Survival Instincts
I absolutely hate the term “comfort food.” Whenever I see any type of advertising or labeling that indicates some type of food brings
comfort my blood pressure immediately rises and I start silently lashing out at
whatever moron decided that was a good idea.
I recently listened to a TED talks on vulnerability. In that
short lecture, the speaker said that people use all kinds of things for an
escape. Some people use drugs, alcohol, prescription medication, and some
people use food. I talk to a lot of people who use food for an escape, a “comfort.”
It makes sense from a scientific standpoint that food brings
comfort to people. For the past thousands of years, our ancestors spent a lot
of time worrying about food and survival, and when they found food their worry
was gone.
Only in the last hundred years, or possibly until
after the Depression era, that food became easy and convenient. Essentially
since the beginning of time, food relieved humankind from anxiety; and
rightfully so. According to Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs your physiological needs: food, sleep, sex, etc, are the
basis to comfort. It’s only been until recently where access of food has not been
an issue for survival.
Mankind is use to the biggest “threat” (survival) being resolved by food. Now that we’ve pretty much established our physiological
needs, our biggest "threats" are the next few levels on Maslow’s triangle:
Safety: security of the family, health, property, etc; Love/Belonging:
friendship, family, sexual intimacy; and Esteem: self-esteem, confidence,
respect, and achievement.
Our ancestors were stressed/felt threatened, ate food, and
were not stressed or threatened anymore because their survival was no longer at
risk. Today, we’re stressed about making ends meet, being loved, our families
health, intimate relationships, being successful, or whatever, but instead of
making choices to take care of the actual issue, people are still looking to
food to clear their anxiety.
Some may argue this is due to behavioral genetics. Some scientists
believe that our genes determine more than just eye or hair color; that more
abstract traits such as intelligence, personality, aggression, and sexual
orientation are also encoded in our DNA—so interesting to read about btw.
It could also be argued that these bad eating habits are actually learned behaviors from parents or caregivers, and most likely, it's a combination.
Anyway, despite whatever genetics or learned behaviors passed down generation to
generation indicating food will give us comfort, everyone still has a brain to figure
out what will solve the problems you have (big or small) and ACTUALLY provide comfort and happiness--and it's not food.
I’m a firm believer that nurture can overcome any nature:) We were all given some
type of genetic lemons in life, you can make lemonade because that’s what feels right,
or you can be smart and make salad dressing <3 span="span">
