I will resume posting new chapters from Flawed Genius on September 7, 2025.
This is an everyman's update of Scott Peck's "The Road Less Traveled." Peck's book, published in 1978, is widely considered a masterpiece. It explores how we confront and solve problems.
Chapter Thirty-Two
APPETITE AND HUNGER
What’s The Difference?
When I first started having serious health problems in 1980, I relied on traditional Western medicine to prop me up. I had developed mild hepatitis symptoms. The infection was too mild to show up on blood tests, but was still capable of leveling me for three months at a time. These episodes happened during periods of overwork and too much drinking. I would develop a viral throat infection and go to the doctor, who would give me antibiotics. The infection would pass, but I would be weak and too sick to work for another eight to ten weeks. In about three months, the cycle would start again.
At the end of these three years, I finally admitted to myself I needed to make some changes in my life. I was still years away from realizing I had to take responsibility for my health, but my admission was a start.
Reading through books at the health food store, I began buying vitamins and supplements. The more I read, the more it became clear what I was eating was making getting healthy more difficult.
Being used to midwestern cafeteria food, New York-style Italian dinners, and drinking wine often, I found it difficult to change my diet. My idea of dessert was a six-pack of dark beer and a family size chocolate bar.
I ate different foods, read more about people who had changed their lives by eating smarter, made more changes in my diet, and gradually became used to eating simpler foods. One guideline I learned was to eat whole foods as much as possible. The more ingredients on the label, the more potential a food had to cause complications.
My taste buds went through shock. Motivated by a deepening frustration with my health, I lost the attachment to "pleasure eating" and tried raw foods, vegetable juices, and fasting. As my body cleansed itself, I found I liked this new way of eating.
During this several year long process, I discovered my body gave me two sets of signals when it wanted food. What I had always called hunger, I learned, was often appetite. The difference? For me, desire fuels appetite. Hunger happens when my body needs nourishment.
Appetite and hunger: I contemplated this realization for months. Slowly, I saw the way my body expressed itself as a metaphor for life. Desires work like appetite. The more I indulge my passions, the more power I give them, whether the arena is food, anger, or titillation. Most desires can become destructive if carried to extremes. True hunger, though, is our higher self calling for nourishment. To grow, we must give ourselves high quality nutrients of all kinds.
I found that if I had a craving and paused for a minute, imagining myself eating that food, I could feel its effects inside me and know if it was a healthy choice or not. Meaningful inner guidance, yes, but I ignored it often. Gradually, I learned to respect the effect of going against my body’s messages and improved my choices. Awareness came before constructive action.
Experiment if you are curious. What will you feel after you eat that piece of cake you are lusting after? How will a fresh salad feel in your stomach instead of the burger and fries you are thinking about? Imagine drinking a large cola. Will you get jittery not long after? How differently would you feel if you drank a glass of water instead?
Learning to discriminate between our appetite and hunger, between desires and our higher self's urge to nourish, are steps along our paths. The more self-awareness we develop, the more opportunities we create to guide ourselves in a positive direction.
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