Beauty giant L'Oréal's advertising slogan "Because I'm Worth it" has become a mantra for our individualistic time. It's a beautiful saying, but if we want to eat fewer cakes and more broccoli, we have to avoid triggering our reward system too often to prevent our brains from turning in to demand machines that request continuous replenishment.
LEARN TO THINK THIN
Published: 17 March 2010, www.svd.se
Judith S Beck, PhD in psychology and psychiatric director of the non-profit Beck Institute for Cognitive Therapy and Research in Philadelphia
"Oh, that cake looks good”, the brain records before we even have time to think. Soon thereafter comes the rationalization: "I deserve it, I've been working out today". Some of us are more receptive of the goodies on offer. If our reward system is used to regular sugar kicks, the powerful forces of the brain makes us behave the same way day after day. We are used to eat when life is hard or when there is something to celebrate. We are experts at trying to persuade ourselves that "I'm worth it" or "Just today."
But it is possible to create new brain pathways by choosing foods that does not result in roller coaster looking blood sugar curves. The focus of today's article, is to understand the thoughts that gets us to eat things that we really had not planned - and what to do to think in a way that makes us lose weight and maintain a lower weight for life. It is not just about the balance between what you eat and how much they consume. To control food intake and create a habit of physical activity is to the very highest degree related to your own thoughts and feelings.
"Malicious thoughts" is what the American psychologist Judith Beck calls what makes us eat more than we think we should. She describes how one can do to train themselves to think like a thin person in the book "The Beck Diet Solution - train your brain to think as a thin person".
Judith Beck (daughter of Aaron Beck, the cognitive therapy's creator) has extensive experience working with overweight patients. She has found that many healthy people behave differently in relation to food than people that are overweight.
Thin people often eat more smaller portions during the course of the day and therefore snacks to a lesser extent than obese in between meals. Food is not a problem solver in their lives. For them, food doesn't play a big role in comfort and consolation. They are not particularly worried about being hungry. Anyone who wants to lose weight and stay there is right to imitate the behavior.
Cognitive behavioral therapy is a method with good scientific results, even for weight loss. The Swedish social scientist Lisbeth Stahre has published two scientific studies that attracted great international attention. Judith Beck refers to them in her book. The studies showed that weight loss was unusually high even 1.5 years after stopping treatment with cognitive behavioral therapy.
In order to find a new approach, it is inter alia to enhance "resistance thinking" and to weaken the "give-up ideas". Every time we resist a temptation it will be easier to resist next time. We get used to the brain to resist rather than to deepen reward the track. Expect many trials and failures along the way, but the industrious training, the new tracks keep a lifetime. Our brains control our behavior, but it also works vice versa. What we do leave marks in our brains, which means we can actually change brain pathways by changing habits.
To cope with this it is important to plan ahead. How will my day be like? What should I eat today? Judith Beck thinks that eating unhealthy favorite foods should be planned and scheduled. It is about creating habits that you should feel comfortable with.
Another of Judith Beck's tip is to make so-called "incentive cards. She gives an example of what might be labeled:
"This is just a temporary craving. It will disappear very quickly if I decide to one hundred percent that I will not eat this and instead engage myself fully in another activity". Impulse control is extremely important for successful weight loss.
Judith Beck thinks that anyone who plans to lose weight can make a personalized list of benefits of the new lifestyle.
- Read through the list many, many times. When faced with a temptation the list will show up in your head and help you make the best possible choice.
Why do most people fail to maintain a lower weight?
- Changing habits is difficult, it takes time to create new brain pathways, it's not about finding a perfect diet that someone else created. We must learn to consistently choose good food and movement, and to learn how to differentiate between real hunger and temporary cravings.
Her experience tells that it is often about taking care of the strong emotions without eating and to get back to good habits quickly after eating the wrong and too much.
- Many obese people are thinking in "either-or-tracks". If I have eaten a fat-dripping 500 kcal donut I might as well eat unhealthy the rest of the day too. A typical malicious thought. Totally insane!
Has new knowledge about the brain's reward system influenced the advice you give to overweight?
- Yes, in some ways. It is important to understand that the reward system is individual and will look different in different people and that for some people it's easier to resist temptations. But with that said, everyone can work on and create healthy habits to reduce the risk to overeat and increase physical activity.
Judith S Beck gives the advice to search for a "diet coach": a friend, family member, colleague - or a professional therapist, personal trainer or coach. The person need not be an expert on weight loss, she says, but should be good at listener, support and encourager.
1st - Choose nutritious, hearty and healthy food.
2nd - Create time and energy for your weight loss.
3rd - Plan what you should eat.
4th - Find support.
5th - Learn how to handle disappointments.
6th - See overeating as a problem you can solve.
7th - Learn how to endure temporary cravings.
8th - Stop eating because of emotional reasons.
9th - Give yourself credit.
I hope you found this article interesting and that it made you realize or remind you that You have the power to control your own thoughts and behavior in everything you do in life, not only when it comes to weight loss and eating control.
I'll stop here before it gets to spiritual and deep, after all this is just a blog about fitness and health=)
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