the ways food and weight direct your energy, and
you will bring awareness and activity to the life directions you value.

The Effects of Eating on Self-­Worth

We all judge ourselves according to certain criteria, such as how we per-
form in our careers, our friendships, our reputations, and even our posses-
sions. For a moment, think about how you judge yourself. What are your
criteria? One of the core features of an unhealthy relationship with eating
includes spending a lot of time preoccupied with controlling shape and
weight (Fairburn 2008).
Often, when something bothers us, the topic captivates our attention.
When you are in a dispute with someone, it may seize your attention for
hours or even years. In a similar way, when we struggle with ourselves and
obsess about what we want to eat, will eat, or did eat, attending to other
aspects in life can feel challenging.

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 Tasting Values

Exercise: How Do I Judge Myself?

We all evaluate ourselves. If you notice that you tend to feel good
or bad based on how you are doing in certain realms, that pro-
vides information that you really care about these areas of your
life. In this exercise (based on Fairburn 2008), grab your notebook
and bring awareness to the criteria you use to evaluate yourself.

1. List areas or criteria that matter to you. You do not need to

rank how you are doing. Just list what matters. You also do
not need to represent what you’d like to have matter to you,
only what you observe actually matters.

2. Now, imagine that you could represent your life in terms of a

pie chart. Place the factors you listed above in a pie chart and
represent each factor in a way that symbolizes its relative
importance in your life now. For example, if you listed rela-
tionships with friends and family, and you feel that symbolizes
one-­third of what matters to you now, label one-­third of the
pie to reflect that.

3. Now, list areas that you would like to matter in your life.

4. Make a new pie chart that reflects how you aspire to live your
life.

5. What are the differences between the current pie chart and
your ideal pie chart?
<

In the preceding exercise, what percentage of each pie represents eat-

ing, appearance, or weight? For many people, eating becomes the focus of
life rather than simply an aspect of life, as the pie chart on the next page
reflects (Fairburn 2008).

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End Emotional Eating

Friends

Travel

Work Food, weight

Figure 8: Life Pie

Focusing a lot of attention on food and shape not only is symptomatic

of problems with eating, but also maintains a problematic relationship
with food and your shape. Ruminating about eating means losing the
moment and suffering more.

The Cost of Overvaluing

If your appearance really matters to you and you feel trapped by food,
it makes sense you would spend a lot of your energy absorbed by those
areas. Our society, especially the advertising industry, encourages us to
make food, weight, and appearance a central focus. Let’s explore mind-
fully what the consequences are.
Overvaluing the body leads us to undervalue other areas in life. Is it
helpful to have a pie where one slice is much bigger than the others? It’s
like putting all of your savings into a single, risky investment. If your worth
depends on how you look and what you eat, and you are struggling with
emotional eating and your self-­image, how effective is it to make the focus
of your life the area that causes you pain? Making eating and your appear-
ance the focus of your life will perpetuate your struggle.

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 Tasting Values

For example, if your self-­worth depends on your children’s successes,

and they aren’t doing well, you will suffer more because their accomplish-
ments and failures define you. Making your self-­worth dependent on their
successes may also lead you to place unnecessary pressure on them, which
may negatively affect their performance, ultimately leaving you feeling
worse and potentially damaging the relationship you have with your chil-
dren. If your sense of self-­worth were to depend on a variety of factors, you
might still feel pained by your children’s setbacks, though to a lesser degree.
Once again, the more you scrutinize and obsess, the worse you feel.

Living Flexibly
When food and weight dominate your focus, you inevitably struggle.
We have only so much attention, time, and energy. When you immerse
yourself in work, your social life may falter; when your focus becomes your
appearance, you may lose sight of other elements of living.
A client of mine, Hailey, who is recovering from a serious history of
anorexia, struggles with eating for emotional reasons. She made the trans-
formative decision to choose living freely over living as a slave to food and
her body. While she is in recovery, she occasionally faces urges and
thoughts that she capitulated to in the past. Her best friend recently began
to diet and started obsessing about her food, calling Hailey to review her
calories and plan her meals. In her preoccupation with food, Hailey’s
friend fails to notice that the woman she is calling to discuss calories and
sizes spent years in the hospital for problems with food. Of course she
means no harm, and her asking Hailey is mindless, not malicious. All too
often, a narrow focus may get in the way of the wisdom that arises from a
flexible, broad awareness—­which is more like a camera that can shift
focus to capture an expansive view.
I really enjoy seeing my clients’ pie charts. Sometimes they draw elabo-
rate pictures or make collages. These can really highlight the difference of
a move from body or weight obsession toward other values and priorities,
such as loving animals or connecting with your British heritage (picture a
pie slice with pictures of the latest royal wedding and Burberry plaid or,
more seriously, family photographs). If it helps you, you may keep your life
chart—­the pie that reflects what you are moving toward—­somewhere

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accessible to reflect and remind you of what matters most to you or what
you would like to matter most to you.

