Food Freedom

Probably the number one issue among all those my patients
have when they first come to see me is something involving
food: allergies with physical and/or mental symptoms,
reflux, digestion and absorption problems, elimination
problems, weight problems, autoimmune disease secondary to
food reactions.

It seems that in the USA we have a national obsession, not
much different from Wallace Wattles’ over 100 years ago,
about what’s wrong with the way we or other people eat.

All the medical and scientific “shoulds” about food seem
so much at odds with what we feel tempted to eat, that
most of us seem to live with quite a bit of mental
conflict.

How can we trust any sort of inner spiritual guidance
about food when we can’t feel the difference between a
craving and an inspiration, and can’t set aside all our
modern education about how we should eat?

It occurs to me that most of the stress about food is
based on the rarely questioned assumption that what
matters most to your health lies in the physical realm.

With this assumption, the purpose of being spiritually
guided would be to know what to DO in the physical realm.

Let’s take a moment and view the question of “what should
I eat?” from the perspective that what’s best for your
health is what feels the least stressful.

To me, the very question of “What should I eat?” is often
stressful, because the apparent answer is both unclear and
so often at odds with my desires.

Let’s try this question of what’s less stressful:

the belief that 99% of your health is a result of your
happiness and only 1% the result of your actions,

or…

the belief that 99% of your health is the result of
your actions, and only 1% is the result of your happiness.

Hmmmm.

Sometimes, it’s easier to eat my vegetables than to feel
happy, and I want to believe that my vegetables are
enough–which then makes me feel better. I can use my love
of vegetables and eating them to feel happy after all–
because I believe I’m doing what’s best for my health.

But then, what if there aren’t any vegetables around? Or,
the ones available aren’t organic, or aren’t the ones I
like? Then that belief about the importance of my actions
makes me unhappy and stressed.

If, on the other hand, I believe that my mood is
exponentially more important than my actions in creating
health, then I have much less need to control my
circumstances. I can use any means to feel better, not
limited to vegetables.

Then, the goal isn’t eating vegetables for health. It’s
feeling happy for health.

This brings us to the questionable goal of being healthy.

If I believe my health is my responsibility and the marker
of my success, I feel stressed. After all, I can’t control
most things about my body, and there’s a 100% chance that
I will sooner or later leave it behind. In the process, my
heart will stop beating, and all my body functions except
disintegration and deterioration will also cease.

In the medical world, the term applied to each organ in
this process is “failure.” “Death” is also usually viewed
as failure by the doctors, hospital, and patient.

Hmmmm.

If, on the other hand, I believe my health is the side
effect of my happiness, and my happiness is the side
effect of my choice of what thoughts, beliefs, and stories
I pay attention to and practice, then I relax.

It’s okay if I don’t seem healthy right now, because
health is not my job. My job is to tend to my attention.
I can’t “make” myself feel happy when I’m not. But I CAN
turn my attention to the thoughts, beliefs, and stories I
choose, and experience the resulting happiness.

Now, where were we about food?

Not the primary question any more, is it?

But then, most of us do need to eat, so how do we decide?

What I’ve found is that when I wait until I’m feeling
really joyful to think about food, I can feel what sorts
of things support my body’s feeling of peace, contentment,
and satisfaction. Then I can use that knowledge to reduce
the anxiety of decision-making when I don’t feel so joyful
and I forget the real take home point:

Relax! Enjoy your precious life!