There are certain foods that we don’t consider good for our bodies, which are actually very good for our souls. They are different for everybody, they are the foods that give us warm, nostalgic feelings. They are the foods whose aromas waft out from the kitchen and immediately make us feel safe and loved. Those are the feelings we all need to feel more often and are just as important as healthy food and clean air.
The not-so-great part of this equation is that those same foods that give us all of the deep and delicious soul food are often the same foods that are full of sugar and refined carbs. What’s worse is that the more we learn about which foods we ‘should’ be eating (or when, let’s say your daughter obsessively researches the foods you should be eating based on your recent cancer diagnosis), we begin to feel guilty about these comforting soul food experiences, an emotion that cancels out all of the health benefits of the good stuff that you may have been feeling from those old familiar smells and tastes.
When we become more conscious of what food does to our body, especially when we are in search of wellness, we tend to cut out a lot of old favourites. Choosing a long and healthy life over your famous mac ’n’ cheese or coffee and muffin routine is an easy choice, right? For many, it is at first, but food also brings us comfort and conjures up fond memories, and it is hard to let this all go, long term. And then if we temporarily fall off the wagon, the guilt and visualization of the delicious buffet that you have just set up for your cancer cells, really doesn’t help anybody.
For this reason, from time to time, I am going to include a healthier alternative to something we might be missing from our lives, to keep us from feeling the guilt, and to help us to create new, fond food memories. New soul food, if you will.
