Ever found yourself reaching for a snack when you're not even hungry?
You're not alone.
Join me as we peel back the layers of our food cravings and relationships in the newest installment of Stronger Way to Eat, Move, and Live.
Together, we'll explore the maze of emotions and habits that leave us yearning for certain foods, uncovering the societal signals that tie comfort to consumption.
Through anecdotes and expertise, gain insights into managing these cravings with practical strategies for a balanced, non-diet approach to life.
Embrace the power of mindfulness and intentional living in this heart-to-heart conversation about more than just what's on your plate.
Learn to identify "speed bump moments" in your daily routine to disrupt autopilot living and make conscious choices that foster personal growth.
As we navigate through the complexities of wellness beyond the kitchen, I invite you to consider a philosophy that sees all foods without judgment and guides you toward making decisions aligned with your goals and well-being.
Let's step into a space where curiosity, patience, and self-compassion are the ingredients for a transformative journey toward mindful nutrition and lifestyle.
Ever found yourself reaching for a snack when you're not even hungry?
You're not alone.
Join me as we peel back the layers of our food cravings and relationships in the newest installment of Stronger Way to Eat, Move, and Live.
Together, we'll explore the maze of emotions and habits that leave us yearning for certain foods, uncovering the societal signals that tie comfort to consumption.
Through anecdotes and expertise, gain insights into managing these cravings with practical strategies for a balanced, non-diet approach to life.
Embrace the power of mindfulness and intentional living in this heart-to-heart conversation about more than just what's on your plate.
Learn to identify "speed bump moments" in your daily routine to disrupt autopilot living and make conscious choices that foster personal growth.
As we navigate through the complexities of wellness beyond the kitchen, I invite you to consider a philosophy that sees all foods without judgment and guides you toward making decisions aligned with your goals and well-being.
Let's step into a space where curiosity, patience, and self-compassion are the ingredients for a transformative journey toward mindful nutrition and lifestyle.
Thank you. Thank you, hey everybody. Welcome to the Stronger Way to Eat, move and Live. Here we talk all things food, freedom, fitness and life transformation, helping you heal your relationship to food, exercise your body and yourself. Thank you so much for tuning in and joining us today. My name is Alicia Carlson. It is lovely to be here with you guys today and I am very excited to be talking to you about this topic.
Alisha Carlson:It is definitely something that comes up so often with so many of my clients. It's something that I even still kind of struggle with from time to time. It's not something that we need to be freaked out about. It's not bad, it's absolutely normal and it is cravings. So why do we tend to crave things even when we are not hungry? This can happen for a variety of reasons. We're going to dive into some of the more common ones that I see, and then my goal is to really give you some tangible, practical strategies that you can begin implementing today to just kind of navigate your cravings a little bit more. So just kind of a quick backstory. If you're new here, maybe you've just kind of started connecting with me or listening to the podcast. If you're listening to this on the Stronger Way. My name is Alicia.
Alisha Carlson:Like I said, I had a history of chronic dieting. Now, from the time that I can really remember as a middle schooler, I started to notice that my body just looked different than a lot of my friends. I was hyper aware of my weight and what my body looks like and really started to feel the pressure to diet and to try to lose weight from very early on. Now, over the years, this led to a lot of different diets, a lot of different attempts and, I would say, failed attempts at weight loss, until I eventually kind of figured out how to successfully and I am using air coats there, if you're just listening lose weight and actually keep it off for almost 10 years. But what sort of came as a consequence of figuring out how to diet and to lose weight was an extremely kind of disorder, dysfunctional, very restricted relationship around food. Back in 2018, I had a very pivotal moment where I just realized I mean, for me, I felt like it was the Holy Spirit kind of speaking and being like the reason that it's so hard to maintain this healthy lifestyle is because you've been dieting this whole time and calling it a lifestyle, and so that really is what launched me to pivot my fitness and nutrition business to go into more of that non-diet space, that holistic approach, to really see the entire woman and not just the number on the scale. So hopefully you know that just that backstory just kind of gives you a little insight into my heart, the mission behind the Strong Her Way.
Alisha Carlson:Like I said, if you have been listening for a while, thank you and welcome back. If you're brand new, then welcome for the first time. So let's dive into and I guess it's important to say you know that's part of my journey of transitioning into more of a non-diet lifestyle based coaching. In doing that it has become so apparent to me that the relationship that we have to food is imperative if we are wanting to break out of that constant struggle and feeling that constant tension around food. Right, we've got to work on our relationship to the scale, to our bodies, to exercise as well, but really, at the end of the day, it's working on our relationship to ourselves, because that really is, in my opinion, what drives so many of the unwanted behaviors around food and exercise, the yoyo dieting and that constant tension between the scale. So let's go ahead and dive into cravings and some of the more common things that I'm seeing around them. So, first and foremost, cravings are not something that we have to stress out about. It's not something that we need to be at ourselves up for. They are super normal and just kind of a part of what happens.
