Eat Your Way to Mental Health
We all know the link between mental and physical health (at least if you’ve been listening to my ravings then you do…), but can you really eat your way to mental health?
Yes… but not quite as you may think.
I’m not talking about the undisputed scientific link between high quality foods and mental health. We all know that eating right and doing exercise is the best way to ensure you are healthy and to give yourself the best possibility of a long and happy life.
What I am talking about is the impact that ritual has on your mental health, and in this sense the ritual of making good food choices.
My philosophy is “everything in moderation including moderation”. There are times when that second piece of cake is great, but there are also times when that second piece of cake is simply you being a fat lazy bastard. It is so easy in the moment to make poor food decisions. The problem is most of us don’t have “moderate” standards or rituals around our eating. The reason I use the term moderate or moderation, is because we too often decide we are going to eat healthy and then if anything bad passes our lips we then beat ourselves up because we have failed, or worse, we decide it’s too hard and just eat whatever we want when we want.
Have rituals around your eating. Make good choices in advance, such as knowing what you eat for breakfast every day, pre-prepare lunches for the week, and use the old slow cooker so your meals are ready at night. Have a good range of foods in your diet and then ritualise what you eat and when. When you have this approach you take away the guilt of the piece of cake because you know that generally over 80% of the time you are eating well.
Life is not meant to be an ascetic race to be the most disciplined person on the planet, nor is it the lassie faire approach to all food is good food. Have some rituals and treat yourself to some moderation.
