What do you do to stay disciplined with the remaining 90% of your day?

[Driftwood]

I've got the exercising part down.  No issues in fitting in a workout or two a day.  I even throw in extra sets of bodyweight exercises while at work.

 

My issue is with what I eat.  On days where work is a whirlwind I have no problem eating healthy.  I'm too busy outside of meal times to be stuffing my face with food.  No issue with temptation on those days. 

 

On days where I have a lot of free time I run into problems.  There's various places in the office that we keep stocked with candy and snacks, and I just keep eating when I have nothing else to do.  I do the same at home sometimes, when I'm chilling in the evenings.  There's definitely a time period in the evenings after my son's bedtime where I need to be quiet enough so he can go to sleep, so I can't be running around the house being productive (cleaning, laundry, preparing food, etc).

 

Before kids if I was bored at home I would just change and go for a run or workout or to expore.  Now that's not really an option. 

 

What do you do during all the hours of the day that you're not free to just run off and do something fun or productive, but you don't want to eat out of temptation or boredom?

[Driftwood]

_{Throw out all the snacks.}

 

_{That only works for my own personal space.  Also, the world is full of snacks, so I need a more effective way to avoid them.}

[Driftwood]

I'll look for jerky.  I stopped snacking on jerky when I read the contents and saw sugar in there.  And I thought I was eating paleo.

[Walkingtree]

I've got a home-made hot sauce that I absolutely love. I dip veggies: sliced carrots, steamed broccoli or cabbage, romaine lettuce, etc.

[Shouathra]

If it's boredom, psychological cravings or the mere presence of snacks as opposed to real hunger, finding a new kind of distraction would be the ticket.  That is, a deliberate 'distraction' that's a mental reconditioning away from associating certain conditions with food.

 

My first choice was herbal tea, as it gives something for the mouth to do without adding any calories or caffeine.  Another thing is memorising stuff, such as quotes or poetry or Chinese characters.  As soon as I feel the mind and eyes wandering towards the pantry I'd force myself to recite something or mentally review something I'd been working on.  It's kind of like a mental "down and give me 20!"

 

Not that there aren't times when this line of defence fails, but it helps some of the time, and that's more than nothing.

[mzmtg]

If it's boredom, psychological cravings or the mere presence of snacks as opposed to real hunger, finding a new kind of distraction would be the ticket.  

 

A quick set of pushups or situps is a good distraction.

[lebe frei]

One of the problems that we heavy people have is that we lack the willpower to not only resist tempting food, but to resist eating too much. Frankly, the only real solution to this is to work on your willpower, which is REALLY HARD but it is also the only way to succeed for the long term. The other methods, all the distractions and tricks (I will go for a walk instead, I will lock my cookies away) are just band-aids that fall away when we are too stressed and look for comfort in our deliciously tempting treats.

 

Only by actually being able to say "no" and really mean it can we move on. It's the reason why so few people actually manage to lose weight and keep it off... it's so easy to give back in, and once your life changes just a little, especially for the worse, you find yourself eating again. We have to be strong in body AND mind, that is a very important lesson to learn in fitness.

[sjr243]

My husband is a huge snacker.  He will graze every few minutes or so when he is home.  He developed a solution to this: he scheduled his snacks.  He would eat breakfast at 7:00.  He knew at 9 he can have his first snack.  What's two hours?  At 9, have an apple, some jerky, whatever.  Then he knew he can eat at noon... you get the idea.  I have 2 small children and I have snacks for them all throughout the kitchen.  I am a stay at home wife/mother so I understand the whole snacking dilemma.  I have adopted his technique and though it does take some will power, it helps knowing how long I have to wait to get my next snack or meal.  Just a suggestion.

[lebe frei]

 I have adopted his technique and though it does take some will power

 

That doesn't just take "some" willpower, it's entirely what it is. Look at wikipedia:

 

 

Willpower may refer to:

Personal character

• Self-discipline, training and control of oneself and one's conduct, usually for personal improvement
• Self-control, the ability of a person to exert his/her will over the inhibitions of their body or self

 

 

You have both taken control of your food, your time and your health, instead of letting your desires for food control you. It's what we ALL have to do if we have an unhealthy relationship with food. Awesome job!

[sjr243]

Thank you!

[A banana]

I just give into my temptation to eat. I always crave something new and different so I eat a variety of things and cook alot.

[lebe frei]

I'm guessing you don't know what it's like to compulsively eat 5000 calories or more every day for years. "Giving into temptation" isn't a good idea for the overweight, unfortunately.

[SoftSoul]

That doesn't just take "some" willpower, it's entirely what it is. Look at wikipedia:

 

 

Willpower may refer to:

Personal character

• Self-discipline, training and control of oneself and one's conduct, usually for personal improvement
• Self-control, the ability of a person to exert his/her will over the inhibitions of their body or self

 

 

You have both taken control of your food, your time and your health, instead of letting your desires for food control you. It's what we ALL have to do if we have an unhealthy relationship with food. Awesome job!

 

 

Self-discipline doesn't work for the long term. Self-discipline is a limited resource. When other things eventually pull on this resource, or in times of mental weakness, we will revert back to our old habits.

 

A more effective way of dealing with emotional eating is to acknowledge and address the feelings that you are trying to suppress by eating. Is it stress? Boredom? First, figure out what the feeling is. Allow yourself to just feel it without reacting or judging it. Then figure out a more constructive way to deal with it. If you eat mainly out of boredom, you need to first acknowledge that "boredom" is just a perception. You could choose to see the world as a colorful, interesting place with thousands of possibilities. There are many options for quiet hobbies you could take up... reading, writing, building models, creating something, playing video games (on mute), doing crossword puzzles, and on... and on.

