What is “Primary Food” and Why Does it Matter?

When you think about getting healthier, what do you think about? Eating boring, bland food and working out all the time, right?  We think about depravation, disappointment, and most of all hunger.  It’s sad and depressing, and it makes any weight loss temporary at best, and doesn’t even improve your health.

What is Primary Food?

Primary food is a combination of several different aspects of your life.  Ironically, it has nothing to do with what you eat!  We will refer to the things you eat as “secondary food”.  (I will explain why later.) Primary food includes:

• Relationships
• Social Life
• Joy
• Spirituality
• Creativity
• Finances
• Career
• Education
• Health
• Physical Activity
• Home Cooking
• Home Environment

These 12 parts of your life feed and nourish you when you are satisficed with their quality and stability, and they depleat you when the are lacking.

Let’s say your job sucks.  In the morning, you oversleep because you don’t want to get up and start your day.  You drag your feet getting ready and driving in.  You barely get the job done and stare at the clock all day hoping the time goes faster so you can go home.  You’re exhausted and have no motivation to cook dinner, so you hit a drive thru on your way home.  You sit on the couch for the rest of the night and stare at the tv or your phone, then you go to bed to start the same unfulfilling cycle all over again tomorrow.

Can you see how not having a job that you love can negatively impact your entire life?  What about all the other primary foods?  How much worse is it when more than one area of your life is out of balance?

Finding Balance

It doesn’t have to be an overwhelming experience to begin finding your balance.  What I find works best is to start with just one area of Primary Food.  It doesn’t even matter which one you pick.  Start with the one you find the easiest to manage!  The more you work at that one thing, the more you will start to see improvements in every other aspect of you life.

For example, say you want to work on your finances.  You start using a spreadsheet to track your monthly bills.  By watching your cash flow, you start to find ways to reduce your money going out.  Maybe you start packing your lunch instead of buying it every day.  Now you’re eating healthier too.  And because you aren’t spending so much on each meal, you can start getting higher quality, organic foods to prepare at home.  Less processed food means more energy.  Now that’s three areas of Primary Food being nourished by making one small change!  Your finances are more stable,  you are cooking more at home, and your overall health is improved. Do you see how they all blend together now?

Breaking it down so simply makes it so much less overwhelming.  Being mindful redunces your stress tremendously because you know what’s going on in  your life.  Having accountability also makes a big difference, whether you are tracking your progress yourself or working with someone else.  I’m always here to help if you need someone to back you up.

Not sure where to start? Take the free Primary Food Evaluation to get started!