Alisha Carlson:Sometimes we have a craving because of an emotional need that is not being met right. So maybe we're wanting to feel some comfort or we're wanting to soothe, and a lot of times in our society especially, we are kind of conditioned to use food in order to feel better. And I've said it before and I'll say it again emotional eating happens on both sides of the spectrum. So we could be eating emotionally to try to bury and resist and avoid feeling you know what we would say our negative emotions. We also might be emotionally eating to experience more pleasure, more joy, more excitement, more happiness.
Alisha Carlson:Right, when you think of going to a celebration like a birthday party or a wedding, a lot of times food is still one of the main staples. If you have a bad day, or if you had a bad day maybe as a kid, then sometimes you might have been offered a snack to kind of cheer you up and to make you feel better. So it's no mystery, like when we really start to dive in and explore why a lot of times when we are seeking comfort or we're seeking some soothing, that we would turn to food for that. So sometimes cravings can really just be like an emotional need that is not being met. But maybe we've been sort of conditioned or we've created that habit of using food to soothe that emotion. So that's one reason that you might be having a craving even when you're not hungry. It's a great opportunity to just kind of pause for a moment and ask yourself what is it that I'm really needing in this moment If I'm not actually hungry but I'm having this craving for this chocolate or this cookie? Is there something going on emotionally? Am I feeling a little bit of stress or a little bit of anxiety? Is this my brain just wanting to kind of take a break and procrastinate doing something that I'm not feeling super excited about doing?
Alisha Carlson:We might also have cravings when we're not hungry, just based out of pure habit, right? So a lot of times what happens is that we create these little micro habits and routines throughout our day without even recognizing it. So let's say, you know, six months ago when you came home, you recognized, man, I'm a little bit tired, I'm feeling a little bit hungry, and so you ate a snack at four o'clock, and that kind of gave you that jolt. It sort of gave you that little bit of a pick me up. And so then the next day you walk in from work again at four o'clock, you go get a snack right, and then the next day, and then the next day, until that was just a pattern, a habit really, that was wired into your brain. And so then it's like every time it's four o'clock in the afternoon, whether you're hungry or not, you start to have a little bit of a craving Again.
Alisha Carlson:This isn't anything that's gone wrong. It's just being able to slow ourselves down enough to really recognize what is happening, to kind of peel back the layer of the craving and just understand what's going on. If I'm not hungry and I'm having a craving for something, let's get super curious about it A lot of times. What impedes our ability to be curious, though, is when we come in with judgment, or we come in with shame and we're like I shouldn't be doing this, I shouldn't still be struggling with this, why can't I figure this out? That is going to be one of the quickest ways to get you to shut down and not be able to understand what is going on, and I truly believe that it's that lack of understanding and it's just that automatic sort of subconscious behavior that really ends up kind of being that you know, quote unquote self sabotaging behavior that no matter how hard we try or how much willpower we use, we can't ever seem to resolve it.
Alisha Carlson:Another thing that can cause some cravings, even when you're not feeling particularly hungry, is a lack of sleep. Now, ironically to having a lack of sleep also actually does tend to drive up hunger. So if it's a day where you feel like you didn't get great sleep, you might notice that you are a little bit hungrier anyway, but maybe you also notice that your cravings for, like, salty foods or, you know, the crackers and kind of those quick digesting carbs really is ramped up. This is another reason why sleep is so important, and really I think we're just kind of starting to scratch the surface with how much poor sleep habits or sleep hygiene really does impact not only our cravings but our food choices, our weight, as well as how it's linked to other chronic disease Right? So again, this is one of those reasons that I really felt the call to kind of step back from just being one of those fitness coaches that is giving out. You know, here's a meal plan, here's a workout program. Just do it. If you can just follow it perfectly, you'll get results, because there are so many other factors to it.
Alisha Carlson:With that being said, stress is yet another reason that you might be having some cravings even when you're not hungry. So stress sends that same signal as hunger to the brain. So we might not feel physically hungry, but again there's this urge or this desire to go and eat something. Again, if we kind of think back to that self, self soothing or that self comforting, stress hits that same thing. So the invitation there is to just slow yourself down.
