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Thought For Food
Most of us concentrate on our diet on the level of pancakes and short ribs. We are unaware of our mental fare. With a whole food table and a junk food soul, is it any wonder we struggle with wellness. We feast away on our musings as if there were no substantial consequences.
Sometimes we feed in packs on great notions that wash up on the beach from the deep. We are like primitives, grateful to Providence for the good fortune, but haven’t a clue why it happens, so we gather in groups to worship, placate, and cajole for a reoccurrence.
Other times we violently tear, like lions, at the carrion of our cherished beliefs, culled from the herd of countless brainchildren grazing on the savanna of our shared human experience. We jealously guard our spot at the carcass “kill” and claim it for ourselves.
Mostly, though, we mindlessly munch and snack at our daily smorgasbord of comfort thoughts, shamelessly overeating. Unsatisfied after such noshing, and perhaps having chosen lightly from the spiritual food group, we search our cupboards for supplements of positive thinking, which we pop like flavored vitamins.
We binge and purge at the vending machine that is our mind, snacking on daydreams and fantasy, which are easily dispensed “fast foods”, highly processed by our own self-serving needs, milled by wishful thinking for easy digestion, and deep fried in snake oil, should we wish to turn them into opinions to peddle them.
And peddle them we do, with each conversation we have! What nourishment do we bring to the table when we speak? For speech, and I include the written word, is a meal. Do we offer chicken soup of prattle, unexamined and unwashed produce raised in toxic soil? Do we serve “plattertudes” of bitter flavors, unseasoned, or too sweet? Do we share over-cooked dishes or half-baked dishes from the recipes of our own disastrous need to validate our cookbook? Maybe we just like food fights! Most probably we are just unaware most of the time that we are walking food stands.
All these tendencies are within myself, and I constantly struggle with my inner diet. I yearn for the company of those friends and people I meet whose very presence is a whole food banquet table that must come from a carefully tended garden of self awareness, humor, love and service. Some people are more that way than others, and sometimes there is a nutritious sort of synergy that occurs among people that is more than each has individually. Maybe there is nobody short of a saint who is really like this, but even so, I wish I were more that way. I fall woefully short. Excuse the “dietribe”, I’m surely no saint.
In Reply to: Thought For Food posted by Jim H. on August 15, 2003 at 10:40:49:
Jim H, Congrats Jim you are a member of the human race and we all fall short..Steve
In Reply to: Thought For Food posted by Jim H. on August 15, 2003 at 10:40:49:
As, always, your writings provide wonderful sentiment and lessons for everyone.
I especially like this part:
I yearn for the company of those friends and people I meet whose very presence is a whole food banquet table that must come from a carefully tended garden of self awareness, humor, love and service.
p.s. Wasn't it just yesterday that you began your holiday?? Well wishes for the new year and a wonderful classroom of eager young minds :)
In Reply to: Re: Thought For Food posted by Steve on August 15, 2003 at 12:23:14:
Jim....I hope that you are a college professor because I'm not sure that children without a degree could understand you. Just Kidding. I enjoyed this too.
In Reply to: Re: Thought For Food posted by Steve on August 15, 2003 at 12:23:14:
Jim....I hope that you are a college professor because I'm not sure that children without a degree could understand you. Just Kidding. I enjoyed this too.
In Reply to: Re: Thought For Food posted by Nita on August 15, 2003 at 13:43:00:
I agree with Nita. I'm sure you can teach Creative Writing to college students, show them how to write with figurative use of the language... Personal Essay is another such course in which the student will benefit from your experiences.
Anyway, I enjoyed reading your food thot.
In Reply to: Re: Thought For Food posted by bing on August 15, 2003 at 19:08:28:
Thanks for the comments, all.
Yes it seems like just yesterday that summer began. It is always over too soon. AArrrgh!!
Yes, it is human to fall short, but also human to keep on striving, eh Steve?
I know you were kidding, Nita, but children never have been my audience. I have not been drawn to write kid books, even though I have a captive audience. I am amazed at some of the great stuff that is out there.
Kids are mostly my subject, except when I ramble on like this. "Personal Essays", as you call them, Bing, don't have the energy for me that stories do. Stories make their own point better than I could. Essays are a chore, and the point I wanted to make is nothing new anyway, but I have been seeing it with new eyes.
Our relationships with food and with our own thoughts are so deeply related. That's it in a nutshell.
Teach writing? Yikes! I think it was Robert Ruark who once told a university group of aspiring writers who had come to hear him tell how to write, (and I quote loosly) "What are you doing here? Don't sit here and listen to me. If you want to write, leave now and go do it."
In Reply to: Thought For Food posted by Jim H. on August 15, 2003 at 10:40:49:
Thanks, Jim.
I just had to add my "welcome back" to the chorus.
I found myself looking for your first note for the past couple of weeks since I knew the schools were opening. I missed you!
Namaste`
Walt
In Reply to: Thought For Food posted by Jim H. on August 15, 2003 at 10:40:49:
Expecting life to treat you well because you are a good person is like
expecting an angry bull not to charge because you are a vegetarian.
In Reply to: Re: Thought For Food - A Morsel posted by Saite on August 16, 2003 at 14:47:30:
Ah, a little dessert from the bitter/irony/pun/metaphor humor food group. Thank you, Saite, could you pass the stevia please?
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