Thought for Food

by Frank Tybislawski,  Brisbane, Australia

I would like to share what I discovered through my recent sessions with a local Universal Medicine practitioner.

While I knew my diet was quite good, I had to admit that how I digested and reacted to the food was irregular. It seems like a simple process, one we have lived with (one way or another) since day one, yet food can be an issue throughout one’s whole life. I knew what tasted nice, I knew what didn’t taste nice, I knew what reacted with my body, so why then did I feel so up and down after eating? There had to be more to this and I needed to examine what that was, and why.

My practitioner and I discussed food and eating habits; most of our discussions centred on how certain foods felt when I ate them. For example, I already knew that a glass of milk caused severe pain, but I came to realise that other foods also had reactions in my body, perhaps in quite subtle ways which were easy to overlook. My focus throughout was to be very honest and feel each and every reaction to all the different foods I was eating. Another point discussed several times was that I often ate because it was that time of day, eg. breakfast time, so I must have breakfast. When I was asked if I was genuinely hungry on those occasions I had to say I was unsure – on some occasions I was, but on other occasions I definitely wasn’t.

The process then was one of self-reflection; firstly to be honest and ask myself, am I genuinely hungry? If the answer was no, then I had to determine why I was wanting to eat… was it to dull or override another feeling? If I was genuinely hungry it was then the time to consider exactly what I felt like eating, and how much I should prepare and eat.

Another factor also came to light; was I eating something just because it tasted nice and therefore made me feel nice? The unfortunate answer was sometimes yes, and I got to feel this quite strongly on one occasion. I knew I was genuinely hungry and was contemplating what to have for dinner. There were a few options available – a quick re-heat of some left-over chicken curry, I could steam some vegetables and have some fish, I could defrost some soup, and there were others. My first thought was the chicken curry (a typical dinner meal), quick and delicious, but that suddenly didn’t feel right. It then just came to me that what I really wanted was a green salad (a typical lunch meal); it would require more preparation, but it really felt like what my body was asking for. I made the salad like I have numerous times before with the same ingredients, but I have to say it felt more satisfying than it usually did, and I felt great after eating it. This was a pivotal moment, as I experienced an entirely different approach to the whole hunger/eating regime.

I haven’t got all the answers and I also know that this is an ongoing process which needs to be continually reviewed. Foods that suit me now may not in the future, and foods that I have dismissed previously may actually be beneficial now, or at some point in the future. What I now realise is that food is a daily choice which I actually need to consider every time I decide to eat, not just treat it as an automatic response to hunger.

1,114 thoughts on “Thought for Food

  1. I am gradually learning to discern when I feel hungry for food or is my body telling me it is hungry for something else.? A deeper connection with someone or myself perhaps.

  2. “food is a daily choice which I actually need to consider every time I decide to eat,” This is so different to how most of us were raised to just eat what was put in front of us at certain set times of day. Choosing to eat what you feel supports your body is very freeing.

  3. My body is starting to speak really loudly now in saying ‘yep I did not want that I do not feel good now’. with certain foods also I agree how many times do we eat when we are not even hungry!

  4. I absolutely love how specific my body is in communicating what it wants to eat. ‘Green vegetables’ are not interchangeable, not at all. I can’t be doing with green beans but offer me a bowl of brussel sprouts and I’m all yours.

  5. Our body is such a good communicator, till we ignore or confuse the signals! Then we can be thirsty and think we are hungry, or anxious and think we are hungry, or tired and think we are hungry… yep very confusing unless you are willing to see below the surface.

  6. Sometimes we overeat or eat the wrong food on a day where we’ve felt anxious, troubled, annoyed, stressed etc. other days, we’ve had an amazing day – worked out, been productive and so on and we still end up eating food that harms or in a way that harms. What’s that all about? Is it possible that there’s more to our relationship with food – is it possible that instead of using it as a nurturing and nourishing tool for life, we use it as a sharp blade to cut ourselves and bring ourselves down? Is it possible that we’ve found another tool to self-abuse, but would never call it self-abuse?

  7. Your sharing has prompted me to feel into how I am with food lately. And what comes to me is how I want to have a bit of naughty just to take the shine off the day, and it doesn’t feel good in my body, I feel bloated, or I actually get a pain in my belly, or an ulcer starts forming in the mouth, so I eat more so that the fullness of my stomach will overshadow other discomfort. This is so not what I want to give to my body. Crazy how I can get carried away with that.

  8. I am considering the same thing at the moment, my food preparation has become so functional – I know the recipes inside & out and can do it all with my eyes closed. But the food I cook never feels quite so nourishing, I can always overeat on it because nothing is ever enough. Recently I attended the Universal Medicine retreat in Vietnam and the food there was prepared for us by the chefs in the hotel. It was amazing, there was no stimulation yet it was so filling. Every meal felt nourishing & I didn’t want to do anything to offset that feeling. Having experienced that, I am now trying to replicate it in the way I cook my meals – try to make them less about the ingredients & more about the quality in which I cook in.

  9. ‘…food is a daily choice which I actually need to consider every time I decide to eat, not just treat it as an automatic response to hunger.’ This very sentence reminds me how important it is to stop for a moment and feel my body, to really discern what is going to heal or harm it through the food I choose. It firstly requires great honesty and then, the love to honour the truth I feel to actually choose what supports me over what simply tastes good or gives me a relief. As my body is alive, there shoudn’t be stagnation but a continuous work in progress with food, which starts with observation and deepens when I allow myself to explore new meals, going out of my comfort zone of what one day worked. Every day is a whole new opportunity to be intimate with my body. How amazing is that!

  10. How lovely to read of someone giving such tender care and consideration to their body! It’s inspiring too, I feel I could go to a more detailed awareness of my body and what foods it would be nourished by, and also be more free to not eat at times, and to also eat things I might not consider because of a rigid mindset, like soup for breakfast if that is what I feel to.

  11. It is inspiring to be able to give ourselves time and space to reflect on our diet, what we are eating, how much of it are we eating, what are our ‘go to’ foods and why. I know I could do this more for myself and have started to do this, especially after having a virus where it feels my body has hit a complete reset button with regards to food, and what does support it and what doesn’t.

  12. Our relationship with food is constantly changing, one day we may eat something and it may support us to be vital, and another day the same food and same portion may actually be making us dull and sickly. Food is so vital for the body, we need the nutrients, the vitamins and our stomach needs to process it. It is also vital for the discarding of energetic imprints, sometimes we may crave something which does not agree with us, and as a result of having it we may get sick. If we look at it on a physical level we may beat ourselves up, and go around in circles not being able to explain why we make silly food choices. However, if we dig a little bit deeper and question the root cause, we may just see that our unexplainable behaviour may be because we are dealing with something which may be difficult to understand and let go of.

    1. Food is such a huge topic of conversation and it is great to be having this conversation because you have raised what I felt was a great point viktoriastoykova. Why do we make the food choices we make? and if we were to look a little deeper at those choices could it be that we are dealing with something that on a conscious level we are not aware of, yet at a sub-conscious level we are aware and want to bury the feelings with food knowing that will dull us because we have yet to let go of the nub of the hurt we cling onto? I have thought I had let go of something only to find that there is a deeper layer to the hurt that needed to be addressed and it was me reaching for certain foods that highlighted to me via my body that I hadn’t cleared everything.

  13. Food can offer us so much, in so much that it lets us know where exactly we are at with our food choices, for example if I start craving more carbs and sugars I know 1. that either there is a situation I am avoiding reading or 2 I am exhausted and not prepared to just rest. Understanding why we make food choices is the first step to making positive change.

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