By Karen Sherwood for NutritiousAmerica.com
Last week nearly half a million people tuned in to see the free online premiere of a new documentary, Hungry For Change. Happily, I was one of them.
Hungry For Change challenges your perception of food, diet, wellness, sickness and happiness. This film is a must see for every person old enough to eat and conscious enough to care.
It is narrated by a team of wellness warriors, namely Kris Carr, Christiane Northrup, David Wolfe, Jason Vale, and others who gently push the film along by highlighting the urgency to change what you eat and how you live. They call for a new hunger, one for real food and self love.
The film follows the daily routine of a struggling thirty-something career woman whose lackluster routine and poor food choices fail to support her. Her routine is all too familiar as she throws away the remnants of last night’s dinner; pizza box, tub of ice cream, and liter of diet soda, only to find herself filled with self loathing, and body rejection as the new day begins. We connect with our heroine’s food regret, and self consciousness. As the film progresses we become emotionally invested in her struggle and desire for change.
The message of the film is quite clear; there is no diet, pill, surgery, or quick fix that will bring you true everlasting health. Health is so much more than fitting into your skinny jeans, it is in fact, a new lease on life.
The real villains in this war on wellness are the packaged-processed foods, “food-like” products and “diet-foods” that keep you trapped in a viscous cycle of low energy, cravings, and weight gain. In fact, as the film points out, these foods are chemically designed to create addiction. The more you eat, the more you crave.
Diet soda has its 15 minutes of fame as we learn the synergistic combination of artificial sweeteners and caffeine in diet soda are “excito-toxins” which accumulate in the body and make us hold on to even more fat. These “excito-toxins” also play a role in several neurological disorders including migraines and seizures. In fact, pilot’s know not to drink diet soda during a flight because it has the ability to dramatically affect their ability to see.
The power of whole foods boastfully took center stage as we were introduced to the real “fat-melters” like vegetables and healthy fats. Yes, healthy fats help melt fat! (Although, my favorite healthy fat, coconut oil, failed to be mentioned.) Super foods like Chia seeds, aloe vera, hemp seeds, dark leafy green vegetables and spirulina are introduced as the detoxifiers that bind to internal sludge and pull it out of our bodies. It is what we choose to ADD to our plate that should be the focus because the more whole, natural, nutrient-dense foods we eat the easier it is to crowd out the foods in our diet that are not health supportive.
In the final 15 minutes of the film we are reminded, “You get what you focus on.” As Tony Robbins said, “Whatever you hold in your mind on a consistent basis is exactly what you will experience in your life.”
Hold wellness, health, vitality and happiness in your mind, your body will guide you, it will support your vision to a better a life. For a much needed dose of healthy inspiration, or to watch the film, check out Hungry For Change, I know you will be utterly satisfied.