How to RewireYour Brain To End Food Cravings!!

***This article is from Dr. Mark Hyman who wrote the bestseller, The Blood Sugar Solution.

I’m a food Addict. We all are. Our brains are biologically driven to seek and devour high-calorie, fatty foods. The difference is that I have learned how to control those primitive parts of my brain. Anyone can this if they know how. In this article, I will share 3 steps to help you counteract those primitive parts of your brain that have you chasing high-calorie, nutrient-poor foods. But before you can update your brain’s biological software, you’ve got to understand why it developed in the first place.

Calories = Survival

The brain’s desire to binge on rich food is a genetic holdover from the days of hunter-gatherers. Given what scientists know today about our early ancestors it makes sense that our brains are hardwired to fixate on high-calorie foods. It’s a survival mechanism. Eating as many calories as possible, whenever possible, allowed our ancestors to store excess calories as fat and survive lean times. That approach worked well for 2.4 million years, but today it’s making us sick and fat.

That’s because our brains haven’t evolved as fast as our food environment. The human brain evolved over 2.5 million years. And, with the exception of the last 10,000 years, people only ate animals they could hunt and wild-plants they could gather. Imagine if you could only eat what you caught or picked! The variety of foods hunter-gatherers ate paled in comparison to the 40,000 different food items we can buy in the average big-box grocery store today(1).

No cinnamon buns for them!

And whereas we have easy access to food 24/7, drive-thru meals were not an option for hunter-gatherers. Not to mention that hunting and gathering was hard work. Early humans expended lots of calories acquiring their food, so they needed to eat high-calorie foods to offset the loss. The average hunter-gatherer got up to 60 percent of his calories from animal foods, such as muscle meat, fat, and organ meat, and the other 40 percent from plants(2).

That balance between protein and carbohydrates in the diet is where the problem lies, but it’s not what you think. Carbohydrates have gotten a bad rap, but they are the single most important nutrient for long-term health and weight loss. But I’m not talking about bagels and donuts. I’m talking about plant foods that more closely resemble what our ancestors ate. Hunter-gatherers ate fruit, tubers, seeds, and nuts. These are whole foods. They are full of fiber, vitamins, minerals and disease- and weight-busting colorful phytochemicals. They also take time to digest. Therefore, they raise blood sugar slowly, which balances metabolism and offers a steady stream of energy. Whole foods have all the right information and turn on all the right genes.

But the past 10,000 years saw the advent of both agriculture and industrialization. And, in the blink of an eye (by evolutionary standards), the human diet got turned upside down. Today, 60 percent of our calories come from things that hunter-gatherers wouldn’t even recognize as food. The bulk of those items—cereal grains, sugary drinks, refined oils and dressings—are simple carbohydrates(3). The primitive brain sees an endless supply of easy energy. Left unchecked, our bodies pay the price. The result is a two-fronted epidemic of obesity and diabetes in our country—what I call diabesity.

The Blood Sugar Cascade

When you eat simple carbohydrates, whether as sugar or as starch, they pass almost instantaneously from the gut into the bloodstream. Within seconds blood sugar levels start to rise. To counter the increase in sugar, the body releases insulin. Insulin is the key that unlocks the cells and allows sugar to enter. As sugar enters the cells, the amount of sugar in the blood declines and the body restores homeostasis.
An abundance of simple sugars in the diet goads the body into releasing more and more insulin. Eventually, the cellular locks get worn down from overuse. Like a key that’s lost its teeth, insulin loses its ability to easily open the cellular door. The cells become numb to the effects of insulin. As a result, the body pumps out more and more of the hormone to keep its blood sugar levels in check. Eventually, this cycle leads to a dangerous condition called insulin resistance. Insulin resistance—at the root of diabesity—causes you to gain belly fat, raises your blood pressure, messes up your cholesterol, makes you infertile, kills your sex drive, makes you depressed, tired, and demented, and even causes cancer.

3 Ways to Reprogram your Brain

Luckily there are ways to rewire the primitive parts of your brain by making good food choices. Here are 3 ways to get started. For more suggestions on how to wrestle control from your reptilian brain, see Chapter 15 of The Blood Sugar Solution.

• Balance blood sugar. Blood sugar highs and lows drive primitive food cravings. If you get famished between meals, that’s a sign that your blood sugar is crashing. When blood sugar is low, you’ll eat anything. To better balance blood sugar, eat a small meal or snack that includes healthy protein, like seeds or nuts, every 3 to 4 hours.
• Eliminate liquid calories and artificial sweeteners. Early humans didn’t reach for soda or fruit juices when they got thirsty. Sodas are full of chemicals and high fructose corn syrup. Processed fruit juices are awash in sugar. Try sticking with water and green tea. Green tea contains plant chemicals that are good for your health. And, last but not least, don’t succumb to the diet-drink trap. The artificial sweeteners in diet drinks fool the body into thinking it is ingesting sugar, which creates the same insulin spike as regular sugar.
• Eat a high-quality protein at breakfast. Ideally, you’re eating quality protein at every meal, but, if you need to prioritize one meal, choose breakfast. Studies show that waking up to a healthy protein, such as eggs, nuts, seeds, nut butters or a protein shake (see my UltraShake recipe) help people lose weight, reduce cravings and burn calories.

