Our Well Being ~ Eating is Social!

Eating is social and food is what we eat to keep going 'socially'. It is unfortunate that we eat less and less socially and I mean with other people and even less with our own family as the fast paced popular culture takes over our lives. We need to eat with other people especially family because it is the social engagement that also is food for us.

Yes, food as in nutritional life giving substance is central to our health, but what we eat, how we eat, and with whom and when is very important and why it is constantly being discussed, debated and politicized. We’re eating the wrong things or too much, or not enough, and our attempts to become healthier are often misguided as we too readily place our trust - and our money - in diet books, celebrities, and proponents of pseudoscience.

The question to ask these days is ... what would happen if we started ignoring the food and diet debates and started trusting ourselves? The answer to that means- listening to our bodies instead of listening to gurus of low-calorie diets or paleo diets or gluten free diets or casein free diets or sugar free diets or fat free diets or carb free diets... amidst the diet clamor and chaos, some people are turning to a dietary approach known as ‘intuitive eating'.

It’s a way of eating based on three simple principles - eating when hungry; stopping when full; and eating with other people at a table (unless medical reasons forbid it). Individuals are encouraged to abandon dieting behaviors such as restraint and conscious control of food intake, and instead are encouraged to listen to internal cues for hunger, fullness and the types of food the body needs to feel nourished.

Eating intuitively is essential for our health; and, as a sociologist, I have to emphasize that eating with friends and family is also food for us socially ~ for our well being. We engage with others as in share our lives and our problems; thus, eating social offers less stress and thus better digestion. So what we eat is always good.



















Source ~  http://www.dailylife.com.au/health-and-fitness/dl-nutrition/is-eating-whatever-you-want-the-best-thing-for-your-body-20140618-3ad5z.html