Valuing
Over my years of seeing clients, I have noticed that the mixture of hope-
lessness and guilt is one of the greatest sources of pain people experience.
There is so much we have no control over. But while we may not choose
what we get in this uncertain world, we do get to choose what we contrib-
ute. Knowing in detail what matters to you provides your whole life with
direction, hope, and clarity. While you may not be able to govern your
weight, you may choose to pursue meaningful actions and construct both
a new course of life and a method of evaluating it.
As we address values in this chapter, there is no assumption that
you’re not living according to your values. Rather, the main purpose in
bringing awareness to your values is to clear away obstacles—­namely feel-
ings, thoughts, and actions—­that may get in the way of living with
intention.
Take a few minutes to honestly consider what matters to you, as you
did earlier in the chapter. Now, rather than jotting down values or think-
ing abstractly, try to really taste these values. For example, if you value
spirituality, you may envision in detail what it would look like to practice
living with this value in your life. Mindfully notice the thoughts and feel-
ings that arise in this process.

Exercise: Funeral Meditation

I’d like to begin this exercise in an unconventional manner. I’d
like to ask you for permission, as this exercise may create a feeling
of vulnerability. If you are willing, continue; if that feels too
unsafe, you may skip over the exercise. In this meditation, allow
yourself to feel, rather than thinking theoretically. You don’t need
to write just yet; instead, immerse yourself in this experience—­
you may write later.

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 Tasting Values

1. Imagine that your life has ended and you are able to observe
your own funeral. Consider:

• What do you want your life to symbolize?

• What would your tombstone say?

• How would you want specific people in your life to
remember you?

• What exactly would you want people to say about you?

How might friends memorialize you? Family? Your part-
ner? How might people look as they spoke about you?

• How might your obituary read?

2. Notice thoughts that arise in this process, as well as feelings

in your body.

3. Return to noticing what you ideally would like your life to

stand for. In this process, you may imagine yourself pursuing
certain ideal activities people may reflect upon.

4. When you are ready, bring your attention back to the present
moment.

5. Consider for several minutes how your life resembles how you
would like to live. Notice where you find yourself less active
than you would like in areas that you know matter.

6. What do you notice as you reflect on what you want your life
to stand for?

7. In all of this, how important was your appearance?

(Adapted from Hayes and Smith 2005)

<

Before writing the above exercise, I took time to participate in this

meditation. This morning it feels challenging to imagine my funeral, but I
can clearly envision others living the values that I aspire to enact. I see in
detail my grandpa, Emil, speaking with patience, humility, and focus. I see

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End Emotional Eating

my grandma Sylvia connecting with kindness, placing herself in the back-

ground and others in the foreground. She never speaks harshly about
another person or complains. She practices gratitude. I see their warm,
generous faces. I notice their gestures and hear their words. Then I see
myself and notice tendencies to fill silence with noise or rush from activity
to activity. When I am mindless or stuck in habit, I assume that my value
is in productivity. Upon reflection, I grasp that my value is actually in my
commitment to slowing down and really showing up with sincerity, humil-
ity, and patience. My value is in mindful speech, not hurried words. These
values relate to relationships with friends and family and to spirituality. I
want my words to serve a spiritual purpose.
And awareness of my values brings up anxiety. I face the worry that I
won’t follow through; I notice sadness for where I am and for where my
BlackBerry has been. I am willing to feel these feelings in the service of
practicing living according to my values. I am far from perfect, but it’s
helpful to have a clear map as my guide. Persistence in and commitment
to our values is a challenge we all face; we’ll address this in more detail
below.

Understanding Values
What are values, exactly? Values are life directions we choose. Your
values reflect what you want your life to stand for, or your life’s purpose.
Values are neither social norms nor judgments about what should matter.
Values arise from your inner wisdom. Values are reflected in actions more
than in feelings. The following exercise will help you identify what you
value and how you are experiencing your values in your life. Make more
than one photocopy of the chart below to keep track over time of which
values matter in your life and how you feel about your activity within each
domain.

