Today we’re talking about resisting temptation of rich foods. Now resisting temptation of candy, chips, chocolate, treats in general is hard because they’re EVERYWHERE.
Whether you’re out with friends, on a lunch break, at the checkout at a store, even in your own home, even if YOU don’t buy junk, guess what your roomate brought home? Mhmm, a pack of double stuff oreos and a gallon of rocky road ice cream. Yeah, you’re fucked.
Temptation is everywhere, avoiding it really isn’t an option, so what we’ll have to do is combat the temptation. Now most people don’t even think about planning a strategy to stay strong in these types of situations, so of course they’re going to give in. You can’t rely on sheer willpower to avoid junk because the effect it has on your brain is wayyyy too powerful. When we ingest foods that are highly acidic, which are your fried foods, sugary foods, foods with flour, gluten, dairy,meat, animal products, all that stuff, our brain releases chemicals that rewire us. Not only that but those foods feed something called candida bacteria in our stomach. Now if you haven’t heard about Candida just wait, i'll give it 6 months tops before its trending harder than Cardi B. Candida is the “bad bacteria” in your stomach, which i really don't like to call it that because it does serve a purpose, but this bacteria feeds off acidic foods. And when you eat them, it sends a signal to your brain to crave more so you can feed them. The human body also contains parasites. It doesn’t matter who you are, how clean you are, how well you eat, parasites can be transferred through a handshake, they can be transferred through the air, most are invisible to the human eye so you have no way of really knowing if you’ve ingested them or not. Different types invade for different reasons, but my understanding is most that invade the human body feed off certain bacteria. If you’re one to eat a lot of junk, a lot animal products and especially raw fish, you have more than someone who does not eat these things. Yep, tiny parasitic and bacteria mother fuckers are causing your sugar cravings, they are controlling your brain and making you fellatio your 5th ice cream sammich.
So with all of these internal stressors manipulating us, we need a strategy to be able to resist the sweet sweet call of that twix bar at the Target checkout. My advice is to find a strategy that works for you and stick with it.
There are a number of strategies that I use but the one I've found that works best for me is this. When I am tempted, usually it’s sweets, I don’t think about the immediate pleasure that I’m going to get from the junk, I think about how I’m going to feel 10- 30 seconds after I consume the treat, it's in my stomach, and the taste is completely gone out of my mouth. So let’s think about this for a second. When you crave a rich, acidic food, you’re craving the way it tastes when you chew it. How long does the flavor of an average bite last? From the time you bite to the time the last of the flavor is washed away by your saliva, usually less than 30 seconds. But the effects of that food stay in your body MUCH longer than 30 seconds. After you take that first bite, your brain is hooked, signals are sent to have another bite, and another, and another. If you’ve ever said you’re going to have “just one bite” of something, you’ll realize how incredibly impossible that seems to be. So you’ve started a negative cycle, you're now craving more and more junk, resisting is getting harder and harder, you're getting more bloated, and more sugar is accumulating in your bloodstream. A chain of negative consequences have started for what? 30 seconds of pleasure? So when you’re craving something bad for you, do NOT think about how it tastes, do whatever you can to avoid that. Think about the cravings, the discomfort, the feeling of guilt, the feeling that you don't have self control, think about the negative consequences that come after the pleasure.
Simply remind yourself why specifically it is you want to abstain from acidic food. If you want to keep belly fat from accumulating, envision yourself with the stomach that you desire. Really envision it, close your eyes, allow yourself to feel the feeling of joy and accomplishment as you wear a crop top, or lounge on the beach with your stomach exposed, or feel confident as you’re getting intimate. Make it as REAL as possible, get giddy, get excited, celebrate your new stomach, and then ask yourself if 30 seconds of pleasure is worth destroying all of that joy and feeling of accomplishment.
If you want to abstain because of the negative effects processed food has on your body in general, visualize the food as acid, moving through your body, destroying cells, controlling your brain, think about the parasites and candida gobbling up the acid and then sending signals for you to crave more, think about the mucus and disease that's produced, think about how your body is no longer controlled by you but by parasites.
They main point is, remind yourself why you want to abstain from junk, and make it as vivid as possible. If you can picture the food as hot tar running through your body, destroying everything in its path, do that. Just don’t think about the immediate pleasure, because that’s what gets us hooked. It’s much easier to stop yourself from ever taking a bite of something in the first place, than to try and stop the cycle in its tracks after the chemicals that make you crave acidic food is already released. I know in the moment it can feel impossible to resist.
It’s so easy to justify treating yourself because the phrase “One doughnut won’t make you fat, just like one salad won’t make you skinny” rings true. One indulgence WON’T make you fat, but it will more than likely make you crave another, if not soon after, later in the day. One treat can affect your eating patterns and your ability to resist temptation for days afterwards. I’m not saying you have to abstain from indulgences at all times, but it is MUCH easier to control food cravings the less you have them.
Changing your health is so much more than going on a diet. Diets DON’T WORK, because they are a temporary change. To really change the way you eat, you have to change the way you think about food. At first it’s difficult, but over time you’ll find you won’t even need to envision your sexy bod or hot tar to turn down temptation. Saying no automatically will be as instinctual as saying yes is now.