Feast or Famin

Had an early Thanksgiving Dinner at sorority last night.  Our chapter has 16 members and we meet at each other’s homes the 1st and 4th Tuesday’s of the month.  The hostess usually prepares a full blown meal for the group and we all leave more than satisfied.  Our hostess last night had a beautiful turkey, dressing, mashed potatoes, gravy, green bean casserole, hot rolls, jello fruit salad, appetizers of cheese and vegetables, pumpkin and pecan pies with whipped cream.  Like I said, it was a full blown meal and I ate some of everything on the table.  The medium sized, heavy duty, paper plates were used and my plate wasn’t even half full, even after putting some of everything on it – and I thought to my self “Self – you can come back for more if you need to” and so I sat down, proceeded to eat everything on my plate and it still amazes me – I didn’t want any more – I was satisfied.

There was a time when that plate, because of its size would have been filled up, and I mean filled up, twice and maybe three times and I would have had at least one piece of each pie with whipped cream on both (I only had a small slice of the pumpkin pie with whipped cream) – and then even though my stomach was bursting and I would be miserable, my mouth would still be hungry and I would go back for one more hot roll, or one more piece of pie – or one more of something – like I was afraid that I was never going to eat again.  What a sad piece of out of control humanity I was then.

History tells us that back in the caveman days people would experience either feast or famin and when there was food to eat, they ate continuously because they knew that when the famin hit there would be no food for a long time.  I guess most of us instinctively use this same eating pattern today – and since it could be a built in instinct, a conscious effort has to be made to recognize it and change our thought pattern about food toward a more realistic one that fits today’s standards.  For the most part, the majority of the people in the United States have enough food to satisfy them each and every day.  I’m not saying that there aren’t many people who don’t know where their next meal is coming from, but for those of us who are fortunate enough to live in the economic strata that allows three meals a day, we have more than enough food provided.

Have any of you ever heard your parents admonish you when you were growing up with “Clean up your plate, there are starving”children in China!”  Those were words that I grew up with and I found that I could not leave food on my plate without feeling guilty.  Those words no longer apply to my eating habits today.  Eating less will not help those who don’t have enough, but it will help us to live happier and healthier lives and then maybe be able to find a way to help those in need because we are happy and healthy. Eating only until the body is satisfied will reduce the body’s weight down to its proper and desired size and that body will serve you for many, many years because the chances of inviting heart disease, high blood pressure, high chloesterol, diabetes and those other maladies that plaque the overweight body will be much less.

Not too long ago I was on the verge of most of these diseases – high blood pressure, high chloesterol, diabetes, thyroid problems, as well as lack of energy, and mild depression.  After I reduced my body weight down to what I considered “my perfect body weight” those problems went away.  If I can do it – anyone can, because I am the world’s best or worst skeptic, however you want to look at it.  But – even though I wasn’t sure that the program that I developed would work, I wanted to give it a whirl, and Hooray!  It Worked!  It can be done!  It’s all up to you and your attitude toward food, your body and your happiness.

Think Thin Thoughts!

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Tags: attitude toward food, diabetes, eating less, happiness, healthy, heart diseases, high blood pressure, high chloesterol, hot rolls, pumpkin pie, skeptic, sorority, starving people, Thanksgiving Dinner, thought pattern, thyroid, whipped cream