Episode Transcript
Hi, everybody, and welcome to The Arm Coach podcast, episode
#7.
Hey everybody. I hope you’re all having a great week. I actually
just got to spend a day with one of my best friends. She’s someone
that has known me for a very long time. We met shortly after I
graduated from college, and we were talking a lot about what
motivates change, in part because since we’ve known each other
for so long, we’ve both seen each other through different jobs,
different relationships, different points in our life, you know. For
me, especially, she’s watched me go through periods where I was
eating a lot and really struggling with my weight and then trying
to cut back and trying different diets. And of course now, she sees
me and what I’m doing today, how I am today, and so we were
talking about change, and what really motivates change in our
lives. And she said something that I thought was so interesting,
and I wanted to share with you.
She talked about how for her, when she thinks about change or
something that she wants to do differently, she always looks at it
as an experiment. So, she’s trying something out, she’s collecting
data. She puts herself in the position of being the scientist. And I
thought that that was such a great way to frame it. Especially
because so many of us, myself included for a very long time,
looked at change and trying to change my behaviors and change
my habits as an all or nothing endeavor . So, it wasn’t about
collecting data, it was really about, “I have to do this perfectly,” “I
have to get this right,” “I can’t make any mistakes,” and I think
that our framework is so helpful when thinking about a different
way to embark on the process of change. A way to think about it as
collecting data, and I wanted to share that with you today because
today, we’re going to be talking all about urges and what to do
when the urge blow off our workout or to overeat appears. And I
think if you can take this framework and this idea of thinking of
what you’re trying out as an experiment, as something where
you’re collecting data, rather than, “I have to do it right,” or “I’m
going to do it wrong,” or “there’s a perfect way to do it.” I think
that that will be really beneficial for you.
The idea of what do I do with the urge to blow off my arm workout
or overeat is something that comes up all the time with people
that I work with. And people will tell me, you know, they
understand these tools, they really like the approach, they like
that I have a different way of thinking about it, but what happens
when they make a plan, and all of a sudden, their urge to go off
plan appears. What do they do with it? And some people will tell
me, ‘well, it’s just so impossible to resist. I had to give in. It came
on so strong or so suddenly or it was so intense that I didn’t know
what else to do with it.’ And I think that that’s a really common
experience. And so if we’re going to understand what to do with it,
and there’s a lot more that you can do than just resist or give in, if
we’re going to start to understand that, before we go there, we
have to really understand what an urge is.
So, I like to think about an urge as just part of the emotion of
desire. And you’re familiar with the emotion of desire. Now, we’re
talking about urges in the context of being sedentary and eating,
but we have the emotion of desire around lots of different things.
It’s just the emotion of wanting something, right? There’s the
emotion of being happy, there’s the emotion of sadness, there’s
the emotion of anger. We have all these different emotions and
this one is just the emotion of wanting something. So, you have
the craving for something: food, the couch. You wish you had it.
You long for it. You yearn for it and you can feel this desire toward
anything. You can feel it towards wanting to check your email or
going out for a walk. You can lust after a car or an outfit or a
vacation or you can also desire food.
So, desire is not just limited to eating, it comes into our life
around many different things, but one piece that’s really
important to understand is that people will describe and you will
experience desire in very different ways. And so sometimes, your
desire, your want, your craving, your longing for something is
quite calm. “I would like to have it. I would like to have a piece of
cake. I would like to watch tv.” You know, it has this calm energy
around it. It doesn’t feel insistent. And other times, you
experience the exact opposite. There’s an intensity to your desire.
It feels really important. There’s an urgency, right?. No surprise
there. Urgency and urge, how the two words are connected. It
feels like the object of your desire is something that needs
immediate attention. And need is a really important word for you
to pay attention to.
