Another approach - especially if it’s low quality, store-bought abominations - is to say “thanks” and take one, only to toss it once we walk away. I did this last week when someone had a container of Costco cookies they were so happy to share. I took one - talked to them for a bit - and once I walked away and was out of sight deposited it in a trash can. I wouldn’t do this for homemade or more elaborate dessert, though.
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This approach also stopped one of your coworkers from having too many, LOL
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Yalls will power is just better than mine, because If I even think I smell workplace treats I’ll turn into that cartoon where the fragrant pie smells coming from a window make them float towards it.
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It’s really not a willpower thing at this point: I don’t like the way I feel after I eat those things. I feel like gut microbiome is a big player there. I’ve seen talk that late night sugar/junkfood cravings at the start of the diet is an indication of the microbiome crying out to get fed those sugars that it’s become dependent on. Similarly, Dave Tate talked about how, when he tried to cold turkey the Little Debbies diet back to the bodybuilder diet of chicken breasts and rice, he’d keep throwing up the chicken breasts after he’d eat them. The body will adapt to the input.
I can still eat sweet treats, but the only time I do is when my wife makes them. And when that happens, it’s quality ingredients. Apparently, titanium dioxide is NOT necessary when you make a batch of homemade oatmeal cookies: damndest thing. And I imagine my guts appreciate that.
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So I should stop eating the chocolates from my wife’s Christmas stocking in the evenings??? Dang!
Although it would be unpleasant, there are times I wish my body would do something to remind me that things like sweet treats are bad. But instead the dopamine kicks in and I’m a happy fool and want more.
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Although it would be unpleasant, there are times I wish my body would do something to remind me that things like sweet treats are bad. But instead the dopamine kicks in and I’m a happy fool and want more.
Just need to detox is all. And like most detoxing, the first few days are hell, but you ride out the storm and come out better.
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Once you are off of sugar for a while it’s not great when you eat it again. Even regular applesauce with added sugar is overwhelming to me in a not great way. It’s like eating a sweet tart. The good thing is, once you are out from under added sugar, everything else tastes sooooo much better. It’s like the sugar overrides all of your taste buds and you can’t really enjoy the flavor of anything else.
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It’s like the sugar overrides all of your taste buds and you can’t really enjoy the flavor of anything else.
Marty Gallagher talks about this in “Purposeful Primitive”, becoming a “Super Taster”, and many other authors have discussed this as well. And we say “sugar”, but real deal natural sugar (ala sugar cane, fruits, honey, etc) can’t even hold a handle to the sugary nonsense we’ve managed to manufacture. And the end result is that we’ve constructed foods that are FAR more palatable than anything that could EVER exist in nature, and they create dopamine spikes that our little lizard brains are built to endure. And, in turn, we saturate our brains with this dopamine blitz, it grows numb to the buzz, so we need bigger and bigger dosages just to get the same buzz. Folks talk about how this is one of the bigger contributors to our obesity epidemic: folks just keep chasing that dragon and have to keep upping the dose.
You get clean from the junk and you can start appreciating what’s actually out there for how incredibly delicious it is. Yet, at the same time, the body eventually says “Hey, I’ve had enough, thanks”, because it’s equipped to deal with this stuff.
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And after you “live like a Monk” for awhile you get the dopamine rush from the decision Not to eat the chocolate and stay on track.
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“Living like a Monk” is a line from Dorian Yates about the pre-contest Bodybuilding lifestyle.
And maybe the dopamine really comes from Reciting the quote and Emulating somebody cool, and not from skipping chocolate?
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Maybe it’s because I’ve never abolished all the bad things. I haven’t had a chocolate chip cookie dough blizzard in quite awhile but I’d eat the heck out of one any time any place… Even if I had a full stomach - I’d make room.
I really like chocolate.
Fortunately, I can control myself.
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I feel confident that I could polish one of those off pretty quick. I’d just make it a small instead of a large and I’d probably crash pretty hard in about an hour. Lol
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I honestly thought you were on your sigma monk mode grindset before this clarification lmao
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Tommy Rosen claims sugar is the gateway drug - we learn to control our emotions as children. Eat sugar, feel good. Sugar crash makes you feel bad, eat more sugar. The cycle trains us to look for external solutions.
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And, of course, we double this up by REWARDING kids with sugar as well. I really love Layne Norton’s quote: “Don’t treat with food: you aren’t a dog”
Maybe it’s because I’ve never abolished all the bad things. I haven’t had a chocolate chip cookie dough blizzard in quite awhile but I’d eat the heck out of one any time any place… Even if I had a full stomach - I’d make room.
Yeah, it’s not like a codex that is unique to one specific junkfood item: it’s the unholy trinity of sweet (typically HFCS), salty and fatty (usually some sort of seed oil). Have to really break the habit to break the spell.
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This is my husband’s favorite quote.
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Good stuff here. It’s really quite simple equation. Food industry needs profits, so they make ultra prosessed, sugary, fatty and salty crap which addicts. It’s legal, so they do it. If they don’t, somebody else does and wins the competition.
Actually many actors from tobacco industry has moved to the food industry when tobacco has became more and more regulated and less trendy. It kinda makes sense.
As a side note, I’ve been in US twice and I never tasted anything so artificial than some of the stuff sold there. Not that we don’t have the same problems here, but I was blown away how different such a simple foods as bread or cereals were.
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Couple of really good books on the topic:
Hooked: Food, Free Will, and How the Food Giants Exploit Our Addictions
Salt Sugar Fat: How the Food Giants Hooked Us
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Yeah I probably should’ve used a different word, but I was leaning into being funny.
I can understand the feeling. Anything from big box retailers I don’t eat often. I think I had a piece of a Zebra cake when I dad offered and I could feel that film on the roof of my mouth.
I’m glad you can still enjoy the times your wife makes the good treats. My dad is the parent who unlocked the mad scientist baker skills, and that man will make some of the most delicious concoctions.
My mom despises sweets. She’ll have a soda every blue moon, but she’s the “beef, liver, onions” parent and she favors salt, just salt, on everything.
In all seriousness I do like rotating the sweets out because it’s a healthier choice. I just have a bit of a flip top head and I like almost everything.
sucks that’s I’m allergic to bananas. Banana stuff is so good. But I also will mash up foods that people say don’t go together. I’ll have some cookies, and then turn around and eat some sea food, or something covered in garlic/onions (off topic there sorry lol).
But all in all I agree.
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