Exercise: Keeping Track of Values

The following chart lists twelve areas of life that are valued by
many people. We are concerned with your quality of life in each

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 Tasting Values

of these areas, and for each there are several aspects you’re asked
to rate. Ask yourself the following questions when you make rat-
ings in each area, being aware that not everyone will value all of
these areas or value all areas the same. Rate each area according
to your own personal view of it. You may find it useful to bring
your attention to really feeling what the value tastes like, rather
than studying this list in a technical sense. You may consider
what you wish might occur in each of these areas. Please take your
time and fill out this chart with a quality of mindfulness and
acceptance of all that you notice.

Possibility: How possible is it that something very meaningful

could happen in this area of your life? Rate how possible you think
it is on a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 meaning that it is not at all pos-
sible and 10 that it is very possible.

Current importance: How important is this area in your life?

Rate the importance on a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 meaning that
the area is not at all important and 10 that it is very important.

Overall importance: How important is this area in your life as a

whole? Rate the importance on a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 meaning
that the area is not at all important and 10 that it is very
important.

Action: How much have you acted in the service of this area dur-
ing the past week? Rate your level of action on a scale of 1 to 10,
with 1 meaning that you have not been active at all with this
value and 10 that you have been very active with this value.

Satisfaction with level of action: How satisfied are you with your
level of action in this area during the past week? Rate your satis-
faction with your level of action on a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 mean-
ing that you are not at all satisfied and 10 that you are completely
satisfied with your level of action in this area.

Concern: How concerned are you that this area will not progress
as you want? Rate your level of concern on a scale of 1 to 10, with
1 meaning that you are not at all concerned and 10 that you are
very concerned.

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206
Possibility Current Overall Action Satisfaction Concern
Importance Importance with Action
1. Family (other than
your partner or
children)
2. Marriage/partner/
End Emotional Eating

intimate relationship

3. Parenting

4. Friends/social life

5. Work

6. Education/training
 7. Recreation/fun

8. Spirituality

9. Community life

10. Physical self-­care
(diet/exercise/sleep)

11. Environment
(caring for the
planet)
12. Aesthetics (art,
music, literature,
beauty)

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Tasting Values
End Emotional Eating

Please take a few moments to consider your responses. What

do you notice when you review your level of possibility? If a value
matters to you and you are caught in unhelpful stories or a low
sense of possibility is getting in the way of your moving forward,
can you commit to act anyhow? If you notice that a value matters
and you feel unsatisfied with the way you are moving toward what
you care about, consider feasible steps you might pursue. When
we talk about values, the focus is on living in accordance with our
values. If a value is a theoretical idea, rather than a guide for
action, are you really living the life you choose?

(Adapted from K. Wilson and DuFrene 2009)

<

Virtues and Values

Virtues describe a set of moral standards that can guide us in how we
implement our values. For example, if you value connecting with your
family, you may further clarify that you want to connect with your family
with patience. Or you may discern that you want to bring self-­direction to
your work. Virtues give our values-­based actions detail. When someone
offers a gift, we appreciate it more when the details reflect thoughtful-
ness—­we feel a difference between receiving a gift card and being pre-
sented in a heartfelt manner with a more personal token. Similarly, in
living, we may add meaning by noticing what matters and attending to the
particulars. To get where you want to go, you need precision.
Here are some examples of virtues that may inform how we live
according to our values:

• Humility • Self-­reliance

• Mindfulness • Moderation

• Flexibility • Loyalty

• Generosity • Determination

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 Tasting Values

• Service • Nonviolence

• Compassion • Love

• Self-­direction • Faith

• Self-­respect • Patience

Our virtues color our values, but a practice of cultivating any of these
virtues (among others) can be a value in itself.

Goals vs. Values

It’s easy to confuse goals with values. We learn to measure achieve-
ment according to outcome. When we focus on values, we let go of mea-
surements and focus on living with virtue. Values are associated with an
ongoing, active process. Goals resemble a to-­do list. Certainly, our goals
may relate to our values. For example, if you value living with kindness,
you may make it your goal to find a volunteer activity. Notice, however,
that showing up to volunteer does not necessarily mean you practiced
kindness. Also, if you really value kindness, you might choose to extend
your actions beyond volunteering periodically.
Values and virtues reflect why—­and how—­you show up; goals are
where you hope to arrive (and virtues are how you get there). When we
practice living according to our values, we have a different quality of
attention than when we focus on our goals. For example, you may show up
in class to learn (value) while you aim to earn a good grade (goal). If your
value is learning, you may choose a course that is difficult, and you may
not necessarily earn a top grade. If you are goal-­oriented and your goal is
excellent grades, you might avoid the more difficult class. Your focus shifts,
and your choices may shift too. If you value health and your goal is to lose
weight, you might not experiment with risky diets. You also may think
about health on a larger scale rather than narrowly defining it in terms of
your weight goal. You may commit to actions consistent with the larger
value of health, such as seeking medical care and facing appointments and
tests with willingness.

