The video delves into the profound emotional connection humans share with food, highlighting how it has been a fundamental part of life's celebrations and moments of comfort. It discusses how food, beyond its basic function of nourishing the body, brings people together and helps them form lasting bonds. The narrative shows how food is intertwined with emotions, memories, and cultural practices, and how it can affect our overall well-being.

The speaker shares personal experiences to illustrate the significance of food and how it sparked a journey toward mindfulness and gratitude. They recount a transformative moment of deprivation that made them appreciate food, inspiring a life-long practice of mindful eating that extended to other areas of their life. This narrative emphasizes the role of food not only as sustenance but as a tool for resilience, emotional balance, and meditation.

Main takeaways from the video:

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Key Vocabularies and Common Phrases:

1. intuition [ˌɪntjuˈɪʃən] - (noun) - The ability to understand something instinctively without conscious reasoning. - Synonyms: (insight, instinct, hunch)

Food is that intuition, binge eating to lack, and loss of appetite.

2. mindfulness [ˈmaɪndf(ə)lnəs] - (noun) - The quality or state of being aware and focused on the present moment. - Synonyms: (awareness, consciousness, attentiveness)

That awareness brought mindfulness into my life and that became my magic mantra of mindfulness.

3. deprivation [ˌdɛprɪˈveɪʃən] - (noun) - The lack or denial of something considered to be a necessity. - Synonyms: (privation, deficiency, lack)

And I was deprived of food for about ten days.

4. tranquility [træŋˈkwɪlɪti] - (noun) - The state of being calm and peaceful. - Synonyms: (peacefulness, calmness, serenity)

...saying that he had practiced it and felt a sense of tranquility and serenity with that food.

5. serenity [səˈrɛnɪti] - (noun) - The state of being calm, peaceful, and untroubled. - Synonyms: (peace, calmness, tranquility)

...saying that he had practiced it and felt a sense of tranquility and serenity with that food.

6. companion [kəmˈpænjən] - (noun) - A person or thing that accompanies or shares experiences with another. - Synonyms: (partner, associate, ally)

...the companion, our food, which is a self-care toolbox to just tap into anywhere, anytime.

7. self-care [ˈselfˈkɛr] - (noun) - The practice of taking an active role in protecting one's own well-being and happiness. - Synonyms: (self-maintenance, wellness, health care)

Food, which is a self-care toolbox to just tap into anywhere, anytime.

8. resilience [rɪˈzɪlɪəns] - (noun) - The capacity to recover quickly from difficulties; toughness. - Synonyms: (flexibility, adaptability, strength)

...all their resilience and focus because they know that after a few days they will get their cheat food.

9. nostalgic [nəˈstældʒɪk] - (adjective) - Longing for or thinking fondly of a past time or condition. - Synonyms: (sentimental, wistful, evocative)

Each time I go back into that nostalgic mode of my past...

10. empower [ɪmˈpaʊər] - (verb) - To give someone the authority or power to do something. - Synonyms: (authorize, enable, equip)

To empower us. Eat every moment.

Food for Thought - How What We Eat Shapes Our Mental Health - Guneet Swani - TEDxSukhna Lake

How do you feel when you walk into a restaurant? And how do you feel after you eat food in that restaurant and pops up hashtag pleasures and judgment of food. From calories to diet to fads, from vegetarian to non vegetarian to vegan, etcetera, etcetera. And the story goes on and on. Don't we have enough discrimination in the world of caste, color and creed that we have added food to this as well?

Have you heard of gut feeling? I'm sure everyone has. From the corporate world to relationships, that usual question which says, what's your gut feel? What is gut is that emotion? We celebrate life with food through food. At all birthdays, weddings, occasions to celebrate life. We are always into the sweet something which adds to sweetness. In our bond, we cut the fanciest of cakes. We certainly do not cut a cake at a funeral. The path between emotions and food has been there forever.

