Conscious Eating

Eating just comes naturally to most people. Or does it?

From an early age, we are taught to get up in the morning and eat a good breakfast. Then around midday to eat another meal. Then later in the day, in the evening before bed at some point, to eat dinner (or supper or tea, depending on where you live). Here in the US, we even have groups of foods that are considered breakfast, lunch, or dinner foods. We all learn this stuff subconsciously for the most part. Eggs, toast, pancakes, waffles, bagels, biscuits, gravy, etc. etc. Those are what most restaurants usually have on their breakfast menus. Then they switch over to the lunch/dinner menu. If you go about mid-morning, you will even hear customers ask, “Are you serving breakfast or lunch?” No one questions what they mean. We all just know. Bacon, Sausage, ham are the primary focus points for breakfast. Hamburgers, chicken and hot dogs or some kind of wrap are the typical lunch menu. By dinner, its all about the steak or a pizza and big bucket of chicken. Usually, these items are the main subject of any fast-food meal and then you pick “Sides” to go with them.

Don’t get me started on the “sides”. Those are usually deep-fried potatoes or onions of some sort. Or occasionally, there will be mashed potatoes, or coleslaw or some other “side” dish to choose from. Sit down restaurants usually serve food that is a bit more varied, baked potatoes, broccoli with cheddar, some rice dish, etc.

Either way, they are almost all prepared as inexpensively and quickly as possible (excluding more fine dining or specialty restaurants of course) with very little added effort or concern for nutritional value. Quick, convenient, and inexpensive is the name of the food game in most cases. Even meals at home are typically bought with those same principles in mind. Unless someone is a food connoisseur of sorts, very little other thought goes into it daily.

But that is not how food was meant to be. God created such a variety of food, it would take a lifetime to try it all. Even as Adam and Eve walked through the garden of Eden, food grew on most of the plants. They could just walk along and pick good healthy delicious food and enjoy earth to the fullest in perfect health. We all know that went sour as soon as Eve ate something she was not supposed to eat. It all pretty much went downhill from there. Growing food immediately became more difficult and a lot more work. They were no longer allowed to just wander around the garden grazing all day on food basically provided naturally through God’s creation. Priorities began to change, right out of the gate. Food because regional, with some growing better in one place and something else growing better somewhere else. People began to have feasts and famines as they were called. As greed and hatred began to fill the earth, everything continued to change and as a species we slowly stopped caring as much about food as we did about survival.

Fast forward several thousand years and we have fast food chains on every corner and delivery of all sorts of food right to our doorsteps. In varying degrees of course with different people and in different locations. We also have hospitals, urgent care centers and Drs offices in every city or town. In fact, medical offices are quite often comparable in number to the fast-food restaurants in the area.

We just do not take care of ourselves and treat our bodies as sacred vessels anymore. Even when we do go to the Dr, they prescribe pills to help alleviate the symptoms and vaguely suggest that we eat a healthier diet. They give us basic instructions and send us on our way and tell us to come back for refills on the medicine when it runs out.

It doesn’t have to be that way. People in general seem to be slowly looking for better food alternatives. If we can all become more conscious about our food, what we eat, how we eat it and even when we eat it, the entire world system of things would begin to transform.

Many of the diseases that people face on a daily basis would begin to disappear. Obesity would fall to the wayside. People would have more energy, stamina, feel better and would need less medication overall. With better access to fresher food, people could get their necessary vitamins that way instead of in a bottle, resembling more of that medication.

Not everyone can live in Caprice. Not everyone can grow their own food or even afford to go to the farmers market for their groceries. But we can all head in that direction if we choose. Even the smallest of changes can make major differences in our lives.

Conscious eating is simply thinking about what you are eating prior to eating and making healthier choices in advance.

Jump forward to how we eat in Caprice. There is always healthy food available in the fridge or canning jar or out in the garden itself. What does a wonderful day in Caprice look like? We get up and have our juice in the morning to start our day off on the right foot, then go for a walk in the garden. As we go along, we pick some berries and fruit from the vines as it is in season, or we pick some vegetables to eat later in the day as we get hungry. After our walk, we go in the house and eat some more fruit we either just picked or previously picked and stored. We then enjoy some grain cereal or have some pancakes or whatever it is that we are craving as long as we grew it here or know who did. Then we start our day. As we feel a tiny bit of hunger or craving coming on, we go grab a tomato sandwich or some broccoli or a salad or a plate of some dish we previously made. If it is warm out and we have time, we will stick some veggies in the sun oven and have those to eat as the day goes on. We continue with our day, grazing along as we feel the desire, rather than waiting for that feeling of starvation to come along and force us into eating heaps of food all at one time that sends our bodies into a frenzy of trying to digest it all at once and figure out what to do with it and store as much of it as possible because it has been trained to know it needs to hold on to all it can to keep us moving until the next bulk feeding later in the day.

Wild animals are usually healthy, much healthier overall than humans or even domesticated animals. At least you don’t usually see obese animals walking around unless they are preparing for hibernation or migration, etc. But rather, they walk, fly, crawl, or swim around and eat as they go along.  They do have some issues but most of them are due to changes in their natural habitats or encroachment from mankind.

Not everyone can do this type of diet but there are so many kinds of fad diets out there, this one certainly needs to make its rounds as well.

Imagine getting up in the morning, going to fridge and getting out whatever kind of food or juice that you want (healthy of course, nothing prepackaged or processed) and eating some of it until you don’t feel hungry. Then start your day. There are so many fruits and vegetables available in the world around us, we could constantly be trying different ones if we wanted to and find all kinds of new favorites. As we get started on our day, we either have access to more healthy food or we take a container of it with us. As soon as we think about it again, we eat a bit more, then a bit more, then a bit more as the day goes on. When lunch time comes around, no need to bulk up on heavy proteins if you aren’t hungry because you have been snacking all day on a variety of healthy fruits, nuts, grains, and vegetables. Maybe use that time to relax, take a quick cat nap, go for a walk, or just sit and talk with your partner, God or a friend. Imagine your day without feeling hungry or drained or bloated because you ate to much. Imagine your system working perfectly as it was meant rather than constantly swinging full spectrum between feast and famine throughout the day.

This grazing method only works properly if you absolutely eat the healthiest of foods. If you eat enough fresh fruits and vegetables throughout the day, there will not be as much room left to splurge on sweets or highly saturated foods like chips, etc. As they say, this program will absolutely work if you work it.