EP 7: How Are You Managing Your Reality: The Truth of Emotional Ties with Food & the Power of Mindful Consumption

Have you ever wondered why you reach for that tub of ice cream after a stressful day or why you associate certain foods with comfort and love?

I'm Cheron Hamner, and in this conversation, I'm unpacking the emotional ties we have with food. From my personal battle with depression and how food became my emotional pacifier, to the empowering journey of gaining control over my eating habits. I'm sharing the benefits of fasting, and giving you an look inside my bodybuilding experience, where mindful eating was instrumental in achieving my goals.

But I'm not just talking about eating healthier, this conversation is about consumption in general, far beyond food. I'm talking about the impacts of what we read, watch, and listen to. Reflect on how our actions shape our mental health and why nurturing our mental state is pivotal for a happy life . 

This conversation is a wake-up call to re-evaluate your consumption habits and their impact on your life.

Don't miss out!

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
You are listening to this Is Some Crazy Shit.
With Sharon Hamner.
This podcast is for you if youare tired of living day to day
feeling unfulfilled, you arefrustrated and you are doing too
much with no return.
This is for you if you areready to take charge of your
life, if you are ready to let goof managing other people's

(00:23):
insecurities and theirexpectations and live life your
way.
Here we have dope conversationsabout saving yourself, so we
can get off these street cornersand stop waiting for Captain
Saviour Ho.
You ready?
Let's go, because this is somecrazy shit.
What is the greatest sin?

(00:46):
Pick one.
I want to fight, let's argue.
Let's argue in the comments.
I want to fight.
Take alcohol, drugs, sex andeven gluttony are sins that have
an impact on how we cope withstress.

(01:07):
A lot of times, gluttony infood is something that's least
talked about within a church onhow we're dealing with stress,
and I can remember a time whereI was slipping back into

(01:29):
depression, where I was so deepinto my emotions that I decided
that I was going to order thisice cream sundae from one of the
local ice cream spots.

(01:50):
I had put that craving off fordays and days and days and
finally, I was like I'm going in, I'm going in.
I ordered that sundae.
It was so delicious.
I walked it back to my car, satin my car and with every bite
of that ice cream sundae that Itook, I thought about everything

(02:15):
that was going wrong in my lifeat that time.
I had so much pain and so muchhurt and I think I probably even
started crying while I waseating this ice cream sundae,
and the feeling that I had onceI was done eating it was relief

(02:43):
and I felt good, so good that afew days later it became my drug
of choice and I went back formore and I was burning my
emotions, one bite at a time,within this ice cream sundae,

(03:03):
and a couple of days later, whenI realized that I had gained a
couple of pounds from it, I'mlike, oh my God, this has got to
stop.
I got to get control over it,and one of the things that
helped to save me that I helpedsave myself from depression is

(03:23):
through food, because food has away of empowering you and it
has a way of tying you to todifferent emotions.
So say like for instance, insome cultures it is offensive

(03:49):
when you go to somebody's houseand they offer you food and you
don't eat it and a lot of timesthat they are associating the
food feeding you with love.
Food is love.
Food ties back to a lot ofmemories For myself.

(04:09):
I can remember growing up andgoing over to my grandmother's
house every Sunday after church.
It was just like that movie,soul Food, where we gather my
whole family, we would eat friedchicken and macaroni and cheese
and on the holidays those werethe things that we ate and we

(04:30):
gathered together and that wasfamily time and that meant love.
And our food can have so manyemotions behind it and some of
that is passed down through ourancestors as well.

(04:50):
Point is an example.
When I go on some fast, I faston a regular basis to cleanse
myself and detox my mind, myspirit and my body and there are
times when I have these deepcravings of foods that I haven't

(05:12):
had in years and I think it'slike my ancestors or like I
don't know somebody is cravingthat food and it's like really,
really weird that I get thosecravings and I like to do the
detox so that I can help cleanmy body out of and like do a

(05:37):
nice reset.
It helps to keep my mental gamein check and I want to
encourage you to pay attentionto the foods that you are eating
and also pay attention to theemotions that you are having
while you're eating those foods.

