Recently I have shared my quest to eat more mindfully & must admit that it is still an uphill battle at times.  As I reflect on my healthy living goals, the top priority is to remain active (check) and be mindful about what I put in my mouth (maybe half a check on that one).  I have tinkered with the idea of recording what I eat for a few days.  However, given the obsessive nature of my personality, I am afraid that calorie counting may become my 3^rd job.  While I am certainly an advocate of food records, there is a fine line between being aware of what we eat and being obsessed with what we put in our mouths.

As I reflected more on the process of calorie counting I realized that this might not be in alignment with my goal of low stress healthful living.  It was serendipitous that I stumbled upon this article from The Stone Soup arguing against calorie counting. The article goes on to talk about mindful eating and though I think there are certain situations where calorie counting is warranted (certain medical conditions that require calories for weight gain/maintenance, etc) this article is pretty spot on.  I encourage all of you to read it.

1.  Calorie counting takes the joy out of eating
2. Counting calories encourages you to eat packaged, processed food
3. Counting calories doesn’t guarantee you will get the nutrients you need
4. Counting calories teaches you to ignore your natural satiety cues
5. Calorie restriction doesn’t work for maintaining weight loss in the long term
6. Cutting calories doesn’t address the root cause of your problem