Dr Rupy: Alright, so this is going to be another podcast episode on mental wellbeing. This is the second of a two-part series on the mental health goal of the app. If you remember a couple of weeks ago, I did the first part, which is basically looking at the connections between nutrition and mental wellbeing. So we looked at protective nutrients, we looked at eating patterns, we looked at the foods to reduce. Well, this is the second element of it, and I think I don't think it's unique to mental wellbeing, but I think it's more obvious in mental wellbeing that it's going to be a lot more than just your diet and your exercise regimes that are going to have an impact. And so I wanted to do something a little bit different. So instead of me orating into the mic, as I've done in previous episodes, or the traditional podcast, which is me having a chat with someone and you listening in, this is an opportunity to break down those barriers and actually get you guys and an almost like crowd-sourcing ideas of how your experiences can potentially be relevant and useful for other people. What works for me, for example, going to sleep early, waking up, meditating, all the rest of it, might be wholly inconvenient or even ineffective for certain people. And so I think through the process of shared experiences, we could do something a bit fun and a bit different on today's episode. So if you are a newsletter subscriber to the Eat Read Listen newsletter, a weekly newsletter where I share something to eat, something to read, something to listen, or even something to watch, if you're lucky, every week, a couple of weeks ago, I put a call out called giving you guys the mic. And I asked you for tips, barriers, what your experiences of improving your mental health have been in the hope that you would allow us to share these on the podcast. And a few of you have, and it's, I mean, the response has been brilliant. And I can't wait to introduce you to some of our community members. And if you if you're not part of that newsletter, do join. You can find find out the doctorskitchen.com/newsletter because depending on the success of this episode, I certainly want to do this a lot more because it was great to really have a genuine connection with with some of you who took the time, who I'm very appreciative of, who took the time to share some audio and even some video as well. So that this is what this episode is going to be about. We're going to talk about a few concepts here. Interoception, which I'll explain in a little bit, the beauty and the pleasure of food and why that's super, super important. I am going to recap the main takeaways from the research that has allowed us to import that those elements into our simple but smart algorithm that allows filtering of the recipes on the app for the mental health goal. And I also want to introduce some tips and hacks from the community about how to instil these values in your day-to-day. This is going to be, I hope, an awesome pod where you're going to learn a whole bunch of tips. So you might want to pause this and take notes at the same time. I don't know, but for now, listen in. I'm sure you're going to enjoy it. To start off with, I think it's important to be aware of the latest nutritional science around whatever health goal that you are trying to optimise for, in this case, mental wellbeing, right? So there's a bunch of studies, nutritional psychiatry, which is a burgeoning field, and it's really interesting to find out about how improving your gut microbiota can improve mental wellbeing, how inflammation control can improve general wellbeing as well as mental wellbeing, how certain micronutrients, as long as they are optimised in the context of everything else, can potentially support a healthy mindset. But there's also an intuition when it comes to food. And in some ways, as unscientific as it might sound, there are ways in which you can tap into what your body needs without having to follow the latest findings in nutritional science. We have this inherent barometer, a detector of how we feel and how we react when we consume a particular food. So today, I want to look at our ability, or to start off with, our ability to listen to our internal organs through the cues and signals that they send. And trust me, they are sending you signals every time you consume something, drink something, sit down to eat. There are a ton of cues and signals that are constantly being communicated to you consciously and subconsciously as well. And so let's look at food through a more integrative lens, giving consideration to things like the pleasure associated with eating and sharing meals. We also asked our lovely newsletter subscribers about their experience of this as well. We were also asking them about the barriers they're facing and some practical tips as well, as I said. So let's talk about interoception. So when we asked newsletter subscribers for tips to make healthy habits easier, some of you already talked about this concept of being aware and listening to information or cues from the body. So let's listen to some of those audio clips and I can comment on them afterwards.
Guest: My biggest tip for healthy eating would be kind of around eating intuitively, but by that I mean listening to your body and really kind of homing in on those hunger cues.
Guest: I come more and more to realise is that all of these practices, these mental health hygiene habits are related somehow to information. And from moment to moment, on a daily basis, a choice as to where is this information coming from, from the outside or a bit more awareness and conscious attention paid to information coming from the inside. And obviously, some kind of a conversation between the two sources of information. So this is something I'm starting to explore a bit more as I continue these practices.
