Last week we looked at two more signs of someone with a healthy relationship to food.  If you missed that post, you can get it here: Healthy Relationship with Food Part Two

Now let’s look at the last two characteristics of someone with a healthy relationship to food:

 You understand basic nutrition.  In the food relationship world, you have people who have an unhealthy obsession with food, and then you have people who don’t ever think about food until they’re hungry and they shuffle off to the nearest McDonald’s to grab a burger and fries.  These people don’t want to be obsessed with food and will sometimes judge those who are struggling with food obsession. Because they don’t want to obsess over food, they never plan for healthy meals, never study anything about nutrition, and rarely think about the best way to nourish their physical bodies.  A person who just wants to “grab something” at a fast food restaurant has no more of a healthy relationship with food than the person who is continuously thinking about her next meal. A person with a healthy mindset towards food recognizes that just as her car needs gas and clean oil to run properly, her body is designed by God to need living, nutritionally dense food to run properly.  She plans her day to include life-giving, nutritionally dense foods into her diet. And if for some reason she has a hectic day where she didn’t get to plan her meals like she would have liked, she doesn’t “just grab” anything. Her food choices are deliberate, keeping good nutrition in mind.

Because a person with a healthy mindset towards food understands the main purpose of eating, she makes sure she understands good nutrition, and incorporates it into her diet.  An emotional eater may think about nutrition, but because she’s using food to deal with her emotions, nutrition is at best secondary in her food choices. And so, the cycle continues.  She feels horrible, she wants to eat. Something about eating a bag of carrots just leaves her cold, but 6 donuts sound great. She eats the donuts, thinking how unhealthy they are, but feeding that addiction and/or emotional need far outweighs her knowledge that she’s doing damage to her body, and ultimately to her emotions. But just as soon as the thrill is over, she feels even worse.  She’s left her body in a state of addictive cravings for more “drugs”, and so she heads to the candy machine. A person with a healthy mindset around food recognizes that she can easily become addicted to nutritional dead, fatty foods but because she has a healthy body image, a clear vision of how she wants to live her life, and a mature, life-giving way to deal with her emotions, she rarely if ever allows herself to get trapped in the cycle of addiction because she knows that addictive foods are not healthy foods.  She is a long-term thinker, not a short-term appeaser. A person with a healthy mindset around food understands the choices she makes today will affect her tomorrows, and she doesn’t want to be five years down the road dealing with illness, weight problems and fatigue because of a desire for self-gratification. She thinks through her choices and for the most part makes food choices that are good for her body and support the self-healing God made her body to perform. She also understands that nutrition is not a complete science.  There is room for healthy debate among scientists and nutritionists alike. However, a person with a healthy mindset towards food has made her body her scientific discovery. She has taken the time to listen to her body and to understand her body’s unique needs. She also understands the stage of life she is in as it relates to hormones, aging, etc. and adjusts her diet and lifestyle accordingly.

You plan for a healthy lifestyle.  Plan is the key word here.  A person with a healthy mindset around food understands that planning to live a healthy lifestyle is an absolute must for it to happen.  We live in a country where there is a fast food restaurant on every street corner, convenience stores abound, vending machines are the norm, and if you don’t plan to eat healthfully, the chances of you doing it are slim to none.  A person with a healthy mindset around food is going to set goals for her health, create plans that work for her schedule and her life, and then live according to that plan. Planning for a healthy lifestyle isn’t just about food either.  Some other areas that a person with a healthy mindset around food will plan for her health are:

•         Getting plenty of rest
•         Getting fresh air and sunshine
•         Solitude – prayer and meditation
•         Clean air and clean water
•         Exercise – moving her body
•         Having fun

Does this sound like I’m describing super woman?  Then let me ease your mind with this one final statement…

It’s not about perfection, it’s about learning how to rest in your true identity and delighting in the process of learning how to care for yourself in the best possible way according to how God designed you!

The characteristics I’ve shared in these three blog posts aren’t going to be choices you make every time, every day, in perfection.   But receive this promise: you are being changed from “glory to glory”!  Ever growing, ever becoming more mature in your relationship to God, others, and yourself.  And that includes your health. Can you bring your body to the weight God has made it to be?  Yes! Can you live in a place where you’re making the right choices for your body most of the time?  Yes! But will you be perfect? No! So, enjoy the journey! It’s all about learning to align with who God is calling you to be in spirit, soul, and body.  He will complete the work He’s started in you. Rest in that knowledge. Surrender to who He’s calling you to be – your physical health will follow.

Yours in radiant health,