Self-Sacrifice is not Your Civic Duty

In this episode of Blasphemous Nutrition, Aimee warns listeners about the destructive impact of staying incessantly connected to the news cycle, particularly during high-stress periods like elections. Drawing from her experience as a nutritionist, Aimee illustrates how anxiety over political events can derail health goals and lead to unhealthy coping mechanisms like emotional eating and increased alcohol consumption. She provides actionable steps for listeners to reclaim their mental and physical well-being by disconnecting from the 24/7 news cycle and social media, and instead, focusing on activities that nourish their spirit. Aimee also shares personal anecdotes and practical tools to help listeners take back control over their lives.

Resources:

Newsfeed Eradicator

Find Research Citations and Transcript at Blasphemous Nutrition on Substack

Work with Aimee

Photography by: Dai Ross Photography

Podcast Cover Art: Lilly Kate Creative

Find Research Citations and Transcript at Blasphemous Nutrition on Substack

Work with Aimee

Photography by: Dai Ross Photography

Podcast Cover Art: Lilly Kate Creative

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Transcript

MacBook Air Microphone-2 0:01

It is now time. For an emergency public service announcement. I wish I could say that this is only a test. But if 2020 was any indication. This is not a test.

0:18

Warning. Warning. This is not a test. Warning. Warning. Warning. This is not a test. Hey Rebels, welcome to Blasphemous Nutrition. Consider this podcast your pantry full of clarity, perspective, and the nuance needed to counter the superficial health advice so freely given on the internet. I'm Aimee, the unapologetically candid host of Blasphemous Nutrition and a double degreed nutritionist with 20 years experience. I'm here to share a more nuanced take. On living and eating well to sustain and recover your health. If you've found most health advice to be so generic as to be meaningless, We're so extreme that it's unrealistic, and you don't mind the occasional F bomb. You've come to the right place. From dissecting the latest nutrition trends to breaking down published research and sharing my own clinical experiences, I'm on a mission to foster clarity amidst all the confusion and empower you to have the health you need to live a life you love. Now let's get started.