Dr Rupy: That's Chey and Jaylia there. Thank you so much. And this is what I wanted to start today's conversation with, the importance of paying attention to information from the inside, body cues and signals about what's going on in your organs. And I believe this is particularly relevant when it comes to diet and mental health, not only to ensure a good relationship with food, but also to learn how to respond to your internal needs and give your brain and body what it needs to feel good and function well. And it's the sensing of what's going on inside the body referred to as interoception, which is an emerging field of neuroscience and psychology, and it's absolutely fascinating. And just to clarify this, I think the opposite of interoception, exteroception, will give you some grounding in what we're talking about here. So exteroception is our ability to sense the outside world, vision, touch, hearing, smell, taste. These are our senses. And it's a bit of a misnomer, and I think it's caused a bit of confusion because we think of our senses as those attributes of our body that allow us to sense the outside world. But actually, we have the being able to sense the internal side of us, our internal systems is just as important. And it's this sensing of what's going on in our organs that I believe we've sort of lost because we're constantly being distracted. We'll come on to that in a bit. Now, the importance of learning how to almost relearn as to how to pay attention to what's going on inside the body, something that we perhaps would have done intuitively years ago, and and how to respond to these signals, I believe could be very important for both mental wellbeing and eating healthier in general. And a clue that suggests that the role of interoception, the fancy word for what I just described, in mental health is that researchers observed dysfunctional interoception in many mental health conditions. So having an anxiety disorder, for example, or depression or a mood disorder or an eating disorder often comes with difficulties in sensing what is going on inside the body. We've done a reference section to to the studies that I'm referring to, so you can check that out on the podcast show notes page. And I think this is a very important field of research because it could provide us with more ways to understand, treat and manage mental health problems that affect many people around the world. One of the many tools, I'm not saying that interoception is the tool, but it's certainly something that we could use a lot more effectively and is currently being ignored. So let's break down basically what's going on when it comes to responding to body signals. So there are two aspects to interoception. First of all, it's how our brain senses what is happening in our organs, whether it's our our gut or our our heart or whatever it might be. The second bit is how it listens, interprets and responds to these signals. So first, the brain senses what is going on, for example, in our digestive system. And this is really cool because what is happening in other organs is being represented in the brain. So the movements of the stomach are all signalling to certain areas of the brain where it's being interpreted and it's eliciting a response as well. So what goes on, let's focus on the gut here. What goes on in your gut is influencing neural activity which can guide feelings, cognition, emotional state. In fact, neuroimaging studies have found that there is spontaneous brain activity depending on the slow electrical rhythm generated by the stomach. So there is this real communication that's going on. I think we've discussed the gut-brain axis before, this bidirectional communication highway, and this is being represented by some of those neuroimaging studies. And there's a lot of evidence now to suggest that there is communication beyond just your your brain and your gut. It's actually happening across multiple organs. And so these particular signals are integrated within specific areas of the brain and these can modulate brain responses associated with all those different things that we just mentioned. One of the channels that we should double click on is the gut microbiome or the gut microbiota, this community of microbes in the gut that we talk about fairly often. And it appears that the alterations in the gut microbiota population can impact the function of major brain centres. Now, we've talked about the role of diet in shaping the gut environment, particularly the gut microbiota, and that a poor diet, one that's lacking in nutrients or rich in processed foods or high in inflammatory oils, for example, can cause alterations and excessive inflammation in the gut, which is which is obviously not good. And the inverse is true, a diet that's rich in protective nutrients and fibre can promote a healthy gut environment. So this basically raises the hypothesis that the food we eat can shape the gastric signals that guide neural activity, emotions and feelings via the gut microbiota. So what we eat influences the gut microbiota, changes the signals that are generated, which therefore changes the way our brain receives those signals and then elicits a response in our feelings, cognition and and general activity. Another potential route by which diet can influence our mental state. I think for regular listeners of the podcast, this is fairly easy to understand as we we talk about this a lot on the podcast, pretty much every week. The second part of interoception is our ability to pay attention. This is something I probably don't spend as much time on. We spoke to Cal Newport a couple of weeks ago about our constant context switching. So every day we have multiple things, there might be apps, there might be people, there might be our own internal thoughts that are grabbing our attention and pulling it in different ways, which makes it very, very hard to find pockets of time to pause and pay attention to your body's sensations. And it matters because studies have found that interoception awareness can influence your eating behaviour as well as the response to what you're eating. You can think of the importance of interoception as the importance of aligning with your body needs and what your responses and cues are as well. And so when you when you have a mismatch of that alignment of listening to your body needs with the external behaviour, then that can lead to some issues. And actually, there was some interesting research. Most research looks at how much we eat rather than what we eat. But they found that people with mental health conditions had a decreased ability to sense body signals that modified their eating behaviour. And the ultimate result was they often ate more than what was needed. Now this is a massive generalisation and I struggle to find representation and replication of these studies. But it stands to reason that if there's a mismatch between responding to your internal body cues, then that may lead to overeating and certain types of foods as well. So they struggled to listen to the cues of hunger and satiety that can result in overeating. So that's just one element of interoception that can be quite interesting. My hunch is that we may see these effects extend to food choices as well. So not just about the amount of food, but actually the type of food. And it could be that the way we respond or the way we don't respond to our our our cues could lead to less healthy food choices. So just to put everything in context, to keep you anchored to what I'm talking about here, diet can influence the signals, the signals which are sent to the brain, and our ability to listen to those signals can or inability to listen to those signals can also shape our eating behaviour. So that's the general train of thought. Now the research is still pretty sparse and these are hypotheses based on available evidence, but it is interesting to see where the field of interoception crosses paths with nutrition and mental wellbeing. And what researchers are suggesting as therapies and strategies aimed at improving awareness of the mind-body connection is that these, this is sort of like the forgotten element of nutritional medicine. And there are practices that I think intuitively a lot of people are talking about, hence why I opened up the mic and the discussion because these mindfulness-based stress reduction techniques, yoga, meditation, movement-based therapies, these are things that you guys are already talking about and you guys are already talking about within the context of how you eat and your relationship with food. My overall point is sometimes I think that rather than just giving people information about the latest scientific developments and you know, what kind of things that we should be eating, an additional strategy or maybe the strategy is to improve awareness of our own body cues and attend to some of those sensations that we can then interpret as what our body is actually craving and make the right choices based on that. It's easier said than done, but some of the things that you guys have already been talking to me about in terms of breathing sessions, meditation, being present, taking time away from your devices that lead to destruction and context switching, these are things that will allow you to tap into more of that mind-body connection that can ultimately lead you to make better choices that suit your needs. And I think this in an era of personalisation where we're looking increasingly externally for barometers of how we should act and what we should eat, etc. And I'm not saying those aren't useful. I use some trackers myself, but I think the ultimate tracker is the collection of incredibly, incredibly advanced technology that we have in our bodies already. You know, when we think about baroreceptors, chemoreceptors, all these different things that allow your body to regulate temperature, regulate hormones, regulate your electrolytes, the different types of molecules you have in your body, all at a subconscious level, it's a pretty incredible machinery that we already have. And I think a lot of times our body is telling something, but because we're constantly being distracted, it can be quite hard to interpret or even pay attention to those signals. So that's the overall concept that I'd want to leave you with. Let's get some more practices from you guys because there's a bunch of things that I even I'm going to start introducing myself.
