Keep pounds off with Automatic Awareness

We're looking at automatic awareness of food choices today as the second deep dive into our 7 principles of healthy eating that guided us in designing Willpwr+EE. We are talking about a special kind of awareness, one that works effortlessly, not compulsively. You just "feel" that you aren't interested in dessert, or that eating more than just a small slice of pie very occasionally isn't for you, You don't struggle to avoid late-night snacking because that is simply something you wouldn't think of doing. You'd automatically recognize when it is boredom or anxiety that is triggering a state where you probably would have searched the refrigerator or pantry for a calorie-rich snack but now grab an apple or go for a walk. This new kind of awareness becomes incorporated into your identity. You simply don't see yourself any longer as a person who would recklessly endanger your health. It's just not you. There's no inner struggle, no sense of being deprived -- you just wouldn't do it.

This is an entirely different kind of awareness than having a vague idea that overeating is unhealthy. Frequently labeled "restrained eaters", people employing forced awareness are white-knuckling through life, trying to do the right thing about calorie intake or saturated fat avoidance, or whatever their goal is. But without following a carefully constructed plan practiced until it is second nature, they are constantly falling short of their wished-for behavior, and the pounds keep piling on.

So, do you know anybody with automatic awareness? We've spent years developing an app that is designed to get you there, but first, we needed to know how normal folks accomplished that ability. Think of people you may know who are lifelong vegetarians or vegans, as one example. Think of individuals who follow religious mandates about foods not allowed by their beliefs (Hindus, Muslims, Jews), and you'll begin to realize both the power and mechanism that can guide food choices "automatically." Whether for health reasons, religious beliefs, or habits from birth, what these individuals all share is that they feel no temptation whatsoever to eat their "forbidden" foods. Instead, they feel revulsion at the thought of ingesting those foods! Mistakenly eating pork for an orthodox Jew is an emergency, usually accompanied by panic, disgust, and nausea. Eating the flesh of an animal for a life-long vegetarian is revolting, not tempting.

Nobody is born that way, folks. On the contrary, we have evolved under conditions of feast and famine, where we are built to put on weight when food is plentiful. Under today's conditions of food being available pretty much all the time, it's no wonder there's an obesity epidemic. So, how do we counter that natural mechanism and exist in our world today without obesity and the health problems that come with it?

Training. Mind and body training. Lots of training that includes breaking habits and conditioned responses and trading negative patterns for healthy patterns. In short, replacing that core instinct to eat a lot when tasty food is plentiful with automatic awareness of and preference for healthy food choices.

This is not a 10-day program, ladies, and gentlemen. It's comparable to becoming fluent in a new language. But that doesn't mean that progress is delayed. From the first day, you begin to work on acquiring automatic awareness, from the first time you say to yourself, "That isn't me anymore", you're on your way to a slimmer, healthier you.