Diet Culture and It’s Effects on Mental Health
We are bombarded on a regular basis with information that we need to buy products to look younger, be thinner, be prettier, be smarter, be stronger, be anyone or anything besides who God designed us to be. What’s worse is that even after buying into these things, we are then shamed when they “do not work”. The message is that you did something wrong. You didn’t have “enough willpower”, were “too lazy” or weren’t “committed enough”. However, this couldn’t be any further than the truth.
If I bought a coffee mug and it spilled all over me I wouldn’t say “Man, what is wrong with me?! I must not have been committed enough to make this mug work.”. Absolutely not! I would say something along the lines of “Man… this is a bad product” and return it to get my money back. I might even write a review to let others know not to waste their time and money on that product.
When it comes to the diet industry though, we have been trained to think otherwise. We have been taught that if their workout regime, diet, medication, injection, serum, etc. don’t “work” we didn’t work hard enough. The diet industry makes 75 billion dollars a year. You read that right… A YEAR! It is expected to grow even more in the coming year, especially since the introduction of weight loss injections such as Wegovy and Saxenda to name a few (2023). Ironically, 95 percent of these products involved in the weight loss industry fail with time (2023). How does the industry keep going though? We have also been subsequently taught that we could and should aspire to be the other 5 percent. If we just “try a little harder and longer” we could be that small percentage of success.
But what if the definition of success isn’t what the diet industry taunts as success? After all, they still continue to rack in an impressive amount of our hard-earned money a year on a philosophy that is downright flawed.
As Christians, we are called to honor our bodies and serve God. I often hear the bible verse ‘the body is a holy temple’ (1 Corinthians 6:19) in regards to someone shaming themselves into a restrictive diet and/or militant exercise routine. However, that is a very misconstrued interpretation of that verse! Allow me to explain more. Before I do, I think it is important to note that the temple is synonymous with the church. They both mean a place (literally or figuratively) in which God dwells. Okay, now that is established, allow me to explain...
Let's say you tithe regularly at your church. The pastor of the church then informs the congregation that there are going to be some pretty extreme exterior makeovers to the church building and all of the tithes from the congregation are going to go into that. Due to these extreme renovations, no church service was going to be held as all the money was going to be going to the renovations and there wouldn’t even be enough money left over to run the AC or heat. But hey… at least your church is going to look awesome when it’s all done!
You probably wouldn’t be very happy. Why? Because the church is a place where we go to connect with one another, God, and the community. It serves as a place to gather, learn about God, and then go out into the community to share God’s word.
Our bodies being the holy temple (or church) means that yes, we need to take care of it, clean it, pay the utility bills, etc. but it’s certainly not all about how it looks on the outside. Our bodies are meant to serve and know God! Isn’t it crazy how diet culture has even tried to infiltrate its way into the Holy Bible?
When diet culture comes in to try and tell you that you are not enough for the way you look and tries to distract you from what God’s plan is for you, work to shift your attention to what you truly value.
Even during biblical times, you can see that the enemy prompted people to look outward vs. inward. “Man looks at the outward appearance but God looks at the heart” (1 Samuel 16:7). You are beautifully and wonderfully made just as you are. God has also naturally given us hunger and fullness cues that we can work on reconnecting to. Diet culture has taught us not to trust our bodies. Yet our bodies were perfectly designed to signal to us when we are hungry and when we are full. What I am referring to is something called intuitive eating. By no means is intuitive eating the hunger and fullness diet. If you are interested in what intuitive eating is check out https://www.intuitiveeating.org/10-principles-of-intuitive-eating/ for more details.
The moral of the story here is to be mindful of the ways the enemy tries to come in and tell you that you are not enough just the way you are as that couldn’t be any further than the truth!
Click here to book an intake session with me today!
References:
The U.S. Weight Loss & Diet Control Market (March 2023). United States Weight Loss & Diet Control Market Report 2023: The $75 Billion Market Grew Nearly 15% in 2022 from the Depressed Level of 2020.