Ultimately, you may not control your genes but you do control what and how you eat. Since taking control and changing my diet, my brain no longer caves into the cravings and urgings that seduce the reptilian brain. The most powerful tool you have to transform your health is your fork! Use it well and you will thrive.

Motivation Part 2

{Sorry for the delay in posting - internet issues}

Affirmations

What you put your attention on grows. The law of attraction states that you attract to you what you think and feel most about. Your mind is like a powerful magnet attracting to you people and events that energetically match the content or vibration of your thoughts and feelings.


All thought is creative. You can use your mind to create good with the use of positive thought, or you can use your mind to destroy by focusing on negative thoughts.  Our bodies actually have a physical chemical reaction to the content of our thoughts. Negative thinking makes our bodies produce cortisol and other stress hormones, which make us store fat around our bellies.


Positive thinking has the power to unleash endorphins and other feel good chemicals throughout our body.  Most of us have far more negative thought than positive ones.  Yet, most of us go through our days unaware of the negative content of our minds, Then we wonder why we feel so badly.  


Each of us is responsible for the content of our own minds. You have a choice as to the content of what you program your mind with.  I like the saying, "Garbage in garbage out."  It reminds me to become more conscious of what I put into my mind.  If I want to feel good and create positive actions and results in my life, I need to feed my mind a steady diet of positive thoughts.


Affirmations create powerful intent. Repeated often enough they will create a powerful shift in your reality.  Most people do not use affirmations correctly and therefore have minimal success with them.  
They either choose ineffective wording that is not meaningful to them or they do not use affirmations long enough to effectively reprogram the mind. They give up on them too quickly.


When you begin to use affirmations for weight loss, or any other goal in life, it is important to choose an affirmation that matches your desires and emotions. It must feel right to you.  If you weigh 250 pounds and start to use an affirmation that says, "I now weigh 110 pounds," it will feel like a lie to you.  It's just not realistic.


It is best to start your affirmations that are more realistic and achievable. A better one in this situation is, " I'm getting thinner everyday!" By making your affirmations more realistic they will become reality sooner.  Break down your weight loss goals and affirmations in small, doable increments. You want to build success quickly as that will build the positive energy and momentum for more success!


When you begin to use affirmations for weight loss you may notice resistance coming up for you in a matter of days. This is to be expected.  Most people give up this time. This resistance is the analytical, critical side of your brain saying things like, "This is dumb,"  "This will never work."  Or, "You'll never lose this weight, etc."  This is also the voice of the saboteur inside of you.  This is part of you that does not want change. It has a vested interest in keeping you fat.


When this resistance comes up use on of the following affirmations:


I AM WILLING TO CHANGE!!
I CAN DO THIS!!
I HAVE THE POWER TO CHANGE MY LIFE!!
YES I CAN!!


Repeat hese 100-200 times a day until you feel less resistance.  Remember, your weight has been serving you in some way. It has been filling a void or need in your life. Along with doing affirmations and visualizations, you must find out what that void or need is and find a way to healthier, positive way of filling it. If you do not, you will quickly lapse back into your old destructive behaviors.  
This is one of the main reasons diets fail.


Affirmations are powerful to use when you are going into situations that cause you to overeat.  If your at a restaurant or party where you are tempted by food you can repeatedly say one of the following affirmations.


I EAT ONLY WHAT I NEED.
I CHOOSE TO EAT HEALTHY FOOD.
I CHOOSE TO STAY ON TRACK.
I AM COMMITTED TO MY GOALS.
I EFFORTLESSLY STAY ON TRACK.
I EAT FOODS THAT SUPPORT MY NEW WEIGHT.
I EAT LIKE A THIN PERSON.


Repeating affirmations at these times will keep you focused and on track.


Using affirmations will help you begin self-nurturing. If you beat yourself up about your weight, or if you say negative things about your body, use affirmations instead.  If when looking in the mirror you say things like, "You have such thunder thighs."  "Look at that cellulite." "I hate my butt, stomach, body, etc."  Choose to say positive affirmations like this:


THANK YOU FOR SERVING ME!
I AM GETTING STRONGER AND SLIMMER EVERYDAY!
I TREAT MY BODY WITH LOVE AND KINDNESS!!
MY BODY IS THE TEMPLE OF MY SPIRIT!!


Every time you catch yourself speaking or thinking negatively turn it around to something positive. Negative thinking is just a bad habit. It will take some time but it can be turned around. It can even lead to depression.


Affirmations do take some work.  That work will pay off for you.  They are not a quick fix. They are however a powerful tool in your weight loss toolbox.  Hopefully you have already come to the realization that all your efforts at dieting and search for the magic bullet has not paid off.
Think of this work as an investment in your thinner and inner life!!!