I know that’s a strange question, but given all the talk lately about how high-fat, high-calorie foods or junk foods are as addictive as hard drugs like cocaine and heroine, I think it is an appropriate one.
Have you ever known what would be best for you to eat, but went for the junk food instead? I know I have. Well apparently there is more going on then many of us realize.
A new study published in the journal Nature Neuroscience, has concluded that eating junk food can be as addictive as hard drugs. High-fat, high-sugar foods are highly acidic. Meat is acidic and fried is even worse. Sugar is acid and probably does more to acidify the body than any other food. Not only is sugar acidic, we have microorganisms in our bodies that eat the sugar and secrete an acidic byproduct. My dentist once told me that when you get a cavity it is not from the sugar per say, it is the acid produced by the bacteria that consume the sugar that causes the decay of the tooth!
According to Paul J. Kenny, Ph.D., an associate professor of molecular therapeutics at the Scripps Research Institute, in Florida, “People know intuitively that there’s more to overeating than just willpower,” he says. “There’s a system in the brain that’s been turned on or over-activated, and that’s driving overeating at some subconscious level.”
There is the subconscious again. You see we have been taught to believe that high-calorie, high-fat foods or comfort foods are the ones that taste the best and make us feel the best (hence comfort foods). We need to change our beliefs, and perhaps break our addiction to these acidic foods, if we ever hope to have the level of health we deserve.
The human body can go either way when it comes to food. That is, when fed healthy, life enhancing foods like vegetables, fruits and nuts, the body will respond and start to “want” these foods. When you feed the body unhealthy foods, such as junk food, it will start to crave these foods as well; however now it becomes like an uncontrollable addiction. In the study mentioned above, three groups of rats were used in the test. The group that was allowed to eat junk food for up to 23-hours a day, would not even stop eating when they were given shocks to their feet! Go here to read the whole article by CNN Health.
So what does this mean for humans? Well people that live on junk food or acid food diets show similarities to the rats in this study. We consume these foods knowing full well how they will make us feel and how they will make our bodies look and perform. Just like the rats were willing to endure electric shocks, we are willing to endure low energy, excess pounds and deterioration of our health in order to “enjoy” these foods. Does this make sense?
Well it does when you understand that we are not controlled (most of the time) by our conscious minds but by our subconscious minds and more specifically by our beliefs and paradigms. So how do we get off this acid trip? First, we become aware. Awareness can go a long way to changing our beliefs and ultimately our habits. By staying aware while we are eating foods that do not support our health, we can start to break our patterns and retrain our subconscious minds. If we are honest with ourselves while and after eating foods that do not support our health we will start to see that perhaps these foods are not “comfort” foods after all. Perhaps we should rename them “discomfort” foods.
Be honest. How do you feel after eating junk food? Does it make your body feel alive? Do you feel good about yourself?
