Reviews

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With chapters like “Are you really savoring your apple? An apple meditation,” “Savor: Mindful Eating, Mindful Life” (HarperOne, 2010, $25.99 hardcover, 304 pp.) is not your average healthy-eating guide. A hybrid of Buddhism and nutrition, “Savor” blends the Vietnamese Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh’s teachings with research done by Dr. Lilian Cheung, the director of health promotion and communication at the Harvard School of Public Health’s Department of Nutrition. Divided into three sections, “A Buddhist Perspective on Weight Control,” “Mindful Action Plans,” and “Individual and Collective Effort,” the book introduces Buddhist ideology before delving into specific healthy living tools, including exercises for untying external (and internal) knots, a ten-week sample mindful-eating plan- even a breakdown of fats. ‘Savor’ may have us rethinking every bite, but maybe that’s just what we need.

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Tricycle Magazine
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Authored by an eminent spiritual leader and a renowned nutritionist, this work infuses science into wisdom and wisdom into science. It is a practical guide to eating mindfully and points the way to attain a healthier weight and a more satisfying life.

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— Harvey V. Fineberg, M.D., Ph.D.
President
Institute of Medicine
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The past 40 years of nutritional science has provided us with solid evidence on healthy foods to eat.  It is now time we moved beyond the “what” to eat. We need to learn and embrace “how” to eat. Savor offers insight, comfort and tools to address the suffering many people experience when trying to achieve a healthy weight and a healthy life. Hanh and Cheung are masterful in communicating the concepts of nourishing our bodies and our hearts. They offer practical steps of how to adopt the practice of mindfulness and integrate it into our daily lives.

Part 1 offers a new way of examining issues around weight and lifestyle. It moves from the traditional recommendations and guidelines for food and exercise and replaces them with concepts of improving weight and health through the journey of a mindfulness living plan.  The guided tour of Savor focuses on enhancing the awareness of body, feelings, and mind and how they are intimately related to changing eating and physical activity habits.

Part II describes how to eat mindfully each day along with providing practical strategies of incorporating movement into our lives. This section offers readers the guidance to create personalized goals and concrete ways to achieve success.

Part III explores the interconnectedness of the world we live in. It describes how for us to eat healthfully and stay physically active we need support from the people and places around us. It reminds us that we can be a change agent for a healthier world today and for future generations.

Savor is a book that teaches us to cherish each moment. It illustrates how living a mindful life can bring joy, meaning and peace to us all.     

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— Kathy McManus, M.S., R.D., L.D.N.
Director of Nutrition
Brigham and Women’s Hospital
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So essential to healthy eating is a healthy perspective that Zen Buddhist master and prolific author Nhat Hanh joins forces with nutritionist Cheung for a truly holistic approach. The duo pairs the latest nutritional information with the age-old Buddhist practice of mindfulness—that is, of being “fully aware of all that is going on within ourselves and all that is happening around us”—to draw attention to what and how we eat. Guidance is offered for recognizing what “barriers—physical, psychological, cultural, and environmental”—prevent us from controlling our weight, and readers are encouraged to savor food in order to fully nourish both the body and the mind. To that end, Nhat Hanh provides guided meditations on everything from eating an apple to coping with stressful situations, along with advice on food selection and preparation, staying active, and avoiding self-criticism. Complete with a discussion of why healthy eating is also good for the environment, this is a uniquely insightful and positive program for wellness; a book of tested wisdom; practical action; and intellectual, emotional, and spiritual nutriments.

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— Donna Seaman
Booklist Advanced Reviews

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