**Context: This reflective essay was created for an assignment in my MSW program that had prompted us to engage in a 7 day mindfulness exercise (of our own choosing), followed by reflection and a write-up to submit for grading.
Mindful Eating
I am not new to mindfulness. I have been practicing and teaching mindfulness for many years. In fact, I would say that I owe my life to the development of mindfulness in my daily practice. I also humbly acknowledge that I am a work in progress. I recognize that for my own well-being and sustainability in this profession, it is critical that I have a plethora of practices and resources that I utilize daily to not only protect against burnout but also elevate my efficacy as a practitioner.
A common fear I hear expressed from clients is the possibility of depressive or symptom relapse as they begin to feel better. Kuyken et al. (2010) highlight that an individual who has recovered from depressive episodes still has a network of negative thinking that can be easily re-activated. An individual’s current default modes of information processing are neural connections that have an ingrained bias as paths of least resistance (Villamil et al., 2018, p. 2). As a practitioner, I recognize the importance of understanding how to help clients grow new neural pathways and compensatory responses so that when they notice the familiar reactions that no longer serve them, they have new skills to implement.
With this in mind, to make this seven day mindfulness experiment as fruitful as possible, I decided to focus on an area of my life where I experience this sense of relapse into negative thinking and distress. What stood out to me? My relationship to food. I spent much of my youth and adolescence battling various forms of eating disorders and the myriad of distorted thinking that comes along with that. I have focused a lot of attention here to create more positive relationships and associations. I ascribe to the Internal Family Systems (IFS) model and its foundation as a non-pathologizing framework (Schwartz & Sweezy, 2020). From this perspective, disordered eating is not a problem itself, rather a symptom of a deeper internal conflict and emotional pain being protected by parts of an individual’s internal system (Catanzaro & Chang, 2025). For example, some parts are seeking control to avoid shame, helplessness or inadequacy, while other parts may use binging to numb or avoid emotional distress that feels unbearable, or purging to mimic the sense of letting go and touching momentary relief (Catanzaro & Chang, 2025).
I would say that most of my internal system has overcome, healed and moved on from the years of eating disorder behavior, but I still have parts of me that use food to manage stress and this occasionally is activated in ways that feel distressing. I am quick to shame, to dissociate, to ramp up my control around food choices and exercise, and I spend more time than I care to admit thinking about what I will eat and comparing my body negatively.
While I am adept in self-compassion in almost every arena of my life, what I have detailed above is where self-compassion has been much harder to access for me. As someone who has an affinity for working with folks who present with a history of complex trauma, depression, anxiety, mood and personality disorders, I recognize both the importance of bottom-up processing techniques and developing self-compassion, and the subjective reports that detail self-compassion as appearing far more difficult to access for folks in those categories (Farb et al., 2012, p. 72). Turning towards my relationship with food, my own struggle with top-down control, and difficulty accessing self-compassion and bottom-up processing, reflects the experience of the folks I am inspired to support.
The Experiment
On Saturday February 22 to February 28, every morning I engaged in a 15 minute wheel of awareness practice. This practice includes moving through the five senses, a body scan, noticing and labeling thoughts, open awareness without judgement, turning awareness in on itself to be aware of awareness, and expanding out to feel the interconnected field with space, other beings, and the earth (Siegel, 2023). This is a multifaceted practice that I had not yet attempted daily for a sequential period of time. It incorporates what is referred to as The Three Pillars of mind training (Villamil et al., 2018), including a relational quality of kind intention or self-compassion, focus or zooming in, and open awareness or zooming out (Villamil et al., 2018). While not all mindfulness practices include all three of these pillars, Villamil and colleagues (2018) distilled that at least one or two of these pillars are present in most mindfulness practices, and to have them all present in one practice was a rare and worth-while pursuit.
Additionally, to target the area I mentioned that has a charge of distress, before one meal each day, I engaged in a mindful eating practice. This began with a body scan of feet, legs, pelvis, torso, arms, neck and head, with one slow breath as I landed in each location. After that, I gazed at my food, enjoyed one or two breaths smelling its aroma. I noticed that my saliva would activate at this point in the practice and would consistently bring a smile to my face. I then allowed for a few moments to notice three sight-based details about my food without judgement or story, rather, qualities like color, texture, or the way the various foods appeared to interact on the dish. Finally, after eating, my goal was to spend one minute in open awareness, followed by a bit of reflection and writing in my daily journal regarding what I am noticing and what I was curious about. Knowing this is a charged area of my existence to focus on, I invited a friend to join me in this experiment. This added a welcomed layer of vulnerability and common humanity (Neff, 2003) as we both wrote in the same daily journal online and talked about our experience a few times throughout the week.
