The Guilty Pleasure Problem

I am certain that you have a food that comes to mind when I say Guilty Pleasure. Have you ever asked yourself “why the guilt?”

Jason Brooks is a performance Psychologist and he spoke to my clients about “The habitual thoughts.” And it made me wonder. What do these terms do to us over time?

Here’s a fun experiment for you. Not that this will work 100% of the time, but I want you to take a survey of the people who will say they “have a sweet tooth” or “can’t control themselves” or “are addicted to” certain types of foods. Anecdotally there is a consistent trend of concern over body image. Therefore, when they eat these foods, they feel bad, guilty or like a cheater.

So then came the “cheat day” for physique and fat loss style dieting. I think cheat days or cheat meals have been a thing since I got into the dieting world. When I listened to Jason, he made me realize something. We create a value for something and we make it negative at the same time. We believe it’s both a pleasure and fun, but we should feel bad if we do it.

It’s like the rules your parents made for you when you were a kid. The things you were “forbidden” to do, made you crave them more. Youth often end up becoming extremely rebellious this way because of the structure.

We had Saturday cereal in our household. Meaning if a cereal had more than 12grams of sugar per serving we could only have it on Saturdays. Pop and chips were only to be had as a weekend treat.

This is where my first rebellion started. As a little fat kid, when I became a teen, pop and chips were my crack. I would sneak into the storage room and hide stashes in my room. This about how ridiculous than is. I developed a relationship with these FOODS like I was hiding a drug.

Now I would say my parents had the right idea of regulation to some degree but there is a key missing step. Instruct why this is for the weekend what the food is doing to my eating habits. The sooner you allow autonomy of choice to be guided, the better the habit will be followed. I created a pedestal for these foods, rather than seeing them for the emptiness they filled with me.

I noticed when I lived with people who didn’t have to worry about their weight, that the way they could exist around food was different. If I see cookies on the table in a jar, I literally have to hide them in the freezer and bury them in other foods in order to not eat them. However, those who are use to seeing that type of food around would eat it as they felt they liked a little bit.

My resistance and guilt created a sense of wrong and also heightened the value of the food. So when I did eat it……Look the F out, because the fat kid is back from fat camp ‘and he’s hungry.

Then I thought, what if we look at what that food is actually. It’s not a bad thing but rather a fun thing. It’s a treat. The main purpose that food represents for me is fun, plain and simple. Not much different to our life when we can accept that fun is to be balanced with rest and discipline.

Now I essentially lowered the value of this Guilty Pleasure to become a fun treat. I appreciate the enjoyment I should get from it, rather than “oh shit here comes a fat kid episode.”

Not only did I change the narrative of the act, but I was able to realize that I should focus on enjoyment. (Rather than binge until it hurt my stomach, then vowing not to eat another cookie for the next 3 months.) This now became mindful eating. I focused on each and every bite.

Here’s one more step that can help immensely. Plan for it. Know that you should address treating yourself no differently than your personal TV time at night, or that nice relaxing wine or beer at the end of the week. We don’t live in front or our TVs and we know there’s a consequence to over consumption of alcohol, so we keep it as a treat. Do the same with your food.

The best part is that I crave them less, but I can have them more, because I see how they fit into my life. Some days I would just simply rather focus on feeling full and satisfied by whole foods rather than a cookie.

However, if it’s been a solid week, and it’s someone’s birthday then you better believe I’m going to enjoy that slice of cake and not feel bad about it.

Seriously…Have your cake and eat it too.