Diets Make You Feel Bad? Try Training Your Brain Instead

With the Eat Well Challenge, you’ll learn how to reshape your eating habits without dieting.

Stop dieting and start savoring your food instead as your New Year’s resolution.

Despite what may seem like surprising advice, there is mounting evidence that diets don’t work. Food restriction makes you want to eat more, according to research. Long-term, dieting can backfire, triggering your body’s survival defenses, slowing your metabolism and making it even more difficult to lose weight in the future.

Quitting dieting doesn’t mean giving up on a healthier body. Dieting habits can be conquered, but you must let go of old ideas about counting calories, avoiding favorite foods, and measuring success by a number.

What are the alternatives? Weight researchers are urging a new approach to healthy eating based on brain science. There are a variety of techniques that can be used to quell cravings and reshape eating habits that encourage mindful awareness of how we eat, acceptance of the foods we want to eat, and intuitive eating exercises.

According to Dr. Judson Brewer, an associate professor at Brown University School of Public Health who has studied mindful eating practices, “the paradigms around willpower don’t work.” “You have to understand how your mind works.”

The case against restrictive diets

In this time of year, it is especially difficult to kick dieting habits due to the allure of gimmicky weight-loss plans. It’s common for established diet programs and diet apps to promise that they’re not promoting traditional diets, only to impose restrictive eating practices after you join.

In addition to the disappointment of not losing weight, Traci Mann, who heads the health and eating laboratory at the University of Minnesota, notes that dieting also negatively affects your body. Restrictive eating affects memory and executive function, leads to obsessive food thoughts, and raises cortisol levels, a stress hormone.

“Dieting is an unpleasant and short-lived way to lose weight,” said Doctor, author of “Secrets From the Eating Lab: The Science of Weight Loss, the Myth of Willpower, and Why You Should Never Diet Again.”

In the short term, you might be able to remove it, but it will return,” Doctor said. No matter who you are, it happens to people with great willpower and to people with crappy willpower.

Consider this: Restricted dieting and rapid weight loss can cause lasting changes that slow your metabolism, alter your hunger hormones, and hamper your efforts to maintain your weight. Studies suggest that a weight-reduced body responds differently to food and exercise than a body that hasn’t dieted, and the muscles of a dieter may burn fewer calories during exercise than expected. Doctor, a professor of medicine at Columbia University’s Institute of Human Nutrition, says these changes help explain why chronic dieters may eat fewer calories than others around them, but still aren’t losing weight.

How eating habits are formed

The addiction psychiatrist Doctor has tested a number of mindfulness practices for reducing anxiety, quitting smoking, and reducing emotional eating. Also, he created an app called Eat Right Now that uses mindfulness exercises to help people change their eating habits.

According to a study conducted at Brown University, mindfulness training reduced craving-related eating by 40 percent among 104 overweight women. Scientists at Columbia University reviewed the literature and found that intuitive and mindful eating training often improved metabolic or heart health, such as glucose levels, cholesterol levels or blood pressure.

According to Doctor, eating behaviors are often the result of habit loops, which reinforce themselves over time.

According to Doctor, habit loops can be formed from both good and bad experiences. We might eat ice cream during celebrations, for example. Eating ice cream is associated with feeling good in the brain. There’s nothing wrong with ice cream, but it can become a problem if we eat it unconsciously after an emotional trigger, such as stress or anger. As a result, our brains have learned that ice cream also makes us feel good when stressed, reinforcing the habit cycle.

We can develop habit loops that trigger us to eat when we are bored, angry, stressed, tired after work, or even just watching television. The tricky part about habit loops is that the more automatic they become, the less conscious they become.

By understanding your own habit loops and the triggers behind them, you can help break their hold on you by educating your brain. When you practice mindfulness exercises, you can teach your brain that a “feel good” food doesn’t actually make you feel as good as you remember. When you reach for a food or decide to eat it, practicing mindfulness can interrupt your habit loop.

Try the Eat Well Challenge

Slow down this week and think about what you’re eating and why you’re eating it for this week’s Eat Well Challenge. Don’t focus on weight loss, food restriction, or eliminating favorite foods from your diet. This week, don’t label foods as “good” or “bad.” Your goal is to focus on the tastes, textures, and how you feel before, during, and after eating.

Be patient as you learn how to bring mindful awareness to what you eat. According to one study, reshaping eating behaviors took at least 10 to 15 attempts – and for many people, 38 or more. You can join the challenge by texting the word “Hi” (or any other word) to 917-810-3302 for a link. There may be a charge for messages and data.)

To get you started, here are two exercises from Doctor Eat Right Now program.

