The Importance of Choosing

Jefferson Breland

(5/2022) As you may have noticed in last month’s column that started with a description of the vernal equinox, balance has been on my mind.

Last month, I wrote it is easiest to achieve balance when "we stay out of our own way." If we pay attention to any activity in our daily lives (eating, sleeping, working, our emotions, etc.) and notice how our way of doing these activities help us feel better and/or feel worse then we can begin to make choices to improve our health.

It may seem strange to include our emotions in a list of activities. I do so because on some level our emotions are a choice, seen or unseen which we make that has a distinct impact on our life and therefore, health.

Call me crazy, you wouldn’t be the first. If we drill down deep enough and examine how we respond emotionally to any given event in our life, we can see that we have choices about how we respond. Victor Frankl in his book, Man's Search for Meaning, called choice "the last human freedom."

In some situations it may seem like we do not have a choice, yet, we always do.

The key to understanding we have a choice in any situation requires paying close attention to create a "gap" between what happens then choosing a response to it. If we don’t create this "moment to decide," we are in reaction. In this reactive state, we may make less than wise choices. Of course, there are exceptions to this whether it be through training or luck or instinct. More often than not, reactions are unhelpful. In our personal lives with family or friends, reactions may damage or even destroy relationships. Reactions with strangers can create deadly situations in our increasingly less tolerant society.

We are given many opportunities to make choices everyday. Each of these choices are an opportunity to move towards a more balanced and healthy life.

Food is a great subject to discuss choice. If we are fortunate, we eat food everyday. I believe food is meant to be enjoyed. I find it very interesting that humans in "developed" countries, often have to be told how to eat. I typed "food diet" into the search window at amazon.com. A list appeared containing over 50,000 titles: Keto this, Paleo that, and on and on.

There are many reasons, too many to mention here, why we have become disconnected from the most fundamental and vital of human activities: eating. I proffer that because of this disconnect, we create unnecessary suffering in our bodies as well as our minds.

Food is not the villain. Food is food. It is not good or bad. How we choose to use it is another story. The stories we tell ourselves about food, is, well, part of that story. Too often, guilt is an emotion associated with food, especially dessert. (Dessert gets a bad rap which is why I think it should be the first course of a meal, not the last.)

Food is life. Food is to be eaten that we may live life to the fullest. I propose that we should unconditionally love what we eat. No guilt allowed. Of course, when we do this, there will be consequences to our choices. We may feel better. We may feel worse.

For instance: several years ago, I decided that I was going to "allow" myself to eat as much ice cream as I wanted. Over the course of four days, I ate about a gallon of ice cream. I then developed a "common cold." The symptoms lasted ten days. I had a bit of a sore throat, a runny nose, and a cough to clear all the phlegm that not-so-mysteriously appeared in my sinuses and lungs. This was a consequence I was not willing to repeat.

A less extreme example of food choice involved my realization that when I went to a certain Boston-based donut franchise to drink coffee and eat several donuts, I would develop indigestion.

In the presence of the indigestion, I had choices: suffer the heartburn, take an over-the-counter antacid, or learn from my experience and make different choices.

Some backstory- I grew up in a house where we always had a bottle of aspirin (or, later, ibuprofen) and a bottle of antacid tablets. This was my family’s normal. We ate what we wanted for the most part and a little later we would take an antacid.

I began to understand this was a form of unnecessary suffering. I began to make different choices about the foods I ate. This new awareness included knowing which fast food places gave me the worst indigestion. Over time I ate less and less fast food. I still eat it every now and then knowing that I have a choice.

Also, know that I am not here to poo-poo fast food. There was a time in my life when the "dollar menu" was an economic necessity for me. I am very grateful that I had access to that food resource.

Now I am going to make what may seem like an unlikely connection: food and emotions.

According to Chinese medicine, the stomach and its associated meridian (energetic pathway) is responsible for the digestion of not only food and drink, but also, experience, knowledge, and emotions.

Is this really such a stretch? We have expressions like, "I can’t stomach it (a situation)," "I can’t stomach that person," and "I have no stomach for it." These mean we don’t like or can’t tolerate a person or situation. We lose our appetite in the presence of certain situations or persons.

The question here is why can’t we stomach the situation or person? The key is how we feel about that situation and that person. Aha! Emotions!

You can choose your emotions just like you choose your food.

When you go to a restaurant and look at the menu, do you order out of habit, out of your mind, your habitual way of thinking? "I always get the chicken parmesan, it is so good." Or do you look over the menu, and listen to your body in that moment? "Perhaps today I’ll have the fish? It just seems like it will taste good. I’m not sure why."

Now apply this to your emotions. When driving on a two-lane road and the person driving the car in front of you is not driving as fast as you want them to drive, do you curse or yell or get frustrated? What are the consequences of these emotional reactions in your body? Indigestion? A headache? A sore throat from yelling? Is this your usual reaction?

What are some other items on the emotional menu? What is a story larger than their incompetence, selfishness, or stupidity? What do you choose for yourself so that you feel more peaceful in your body? What is a story peaceful enough for you to stomach the experience of their driving? What is the most loving or caring thing you can do or say for yourself or that other person in that moment?

Consider asking yourself that last question in any situation where you have to make a choice. The first step is to know that you have a choice about what you say or do. You also have a choice about how you feel. This is the beginning of healing.

Want to learn more about making healing choices? Get in touch with me. Take care.

Jefferson Breland is a board-certified acupuncturists licensed in Pennsylvania and Maryland with offices in Gettysburg and Towson, respectively. He can be reached at 410-336-5876.