Here's the conundrum: We are meant to enjoy food. Our brains evolved in such a way that we feel pleasure from eating foods that are good for us--sweet (fruit), salty (our bodies NEED natural salt), fat (fish, wild animals). Food manufacturers create packaged foods that intentionally set off our natural pleasure centers with concentrated amounts of (guess what?) sweet, salt, fat. Think of literally every type of junk food out there; they all fall into those three categories: sweet, salt, fat (sometimes in various combinations of the three). The problem is, when you eat an apple, it's filled with tons of nutrients and fiber that actually makes you feel satisfied. Processed foods are stripped of all nutrients, so you don't get the satisfaction. You get the pleasure centers in your brain lighting up from the salt, fat, sweet, but you don't feel satisfied, so you keep eating. Now, because this processed food is immediately pleasurable, some of us discovered that when we're stressed, we can eat the stuff and feel better right away. Exactly in the way alcohol can make some feel "better" almost instantly. Then, exactly in the way some people lose the power of choice over alcohol and cannot stop themselves from drinking, we lose the power of choice over food and cannot stop ourselves from eating. Once I realized I lost control over my actions, I had no option but to seek out some power greater than myself upon which to rely. It works. I don't care whether you call it God, higher power, or nature; after all, it is nature itself that made it pleasurable to eat--that's an irrefutable fact. So by relying on God, I return to my natural state and eat only natural foods, which is satisfying both immediately and over time.

Hazaah!

That makes sense but the new mantra seems to be you have to eat to live, not live to eat.

That depends on how you define LIVING! If you mean eating to be vibrantly, acutely alive, then helll yah, I eat to live.

I just found foods that were good for me and tick all the "pleasure" boxes you so eloquently describe without piling on the weight.

God was about as useful as my doctor on this one.

In other words, not very.

Control has little to do with it, if you are smart. Exploration and experimentation do. There are great, tasty foods out there that help you lose and/or maintain weight and that are good for your health.

Which is why some Christians will go to heaven fat.