Weight loss starts in your brain. Changing food habits is a head game. Here’s why. Experts suggest it takes at least twenty-one days. I find it takes longer with food behaviors. Consider that your focused effort to maintain any structured practice of a chosen behavior will give you a better chance of attaining it. Not only will you be more likely to stay on track, you will be recreating a new pattern that your brain will want to adopt. Assuming your brain controls the behavior, sending signals through the nervous system calling for appropriate action. The brain wants to auto-adapt so that it can respond to your demands in a way that requires a minimum output of energy to accomplish that task. With repetition, your brain does not forget what you did the time before, the day before, the week, and decades before. It is like an x-ray or energetic imprint that you hold on a cellular level. You are building repetition of a new behavior that will become part of your neural patterning.
This takes time but eventually resistance can be significantly reduced and the new behavior will be met with less effort. We see this process driving a car. At first, our awareness needs to be keen. We need to think about each step with a more focused intention. Over time, we don’t need to think about the mechanics of driving, we simply get in the car and go. The specific step by step mechanics have been habituated. Most of us don’t think about driving when we are traveling to and from. Our minds are open to have random thoughts unrelated to driving. Another example of auto-adaptation is showering. Once we become comfortable with the mechanical steps of how to safely and effectively shower, we are able to modify our behavior with little or no anxiety. Sometimes we may want to shave, or apply a leave-in-conditioner, or make life-altering decisions. Regardless, our thoughts are free to wander because we have already adapted to the task of showering. For many of us this leaves more time for meaningful, passionate singing. Your brain will adapt to new eating behaviors as well. Within a few weeks, new patterns will form new habits and eating healthier can become automatic. Adopt new eating behaviors now so you don't have to fight with yourself every day mustering up motivation to choose the carrots over the cookies?