9. Anorexia: being hungry for another kind of food
Hypothesis: an anorectic is someone who is in dire need of ‘soul food’ and because this is not available, enacts this deep need into not taking any other food either.
◊◊◊
This doesn’t make every anorectic a kind of saint, unless you assume that in the end we are all ‘saints’. What’s in a word. Really when thinking in religious terms, we are all ‘close to God’. If God is everywhere, he is also in you, sorry, You. You may be a saint without knowing it yet.
◊◊◊
So, yes, I dare speak of ‘soul food’. In this case, ‘food for the soul’ is the soul itself. The soul is the food. What I’m saying is that an anorectic needs more genuine ‘soul’. One can easily see in the very low body weight an attempt to get to this soul within oneself, to make the soul come out as it were. Sadly, one cannot make the soul come out. It’s a desperate attempt. Therein lies the ‘disorder’ of anorexia nervosa.
◊◊◊
You may say that anorectics are ‘victims of a beauty ideal of sveltness’. But then you are in fact saying the same thing. Ideals are soul-stuff. So anorectics are sensitive / possible victims to this more than most other people.
◊◊◊
You may say that anorectics have ‘an unrealistic vision of their own body’. That’s true. They have a soul-vision of the body. That is unrealistic, depending of course on what you call ‘realistic’. For an anorectic, it is realistic, so you will not be able to convince him/her of the opposite view through a verbal fight.
◊◊◊
You may say that anorexia is a kind of slow suicide. True. If the soul cannot be found in this life, then it will be looked for in another ‘life’, say: in death.
◊◊◊
Whatever vision I encounter on anorexia, I always see in its core a ‘quest for soul’. Probably, a number of anorectic personalities find this in religion if it is available to them in a fulfilling manner.
◊◊◊
In this view, an anorectic is someone with a specific sensitivity, therefore also vulnerability in certain circumstances. Our age of ‘enlightenment’ and rationalism may be such a circumstance. This doesn’t mean that we have to forget rationalism. On the contrary, we may have to deepen it, so that it becomes broad enough as to be a good place for all people, including ‘anorectics’. Maybe then they are no longer people with weight problems. Maybe then they can thrive as people with a very big potential to shape and deepen humanity itself.
◊◊◊
Maybe then they are the ones who find ‘soul’ most of all.
◊◊◊
Related Posts
Studies Show: Placebo as Effective as Treatment
The conclusion of a meta-study by Howick et al.: “Placebos and treatments often have similar effect sizes. Placebos with comparably powerful effects can benefit patients either alone or as part of a therapeutic regimen” [1] The differences In this meta-analysis involving 12.576 subjects, differences were measured between placebo (versus no-treatment) and active treatment (versus placebo) Read the full article…
Does Deep Meaning Change the Body?
A meaningful experience can bring chills, pain, relaxation, or a racing heart. Few people find this strange. Yet when the question moves toward inflammation, healing, immune activity, or illness, meaning and biology are often treated as belonging to separate worlds. Perhaps the separation is less obvious than it seems. Perhaps the deeper question is how Read the full article…
The Cost of Medicine — and What AureLisa can Do about it
The enormous and heightening ‘cost of medicine’ doesn’t mean that medicine is the guilty cause. It’s part of the broader culture at the world level. Medicine flows along unknowingly ― or unwillingly to know? Anyway, the situation is dire. This is also a communication to relevant decision-makers. Mostly about psycho-somatic healthcare Nowadays, people go to Read the full article…