Imagine if one subtle mindset shift could have a powerful effect on your decisions around food and your willingness to choose the foods that will best support the health you want. Often we feel we have to fight a battle of “will” to make the right choice. Relying on “willpower” is stressful, often backfires, and doesn’t lead to sustainable positive change. But when it comes to food, there is one mindset shift that you can count on to support the changes you’d like to make around food.
Imagine food as information. It’s not just calories, or something that is either “good” or “bad” for you. Imagine how it will ultimately play out in your system. Will it leave you energized, or bloated, toxic, congested or fatigued?
Physically, you literally are what you eat. Food is direct information for your cells, for your immune system, your hormones, your genes, your nervous system and your metabolism. It’s not just calories. It’s instruction for your body, directly telling your cells what to do. Every bite alters your biology and changes your gene expression for good or for bad. According to Dr. Mark Hyman, “We are learning from research of nutrigenomics that food “talks” to our DNA, literally switching on or off genes that lead to health or disease. What you eat programs your body with messages of health or illness.”
So what about calories? All calories are not created equal, no matter how often we’ve been misled over many, many years. The truth is, some calories are better than others. It’s the source of the calories that’s important, over the calorie itself. Your body is much more complex than the simple math equation of calories in, calories out. The quality of the food you are eating can help turn on your metabolism or shut it down. For instance, calories high in sugar or starch will slow metabolism, calories from healthy fats will speed it up. 300 calories of donut and 300 calories of spinach will not have the same effect on your body. Calorie for calorie it acts very differently in your body in a multitude of ways. And it doesn’t just impact your metabolism, but your cravings, energy levels, your moods + everything I already mentioned above!
Where does your “information” come from? Hopefully from whole foods in their most natural state! High quality whole foods provide “information” your body knows what to do with! When you provide the wrong “information”, your body doesn’t know what to do with it, so it stores it away as toxic waste or fat and generally just starts wreaking havoc with your system.
What would change for you if you looked at food as direct information for all the systems in your body rather than just calories, every time you ate? Would you choose differently or better? I believe, once you begin to mindfully consider food in this way, you can’t help but begin to choose healthier foods! It replaces willpower with knowledge and mindfulness and gives you a much better chance to choose well!
Every time you make a food choice you are either fueling your body or inflaming it, feeding disease or fighting it. It’s that basic. Mindfully consider this next time you eat, rather than relying on “willpower”. See if it makes a difference! You owe it to yourself to choose well!
