Christmas Nutrition Tips & My Favourite Ingredients.

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The diet starts in January - Christmas can be one of the most challenging times when it comes to our relationship with food and our body. This year, maybe try to do it a wee bit differently.

Stress management is essential for overall health, well-being and managing your weight. Chronic stress affects the body in several ways, and managing it can lead to significant improvements in physical, emotional, and mental health.

Holistic therapies take into account the whole person, including the mind, body, and spirit, to support overall health and balance.

What we eat matters, how we eat matters, how we feel about what we eat matters, how we feel when we eat matters, what we believe about food matters, what we believe about ourselves matters. There are many other factors and all of them effect how we process the energy in our food. 

From a holistic perspective, this is the best definition of Metabolism that I have found. 

“Metabolism is the sum total of all the chemical reactions in the body, plus the sum total of all our thoughts, feelings, beliefs and experiences.” Marc David 

We know that two people can eat exactly the same thing and yet they will metabolise it differently, because we are much more complex than a kettle. 

“In 1863, a calorie was defined as the amount of heat needed to raise the temperature of 1 kilogram of water from 0 to 1 degree Celsius. In 1925, calories became scientifically defined in terms of joules, which are units typically used by physicists to describe the amount of work needed to force one newton through one meter.” www.livescience.com

Our Metabolism is what allows us to utilise the energy that our food provides. Understanding Metabolism is key to understanding nutrition, changing your relationship with food, improving your relationship with your body and being the healthiest you can be.

“Fitness experts are satisfied when we have burned enough calories or reached our target heart rate. Dietary gurus are happy when our milk has enough Vitamin D or are juice has enough Vitamin C. Little have we realised that our diet's have been collectively deficient in some important nutrients that have been around for some time, yet have been overlooked: 

Vitamin L - Love, Vitamin H- Happiness, Vitamin S - Soul.

You won’t find these listed on the side of your cereal box, but don’t let that absence fool you. 

If something is truly nourishing for the soul then it is literally nourishing for the body and that nourishment is what fuels metabolism.” Marc David - The Slow Down Diet. 

A stressed eater will be in a place of digestive shutdown, a relaxed eater will be a place of full digestive force. Feelings such as guilt, shame that come from good food/ bad food mentality will always lead us to be in stress response. If we add that to our normal everyday stress and emotional experiences then we will be in digestive shutdown, dealing with the impact of high cortisol and adrenaline in our body.

There is nothing more stressful to the body than feelings of guilt and shame, especially around food. This Christmas, be gentle with yourself and be a relaxed eater, an emotional eater - allow yourself full permission to savour every bite, with emotions of joy and pleasure.

Happy Christmas

Joanne