But is this true? Do we really have no choice? We make decisions daily regarding our personal diet. What drives us when we choose the kind of food we eat?
It is not easy to gain insight into who or what inspires us to healthy eating. Could it be the adverts we see for beautyfood that nourishes skin and hair? Or for the 12 foods that make us fit and clever? For brainfood, superfoods, intermittent fasting, low carb diets? Are we being seduced, and if so, who is the seducer?
Every magazine we pick up is full of expert advice, guidelines and recipes. As independent individuals we value the moment of freedom, however, and our own creative power out of which we put together our daily menues. And this is – or can become – a question of consciousness.
No freedom at the cost of others
We no longer need to follow traditional eating habits today or eat what we are used to from home. In many – but unfortunately far from all – regions of the earth we have even become independent of crop failures which means we can decide what we eat every day.
It is even important that we use our own judgment in keeping with our own values. But that is not all that is required for inner development, because freedom must not be gained at the cost of others. As long as other people suffer due to my actions there will be no progress.
First of all we need to understand what is going on. What kind of animal farming are we agreeing with if we eat a steak every day, for instance, or if we greedily buy the cheapest food possible? We are saying ‹yes› to nitrate-laden drinking water, to emissions that are harmful for the environment, the expansion of soya plantations that requires the chopping down of the Brazilian rainforest.
The biography of my food
I am conscious of what I eat, how this food has been produced and whether the farmer has enough to live on. An image arises in me of the biography of my food. This means I have a choice as to how I will act, for the true path to freedom for me as the shaper of my own life is based on the triad of knowing, judging and acting.
My living healthily will then be a side-effect of my conscious eating. For my actions will be directed towards a healthy future for the soil, the plants, the animals, and the earth with the human beings who live and work on it.
The thoughts Jasmin Peschke shares here formed the basis of her talk at the summer conference «Spirituality - Fear and Health» at the Goetheanum.
