Life is for living! That is where my love for food stems from. Food is not just for eating, it's about what it does for us. We need to eat to survive physically and mentally.
Sharing a meal that tastes great creates such a positive ambiance around the table. That in turn helps us to have great conversations, share ideas, enjoy laughter, and lots more. In my experience growing up in Holland with a Spanish mother, the better the food, the more fun is had around the table. There are so few moments in the day that I can get people to sit down and make time to talk, but when we sit to eat we also make time for conversation.
When I was younger it was all about good tasting food and probably a drink. Back then it didn't matter if it was healthy or not as long as it was delicious. I strongly believed that if there were enough vegetables in each meal it was healthy. Unfortunately as I became older I also developed physical complaints and it was at that stage I was forced to look at my diet.
In the beginning I was resistant to that idea because life should be fun, and if I couldn't eat the things I loved then life wasn't fun. Waking up in the morning and feeling tired, exhausted, was becoming a regular occasion. I also started to develop rashes and small allergies. Luckily my love for wanting to feel fit and healthy, as well as awake and alert won me over. Slowly I started to learn all about food, discovered super foods, read everything about diets and health. Then I found information about hormones and went back to school.It all came together after more then 15 years of researching and learning. For a second I thought I had found it. I started to live according to what I had learned. I felt more and more amazing. Then all of the sudden I've started to feel tired again, this time intensely tired. Why, how?? I did everything according to the rules, being really good.
Luckily one of my last classes was about stress. It took me an hour to realise how stressful my healthy lifestyle was. Every time I left my house I was totally stressed because I just couldn't find the food I wanted and needed to meet my exacting standards anywhere. I realised I had gone from an unhealthy but very fun lifestyle to an extremely healthy one, but losing the fun in the process.
Clearly there was balance to be struck with retaining fun in life, as well as understanding that our bodies need balance. We have a liver that needs to work, it needs to clean, in balance. That was magical to me, because it meant I didn't have to give up everything. I've learned what was healthy and I've also learned to love it. I've learned to listen to my body and learned what it can take. It's entirely personal. My taste has changed and I automatically now choose the right things to buy.
Still, when I go out for dinner I love to be naughty, and I've instigated 'naughty Sundays'. I have shifted what naughty means though, Burger King really doesn't taste good anymore, not even when I'm tipsy, but that doesn't mean I don't like a good burger. The last four years I feel better than I ever have and I'm healthier then I've ever been. I love to read and study everything there is about health and food, but the best thing discovered is the balance that made it work for me.
Love Viviana
