If the ONLY thing I took away from you was processed foods, fast foods, poor quality restaurant foods, and any other food void of real nutritional value, how happy and fulfilling would your life be? I pose this question, because I believe people place more value and importance on unhealthy eating than they do on most categories in life. It is my belief that this path has destroyed more lives and continues to do so today. A “time out” from this thought process is desperately needed. I believe a REALISTIC solution can be found by each person suffering this affliction. I also believe that people suffering from various diseases can change their status by following this approach. See if you agree.
How often do we ask ourselves:
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What is my purpose?
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What are my passions in life?
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What in life is meaningful to me?
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What do I get pleasure from doing or being part of?
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What makes me happy?
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What do I need to do or be part of to feel fulfillment?
These are important questions that each person needs to answer for themselves to achieve a life of quality. If we sat down and answered these questions honestly, food would no longer be a focal point in people’s lives. The temporary comfort we experience when eating unhealthy foods would no longer be needed. We would have constructive beneficial things to do that would enhance our experiences replacing our need for self destructive behaviors. Food could still be a part of enjoyment. It would simply lose its place in its hierarchy of life’s experiences.
I believe this is a unique approach to overcoming weight management issues. We typically think in terms of diet, exercise, metabolism, hormones, etc… when addressing these problems. We attempt to fix eating disorders, conditions that contain huge emotional components, with scientific, logical and rational approaches that mathematically (on paper) correct these issues. Do you wonder why we are failing to help people? It’s not only about science; it’s about people and their fragile personalities that we impose our logical answers onto without any real insight into the underlying problems these people face.
Instead of focusing on the tangible components that deal with eating disorders, I suggest we start with the questions mentioned earlier in this article. In my opinion, it will be easier to help people help themselves if they develop greater understanding about who they are and what their meaning in life is. As they begin to grow as a person and transform their current thought process into a greater awareness of self and purpose, food takes on a whole different perspective.
I challenge anyone suffering weight problems, diabetes, cancer, depression, and any other condition that impacts your quality of life to TRUTHFULLY answer the 6 questions listed. Once you do, design a REALISTIC game plan to achieve these answers. This approach requires TIME and PATIENCE. How many years did it take for your current health status to evolve? The more effort you place in creating realistic action steps to answering these questions, the sooner your health condition will likely show improvement. These steps help rebalance the body and allow it to function the way it was designed. We don’t need to “fix” each broken piece. We need to restore the body’s capabilities to mend itself.
Accomplishing these six aspects will place food in a whole new perspective. It will no longer be your source of temporary escape. You will now have places to turn that offer better healthier solutions that will provide a sense of self empowerment. A new level of confidence will develop providing new opportunities for unlimited possibilities in the future.
This is a better path than most people travel. If food is your primary source of happiness, why not try this path I have shared. Diets deprive; passions enhance. Isn’t it time to start feeling better about yourself?
Thousands of demonstrators protest against the 8th ASEM Foreign Ministers meeting been held in the northern German city of Hamburg 28 May 2007. The protesters, accompanied by a large police presence, carried a banner which reads “Total Freedom”. AFP PHOTO DDP/ROLAND MAGUNIA GERMANY OUT
(Photo credit should read ROLAND MAGUNIA/AFP/Getty Images)
All About Healthy Choices 
Reblogged this on Advocate for Invisible Illness! and commented:
I think this was written with me in mind LOL! But seriously this is a serious article and you should take the time to read it. I need to redo my thinking again as I have taken several steps back and only 1 forward.
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If I were to answer your questions most of them would be answered with writing. That is my passion in life and helping others through my blog. BUT I still am not on the healthy food bandwagon. I fell off it. I eat one meal a day usually and it is not a healthy one. My chiropractor is always on me to eat better, to move, to get off all the prescribed medicines I am on. I have my own real life conscience.
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Writing is certainly an important part in your life, but to complete a person, we need more than just one activity. I believe we need to develop relationships (with people, families, religious institutions, social clubs, etc…) I believe we need to “feed each other” with knowledge, compassion, understanding, empathy, etc… I believe we need to create our own individual time (used to explore ourselves and our needs.)
If you search deeper within yourself, you may find more answers than you realize. In doing so, you will not need to worry about falling from bandwagons. You will likely find a new level of self appreciation. This translates into approaching food and health from a new perspective. As you begin to provide your body with what it needs, the possibilities improve significantly. I hope introspection provides you with choices you never thought about previously.
