The PuNolChi Mind Table began ten years ago and has been spreading by word of mouth, centered on FEAT professionals.
It truly took off in autumn 2018 as a dementia-prevention cultural arts program using Food Expressive Arts Therapy, together with the Dementia Care Center of ○○ County.
Starting with the idea “Express with food and play, and dementia is prevented,” it achieved good results, and today it offers customized lectures for many different groups.
To grow into a capable professional in psychotherapy or counseling, you need long, specialized education and training. But the PuNolChi Mind Table — eating with the positive heart-energy already inside you — is something anyone who sits at a table can do.
From small children who can hold a spoon to the elderly, everyone can enjoy a Mind Table while eating, using the ingredients on the table to put in positive energy and supply the energy they need.
And if you wish earnestly, you can even send a Mind Table filled with positive energy to the other side of the earth to pass on that energy. Much has been revealed about the invisible super-energy that transcends time and space (quantum fields, energy, Qi). If you pray wholeheartedly with that energy, your sincerity can reach the other person. As I face the table, I believe an invisible energy can heal oneself or help others grow. I don’t think you have to complete a Food Expressive Arts Therapy professional course to become someone who helps and heals others. The study of the heart begins with understanding and noticing yourself.
Right now — as you comfortably eat in daily life and take a Mind Journey on your plate, letting your hands and heart lead — this very moment is the start of meeting yourself. First, I recommend having Mind Table time every day, gifting yourself a Positivity Table, a Love Table, a Gratitude Table and a Self-Praise Table, so that the positive energy of the happiness blooming inside you overflows. Then your overflowing energy naturally spreads to those around you.
With that heart, I practice the Mind Table filled with positive energy.
A Mind Journey expressing the wish that the health within me comes alive and love blossoms; that you, I and our planet Earth may become healthy together; and that the mission of PuNolChi — Psychology on the Dining Table, 5 Minutes a Day — will reach the world so that the global village becomes more peaceful, full of love, and blooming with happiness
PuNolChi reaching overseas — footsteps of talent donation
Since 2012, whenever circumstances allowed, I also donated my talents overseas to promote PuNolChi.
Moved by the values of Principal Won Hye-kyung, and at her invitation, I gave lectures at Hunmin Hakdang Global Korean School in New Jersey using PuNolChi — creativity coaching, attention coaching, problem-solving coaching, social-skills coaching and parent coaching with children — and I am grateful that I could contribute to the school’s growth.
An article from July 9, 2012 appeared in the New Jersey edition of the Korea Daily (Joongang Ilbo). Using PuNolChi coaching on many topics, I began full-scale activities to help Korean communities living abroad. I had wondered what effects PuNolChi would have outside Korea, and I am grateful that it became a good opportunity to see positive results just like in Korea.
In particular, in the Coaching Mom program where children and parents took part together, a child who had been struggling with anxiety changed dramatically in just three weeks, surprising everyone. Encouraged by these positive responses, Healing Santa Dr. Kim Ji-yu actively carried out activities to help Korean communities abroad at Hunmin Hakdang Global Korean School in New Jersey.
Food Expression Coaching professional course in New Jersey, 2013 — not a large group, but I am grateful for the fulfilling time we shared.
After that, Dr. Kim Ji-yu supported Hunmin Hakdang Korean School in New Jersey, USA, from its early days until 2017, when it grew into a global Korean school. The goals she first set — “Although we start late as a Korean school, let’s rank in the top three in New Jersey” and “Principal Won Hye-kyung’s values are so admirable, let’s even receive a commendation from the U.S. President” — were all achieved, which made it even more rewarding; it is one of the best things she has done in her life. Today Hunmin Hakdang Global Korean School has grown into a global institution and established itself as a fine school in New Jersey.
It feels like only yesterday that I was passionately traveling back and forth between Korea and the United States, yet 13 years have already flown by. I am grateful that circumstances have allowed me to share what I have and donate my talents.
Talent donation at the Korean Women’s Association of Singapore, February 2018
A wonderful meeting with members of the Korean Women’s Association of Singapore — grateful to share good influence.
Later, because of a car accident, Dr. Kim Ji-yu could no longer donate her talents overseas, but even amid pain she did her very best, donating her talents through writing and online Zoom lectures.
As her health improved, in 2024 she visited Shenzhen and Guangzhou in China and had the chance to introduce PuNolChi to China. People in China also showed serious interest in the effects of PuNolChi.
Food seems to transcend time and space. Even with different countries, languages and cultures, I experienced that we can communicate through PuNolChi.
PuNolChi, proven as a K-Therapy
President Kim Min-yong of the Korea Food Expressive Arts Therapy Association (K-FEAT) presented, as his doctoral dissertation, a concept-mapping study of the therapeutic factors of Food Expressive Arts Therapy — first started in Korea in 2006 by Dr. Kim Ji-yu — demonstrating that Food Expressive Arts Therapy is a K-Therapy. Based on 20 years of research, Dr. Kim Min-yong proved the therapeutic effects of Food Expressive Arts Therapy in <A study of therapeutic factors perceived by experienced food expressive arts therapists in food expressive arts therapy>, and he is currently teaching the professional training course in food expressive counseling.
Based on the theory of Food Expressive Arts Therapy, PuNolChi is being promoted to the general public, companies and the wider community as a concept for maintaining and expanding health in daily life.
Psychology on the Dining Table, PuNolChi — Dr. Kim Ji-yu recommends that anyone who wants to sublimate everyday life into art at the dining table should try the 5-Minutes-a-Day PuNolChi Mind Table.
Hoping that PuNolChi will help spread peace on our planet and build a healthy and beautiful world, Dr. Kim Ji-yu focuses every moment on doing her very best to share good influence.
Kim Ji-yu is carrying out full-scale activities — lecture sharing, writing and fieldwork — so that PuNolChi, which began in Korea, can take root as a good tool for a healthy life: as K-Culture, K-Healing Education and K-Coaching.