I recently asked a bunch of people what, if anything, they would most like to change about their relationship to food. As expected, since people vary, there was a wide range of responses, all of which were cogent and wonderful.<\/p>\n
I guess I had my suspicions about what issues would be most popular. I expected maybe people would want to learn how to stop eating when full? And, yes, that was a pretty popular wish. Or maybe, how to eat nutritiously (or, to use the phrase from Satter\u2019s Hierarchy of Food Needs<\/a>, \u201cinstrumentally\u201d) without driving oneself bonkers? And, yes, that came up too.<\/p>\n But the most popular wish of all, the one that came up most often, was one that wasn\u2019t even really on my radar when I asked the question \u2013 despite the fact that it was something I have struggled with myself, and something that was a key lesson I learned when I went through the Learn to Eat<\/a> process myself several years ago. <\/p>\n You know what it was?<\/p>\n How to eat in front of other people.<\/strong><\/p>\n By this, people do not, of course, mean how to put food in their mouth<\/em> with other people present, or what foods they should choose<\/em> when eating with others, but how to stop feeling so damn self-conscious<\/em> about eating in public. Or with friends and family. Or with strangers at a party.<\/p>\n This not only makes perfect sense to me, having tussled with the same thing in the past, but it\u2019s something that comes up again and again, now, with my clients.<\/p>\n So, I thought, yes \u2013 of course! Let\u2019s write a little primer on how to eat in front of other people. And I have.<\/p>\n It’s a pdf, made with love…and with absolutely no clue how to make a pdf. I’ll email it to you if you fill in the form (the one that says “Join THE LIST”) over there on the right.<\/p>\n