Recently I’ve tried to be mindful about my eating habits…not necessarily what I eat, but more how I eat. Outside of our family dinners, I’ve developed a pretty bad habit of consuming meals in the car, standing in the kitchen over the sink or scarfing down food in a rush to move on to the next part of my day. It may have started in middle school when my friends and I would eat our lunches as fast as possible so we could have more time to play football during recess, but I’ve found that my propensity to eat fast, even when sitting down for a nice dinner, has stayed with me. It’s left me questioning the negative impact it may be having on me and other leaders who have fallen into the same trap.

Many of us pack so much into our weeks, days and hours that we don’t pause and actually enjoy the process of eating, instead viewing it as something that is totally acceptable to do “on the run”. The problem is that stress signals for our body to store fat, move blood to reactive parts of the brain, tense our muscles and draw energy away from digestion and immunity. Not exactly the things we are looking for if we want to be the best version of ourselves.

Slowing down to savor and enjoy our food comes with a tremendous amount of mental and physical benefits. First of all, slower eating improves digestion. Our digestive system is designed as a chain reaction that takes time. Rushing this process forces the system to do work before it’s ready and is even more problematic when we take large bites of food. Taking smaller bites makes it easier for our bodies to digest and speeds the conversion into usable energy. Also, it takes about 20 minutes from the start of eating for your brain to send messages that you are getting full. I know I’m guilty of most of my meals not even lasting 20 minutes. Not giving your body a chance to signal that you are full can lead to over-eating and sucking the energy out of you for the next few hours. Mentally when we slow down to eat, we take a moment to pause our busy lives and can better appreciate the food that nourishes our bodies.

I’ve been experimenting with a number of suggested tips to slow down my eating. The first has been no more eating while standing or driving, forcing myself to actually sit down and enjoy my meal. Putting my fork down on the table in between bites feels really weird, but it also made me realize that I was previously putting a second bite in my mouth before swallowing the first. I’ve tried eating with my non-dominant hand (difficult), eating with chopsticks (kinda fun) and chewing my food 15-20 times before swallowing (it’s a lot). All of this has caused me to be more mindful about how I eat. I’ve taken time to smell the food I’m about to eat helping me to better enjoy the meal. I’ve been more present with the people I’m eating with, and I’ve found myself thinking about where our food comes from and feeling incredibly grateful for what is in front of me.

I’m hopeful that my hyper focus on how I am eating leads to progress and improvements that I can carry into the future. I encouraged our team to take stock of their eating habits and maybe try out one or two of the tips to see if they notice an impact. I know the last thing that many of us have in a day is extra time to devote to eating. But even spending 10 extra minutes during meal time can leave us feeling less tired and stressed, and more energized and grateful, which I think we all can agree would help us to be better leaders.