Whenever you find yourself thinking, I really need to eat this, I
need a treat, usually there’s an intensity behind that. It’s not a
calm energy. It feels really important and like it has to be dealt
with right away. So, we can experience our desire in a calm way
and we can also experience our desire in an intense way, and of
course, in between, right? There is an entire spectrum, but then
the question that people ask me is, “Okay, so why do some of my
desires feel calm, why do they feel like just little, little kind of
inklings of what I would like to do, and others feel so intense?”
And for a lot of people that urge to skip a workout, that desire to
eat is one of those desires that feels very intense. And the answer
has to do with everything about the reward that your brain is
getting.
So, at a very base level, your brain has a simple goal. It wants to
seek pleasure and avoid pain and to do these things as efficiently
as possible and wants to expend the least amount of energy as
possible. Your brain wants to seek out rewards and avoid pain.
Our brain places a priority on things that reward us. Now, I want
you to think about all of the things that you can desire, you can
desire food and money and sex and nature and time alone and
clothing and Facebook and also alcohol. There are lots of things
that you can desire, more than what I just listed, and all of these
things will produce varying levels of a reward in your brain. So,
the reward for going on a walk in your brain is not going to be as
great as a reward for having a piece of cake. You’re not going to
get as much dopamine in your brain when you go on a walk than
when you finish a piece of cake simply because humans developed
sugar to be a concentrated form of reward. Sugar delivers an
influx of dopamine into your brain and that influx is greater than
many of your other desires.
Now, I also want you to think about how many times you’ve given
your brain the reward of food or your phone? How many times
you have done it? I talk a lot about the idea that when we eat more
than we want, in large part, what’s going on is that we have
created a habit around our eating. So, think about this, think
about in your life, how many times have you’ve eaten when you’re
bored or with friends or after work or at a sporting event or when
you go out to a restaurant or when you’re celebrating. We do this
and we do this over and over and over again, and we’re not even
realizing that we’re creating a habit. We’re not even realizing that
our brain has come to expect to be rewarded with an influx of
dopamine at a certain time of day, at certain events, when we see
certain people. We’re not even aware that we’re doing this. But we
are unconsciously conditioning our brains to expect a reward at
certain times. And if you decide that you want to create an eating
plan and stick to it, you deny yourself the reward that excess food
brings, you will have a strong desire to go get it. You will have an
urge.
Now, that’s not the only reason that I think the desire to eat can
feel so strong for so many people. Part of it is, yes, food delivers a
bigger reward than many other things that we desire. It’s a
concentrated reward, but your brain isn’t just getting this influx of
dopamine from consuming food, right? For many people who eat
when they’re not hungry, your brain is actually getting a second
equally powerful reward, but a reward that we don’t often think
about. And that’s the reward of dulling or getting rid of a negative
emotion. It’s the reward of how food can change our emotional
state. So, people will say, you know, like I eat because I want to
relax, I want to have fun, I want to unwind, I want to feel
confident, I want to feel attractive, I want to feel less lonely.
Whatever it is, we often think of our eating in the terms of the up
side that food is giving us. And what happens is that when we just
focus on the up side, we often miss what’s on the other side.
We miss that what we’re trying to move away from, is a negative
emotion that we’re feeling in the moment before we were eating.
We’re trying to get rid of feeling insecure or anxious or stressed
out or bored or lonely. We miss that piece that we’re eating often
to change our feeling state. And part of that is the way in which
food can cover up how we’re feeling. And for most of us, we do
this completely unconsciously. But even though it’s unconscious,
we’re still teaching our brain the same lesson that you can dull or
cover up or get rid of a negative emotion when you eat. And that’s
a reward in and of itself. So, there are two rewards. There’s that
reward that you get, that everyone gets when they eat, that influx
of dopamine, but for many people who get into the habit of
turning to food as a quick and easy way to feel better, to relax, to
unwind, whatever it is, what we’re also doing at the same time is
getting the reward of teaching ourself that we can dull a negative
emotion when we eat.
