Do you disagree?
If it’s not a thinking problem, what is it?
No one is making you eat anything. It’s your choice. Do you think you’re choosing to eat certain foods because you’re hungry or perhaps just because they taste good?
Maybe - but maybe not?
Think about it; you know the health issues related to being overweight. You know the body image issues associated with being overweight. We know that a diet composed of high fat, high sugar and high salt wreak havoc on our health and looks, so why do we do it?
Have you ever considered the neurological payoff that you may be receiving from these foods? We know that dopamine is the reward neural transmitter in our brain. When we partake in a pleasurable activity, our dopamine levels spike in our brains pleasure center.
This almost always guarantees we will be more likely to return to that activity. This is the same mechanism that makes us desire the foods we choose to eat.
Fat, salt, and sugar elicit a large dopamine response because at one time in our history the nutrients were extremely hard to come by. (Our dopamine levels are actually higher prior to eating the food…this mechanism drives us to make our food choices based on the past experiences with the food)
These nutrients (fat, salt, and sugar) are essential nutrients for our species survival. It’s very ironic that what was once hard to get is now available in abundance.
Fast forward to modernity and we have once again, as humans do, over corrected. It’s very ironic that what was once hard to get is now available in abundance. (This is the subconscious work of the limbic system)
We are all at the mercy of our limbic system. Our emotions drive our behavior, and our consciousness tries to rationalize our behavior.
Our subconscious and conscious battle will be the next topic I will cover.
This is the good wolf bad wolf story – the wolf that wins is the wolf you feed.
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