Boredom: Breaking The Habit Of Boredom Eating
Boredom is one of the most common reasons for emotional eating, especially at night. You’re sitting in front of the tv and have the urge to reach for a snack. You know you’re not hungry, you’re just bored!
This can be one of two things:
Firstly, it’s become a habit! There isn’t necessarily an emotional drive behind this behavior. It’s just become a habit - and habits can be hard to break especially as they strengthen over time until they happen on autopilot.
Now if you’re doing this on a regular basis, there is another thing I want to you to get really curious about. Nowadays it’s actually quite hard to be bored!
Most of have Netflix, a list of favorite podcasts, books we want to read and at least 10 things on our to-do list that we we’ve been putting off in favor of scrolling through social media. Most of us are overwhelmed and overstimulated! So if you find yourself saying you’re eating because you’re bored on a regular basis I want to get curious about what else might be going on.
When you struggle to connect with your emotions, ‘bored’ can become a default description for how you feel.
‘Bored’ can mask the more difficult underlying feelings for which emotional eating provides an escape. Get curious about your boredom: are you actually lonely, do you feel unfulfilled, are you exhausted, sad, disappointed, or burned out? Or are you procrastinating?
So instead of telling you to go for a walk or call a friend to avoid nighttime eating, I invite you to gather some data about your behaviors and get curious about what’s really going on.
Here are a few reflective questions you can use:
Did you experience any moments of joy today? (this can be simple moments like enjoying a morning coffee or playing with your kids).
Did you have any time to yourself today?
Did anything triggering happen today that has annoyed you?
Do you feel seen, heard and connected or do you feel isolated?
Do you feel excited about tomorrow or are you delaying going to bed?
When working with clients on the Eating Freely Program, we work towards making the necessary changes in your daily life so you no longer find yourself feeling ‘bored’ or triggered to binge on a regular basis. This is where the real transformation happens!
