Cravings got you down? If so, you aren’t alone. One of the hardest things most dieters face when aiming to achieve great fat loss is such strong food cravings that it’s all they can think about.
You know the feeling. You come home after work and your mind is only fixated on one thing – those chocolate brownies in the pantry. You serve up a nice healthy meal of grilled chicken stir-fry but still, despite the fact you are no longer hungry, those brownies are calling your name.
Thinking you can ‘side track yourself’, you drink a small chocolate protein shake, hoping that will kill the craving and then go for a walk outside. You’ve read before that taking a brief walk is a fast-track way to kill cravings dead.
But upon returning home, now you just find that the craving is just as strong as it was before and you aren’t quite sure what to do next.
Do you give in?
Do you continue to fight it?
Let’s take a look at what you should do when cravings seem too strong to bear.
Assess Your Diet Leading Up To The Craving
The very first thing that you should do when you have a strong craving come on is assess what your diet has been like leading up to that point. Where you starving all day and then came home and had the craving?
Were you eating well balanced meals or was something missing? (in most cases protein wasn’t present).
If you weren’t eating healthy throughout the day, that could have in fact set you up for that craving as the body is now wanting food with a vengeance. If this is the situation at hand, it’s time to look at how you can restructure your diet so that you are eating healthier throughout the morning and afternoon.
If you do that, you may just find that the cravings magically disappear.
Think About The Last Time You Had A Cheat Meal
Second, you should also evaluate when the last time you had a cheat meal was. Has it been so long you can’t remember?
On any diet plan, cheat meals should be incorporated in. You’re only human and it is very natural to experience cravings from time to time. If you never let yourself indulge, this can build up more and more until you just can’t handle it any longer.
If it’s been forever since you had something you really desired, it’s time to start scheduling cheat meals in. When you know they’re coming, you’ll find it’s much easier to handle food cravings.
Assess Whether Emotions Are Involved
Another key thing you must do is think about whether emotions are currently involved in your food craving. It can help to write in a journal about anything that’s bothering you and after you get this out, see if the craving is still present.
Often we eat for many reasons other than true psychological desire for that food or a physiological need, and doing this will help you determine that.
If it’s loneliness or stress driving the craving, you can figure out more productive ways to deal with this.
Spot Patterns
Finally, also be sure to look for patterns. Do you always get the same craving at the same time of the day? If so, it could just be habit. You’re used to eating this food at this time and your ‘routine’ calls for you to do this.
When that’s the case, purposely change the routine so that you won’t be available to eat the food at that time in the day. If you’re out when you would normally experience the craving, you may just find that it doesn’t occur later on in the day when you’re home.
That craving was more of a habit than a true craving.
So there you have some key ideas to keep in mind when you’re battling a food craving. If you can try these out you may be able to combat that craving better so that it doesn’t take you away from your nutritionally sound diet plan.
How do you handle cravings? Comment below!
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