Guest: First would be having herbal tea, like chamomile or lavender or lemon balm, and having a mindful moment whilst making it and drinking it.
Guest: I like to do gratitude exercises throughout the day really, but especially at night when I'm in bed, I drift off to sleep.
Guest: A Qigong, meditation and exercises that are quite related to the two previous habits. I would add the, I would add a fourth one would be water. Water does help a lot in the morning.
Guest: I take an evening walk. It doesn't have to be long. It can be five minutes, but as long as I'm outside in nature, that's the most important thing for me. I find that it's something that I look forward to every day and I really enjoy being outside for a little bit.
Dr Rupy: You just heard from B, Najma, Jaylia and Divya. Thanks for those contributions, guys. So let's talk about another aspect of food that I think we give little attention to, and that is the pleasure of eating. And I think there is a myth going around given how busy our lifestyles are, that nutrition is purely there for fuel and to support our physiology. Now, I think that's fundamentally wrong. I think the pleasure of food is hardwired into our brain such that we have circuits that release dopamine such that it rewards that behaviour. So I think the pleasure of eating is something we really need to lean into in the same way we have pleasure in communities, pleasure in procreation, pleasure in having moments with loved ones. Anyone who's come across my work in the past or whatever, you know, will understand that eating is not simply the ingestion of a nutrient mix. Otherwise, we'd just all be eating astronaut food. And whilst I appreciate that there are solutions out there for busy individuals, it should never really be seen as a replacement for food or that food should be seen as an inconvenience because food's not just a tool for health, it's an important pleasure for life. It's an important tool to allow us to connect with others and be present in the moment, for example. So food isn't really something that should be sidelined, it should be something that I think is a central feature of life. And I'm not just saying that because I'm a foodie myself. I certainly appreciate that not everyone is interested in food to the same degree as someone like myself, but it is something that I think is deeply central to being human in the same way that connection with other humans is again deeply rooted in in being human, which is why loneliness is associated with negative outcomes, for example. A lot of you, probably because we're a self-selecting audience here of people who are on the newsletter, talked about sharing tips to make healthier habits easier. And a lot of you described how to make healthy eating easier. And I just wanted to showcase a tip from one of our subscribers here.
Guest: Have fun cooking, eat vibrant, colourful foods that are nutrient dense, and also have fun with that. You know, be curious, cook something you cook all the time in a different way, explore the endless possibilities of what one ingredient can turn out at the end.
Dr Rupy: That was one of our subscribers, Mercy. Thank you, Mercy. I want to expand on this view because it really leans into the Epicurean perspective. The Epicurean being a person who's devoted to the sensual enjoyment, especially that derived from fine food and drink, derived from being a disciple of the Greek philosopher Epicure. I certainly see myself as an Epicurean. And this eating or the act of eating is a pleasurable experience derived from the aesthetic appreciation of the sensory and symbolic value of food. And it goes hand in hand with moderation, health and wellbeing. I love this. I love this Epicurean view because I think it's again something that is historically relevant and is deeply, deeply human. Researchers define this experiential pleasure of food as a sustainable expansion of this philosophical approach. And it's this lasting cognitive and emotional value that we get from savouring food as multi-sensory, communal and ultimately a cultural experience. And it involves a few steps around food. So I want you to to sort of listen to this with a with a bit more gusto. Anticipation of food events, creation of food events, degustation, i.e. the tasting, and remembrance. And if I just think of those four things, it's something I probably do most days. I anticipate food events. What am I having for dinner? What am I having for lunch? What what a amazing food am I going to enjoy? The creation of said event or said food, you know, how am I structuring my mise en place, what ingredients am I using, what methodology am I doing? How long is it going to take me? The degustation, this is something we'll double down on a little bit later, but the tasting and the appreciation of the elements of the food that we have created and allowed the time for. And remembrance. I remember food all the time. Some of the best meals I've had are in my kitchen, they're abroad, they're with family and friends. Sometimes it's not even about the food, it's the feeling, the experience, you know, a Sunday dinner. I had a really lovely experience with a couple of friends of ours where we went to an Italian restaurant, we had some very, very simple food, very simple pasta, but the sun was out, everyone was glammed up, it was a Sunday lunch. You know, it was nothing particularly fancy, but it was just that that experience. And that remembrance, I can I can feel how I felt in that moment now. That remembrance is is incredible. It puts a smile on my face. And I'm sure as you're listening to this, hopefully, you're thinking of the last magical meal you might have experienced with your friends, family, it might have been tied to a remarkable event, or it might have just been something very simple that you made yourself at home. We all have these steps around food and I think it's important to really to to really magnify or put a magnifying glass on those because that again is something that allows us to be more interoceptive. This is actually something we've talked about in the episode with Julia Samuels MBE, the author of Every Family Has a Story and This Too Shall Pass. She tells us about food and sitting around a family meal as a powerful way to connect, form memories, create a sense of love, safety, security. She also talked about the smell of certain foods and how that brings