As the old saying goes, health is wealth. And in this case we are referring to spiritual wealth. Whole food is good for our health because our body is able to absorb its full nutrients - the same with our life. When we embrace our life as a whole, savoring all the experiences and feelings in it, our soul will be able to absorb its full ‘nutrient’, grasping the full essence of our existence, and enabling us to live our life to the fullest. Masami Sato shares the magic of living a whole life in this excerpt from her latest book, ONE.
How come that many of us, (in fact, more of us) occasionally have a hollow feeling in our life? It is like the pangs of hunger. When we eat, the hunger is appeased and then we are not as much interested in food. But after a while, we become hungry again. Then, surprisingly we feel again enticed by the flavour and vision of food. We also experience some sort of a pining when we are not even actually hungry - just after we had some food. Some of us are perpetually hungry.
Constant emotional hunger is not the most pleasant thing to have. Then, how can we live our lives to the fullest? How can we be more satisfied permanently?
Maybe the answer is simple: just live our lives as a whole. The word ‘whole’ holds the meaning of completion. Then the secret to live a complete life is simply to live it as a whole.
Let’s start to look at one example of this ‘wholeness’ with something awfully close to our heart-our stomach.
Whole Food VS Part Food
We are used to the usage ‘whole food.’ People say that taking whole food is the secret to the vigour and wellbeing that we require. How is whole food better than ’semi food?’
A full grain throbs with a life of its own. If you put the full grain in water, drain the next day and keep for a few days, it shoots. It has its own life. When we dine on such food, our body takes in the entire live nutrients. It has all the qualities required to purify, remedy and foster different body cells.
As in the example of a grain, most conventional dining includes having whole creatures as well. Having entire fresh fish used to be more popular than taking a portion of fish and throwing the balance away. It was ditto for poultry and also for vegetables.
‘Semi food’ at times is more sweet and aromatic but does not offer much nutrition. We may savour its taste, but we could become a victim of a long-time malady if we only ate ’semi food’ every day of our life.
So, to compensate the absent half, we started to have dietary supplements. We have been analysing and learning for quite some time to reach the correct balance. It becomes more and more problematical as we chop up the food, process it and ship it, and even try to make up the deficiency with other parts that have its origin in other countries, seasons or sources. Some of these supplements do not even come from natural food sources. They are artificially made. After testing and analysing, it is endorsed to be edible. But no matter how much we strive; we cannot bring all the ‘bits’ together to make it alive and pulsating.
Part Life-’Sweetness’ of Life
So, if we perceive our life now, much of what we are doing can be similar to eating the ‘part food.’ Just enjoying the sugariness of life but jettisoning the real nutritious part. And if we put our ‘part life’ in water with other pieces and left it in the sunlight, could it germinate and grow into a beautiful complete life?
Whole food is not (as some people perceive it) poor in taste. It is actually tastier when we prepare it properly. But while the demand is low, it is more expensive. It is actually more economical in the long run though, as we have less medical expenses later on. When more people start eating it, it will naturally become cheaper because it is a simpler food with less processing and waste.
Our life is very similar. When we only value the ’sugariness’, and cast out the rest as litter because we don’t perceive its value, we may be throwing out the most important portion. And what we jettison could have the biggest power for the endorsement of our life and our financial health. It also takes more strength and resources to cast it out. Better still, that which is thrown away comes free.
So, what is it that we do not perceive?
Think of a life where we didn’t actually sense we were missing anything there.
The secret is right here. The secret of a full life.
Entire Life-The Complete Life
When it’s ‘whole’, it doesn’t matter how big the whole is. It can expand simultaneously. It can still contain all the elements to sustain itself as a whole living being. Once it grows to a certain size, it can still live without some of the parts. Like plants can live after being eaten a little by birds or trees still thrive even after losing their leaves. But if we neglect the balance for a very long time, eventually it can start creating a fatal imbalance. Then it could become too complicated to get back into balance.
We don’t have to go back to the Stone Age to find the wholeness. Wholeness exists right now. All we need do is look closely; look closely enough to really see.
When we can see our life as an entirety and resist jettisoning what feeds our life the most, we start feeling more and more satisfied without searching for ‘material’ to fill the depressions and vacuums of our life. Everything finally finds its level. We now recognize the entire apparatus of the world in a very altered way.
Yes, it is now time to discover how we can fashion (and perceive) this equation consistently and affordably.
The real nourishing part of our life is what makes us feel good deep down. It is like the part of food that makes our body become healthy in the long-term. Feelings we experience in our everyday life are the real key to our long-term happiness. And there are feelings that make us feel more complete.
The happy faces we see when we give recognition to others. The pleasure we experience when we give presents to others. The affection we feel when we see our kids being happy. The encouragements we get when we feel our life is full of significance ..
Let us internalize these moments of our life totally and relish the flavour of our entire life. Then we will perceive how it is not so imperative to constantly fill our heart (and tummy!) with physical indulgences - those types of things that only increase our cravings afterwards.
We can actually feel this joy, gratitude and love in order to experience the life as a whole at any moment regardless of the situations. It is not about what we see, what we hear or what we do that complete our life as a whole. It is about what we ‘choose to’ feel about our life.
Yes, our life indeed is already absolute.
When we initiate taking actions based on this knowledge, we can have real control over the balance creation - enduring health, prosperity, enriching connection and delight.
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