April 2010 issue of Popular Science reports recent research by Brigham Young University psychologist Dr. Katie Liljenquist shows that people “act more civil in an area spritzed with lemon-scented Windex.” While Dr. Liljenquist proposes that “scent could help business promote ethical behavior,” I wonder if, perhaps, this kind of use of scent could also facilitate mindful eating.

Some of us have not yet developed a particularly firm sense of self: the self-structure is a little fuzzy so to say, not enough informational-conceptual ego. If you are getting easily flooded with emotions, if you happen to recognize yourself in the Borderline Personality Disorder diagnostic criteria, such craving control strategies as self-talk are a bit premature. To put it bluntly, you just don’t have a firm enough self to argue with yourself (because that’s what self-talk is, a kind of inner dialogue, a tug-of-war between the wise mind and the not-so-wise mind). Self-talk is a bit too destabilizing, defragmenting for a self that is not neurotic enough to argue with itself.