Happiness Craving

Who doesn’t want to be happy?  And often, we think that food is a good source of happiness.

However, hunger is either physiological (fuel for survival) or psychological (influenced by sight, smell, stress, social, emotions etc).  A number of hormones and neurotransmitters are at play, including appetite boosters, appetite suppressors, fullness and even stress indicators.  And the problem is distinguishing between the two. 

Do you need fuel, or are you acting on an external trigger such as a TV advert?  Or in our terminology, do you know when your hunger is real or a trick?

As an example, let’s look briefly at the neurotransmitter dopamine – our feel good/reward hormone.  It’s responsible for many functions, including memory, sleep, mood and the pleasure reward.  So a fix of dopamine makes us feel good.  Why wouldn’t we want more of that?

And this reward doesn’t have to be food.  Dopamine can be increased when we exercise aerobically, laugh, receive a treat, reflect on positive emotions etc.  Your brain also uses less dopamine while you sleep, so having a good night’s sleep helps you to build up your supply naturally for the next day.

But quite often, the reward is food.  Let’s look at sugar cravings.  Our addiction to all things sweet. 

When we eat a lot of sweet foods, we end up needing more of them in order to get the same level of dopamine (reward) as we once received.  As we become addicted, this results in less dopamine being generated, so we overeat in attempt to achieve the previous levels of pleasure and reward.  What drives us to overeat is our need for this dopamine fix.

Once wired to overeat, the brain needs substantially larger amounts of tasty food to produce a normal amount of dopamine, and it needs them more frequently.   We are also in the habit of wanting our dopamine levels up as quickly as possible, so we eat fast (especially if it’s something we’ve been thinking about and craving).

When we eat foods high in sugar, we get an immediate feeling of happiness.  And after a few hours, these receptors will be looking for their next fix, and urge us to eat again even if we are not physically hungry.

We can re-train our minds and bodies over time, by bringing all this into our awareness and working out when our hunger is real.  It may take a bit of time, but will certainly be worth it.

Attend one of our Workshops for additional support with your health plans.