MacBook Air Microphone-2 1:41

In today's episode, I will be addressing my American listeners. My British Kiwi Canadian and Australia folk. I cannot sense to what degree that which I have seen in the United States also plagues you. But I sense if it isn't happening in the political arena yet. Well, firstly, I hope it never does. But it may be happening in another arena. Uh, grand social cause such as the rights of the underprivileged or climate change or animal ethics. And if you have a big heart and you care deeply about the world, Then today's topic will more than likely apply to you. Even if the details differ. I was working in a large medical clinic during the last American presidential election helping individuals who are working to manage obesity, metabolic syndrome, diabetes. And heart disease and a very progressive area of the United States. This was a population that by and large still felt traumatized. By the 2016 election that brought Donald Trump into more power than he'd ever had before. Because everyone around them, all the media, they immersed themselves in. Had told them such an outcome was an impossibility. And many believed fully that a reelection of this man would be the end of democracy in the United States. I'm not interested in weighing in on the truth of that. But what I witnessed as we came closer and closer to election day was that many of my patients were deeply struggling to stay to their outlined plan that was needed to get their health in order. Anxiety and worry. We're terribly high. They were tapped into a new cycle constantly, and it dominated all discussion in social circles, both online and in-person. I witnessed a lot of unquestioned acceptance of the media narrative. Parroting of hyperbolic statements gone viral on social media and a level of exhaustion and worry that I would expect from a parent with a child in the NICU, not from an election year. Because the source of this anxiety was based upon polling averages, media reports and the gossip of everyone around them, there was no effective action to take, to empower themselves or put themselves at ease. And multitudes of my patients during the last couple months of that election cycle back slid. And gained 15 to 20 pounds or more. Due to emotional eating and increased alcohol use. Just to cope with the intensity of the situation. They were compelled to stay tuned. They could not turn away. And when I gently confronted them with the fact that they were very literally sacrificing their health for an outcome, they could not directly control. And for information, they could do nothing about, upon speculation one patient told me she felt it was her civic duty to stay connected to the new cycle. Another said it gave her a sense of control. If she could anticipate the doom, then it wouldn't catch her off guard this time. It's interesting. I just realized that those who had the most struggles with this were women. At least the most memorable ones, the men did not seem as caught up in it, or perhaps they didn't talk about it openly. But I did have very, very candid and vulnerable conversations with my male patients. So it isn't that they fit into that stereotype of men who couldn't connect with their feelings. Like that's not what was going on. but I don't recall the same degree of backsliding occurring in that population. Unfortunately, I have zero access to anybody's medical charts to test the accuracy of that memory. So I'll just sit with that and think about it for a bit. Anyway, these were some of the reasons given to justify alcohol and food abuse: civic duty, and a sense of control. Today's episode is a plea. To not follow that path. You cannot save democracy by staying so connected to a media industry with perverted incentives to create clickbait for an increasingly diminishing attention span that necessitates the loss of nuance all together that you need to numb out at the end of the day, to cope with being alive. Life is challenging enough for many of you already. And this does you. No favors. The majority of people who struggle with weight also have complex emotional relationships with food that will need to be addressed as part of a sustainable plan. It doesn't always mean you have to go out and get a therapist, but. If somewhere along the way you have learned that food or alcohol is an excellent sedative. Staying tuned into an intentionally inflammatory news cycle is very much throwing yourself under the bus. And then if you blame yourself for your lack of willpower, following such self traumatization, then you're neglecting to acknowledge the skillset of marketer's ability to manipulate human emotions. And you're doing so in a way that is simply unfair, unkind. And further traumatizing. So for the love of all that is good in the world. Please stop. Whether the cause you are close to is political, environmental or social. You do that cause no good by staying in a place of panic and fear. Human beings cannot think clearly or rationally under duress. And what all of these situations need right now is clear, headed, rational, strategic thinkers, to write the path and work together, to bring us to a better place. This can not happen. If you are forever tapped into the news cycle. The problems. The multitude of problems that we face today. Are bigger than any one person can cause and bigger than any one person. Ken fix. But if none of us are capable of coping. Then we certainly have no chance of fixing anything bigger than us. And we have a very real risk of damaging ourselves and others close to us whom we love. I'm hard pressed to think of a circumstance where that is ever justified. If any of this resonates, there are actions that you can take now to preserve your strength, your spirit, and your sanity. They must be employed aggressively, immediately. Because it's an all out fever pitch and it's not going to abate for some time. So for reference, I want to tell you, I pulled out of the news cycle shortly after the United States, invaded Iraq a second time. I saw how all the protests I attended and the work I did to voice my opposition, amounted to nothing. All it did was make me feel good about myself. Made me feel a part of something larger justified, but