Many dieters are pointing the finger in the wrong direction when it comes to weight problems. Say what you will about too many carbs and fats or quantities consumed of your favorite foods, but there are usually deeper, underlying reasons for why you just can’t seem to get full.
You’ve tried every way under the sun to fill up more quickly: eat slowly, chew your food more thoroughly, drink a lot of water before your meals, or even resort to wearing tighter pants for the restriction. While the former two are actually good advice, the last method is absurd to say the least. The pants have to come off some time!
You can be in control of your eating habits and maintain good health. Here are some reasons why you may be eating more than you really need:
1. Stress
Emotional eating is the number one saboteur of weight management. A stressful day can make you feel like you’ve spent the day in a high-impact aerobics class without reaping the benefits of exercise! Stress can really bottom out your blood sugar and cause you to binge to feel like you’re back on an even keel. You could easily wind up putting away an entire package of Oreos or a box of macaroni and cheese to find comfort and calm your nerves at the end of an overloaded day.
2. Low quality nutrition- chemically enhanced foods
Unnatural, highly-processed, ready- to- eat foods are not only seasoned with way too much salt and sugar, but they are actually made with chemicals that tell your brain you are still hungry so that they producer can sell more product. This is why you can eat a truck load of most frozen dinners and still feel ready for more!
3. Not enough Zzzz’s
Besides getting enough water, sleep is the most important resource for staying healthy. Turn out the lights on some of those “pressing” matters and don’t feel guilty about dozing off for a good 7 hours. This way, your brain can accurately separate the difference between being hungry and being tired. If you truly have an unusually long to do list, at least aim to be asleep between the hours of 11pm and 3am since these hours are when your body does most of its healing.
4. Banning foods your body craves and fad dieting
You’ve probably heard the advice before that you should listen to your body’s messages and eat what you crave because the foods you crave contain nutrients that your body needs to stay in balance. If you’re trying to go low carb, paleo, low fat, or any other deviation from your customary eating habits, you may find that you will just eat more quantities of the unrestricted foods because they aren’t leaving you satiated.
5. Too much exercise
If you’re crushing it too often on the paths or ripping it in the gym several days a week, your muscles aren’t getting the recovery time they need. Especially if you aren’t fueling your body properly for that kind of physical demand, it will relay instructions to your brain for you to eat more in search of the nutritional components it needs to heal, meaning you could wind up consuming massive amounts of food and cover more than what you actually need for your caloric intake. Excessive exercise can throw many systems off in your body, including blood sugar, metabolism, and menstrual cycles in women. Essentially, your body can go into panic mode and make you feel ravenously hungry – which can send you to demand an entire large pizza all for yourself – right now!
Good health and weight management really boil down to good life management. Try meditation or gentle calisthenics for just a few minutes instead of raiding the fridge and pantry next time you feel overwhelmed with life’s everyday stress and curveballs.
