Get Lean Quick: Control Your Subconscious Food Cravings With Brain Games

Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Control Your Subconscious Food Cravings With Brain Games

by Jett Brennerin Health / Weight Loss (submitted 2012-01-26)

Have you every ruined your diet by giving in to a food craving? For many, food cravings and the snacking that follows are habitual. TheFreeDictionary.com defines a habit as "A recurrent, often unconscious pattern of behavior that is acquired through frequent repetition." Does this sound familiar?

It can be discouraging when we realize that so many of the harmful behaviors that we engage in are controlled by our subconscious mind. How can we ever hope to achieve our goals when our own mind is plotting against us? The good news is that we can train our subconscious to help us instead of hurt us.

To take control of your cravings, you need to interrupt the pattern of behavior. When you feel that initial urge, make this a trigger for a new behavior. Feel the craving and do something other than eating. A great thing to do is a mind puzzle. This will distract your entire mind and make your subconscious forget about the craving.

To give my subconscious something else to think about, I do an "N-Back" puzzle in my mind. I think of a sequence of random number and try to remember the pattern for three numbers back. To start, I think of something like, "7, 1, 50, 12". Then, I try to think of the last three numbers and add another number to the end. Something like, "1, 50, 12, 3". I continue thinking these patterns and adding new numbers for a few minutes and the craving is forgotten.

I also use my iPhone for mind puzzles. I have several N-Back games. Word puzzle games and matching games are also very useful for curbing my hunger. "Words with Friends" is great, especially if you have some friends going through the diet with you.

Awareness can sometimes be the biggest challenge when fighting cravings. Sometimes, we get the craving and eat the snack before we consciously realize what is happening! To fight this, I put bright pink signs on my cabinets and refrigerator that say "Do you really want that?" The color snaps me out of the "food trance" and makes me think about my choices. Once I consciously start to think, I can use tools to help me. This gives me the opportunity to play the mind puzzles.

Please contact me if you have any questions or if you think I can help in any way.

Good luck!

Jett Brenner
jett@succinctsuccess.com
http://www.succinctsuccess.com About the Author

Jett Brenner is a success coach living in sunny San Diego, CA. His passion is finding ideas and tips that make living an even more amazing experience! He loves to share new life tips at http://www.SuccinctSuccess.com.

Jett Brenner