So, here’s the thing. The urge to eat is completely harmless. It
cannot harm you. You have just trained your brain to want the
reward that food gives you, the dopamine reward and the reward
of getting rid of a negative emotion. You have just trained your
brain to want that reward in certain situations. You weren’t born
with this desire. You weren’t born with the desire to overeat. It’s
not a need. It wasn’t programmed in, right? It was something that
you learned and you learned it through repetition. You learned it
through unconsciously repeating this over and over and over
again and never realizing that you were creating a habit.
The only way your desire can be harmful is if you obey that desire
over and over and over again. And a lot of people feel like they
don’t know how not to obey that desire. They only know how to
resist it. A lot of you don’t know what to do when that desire
appears. So, here’s the problem. Most people think that if they cut
back or create meal plan, they shouldn’t have any urges at all.
That they should just be able to snap their fingers and decide that
they aren’t going to eat off plan and they’re going to follow it,
whatever it is, and they should not have any problem. You can
control yourself or you can’t, your brain can handle it or it can’t,
right? You have a problem or you don’t because it’s so black and
white. Most people don’t want to have any acknowledgement that
they have any sign of struggle at all because they are afraid of
what that struggle means. So, we go into this, we go into our meal
plans, we go into cutting back thinking that we shouldn’t have any
urges. So, that’s the first problem.
The second problem is that no one has ever taught you what to do
with an urge when it appears. No one ever shows us what to do
with it. First of all, we’re not expecting it, and then, we don’t know
what to do when it appears. And most of us, will just try to resist
it, will try to push it away, will try to use will power, but the urge
will keep appearing and we will keep resisting and will feel like we
are doing something wrong. We don’t understand why this cycle is
continuing, and the reason you don’t understand is only because
no one has ever showed you what you can do with an urge.
When an urge appears, there are several things that you can do
and some are more helpful than others. So, there are four things
that you can do when an urge appears, and this applies to all
urges, not just the urge to eat, and those four things are you can
react, you can resist, you can distract, or you can observe, and I’m
going to explain to you what all of these look like. So, you
probably have had experience reacting, right? You have the
thought, I want to have a piece of cake, your desire bubbles up
and then you go get the cake. You go get the reward, and if you
repeat that enough, you start to reinforce the cycle. You start to
build the habit. So, simply, reacting is just feeling desire and then
going and getting what you want. It’s opening the cupboard or
ordering dessert or heading into the pantry, that’s reacting and
that’s what so many of us have done. Many of us for years,
thousands of times, we have reacted, and that’s why, we have the
habit and why we have the habit in certain situations.
You can also resist when the urge to go off plan appears. So, you
can have the thought come up, Oh, I want to have a piece of cake,
you’re feeling the desire, and then, you can say, no. You can resist.
You can fight it. You can tell yourself, I am not going to give in,
and for a lot of people, it feels like a war, right? It feels very tense
because there’s a part of you that wants it and there’s a part of you
that’s trying really hard to resist it. And will power can work. You
can say no to your desire over and over again. You can do that, but
here’s the problem. Most people find it exhausting and the reason
why most people find it exhausting is what’s happening in their
body.
So, if you pay attention to what’s happening in your body when
you’re using will power with all your might, you will see that your
body is really tense and constricted, and your breathing is
shallow, and you might notice yourself sort of gripping or
clutching. This is what white-knuckling is. When people talk
about white-knuckling through their desire. This is what it looks
like, it’s that sort of very tense resistance going on, and that’s in
part why it feels so exhausting because an urge is appearing, and
you’re just using all your mental strength, all your fortitude and
energy to resist it.
So, a lot of people are familiar with that. They’re familiar with will
power as the way to cut back or to change their eating. And what
I’m suggesting is that there are other things that you can do. So,
the third thing that a lot of people will turn to and most people
will turn to this very unconsciously. They may not even be aware
of it. When the urge appears, when they think the thought I would
like a piece of cake, and the desire appears, they might decide to
try to distract themselves or think of something else, and so, this
looks like, you know, turning on the TV, drinking a cup of coffee,
trying to keep yourself busy. It might look like removing yourself
from a situation where people are eating or deciding that you’re
not going to go out if you know that food is going to be there. It’s
the sense of, okay, I’m just going to keep myself either as far away
or my brain is occupied with something else, so I don’t have to
think about it.
