I believe that food enters our bodies and breaks down to become our physical being (cells, blood, tissue, organs, etc.). I also believe food affects our thoughts, feelings, and emotions. I counsel people to eat whole food (food as close to the way it was created in nature) and believe that whole food creates whole people.
If we are the image of God, which I believe now more than ever after the exercise of having the Hebrew text YHVH imprinted on me during session 2 of Academy, where does the food piece fit in? Is God food? Rabbi Rami would say yes, because "God is everything," but I struggle with non-whole food. Is that still God? If it is, and we eat it, are we just a different, less-than-whole manifestation of God? "Of course!" would be Rami's response.
I get that. I don't like it, but I get it. For me, I know that when I eat whole food I feel like a whole person. I am centered and in my body. The mindless chit chat is less loud, and I easily open myself to Echad b'echad (One into One; One becomes One), heightening my link to God. I find myself in a place of divine connection without really thinking about it or even trying to get there. That's why eating whole food is critical for me. Without it, I cannot connect with the divine.
Ok, maybe that's not 100% true--I can connect with the divine when I eat non-whole food, but the connection is significantly reduced. I'm fractionated, just like the food. It's difficult to focus and clear my egoic self of the endless noise. It's exhausting, because I have to work ten times as hard. It's work, rather than a state of being.
So here's my surprise conclusion--keep eating whole food, especially when I'm feeling disconnected from God. I know, quite a shocker.
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Thank you, Jeni, for your reflections. Just today I was talking with some women about the effects of highly processed sugar on emotional and spiritual states -- and the great addiction to something that doesn't do much except meet the immediate desire for the taste. We all talked about how our bodies don't respond well to highly processed sugars (never mind that we were processing this over coffee and Tim Horton's - the doughnut shop!)
ReplyDeleteI was also thinking in regard to the spiritual practices related to food how wonderful the meals were that I ate at Mepkin Abbey (the Trappist monastery). Everyone ate in silence -- we were so mindful of the food, the taste, the origins of what we were eating. I remember sensing God's presence more so than at any other meal because I wasn't so distracted by the other things -- TV, children, books/newspapers/magazines, talking. Okay -- well just a response to your thoughtful post. Peace - Amy
Great post, Jeni. And thanks for referencing me. I think that while we are always God we can be more or less attune to the fact. Eating whole foods makes being aware of God easier. The cleaner our food, the cleaner our vision of Reality. Keep sharing.
ReplyDeleteLove- Rami