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Emotional Wishes vs. Values

So often, in talking about values, people insist they want to feel happy,
attractive, confident, or relaxed. We live in a “Don’t worry, be happy!” big
yellow  culture, which may lead us into what Russ Harris (2008) calls
the “happiness trap,” the assumption that happiness is normal and
achieved by chasing fun and running from pain. In fact, the word “happi-
ness” stems from the root word hap, defined as “by chance.” You can’t get
happy on purpose and stay that way any more than you can force confi-
dence in a sustainable way. Spending a lot of money, sleeping in, taking
lavish vacations, having casual sex, and using substances or food may lead
to a feeling of happiness. Do these behaviors result in enduring happiness?
Reflect on your own experience. Aspiring to attain feelings of happiness,
attractiveness, confidence, or calm are examples of flimsy goals, based on
emotional wishes rather than enduring values.
A more sustainable plan for living includes cultivating acceptance of
your current experience and choosing to take effective action in a direc-
tion that may not prove “fun” but that is genuine in terms of what you
actually want. As a wise person once said, “The main thing is to keep the
main thing the main thing!” If your value is to connect, and you get caught
up in worries about your worthiness, keeping the main thing the main
thing entails purposely pursuing activities wholeheartedly, even at the risk
of discomfort. Comfort is a narrow and precarious objective. There is no
guarantee you’ll find comfort even in staying home.

Valued Living Requires Skill

Living a valued life—­that is, a life informed by your values—­entails will-
ingness to experience negative emotions in the service of your values. You
may use any number of the skills addressed in earlier chapters, including
accessing wise mind, urge surfing, noticing thoughts, acting opposite, tol-
erating distress, practicing self-­compassion, coping ahead, and building
mastery, to help you move toward what matters. For example, if you value
learning and find yourself struggling and frustrated, living with this value
includes persevering, sitting with urges to give up, noticing thoughts and

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 Tasting Values

feelings to eat and distract, and continuing to learn even in the presence
of anxiety and frustration. It may feel more comfortable to live according
to your values in times of ease; for example, learning something that is
easy to grasp when you have time. To live according to your values during
trying times requires devotion and skill.

Sorting Out Conflicts among Values

In addition to clarifying our values, we also need to develop a sense of
priority among our values. We each have choices to make about what truly
matters to us. At times, our values conflict with one another. A common
struggle many people face relates to balancing productivity at work with
participating meaningfully in relationships. The challenge is to make deci-
sions about what matters mindfully from a place of inner wisdom. This
takes time and experimentation, as well as acceptance of the fact that the
elements of a fulfilling balance will shift over the course of our lives.

Procrastination Differs from

Valued Living
Procrastination involves putting off valued living in order to do some-
thing sort of pleasant or to avoid difficult feelings. It makes good sense
that we do this, when you think about how naturally we seek pleasure and
avoid pain. In earlier chapters, we explored how pursuits like eating reward
us on multiple levels, both adding positive emotions and taking away nega-
tive emotions. Yet, postponing valued living may mean we’re dropping
opportunities. Since we can never know how much time we have or how
often certain opportunities will present themselves, procrastinating can
hinder living according to our values. Equally important, it can maintain
a cycle of training our minds to seek pleasure at the potential expense of
meaning. You may not feel better the moment you move toward your val-
ues; however, you are guaranteed to feel worse over time if you don’t move
toward them.

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End Emotional Eating

Valued Living: Difficult and Meaningful

Thinking about what really matters to you can produce anxiety or
sadness at the same time it facilitates creating a rich life that you choose.
Clear awareness of what you care about often creates a sense of vulnerabil-
ity; negative emotions may arise. Perhaps imagining in full detail a career
that matters to you brings up thoughts and feelings related to anxiety: “I
don’t have the money for more training”; “If I pursue this fully, people will
catch on that I’m a fraud.”
Again, valued living may not feel as enjoyable in the short term. Even
if you value kind speech, it can feel easier to gossip than to sit with uncom-
fortable silence and urges. Even when your value is faithfulness, cheating
on your spouse may bring pleasure. Interacting lovingly with family mem-
bers in trying circumstances is not exactly fun. Eating in moderation can
expose your emotional hunger.
Just as a pregnant woman may cope with nausea and discomfort by
envisioning cuddling with a smiling baby, when you are trying to live
according to your values in the midst of experiencing difficult emotions, it
may be useful to bring your attention to a more holistic view of your life.
The following exercise will help you problem solve around the obstacles
that tend to come up as you try to live your values.