Now, a lot of people will do this, and they’ll start doing this lots of
times not even realizing it. The sense of, okay, well, I’m just going
to drink something, or I’m just going to have something to occupy
my hands, or I’m going to turn on the TV, whatever it is. I don’t
think that there is anything wrong with distraction and a lot of
people may find in the beginning, especially when they haven’t
practiced how to handle the urges in different ways, they may find
the distraction is helpful. The only problem I see with distraction
is that it’s not a very good long-term solution. Most people get to a
point where they don’t want to entirely remove themselves from
being around food. They might have friends that go to lunch. They
might want to go out to dinner. They still might want to go out to
bars, or they might want to go to a sporting event. It’s pretty hard
to completely remove yourself from ever being around food, but if
distraction is your option of choice when the urge appears, then
you’re not going to get a sense of, okay, so what do I do, how do I
handle it other than keeping my brain busy with something else.
So the fourth option you have is to observe an urge. You can have
the thought, I would like a piece of cake, I want to eat, I need a
piece of cake. You can have the desire appear, the urge appear and
you can tell yourself, everything is fine, nothing has gone wrong.
You can really welcome that urge, like, oh, hello, it’s you again. Of
course, you’re here because it’s 7 o’clock and I just got home from
work and I’m used to walking in the pantry when I get home from
work and I’m not doing that. So, of course, that urge is here. I
trained you to be here. I didn’t know I was doing it, but I did. This
was supposed to happen.
Now, that’s a totally different energy than resisting. Instead of
saying, you know, I am pushing it away and I wish it wasn’t here
and I’m not going to give in, right? This is a really strong energy.
That’s totally different from what I’m talking about which is
expecting that the urge is going to be there and welcoming it,
saying like, yeah, hi. This makes perfect sense that you’re here,
and I am okay with an urge being here. When you shift to this
option, when you feel the urge in your body, and you’re not
judging it, you’re not resisting it, you’re not trying to cover it up or
distract yourself, you’re just trying to notice, that is where all your
power comes back. Because so many of us feel like we’re at the
mercy of our urges. We feel like, I couldn’t resist it. It was just too
strong. And what I want to offer to you is that when you’re able to
look at it, when you’re able to welcome it, when you’re able to see
the urge and not judge it and not make it mean anything, you can
notice it for what it is. And most people will describe an urge as
this. They will describe it as sort of a sense of rushing or an
immediacy that they feel in their body. Some people might even
liken it to almost like adrenaline, right? It’s the sense of fastness.
People will talk about speed a lot with urges, but if you’re able to
be aware of that and also breathe, right, take a couple of deep
breaths. Don’t’ be afraid of the urge and just try to sit with it, you
realize that you are not at the mercy of an urge. You can be with
an urge, you can sit with it, you can watch it and it will eventually
go away on its own. Now, this takes practice because most of us do
not have the experience of doing this. We have the experience of
reacting, resisting or distracting. So, it will take practice for you to
realize that you can observe, you can welcome it. You can expect
that it will come and when it comes, it doesn’t mean anything has
gone wrong. And you can notice what it feels like. You are not at
the mercy of an urge to eat. You always have free will.
People really don’t like observing their urges because they usually
have this belief that something has gone wrong, that it’s a
problem. If they feel an urge, it’s a sign of something bad, but
nothing has gone wrong. Your urge to eat is supposed to be there.
You created that habit. You didn’t know it, but you did. You
created the habit by routinely eating when you weren’t hungry,
when you were celebrating, and also when you were feeling
certain emotions. When you were feeling anxious or stressed out
or insecure or lonely. You repeated that enough times and you
started to create a habit and that’s all the urge is there to tell you.
That you have created something that has become unconscious
and the way you will bring it back, the way you’ll be able to undo
that habit, is to bring consciousness back to the habit. And you do
that first by observing the urge.