those feelings did not equate to change. And I became aware that really I can only have an impact in my immediate environment. And there's the potential there to create a ripple effect of positive change within family, within community, which can then continue to ripple outward. Change historically has always come from the bottom up. And I'm convinced at this stage in my life, it will continue to be that way. It is only until we stop feeding our attention to those who will profit off of it. That they will be compelled to find something different and hopefully better to sustain themselves. That's how it is with schoolyard bullies. And that's how it is with the media. We will not get better until we demand better. So I stopped watching the news in the late nineties. Believe it or not. I still found out when the twin towers fell Every major event that happened locally, nationally, internationally. Came to me regardless. Minor events that impacted me personally, also reached me. Most other news did not. And my life was a hell of a lot better for it. I did have a lapse during a pandemic. And this was a very novel situation that definitely was going to have a personal impact at some point or another viruses can't be stopped. I knew that. So I tapped in and within a couple of months, I observed how the media had skillfully seduced and hijacked me again. And how easy it was to feel that rise of outrage or urgency and begin spreading information. That was not telling the full story was not nuanced. But was crafted and designed to get eyes on news pages. When I realized what I was doing, I pulled out of it soon afterwards, and I just like, screw this right. I went back to the basics of what I knew about supporting the immune system and the little I knew about virology from my education. And I trusted that what news was relevant to me would be made known to me without me going and looking for it. And it was. Plenty of other people were tuning in for me. Being emotionally yanked around by fear and poorly conducted questionably scientific sounding journalists who had even less education in biology than I do spouting off their expertise in something that no human was actually an expert in. And since my central nervous system was not kept in a perpetual state of panic, I had better ability to critically think of the information as it was shared with me and keep a clearer, big picture perspective. As everything unfolded. This doesn't mean that I didn't make mistakes. It doesn't mean that I had everything right. And it doesn't mean that I'm not without my own pandemic scars. I'm not immune to being human. But my scars are more due to witnessing what large groups of people in a panic do to one another than it is from being relentlessly goaded into panic from being way too connected to corporations that were making glorious profits off of my attention and emotions. One of the most immediate things that you can do in this moment. Is to take out your phone and delete news apps. And if you want to go a step further delete social media apps as well. This will make it less easy to get that information. Give yourself the blessing of making the conscious choice to seek out the information rather than letting notifications and algorithm altered, feeds, subject you to what they decide you want in your life. Remember, you can always re-download these after the election. If you find you actually miss them. Replace that time with devoted attention to what calms and delights you. Go for walks. Spend some time with your kid or your dog. Have a conversation with somebody. But don't talk about the news. Watch a sunset make a healthy meal. Catch up on laundry because that's an action you can also take that will directly improve your quality of life immediately. Pick up a physical book and read it, explore what it feels like to be bored. Observe how many times you have the impulse to check out what's going on? And then ask yourself if you are genuinely okay. With that impulse going off that often. This is a simple request. But it is not easy. I don't want to mislead you into thinking it is. When our brain is accustomed to that much stimulation coming off of it and can be painful. At least it is for me. But in time it gets easier. Give it four to five weeks. And you'll see what I mean. There's a book out there. I can't think of the title of it right now. It's. Got the word, dopamine and the title. And it talks about doing like social media fast and minimizing your phones as part of creating a more balanced. Regulated dopamine loop in the brain. I will put that in the show notes. If I can find it. Because that may be something worth checking out. Now as much as I detest social media, I can't pull away from it completely. Okay. Wait, let me rephrase that because saying I can't pull away from it completely. Is me being a victim to social media and that's not what's happening here. I have made the choice not to pull away from social media completely. But what I did do to preserve my sanity is I installed a browser app called newsfeed Eradicator, and that eliminates my social media feed and replaces it with an inspirational quote. So if I log onto Facebook, I don't have that feed that has everybody's random thoughts and a bunch of ads for stupid shit that I don't want. Instead. There's just a quote and blank space. I mean, honestly, even just going to a website and seeing blank space. Is really kind of beautiful. The lack of stimulation. I think as something that we're deeply craving. But don't really know how to find anymore in a lot of ways. Anyway, I no longer get on social and unwillingly unintentionally step into somebody. Else's shit. This is the only way that I can stay online in any capacity. I have to go looking for a person to go to their feed, to see what they say or choose a group that I want to tap into. And yeah, I am missing out on several of my friends, random posts, but my best of friends are those who have made equal efforts to maintain a relationship offline as well. And the quality of those relationships are higher than where we to take the easy way out and just stay connected on Facebook. Those relationships feed me more. They enriched my life more. It's quality over