Because it’s a little TOO easy.

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

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.

its all in your head, your comparing your future food meal to the social options you arn’t exercising and it makes you sad.

Record an album. You’ll feel better.

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.

Probably all the textured vegetable protein that they use as filler makes everything seem like fake food.

I just wanted to say I love how you phrased the question and un upvote was not enough to express that

My biggest issue with them is they always say for 2 yet there’s no way I could consider one a full meal. (might be a UK portion thing maybe).

Because there was no reason to try any harder, no one to impress, not even yourself.

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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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.

Eating is a social deal in every culture (as is smoking, doing edibles, or partaking in any other consumable, generally). It might even be an instinctive thing. I know when my wife isn’t around (often due to business) I’ll just make something simple for myself (like the stereotypical can of tuna) and when she doesn’t want to eat (migraines, etc.) then I feel disappointed that I won’t be making dinner for us.

Curiously, when it comes to dessert, I am a little sad if we don’t eat it together, if say, there’s pie and she had her slice while I was dogwalking or something.

And I say this as someone who’s eaten alone for most of my life. My usual thing was just to make myself one of a few staples and snack while playing video games. (This also led to a preference for food I could handle without flatware but also wasn’t greasy. Things wrapped in tortillas and carrotsticks.)

Now that I’m in the habit of prepping dinner every night, it feels weird when I don’t.

Because we live in a society.