us back to a time in childhood and moments spent with loved ones. The smell, taste and experience of being together, talking, appreciating life, each other's company. This is why food is so powerful and healthy eating should really not take anything away from that. And at the core of eating, there are five principles to keep in mind, right? So there's the sensory experience, there's the sharing aspect, the socio-cultural meaning, symbolism and storytelling. So, you know, I'm not expecting everyone to think about every time they sit down to have a fish and chips or whatever, sensory sharing, socio-cultural meaning, symbolism, storytelling. I'm not asking everyone to really dig down into every single meal time. But when you break them out, those elements are really critical, are really important concepts to to keep in mind. And the reason why I think these are important principles to keep in mind is because it's difficult in the current context where healthy food decisions are very much characterized by the sacrifice of pleasure for the sake of long-term health. Most people will describe, if not outwardly, but certainly to themselves, that they should be exercising restraint to maintain a healthy way of living. And whilst I agree that in the context of an environment where the food landscape is conspiring against us, we do have to exercise that, it doesn't need to spill out into every element of our eating circumstances. And in doing so, my point here is that we're resisting the siren calls of food by shifting our attention away from internal body signals like hunger, arousal, salivation, and encouraged to focus on the health goals and objectives, ignoring the sensory pleasure that food procures and potentially encouraging us to be less intuitive about the foods that we consume. That's my point there. And I think once we are educated in what is a healthful food, a whole food, a food that's been minimally processed, etc, etc, that's where we can lean into these other elements that really magnify the pleasurable aspects of food because healthy eating is delicious eating. And something I'm putting into my next book actually, a whole chapter on why we have to reframe healthy recipes away from the descriptors of why this is beneficial for your gut, why this is beneficial for your immune system. Whilst I still will probably describe some elements of the food as such because it's interesting and informational, the focus should really be on the flavourful aspects of food. And that's what I'm trying to instil in recipes that we create going forward and have done for a number of years. The messaging around food, healthy foods, can make us underappreciate foods labelled as healthy, going so far as to feeling less full when eating them. And we've we've talked about this on the podcast before in reference to the milkshake study, where the perception, even though the food was identical, the perception changed the physiological outcome. If you haven't come across the milkshake study, I won't repeat it here, but you can look it up and the general findings are purely the way the food was described changed the physiological outcome, the hunger hormone, the satiety level of the participants, and it magnified the idea that the mindset in which you consume a food is super important and it can have a physiological, a physical response. That's, you know, something you can't you can't fake. So an exercise in self-awareness and acceptance is trying to really dive into the sensory pleasures of eating and nourishing our bodies instead of focusing externally on avoiding perceived temptations. So using the pleasure of food as an ally to healthy eating. How delicious is this red rice that I'm consuming? How what are the flavour profiles of this seasonal, locally grown tomato? You know, what are the the sensory experiences that we're missing by just consuming it absent consuming your food absent-mindedly. And this is actually one of the objectives of the app. The recipes are created to be full of flavours and textures whilst also being rich in a variety of nutrients. It's almost like the nutritional aspect of it is an add-on. The way we present the instructions and the images and everything else, it's really there to entice the user, make you salivate, make you really appreciate the the sensory experience of of creating and eating a delicious meal. Going back to the idea of food in its whole form being a very necessary part of our lifestyles, rather than trying to see it as an inconvenience and optimizing the way out of it by creating astronaut food or whatever, eating is is genuinely a multi-sensory experience. It involves all the senses with different routes to the brain, the eyes, the ears, the nose, the mouth. And at first, there's the processing of sight and sound and tactile elements of food. Then there's the processing of smell and taste and mouthfeel. There is hedonic value of food that activates pathways in specific brain regions. And this is why food is such an important part. And I feel like the less people cook, the less people have a relationship with how food is grown and sourced, the more we're losing that element of food and and it leads to a lack of respect and lack of enjoyment for something that I think is so important. And this is why I'm bringing it up on the on a mental health episode. Okay, so let's talk, let's talk about some practical things now that we can slowly start adding to everyday life to help us reconnect with the pleasure of eating, the nourishing elements of food and stuff. Let's let's start thinking about how we eat. So talking about the pleasure of food is is interesting, but like I said earlier, it's hard to apply in a real-life situation when you've only got half an hour to eat or you're eating at work or you've got children who require your attention or you're already overwhelmed by the stresses of life or creating a meal. So, you know, in the past year, we've heard a lot about mindfulness and how to integrate mindfulness into our lives. There are no golden rules when it comes to what works for everyone. It can be very hard to stay consistent, but the benefits of mindfulness and stillness are undeniable. And what we can benefit from mindfulness is also applicable to food. We can use mindfulness and creativity to make eating a pleasurable experience that improves our mental state and overall health. So here are