5 Reasons Why Food Consciousness is Essential to Good Health
We live in a culture where we eat what we want, however much we want and when we want. We rarely consider whether the foods we choose to eat are good for us. But the fact is that food is more than just fuel to our body, or a temporary fix for our emotions or a treat at the end of a day.
Food speaks to each one of us in different ways – it has the power to express culture, to bring joy, to celebrate, to facilitate community and sometimes more negatively, to hide pain, to ‘fix’ body image, or even to mask inner insecurities.
When we stop to consider how integral food is to our daily lives and how often it comes to our mind, one might consider why we don’t pay more attention to the ways in which food can contribute to and influence our health, emotional balance and mental well-being.
Most people are not food conscious. Food consciousness is about being aware of your food on the level that you recognizes that food has power to affect your health on a physical, mental and emotional level. More importantly, it is about YOU and your ability to choose; You are the one that has the power to recognize the healing and nourishing power of food and then make a choice to eat or not eat that food.
Five Reasons Why You Need to Embrace Food Consciousness Today:
- Foods can heal. We often don’t think about food except for, “This tastes good.” We often look at food as fuel. We think, “I need to eat this or that to get through today.” We don’t think about how the food we choose will fuel our bodies in healthy and healing ways. Certain foods have been shown to reduce inflammation, lower cholesterol, balance blood sugar levels, manage auto-immune disease symptoms, build muscle, supply minerals, nutrients and vitamins and YOU have the power to choose to eat foods that can do just that! Food is powerful stuff.
- It’s about embracing yourself. We are all in different life stages. We all experience different traumas, stresses and difficulties. But the one thing that stays the same is you. When you choose to accept yourself AND recognize that the choices you make today have impact on your health today and in the future you actually begin the process of embracing yourself. That does not mean that you accept your high blood pressure or high cholesterol or being overweight as, “That’s just me,” but it means that you learn to embrace your power to make choices. By embracing yourself you recognize the power of self and the ability to make choices that can heal and support your body through whatever struggle or transition you face.
- It creates space for choice. Choice is a powerful thing. We can often feel powerless over our health but you do have power! By choosing to be aware of every single thing you put in your body and recognizing the power of those foods to bring health and wellness you have the ability to heal your body day by day. The moment to moment choices you make create opportunities for your body to heal, your mind and willpower to be strengthened and your emotional well-being to be enhanced and empowered.
- It’s about owning and recognizing the importance of process. The process is just as important as the destination if not more so in the journey to health and wellness. When you recognize the power of food on your health and well-being, health suddenly becomes about the now and not just about the goal. We are often willing to eat “healthy” for a few weeks to lose a few pounds or to prepare our body for a marathon but when it comes to eating healthy for life we easily fall off the band wagon. The journey is where character is created. It’s where willpower is honed. The health you want is achieved today because health is in the moment by moment choices you make.
- It makes our bodies come alive. No one wants to live life with no energy, poor concentration, sleeping issues, anxiety and feeling just plain ‘bleg.’ And yet, we often do live feeling exactly like that and we don’t realize that it begins with the simple food choices we make moment by moment. Food not only nourishes and heals our bodies physically, but it makes our mind more aware, balanced and focused. Eating a diet high in refined sugar and processed foods deadens our tastes buds so that we are left wanting more and more of that thing to get that same intensity of taste. Have you ever fasted before? If so, you’ll understand that afterwards, water suddenly tastes purer, sugar tastes sweeter and our taste buds come alive to the flavours in foods we never realized were there! Your body comes alive!
Choose life for your body by embracing yourself and the ability you have to make choices that will affect your health today and tomorrow.
If you need someone to help you in the process of achieving the level of health you desire (and deserve) consider the help of a health coach!
In health,
Rachel
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