Exercise: Committing to Valued Living

1. Reflect on some of the areas of valued living you’ve identified
in your pie chart or during the funeral meditation.

2. Notice what sorts of thoughts, feelings, or behaviors tend to get

in the way of your living in tune with what you care deeply
about. To do this, imagine yourself in a familiar situation where
it is difficult to act on your values, and notice exactly what
arises. Imagine watching yourself and pausing at certain points,
as you’d pause a film at a frame you want to examine in detail.

3. What thoughts and feelings do you expect to arise at these

moments in the situation?

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 Tasting Values

4. Next, generate a detailed plan for moving toward your values,

with awareness of what may get in the way both emotionally
and logistically. You may use skills you’ve learned earlier in
this book as well as approaches that have previously helped
you move forward in a meaningful manner.

5. What do you notice as you commit to pursuing a valued

action by making a concrete and detailed plan to do so?

It is helpful to break down a commitment to valued living

into specific and feasible steps. The purpose of commitment is not
to get stuff done, but to move toward what matters even when
your thoughts and feelings tend to move you away. When chal-
lenges come up, they give you an opportunity to solidify your
commitment.
<

Remember, practicing coping ahead exercises the same parts of the

brain as actually engaging in the behavior. In order to move from habit to
deliberate action, we need to slow down to bring awareness to our routine
and consider ways to implement specific changes.
You might notice how moving forward actually feels as compared to
how you anticipated it would feel before engaging. If negative thoughts and
feelings arise when you pursue what matters, does the intrinsic meaning in
fulfilling a valued goal feel worthwhile regardless?

Getting Support
Following through on what matters can feel challenging, and finding
support can be instrumental. I know several people who have “gratitude
buddies” with whom they share daily gratitude lists. What would it be like
to start each day with an e-mail from someone giving you an authentic
reminder to shift your attention to what’s right? Personally, I know I
wouldn’t practice yoga as often if I didn’t have my yoga community, and I
have found that organized prayer and meditation groups similarly foster
my practice.

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End Emotional Eating

Don’t let logistics get in the way of what you care about. Get creative
about ways to both connect with support and move forward with what you
value. You might find resources online. Several of my clients who have
mobility impairment enjoy taking university courses on the Internet.
If you are someone who works best when you are accountable, you
may experiment with joining StickK (www.stickk.com), a website created
by Yale University economists who observed the way commitment con-
tracts increase success. StickK allows you to publicly commit to a goal. If
you don’t meet your goal, you can choose between giving money to a friend
or a charity you choose. If you value productivity and charity, you win
either way!
When you move from external, precarious goals (e.g., weight, food,
fame) to a focus on values and values-­related actions, you will actually set
yourself up for feeling capable and purposeful. Wouldn’t that be a crazy
and wonderful thing?

Summary
Our problems are important, but living is more important. You can spend
a great deal of time harping on your flaws and failing to appreciate your
life. So much of this book emphasizes acceptance rather than control;
values are a domain where you can practice flexible control, accepting
your thoughts and feelings at the same time as you commit to pursuing
values related to your actions. Here we explored what values are (life
directions we choose) and are not (goals or emotional wishes) and how
they relate to virtues. You worked through a couple of exercises to help
identify what your particular values are and to make practical plans to
move closer to living in accordance with them. “In this very moment, will
you accept the sad and the sweet, hold lightly stories about what’s possible,
and be the author of a life that has meaning and purpose for you, turning
in kindness back to that life when you find yourself moving away from it?”
(K. Wilson and DuFrene 2010, 152)

214
 Chapter 10

Ending Well and

Beginning Again

We either make ourselves miserable or we make ourselves

strong. The amount of work is the same.
—Carlos Castaneda

A
challenge we all face in making changes is how to maintain our
gains and prevent relapsing into old ways. Fear of relapse can
make us rigid, and can actually contribute to relapse. In this
chapter, we’ll discuss concepts and skills that can help you move away
from “yo-­yo” diets and rigid or temporary solutions, toward sustainable
values-based choices.
One of the most powerful tools for sustaining change is the willing-
ness to begin anew, again and again, with mindfulness and acceptance.
Given that both food and feelings are constants in life, you will face temp-
tations and you will experience slips. This is certain, and it is by no means
a poor reflection on you or a bad thing in itself. One of the best predictors
of successful smoking cessation is the number of previous failed attempts;
in other words, trying to quit repeatedly means you are more likely to suc-
ceed. The thought “I can’t; I’ve tried for years,” is unsubstantiated by this
research, since the person trying to quit smoking for the fourth time is
more likely to succeed than a person who is on her first attempt.
End Emotional Eating

When we see each moment as a time to begin again, moments gener-

ate exciting choices. One of the most important moments is when you
notice that you’ve moved away from what you value—­that is the moment
to practice mindfulness, acceptance, mastery, and compassion. Formula
409, the ubiquitous cleaning agent, is called Formula 409 because it was
devised on the 409th trial. Wipe your slate clean and give yourself room to
start again.

