“You have to rig the game so you can win, set yourself the lowest minimal bar to do something. That was really the key to my success.” – Sarah

It happens to the best of us. You get a little older, your life changes, you start moving less, maybe have a kid or two, and before you know it the extra pounds have slowly crept on. And when you finally realize something needs to be done about it you find you can’t lose it as easily as you used to.

This can be a crucial moment in a person’s life. Do I hop on a diet and get back to my target weight right away or do I look at my lifestyle and start thinking long-term? The latter can seem like a daunting task and you may lack confidence in your ability to do it. But it is the only way to achieve lasting success.

This insight was the key to Sarah’s success. Having been raised on whole foods she found Summer Tomato and immediately identified with the philosophy of using Real Food to lose weight. She knew dieting was not the answer.

Exercise was a different story. Sarah knew that developing a consistent workout routine would be crucial for her success, but that it would also be her most challenging obstacle to overcome.

In this episode Sarah explains the very small yet critical mindset shift she made that enabled her to not only build an exercise routine, but to look forward to it every day.

If you hate exercise and have been trying to develop a routine for years without success I invite you to try Sarah’s approach. It’s a game changer.

Wish you had more time to listen to the podcast? I use an app called Overcast (no affiliation) to play back my favorite podcasts at faster speeds, dynamically shortening silences in talk shows so it doesn’t sound weird. It’s pretty rad.

Related links:

In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto by Michael Pollan

Foodist: Using Real Food and Real Science to Lose Weight Without Dieting by Darya Rose, Ph.D

You Never Regret A Workout

Home Court Habits: The Secret to Effortless Weight Control

The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business by Charles Duhigg

MyFitnessPal

Mindful Meal Challenge

Zero – fasting tracker app from Kevin Rose

No, You Don’t Deserve That Indulgence Today

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If you’d like to be a guest on the show, please fill out the form here and tell us your story.

Monica has a demanding job with hours that are continuously changing. She is responsible for producing original ideas at a moment’s notice, which is very intellectually demanding. Although she enjoys her work, the stress of the job causes her to snack constantly whether she is hungry or not.

It doesn’t help that her job is copywriting for fast food and snack companies and there are always plenty of treats around for her to indulge in whenever good ideas are not flowing.

Monica knows that she needs to deal with work anxiety in a healthier way. In general, she has a very healthy lifestyle. At home she eats mindfully, has a regular exercise routine and cooks healthy foods. However, when she gets to work she compares it to a “black hole” where she disappears into “non-healthstyle land.”

The overeating at work caused by stress ends up making her tired, hurting her stomach and does not align with her values. Together we come up with ideas for how Monica can resolve her anxiety using her mind instead of food.

Wish you had more time to listen to the podcast? I use an app called Overcast (no affiliation) to play back my favorite podcasts at faster speeds, dynamically shortening silences in talk shows so it doesn’t sound weird. It’s pretty rad.

Related links:

How to Eat More Mindfully in 19 Seconds

Listen:

Listen on iTunes

Listen on Stitcher

Listen on Soundcloud

If you’d like to be a guest on the show, please fill out the form here and tell us your story.

This week our Ask Darya question is from Leslie:

Hey Darya, I have a question for you about that sentence you inserted regarding your exercise regimen.

I’m a healthy person who just wants to stay where I am weight-wise, but I’m working on going from mild to moderate/high exercise in order to increase my endurance and strength. My current challenge is balancing enough exercise so that I’m making progress, but not so much that by body thinks I’m hungry all the time (hello, Hunger Tiger). I know that I’ve read on your site that you are familiar with this phenomenon, that too much exercise can throw your hunger off balance, leading you to overeat. However, I read your weekly exercise description–4x strength training, 2x HIIT, 1x pilates–and when I workout that amount, I get so, so hungry. I know everyone is different, but do you have any advice for how someone can discover a balance between the right amount of food and exercise?

This is a great question because she’s asking about a specific behavior she’s struggling with in her healthstyle. In this video I clarify my own workout habits (I’m not crazy, I swear) and offer some advice on how to modify your snacking habits so you don’t overeat on intense exercise days.

Want me to answer your question? Submit it on the Ask Darya page.

Cheers,

Darya

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Photo by nettsu

Whenever I ask people what the most difficult habit is for them to break, late night snacking is often the first thing they say. This doesn’t surprise me.

If you feel like a zombie every night when you get home from work, it’s because you pretty much are one. Even if you enjoy your job, you are still subject to countless stressors throughout the day that deplete your cognitive resources––especially those required for self-control. Without a well of willpower to rely on at the end of the day, our brains go into autopilot to avoid more heavy lifting.

For these reasons, more than at any other time of day our evening actions are guided by habit. All the cues and triggers around our home––the TV, computer, couch, etc.––guide us mindlessly to the pantry for the cookies, or the freezer for the ice cream, and we eat to our heart’s content (not our mind’s or stomach’s content, those guys stopped caring hours ago). Stopping doesn’t even occur to us. We just continue until the cookies are gone, or the carton is empty.

It makes sense that these late night eating habits are particularly difficult to kick. Bad food habits are hard to break as is, but at night we have even less self-control than at other times of day for reshaping them, so we usually don’t even try. These habits are also especially strong, since they are deeply entrenched through weeks, months and years of repetition.

So what should we do?

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For The Love of Food

Welcome to Friday’s For The Love of Food, Summer Tomato’s weekly link roundup.

This week intense exercise reduces appetite, health-conscious companies make more money, and psychology’s power to influence food choices.

Want to see all my favorite links? (There’s lots more). Be sure to follow me on on Delicious. I also share links on Twitter @summertomato,  Google+ and the Summer Tomato Facebook page. I’m very active on all these sites and would love to connect with you. (And yes, I took that pepper heart pic myself).

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