The age we live in now can be crystallised by one word: excess. One obvious example is the sheer amount of information we are bombarded with at every moment. We are permanently plugged in to a network of mobile phones, radio, internet and TV. The daily press greets us with stories of new discoveries at the frontiers of medicine and technology. The question we face is whether we are fully equipped to use our knowledge in a way which enhances our lives, or will this excess information erode our intuition and in fact cripple us?
One such example of information getting the better of basic human intuition is the disorder "orthorexia", where sufferers become consumed with "correct" eating. This could range from refraining from certain food groups to subsisting on a mono diet of what they know to be "pure" and "healthy" foods. Foods that are organic, measured and prepped according to a maximum nutritional ritual. As we finally unweave the remaining building blocks of nature's intricate banquet through scientific research, our awareness of how food affects us at a cellular level could exasperate such orthorexic thinking.
Of course, the extreme opposite of orthorexia is an uninhibted and unconscious approach to nutrition, which the government is trying to tame through its encouragement of the traffic light system of nutrition. Tescos is the latest supermarket to adopt the new colour-coded system to inform its consumers of the nutritional value of its products. However, such practices could again be preventing us from accessing our basic intuition and developing our own sense of "right" eating as we listen to our bodies.
Should "right" eating be pinned down to the nutritive and biochemical components of food? I can imagine eating "green" will soon be equated with stickers on packaging instead of vegetables. However, promoting vegetables does not define a healthy diet in all cases. After seeing a dietician to recover from liver inflammation, I was given the government's "Eat-Well Plate" and told to prioritise my intake of green leafy vegetables (at least 6 servings a day). My snacks were to consist of fruit (carbohydrate) and protein (nuts and yoghurt). After weeks of stagnating recovery I stopped seeing my dietician and reverted back to a traditional grain-based diet. No amount of green leafy vegetables can give you the energy that a bowl of porridge can, however good science believes they may be for the liver. As I began to listen to my intuition and trust my gut, my recovery miraculously sped up.
As we strive for balance it is easy to get swept up with the latest information, or to subscribe to a "healthy" formula of eating. Currently, we have reached our capacity to stay informed but do we have the capacity to make the right choice for ourselves? Or are we to forever to rely on formulas?