“Problems” Are Opportunities

When you face a setback, take a moment to nondefensively and nonjudg-
mentally learn from the setback. A scientific way to change behavior in
this nonjudgmental spirit is through behavior analysis. In this systematic
approach, you specify a behavior you wish to modify, determine the causes
of the behavior, and identify the potential challenges in implementing
change. Instead of approaching a problem by fast-­forwarding through it or
avoiding facing it, which obscure detail, think of this method as hitting
pause. Slowing down, you carefully examine the intricacies of factors
underlying your behavior—­external events, emotions, thoughts, and sen-
sations—­to gather important information that will help you move forward
(Linehan 1993a). You can do this examination right away after a setback
or at a later time when you have some perspective.
As an example of using behavior analysis, let’s say you are repeatedly
late. You can either get caught in shame and worry about this or use that
same mental energy to thoroughly uncover the factors in the behavior. (In
this case it might be best to notice the nuances related to this behavior
once you’re settled at work rather than as you run through the door, panic-­
stricken.) When you slow down and deliberately examine the behavior,
you might note the following events, actions, and circumstances:

• Felt anxious and went to bed late

• Hit the snooze button

• Had the thought “It’s okay if I’m a little late”

• Checked e-mail

216
 Ending Well and Beginning Again

• Spent time making wardrobe choices

• Noticed feeling fat and thought, “Changing clothes won’t

take long”

• There was a line at the café where I buy coffee

• Saw my old friend at the café and stopped to talk

• Thought, “It’s rude to rush away”

• Uncomfortable shoes slowed my pace

• Caught in traffic

In slowing down to notice the details, you generate more potential

solutions than the overly simple “I shouldn’t hit the snooze button.” Upon
reflection, you may notice such possible choices as:

• Reduce vulnerability by getting more sleep

• Cope ahead and choose outfit the night before

• Notice thoughts

• Surf urges to check e-mail

• Practice mindfulness around time

• Problem solve: explore alternate routes to work; build in more

time; buy espresso machine

If you were to combine several of these solutions, you might really

change your timing.

Catch Yourself Capitulating

One propensity you may notice is the urge to capitulate, or give in to a
behavior, such as using food to cope, overeating, not accepting, or moving
away from what you care about. Capitulating is not passive—­it’s actively
deciding not to bother (Safer, Telch, and Chen 2009). For example, if you

217
End Emotional Eating

notice that you haven’t lost weight and feel sad, you may think, “It’s too
late,” or, “Screw this,” and head over to your favorite bakery. Capitulating
is really different from acceptance. It’s willful and comes from emotion
mind. What happens when you repeatedly capitulate? You may come to
believe you “can’t” or feel hopeless. In noticing that capitulating is a choice,
you may bring awareness to urges, thoughts, feelings, and your values when
you face a desire to capitulate. This moment is an opportunity to build a
sense of resilience and mastery. You may keep track of the urge to capitu-
late in your behavior analyses.

Notice “Irrelevant” Behaviors

Apparently irrelevant behavior (AIB) is a term used to describe a behav-
ior that initially seems irrelevant; only upon close attention do you notice
that the behavior actually impacts the behavior you want to modify (Safer,
Telch, and Chen 2009). To notice AIBs, you need mindful awareness.
Returning to the earlier example of finding yourself late, an AIB you might
notice is not wearing a watch. You might assume that you’ll keep track of
time with your cell phone. With considerate attention, you might notice
that you don’t check your phone as easily and as often as you might check
a watch.
The following are some potential AIBs you may notice that relate to
emotional eating:
1. Postponing a meal or restricting your food. In the moment, you
may think restricting is a helpful strategy in losing weight. But in
fact, you may notice that significantly restricting your food intake
often leads to bingeing. Have you ever gone to a restaurant starv-
ing and noticed yourself diving into the bread basket?
2. Eating from a container rather than serving yourself a portion.

3. Deciding to “just have one.”

4. Packing a bland lunch you know you won’t enjoy. If you real-
ize that packing something you dislike will lead to your order-
ing in a second lunch, choosing overly bland foods might be
an AIB.