(05:59):
A lot of times we are likedoing unconscious eating.
We're not even taking the timeto one.
Bless our food and thank theearth for giving us food to eat.
Thanks, be thankful for whoeverprepared that food and being

(06:19):
present within every bite thatyou take.
A lot of times we arecontinuously overeating because
we're eating way too fast andour bodies don't have the time
to recognize that we're fulluntil it's too late because
we're going through and eatingour food super, super fast.

(06:43):
A little known fact is that youshould be chewing your food at
least like 50 times, becausedigestion begins within the
mouth and by you using yourteeth, you're breaking down the
food, you're helping the enzymesbe extracted that help to

(07:06):
nourish your body and then, onceit goes down inside of your
body, your enzymes inside yourlarge intestine and everything
has an opportunity to break thatfood down.
And it's less impactful whenyou actually chew your food at a

(07:29):
slower pace and break it downand your body gets to use all
the value in the nutrition inthe food versus it coming out on

(07:49):
the other end, because yourbody didn't have a chance to
break it down and absorb it whenI was competing for my
bodybuilding competition, when Iwas preparing for the
bodybuilding competition, foodwas all that I thought about,

(08:12):
because it was important for onethat I had my meals prepared in
advance, that I always had foodon me and that I had the right
portions of protein, fats andcarbohydrates in my macros.

(08:35):
And being on a schedule andhaving the food prepared helped
me to meet my goals as abodybuilder, because my body was
constantly getting fueled withthe nutrition, my muscles were
being built, because I waseating the right foods and

(09:00):
eating at the right time andeating in the right connection,
in the right order and with thethings that we take in through
our mind, through our ears,through social media, the news,

(09:27):
everything around us.
Are we paying attention to thatconsumption and how it is
affecting our emotional body,our spiritual bodies and our
mental bodies?

(09:48):
Sometimes, with detoxing, it'sgreat when you can do a detox,
what I like to call PMA dietpositive mental attitude where
you take out all the things thatare distracting you from your

(10:10):
life.
One time I came about this ideabecause one time I decided that
I was not gonna watch TV for aweek.
I was tired of the TV kind oftaking over my life, and so I
decided for one week straightthat I wasn't gonna turn on the
TV.
And at first it was pretty hard, and once I got through the

(10:32):
week I felt a sense of peacebecause I wasn't watching a lot
of reality TV show.
I was caught up in thehousewives and I was excited
about how I felt that I wantedto do it again.
So I did a second week and nowI'm at the point where I can be

(10:58):
in my space at home and I willrarely turn the TV on.
And what that has done is ithas helped me to have more inner
peace because I'm not beingbombarded with the negativity
that's on TV, on the news, thenegativity from the reality TV

(11:24):
shows.
I'm very careful about the showsthat I do watch whenever I
watch TV, and just being mindfulof everything that we consume
whether it's food, whether it'sTV, whether it's social media,

(11:47):
whether it's something thatwe're reading because all of
that has an impact on how we arefeeling within ourselves and,
with how we're feeling, is goingto make an impact on a lot of
the actions that we have withinour life, and every action that

(12:08):
we have affects someone else andit affects our bottom line
Bottom line of what it is thatwe want.
So are you really making apositive impact on your life
every single day by what you'reeating, what you're reading,

(12:31):
what you're listening to and whoyou're being around?
Take care of managing yourportions in all areas of your
life, and when you manage thoseportions, you have a greater

(12:54):
mental health capacity.
Hey, sis, you have beenlistening to.
This Is Some Crazy Shit.
I am Charon Hamner.
Make sure you like andsubscribe to hear more dope
conversations on this podcast.
You can check me out on mywebsite at wwwcharonhamnercom or

(13:16):
on all of my social mediaplatforms.
I look forward to seeing you inthese social media streets.