some quick and easy tips to make our meals more mindful and ultimately more enjoyable. Number one, create an enjoyable, relaxing eating environment. So to help cultivate and curate positive emotions around food and signal to the nervous system a shift to rest and digest, clear the table, put away distractions, use your favourite plate, dress the table, lighting a candle, setting the environment. They might sound a little bit left field, but honestly, curating that environment is signalling to your body, now is a time to relax and eat. It's a very simple thing to do. I'm often accused of eating al desko, the technical word for eating at one's desk, but I I am starting to implement some of these tips and it definitely helps with mindlessly eating. And I'm surprised at how many people who suffer with things like bloating and immediately assume that it is a food trigger. Now there are food triggers, I'm not denying that that doesn't exist, but in a lot of cases, the environment and the state in which we eat can also be responsible for physical symptoms. Eating too quickly, eating in the wrong mindset, etc. So curating an enjoyable and relaxing eating environment, I think is a great, great tip. Second, take three deep belly breaths before eating. Again, signals to your digestive system that you're going to be in a relaxed state, that also signals to your brain, it also slows down your your own pace of the day, it allows you to ground yourself in that moment and prepares your digestive system to receive and digest food. Very simple signalling exercise that I think is a great antidote to what is otherwise a fast-paced environment in which we eat. Another tip, pay attention to the way you sit. Sometimes we take a seat and we don't really realize how hunched over we are, how our feet aren't grounded on the floor, we might be slouched to one side, we might not be in the most comfortable seat in terms of the height from the table to the to the where you're sitting. Very interesting areas that I think probably require a little bit more research, but I think intuitively, if you're cramping and your digestive system, you're bent over, you're actually putting pressure on your abdomen and that can signal again that you're you're not quite comfortable in your digestive system. It's not to say that you have to eat in a purely stretching environment that is optimized for your organs. I'm not trying to suggest that, but simply paying attention to the way you sit, I believe will again signal to yourself very consciously that it's time to relax and time to eat. As a gratitude exercise, something I've started doing, well I've been doing for a little while now, if I'm honest, but I try to consciously introduce at meal times, particularly dinner times, I think we've got a little bit more time in the evenings, is to appreciate what it took to bring this food to your plate. So we're very, if you're listening to this podcast and you're into food, we're generally in a privileged position where we can access food, can afford food, can experience different types of foods through the shared sort of enjoyment of other cultures. Appreciating what it took to take every element of the ingredients that you put on your plate, who was involved in the growing process, the production, the sun, the soil it took to grow the food, where in the world it came from. Honestly, it just imbues the the the time of eating your your dinner time with just pure gratitude. And I I absolutely love it. You know, whether I'm eating tenderstem broccoli, mushrooms, whether I'm eating grains, wherever, you know, I always try to look at where the ingredients were grown and I try and support local and and eat in season and all the rest of it. But sometimes you'll have grains or spices even that are grown and produced from thousands of miles away. And it's just incredible to look at my spice cabinet and just think, wow, this came from Sri Lanka. Wow, this came from this area of North Africa. Wow, this is a a spice blend that originated in Egypt, for example. You know, there are so many sensations that we now take for granted because it's become the norm and it's almost like we've hedonically adapted to our current environment, whereas actually if we take a step back, our environment is absolutely incredible and the fact that we get to enjoy all these different elements of food is pretty astonishing in the context of human history. You know, even our ancestors from 50, 60 years ago would be pretty astonished at the fact that we have so much variety at our fingertips. And again, I think it's just the fact that it's become the norm that we've become less appreciative of it and that's just a normal human behaviour. And I guess very similarly to that is to enjoy the sensations, you know, when you're cooking, serving, eating your food, be attentive to things like the colour, the texture, the aroma, the sound, taste the individual ingredients and seasonings and think about all those different elements that I mentioned. So those are a few things that I think would be very useful for people. The environment, belly breaths, taking care in the way you sit, appreciation of all those different elements as well as the sensations and everything, the theatre around eating. One of the practices I I was quite commonly prescribing during the last couple of years as a GP was a journaling practice to increase mind-body awareness of when somebody was eating. So the feelings of how you you are before, during and after a meal, salivating before placing food in your mouth, you know, how hungry were you before you ate? Had you left it a bit too long between meals? Were you in a what kind of state of mind were you? It brings to the surface the experience around eating that otherwise we we pretty much don't, you know, take a moment to to appreciate and actually be aware of. So there are many other questions you can you can try, you know, remembering the flavours and the textures of food, remembering where the food came from, all these different questions, but a journaling practice around food to increase mind-body awareness in general, I think is a really good and interesting exercise, particularly for foodies. All those practices I suggested are new things perhaps to to to add. But as one of you expressed in the tips, one of the best ways to add a habit is by building on what you already do. Here is Rachel.