My relationship with food began in May 1977. And I literally thought, it's the end of the world. And I was deprived of food for about ten days. Each day felt too hard to cope up with. Finally, when I ate after two weeks, my feelings towards food were full of gratitude. Each time I ate, I looked at food with gratitude. And that journey continued. And that gratitude started to trickle into all the areas of my life.

Surely the years went by and I started to feel more aware of what I ate and what was the ocean of what I ate all about. That awareness brought mindfulness into my life and that became my magic mantra of mindfulness. And that Murphy's law started to flow into all the other areas of my life.

Have you heard of the term the cheat food? The high performance athletes get all their resilience and focus because they know that after a few days they will get their cheat food. That helps them focus into their goal and achieve their goals. And that's what food does to us, that reward.

And then comes the comfort food. We all have comfort food, our favorite comfort food, which simply uplifts us. When I eat that samosa, which has now become the air fry samosa, I feel so good and joyous. And it throws me back to my high school days, all the memories with my friends. With that just one bite of samosa, I feel joyous.

I have this comfort food narrative of my childhood favorite food joints to my favorite foods. Each time I go back into that nostalgic mode of my past and I bring it to my present by simply looking at those images, pictures, and taking it back, visualizing when will I go back to that era and enjoy and cherish that food and those moments and those eating joints? This two minute narrative simply perks me up.

One of my colleagues was going through relationship crisis, and he called me up during his lunch hour, absolutely devastated, a bundle of nerves. I told him to just switch off his phone, put aside all the gadgets, and to practice still less while eating. Instead of focusing on the breath, which we do during meditation, I told him to focus on the bites. And he called me back the following week, saying that he had practiced it and felt a sense of tranquility and serenity with that food.

Meditation. I thought, let me try it too. There were days when I did not get the chance or time to practice meditation. I started to practice my food, still less meditation, focusing on my bites, and it became a daily practice. Food can be so comforting. Even my dog, when he gets his favorite little bite, he goes berserk emotionally. That's what it does to each one of us.

Food is that intuition, binge eating to lack, and loss of appetite. It's an indicator for us that we need our emotional balance to be looked into. What is the trigger here, which is making me change my relationship with my appetite? Is it guilt? Is it fear? Is it anger? Is it sadness? Is it pain? What is it that is altered for me?

So we have the skill with us, the companion, our food, which is a self care toolbox to just tap into anywhere, anytime. We all enjoy cooking. It's a skill which is very fulfilling. Even tossing up a salad is about love and care. Even if you do it for yourself, it is self love when you do it for another, that can just elevate the relationship and strengthen the bond.

We've all heard the way to a person's heart is through the stomach. And then cooking for someone is action speaks louder than words. That is the journey of food and present within each one of us. We really don't need to run around anywhere to seek it. It is right there.

Some of my friends were not fond of cooking or did not have the time to cook. So we decided to get together every month for potluck. Each one of them would pick up a dish from their favorite eating place, and then we would bond together, check out each other's favorite foods, flavors. And there were such memorable fun evenings, which we cherished.

One of the friends of that group lost a loved one. She was completely devastated and lost her appetite. We all decided that we would go to her place with our favorite food. We picked it up, went to her place. Watching her eat again was a priceless, priceless moment. It was so fulfilling that that's what food is all about.

We are wired to get comfort through food. A baby was crying inconsolably the minute that baby latches on to the mother's breast and that breastfeeding soothes the baby, it just completely is clarity what food does to us. It's our birthright to feel joyous, loved and comforted through food. Not judge it constantly, not fear it, and be in that space we all have heard while we were growing up. Thank you God, for the food we eat. Thank you God, for that lovely treat. We're unstoppable and unlimited in this journey, which is just with us. To empower us. Eat every moment. Let's bite into bliss now and forever.

Emotional Connection, Mindful Eating, Nostalgia, Comfort Food, Inspiration, Philosophy, Tedx Talks