On Eating Slowly

You will sit down to eat something today. You will probably do it while reading something else. You will probably finish the meal without remembering most of the bites.

This is normal. It is also a small theft.

The food took someone's labor to grow, someone else's to ship, your own to prepare or pay for. To not be present at the eating of it is to receive the thing without acknowledging the gift.

A small practice

Once a day this week, eat one meal — or just one course, or even just one snack — without a screen and without a book.

Notice the first bite especially. The temperature. The way it changes shape in the mouth. The taste, which is sharper than you remembered.

You will be tempted to reach for the phone in the silences between bites. Resist for the duration of the meal. The phone has had your attention all morning. The food can have it for ten minutes.

What you will find

You will find that you eat less. Not because you tried to, but because the body, given a chance to register fullness, registers it.

You will find that the food tastes better. The same food. You did not change it. You changed the witness.

You will find that the meal is over sooner than you expected, and that the rest of the day starts a little more steadily, because the meal was a real meal — not a refueling, but an act of attention.

You do this three times a day, every day, until you don't. The cheapest practice in the world is also the one most often skipped.

Begin tonight. Begin with one bite.