Wednesday, October 19, 2022
“You are what you eat,” or better yet, “You feel like what you eat.” If you were a stalk of broccoli, standing proudly in the ground, soaking in the sun’s radiance as you turn a bright, bluish green, how would you feel? What if you were an eye-catching, crisp, red apple, contrasting autumn foliage all around you? You’re becoming mouthwatering, juicy, and sweet, while you hang in a hillside orchard. How exhilarating!
How does a bag of corn chips feel? It’s hard to imagine that, actually. Its form-identity has been stripped. It was once a bright yellow, sweet ear of corn, ripening proudly on the vine, happy and whole. Junk foods are not whole. They’re fragmented, stripped, and processed. Junk food is synthetic. If you were stripped of your truth, and synthetically processed, I think you’d feel pretty rotten too.
Most of us “feed” our minds a steady diet of synthetically processed, junk “reality” – social media, videos, and the so-called news are processed forms of the past. They don’t represent the wholeness of the present moment, the purity of right here and right now. Right here and right now have a totally different quality than what’s on your phone or TV. It’s like the difference between an ear of corn and a bag of corn chips. One is immersive and real, the other is processed and part of the past. One will make you feel alive, the other, junky. So put down the phone, focus on what’s right in front of you, and just be fully present with everyone and everything that you experience today. Drink in the wholesomeness of this moment. Your mind will feel healthy, strong, and free from the processed junk that you’ve been feeding it.