Tummy Besimcha

There is a Chassidic expression that it is a Jewish person’s obligation always to live with joy. In Hebrew that is tamid besimcha. This article will deal with an offshoot of that issue. The question of whether people of weight or fat people or obese people are really happier than others.

Perhaps we should call that concept “tummy besimcha.” Tummy besimcha is perhaps a stereotype that some people have and that fat people may like to have as well. Very often we do think of a fat person as standing with a silly grin on his face. That grin can sometimes be misinterpreted as good cheer or even joy. It is questionable whether such is indeed the case.

Fat people do sometimes do things in order to be cheerful. Sometimes it is helpful to eat in order to remove challenges, problems, difficulties or other things that may make someone to be less cheerful. If you eat enough then you will have taken away the challenges on a surface level but they really still remain. On the other hand by removing them at least on the surface level the obese is able to cope with the things that might make another person unhappy. He isn’t really that happy he sounds but he is happy at least in the surface. His eating made him deal with the problems on one level but in so doing they created a side effect his obesity. In other words, he looks cheerful. He acts cheerful. It is doubtful whether he is fulfilling the Chassidic directive to be always happy. But the food is causing him to feel happy. He is tummy besimcha. Tummy besimcha is not necessarily a terrible thing. It is one way of dealing with problems. It may be argued that if the person does not handle the problems on a surface level and at least feel happy then these problems then it is true that he will not be happy. However, in addition to not being happy he made exhibit different ways of being with the problems, challenges, or difficulties.

In other words simply removing the method of eating in order to cope with the problems may cause different problems to exhibit themselves in which case it is questionable whether there has really been progress. It would be necessary to choose between a situation in which the person is tummy besimcha or in which he exhibits other internal or external symptoms of the challenges which did indeed cause him to eat. In this case it is not clear whether dieting or exercise or other forms of weight control are what would indeed be required or whether it is necessary to handle the real problems which are causing the person to overeat.

In many cases those real problems cannot be handled in the usual methods. It may be a person’s over sensitivity to situations over which he has no control or the person’s realization that circumstances which are indeed problematic cannot be handled and his frustration about the fact that the world is not better than it really is. If this is the case, then there is a difficult question to be asked. Which is better tummy besimcha and suffering the consequences of obesity or removing the obesity which may itself cause distress to the person because of the difficulty involved in losing that additional weight and risking the fact that the person will then exhibit new, different, or possibly even worse symptoms of the problems or difficulties which he faces.

This is not an issue for which there is a definite answer which is suitable for any occasion. This is an issue which has to be determined after extensive counseling and determining the person’s real needs, feelings, desires, and ability to cope with change.