Find joy in home cooking duties

I am among the approx 60% People all over the world say they feel happiest in the kitchen. But I didn’t start there.

When I was 12, I told my parents that I planned to marry a chef. I liked the idea of ​​good food. I didn’t like the quiet assumption that caring for others through food is simply what girls are supposed to do. Then the kitchen seemed less of an option. But as I got older, I started to see to cook As a space for self-discovery rather than obligation, and I experienced that differently.

I realized that the way I prepared the meal shaped how I felt long after eating. Noticing whether I feel impatient or present, self-critical or curious, obliging or self-nurturing is important.

This shift in perspective seemed surprising at first. We discuss often What to eatincluding protein, fiber, anti-inflammatory foods, weight loss, and gut health. But we talk less about what happens before the first bite. In fact, preparing a meal can be just as fun as eating it.

Why can cooking feel soothing?

In stressful and uncertain times, we instinctively look for practices that make us feel grounded and grounded. For some, this looks like journaling, walking, or knitting. For others, it’s cooking. “Food preparation engages all five senses, and the whole-body experience can feel grounding in a way that few other daily tasks can,” Agata Williams, RDN, tells SELF. “You touch the bell peppers before you cut them, you smell the spices in the pan, you hear them sizzle, you see the colors change,” she explains. “And then, at the end of it all, you taste them.”

Cooking engages the body in small, frequent ways. Washing, chopping, sorting, and stirring are movements that ask my hands to do something steady and specific. When I’m immersed in this task, my thinking slows down and my shoulders slump.

It’s not magic. It’s mechanics. “Cutting, separating, and sorting are repetitive movements that can be soothing to the nervous system,” says Gary Cotman, licensed mental health therapist and founder of Kitchen Therapy.

When cooking becomes soothing, nutritional therapist Kim Shapira describes it as shifting into a different mental state. Cooking can become a “trance,” where your mind is no longer focused on “bills or problems,” but instead turns to “gratitude, beauty, and art,” she tells SELF. At its best, cooking feels “like a slow dance with yourself.”