One of the things I realized when I was diagnosed is that there is a huge difference between eating well and not eating badly. I have always figured that, since I don't eat french fries with every meal, that I was a pretty good eater. I always was a few pounds overweight, nothing terribly noticeable (or at least so I told myself), and I never had any digestive or other issues. Ergo: I'm eating OK. Basically, I only watched it when I was really unable to fit into my jeans comfortably, and other than that I tried not to overeat, over drink, or over stress about any of it.
Then this cancer thing happens. My risk factors were few: no cancer in my family, maybe a little bit overweight, and maybe not enough exercise. Maybe my nutritional needs could be met a little better. But even though these were all small issues individually, these were the things I could control... as opposed to the air I was breathing and the plastic bottles and the food additives, etc., that I could not.
So I started looking at nutrients, and the nutritional value of what was being put in my body. And what started to become really clear was that -- to really get the most nourishment out of food -- you have to eat a lot of it, and a lot of different kinds of it. And in order to do all that eating to get all those nutrients, you can't be full of stuff that gives you nothing at all.
Bye bye chocolate croissants. Bye bye plain croissants. Bye bye sugar and bye bye white carbs. Bye bye dairy and bye bye, basically, to everything that did not nourish me directly. And hello to everything that did. So hello to protein, and hello to lots of vegetables, and hello to water, and hello to fruits and seaweed and nuts and even more vegetables. Hello organic when possible.
Make sense? The more you use up your appetite with stuff that doesn't do you a lot of harm (but doesn't do you much good either), the less able you are to fill yourself up with things that actually do you good, with minerals and vitamins and all that stuff that your body actually needs.
Now, think about this. Time is like our stomach. And how we fill it up can either be positive, negative, or neutral.
Interesting idea, right?
Like, up until very recently, I figured that as long as I wasn't doing actual harm to myself during my waking hours, I was living a pretty fulfilled life. But then there's the concept of doing good for yourself, taking care of yourself. And how do you have time to do that if you're busy doing things that are, at best, not bad for you?
Don't get me wrong. I am a big fan of binge watching cable series and scrolling through Facebook. I think there is soul value in those things, as long as they are ingested when the soul is needing that specific type of content. I'm not being judgmental at all when it comes to, well, anything.
But for me, it's the neutral stuff in my life that I'm looking at these days. Say, for example, work. Absolutely, work is very important. For one thing, it enables me to buy the good nutritious organic fruits and vegetables at overly priced fancy markets so that I can take care of my body better. I get that. And I also get that this is a very privileged conversation to be starting, because it does presuppose that one has a choice in the matter of work, and that's a very good thing and not something that everyone has.
But... what about work that has neutral nutritional soul value? Yes, it pays for the organic fruits and vegetables, it pays for the roof over the head, it pays for the gas to get to/from the job, it helps do a lot of things that require money. But what if you are not doing something that really nourishes you? What if who you are and what you do are no longer in line? Again, I know, very few people get to have these questions, and even fewer wake up in the morning feeling fully integrated with their lives. But hang with me here.
Isn't there kind of a concept of junk time? Time spent that doesn't nourish? Time spent that just kind of gets us through to the next thing, but neither intrinsically adds or subtracts much?
What if I could substitute some of that time for time that has more nutrients? That fed soul and mind a bit more robustly? What if I spent my time with whole activities... things that weren't fractured by multiple screens and noises and constant switching of mental and emotional channels? What if I consumed my time in bites that were savored a little more deeply, chewed a little more thoroughly, and spiced with flavors that really were pleasing, rather than discordant and chaotic?
Wouldn't that be nice? Wouldn't that make my soul a bit more satisfied at the end of the day?
I want my soul to be sated. I want it to lean back and belch after a good meal of time, picking at its teeth and savoring the little last remnants. I want it to grow fat and sassy, engorged on laughter with friends and moments of true creation and hours of feeling the sun and experiencing the world fully. I want my soul to never have to diet, or starve for more things it needs. I want my soul to be able to feast fully on time, as I spend my days on activities that grow and enhance and inspire it.
I want my life to be an endless smorgasbord of soul smacking ways to spend my time. If done correctly and mindfully, I think even the laundry can be given enough room to become a little soul tidbit, a bit of way to connect to family and home. I know it's a dream... but it's an intentional one, like eating only foods that are delicious and satisfying and good for my body to build itself back up with.
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