Begin with a pre-meal warm-up

Try this simple awareness exercise before every meal this week. Keeping a food diary or restricting your diet isn’t necessary. Every time you eat, check in with your body. Using a scale of zero to 10, with zero being an empty stomach and 10 being unbearably full, how hungry are you right now? Observe the textures and colors of the food. Take a whiff of your food now. Take your first mindful bite after picking up your fork. Put your fork down while chewing and pay attention to how the food tastes and feels. Check in with your body after several bites to see if you’re still hungry. Listen to Dr. Brewer guide you through the pre-meal warm-up here.

Map your eating habits

You can use this exercise to modify an eating behavior you’d like to change, such as excessive snacking or ordering fast food. There are three elements to our eating habits: a trigger, a behavior, and a result. It is possible to provide your brain with new information about how the habit actually makes you feel by mapping your habits. For this exercise, you can download a worksheet from Dr. Brewer’s website.

• Change one eating behavior at a time. Cut back on takeout, indulgences like cookies, potato chips, or ice cream during the day. Despite the fact that there is nothing wrong with enjoying these foods, you have identified this as a problematic eating behavior. What is the reason for this?
• Now think about what triggers this behavior. Is it an emotion, like anger or stress, or are you rewarding yourself with a treat? Or it could be a situation, like watching television or Diets Make You Feel Bad. Try Training Your Brain Instead.

The new Eat Well Challenge will show you how to reshape your eating habits without dieting.

Here’s a New Year’s resolution you can keep: Stop dieting and start savoring your food instead.

That may seem like surprising advice, but there’s mounting scientific evidence to suggest that diets don’t work. Research shows that food restriction just makes you want to eat more. And over the long term, dieting can backfire, triggering your body’s survival defenses, slowing your metabolism and making it even harder to lose weight in the future.

A resolution to quit dieting doesn’t mean giving up on having a healthier body. But to successfully conquer a dieting habit, you’ll need to let go of old ideas about counting calories, banning your favorite foods and measuring success by a number on a scale.

So what’s the alternative? Many weight researchers are encouraging a new approach to healthy eating based on brain science. A variety of techniques that encourage mindful awareness of how we eat, acceptance related to the foods we want to eat and intuitive eating exercises can be used to quell cravings and reshape our eating habits.

“The paradigms around willpower don’t work,” said Dr. Judson Brewer, an associate professor in behavioral and social sciences at the Brown University School of Public Health who has studied mindful eating practices. “You have to start by knowing how your mind works.”

The case against restrictive diets

Kicking dieting habits this time of year is especially hard because of the allure of gimmicky weight-loss plans. Many established diet programs and dieting apps try to attract users with the promise that they’re not promoting a traditional diet, only to impose restrictive eating practices once you sign up.

Traci Mann, who heads the health and eating laboratory at the University of Minnesota, notes that beyond the disappointment of not keeping weight off, dieting also affects your body in a number of negative ways. Among other things, restrictive eating can affect memory and executive function, lead to obsessive food thoughts and trigger a surge in cortisol, a stress hormone.

“A diet is an unpleasant and short-lived way to try to lose weight,” said Dr. Mann, author of “Secrets From the Eating Lab: The Science of Weight Loss, the Myth of Willpower, and Why You Should Never Diet Again.”

“You might take it off in the short term, but it comes back,” Dr. Mann continued. “It happens no matter who you are; it happens to people with great willpower and to people with crappy willpower.”

If you’re still tempted to try that fad diet, consider this: Evidence suggests that restrictive dieting and rapid weight loss can lead to lasting changes that may slow your metabolism, alter hormones that regulate hunger and hamper efforts to maintain your weight.

A weight-reduced body responds differently to food and exercise than a body that has not dieted, studies suggest, and a dieter’s muscles may burn fewer calories than expected during exercise. These changes help explain why many chronic dieters may be eating far fewer calories than those around them, but still aren’t losing weight, said Dr. Rudolph Leibel, a professor of medicine at Columbia University’s Institute of Human Nutrition.

How eating habits are formed

Dr. Brewer, an addiction psychiatrist, has tested a number of mindfulness practices to help people quit smoking, lower anxiety and reduce emotional eating. He has also created an app called Eat Right Now that uses mindfulness exercises to help people change their eating habits.

One Brown University study of 104 overweight women found that mindfulness training reduced craving-related eating by 40 percent. Another review by scientists at Columbia University found that intuitive and mindful eating training often resulted in at least one benefit for metabolic or heart health, such as improved glucose levels, lower cholesterol or improved blood pressure

Dr. Brewer notes that eating behaviors, like absentmindedly snacking on potato chips or bingeing on dessert, are often the result of habit loops that get reinforced over time.

