Connecting starts with taking care of yourself and one way to do that is through the practice of eating, but in a way that helps create a stronger connection with your higher self.
Years ago when I was running my life a certain way, on empty most of the time but also in a state of unawareness, the universe may have been trying to get in touch with me to initiate change but I wasn’t answering the phone, I wasn’t as accessible or as open as I am now. When I started to pay attention to myself, to what I wanted as well as needed only then things began to change. I am no doctor in the traditional sense, but I do believe in intuitively accessing your own inner knowledge to understand what does and doesn’t work. That is what I am bringing to this section on Nutrition but also that may or may not work for you. I am continuously learning and evolving as we all are, but I want to be clear that nothing I write about in this section should be taken as literal medical advice. I have learned that in truth, no food is good or bad there are only foods that help you get closer to yourself or don’t, those that can contribute to a better emotional, mental and physical state vs. those that don’t. Below is my story.
I used to be skeletal, feeding my body cigarettes as that was appropriate for me at the time. I smoked from age 12-33, two packs a day when I was really struggling with people or situations. I ate out all the time (and was always getting sick from doing this) and rarely cooked. Full bags of chips and packs of cookies would be eaten in one sitting. Then when I was depressed I wouldn’t eat at all. I can still remember what the gnawing feeling against my stomach felt like, my demons pushing on and scratching at my insides, while I was going through the motions of my day anxious, detached, or stressed out. I couldn’t handle my feelings, and sometimes not eating was even a punishment. Cutting was another way I hurt my body. I lived in extremes, and I normalized this.
What changed was that I had a spiritual awakening in 2017 that led me to exercise and eating differently. I found the will to survive through these two methods, whereas before I truly didn’t want to be here because everything hurt and nothing would ever get better, two myths I clung to. At first I developed a relationship with food because I joined the gym and had no choice, if I wanted to strength train, I needed to eat. So I started eating much better than before and for about 3 years I got heavily into bodybuilding and gaining weight, but the eat-it-all-at-any-cost-to-make-gains culture stopped working for me. It no longer felt authentic.
Especially after I ended up in the hospital. This health scare caused me to reevaluate if I was feeding myself only to look a certain way. I ended up developing a new relationship with food after working with two specialists and became more conscious of how I was doing everything. Instead of pushing for an external image, I started eating for me with no goals. I reverted back to my original purpose, which was to just help myself feel better in my body. I learned more and made better choices that stuck until it became a lifestyle and since then there haven’t just been physical effects. One example is that I am more aware of how my emotions are tied into my consumption so it is easy for me to know when I’m not okay. It’s rare now but if I were to skip a meal or am like “I don’t care” about food that day, I’d know something is wrong. It’s a cue that I’m veering into old coping mechanisms. Staying on track with food helps me stay on track emotionally, mentally and physically because all those parts of me are connected. Realizing all of this was a gift, and this is what I’ll be sharing about in this section.
Jennifer Diane is a goddess of darkness, writer and model based out of New Jersey. Jennifer writes for Healing with the Occult, speaks for the Enlightenment through Hellfire Podcast, and creates books and zines (coming soon).