We are continuing to explore the concepts involved in solving overhunger and overeating.
Yesterday I discussed the reasons why we overeat and how it’s not our fault. Our society and brains are designed in such a way that lead us to overeat by creating so much overdesire for food. If we can solve for the overdesire, we can then solve overeating and will naturally lose weight.
I discussed how eating concentrated and refined foods such as foods that contain sugar will trigger a rush of dopamine in our brain and concentrate the reward response in our brain. This will strengthen those neural pathways and make us desire these foods even more with time.
One of the things we want to do to help break this cycle is to become very aware of our bodies and understand the signals our body is sending us so that we can interpret them correctly before we take action.
We want to understand the difference between physical hunger, cravings, withdrawal, and emotions.
Physical hunger is a sensation that we feel in our body that comes gradually in waves. Just like a wave, it comes over us and then retreats.
Cravings are a desire for a specific food or food type.
Withdrawal is both a psychological and a physical sensation from a lack of sugar. If your body is accustomed to getting a lot of sugar and you remove this source of fuel, you may experience numerous withdrawal symptoms including headaches and cravings and anxiety and food-focused thinking just to name a few. Nothing has gone wrong here and it is important to recognize that these symptoms are totally normal and can take days and even weeks to resolve.
Emotions or feelings are just vibrations that you feel in your body that come from your thoughts. So emotions start in the head and are experienced in the body unlike physical hunger which starts in the body.
As you are planning your food daily and then executing on that plan, keep these different things in mind and pay attention to what you are experiencing in both your head and your body as you go through your day and are confronted with the decision to stick with your plan or not.
Ask yourself what you are feeling. Am I really hungry right now or am I having a craving for a particular type of food? Am I going through physical or mental withdrawal from sugar right now? Am I experiencing the feeling of deprivation and that’s why I want to eat off my plan?
Asking yourself these questions before you take any bites will help create a brief pause. That space will allow you to become better attuned to your body’s true needs and help you stay on the plan that you created from your highest, most evolved human brain that only wants what is best for you.
Need help getting started or moving forward? Schedule a free call with me at the link below or email me at mindfuldocmom@gmail.com.
