The Worst Nutritional Traps

The subject of nutritional traps is so broad that it can fill a book but I will try to summarize it for you in a few paragraphs.

We, human beings, are the only living organisms that associate food not only with nutrients but also with pleasure, comfort and joy. The roots of this attitude can be traced back to our childhood when together with the nutritious mother’s milk, we received love, affection and tenderness. The memory of this link is deeply imprinted in our subconscious and later in our adulthood our body keeps trying the same pleasurable sensations from food.

This confused emotional relation with food, makes us susceptible to a number of nutritional traps that can place high hazards on our health.

Nutritional Trap №1: The Junk Food Trap
This big trap is opened to those who subconsciously use food as a means of solving their emotional problems. Such people eat out of solitude, out fear, nervousness and anxiety. Food becomes their pleasure, joy and company. They often get addicted to high-fat, salty foods, refined sugars and empty calories. Ultimately, eating junk food does not solve emotional problems but only add to them the problem of obesity and even worse – of dangerous diseases like diabetes, cardiovascular disease and cancer.

Nutritional Trap №2 The Fast Food Trap
We are living in a fast-moving, fast-consuming, fast-food world. People are always running for time, always getting late. Time is the new currency and everything is sacrificed for time. People eat fast food and they eat it fast. This may be time-saving approach in the short run but the long-turn effects on health can be quite detructive.

Nutritional Trap №3 The Diet Food Trap
Diets are always on fashion. Many people, especially women, try one diet after another in order to achieve the perfect size and weight. Diets bear short-lived effects that melt away once the yo-yo effect is unleashed. Ultimately, diets do not work. They fail because they peruse and external focus: beauty is something that shines from inside and it takes a healthy and harmonious person to manifest beauty.

Nutritional Trap №4 The Healthy Food Trap
Eating healthy is the word of the day. It becomes the new obsession. Anyone who has ever read an article on the subject or has tried a broccoli starts giving healthy-eating advices. There is nothing wrong in wanting to eat healthy but there is the whole world wrong when this becomes an aim in itself, obliterating anything else and turning into a dogmatic endeavor. Getting at that extreme is as unhealthy as eating junk food, and is even labeled as a psychological disorder: ortorexia.

Nutritional Trap №5 The No Food Trap
This is the ultimate food trap when a person says NO to life by saying NO to food. The consequences of this trap might trigger eating disorders like anorexia and bulimia that can be fatal, if not timely healed.

In the face of all nutritional traps, the right choice of food might look difficult, but it is not impossible. Most importantly, remember that there is no one-size-fit-all recipe for healthy eating. We as individuals are all biochemically unique and everyone has different food requirements. Yet, there are certain basic principles that you need to observe, if you want to eat healthy. Strive for natural, whole, unprocessed, food. Avoid industrially grown or raised products, anything that comes into cans and boxes or has more than one unfamiliar word in the ingredients list. Keep your menu balanced, seasonal and diversified. Choose your food in harmony with your moral principles and prepare it with love.

Finally, do not forget that we are human beings and as such it is natural to retrieve from food not only nutrients, but pleasure.