Observations
As I had anticipated, the first few days of this felt relatively difficult as I was more aware of my anxiety around food. A common experience I have had is that shining the light of attention on something that already has some anxiety tied to it, generally amplifies that anxiety initially. I noticed that the body scan and breathing before eating was calming and enjoyable, although only if I was completely alone. When I engaged with this practice around my partner or out in public, I found myself wanting to adapt to a shorter version of the prescribed sequence. A pleasant surprise from this exercise was the arrival of spontaneous moments throughout the day that I recognized a narrowing in my perspective and breath, and an easeful release as I did a body scan and relaxed into the present moment with an open awareness.
Self-Led Eating
On February 24, three days into the experiment, I noticed my anxiety was on a steady incline and this sparked immense curiosity regarding what parts in my internal system were having such a hard time with this. Central to IFS is the concept of Self and Self-leadership as the goal being to coordinate and harmonize the Self and the parts so they collaborate as a team to achieve balance and wholeness (Finney, 2024). There are many ways to engage with parts, and I have learned from experience that when I am doing parts work on my own and there is a lot of anxiety or activation present, it is helpful to write out a conversation between my Higher Self and the parts that are in distress. I began by reflecting on why my anxiety might be increasing as I engaged in this experiment. Fostering some understanding, I recognized that there were many periods in my life when I observed myself feeling out of control around food. At times, binging until I felt disgusted with myself, and on the other side of the spectrum, restricting my food intake so much that all joy, flexibility and spontaneity with food was out of reach. I recognized that my anxiety was alarming me to be hypervigilant around food, as though it was protecting me from the slippery slope of “losing control”. Yet this fear of losing control, and the intense anxiety around food was making me feel a bit stuck as the negative results of this protective strategy were outweighing the positives. This insight led me to sit with some questions before I went to bed that night. How do I help my body know that I can relax more around food? Is my anxiety protecting a deeper, more vulnerable part of me? Or is the part of me that is stuck in hypervigilance polarized (in direct conflict) with the part that wants to relax?
The following morning I felt the intuition to follow the assumption that there was a polarization happening between the anxious part and the part that wants to relax around food. Using my IFS skillset, I anchored into my Higher Self and I began a conversation. I leaned in to listen and get to know the anxious part, and felt more space and compassion as I heard this part express how hard it works to avoid shame, disgust, and the pain due to lack of control around food. As I (or my Higher Self) expressed appreciation and recognition of how hard this part is working to protect me, it also opened up more about what it would like to do if it didn’t have to be so hypervigilant, and why it doesn’t feel yet able to relax back.
(Anxious Part) “You love food too much and I worry you will lose control, even if just slowly over time. I worry that you won't be present or pay attention to your food without me blaring alarms. I worry that relaxing means having no boundaries or attention to food to keep things in check.”
(Higher Self) “Oh I really get that. Is it okay if we chat with the part that wants us to relax more about this, and see if we can get to know it and understand it better?”
(Anxious Part) “Yes.”
My Higher Self then leaned in to get to know the part that wants to relax around food. Another fascinating conversation ensued. This part expressed empathy and understanding towards the anxious part and similarities in what it desires for our internal system. I asked it specifically about the anxious part’s worries regarding lack of boundaries and what its perspective was on that.
(Relaxed Part) “I am really enjoying this mindful eating exercise. This is a great example of an activity we can come back to for a consistent check in while creating some fluid boundaries around eating. Relationships with food and body image is so much bigger than just our own system. This is a collective struggle and we are not alone in this. I desire for us to have a sustainable and balanced movement routine that honors our rhythms. That feels like some powerful structure to me. I desire that before every meal we take at least 3 breaths to feel the body and land here and now. I love taking a big smell of our food and enjoying the arrival of saliva. I love slowing down and noticing how much we chew and how fast we are going. These are all things we can continue, not out of fear, but out of pleasure and gratitude. And it’s okay that there is still this undercurrent struggle regarding body image that is a reflection from culture - I mean, it makes sense that that is here too. Can we allow that and notice it, and be tender and kind towards it, rather than reacting with fear and trying to berate the body to conform? Can we push against the norm in society that sends so many people into self-hatred and intense self-soothing by choosing kindness, and presence and awareness? I am not saying it’s going to be easy, but I truly believe it will get easier and the way forward is body love and food love and revering this amazing part of being alive.”
From there I shifted this conversation to invite these two parts to come together. The anxious part appeared very sad, tired, emaciated, tight and tense. The relaxed part appeared with a warm and welcoming smile, and emanating with white light. The anxious part asked for patience and guidance, and a desire to release tension. It expressed comfort to step back and allow the relaxed part to take the lead for the remainder of time allotted to this week long experiment. I saw it sit back into what looked like a womb of white light created by the relaxed part and its immense amount of Higher Self energy. Its intention is to learn, to stay open minded to a new way of approaching food and structure. That new relationship felt powerful. And for the remainder of the week, my levels of anxiety went down drastically. Continuing to this moment in time, when I notice a bit of anxiety around food, I pause and imagine that white light enveloping and embracing my anxious part and my whole system relaxes and opens to presence.