Habit loops can be formed from both good and bad experiences, explains Dr. Brewer. Ice cream, for instance, is something we might eat during celebrations. The brain learns to associate eating ice cream with feeling good. While there’s nothing wrong with ice cream, it can become a problem when we start eating it unthinkingly after an emotional trigger, such as when we feel stressed or angry. Now our brains have learned that ice cream also makes us feel good in times of stress, reinforcing the habit loop.

Over time, we can develop a number of habit loops that trigger us to eat when we’re bored, angry, stressed, tired after work or even just watching television. “What’s tricky about habit loops,” Dr. Brewer said, “is that the more automatic they become, over time you’re not even consciously choosing these actions.”

By understanding your own habit loops and the triggers behind them, Dr. Brewer explained, you can help break the hold they have on you by updating your brain with new information. Mindfulness exercises, which prompt you to slow down and think about how and why you’re eating, can teach your brain that a “feel good” food doesn’t actually make you feel as good as you remembered. Practicing mindfulness each time you reach for a food or decide to eat it can interrupt the habit loop.

Try the Eat Well Challenge

For this week’s Eat Well Challenge, start practicing awareness by slowing down and thinking about what you’re eating and why you’re eating it. Try not to focus on weight loss, food restriction or eliminating favorite foods from your diet. Avoid labeling foods as “good” or “bad.” Your goal this week is to focus on the tastes and textures of food, and how you feel before, during and after eating.

It can take time to learn how to bring mindful awareness to what you’re eating, so be patient. In one study, it took participants at least 10 to 15 tries — and for many people it took 38 or more attempts — to begin to reshape eating behaviors. (I will be offering extra tips and coaching via text message during the challenge this month. Text the word “Hi” (or any word) to 917-810-3302 for a link to join. Message and data rates may apply.)

Here are two simple exercises from Dr. Brewer’s Eat Right Now program to get you started.

Begin with a pre-meal warm-up

Before every meal this week, try this simple awareness exercise. There’s no need to track what you eat or restrict your diet. Just check in with your body every time you eat. On a scale of zero to 10, with zero being an empty stomach and 10 being uncomfortably full, how hungry are you right now? Next, look at the food, observing the textures and colors. Now smell your food.

Finally, pick up your fork and take your first mindful bite. As you chew, put your fork down and pay careful attention to how the food tastes and feels in your mouth. After several bites, check in with your body to see if you’re hungry or full. You can listen here to Dr. Brewer guide you through the pre-meal warm up.

Map your eating habits

Use this exercise to work on an eating behavior you’d like to change, like excessive snacking or ordering fast food. Our eating habits have three elements: a trigger, a behavior and a result. By mapping your habits, you can provide your brain with new information about how the habit really makes you feel. You can download a worksheet on Dr. Brewer’s website to help you with this exercise.

• Start by choosing one eating behavior you’d like to change. Maybe you want to snack less during the day, cut back on takeout or indulgences like cookies, potato chips or ice cream. While there’s nothing wrong with enjoying these foods, you’ve identified this as a problematic eating behavior. Why is that?
• Consider what triggers this behavior. Is it an emotion, such as anger or stress, or are you rewarding yourself? It could also be a situation, like watching television or grocery shopping when you’re hungry.
• Put your focus on the result. Ask yourself some questions before you eat. What am I getting out of this? What will I feel like after eating this food? Consider how you felt the last time you ate it. What did you think of it? Did you eat too much? Have you ever felt nauseous or uncomfortable after eating? Did you feel guilty after eating it and beat yourself up for it? You can update your brain’s information about how rewarding (or not) a food is by considering how you feel before, during, and after eating it. In addition, it can help you break your addiction to a particular food.

The Eat Well Challenge will focus on some new brain strategies that can help you reshape your eating habits on Mondays in January. Subscribe to the Well newsletter to receive it in your inbox. To assist you along the way, you can also sign up for weekly texts. For a link to join, text “Hi” (or any word) to 917-810-3302. You may be charged a message and data rate for shopping when you’re hungry.

• Put your focus on the result. Ask yourself a few questions before you eat. How does this benefit me? What will I feel like after eating this food? Consider how you felt after eating it last time. Was it enjoyable for you? Did you eat too much? Were you feeling uncomfortably full or nauseous after eating? Did you feel guilty and beat yourself up later for eating it? When you think about how a food makes you feel before, during, and after eating, you update the information your brain has about how rewarding (or not) that food really is. In addition, it can help you break the hold a particular food has on you.

The Eat Well Challenge will focus on new brain strategies in January that can help you reshape your eating habits. Subscribe to the Well newsletter to receive it in your inbox. Sign up for weekly texts to help you along the way. You can join by texting “Hi” (or any word) to 917-810-3302. There may be a charge for messages and data.