The Trap of Nutritional Efficiency

“Welcome back, what do you remember me saying?”

I’m in the basement unit of a pre-war apartment building, elbows on thighs, hunched over with my bangs in my eyes. My hypnotherapist is looking at me intently as she asks me this question, but all I can recall is getting off the F train at 2nd Ave, buzzing into the unit, then settling onto a couch before being instructed to drop my head and look at the floor.

I stare at her blankly and shake my head. Somehow, an hour has passed since she began garbling words I didn’t recognize. Did I close my eyes before or after the hypnotherapist started speaking? Did I sway my body as she asked? In what universe could this possibly stop my binge eating?

$250 gone and not even a word to show for it. As I walk back to the subway, I’m unsure whether to berate myself for yet another impulsive buy or celebrate the supposed end to a year-plus of disordered eating. I had already optimized myself into a calorie deficit — and now I was attempting to optimize my way into a cure.

Optimization culture today tells women there is one right way to be: thin, pretty, productive, cheerful. And I am far from the only one to sacrifice my health and well-being for that elusive ideal. The socially sanctioned male archetype, on the other hand — big, strong, rich, loud — is typically the result of addition rather than reduction.  Most recently, “looksmaxxing,” a term originating in the incel community, has soared in popularity on platforms like TikTok. 

Either way, the language of optimization is buried deep within our psyches — and consequently, everywhere in the food system. It shapes how we eat, how we work, and how entire economies are designed. What we live with today is a cumulative butterfly effect of various generally misguided attempts to optimize human life itself.