Solving for Over Desire

The cause of over eating is over desire. We have a natural normal desire for food, we need food to function. We also receive a subtle reward of dopamine in the brain when we eat healthy foods. Over-desire is the cause of the societal epidemic of obesity that we are experiencing today. Our desire comes from our cultural conditioning and beliefs around what is “normal” eating and how much enjoyment we get from food.

When we eat foods that are concentrated, like sugar and flour, our primitive brain recognizes the overabundant hit of dopamine and thinks is super important and we should do that again and again because it will keep us alive! This is why we need to use our prefrontal cortex to make the decisions about what we are going to eat ahead of time.

We need to be prepared for the withdrawal we will feel when start to cut out these foods that our brain has decided are super important to our survival. When we just cut out foods and don’t address the underlying desire, we actually increase our desire for that food by withholding it. The ultimate goal is to reduce the desire for over eating.

Willpower is temporary and limited. This is why we go deeper, to the cause of the desire. Desire is caused by our belief systems, our unwillingness to feel discomfort and also brains need to feel pleasure. We have to question all of the belief systems that we have in place about food to start to control our over desire. We also have to be willing to feel our feelings, and we need to let go of false pleasures in order to be successful in losing weight.