Guide on "How to control food cravings" based on scientific research and from my personal journey.
From my personal experience of being a chubby guy and then losing weight through dieting, the most difficult thing while I was dieting was beating cravings.
This guide on how to lose weight will help you to kickstart your journey.
Before looking how to control food cravings, let's see what are cravings?
Now those cravings I have is enemy if you are trying to lose weight.
But to beat your enemy you need to understand the enemy first. So let is get into the science of it.
First, so the simplest explanation for cravings is this
The first human appeared on earth around one or two lakh years ago. Now one or two lakh years ago there wasn't even any farming. Every single human had to hunt for their food even Gujarati humans used to hunt for food and hunting wasn't easy at all.
So every time we came across something high in calories and especially high in sugar. Something that could be absorbed by a body quickly for a large amount of energy.
A brain signal to a tongue, this is so good this has so much energy and I need more of this for survival.
So we were genetically modified like this. Trade was passed down the generations and humans were built to like sugar and high-calorie foods.
This is where our cravings started. I that is why I have to write this guide about How to control food cravings. ;-p
Now, This sympathy towards high-calorie food and high carbohydrate food was okay one hundred thousand years ago when we burn off those calories by walking and running and hunting and things like that.
Fast-forward to the 21st century our brains are still in that hunting mode. But our lifestyle has changed.
All of us have office jobs. Now we don't hunt anymore. We are not traveller anymore.
All of us are just staying at home but we still have an closeness for sugar and we have an attachment for high-calorie food. Which our bodies can't work off by themselves.
Even now if we have high calorie or high sugar foods our brains be like wow that was so satisfying.
People don't generally crave chicken breasts or paneer. It is always a cake or a burger or something with carbs. This is because our brains crave carbs.
Now carbs are broken up really easily by a body and a packed full of energy. Your body chooses the path of least resistance. It is the easiest to digest for energy that is why most people crave carbs and the one carb that is the easiest to break down is sugar.
Now coming to beating cravings there are two ways to do this.
The first way is the physical or physiological way.
This isn't scientifically proven, but I am talking from my own experience dieting and from the experience I have had with my clients.
So every time you are craving a chocolate cake or lemon tart instead of killing your craving with that cake and getting zero nutrition, you go and have some form of protein.
I am not saying that because I'm a gym boy and I eat a lot of protein.
This works for all human beings irrespective if you gym or not you need to have protein in your diet and as Indians we are getting very little protein.
Now this works scientifically because protein is structurally very complex. It is very difficult for your body to break down. Various studies also have shown that Protein is the most satiating nutrient.
So every time you are craving something sugary or some form of carbohydrate and instead you have protein your stomach is full with that protein.
It is very difficult for someone to absorb all of that very easily by consuming protein. You are definitely killing your appetite and you are kind of killing that craving as well.
what is more important is that by eating all that protein you are getting a lot of nutrition. Something that you weren't getting through that cake.
Now by protein, I mean any first class protein sources. You can have protein sources like chicken, paneer. You can make any recipes out of these protein sources. I mean butter chicken or that paneer chili you get at restaurants. The key point is eat minimum amounts of Carbohydrates.
See you have to reduce craving but you don't have to make your life tasteless.
Go the healthy way kill your cravings with healthy food.
The second way and the more important way in my opinion is psychological.
I go to the gym to make my muscles stronger. I put them to some stress so that they react and they become stronger tomorrow.
Your brain works the same way every single time you are beating a craving it is kind of like a workout for your brain and I am talking from personal experience this has happened to me every time I beat the craving. The next day I didn't really get that craving or the craving wasn't strong enough or I was stronger than the craving.
That is what you should try to do. Try beating cravings to make your brain a stronger place and to get the power part of your willpower up.
Initially of course it is going to be hard to beat those cravings but every time you are craving something unhealthy, picture yourself a year from now do you still want to be at the same weight you are or lose weight.
Picture yourself thin, picture the kind of compliments you are going to get that kind of stuff should motivate you. Should push you in healthier way.
Every time you are craving that spoon of ice cream at night, remember even that one spoon there is a bunch of calories that your body doesn't need. There is a bunch of calories that are gonna go straight to your stomach.
I used to have a these cravings myself. I used to crave Choco Chip Ice cream, Kulfi and Rasgulla and I used to go and have them every single day.
There wasn't a single day where it didn't have some dessert after dinner or lunch and that is why I exploded into a fat.
But I took that initiative to become fit. I took the initiative to beat all those cravings and today I don't have a sweet tooth at all.
Now I don't even enjoy desserts. When I do have desserts it is so sweet for me and I feel so guilty afterwards. That the experience isn't worth all the calories.
That one spoon of ice cream can have is the difference between you being unhealthy and unhappy or healthy and the happiest you can possibly be.
Remember this when you do reach a really good level of fitness you understand that it is not just the external happiness that you get it is also the happiness you get inside your body.
That is what you need to keep in mind. Keep your goal clear in mind and I'm sure you can achieve it if you are psychologically strong.
Comment below "Except these which method have you used?"