Final Thoughts
With bottom-up processing, as I exemplified above, one is able to experience a shift away from prior knowledge and neural networks of least resistance, and access new data and new possibilities that arise in presence (Plesa & Petranker, 2023). When I feel the familiar alarm of anxiety around food, my new compensatory response is the visual of the white light as an act from my Higher Self towards the part in me that has been carrying this anxious protective strategy. This has already proved to be a fast-acting intervention that is redirecting neural energy from what was, into new connections. I noticed that as the week went on I was able to adapt and allow some flexibility depending on the environment I was in. I was not stuck on it needing to look a certain way, and this allowed me to engage in the activity with a lens of learning and noticing rather than performing.
Lastly, some contention in the literature around mindfulness is found in conflictual stances in relation to some claims that engaging in mindfulness and working on oneself can lead to valuable systemic changes (Plesa & Petranker, 2023). I align with the relational perspective that says “as within, so without” (Ghosthorse, 2021). We are relational beings at the quantum to the macro levels of existence. And I also recognize that not all mindfulness practices are created equally and the intent behind the practice impacts the results. My example of depolarizing conflict internally not only creates a subjective experience of hope and harmony, it also teaches and informs me regarding how to lean in and support others as a bridge between opposition. The lessons I glean in my own internal system are utilized as wisdom with the intention of extending outwards as a social worker inclined to engage in social justice and to propagate pro-social behavior. Mindfulness increases one’s capacity for awareness, it creates a shift in salience, and has even been connected to an increased “sensed feeling of meaning in life” (Plesa & Petranker, 2023, p. 5). The immense possibility within mindfulness is a tool to wield, and how to choose to wield that tool is what matters most.
**After references list, I have included the full conversation I had written down between my Higher Self, the anxious part and the relaxed part.
References
Catanzaro, J. & Chang, S. (2025). Appreciating extreme parts in context: IFS, food, and the body. IFS Learning Hub. IFS Institute.
Farb, N. A., Anderson, A. K., & Segal, Z. V. (2012a). The Mindful Brain and emotion regulation in mood disorders. The Canadian Journal of Psychiatry, 57(2), 70–77. https://doi.org/10.1177/070674371205700203
Finney, F. (2024). Self, spirituality & social justice. IFS: A tool for liberation. IFS Learning Hub. IFS Institute.
Ghosthorse, T. (2021). Deprogramming the colonial mind: Re-languaging regeneration. Restorative Practices. https://restorativepractices.com/product/re-languaging/
Kuyken, W., Watkins, E., Holden, E., White, K., Taylor, R. S., Byford, S., Evans, A., Radford, S., Teasdale, J. D., & Dalgleish, T. (2010). How does mindfulness-based cognitive therapy work? Behaviour Research and Therapy, 48(11), 1105–1112.
Neff, K. D. (2003). Self-compassion: An alternative conceptualization of a healthy attitude toward oneself. Self and Identity, 2, 85–102
Plesa, P., & Petranker, R. (2023). Psychedelics and neonihilism: Connectedness in a meaningless world. Frontiers in Psychology, 14. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1125780
Schwartz, R. C., & Sweezy, M. (2020). Internal family systems therapy (2nd ed.). The Guilford Press.
Villamil, A., Vogel, T., Weisbaum, E., & J. Siegel, D. (2018). Cultivating well-being through the three pillars of mind training: Understanding how training the mind improves physiological and psychological well-being. OBM Integrative and Complementary Medicine, 4(1), 1–16. https://doi.org/10.21926/obm.icm.1901003
Higher Self (HS) with Anxious Part (AP)
(HS) Tell me about yourself, what are you afraid would happen if you relaxed back?
(AP) I feel the slippery slope around food. It has been such a charged topic for so long and it feels necessary to remain hyper vigilant just in case things go haywire again.
(HS) What are you trying to protect me from?
(AP) Shame. Disgust with yourself. All of the sad and heavy emotions I see others carry who struggle with weight and food. I want you to feel light and happy and strong.
(HS) How do you protect me? What do you do in my system?
(AP) I ramp up your anxiety to pay attention to food. I ensure you think about what you are going to eat so you have a plan. I send off alarms in your body to make sure you are paying attention.
(HS) Thank you for working so hard. I really get that you are trying to protect me by making me pay attention and to plan ahead. This has been quite valuable at various times in my development, and I am really grateful for your stamina and strength and your wonderful desires for me. I am curious, if you didn’t have to work so hard, if you could relax back a bit, what might you want to do in my system instead?
