News flash the saying “you are what you eat” has never made any sense.
I understand that I may be taking it into a literal sense as I write this blog post, but society tends to use it in the same context. We intertwine our eating behaviors and patterns into our identity. I hate to break it to you, the characteristics that are interesting and make you the amazing person you are, do not equate to you being a carnivore vegan, or whatever we are calling our eating habits today.
As a reminder, no one’s tombstone ever said, “They will be remembered by the ratio of protein to carbohydrates they ate each day.”
Yes, food is a big part of our everyday lives, we need it to survive; it can show culture, community, interests, fears and more. But it is not everything. When we tie it to our identity, we shelter all the amazing attributes that make us, us. We dim the characteristics that are beyond surviving.
Can we challenge ourselves to drop the labels?
The good versus bad
The, I cannot eat this because of x, y and z (of course if you are allergic to foods, have significant trauma associated with them or the food in mention is moldy, expired, or rotten, then you have significant reasoning to NOT eat it).
By perpetuating these statements and putting ourselves in a box. We are allowing our identity to be a part of diet culture. There truly is no need to label our eating patterns. Food preferences matter and it is okay to like or to dislike things, but it is not okay to deprive ourselves of things to fit into a label. We can find community and commonalities outside of bullying food groups.
What would happen if we trusted ourselves to eat whatever we wanted?
It is not that you are “letting yourself go.” You are just letting yourself live.
You are not what you eat. You are so much more; you are beautiful, kind, adventurous, silly, wise, independent, and human.
Eat the tasty things in life.