Guest: But just, you know, adding something on an existing habit that you already have, adding it on to that rather than, you know, whatever it is being yet another thing to add to your to-do list. So, you know, for example, I am, I know I wanted to do more resistant training, weight, weight, bone loading type things. But rather than me thinking, gosh, you know, I've got now to do, go to the gym or or whatever it might be, I've simply just added that on to my morning walk. So I wear my wrist weights, ankle weights, when I'm going on my morning walk and I add them to my yoga practice.
Dr Rupy: That's some great advice there. Okay, so to round off this journey on the links between diet, mental health, interoception, the way we value food, all the rest of it, I'm just going to give you the main takeaways from the research in terms of what foods to eat for good mental health. And these were, first of all, eating plenty of fruits and vegetables every day, especially leafy greens like kale, spinach, berries, carrots, oranges, high in vitamin C. As you've heard many times, we need at least five portions per day, but actually it's 10. And so that's why all the recipes that we try and create have got at least three portions of fruit, vegetables, nuts and seeds per person in in the recipes that we construct. In practice, you know, adding onions, tomatoes, anything to add extra vegetable density to your meals is going to be good in the long run for mental wellbeing. There are a number of reasons as to why, supporting gut health, minimizing inflammation, also what you replace your diet with as well. So you're introducing whole, minimally processed foods. The second takeaway is getting enough omega-3 fatty acids. Now, a lot of people do not eat enough omega-3 fatty acids. It can be very hard to do. It's why I personally supplement. But we talked about in that episode, we talked about the studies looking at omega-3 fatty acids and the risk of depression. It's an essential nutrient for brain function. And we've known that for quite some time now. So I'm sure this isn't the first time you're hearing it. The recommendation is that we get two portions of oily fish per week, things like mackerel, trout, herring, and a portion being 140 grams. But there are a number of caveats to that. A, environmental reasons, fish stocks, the issue of pollutants, and plant sources like flax, walnuts, certain types of seeds, they don't contain the long chain omega-3 fatty acids that we need. So I actually think getting enough omega-3 fatty acids, whilst it is preferable to do through whole foods, it's easier to do with either a vegan algae supplement or a fish oil supplement as long as you're getting it from a very robust source. There are a number of independent lab companies like Labdoor, I believe it's called labdoor.com, that you can use that independently verify the quality of supplements. They usually look at American-based supplements, but we did a podcast episode on supplements and the general way in which you should approach what is a good supplement or not with Kamal Patel, who is the co-founder of examine.com, which is a resource that I personally use a lot. So you can definitely check out some more stuff on that podcast and definitely look at the quality of your omega-3 supplement. Third takeaway is eating enough magnesium, zinc and iron-rich foods. So these are the types of micronutrients that are found in leafy green vegetables, nuts and seeds, beans and whole grains. So again, you can see this pattern of ingredients that we're talking about are really all veering closer and closer to a whole, minimally processed, plant-focused diet. Zinc and iron are often found in similar foods, things like nuts, seeds, beans, but you also get it in red meat and shellfish as well that I eat judiciously, so you know, once every two weeks or so. I've shared a quick card with all this information on the foods, including food swaps as well. I know it can seem a bit vague and repetitive, but it's all backed up by the evidence. If you want that quick card, it's always on the footer to my weekly newsletter, Eat Read Listen. I feel like sometimes I'm calling it Eat Listen Read or Eat Watch Listen, but yeah, Eat Read Listen is the newsletter. You'll find the newsletter on the doctorskitchen.com/newsletter. It's always in the bottom there as well as a seven-day meal plan and we're planning on doing some more meal plans as well, so definitely watch out for those. So I have a way of thinking about what we're talking about today. The science is complex, the mechanisms, the observational studies, the the way in which we can interpret different sources of data, that's all very complex. Solutions, really easy. So getting a lovely mix of plant-focused foods, minimally processed, etc, etc. All the types of foods that we talk about on the podcast week in week out. The hard thing is implementation. So one of the questions that I asked our lovely newsletter community were about barriers to healthy eating and healthy habits in general, especially when struggling with things like mental health. I think it's really important to be aware of the barriers to staying well and being compassionate with ourselves and others about why we might not be able to maintain consistency. So one of the things that I wanted to do with some of the feedback using our subscribers is to to open up about some of the barriers that we face. There are a ton more depending on who you are and your background and where you live in the world, but this is just the start of a conversation to allow us to face and embrace what we what can get in the way of of good intentions. So many of you mentioned time, lack of time, pressure of work, social, family life. Let's hear from some of you guys.
Guest: My biggest barrier is my work-life balance. The only thing that stops me from being able to work out in the morning is if I have an early morning meeting and stopping me from getting to go out for a walk at my lunch break is if I don't even get to have a lunch break.
Guest: A big barrier to my personal healthcare journey is my job expectations. I mean, I work 12 hours a day and that's not including the time that it takes for me to get up and get ready and then come back and, you know, unwind. And by the end of the day, I'm just not interested in going to the gym. I'm not interested in making a big fancy meal. I kind of just want to relax a little bit and that's something that I struggle with a lot. I also struggle with relaxing because I feel guilty because I think, you know, I need to go and work out or I need to make sure I get my steps in or I need to, you know, I come up with these chores that I have to do when all I really want to do is just sit and recharge my brain and spend some time doing something that I really like.
