Your body and brain know you didn’t put any effort into it, not because you were in a rush, but just because you couldn’t be arsed to. So it punishes you by making you hyper aware that you’re consuming the uncanny valley of food. It’s not NOT food, but it’s not FOOD.
To be clear, I’m just using “you” generically. Absolutely no judgement here lol
In an interesting corellary, those frozen meals taste delicious after I get home from busting my ass all day at work. On a slow work day or weekend tho, they feel how OP described.
Add some love to it. Put it on a plate, add a sprig of whatever, eat with a fancy fork, whatever it is that makes you happy. It’s a little gift of love to yourself. Soon after living on my own I realized I could eat whatever I wanted out of those big wine glasses. So… I did. Juice, yogurt, cereal, mac and cheese. I liked how it looked and it was a small thing that made my day brighter.
Self-judgement; it sucks and is useless and generally bad for you.
Maybe you're judging yourself for not cooking, but a lot of otherwise functional people can't cook or simply don't want to after a busy or tiring day. Enjoy your easy dinner!
Maybe you're judging yourself for eating a cheap meal on your own, but not every day can be a big party or expensive feast. Don't compare yourself to other people, especially when so much of what people depict on social media is misleading or exaggerated. It's fine to eat on your own (loneliness is a separate issue) and it's good to save money or live within your means.
Maybe you're judging yourself for eating something that you know is low quality or unhealthy, but health and fitness are much more about long term behavior patterns than any single day. As long as we're trying to be active and eat healthy on a regular basis there's nothing wrong with occasional junk food.
Anyway, the point is this: if you feel bad or depressed about something as small as what you're eating for dinner, it might be a sign of deeper problems with depression and self-judgment. And if you find yourself judging yourself, it can be very helpful in my experience to really think about why you're doing it, whether it's a reasonable critique, and whether you'd judge someone else for doing the same thing in your shoes.
You probably wouldn't judge someone else for eating a microwave dinner, so why judge yourself?
I’ve been poor before but I’ve always had access to food and decent shelter. I use to eat ramen noodles, chili and rice, and baloney sandwiches. I could really stretch out a $20 a week food budget.
When I eat a microwave meal I’m just happy I can afford to enjoy variety in my meals now though I still like sandwiches.
You could be focusing on “it’s amazing how easy it is for me to make food!” But you’re not. Your emotions are leading you somewhere, instead of your rational mind. Next time you recognize that you feel like that, pause, and pay attention to what exactly it is that you are feeling, without judgement. Use your rational mind to observe your emotional state. Just observe it, don’t control it or try to change it. Hopefully you’ll discover something, maybe even the answer you’re looking for.
Nourishment is nourishment. I would love to have a home-cooked three course meal every night, but that's a lot of effort and money to spend on lil' old me. Ready meals are fine for those nights where I can't be bothered to actually prepare a decent meal.
Prepagaged food is generally quite bad for you. Rancid oils, high fructose corn syrup in everything, low fiber, mystery preservatives, and so on. When i lived on that kind of food, i rapidly gained weight to 210 lbs. I look at pictures of myself from back then and it’s horrifying. I look like I’m dying. I started cooking my own food from simple ingredients, and within a year i was down to 140. I’ve kept it off ever since.
I’d say a contributing factor could be tv/films. It’s very common to see the divorced/dumped/bereaved/generally lonely people heating up frozen food and pushing some meat puck around with a fork, feeling pretty close to ending it all… it’s just dumb social commentary but I think it shares some blame for the “universal view” of one person heating up a frozen dish being kind of pathetic
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