A complex web of signals throughout the brain and body drives how and when we feel hungry. And even the question of why we feel hungry is not always simple to answer. The drive to eat comes not only from the body’s need for energy, but also a variety of cues in our environment and a pursuit of pleasure.
There have been extensive studies which have poked and prodded hungry people to find out exactly what’s going on within their bodies. Research suggests that fighting off that hungry feeling goes beyond eating food. It also involves understanding your cravings and how to fight them, and how other lifestyle choices; such as sleep, exercise and stress, play a role in how the body experiences hunger.
Hedonic Hunger
Hedonic hunger refers to consumption of food just for pleasure and not to maintain energy homeostasis. In this condition, the subject eats also when not in a state of short-term energy depletion, and food is consumed uniquely because of its gustatory rewarding properties.
Evidence now shows that Ghrelin, the hormone that your body secretes when you are hungry, may also influence the hedonic aspects of eating behavior. The result is that we continue to eat “pleasurable” foods even when we are full.
Homeostatic Hunger
Homeostatic eating is eating in response to a perceived energy needed by the brain. When the body thinks you need energy it sends a signal to your brain telling you you’re hungry. This suddenly makes you more interested in food.
Essentially your body has a system which is optimised for the quantity of food it needs to cover your regular energy needs. Too little and your at the risk of starvation. Too much and you’re going to store the excess as fat and potentially lose your ability to forage or escape from predators or fight if you need to. The ultimate survival.
If you are reading this, then its highly probably that you have eaten foods for pleasure. You life may even revolve around food and you could even be overweight or obese as a result of this “hedonic eating” behaviour. If you are unsure why you do it, when you do it and now have a desire to challenge it in an effort to reduce your weight; read on…..
So how do we fight it………….?
- Keep track – write down everything you eat/drink
- Pause before eating.
- Remove/Reduce distractions when you are eating.
- Chew more.
- Take steps to reduce stress.
- Eat at home more than eating out.
- Choose good quality foods.
- Dont buy high sugar foods to keep in the house as ‘treats’.
- Research and re-educate your understanding of nutrition. (concentrate your research on modern studies).
- Use meditation to work on the neural pathways in your brain. Effectively retraining your thought processes.

I have created a FREE guided meditation for you to use as often as you like.
Remember the more you use meditation, the stronger those new neural connections will be.
Lighterlife is a total solution for losing weight fast, achieving your goal and keeping it off for good. Lighterlife include cognitive behavioural practices to support clients on their weightloss and weight maintenance journey. The beauty behind this is that while you’re losing their products to lose weight, you are also working on your mind to help you understand why you put weight on in the first place. Once you have identified that, you can spend time challenging those behaviours and working on new ones so that you dont go back to eating the way you did that got you fat in the first place.
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