How to Curb Food Cravings Without Giving up Your Favorite Meals.

I had been a slave to my food cravings for many years until I started really disciplining myself. Like many, I had always tried to force myself to eat healthy, prepare my own meals, only to feel that hunger coming on and finding reasons to say yes to it and I did end up doing that a lot and felt incredibly guilty afterward.

Everyone who has food cravings knows that feeling when they are dieting right or preparing to eat healthy, only to find that 1 craving is so easy to cave into.

  • What’s the harm of eating that extra burger?
  • That ice cream looks so GOOD. 
  • I’m too tired to prepare anything so I’ll give myself a break today.
  • Today I’ll add another cheat day to my diet even though I only said it would be once a week.
  • Well I’ve been dieting for a few days so I think I’ll reward myself with a bad meal. 

But we all know that all of those excuses always lead to you feeling well while you’re eating it, but SO unhappy after. And if you try to diet again, you’re going to bounce back into that excuse, ruin your diet again, blame yourself again, ect…

I never really had major weight issues. I just had a belly I was trying to get rid of and pushing 30, I knew it wouldn’t be easier to get rid of it. But the older I got, the more excuses I made and the more I kept breaking my own dieting rules.

So if I kept trying to do the same things that kept pushing me back like this, I had to change how I looked at dieting. So I started dieting differently and have followed very simple eating rules that have helped me lose weight, but also not completely give up the foods I loved to eat, but hated myself for eating after. I have lost about 10 pounds and kept the weight off. 

For me 10 pounds is major, but for people who need to lose more than that, the same dieting rules will also help, but help you lose even more weight. They do require discipline, but they are much easier to get results with than forcing yourself to stop eating anything bad cold turkey.

Contents

1: Go to bed hungry, always.

I started going to bed hungry about 2 months ago after hearing from my grandfather how much better it would affect my weight and after trying it, I lost 4 pounds in about 1-2 weeks. 

I was also trying to eat more healthy at the time, but I wasn’t giving up any pounds, but until I started going to bed hungry, I didn’t start losing weight. It was as though I broke a plateau.

2: Follow the rule of “2”. 

I made this dieting rule up, but it’s easy to use: Whatever you think you can eat when you’re hungry, divide it by 2. Then eat that much instead.

How many times have you felt hungry, made or bought food that you though you could eat, were not able to eat it all, and then felt bloated and horrible, but still had leftovers which you weren’t going to finish? I always had that! 

I had noticed that whenever I felt I could eat a lot, I always ate about half of that before I couldn’t eat anymore, so instead of eating what I though I could eat, I started eating half. 

If I though I could eat 2 big macs, I ate 1. If I think I can eat a whole pizza pie, I eat half a pie.

When I did that, I started saving money. But what about calories? Aren’t I still eating the same? Not always! When you eat half of what you think you can, if you ever feel like you could eat more, you won’t be able to because there won’t be anymore food.

But before you can go back out to order more food, your mind and stomach are going to feel satisfied so you’re either going to spend less on food OR you’re going to eat less and feel full before you can eat more so you’ll eat less calories.

You can also curb your food cravings by just eating something healthy that’s low in calories like walnuts or scrambled eggs (also in emergencies when you feel like you can’t sleep without eating something, then eat something very small like 1 walnut, no more). You may feel like you can eat a whole pizza pie, but eat that 1 scrambled egg or 2, give yourself about 15 minutes and then you’ll see you’ll feel better.

Your stomach and mind will always make you think you can eat more than you really can. If you let them control you, you’re never going to lose weight. If you understand how they trick you and don’t listen to them, you will lose weight!

 3: Transitional eating is the way to your ideal weight.

Compare how much of your diet is bad foods vs good, put it into a ratio. If you eat completely bad, that number will be 0/100 (0 good foods). Start off your first week eating 10% of good foods so now your ratio will become 10/90, then every weeks, make your good food ratio increase by 10%. 

You will want to be at 100/0 eventually, but it’s very hard to eat completely healthy. But when you transitionally eat, your body more easily becomes adjusted to your changes and it will crave it. It’s very hard to go from eating completely bad to completely good, unless you cleanse, or do some kind of fast diet, like the 3 week diet, but doing it transitionally is very healthy and as you eat more healthy, you will gain less weight and lose more.

Simple weight loss ideas to solve the weight loss problem:

When you eat less than you think you can, go to sleep hungry and discipline yourself to change how you eat from bad to good, you are going to lose weight, but you also will not feel so horrible from doing regular crash diets or always failing them. These diet tips are very comfortable to do!

5 thoughts on “How to Curb Food Cravings Without Giving up Your Favorite Meals.”

  1. Hi here, I admire your character because I never could go to bed hungry. No way. I try to have my last meal around six at the evening. This meal must be fulfilling and good.
    It takes few hours to digest it and when I go to bed I do not feel hungry.
    I know that it is great for the body to have an empty stomach before bed. It takes courage and strong will to lead this way your life.
    Having small portions is a great idea. Here, in the USA, portions are enormous. I think that it is one of the reasons that people are getting big.
    Thanks for the advice regarding food cravings. All the best, Nemira.

    Reply
  2. Hi,

    Just the article I needed to read! I have to make some major changes in my eating habits because I have gained 30 pounds in the last year. I’m so unhappy and desperately want to lose this weight! You have given me great ideas which I know are going to help!

    I completely agree with going to bed hungry (not eating after a certain time). Unfortunately, this is the number one rule I’ve broken and the biggest reason for my weight gain.

    I also love the idea of transitional eating. I had never thought about it in that way but it makes perfect sense. My “bad food” intake is very high, but I know it’s not realistic for me to change things right away – transitioning slowly is the way to go!

    Thank you so much for the advice you’ve given!

    Anna

    Reply
  3. Great tips! I’m a weightlifter and I often have to cut weight so I know all about this subject. Your rules are spot on, I could not have said it any better. What is your degree of specialty? Cause mine is exercise and fitness, and yours seems to be diet.

    Reply

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