Consciousness Café

By Eve Prang Plews

Licensed Nutrition Counselor
(Originally published in Sarasota's Natural Awakenings magazine December, 2010)

 
Every bite and every swallow of food and drink you share with your body affects your consciousness.  In subtle ways, science is only beginning to understand how the compounds in your diet drive your brain (and thus your emotions) to express changes in awareness and behavior. 

New research from Harvard based on a quarter million responses from 2,200 people indicates that letting the mind wander reduces our feelings of happiness.  Rating from 0 to 100, with 100 being “very good”, having sex received a 90 average rating and exercise was in the number 2 spot with 75 points.  Next best activities rated were conversation, listening to music, taking a walk, eating, praying and meditating, cooking, shopping, caring for one’s children, and reading.  Personal grooming, commuting and working were near the bottom of the list.

Yet our minds wander on average 47% of the time with as little as 10% wandering during sex and 65% wandering while engaged in personal grooming.  Clearly sex is more captivating than flossing your teeth.  Trouble is that nearly half of every crowd you see – on the street or anywhere – aren’t really there, at least not there mentally.  In nearly all cases, people rated their happiness higher if they focused on their activity instead of thinking about something else, even if it was a positive thought.  If and where your mind wanders is a better predictor of your happiness than what you are doing.  According to researcher Dr. Daniel Gilbert, “The heart goes where the head takes it, and neither care much about the whereabouts of the feet.”  The psychologist Matthew Killingsworth says, “We see evidence for mind-wandering causing unhappiness, but no evidence for unhappiness causing mind-wandering.”

 This author submits that static in the brain caused by toxic and artificial chemicals increases the inability to focus and thus allow the mind to go down the road of stray thoughts.  The body evolved to consume molecules that occur in nature.  Until the last hundred years (or less) of the 3 million years humankind has been evolving, our diet and thus our consciousness was not exposed to Yellow Dye #5, aspartame, pesticides, caffeinated cola or lead in lipstick.  We continue to fail to see the relationship between our exposure to new-to-nature molecules and how we think and feel, both physically and emotionally. Yet we are chemical beings living in a chemical world. We need to know that these chemicals, good and bad, affect us in positive and negative ways.

That leads to the conclusion that drinking and eating foods as close to the way they occur in nature is just what your body is designed to thrive on.  The more chemical creations, or Franken-foods you put in your plate, the less likely your nervous system will transmit appropriate messages all throughout your mind and body.

Carol Simontacchi’s book The Crazy Maker’s: How the Food Industry is Destroying Our Brains and Harming Our Children, shows us how food manufacturers knowingly put toxic products into our cereals, soups, breads, beverages and more, and call it progress.  Foods can cause receptor sites to beg for synthetic stimulation.  We try to satisfy artificial cravings from a brain that isn’t working right.  We eat, but are not satisfied.  We’re full, but not contented.  We’re being poisoned, but don’t know it.

It’s hard to eat clean.  There’s nothing natural about natural health when you have to work so hard to preserve it or get it back.  Awareness is always the first step for change.  Becoming aware that our food choices affect more than our waistline adds another layer of responsibility to every restaurant order and every shopping trip.  When you become aware that the chemicals that make up your breakfast set the stage for not only how much energy you will have for the day, but how your mood can fluctuate during that day; you bear a new dimension of self-care and a further responsibility to eat well if you want to think well, too.

When Ram Dass wrote Be Here Now nearly 40 years ago, he was all about training the brain to “be in the moment.” Every meditative path and every martial art are training the mind to focus.  Doing breath work, chanting, staring at a candle’s flame – all are designed to improve concentration. Awakening consciousness begins with wanting to discover our place in the universe, to awaken our relationship to all the life that’s out there from algae to galaxies, from bacteria in your gut to God, from your household pet to all there is.  If you desire to awaken consciousness, perhaps in addition to your meditation and exercise you could consider that your next meal tonight may inhibit or allow you the opportunity to focus that exquisite instrument of awareness known as your brain/mind. 

There’s a big adventure awaiting people who chose to enhance their lives by exploring the realms of awareness.  No one knows where that trip will take you.  We’re only beginning to learn that more than intent is involved in successful exploration of the consciousness.  Lunch may also be an ingredient in the recipe of examining consciousness awareness.  Focus may be the key that opens the door of a new reality and food may be a key to enable one to focus. 

Eve Prang Plews is a Licensed Nutrition Counselor.  She has been in practice in Sarasota for 22 years.  Her clinic, Full Spectrum Health, is located at 2106 Bispham Road, Sarasota,FL 34231(phone  941-952-1200).   Her previous articles are available on Eve’s Blog at www.fullspectrumhealth.com   Eve radio show, No Nonsense Nutrition airs Mondays 9-10 AM on WSLR 96.5 LPFM.  Stream it live from www.wslr.org.