It’s time for man to realize that you are more than what you eat. “Man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD” (Deut. 8:3 ESV).
Food Rules and Food Fear
Do not touch. Do not eat. You cannot have. These are extra rules that do not come from heaven; they are man-made opinions.
The world is so easily ensnared by voices that do not come from the Father. “Do not touch.” “Do not eat.” “You cannot have.” These voices do not come from the Father but are of the world.
The world believes that some foods are good and others are bad. “You are what you eat.” These beliefs place too much power in the hands of food. While food can be medicinal, it does not save you.
Foods cannot be your Lord. Yahweh is the Lord your God. Food can bring life if you bless it and receive it with thanksgiving. It is the emotions and beliefs around food that cause symptoms—not the food itself. If you have anxiety around food, do not eat it. The fear will cause symptoms like bloating, nausea, distention, and constipation.
Rather than giving God power, you give food power over you when you decide which foods will make you sick.
If you are afraid of food, I can assure you, it will make you feel sick. It’s the emotions that change the body’s physiological state. These symptoms may look like a reaction to food, but the confusion becomes, “Did my emotions or the food make me sick?”
Anxiety and Food Symptoms
The food does not hold any power over you. It is the false beliefs about food that drive anxiety and worry. When the body is in an anxious state, it is not prepared to digest food. The fear activates the body’s sympathetic nervous system (the fight or flight response).
When the body is in the sympathetic state, it pumps blood away from the digestive tract and into your arms and legs. The body will not be ready to digest food until it is in the parasympathetic state (rest and digest).
When you are in the parasympathetic state, you are ready to digest food. Your heart rate is lower, and the body is pumping blood into the digestive tract. We want to eat food when we are in the parasympathetic state.
If you see food and think, “This food is bad for me. This food is going to make me sick,” your brain will perceive the food as a threat.
Regardless of whether the threat is real or imagined, the body responds the same way. It activates the sympathetic nervous system and can trigger emotions like fear and anxiety. Many of my clients feel anxiety in their gut.
If you feel a pit in your stomach, nausea, or tightness in your chest, these emotions were triggered by your thoughts.
If you eat any food in this physiological state, the body will not respond well. The body is in fight or flight mode, and the gut is not prepared to digest food.
If this happens to you, it’s better to get out of your physiological state before you eat the food.
1 Strategy to Stop Food Fear
Here is an emotional processing tool that my clients use when they experience unhealthy food fear or anxiety around meals.
Once you move out of that state, you’ll know because you no longer feel the emotion in your body. Now, it’s time to eat. If you’re feeling hungry and in a relaxed state, you can bless the food and receive it with thanksgiving.