Dieters don’t eat consciously. They do t have blackouts. They know when they’re eating the whole box of cookies. What they lack is an awareness of the feeling of being hungry or craving the food. They’ve blocked the feeling because they thought it was bad. They tried to protect themselves from those urges.
Dieters need to get comfortable with these urges. They should know that it’s okay to eat, but to do it mindfully. In fact, you have to learn to work with those urges. If you don’t, the inevitable result is a binge. A woman once went into Dr. Howard M. Shapiro’s office that tell him that she’d had a terrible week. She went to a birthday party that featured a lavish buffet. Smelling the food, she was tempted, but what really called out to her was a piece of cheesecake. She resisted it because she thought it was bad.
Instead of having the buffet food or the cheesecake, she had a cupcake that she was a little less bad. The cupcake didn’t satisfy her, so she had another cupcake. After that, she just continued eating, having far more food than she was comfortable with. She ate so quickly, and with such feelings of guilt, that she didn’t enjoy any of it.
What was the alternative?
His message to her was that giving in to her urge and eating the cheesecake would not have been a problem. Where she had a problem was with her attitude. Instead of saying, “ This cheesecake looks good to me,” she said to herself, “How can I avoid this cheesecake?”
To loose weight successfully, you have to figure out a way to have that occasional piece of cake and still feel like you’re in the driver’s seat. Some people have the cake and say “ I would have the piece of cake and get it over with.” Why would you want to get it over with? Does it mean that you do not plan to have a price of cake for another four weeks or 3 months or a year? It is a mistake to put eating on hold, to think that you can turn off your desire to eat as if you were turning off a switch. That would be sad. You will have the urge to eat cake or whatever else tempts you from time to time. That urge is not an evil thing. You don’t have to view a piece of cake, or whatever you desire, as an unfortunate or disastrous lapse of self-control.
The goal is to have your mind right. Find a way to psyche yourself to the point that you understand that it is okay to have a piece of cake or any other craving when you’re on a diet. It’s not going to put a spammer into your works. As long as you don’t do it on a daily basis or frequently, cause then you’re being counterproductive.
