Popcorn at the movies, pretzel at a baseball game, pizza and wings...........what other dynamic duos can you think of?

When I was searching for images for this post and typed "popcorn", more pictures of movie screens and theatres popped up then actual popcorn. There are several combinations like this that seem to be engrained in us. Most people can agree which two things go together - popcorn + movies, hot dog + baseball game, funnel cake + fair, cake + birthday, candy + Halloween. This is called event association. A certain event causes you to associate a certain food.

 

Companies that market these foods and drink play into our emotions and associations with certain events. Commercials are meant to pull on your feelings. They show the excitement at a sporting event or families gathered around having the best time while drinking a Coke or eating a certain food. They want you to crave their product at certain times.

For me, there are a lot of events and certain times of year where I have the feeling like I should have a certain food instead of actually craving it. Once I realized how many times I felt like I "should' have something because of what I was doing or what time of year it was, I was determined to reverse it.

Once I realized that I really didn't want the treats it became easier to resist. I was able to talk myself out of the craving. Now, I am not telling you that it was as easy as realizing that I wanted the food due to event association. It was still a struggle to talk myself out of wanting or even needing the food to enjoy the moment to it's fullest.

I started switching out certain foods for healthier options - taking SmartPop to the movies, buying frozen pizza instead of getting deep dish order out. Then slowly I began to not need any food that was close to the original craving.

Taking control of my health and relationship with food became easier as I understood the why. Knowing that it wasn't completely all my fault and just my cravings, helped me change my mindset.

My challenge to you is to be more mindful about your cravings. Why are you craving a certain food? Do you really want it or something you think you should have?

X - Rachel