Weight Loss – Your Stomach Is the Key to Portion Size

One of the most important problems for the client who is serious about losing
weight is portion size. Everyone wishing to lose weight needs to learn about healthy
eating habits, the importance of fresh fruits and vegetables, avoiding highly
processed foods, and the value of whole grains. In fact, I require every client I see to
research proper nutrition or consult a trained nutritionist. But another major
challenge is controlling the portions that we eat. No matter how good their food
choices are, overweight people often simply eat too much. One solution is to join a
diet program like Jennie Craig which basically determines both your food choices
and portions for you.

Such programs have a high success rate for rapid weight loss. The problem of
course is that it may be difficult to make the transition from this kind of highly
regimented program to a self-regulating regime. While carefully measuring ones
portions may be workable for some of us, many of my weight loss clients are
looking for an easier way to manage portion size than always using measuring cups.
And there is one. It requires that we understand the proper role of the stomach in
managing our eating habits. We need to start listening to our stomach’s wisdom.

The human stomach is a uniquely versatile organ. For most of the last two million
years of evolution our human ancestors needed a stomach that could hold up to two
quarts of food. That’s because they might spend two days chasing a mammoth
across the plains on an empty stomach. Then they had to eat very quickly before
they were chased off by the saber toothed tigers. The uncertainty of food sources
and lack of storage options required our early ancestors to develop a stomach that
was uniquely suited to this environment. Early humans lived a life of nearly constant
physical exertion. And their stomach would be filled with food only once every few
days. The rest of the time it would be a few bites of leaves or fruit. Our ancestors
did not suffer from overweight problems.

Now this same large stomach no longer serves us. If a modern human who is living
a sedentary life fills this stomach even once a day to capacity, obesity is the
inevitable outcome. That’s because this stomach was never intended to be filled
every day in this way. Unfortunately, we are conditioned to eat to capacity in many
subtle ways. We are trained to experience eating to a sensation of fullness as the
goal of a meal.

Even during our mealtimes as a child we were programmed to stuff ourselves.
“Come on, Joey, have another piece of pie. Don’t you like it? You have to grow up
big and strong. Are you sick? Where’s your appetite? Don’t you want to be in the
clean plate club?” Restaurant portions are also designed to fill us to capacity, not to
mention the joys of all you can eat buffets. In the face of this kind of programming
it should hardly be surprising that obesity is a nation-wide epidemic.

But this same stomach that creates such a problem for weight loss also offers us a
solution to this problem. I teach my clients to eat slowly and remain tuned in to
their stomach’s signals after every bite, rather than waiting until they feel stuffed to
listen to their stomach’s complaints. What this reveals is that the stomach gives a
more subtle signal when it is no longer churning with hunger. Instead our stomach
is simply calm. At this time the stomach is telling us “I’ve got enough now to fend
off starvation.”

While most overweight people are trained to ignore this early signal and keep on
stuffing themselves, it is easy to use hypnosis to help us experience this subtle
signal and stop eating at that point. Since it will take up to twenty minutes for the
food still in your mouth to reach your stomach, you will leave the table with a
comfortable feeling of satisfaction. But, you will not feel the sense of tiredness,
bloating or heartburn so common with a full stomach.

Along with tuning in to stomach signals, we can tune into our taste buds for help in
portion control. All of us are aware that when we are truly hungry the first bites of a
good meal are incredibly delicious. But after a few bites, as the edge of our appetite
is reduced, the taste of the food diminishes. After a few more bites the taste of the
food may entirely disappear and we are simply shoving the food in because it is
there.

Next time you sit down to a meal, notice how this is true for you. Now, here’s the
secret: if you tune into the enormous pleasure of eating those first bites you will
multiply your eating pleasure. Enjoy these bites even more by chewing slowly to
absorb all the subtle flavors. And as soon as this enormous pleasure is gone, as
soon as your eating becomes routine, even boring, simply STOP EATING. You can
put the rest of your delicious meal in the frig. Tomorrow those leftovers will bring
you a second serving of sheer gustatory ecstasy. But for today, the pleasure is gone,
and so is your need to eat.

Most of us are not accustomed to tuning in to our bodies in this way. Many of us are
conditioned to stuff our faces automatically throughout the day in response to every
feeling of stress, hunger, or simply boredom. Many of us are ruled subconsciously
by emotional eating habits which have nothing to do with our taste buds or our
physical hungers. These issues are addressed in Permanent Secrets of Weight Loss,
Parts 1-3. So it requires disciplined effort and patience at first to tune in to these
subtle signals. My work as a hypnotherapist often requires me to explore traumatic
mealtimes in my client’s memories in order to rescue their inner child from these
experiences where they learned inappropriate eating habits. Then hypnotherapy can
be used to help tune in to these signals from our bodies, and respond to them.
Remember that our eating habits, like all other habits, are stored in the
subconscious mind, which can be easily accessed in a hypnotic trance.

Once these new eating habits are in place the benefits are enormous. First, we lose
weight effortlessly without the need to count calories. Second, we multiply the
pleasures of eating as we learn to tune in to our bodies more efficiently. Thirdly, we
gain control over the common symptoms of heartburn, bloating and indigestion
which are the universal signals of poor portion control. Try practicing this new style
of eating.

Soon, you’ll discover that it is easy to control portion size by listening to your own
stomach and your taste buds. Then your life doesn’t have to be about controlling
your eating any more. Perhaps you can enjoy the valuable external controls of a
program like Jenny Craig or weight watchers while developing these internal
controls. But now you won’t always have to depend on others to control your eating
choices. Good luck on your journey.

About Alchemy Institute of Hypnosis: We offer a list of
hypnotherapists in your area. Our website also offers an
extensive library of information about hypnotherapy.
http://www.alchemyinstitute.com/articles.htm If you would like a specially trained
hypnotherapist to assist you in learning this new pattern of eating, call us at 800
-950-4984 or visit us online at http://www.alchemyinstitute.com/Weight-Loss/

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