Food is Meant to Move You
There has been an increase in the number of people that take pride in the food they eat and create. Chefs make efforts to make the food we eat look great and taste great. And it seems like over the past few decades marketing companies have made a shift from food tasting great to making us feel better. In recent Hardees advertisements it seems like the marketers are attempting to make eating at their restaurant seemingly more attractive. Or even more patriotic for some of the recent ads we've seen from the popular food chain. But food should not give us any sort of feeling of comfort, relaxation, or anything else! It's just fuel to keep us going as human beings.
Food is Fuel
The food we accept into our bodies is meant to give us energy to do things. From core body functions such as your heart pumping blood through your body to muscle fuel such as walking around. In either case it's important to treat your food as something as simple as fuel, because it is.
Depending on the type of food you eat will determine just how much fuel you're getting into your body. Well that means the usable food anyway. Eating processed sugar loaded snacks does give you fuel but it also contains all sorts of other gook that is simply making you sluggish and weighing you down. It's not only important to realize that food is fuel but it's also important that you fuel your body with the right foods.
Breaking the Emotional Attachment to Food And Why It Is There
There is an attachment to food in many cases and you may not even realize it. The attachment or bond could have been formed in your childhood or years or even decades ago. You may have somehow associated food with comfort or feeling good. Now when you feel bad you almost immediately turn to food. And what is so dangerous is that most people do this without ever realizing it. They want comfort or peace somehow and they think that food is the way they will get it.
Food is just fuel for your body
So why are we so emotionally drawn to food? I think for me it went all the way back to my childhood. When I fell or didn't feel good about something my mother would always ask me if I wanted ice cream. And if I felt really bad we'd head down to the local ice cream shop and pig out with the frozen delight. It made me somehow connect in my mind that when something bad happened to me or I got hurt somehow I absolutely needed ice cream to feel better. Strange but true. My mother likely never considered the idea of how I would make this connection and it's not like I blame her for it. But I needed to break this attachment and make a new, healthier way to deal with hurt rather than ice cream.
Breaking an emotional bond with food is tough, really tough. This is especially true if that bond has been there for some time. It's much like the more it goes on the more it will go on. That's the thing about emotional attachments, once they are there it's tough to shake off. Add to the fact that some of the best times in my life were spent sharing ice cream with my mother and it's not just an easy break. It almost felt like I was somehow making a break from my memories which was not at all easy.
It wasn't long before I realized that this entire process was more than a mere fad. It took work and determination to overcome my attachment to food. I'm still trying everyday to only consider food as fuel and it's tough but each day I can get stronger and stronger both mentally and physically with my weight loss efforts.
Share Your Story
I always love to see and hear what my readers think. If you have a similar story or situation where you have somehow connected food with emotion I would love to hear about it. Use the comments section below to tell us all about it. Your words and story may help to inspire others to start living a healthy life as well.
