Welcome to the hunger games! In this lesson, you’re going to learn how to reduce your hunger by 20% or more.
Wouldn’t that be great? To not WANT the amount of food you’re currently eating? Imagine the impact on your weight.
To understand how you can reduce your hunger you first have to understand that you’ve artificially raised it.
Scientists have long known that we make ourselves hungry without knowing it. We do things that inadvertently increase our appetites.
That’s the bad news. The good news is that we can stop doing these things and experience a significant drop in hunger.
Hunger is not at all what you think it is. Most of us define it as “natural,” for a lack of a better term.
That’s a traditional understanding of our desire for food—your belly is empty, your body needs fuel, hunger arises.
But scientists know hunger often has nothing to do with the emptiness of your belly. Mornings are a great example: Raise your hand if you wake up hungry. Almost no one will. Why? It’s been 12-14 hours since you’ve eaten. Your belly is empty. Shouldn’t you be starving?
No, because Ghrelin, the only hunger hormone known to science, is lowest when we first wake up. Again, If hunger is about empty bellies, why aren’t we STARVING when we first wake up?
Every morning we wake up to the counterintuitive nature of hunger—we experience no hunger despite the longest stretch of time we’ve gone without food.
Scientists have proven that hunger isn’t a fixed drive dependent on how long it’s been since we’ve eaten; it’s actually a highly suggestible state that can be innocently influenced… or maliciously manipulated. Let’s look at some examples.
It’s dinner time but you’re not hungry.
Even the sizzle of the steak doesn’t perk up your appetite. But your partner talks you into having a bite…
and next thing you know, you finish the steak with gusto. You started off not hungry and then you ate a steak?
Another example. You’re watching tv, not particularly hungry, but a commercial for pizza comes on and suddenly you find yourself panic texting the order app.
Another example. You’re not particularly hungry when you stop at the gas station to pick up a bottle of water…but row after row of candy bars, snacks and food awakens the hunger within.
You’re on vacation. It’s morning, you’re not hungry. Neither is your partner so you decide to just have coffee at the hotel’s restaurant. But you see the food being presented to other guests…. and you find yourself eating a full breakfast.
Think about these examples. You started out with no appetite and then became hungry like THAT. Why? nothing changed in your physiology. No time had elapsed. You became hungry, according to scientists, because hunger is highly suggestible. It can be easily MANIPULATED.
Think of hunger as a dial that can turned up or down---by you, your friends, your family, society…and ESPECIALLY by a food industry that profits handsomely from increasing your hunger.
In the next lesson, you’re going to have a few aha! moments as you realize the extent of just how much you’ve accidentally inflated your hunger.