Digest your food, digest your life
Thoughts on digestion, and practical actions to improve it.
This week, I’m talking to digestion. Specifically, the daily practices we can all call on to encourage less heaviness or bloating after meals, and better assimilation of nutrients. We’re looking for energy, power and big vitality to accomplish all we mean to do, not dragging ourselves through the day or feeling apprehensive about how we’re going to feel after eating. It’s hard to be a visionary when feeling bloated.
Understanding how your body processes what you eat matters just as much as knowledge of the healthy foods themselves.
The liver, along with the stomach, gallbladder and pancreas, make up our digestive organs. When we speak casually about the need to ‘improve our digestion’, what we’re really saying is that we need to better support the function of these organs, so that they can more effectively break down food to be used for fuel, building and repair. Significant responsibilities deserve to be supported, don’t you think?
Here’s a few baseline ideas to start. You may be doing some of these already, or none at all. My personal experience is that when done in combination, and consistently, these micro actions can bring real change to how we feel daily and how enjoyable the time immediately after meals is.
Sit down to eat and relax your breathing before starting a meal. In TCM, eating while standing is discouraged. It's thought to disrupt the flow of energy in the body, and impair digestion. We want to have our body in a more relaxed state to promote digestion and by extension, nutrient absorption, as this will minimise digestive discomfort. If you’re a kitchen bench snacker, you could try to unwind the habit by settling on a stool instead.
Allow for digestive system rest periods. Unless you require small and frequent meals for specific health reasons, we want to gently move away from constant snacking or eating late at night to give ourselves rest and digest time. Practically, this means: focusing on regular meals that are large enough to satiate us so we don’t feel as much urge to snack, and finishing eating several hours before bed. At night, we rest digestion so the liver can repair and prepare for a new day of processing!
Combine foods in simple ways. This is a whole newsletter in and of itself. But, I’ll touch on it lightly and say that proteins require the digestive juices of vegetables to efficiently digest. The meat-and-veg cliche exists for a reason. Starchy carbohydrates like grains need pancreatic enzymes (fruit and ferments), which can neutralise the digestive process needed for protein. So if you’re experiencing regular bloating or stomach upset it can help to eat carbohydrates and proteins at different meals. Like all things, it's never a strict no because well, life! However in my personal experience, awareness of the extra challenge to digestion carb+protein can present, helps. Simply put: uncomplicated food combinations = easier digestion.
Bone broth in the morning. I’ve had success with a regular morning bone broth, although I’m trying to get more organised so it becomes an easier AM task (read: regular) in our loud and busy home. Drinking bone broth first thing before breakfast provides easily assimilated nutrients. It also gently prepares your digestive system for food. I prefer chicken broth (buy or make, whatever works for you), and I always add a few thick slices of fresh ginger, along with sea salt and cracked pepper while the broth warms in the pot.
Quick fire tips: drink water before meals, not during; walk after meals; focus on incorporating lots of cooked vegetables into meals by way of soups, sautéing and steaming. Warm food supports our digestive fire.
Sophie’s Marketplace
A few bits and pieces I’m loving right now, maybe you will too.
Note! I’ve made a temporary home for lots of the Sophie’s Marketplace inclusions so far, so that instead of rifling back through past newsletters, you can check them all out and shop for them in one place here.
1. Shop options for store bought bone broth: Liquid Lightning, Organic Farm Butchery and Best Bones Broth.
2. The Energy of Money. I’ve ordered this and am really looking forward to reading it. Has anyone else read it? Fantastic title in my opinion, I think that’s what stood out to me the most in the sea of finance titles out there.
As always, we’re aiming for joy, ease and curiosity. These are my own personal baselines for health on a daily basis. Keep establishing, practising and noticing and I’ll see you back here next week!