Feeling whelmed?
Following dinner one evening several years ago, my word-smith husband announced “that was a whelming dinner.” Huh. Whelming? Hadn’t heard that word before. I naturally compared whelming to overwhelming and underwhelming. But I got what he meant.
As it turned out, whelm identifies something as buried or turned over. Brian’s brain knew the flavors were in that meal and his senses didn’t. According to taste, the flavors were buried. Intellectually, this makes sense.
Well, it also turned out there’s no evidence-based studies on whelm. Although, there are decades of research about meaning-making. It’s a practice of understanding that functions as a way to achieve stability.
The lesson: assigning meaning is comprehending an experience.
Being intelligible is understanding by intellect, not by sense. Since your body is a sensory powerhouse, assigning meaning to what you feel (think, emotionally respond, etc) effectively builds skills. Especially self-awareness skills. The image of a 1 to 10 scale is intellectually helpful for understanding a feeling or emotion along a spectrum. Like a fish, standing on the beach is an example of a metaphor.
A simple way to practice assigning meaning to food is to explore one type. For example, types of chocolate are bulk, packaged, and homemade.
Notice the sensations while eating each. Or you might experiment with noticing the sensation while only thinking about a specific type.
Observe the experience.
Name it. Assign meaning to it.
