Cutting the vicious sugar cycle can be just as difficult as any other addiction, if not MORE-so. Simply because if you decide to quit alcohol, that's it. You don't need it to live. Same with drugs. Food on the other hand is a whole 'nother addictive challenge because we can't decide to "quit the turkey cold turkey", so to speak. We need to eat in order to live. That means you we must find ways to keep ourselves in healthy balance with what we eat & how we eat. So, in this video I share what did it for me. Not just with sugar, but with other unhealthy habits in my life too. I also give you some homework... if you accept the assignment!
I’m 53 and I’ve been addicted to sugar my whole life. When I decided to quit refined sugar and sugar substitutes (AGAIN!) I did it differently this time. I listened to the audiobook “This Year I Will . . .: How to Change a Habit, Keep a Resolution, or Make a Dream Come True” by MJ Ryan. It tells how to create a new habit and understand the whole process and how the mind works so that when I fell off the wagon, I would know how to get back on and not quit out of frustration.
One quick tip is make your resolution into something positive. Don’t tell yourself that you are giving up sugar. Tell yourself that you are choosing to eat differently in order to have a strong, healthy body that you are proud of. The brain loves to move toward the positive. The brain hates to be deprived.
Quick tip 2: Have a substitute. When you want sugar, have a healthy green tea break instead. Or substitute something else that you like. Like a quick walk. Whenever there are birthday parties at work, I bring my tea and chat about something fun with others instead of stuffing my face with sugary birthday cake the whole time.
So far I have been off refined sugars and sugar substitutes for 3 months and the sugar cravings have stopped. I don’t think about food and sugar every 15 minutes. (Seriously, if I ate one pastry, I immediately wanted another, like a junkie. I was always thinking about food.)
And like Dana Lee says I don’t see sweet, overly processed food as food anymore. I see it as crap and I simply don’t want it because I also educated myself on how bad sugar really is by reading the “Sugar Busters” book — along with listening to “This Year I Will . . .” multiple times.
Great tips Tracy. Thanks for sharing!!!