218
 Ending Well and Beginning Again

5. Overvaluing weight or shape. As addressed in chapter 9,

although it may feel counterintuitive, the more you think
about and attend to your shape and weight, the less you will
succeed. This is an AIB if you notice that this state of mind
is not working.

Exercise: Learning from a Setback

1. Bring to mind a recent incidence of a specific behavior you
would like to change; for example, the most recent time you
ate for emotional reasons or violated a personal value.
Describe why this behavior is problematic (e.g., “Coming to
work late affects my productivity and increases my anxiety
and may get me fired”).
2. Specify exactly what the problematic behavior was and when it
occurred (e.g., “I was twenty minutes late Monday morning”).
3. Review in full detail all the factors that resulted in the behav-
ior. You may reflect on vulnerability factors, thoughts, feelings,
actions, events, and sensations (e.g., “I was tired; I thought, ‘I
can be a few minutes late’; I felt anxious; I changed clothes
twice; I saw a friend; traffic was bad; my heart was racing…”).
4. Look at the list of factors. Do you notice capitulating or AIBs?

5. Alongside each factor, describe a few potential solutions.

Create a plan with several specific steps that may help you
change your habit (e.g., “Modify my sleep schedule; sign up
for StickK (www.stickK.com) to keep track of lateness; remind
myself, ‘Being late is not workable’; buy instant coffee for the
office; organize my closet; carpool to increase my chances of
leaving on time; sign up for HabitForge (habitforge.com)
e-mails to remind me to go to bed on time”).

You may consider each behavior analysis as a rough draft as

you work toward understanding and changing your behavior; you
can revisit and modify it as you gather more information.
<

219
End Emotional Eating

Monitor What Matters to You

As this book comes to an end, what are your aspirations? If you were to set
goals and practice coping ahead, how might you proceed? Purposefully
pursuing your values requires commitment and a good plan. We’ve cov-
ered many concepts and explored many tools to employ. With so much
new material, one of the most helpful methods to practice paying atten-
tion and building mastery is to keep track of what you did and how it
went—­mindfully, nonjudgmentally, and in a spirit of acceptance.
The goal here isn’t to feel better or feel negative emotions less. In fact,
you may feel negative emotions more as you practice awareness and accep-
tance. The goal is to live the valued life you chose. Achieving this will
most likely mean you will be noticing—­and keeping track of—­both nega-
tive emotion and skillful action.
Many people find it difficult to remember events or emotions in detail.
When in emotion mind, you may forget that you felt differently earlier.
And in emotion mind it’s also hard to consider all of the practices you’ve
learned. Using a reminder list of tools learned and keeping track of using
skills will help boost your practice.
On the pages ahead, there are several forms to help you in noticing
and labeling emotions and in practicing skills introduced in earlier chap-
ters (you may also find these forms on my site, drjennytaitz.com). There is
also space for writing a brief general note on your day. As you self-monitor,
notice and implement changes to practice moving toward your goals. For
example, if you notice an instance of emotional eating, rather than beat-
ing yourself up, conduct a compassionate behavior analysis.
I warmly encourage you to try your best in experimenting with keep-
ing track of what you choose. Do it for a while to see whether practicing
these steps enriches your experience.
If the number of skills feels overwhelming, break it down: highlight
five skills of your choice. You may also start at the beginning of the book,
focusing on one or two skills to practice regularly and continuing to add a
skill each week.
Feel free to get creative. Choose, experiment, and modify as you like.
Create and commit to a system that works for you. One client of mine, an
art student, created a color-­coded system in a journal, designating a daily
value such as patience. Or you may use software to keep track.

220
 Ending Well and Beginning Again

Monitoring will allow you to notice in detail how much you used a
skill and also keep track of the intensity of your experience.
Each moment—­and each day, and each week—is a chance to start
again by accepting yourself more. Valued living is a lifelong journey that
requires understanding and diligence, but the road is always right before
your feet. There’s no prerequisite for beginning and no punishment for
faltering; we only begin, and begin again.

