Food Fundamentalism

Source: Stock snap Matthew Henry

Food has traditionally been treated with reverence– it has been blessed, offered up, shared, and understood as a marker of group identity. What we eat and don’t eat is often indicative of the community to which we belong. However, the increasing number of people reporting no religious beliefs at all has not meant that this tendency to assert moral value through food and the body has disappeared. Increasingly diets popular in North America call for more and more restrictive attitudes towards food and extreme forms of prohibition and discipline. Many of us are perplexed by the seemingly endless permutations of highly restrictive diets with their array of promises and the self-righteous attitudes of the larger “wellness culture” that may accompany them.These attempts at creating meaning through food and various physical practices can easily fall into unconscious states of intolerance.

In her influential book “Purity and Danger” anthropologist Mary Douglas argued the food rules of religious traditions maintain and police boundaries. Those who practice food purity and physical self-discipline, then, are part of the “in-group” and those who do not are outside. In our moment in late modernity connecting virtue and purity to food and fitness seems to be playing itself out in an intriguing way. The ubiquitous use of the word “clean” in regard to eating, and now to parenting, tells us there is a spiritual nuance to these movements. But can we really prove our virtuousness through what we eat and how long we work out each day? Also do we run the risk of creating a variety of form of food intolerance and a sort of fanaticism?

The fanatical mindset, whether related to religion, food or physical fitness is one that seeks to simplify and create black and white styles of belief. This psychology tends to be very rigid and yet weak at its core and is an unreliable guide in our quest for good health. Aside from the problem of rigidity it has a tendency to oscillate between extremes of self-inflation - in this context being ‘better’ and ‘purer’ than others and self-deflation, - not experiencing our self as good or pure enough. This can easily lead to a whole array of problems with self-regulation and self-image and does not necessarily foster emotional and mental stability.

Self-regulation is important in creating a sense of being in control of our moods and impulses, and fostering the ability to find an anchoring point in the midst of life’s challenges. It is a matter of striking a balance between ‘not too much’ and ‘not too little’. This regulating function of the psyche is partly dependent on our lifestyle and diet, daily self-care routines and healthy relationships. It requires a variety of supports not simply focus on one aspect of life.

One example of a moderate approach to healthy food and purification is the traditional Indian healing system of Ayurveda. Ayurvedic practice encourages a middle path in both diet and lifestyle. This more ‘tempered’ approach to food and life-style choices avoids either excess or neglect that are both likely to create imbalances in the body-mind. We all know that sometimes imbalances are created by eating too many of the foods, or doing too many of the things we crave, or thinking too of the same thoughts over and over again.

As a delicious dish can be destroyed by adding too much salt instead of just a moderate amount, in the same way can our mental and emotional state be set off kilter when we go too far in our quest for purification. It is interesting to note that all of the world’s traditional food systems offer a rich array of foods that are to be eaten in a social setting with gratitude. These elements, in fact, tend to get lost as food becomes an elaborate quest for purity that can often make it impossible to eat with others and can lead to conditions such as orthorexia.

Today we have to be careful not to confuse traditional forms of discipline and purifying lifestyle practices with a psychologically driven deprivation based approach. Traditionally bodily practices were about linking the self to the larger order and to community. Current health obsessions often seem to encourage the opposite approach and encourage narcissistic obsession with one’s health.. This spiral into a fanatical mindset is illustrated in an article by Lauren McKeon who describes her introduction to CrossFit as a “conversion” and states that she was a “true believer” until the regimen resulted in a spiral fracture of her leg and a dislocated ankle. With impressive honesty McKeon writes that she woke up in her hospital bed and couldn’t wait to get back to the gym.[i] The fact that many of the faddish food and fitness practices that spring up like mushrooms have nothing to do with health is made clear in this example.

We have to remember that the aim of purification in the traditional spiritual sense is refinement of the whole human being and a seeking to perfect our health, character and mental state. The aim is to change positively and fine-tune the instrument of the body and mind. Though there is a startling array of life-style practices and food adaptations these are always training the person to think beyond themselves, and to purify not just the poisons of the body but also of the mind and spirit. Therapeutically they can offer profound insight and self-understanding, and ameliorate numerous psychosomatic disorders. From a spiritual perspective, these rituals are understood as a bridge between the sacred and the earthly realms that permits communication and contact with our innermost Self. As a result they point towards tolerance and care towards both towards oneself and others rather than puritanical ideals of a perfect body and diet.

[i] Lauren McKeon, “Save Me From My Workout,” Toronto Life, June 23, 2014.