Week 1:
“Identify Your Hunger Cues”
“Eat More, Eat Some, and Eat Less”
Awareness Task: Identify Your Hunger Cues
Hunger, or, more precisely, appetite, is stimulated by various factors. Generally, there are two types of hunger cues: Internal and External. Internal hunger cues come from your body directly whereas external hunger cues come from sources outside of your body and in your surrounding environment.
Example of an Internal Hunger Cue: Stomach growling indicating that there is emptiness in your stomach.
Example of an External Hunger Cue: You can be completely satisfied and not even thinking about food one moment and then you see an ad on TV for your favorite fast food restaurant and then all of a sudden you feel a desire to eat.
Your task this week is to identify at each meal which hunger cue is present dictating you to eat or not.
Internal Hunger Cues:
Slight Hollow Feeling in Stomach
Brain Fog/overall fatigue
Irritability
Headache
External Hunger Cues:
Food ads that trigger cravings
Time of day/routine meal time
Amount of food on your plate
Someone gifted you a dessert
Coach Alan’s Tip!
“Focus more on your internal hunger cues. They will tell you the truth about how hungry you are.”
Physical Task: Eat More, Eat Some, Eat Less
There are no “bad” foods. Rather, there are foods that you should eat more often in relation to your goals and foods that you should consume less of in order to get to where you want to be.
One of the best methods of making sure that you are eating the foods that will help you get to your goals is to grocery shop for the foods that are going to serve you well on the journey towards sustainable, healthy eating.
Your task this week is to go grocery shopping and pick out the foods on the “Eat More” list. Study this list beforehand and determine which foods you are most likely able to enjoy eating on a regular basis and include those in your grocery list. Of course, you can still pick out several items in the “Eat Some” category and “Eat Less” category but place more of an emphasis on shopping for the “Eat More” foods.
Coach Alan’s Tip!
“Shop on the perimeter of the grocery store where the produce, meat, dairy, and eggs are located.”