THE JOLLY ALLOTMENT BOOK CLUB - APRIL RECOMMENDATION.
April's recommendation is a big one. This is a challenging book, but the good news is that an edited, more concise version is now available as an audiobook.
It's one of the most important works I've read. It was instrumental in my healing and understanding of how possible it was to change what my body understood to be nourishing. I wanted to change the foods I craved when I was sad or sick to foods that would truly nourish my gut, mind, body, and soul to feed my body's primal needs, not those instilled in me through parenting and advertising. The book that proved to me with science everything my body was trying to tell me whilst I was healing. It's a must-read and one I wish we could put on a school reading list.
NOURISHMENT
'What Animals Can Teach Us About Rediscovering Our Nutritional Wisdom'
by Fred Provenza.
In Nourishment, Provenza presents his thesis on the wisdom body, a wisdom that links flavour-feedback relationships at a cellular level with biochemically rich foods to meet the body's nutritional and medicinal needs. It sounds like a lot of science is hard to swallow, but honestly, this book will make you question everything you feel about what you eat and how far you have come from your inner nature and human instinct.
Provenza explores the fascinating complexity of these relationships as he raises and answers thought-provoking questions about what we can learn from animals about nutritional wisdom.
- What kinds of memories form the basis for how herbivores and humans recognize foods?
- Can a body develop nutritional and medicinal memories in utero and early life?
- Do humans still possess the wisdom to select nourishing diets, or has that ability been hijacked by nutritional "authorities"?
- Is taking supplements and enriching and fortifying foods helping us, or is it hurting us?
All such important questions.
I warn you, though, that this book will change the way you think and feel about food, so you will need to be prepared to accept the changes it will encourage you to make and receive them with kindness to those who nurtured your relationship to food. They just didn't know any different than to trust the system.
Let me know in the comments what you think when you've read it.
If you want to learn how to nourish your gut and change your relationship with food, you can read about our workshops and events here.
Thank you for reading the Jolly Journal - I appreciate your interest and hope it's of value to you. I am dyslexic, and for years, this stopped me writing because of the fear and shame of getting it wrong. I am embracing my fear, so I appreciate your understanding if you see a mistake I have missed. Thank you! - Polly x
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