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Having you on my side has helped tremendously in building up my self-esteem for one thing. Your posts boost my confidence to much higher levels. I just got asked by someone to check out their friend’s blog because they were worried about them. I went, listened to the video, responded and followed his blog just to keep a check on him. That made me feel important to someone and this world. I wasted most of my life with my illnesses,but I plan to make up for it now.
I am getting ready to start an article and it needs research. It will help me and hopefully others. I am worried as I haven’t written a research type paper in a long time. I throw together stories and poems. I have a need right now to write. This article will take it deeper. I wrote great papers in school, but that was a long time ago. I am keeping myself busy because other wise I go to bed and that isn’t a good thing. I worry about going back into the deep depression. I am definitely not manic right now. I still feel stable, but I have a need to keep busy and all I want to do is write.
I am not a family, friend type person. I am happy alone and with my online communities. Not good I know, but it is all I know.
I am writing a book here.
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Read your own comment and see how much you have grown and developed. Most people with health maladies focus on their own needs. This is understandable. You have written that you’ve reached out to make certain someone else’s needs are being met. A noble and selfless response. You need to stop judging yourself or worrying how others judge you. You need to continue to pursue activities that reinforce the type of person you want to be. I believe you will come much further in life than you give yourself credit for. Enjoy the journey!!
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Writing nonfiction can be therapeutic, and any rust accumulated since your school yrs may well be superficial. Mindful prepping of healthy meals can also help. Don’t just slice the tomato; admire its color.
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You are most certainly correct. Thank you and just to make you happy (and my body and brain) I am heading to bed now. It is almost 10 and I took my night meds at 8 PM. I still feel tired.
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I believe the questions you’ve posted are important ones to help folks identify or re-identify their passions. I wonder, though, if most people seriously struggling with their weight would ever really consider food their “passion” so as to ever answer the questions you’ve posed any differently than how they’ve been answering them for years. I know highly successful and passionate people with great careers, hobbies, families, etc. who are obese. Their crux isn’t food….it’s the reasons why they eat that are at the heart of their maladies.
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I believe that the combination of answers to ALL of these questions has the ability to help people recognize and overcome the emptiness that currently exists in so many lives (what you define as “the reasons” at the heart of their maladies.) I hope that the combination of answers helps create a more complete individual able to handle the difficulties in life many face from a new perspective that provides hope and opportunities. When people feel a sense of purpose, it adds meaning and value to their lives. If a person is missing parts of the puzzle from their lives, success, passion, hobbies, careers, etc… may not be enough to complete the individual. The goal of the 6 questions is to help a person complete themselves by discovering the missing pieces. They are designed to create better awareness through introspection that may elicit emotions that were never perceived or understood. They allow a person to heal from the inside out. Removing these “emotional toxins” that have accumulated over many years can be a draining experience, but one that may be necessary to overcome eating disorders and other disease processes.
The traditional approaches to weight control have failed to a large extent. These 6 questions provide a more appetizing (excuse the pun) and less threatening approach to a serious problem. I don’t know for certain if this approach will effectively help people or not. I just don’t see many people standing up and offering better solutions to this epidemic we face.
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I think everyone would benefit from a contemplative retreat or weekend away. Asking the hard questions is, well, hard, when you’re grinding it out in the real world 9-5, and then going home to a family that needs your attention, with supper to make, dishes to do, baths to give, stories to read, and bedtime rituals to complete. Somewhere in all that we lose ourselves. I love that you’re asking people to think through what’s keeping them from living large–and not in a fast food kinda way. 😉
Each of us came into this world with a passion in our hearts and a purpose for our lives, it can only help us to remember (find out) what that was/is and take steps to get back on track.
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Rather than treat a disease, this article allows the individual to revisit their life and direction. It gives them a chance to plot a new course; to redefine their purpose and to rediscover what happiness and fulfillment are. I believe in doing so, the underlying (ROOT CAUSE) problem will resolve leading to a natural change in behaviors from destructive to constructive. This natural progression results in a better quality of mental, physical and spiritual health Once again, BALANCE is restored.
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Great questions for one to answer for themselves and give SERIOUS thought to! Light and Love, Shona
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I believe people will be pleasantly surprised the impact these 6 questions can have on the quality of their lives. They help create self awareness and a new perspective on life. The change in behavior that most will experience can have a dramatic effect on disease and desire. It takes more than filling in the answers; it takes persistence and commitment to creating a realistic approach that will achieve the desired results. For those seeking a better life, these simple 6 questions might provide their solution.
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