Now, I like to talk about it this way, that, you know, the idea that
you can’t change something unless you’re willing to look at it. So,
if we take it outside of the realm of eating, we think about the idea
of debt, right? You may have been in this position or you might
know someone. They are in a lot of debt, and sometimes, they
won’t even know how much. They’ll just have a rough ballpark
estimate. That’s how much they don’t want to look at it. And what
are your options in that moment? What are the options when you
owe $20,000 on your credit card. You can keep spending, right?
You can keep using that credit card. You can wish that it would go
away. You can think this is unfair and how come this is my
problem and why am I in so much debt. You can also never open
your bills. You can pretend it’s not there, you can not tally up your
balance. You can focus on everything else and tell yourself you’ll
deal with it later. Or you can open up the bill, you can look at your
credit card statement, you can log into the bank account online,
and you can see what’s going on and figure out a way forward.
The only way that you really can start to change is if you’re willing
to look at it. And for so many people they’re not willing to look at
that urge to eat. They just want it to go away because they’re so
sure that it means something wrong. It doesn’t mean anything has
gone wrong. If you have created a habit, there is a reason why you
have an urge. Your urge will pass. It will. It cannot last forever.
But you’ve probably been so busy reacting or resisting or
distracting that you have never given yourself the opportunity to
watch it pass. Because the only way to have that opportunity is to
be open to it.
Okay, so what do you do when the urge to eat appears? The very
first thing you have to do is figure out what option you are in. Are
you reacting, are you resisting, are you distracting, or are you
trying to observe. And trying to observe is going to be the work
that’s going to move you forward. It’s going to feel awkward and it
is going to feel a little uncomfortable probably. You’re going to not
be sure if you doing it right. But I will tell you that it’s just a skill
you need to consciously practice and consciously build. And you
can do that by telling yourself that nothing has gone wrong. You
can do that by welcoming the urge.
You may have created this habit unknowingly, but you can undo
this habit. But if you created it unknowingly, the way to undo it is
to bring consciousness to it. The urge to eat cake does not have
power over you. You are not at the mercy of it. You just haven’t
practiced different ways of dealing with it. You’ve been very
practiced probably, if you have done this work on your own, at
resisting or distracting, but that doesn’t really lets you look at it. It
doesn’t let you feel like you are not at the mercy of it. It tells you
you have to push it away or you have to cover it up. But you don’t
have to do either of those things.
You can just notice how the urge feels in your body, you can try to
describe it, and you can know that an urge to eat is perfectly
normal and once you’re able to do that, you can also start to ask
yourself, Okay, what makes the sensations in my body that
accompany an urge to drink so unpleasant that I would rather
react, resist, or distract. Can I just be with it? Can I put faith in the
idea that it will pass?
Alright, so, just a recap. Urges are part of the emotion of desire,
and our desire, we can feel it calmly or we can feel it intensely or
everything in between. And if you are feeling it intensely, one of
the things you have to pay attention to, is the reward associated
with the object of your desire and for many people, that reward is
twofold. It’s both the influx of dopamine you get when you have a
bite, but it’s also the knowledge that having a piece of cake can
change how you feel. It is a quick and easy fix to change your
emotional state and for many people they unknowingly get in the
habit of eating to get rid of negative emotions.
The other piece to remember is that when an urge appears,
nothing has gone wrong. You are supposed to have urges. If you
have been in the habit of eating, and now, you want to cut back or
eat on plan, you’re going to have urges. That is normal. The only
problem is that no one showed you what to do with them. You’ve
probably spent a lot of time reacting or resisting and may be even
distracting, but what I want you to think about today is what you
can do to observe. What you can do to be perfectly fine and not
judge the urge and even welcome it. Because that’s the moment
when you can start to change it. That’s the moment when you can
start to have authority over the urge to eat instead of feeling like
you are at the mercy of it.
So, that’s it for today everyone. Let me know what you think or if
you have any questions.