Alisha Carlson:Anytime that you notice a craving, just take a minute to pause, right, and a lot of times what ends up happening is we try to resist or we try to Avoid the craving, kind of pushing it back, and that usually only ends up making it come back even stronger or come back Even more intense, so having that craving again. If we can just kind of disarm it, so it's like, okay, this is really interesting. I feel like going and getting a bag of chips out of the garage. What's going on? Am I actually hungry? Is this going to be the thing that ultimately satisfies that need? If it's not a physical hunger, how am I going to end up feeling afterwards? Right? And then, even if you decide to indulge the craving or satisfy the craving Not judging or beating yourself up for that either, but taking that little speed but moment, giving yourself that pause Really allows you to make an intentional and a deliberate decision, instead of just acting on autopilot, which is what happens when the subconscious is running 90% of our daily decisions, right, or those daily thought habits.
Alisha Carlson:Another thing that can cause cravings when we're not hungry could be things like nutrient deficiencies. So if you're eating currently a diet that tends to be a little bit more in the highly or more Processed side of things, or that end of the spectrum, then you might be getting adequate calories coming in, but you might be missing some Nutrients, right, and so, again, I don't want to just completely dismiss cravings. It's an opportunity to really just pause and kind of check in. Maybe do just kind of a quick audit of how your nutrition has been over the past couple of days. If you are having some cravings, it could be kind of helpful to look at, okay, what's in this particular food that I'm craving, that I might be not, maybe not getting enough of in my daily diet? You also want to look at social and environmental factors or cues, right. So, again, just being around something can sort of trigger this urge or this craving and this desire for the food. Hopefully you're getting.
Alisha Carlson:The main theme here is nothing has gone wrong when we have a craving or we have an urge to eat anything, to take a pause, to really take that moment to to kind of interrupt that Habit loop or that just automatic response and get curious. We can only get curious when we're not judging, when we're not shaming, when we're not beating ourselves up and just kind of coming Alongside yourself as a coach or as a best friend instead of as that inner critic which so often is that initial voice that wants to kick in, especially when we think that we're doing something wrong or we're doing something bad. This is yet another reason why really working on your relationship to food is so important, because it takes us out of that judgment and that criticism Really allows us to remove the food labels there's no good, there's no bad, create a relationship with food, where all food is basically neutral and we're just deciding what we want to eat based on our goals, based on how different foods feel in our body. And I'm a firm believer that anything that is going to allow you to be successful long term Is going to give you the opportunity to have some of your favorite foods on purpose, intentionally, to especially avoid moving into that sort of binge and restrict cycle where we restrict, restrict, restrict, which we can only do for so long before it feels like the straw that breaks the camel's back and then we're eating an entire bag of chips. Now there are definitely some strategies, some techniques that we can implement so that you are able to kind of eat those things that you're craving in moderation, without going overboard. That's something that I work with my clients on.
Alisha Carlson:On a deeper level, there's also learning how to process and urge or process a craving, just like we learn how to process other emotions. Unfortunately, that is not a skill that has been talked to us, and so what ends up happening a lot of times is that we're stuffing those emotions or we're just kind of eating those emotions away, but really they don't ever resolve. If anything, they come back even more heightened, more intense, until we really sit through and kind of deal with those. So those are some of the top reasons, really, that I see cravings appear when we're not hungry. Hopefully this was helpful for you. Hopefully it kind of gave you some ah-ha's.
Alisha Carlson:Just to recap, some of those top reasons would be stress, lack of quality sleep. It could be those social or environmental cues, it could simply be just a habit or it's an emotional need, right? So oftentimes it's not really what we're eating but what's eating us, and the more that we are taking time to take care of ourselves, to meet ourselves emotionally, mentally and physically, the less we're going to be engaging and indulging in some of those self comforting or self soothing behaviors. So if this resonated with you, if you are wanting to learn a little bit more about my non-diet approach, the holistic approach that I'm taking with my clients, then I want to invite you to hop on a call with me. This is a no pressure, no strings attached call, but it's just an opportunity for you to explore this non-diet approach and really see if it's the direction that you want to go.
Alisha Carlson:Thank you so much for spending your time and hanging out with me today.
Alisha Carlson:I look forward to being here with you again next week and until then, enjoy the rest of your day, meet yourself where you're at, be patient, practice that curiosity and really allow yourself to take those speed bump moments. Those simple pauses is where all of the gold is found, and it can oftentimes be enough to just interrupt that automatic pattern so that we're not just falling right into that automation but we're actually making more intentional, deliberate and mindful decisions, not only around food, but maybe how you're spending your time, your money and even the responses and the reactions that you're having with your loved ones. So hopefully this was helpful for you. Feel free to share it with anybody that you think would benefit and, like I said, if you are wanting to take this deeper, learn more about my non-diet approach, then please do message me the word strong her, and we will get that free call on the books for you. Have a great rest of your day, thanks for spending your time with me and we'll be back here again soon. Bye.