It’s Just Not That Exciting
My wife and I embarked on a journey 3 years ago when we did the Whole 30 program. I lost a bunch of weight that I didn’t even know I had, temporarily reset my taste for sugar and gained a really strange craving for kale salads. I’m not kidding: if I don’t have a kale salad every few days I feel like something’s missing. Anyway... I tried to be mindful during this time and there were a couple of things that I observed:
I did not really have hunger pangs, I had habit pangs. I wanted to have a snack because I was used to having a snack.
There is an absurd amount of sugar in nearly everything. Seriously, reading labels carefully will change your view of food forever.
At some point, I simply got bored with eating. It was just a thing I needed to do.
The last one is curious. I had gotten used to food as entertainment or recreation. Why eat just for nutrition when it can be an extravaganza? Why shouldn’t it be amusing and delightful? Every. Single. Meal.
And, of course, food is delightful. And it is delicious even if it’s not loaded with sugar AND dextrose AND corn syrup. (That’s not a joke: I’ve seen all three on the same label.) But sometimes you just need to have lunch and it doesn’t have to be a big deal. It’s some chicken and vegetables. It’s some fish and vegetables. It’s some vegetables and some other different vegetables. Or some fruit. And it’s healthy and satisfying in every way except that it’s not French fries dipped in BBQ sauce.
There are traditional foods that are only prepared for special occasions: celebrations, holidays, religious observances. The thing is, we’ve gotten used to being able to have anything we want almost any time we want it and subsequently erased nearly every association it may have had with a special occasion. That may not be quite as true these last few months as it used to be, but my last trip to the grocery store suggests that it’s still mostly in effect.
There are people struggling with being bored because they’ve got too much time on their hands (envy...), but I wonder if they’ve gotten bored with their food choices. I wonder what this time would be like if we ate pretty much the same thing each day and got used to not being surprised and delighted the way we’re used to?