Guest: I think for me, the biggest barrier I face with sticking to those daily practices is finding the balance between managing the things that I know will support my mental health and also managing keeping up a social life and a healthy relationship with my partner.
Guest: Oh, there are so many barriers, aren't there to that interfere with your good intentions. So, yeah, for me, I think one of the biggest barriers is that because the things that I do, I do every day, so going out for a run every day, making sure I get up from my desk every hour and making sure that I go to bed at a reasonable time, there's that temptation to think that, oh, it's not going to hurt just this once. Oh, it'll be fine. I'll just stay up late. I'll make a coffee. I'll watch something on TV. I'll spend a bit more time on my screen. I won't switch it off that hour before that I know I'm supposed to. And very slowly you start getting into bad habits and your intentions go out of the window. So what I find really helps is just not thinking about it. When my alarm goes off in the morning, so often, you know, I'll switch snooze, I'll switch snooze. And then something sort of about 10 minutes, 15 minutes in kicks in and I get out of bed. And because I know that I'm going to do that, what I do is I set my alarm 15 minutes early and I go to bed 15 minutes early. So I know what my sabotaging instincts are and so I meet those head on and set my alarm that 15 minutes early so that it's already built in and I can carry on with these good habits and and I've found that over these two years it's really paid off.
Guest: Discipline is is is kind of a tough one. It's hard to overcome, I guess, because if you don't have it set in stone, it's very easy for you to push it to a later time or, okay, I'll do it at lunch or, okay, I'll do it before I go to bed. And then it comes to bedtime, you're like, ah, crud, I didn't do it. I'll just do it, I'll do it tomorrow. Tomorrow's going to be the day I do it.
Guest: So the biggest obstacle for me is getting to bed on time and resisting the urge to binge watch Netflix until an hour that is too late for me to be able to get up in time to do all the things that I want to do before I start work.
Dr Rupy: That was Emma, Divya, Chey, Ginny, who I think needs her own podcast, Mercy and Sonia at the end. I think this is a tough one. I think it I think it's definitely important to allow space for flexibility, to allow life to happen. You know, there are a few moments where we might not follow the habits that matter to us because we're traveling or we've got family over or we want to do something new or something exciting for one day. And I think it should be down to the intention of the activity that you're allowing disruption for. And you know, if it is, am I skipping practice today? What is the reason? Is that reason serving me better? And I think being intentional about that is is really important. There's a balance to strike here and I think kindness and compassion to oneself is utmost because judgment and self-criticism is really not going to help stick those help people stick to habits in the in the long term as well. And when it comes down to discipline and committing to supportive practices, self-awareness, self-understanding, those things matter. So, yeah, I think being intentional about times when we don't stick to some of our habits to do something else and observing how we feel, I think that can even reaffirm to us why we started practicing the the habit in the first place, whether it be meditation, morning stretching, daily walks, all those activities that we know are so helpful for us. And focusing on the pleasurable aspects. I mean, I love my, you know, my my walks and my morning exercise and stretching. Without those, I don't feel set up for the day, but that doesn't mean to say that I'm completely reliant on them. And I think having that relationship with our habits is really important. As is the next concept. So feeling overwhelmed and taking too much on. I want you to listen to a couple of these clips.
Guest: So I guess the number one thing that sometimes gets in the way is anxiety, actually. So, you know, the the times when you need your foundations the most, your well-being foundations, is often the time when you think you don't have the time. You think that there's there's too much else to do and it's that sense of being overwhelmed. And to me, I know that's my my biggest block, if you like. And it's funny, you know, you have all these tools, but even having all those tools, you need those constant reminders to use them when anxiety creeps in. So I think that would be my biggest thing. When anxiety rolls in, everything speeds up for me. So, you know, rather than taking time to be still, there's a sense that I speed up. And it's it's kind of I feel that happening, but it takes me a while to then press pause and step back.
Guest: Barriers are usually not being able to say no, taking too much on, starting to feel rushed and getting myself into a sort of circle of panic.
Dr Rupy: I think those two clips are really telling from Rachel and B there. Certainly the feeling of being overwhelmed and taking too much on is something a lot of people can resonate with. I certainly can, colleagues can, certainly patients as well. It's a very common theme. And I think that's why just to underline the point about the importance of self-compassion can't be overemphasized. Another one of our listeners also contributed by talking about barriers and summarizing them in three words, interruptions, distractions and addictions. I really enjoyed this framework. So interruptions are things like daily life activities that get in the way, distractions, things that perhaps aren't part of our daily life activities, but we've introduced them into our lives artificially, things like social media or anything that takes a lot of time away from us, whether it be doing your daily wordle or things like reading media articles and that kind of stuff. Some of them can be contributing to your sense of well-being and just, you know, enjoyment of life. But you have to be clear about what is a distraction versus something that is out of completely out of your hands. And then addictions, so getting glued and lost into activities, whether it be technology, whether it be thought processes, all those different things can coalesce and create barriers to your habits. So I did I did like that framework from Jaylia, interruptions, distractions and addictions. Thank you so much to everyone who shared their experiences. I think it's really valuable to have so many voices sharing what works for them, what they struggle with, because this is how we connect and this is how we understand more about ourselves through those shared experiences and and shared barriers. And I think when we listen to other people's experiences, it sort of makes us feel a bit better about ourselves. I know certainly when I listen to podcasts or from from other people in my network and I find out about what they're struggling with, it really makes me feel a bit better about myself because it's through shared experiences that we can be a bit more compassionate on ourselves for sure. Another barrier I think is the current food environment, you know, what's available to us, what's easy to get our hands on, what's added to the food we buy. And I think with with lack of time, we are, we don't really have the brain capacity to fight against our environment. So we reach for the easiest food to eat. And supermarkets and those tend to be those heavily marketed processed snacks and stuff. So again, be compassionate with yourself. You're fighting against a a billion-dollar industry there where food labs worldwide find the best way to to make cheap, palatable food at very, very low cost. So, yeah, just just be compassionate about yourself in that in that regard. I always try and remind people of that.