quantity in both food and friendship. So definitely check out newsfeed Eradicator. If you don't want to be further subjected to your family's crazy ass political rants. Some of you may work in journalism or some arena that literally necessitates being connected to the news. But before you decide that as you, cause I know some of you will think that's true. But you're not a journalist or you're not working for a political party. I want you to really question if it is true. There are a lot of. Pathological is the only word I can think of. But there are a lot of. Pathological or dysfunctional cultural workplace norms. That are not necessarily a commandment required to keep your job. Obviously, if you're working for a politician, you probably just can't stop watching the news. But even in those cases, setting some boundaries to reduce exposure and give you a moment to collect yourself and remember who you are outside of all of that. Distraction. Is helpful and needed. You can go to a happy hour and designate it as a no workplace talk hour or a no politics hour. I am sure there are plenty of people who will be quite excited to join you for something like that. Learn about who your coworkers and friends are as humans, rather than continuing to work off hours. What else do they have going on in their lives? And if the answer is nothing, what would they like to be doing instead? Turn off your phone for specific times of the day, even if it's only for an hour silence notifications after 7:00 PM or earlier, just begin to take your life back 30 minutes at a time. It all counts and it all matters. More than the amount of time that you take. At this stage, it is the very act of taking action to preserve your mental and physical health. That is the most important act. When you discover that not everything falls apart when you're not tuned in 24 7. You can begin to explore, taking a little more time and seeing how much of your life that you can reclaim for yourself. This is the only way. You cannot give everything. To your job. Or a social cause. Or civic duty. And expect to also have something left for you. And if there is nothing left for you. Eventually. There will be nothing left for them either. So to recap. Social media and the news cycle is now a business model designed to take as much of your attention as it possibly can. And if these businesses are impacting your mental health To the degree that you find yourself using food or alcohol to cope, you need to revisit the role that they play in your life. Because at the current level, they are leading to active destruction of your health and your quality of life. Begin by deleting news and social media apps to make it harder, to react to the impulse, to check in and eliminate unasked for notifications about things going on, that you have no control over. And ultimately probably can't do anything about. Install newsfeed Eradicator on your web browser to disrupt the inevitable unconscious impulse to check social media on a laptop that will come when you uninstall apps on your phone. And this is also a really great way to find out who stays top of mind that you want to stay in contact with and who doesn't. And then reinvest your attention. To that, which nourishes you. Look for the beauty in the world around you. Rekindle and deepen friendships and relationships. Pick up a hobby or resume a craft that delights you. And if you want to escape, which will still probably happen, even if you're not watching the news. Pick up a physical book or put on an audio book, go for a walk or a hike, find healthier forms of escapism. That will ultimately replenish you rather than further deplete you. Don't expect this to be easy. Marketing psychology is an advanced industry that is very, very skilled at keeping us addicted. Use this time. As a time to increase awareness to the degree, to which you feel that internal impulse to seek the emotional rush of an inflammatory headline or an unexpected tweet. Notice how it feels to come down from the rush of righteous indignation that we are all subjected to from the political landscape. If you find yourself anxious about not knowing what's going on. Just remind yourself. You can always go back to it later. But right now in this moment, you are choosing not to. You're doing an experiment. You're traveling back in time to 20 years ago before social media or hell even 40 years ago before CNN brought us a 24 hour news cycle and the inevitable hot air pundants speculating ad nauseum, just to fill up airtime. Trust that important news will still reach you. And see what happens when you make the active choice not to engage versus being a passive recipient of what has been effectively determined to command as much of your attention as you will allow it. On election day. You don't even need to be tuned in. I mean, you can't change what the outcome's going to be at that point. Anyway. Being the first to know doesn't. Change anything. So you might as well get a good night's sleep and allow your body to rest and prepare for whatever the future brings. My dear listener. Please please take care of yourself. The world needs your health. Your joy and your sanity. If we are to make a better life for ourselves. Those around us who are here now. And those who are to come. And if you are so bold as to undergo this experiment, You got to reach out to me and let me know. I will be your biggest cheerleader. Then honestly, I wouldn't mind a little bit of company in this place. Until next time, my blasphemous buddies. Stay healthy and stay sane.

25:06

If you have found some Nuggets of Wisdom, make sure to subscribe, rate, and share Blasphemous Nutrition with those you care about. As you navigate the labyrinth of health advice out there, remember, health is a journey, not a dietary dictatorship. Stay skeptical, stay daring, and challenge the norms that no longer serve you. If you've got burning questions or want to share your own flavor of rebellion, slide into my DMs. Your stories fuel me, and I love hearing them. Thanks again for tuning in to Blasphemous Nutrition. Until next time, this is Aimee signing off, reminding you that truth is nuanced, and any dish can be made better with a little bit of sass.