 

At work, you could bring your own snacks. Make all food not brought by you just off limits. Eat at scheduled intervals.... but this can drive a person crazy. Perhaps try to become more interested in the tasks in front of you... or just start writing a novel on company time. That's what I do :-)

[sea.bee]

Offices suck sometimes. When you can use the tactic, avoidance is good. I had to train myself to avoid the office with the candy jar until I simply stopped caring as much, the same way I had once trained myself to grab a piece or two of candy every time I was in said office.

 

If it's a common area like a meeting room that you can't really avoid, maybe you should bring a healthy snack to munch while everyone else is munching on office junk food. Eating is a social activity, so you'll still be involved in that aspect, just with more health.

 

I no longer carry spare change or $1 bills. I've really minimized paying cash in general. Our vending machines don't accept credit/debit cards, so if I don't have $0.75, no coke. If I don't have $0.60, no chips. If I have change from the store, I put it in our change bank once I get home. I transfer all $1 bills to my fiance's wallet. It's a stupid tactic, but it works. Because if I give into temptation in the morning, grab an egg mcmuffin for breakfast and have $1 in change, I'll both have an unhealthy breakfast and have a bag of chips later in the day. That's a lose-lose situation right there. I've tried to build habits that indirectly avoid junk food as often as possible. That way there are less situations when I have to directly say no, and I'll have more willpower for them.

 

So when I bring my food for the day to the office, I have it mentally designated into AM munchies, lunch, PM munchies. I can't say "I will eat this at 8:45 every day" because my day isn't that structured. And in case I go "man, my food is boring today", I've got a few different dressings and spices in my desk. Things that require no refrigeration work best due to the same willpower principle. Vinaigrettes probably work best for this. Creamy dressings, you may end up with a lab experiment on your hands.

[Gainsdalf the Whey]

My most succesful times were when I considered processed sugary foods a drug and myself no better than a junky. Thinking of myself as being that weak if I so much as touched a snack and chastising myself harshly when I did so was extremely good negative reinforcement that got me to stop doing it, as the kind of self deprivation wasn't worth the short term deliciousness.

[pattycake118]

I need to keep my hands busy.

 

At home, since you need to stay quiet, maybe you can tidy up the living room, etc while the kids are falling asleep. Or start a book/read the news - sit down in a comfy chair with a cup of tea and quietly read for a half hour or so.

 

At work, hold your water bottle with both hands. Seriously, this works for me. If you need, get a bigger water bottle so you need to hold it with both hands so you don't worry about dropping it. Hands full while chatting = hands not going for candy.

[.strike]

Think about how far I've come; think about my most recent gains; think about my hopefully soon-to-be-achieved gains; think about my long-term future gains. Remind myself that by giving into base impulses I am jeopardising all these things.

[El Exorcisto]

I think it would be down right impossible for me to maintain a given level of leanness for a long period of time. The idea of suffering day-in and day-out for months and years would be a real deal breaker for me. Since I started training the goals change, and the diet acutely changes to make those goals happen. In the beginning the pursuit was of strength alone, and I ate to make that happen. When I decided I had put on enough meat to make me happy I cut, hard, for 3 months and dropped 24 pounds. Now I'm on a three month bulk and I am back to eating like Epic Meal Time and gaining weight slowly. At the end of this three months I'll do another hard cut for six weeks and strip some more fat off. Cycling of goals just makes more sense to me. Time spent gaining must be tempered with time spent losing, and vice versa.

[liveforwonder]

It will annoy the bejeezus out of people around you, but bouncing my leg or something like that give me a little bit of activity while at a desk to keep my mind off food. Also gum. Gum is great for keeping your mouth busy. I also defend myself against snacking my saying something like "i just had gum so the taste would make anything i ate disgusting"

[SevenofSeven]

Eat enough at meal times and snack right. Since going Paleo this hasn't been a problem, it was the empty calories and sugar that made me go back for more and more and more!

[MalleusMaleficarum]

I have a method for this that's extremely effective for me as an individual.

 

1. Eat 1g protein/lb bodyweight daily
2. Eat 1 pound of vegetables daily
3. Drink one whole gallon of water daily

 

With these daily consumption goals in mind, I do not have the stomach space left over to eat crap.

 

Granted this isn't something I do all the time, and I'm not doing it right now - I am lucky to live in a part of the world with high quality local food all over the place, so I can easily just buy a bunch of meat, eggs and vegetables whenever I want. There is little temptation because I eat like a king every day.

 

Another thing I've found helpful to gradually train away the habit of eating crap is to decide that if I'm going to binge on it, I'm going to make it as painful as possible.

 

If I have an insatiable craving for candy, I go buy a pound of dollar store candy that expired in 1997 and eat nothing but that for a whole day. Obviously I feel like hell after it and don't want candy anymore. I'm in my mid 20's and all candy tastes like cough syrup to me now.

 

Obviously in the short term if you have some kind of weight loss goal you're not going to want to binge on candy because that could sabotage you, but this has worked for me.

 

Another thing I have learned over time is that it's beneficial to only ever change my diet gradually. If I go from eating a gallon of pasta a day to waking up one morning and trying to keto diet, I will probably fail. Not guaranteed, but the body doesn't seem to like fast change while it has an almost infinite capacity to adapt to gradual change. With that in mind I never try to restrict anything too fast and always taper things off over the course of about a month. If I've been lowering carbs and adding fat over the course of a month, it doesn't seem so hard to turn down cake.