What is Real Hunger? by Caryl Ehrlich

Human beings have a built-in fight or flight mechanism that helps them to survive. When your ancestors roamed the earth and encountered a tiger who had leaped out of the bushes, they would mobilize themselves to either fight the tiger or flee from it. Years later, you still face the tigers. A death in the family, loss of a job, or an illness may certainly have the bite of a tiger. Your pulse quickens, your mouth feels dry, your palms sweat and you revert to old behavior and try to quell the anxiety by putting something into your mouth. You also may be reacting to the fluctuations of daily life – a waiter being inept, traffic inching along, a line at the bank – that cause you to eat a box of cookies or ask for a second helping of food. You might be misidentifying a minor travail as a tiger when it is only a baby cub.

Have you had the experience of thinking you were hungry at noontime only to become absorbed in a project or in a book, and have several hours pass before you think about food again? True hunger cannot wait a few hours. It demands to be fed. You were not hungry at noon but were responding to a time of day stimulus, another reason you’ve given yourself to eat. If you distract yourself with some other activity, the urge usually passes within a few minutes. Try to differentiate between your hungers and your urges.

Food need not fill you up in order for you to feel satisfied. A few bites of foods you don’t usually eat can be very satisfying while baskets of bread, mugs of coffee, or liter bottles of diet soda might leave you feeling hungry and unsatisfied.

It is not okay to eat when you are physically or emotionally uncomfortable. Eat when you’re hungry. Stop eating when you are no longer hungry, not when you are full or there is nothing remaining on your plate. As your clothes get looser, you’ll start to enjoy leaving food on your plate. It is a process that takes time to achieve. Remember:

· Volume of non-nutritious food merely stuffs and bloats but does not satisfy real hunger.

· Variety and texture along with nutrition satiates hunger.

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BIO:

This article is an excerpt from the book Conquer Your Food Addiction authored by Caryl Ehrlich. Visit her at http://www.ConquerFood.com to know more about weight loss and keep it off without diet, deprivation, props, or pills. Contact her at Caryl@ConquerFood.com or call 212-986-7155.

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