This is a slight revamp of an earlier post:
One of the main spiritual laws I believe is that the things we believe (both consciously and subconsciously) create the world we experience. Most of my spiritually inclined friends believe some version of that, so I’m often taken aback to hear people talking about food as if it is ruled by laws that are outside the purview of beliefs creating what is.
Lots of people start exploring healthy eating and come up with some theory that involves a list of good foods and a list of bad foods and from then on their conversation about food is filled with phrases like “that’s so sinful”, “that was so bad to eat that,” “I only like to eat healthy food”, etc. They give long lectures on the horrible things that can happen from eating the wrong thing, drinking the wrong kind of water, cooking your food, not cooking your food… In other words they can’t make a decision about food being good for them and just believe that it will be so, but food apparently has some sort of power that puts it beyond having their thoughts affect it.
I like the observation in The Nature of Personal Reality (Jane Roberts channeling Seth) that an obsession about the healthiness of food (or lack thereof) usually means the core belief you live by is that food is tricky and it’s likely something will harm you. Then even with hypervigilance about what you eat your belief makes it easier for something you haven’t noticed to cause a problem.
Personally, I like the idea of assuming that what I eat is good for me. However, I am aware that I, like most Americans, have a fairly tortured relationship with food and deeply held beliefs about goodness and badness. So I try to figure out a “healthy” diet that makes sense and not to worry about eating some things that aren’t on the diet because I believe that generally what I eat is good for me.
It’s tricky in this country with our crazy habits of eating junk food in giant quantities as if nothing could harm us while simultaneously believing that all kinds of foods are bad. While I believe that theoretically you could go on a hot fudge sundae diet and be perfectly healthy if you believed in it, most of us have beliefs about food that are far too confused for that. It’s a balancing act to work on positive views about eating while keeping your diet within a range you truly believe is healthy.
Not Just Sassy on the Inside 
YES!!! I mean … I agree wholeheartedly! 🙂
Thanks!
Oh, yea! Maharishi has told us that if we are going to eat something that we think may not be the best thing for us, we should eat it with much enjoyment, relishing every bite and enjoying the experience and let the concern about it go. He told us that how we feel about the food we are eating has a bearing on the effect it has on our body. That is not to say we can feel well living on RC Cola and Ho ho’s, but that we should pay attention to how food makes us feel and how we feel about the food we eat. Eating with guilt is certainly not good for us. I try to eat whole, organic foods cooked with positive intent 90 % of the time and then enjoy my chocolate, chips, etc. that I eat the rest of the time. Seems to work for me! If I don’t feel good after eating it, it isn’t good for me. If I don’t feel good eating it, I shouldn’t eat it just then.
Sounds very sensible — thanks for explaining so much so well.
I agree whole-heartedly. I believe that preparing, enjoying and sharing our food is an important part of healthy diet. If we become obsessed with every piece of food we put in our bodies we lose the enjoyment factor. While I strive to eat a healthful diet – lots of fresh (organic if possible) fruits and veggies, limited protein, mainly whole grains, etc….I also enjoy a good dessert, ie. a piece of juicy berry pie with ice cream – without guilt I will add.
Exactly! Thanks for reading and commenting.
Two . . .no THREE thumbs UP!
Wow, that’s a lot of thumbs — thanks.
Pingback: F is for Food « shanjeniah