In this lesson we’re going to replace our current thinking from “Food as nutrients” to what many scholars in the field think it should be: “food as well-being.”
This means your food choices shouldn’t be just about nutrients and their effect on health and weight.
They should also include its deliciousness, it’s psychological, emotional, and social benefits--like comfort, connection, love and belonging. Here’s what they mean.
Nobody sits down to eat a plate of nutrients. We sit down for a meal that gives physical, emotional, and psychological nourishment.
We eat for comfort, pleasure, love, identity, and community. Anything that enhances those needs—aesthetics and rituals come to mind—enhances our well-being.
A “food as well being” consciousness absolutely values the nutritional content of food, but it recognizes that nutrition, it’s impact on our health and weight, is just ONE of many factors we use to decide what to eat.
In this new consciousness, what you eat can't be separated from how good it tastes, how you eat it, what you eat it on, the context you eat it in and the cultural meaning it revolves around.
What does moving away from “food as nutrients” to “food as well-being” look like on an everyday basis?
Under our current “Food as Nutrients” definition, you would decide to eat, say an egg, on the basis of whether it’s healthy or unhealthy, or whether it will make you fat or skinny. And because nothing else matters but the nutrients and its effect on health, it doesn’t matter if you eat it like this:
But in a “Food as Well-being” consciousness, sure you’re concerned about whether the egg is healthy or not, but that’s not your only concern. You’d ask: does this food give me pleasure, comfort? How should I prepare it, and serve it?
Because you know food is about well-being, not just nutrients, You CARE about rituals, ambiance, where the food was sourced and so on. And because you care you’re likely to serve it like this:
Because you know the eye eats before the mouth tastes.
What will happen when you change the meaning of food away from just nutrients to the more expansive view of well-being?
You will minimize weight-gaining visceral pleasures and maximize waist-slimming Epicurean pleasures.
In the next blog post, we’re going to see the best ways to incorporate “food as well-being” into our daily lives. In the meantime, check out our Intuitive Eating Online Course.
Nestorowicz, R., Jerzyk, E., & Rogala, A. (2022). In the Labyrinth of Dietary Patterns and Well-Being-When Eating Healthy Is Not Enough to Be Well. International journal of environmental research and public health, 19(3), 1259. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph19031259
Quote: People paying attention to the health aspects, pleasure and social dimension of food meaning show higher levels of FWB than people focusing exclusively on health aspects.
Boles, D. Z., DeSousa, M., Turnwald, B. P., Horii, R. I., Duarte, T., Zahrt, O. H., Markus, H. R., & Crum, A. J. (2021). Can Exercising and Eating Healthy Be Fun and Indulgent Instead of Boring and Depriving? Targeting Mindsets About the Process of Engaging in Healthy Behaviors.
Frontiers in psychology,
12, 745950. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.745950
Quote: Meanwhile, interventions targeting mindsets about the appeal of healthy eating increases in-class fruit and vegetable selection more than emphasizing the importance of eating nutritious foods.
Vaillancourt, C., Bédard, A., Bélanger-Gravel, A., Provencher, V., Bégin, C., Desroches, S., & Lemieux, S. (2019). Promoting Healthy Eating in Adults: An Evaluation of Pleasure-Oriented versus Health-Oriented Messages.
Current developments in nutrition,
3(5), nzz012. https://doi.org/10.1093/cdn/nzz012
Quote: These findings suggest that the leaflets would be appropriate to promote healthy eating through 2 distinct approaches (health and pleasure paradigms) and propose that different effects on attitude could be observed from these 2 approaches.