Dear maturing wellness gal— You don’t need to smash a bag of MnM’s to prove you’re free.

Some raw musings on a sunny afternoon.

I’m trying to be write and share more— get the juices flowing without trying to make everything perfect. So, in the spirit. Here’s a quick one this afternoon.

*Photo by my good pal Jerusha Sutton back in my Bondi Beach days.

You don’t need to smash a bag of MnM’s to prove that you’re free.

You really don’t. 

Food freedom is being free to, and free not to. 

This can be a tender topic so please exercise discernment when reading. I don’t know the stories and situations of everyone reading and so with anything, read and process as a responsible adult.

*Obviously, this post is not meant to replace professional help, and should be read in the context of which it is written— an opinion piece for resourced women who can observe others expression without being influenced if not appropriate.*

I am writing to the maturing wellness gal— the one who has for a long time been very healthy ingredient obsessed, sometimes obsessive, fearful of certain toxic foods and who for the most part now lives very freely with food. 

Your standards are high.

You care about good quality. 

You buy and make the wholesome version of many things but not the junky green-washed-324723 ingredient ‘healthy’ version— the actual better version. You know the difference now.

But you’re not over the top, either. Out at the cafe and feeling fine? Hungrier than you thought from chasing the kids? Yeh, gimme that croissant!! Yeh go on kids, have the marshmallow with the babycino. (Side note, after living in Italy, I see croissants as medicinal, same as raw milk gelato. But we all know the ones in the average cafe are try-hard versions of those supremo European pastries.. ahh!).

Your foundations are solid, but if the occasion arises and you really want something, you can have it. You are robust enough an individual, with a solid foundation in mind, body and spirit that you can afford a little ‘not usually on brand’ food here and there— IF you want it. Your life force isn’t going to be crippled by a rasberry and white choc muffin.

Here’s the thing though. 

It’s ok if you don’t want it. 

It’s ok if certain foods give are just a no.

It’s ok if your vitality and life force is in such a place that you just don’t want those foods that were once on your ‘forbidden list’. 

It’s ok if you don’t want half of your kids muffin. Because let’s face it. Sometimes you make yourself eat it even though you had a good solid breakfast, because “If I don’t, then I’m not free.”

This is the little sneaky voice I want to address.

“If you were REALLY free, you’d eat this.” 

You don’t want it.

You don’t feel like it.

It’s processed junk that doesn’t really belong in a human body. Let’s just not forget this part. Sure we can have it and carry on with our lives as normal. But we are also free to say ‘actually, nah. I’m not controlled by it but I just don’t want it.’

Food freedom folk love to say ‘there is no good or bad food.’ I agree to an extent. I believe that our psyche and beliefs around food and our perception of ourselves matter even more than food, and that this knowledge will be at the forefront in the wellbeing world over the next few years (A post on this coming soon). But I also believe that toxic load is real and that we were designed to exercise discipline.

Our bodies are not so fragile that we can’t process certain less than ideal ingredients. I wholeheartedly believe that when our vital force is unhindered, we are resilient— we have to be considering all of the new environmental challenges we face in today’s world. 

In saying that— the food freedom movement can be so highly charged. I understand this, because the opposite of food freedom is so gripping and once women free themselves from those grips, it can make us angry, and desperate not to go back there. This then causes a really charged up ‘anti-diet culture’ where we can think that any form of care and consideration with our food, means we’re getting sucked in again. 

As with many movements, they can be hijacked, and something that once was very life giving, can become detrimental.

There has to be a middle ground, where we are truly free with food, vital and alive, resilient and robust…. but also free to care about our appearance, care about lessening our toxic load, care about having a radiant and vital body. 

This is where the ‘anti-diet’ and body positivity movement can go too far and I have spoken about it for years— often it suggests that wanting to be trim and vital, is a problem. 

But it’s not. 

Out BEYOND body positivity and also BEYOND intuitive eating, there is a place— Body Luxury. It is where we do what is life giving, it is where vitality is the goal, it is where beauty and radiance is allowed to be wanted. You are not trapped by food but you are also not trapped under the life sucking message that you’re not allowed to care about your body size. 

I eat whatever I want but my foundation is a very high standard for food quality.

Some foods make me feel like crap.

Some times I feel better for lightening up and not trying to ram protein down my throat.

Sometimes I can be a green juice gal, food combining gal and sometimes I can be a gelatinous broths gal. I have been all extremes and now incorporate what feels right in the season and climate I am in.

Some foods are alluring and will taste good for 30 seconds but if I’m honest with myself— I didn’t need it. Why do we glorify over-burdening ourselves?

Some foods I eat just to prove to myself that I can. Some foods I eat because I’m emotional. I don’t beat myself up for this.

Maturing is realising that we no longer need to eat certain things just to prove we are free.

What is actually the most life giving? THIS is the goal.

Sometimes it will be a celebratory piece of decadent fat cake. YUM.

Sometimes it will be a little more discipline.

Whether food is life giving or not depends on so much more than just the ingredients. I have always said— it’s not what we’re eating, but who is eating. 

Once you overcome certain unhealthy habits with food, you may think that you need to eat anything and everything otherwise you’re ’sucked in by diet culture’.

The goal of food freedom is not just to be free of the grips of disordered eating, but it’s to be free to live your LIFE. Food freedom is meant to be life GIVING. 

You can be totally free with food AND also not give in to your every whim. This is not just true with food but in life. 

With any true freedom there is discipline. 

Discipline allows us to live more freely. 

Discipline allows us benefits that the undisciplined do not have. 

People think freedom is about ‘a free for all’ all of the time. It’s not. I once heard Tim Keller (God bless his soul) say that freedom is having the RIGHT constraints in place, not having NONE. 

Vitality requires discipline and the older I get the more I realise that all the best things in life do. Discipline allows for freedom. Freedom is a benefit of discipline.

You can live food freedom and still have standards.

You can live food freedom and know that certain ‘foods’ don’t belong in a body.

You can live food freedom without sacrificing vitality.

You can live food freedom and healthy discipline at the same time… and I believe you already know what that looks and feels like. 

You do not need to eat junk to prove that you’re free. 

You are already free. 

You are free to choose what is life giving for you, and you are free not to. 

Beware the voice in your head that says ‘if you were really free you’d eat this *junk*’. Is that true? You ARE free. 

You are free to eat *that*, and you’re free not to. 

Your goal is vitality and LIFE.

This is Body Luxury. 

Love, PK XX