Exercise: Keeping Track of Skills Used

For each day of the week, take note of what skills you used. In the
chart below, the names of some skills are followed by a word or
two of guidance that will help you usefully describe your use of
the skill. It may also help you to use numbers when noting which
skills you used and how useful they were, as follows:

0 = Didn’t think about or use

1 = Thought about, didn’t use

2 = Tried to use but couldn’t

3 = Used skill; not helpful

4 = Used skill; found somewhat helpful

5 = Used skill; found very helpful

221
222
Mon Tues Wed Thurs Fri Sat Sun
Notice and Label Emotions (specify
emotions and intensity on a scale of 1–10)
Accept Emotions

Practice Willingness
End Emotional Eating

Notice Emotional Eating

(specify when and where)
Practice Mindfulness
Formally:
Informally:
Mindful Eating
Breakfast:
Lunch:
Dinner:
Snacks:
 Eat at Moderate Hunger, Stop at Moderate
Fullness
Notice Mind States
(emotion, reasonable, wise)
Reduce Vulnerability
Add Positives:
Build Mastery:
Cope Ahead:

Notice and Surf Urges

Observe Thoughts and

Catch Interpretations
Distress Tolerance:
Review Costs and Benefits

223
Ending Well and Beginning Again
224
Soothe

One Moment at a Time:

With Other Senses:

Find Meaning:
End Emotional Eating

Contribute:

Self-­Compassion

Notice Critical Thoughts:

Practice Loving-­kindness:

Ask Clearly:
Focus on Higher Values

Notice AIBs

Catch Capitulating
 Ending Well and Beginning Again

Notes

Thurs
Mon

Wed
Tues

Sun
Sat
Fri

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End Emotional Eating

Final Thoughts
Do we really know what will bring us joy? At the start of this chapter, we
talked about how you might learn from your setbacks, giving them real,
productive value. The idea that struggle is bad is a common inaccuracy.
Now it is time to consider some other inaccuracies.
We confuse our memories with our expectations. All too often, we
allow our emotions rather than our inner wisdom to govern our behaviors.
This leads us to repeatedly pursue “fixes” that don’t actually fix anything
(Gilbert 2005). We spend a lot of time imagining how things will be, sali-
vating over potential food choices, and shunning scary feelings. And so
easily we forget the larger perspective—­that the deliciousness and the
dreariness come and go.
We started this book noticing how lottery winners are not happier
than accident victims and how a tolerance for the momentary cravings
that arise when sitting with a marshmallow relates to long-­term success.
My hope for this book is that it illuminates why the marshmallow, the
house in Maui, or the Oreo cheesecake get us all stuck. Focusing on these
false fixes potentially stifles the wisdom in our emotions, jeopardizes our
sense of mastery, and delays our taking valued actions. While false or
biased memories may tell us otherwise, we can’t stop our feelings, and fill-
ing ourselves with food in the attempt doesn’t work and isn’t sustainable.
Learning to accept urges and emotions does more than shrink your waist-
line. Living your life with awareness and acceptance of this moment can
facilitate authentic nourishment. And the good news is that the ability to
slow down and live mindfully involves skill—­it is not a fixed character
trait. Anyone can learn it.
Unattainable goals and inflexible attachment to them make us miser-
able. We spend a lot of time ruminating on what is “wrong” with us and
trying to fix it with our minds—­using the same thought patterns and
habits that have not worked before. Surrendering into present-­moment
awareness, acceptance, and habits of the heart may provide us with achiev-
able emotional sustenance. To move away from emotional eating, move
toward what you really care about, even if your thoughts discourage you.
This book has introduced a good number of concepts and taught you
a variety of skills and techniques aimed at helping you learn to experience
and manage difficult emotions that can get tangled up in food, eating, and

226
 Ending Well and Beginning Again

body image. I hope you have found inspiration, insight, and some new
tools to try. I also hope to convey the message that you are more than your
body and negative emotions. You embody virtue, and my wish is that you
make a practice of clearing away anything that keeps you from knowing
that.

I wish I could show you, when you are lonely or in darkness,

the astonishing light of your own being.
—Hafiz

227
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241
Jennifer L. Taitz, PsyD, is a clinical psychologist and director of the dia-
lectical behavior therapy program at the American Institute for Cognitive
Therapy in New York, NY. She is a certified diplomate of the Academy of
Cognitive Therapy and is a founding board member of the New York City
Association for Contextual Behavior Science. Her expertise lies in empha-
sizing simultaneous acceptance and change and providing tangible tools
to help people get “unstuck” so they are better able to regulate their emo-
tions. She has presented at conferences internationally on mindfulness
and acceptance. Visit her online at drjennytaitz.com.

Foreword writer Debra L. Safer, MD, is codirector of the Stanford Adult

Eating and Weight Disorders Clinic and coauthor of Dialectical Behavior
Therapy for Binge Eating and Bulimia. Her clinical interests include work-
ing with patients who struggle with eating disorders and obesity, designing
interventions for post-bariatric surgery patients, and using computer-
assisted therapies to increase the dissemination of evidence-based treat-
ments for eating disorders.
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