(AP) Pay attention to enjoyment. Spread my attention and energy throughout the day to be more present and in tune with what is happening in the moment. Be creative with food rather than protective.
(HS) That sounds really nice. What stops you right now from doing that?
(AP) You love food too much and I worry you will lose control, even if just slowly over time. I worry that you won't be present or pay attention to your food without me blaring alarms. I worry that relaxing means having no boundaries or attention to food to keep things in check.
(HS) Oh I really get that. Is it okay if we chat with the part that wants us to relax more about this, and see if we can get to know it and understand it better?
(AP) Yes.
Higher Self (HS) with Relaxed Part (RP):
(HS) Hey. Thanks for waiting. I am curious, did you hear that conversation? Anything you want to share about your perspective and experience?
(RP) Yes. I really appreciated hearing that there is worry that relaxing about food means not paying attention or having any boundaries. That makes sense why that part remains hypervigilant. And I really appreciated hearing what that part desires for us.
(HS) Amazing. And what is it that you desire for us?
(RP) The same things and more. I desire you to feel strong, light, agile, adaptive. To enjoy life, to enjoy food, to trust the hard work you’ve done and allow that to pay dividends in how spacious and open and fluid you feel on a daily basis. I desire continued growth. I desire the ability to steep in presence and lavish in this resilient and beautiful body. I desire to lead by example so that others’ around us who struggle with food can have a beacon of hope and light as we have been in the depths and are examples of how good life can be.
(HS) That’s beautiful. And yes, so many similarities in what you and this other part desire. This other part expressed worry about boundaries and paying attention. I am curious about your perspective on that. If we are to relax more and enjoy more, what would boundaries and presence look like?
(RP) I am really enjoying this mindful eating assignment, exercise. This is a great example of some activities we can come back to for consistent check in and creating some fluid boundaries around eating. Relationships with food and body image is so much bigger than just our own system. This is a collective struggle and I am not alone in this. I desire for us to have a sustainable and balanced workout, movement routine that honors our rhythms. That feels like some powerful structure to me. I desire that before every meal we take at least 3 breaths to feel the body and land here and now. I love taking a big smell of our food and enjoying the activating of saliva. I love slowing down and noticing how much we chew and how fast we are going. These are all things we can continue, not out of fear, but out of pleasure and gratitude. And it’s okay that there is still this undercurrent struggle regarding body image that is a reflection from culture - I mean, it makes sense that that is here too. Can we allow that and notice it, and be tender and kind towards it, rather than reacting with fear and trying to berate the body to conform? Can we push against the norm in society that sends so many people into self-hatred and intense self-soothing by choosing kindness, and presence and awareness? I am not saying it’s going to be easy, but I truly believe it will get easier and the way forward is body love and food love and revering this amazing part of being alive.
(HS) Thank you for sharing that. I appreciate you naming that it’s still going to be hard occasionally, and that we basically don’t need to have it all figured out right now. I hear compassion. I hear celebration. I hear a desire for more awe and love. And so much presence and structure, coming from freedom and wisdom, rather than fear.
Back to the Anxious Part:
(HS) Did you hear all that? How does that feel to you?
(AP) Not as scary as I thought it would be. That actually all sounds really nice. And I can hear there is room for me as I learn how to soften and support with structure that comes from a higher vibrational place.
(HS) How about you two get together in the same room now for a bit. I’d love for you to get to know each other. Maybe chat a bit and come up with some next steps that you both feel good about?
Parts come together…..
The anxious part appeared very sad, tired, emaciated, tight and tense. Doesn’t really know how to relax and is not keen to just surrender. The relaxed part appeared with a warm and welcoming smile, and emanating with white light. The anxious part asked for patience and guidance, and a desire to release tension. It expressed comfort to step back and allow the relaxed part to take the lead for the remainder of time allotted to this week long experiment. Wants to remain present and included, but very open to feeling supported. A desire to release tension and take on higher self qualities as well. I saw it sit back into what looked like a womb of white light created by the relaxed part and its immense amount of Higher Self energy. Its intention is to learn, to stay open minded to a new way of approaching food and structure. While this structure is in place, the anxious part can sit back and witness while it rests. Its intention is to learn, to stay open minded to a new way of approaching food and structure. The relaxed part is happy to take the lead this week and is open to engaging, answering questions, and even supporting this part if/when it’s ready to unburden and move through a transition. That new relationship felt powerful. If/when I feel that fear/anxiety, I can imagine this womb of light and imagine I am being bathed and supported, and remind myself that the relaxed part has a lot of higher self energy and I can trust their leadership and let this be a learning opportunity.