Guest: I would say do what you can and be glad that you are doing something. For example, I don't get to do as much exercise as I'd like every single day, but if one day all I've done is walked for 10 minutes, then I've done something and this is good. And I think looking at the positive side helps with your mental health and overall wellbeing.
Dr Rupy: I think that is a great reminder from Najma there about the importance of celebrating those small wins because whatever works for you is is going to be unique, but with a bit of empathy, patience, understanding of yourselves, you'd be able to put it into practice and maintain that consistency as well. Talking about consistency and what makes healthy habits easier and more enjoyable, we've had a few good tips actually. This is Divya about increasing convenience and Emma.
Guest: I found the biggest thing that I do for myself, which helps me on my health journey and incorporate more healthy habits include figuring out ways to increase convenience. So, for example, I'll make grains and then I'll put them in the freezer. That way that I can just pull out pre-cooked rice and have it ready in an instant. Or I'll use steamed vegetables and I'll just steam them in the bag. And then there you have two-thirds of a meal ready.
Guest: My tip for eating healthily is just making sure that you have healthy food in the house and no junk food. I mean, if we ever have junk food in the house, it's the first thing I want to eat. So I will go out purposely to get myself a treat that I will be eating that evening. However, otherwise, our house only has healthy food. And a way of making sure you have a healthy lifestyle and making sure you just surround yourself with other people who also want to have a healthy lifestyle and are there to motivate you.
Dr Rupy: What a lot of you guys picked up on is the concept of starting small. So, um, you know, steadily adding just one more portion of fruit, vegetables, nuts or seeds. That's something that my TED talk was was all about. Uh, but a a good quote of this is one by, I'm going to mess up these name. He he sadly passed away recently. Thich Nhat Hanh is a a Thai Buddhist monk who is very well known for his incredible insights. And a quote is, the seeds that are watered frequently are those that will grow strong. So you have these small seeds of a habit change and you just have to keep on reminding yourself to water them every day, every day, every day. So it's about making those little additions that make big differences in the in the in the bigger picture. So having, you know, one portion of fruit, vegetable, nut or seed extra every day might seem like a very small thing or going to the park and and going for a walk or stretching for 60 seconds every single day might seem like a very small thing, but actually that is the seed of change that will grow into a much larger and more consistent habit of which the roots, to use the same analogy, are very, very strong. I really hope this episode has been useful. I just want to formally say a massive thank you to everyone that submitted their tips and tricks and and were amazing in sharing their barriers as well. I'm sorry we couldn't play every single clip that would have been a couple of episodes long, but I think the the reminders are that this is a process and it's not at an individual level, but it's also at a societal level. So we're actually deconstructing years of issues with nutrition and ways in which to make ourselves healthier. So what we need is actually patience, trust. And I think this process is helped along through shared experiences. So I really appreciate everyone giving up their time and and their tips as well. I think they're super, super useful. Remember, in the show notes, you'll find links to research papers, reviews and guidelines for the nutrients I talked about, as well as some of those behavioural studies, as well as review studies looking at interoception. And I just want to say that food is, you know, just one piece of the puzzle when it comes to mental wellbeing, as is interoception, as are all the tools. And I think we have to look collectively at how we can nourish this garden that is our mind. But there are many, many other forms of care that are needed to help us flourish. So if you if you do, if you did enjoy this, please do share on social media, comment on Twitter, which tips were most useful for you. If you want to hear me do more of these, or you want to contribute, then you can just keep an eye out on the Eat Read Listen newsletter that I send out every week. If this is a success, if this is a success, I'd love to do some more sort of audience participation. I really want to do a live event at some point. I think a live Q&A or an immersive experience where you get to have a meal, you get to listen to some some great guests and and share in the experience and meet each other and network. I think it would be brilliant. I'd love to introduce everyone that we just heard from to each other. And as you can hear from the different accents, they come from all over the world, which is amazing. So, so I really do appreciate that. And yeah, hopefully we can do something like this again. Remember, you can download the app for free from the App Store. Unfortunately, Android, we don't have one yet. I am working very, very hard on that. It will hopefully be out later on this year. There's a two-week trial, and if you if you want to try it out, it's all there. We are still sharing tons of recipes and we're uploading our backlog of recipes onto the new website that we launched at the start of this year. And of course, I will see you here next time where we're going to be talking about a different subject, but hopefully equally as interesting. Thanks a lot. I really appreciate you listening all this way and I will see you here next time.
