Food Addiction

Addiction - the state of being enslaved to a habit or practice or to something that is psychologically or physically habit forming, such as a narcotic, to such an extent that its cessation causes a severe trauma.

The more my experience grows in the business of coaching people in areas of weight loss and fitness it becomes increasingly apparent that many people are unable to become healthy and fit due to Food Addiction.  Food has become a center of pleasure that is so strong and enslaving that very little attention is given to the nutritional content of the food.

This is a relatively new phenomenon that came about largely because food manufacturers, in an effort to make more sales, included ingredients or combinations of ingredients that make certain foods extremely tasty, but at the same time causing problems such as toxicity and overconsumption.  Many people that I talk to know that these foods are causing them to experience less of life, but are so enslaved to these highly palatable foods that they simply have decided that they will experience the pleasure of these "foods" at the expense of good health.

So what do we do to help this situation?  First, we need to recognize this enslavement to highly palatable foods as an addiction and to treat it as such.  Second, we must find a way to separate ourselves from these "foods" and find ones that are nutritious and tasty, but not laced with agents that bombard our pleasure center in the brains causing us to over consume.  The foods are available.  They may even cost a little more, but are well worth the extra effort to find, purchase and prepare.
 
Soon enough after consistently consuming tasty, healthy foods, our pleasure center that called for the unhealthy, highly palatable food will begin to quiet and we get on with the business of fat loss and good health.