Food and Responsibility

[Three]

This morning I was triggered by something, which provoked much anxiety within me. I came very close to getting up and eating something to sooth myself, but decided to eat two bananas instead. I'm not overweight, in fact I'm quite slender and I exercise daily, but I have gained a bit of fat around the sides of my lower belly from not eating as I should. I'm worth a healthy and energetic body. When I eat junk I feel lethargic, guilty, and overall not good about myself. Sometimes, I overeat and go to bed on a full stomach, only to wake up the next day with a full stomach, which makes it difficult for me to get the most out of my morning workout. It isn't a pleasant way to start out the day. I don't want to keep sending this message to my unconscious that, "I don't deserve a good body". I want to commit to eating better, to love myself enough to stop eating junk. The short benefits of sugar and carbs are not worth the long term, or even the daily stress for that matter, of not getting getting the most out of this precious life, which we are all lucky to be a part of.

I want to feel good. I want to look good. i want to live with integrity, so when I talk to people about serious issues, my words have more weight to them. I want that confidence, so I am making a commitment to eating better right now. Although, I am eager to understand how I ended up where I am today in terms of health. I use to be far more committed. I avoided sugar like the plague and I would always order the healthiest item on the menu when out with friends. I took health very seriously and regularly rejected food that was offered to me by others if it was unhealthy. Even if it was a family gathering or a friend’s family gathering, if their food was unhealthy, it didn’t matter how free, unique, or special it was, I refused to compromise my values. My health was more important than their traditions.Was I being too “Anal” about what I ate? This might sound like a disparaging and loaded question to ask myself, but I assure you that’s only because it is. And if you think it’s unfair for me to ask myself questions like that, I agree. What is even more disagreeable is that these are the kinds of questions I would get asked by people who claimed to be my friend. I’m feeling really angry right now thinking about it. I remember being asked this by an old friend while I was in the passenger seat of his car. This occurred shortly after we had both mentioned that we were hungry. Why would he ask a question like this? Control. He wanted to control me. A loaded question is by definition “a rhetorical tool that attempts to limit direct replies to be those that serve the questioners agenda.” So, what was his agenda? Well, he wanted to eat Popeye’s Fried Chicken and knew that I prefered to stay away from that kind of food. But, you see, he didn’t want to have to drive to the grocery store so I could purchase me some fresh produce. You see, that would involve extra driving and he wanted to get his food and go home. So, what he cleverly did was embed false premises in the question and frame it with a negative connotation attached to it. That way, I would be more likely to say no. “Are you feeling anal about food today?”, in other words translates to, “are you feeling your neurotic compulsion to annoyingly obsess over what you eat today and thus willing to become an inconvenience?”. It’s as subtle as it is cruel. And it’s as abusive as it is brilliant, which is why it’s always always worth slowing down and pointing this kind of stuff out. This undoubtedly qualifies as verbal abuse. It’s no wonder I felt so depressed and self loathing when I was around this guy. It really is astounding when you think about it. I wasn’t expressing anything nearly as emotional volatile and explosive as topics such as religion, the state, or family dysfunction. I was receiving this hostility because of my desire to eat plants instead of poultry. Admittedly, it probably does deeper than that. When a person grows and decides to make better, more challenging and rewarding choices in life, there becomes an implicit obligation for the people around him to change as well, if they want to remain friends. I mean, let’s face it, you either grow with or away from people. What this guy in the car was probably experiencing was that obligation. He felt anxious and tense, which is okay to feel. But, he did not take ownership for his feelings and instead interpreted this impetus to change as something that was being imposed upon him. He felt controlled, he did not acknowledged it, so he inflicted this feeling on me. It’s also worth mentioning that this guy was not religious or statist. Intellectually, he accepted that god doesn’t exist and that the state is an institution of violence. Yet, despite this intellectual understanding between us, we could not connect. The lesson that I take from this is that conclusions aren’t enough. Having the “same beliefs”,  for a lack of better words, is not a stable foundation for an intimate relationship, nor does it entail that the other person has empathy. The reason I share is not to lecture, but to use my mistakes as a way to warn people away from making the assumptions I did. As surely as physics, in the absence of a strong foundation of honesty, empathy, and curiosity, there can be no sturdy relationship.I was going to give more examples of old friends and family rejecting me in similar ways because of my eating, but I think you get the point. What was originally going to be a list of examples for the purpose of venting, I think has transformed into something more. I’m becoming more aware on an emotional level of the importance of responsibility. Yes, it’s true these people made it very difficult for me to reach my goals by creating an association in my mind that, “committing to goals = the pain of rejection”(or something like that). Also, I think it’s true that we can only be as great as the people we choose to have around us let us be. And I chose to surround myself with these drag downers and to avoid being honest, even after intellectually understanding a number of books and podcasts I had listened to by Stefan Molyneux. I stress the importance of responsibility now, not as a way to castigate myself, but to empower myself and others to bring consciousness to the choices they make so that you can avoid suffering the consequences like I did. Prevention is always better than cure. In other words, remember to eat your bananas.As always, take care.- Joel