Everyday Systems

http://www.salon.com/env/feature/2009/06/18/overeating/

Interesting interview with the author of The End of Overeating (this book may have already been discussed on this board). I thought of No S when he says one of the ways people succeed in keeping weight off is by setting unambiguous rules to live by. Works for me!

I read this book last week! He really does hint at a lot of No-S principles (reduce portion sizes, eat healthy (or healthier) foods, make it a habit ... and he explores cultural differences too a bit. The only downside is that I can really see people reading it and saying yeah that it makes sense, but it's kind of vague and doesn't give people a real standard to live by. If it stays vague, then it's a lot easier to not follow the principles - that's why people say when you set goals you are supposed to make them specific and measurable. If it's not specific, how do you know when you are actually following it?

Anyway, it was an interesting book - I checked it out at the library and was tempted to put a little card with the No-S web address on it in the book so that people can find some real, do-able rules for living/eating.

Here are the pieces that really resonated with No-S to me, from the last page.

Our data suggests that a greater percentage of obese individuals and overweight individuals have this. But a significant percentage of lean people have it. If you say to them -- "Do you have a hard time resisting? Do you think about foods? Do you have a hard time stopping?" -- a significant percentage of lean people say, "That's me."

The question is, how have they stayed lean? For many of them the fact is, they're in torment. It's a constant struggle. Others have laid down new learning, and that's made it easier. They develop rules for themselves that they follow. Then, you're not constantly eating in a chaotic, disorganized way. You're not constantly being cued. Your brain's not being constantly activated. But those rules have to be unambiguous, and they're not easy to follow.

In the end, they have what's called a critical perceptual shift. They look at food differently. How do you really cool a stimulus? How do you decrease the anticipation of the food, the power of the food to activate, to grab attention? The answer to that is you view the stimulus differently.

If you look at a huge plate of fries and say "That's my friend, that's going to make me feel better, I want that," that's only going to increase the level of anticipation. You look at that huge plate of fries and say, "That's not my friend, that's going to make me feel pretty crummy in 20 minutes. I don't want that," and you internalize that, then you can decrease the anticipation.

But if you have any doubts, if you have this back-and-forth debate in your head -- "Boy that's great. I shouldn't have that" -- that only increases the anticipation more.

What's the great success with tobacco? Did we change the product? No. We changed how the product was perceived. It used to be perceived as something that was glamorous, something that people wanted to do that was cool. We changed the perception, the social norm. It's now viewed as a deadly, disgusting, addictive product. Where it was once positively valenced, as scientists call it, we made it negatively valenced.

And then a bit further down...

But how is laying down new learning or creating rules any different than the call to have willpower?

Rules can help calm down the brain activation. If you say to a smoker, "You can't smoke for the next four hours. It's impossible," that's calming. On a plane, no smoker opens the emergency exit mid-flight and says, "I need a cigarette." It's because they know it's impossible. It cools down the stimuli.

I got to the point where I said, "I'm not going to eat French fries because I know if I eat them, I'm going to finish all of them." There's just no way I'm going to be able to resist. And now when I look at French fries I don't have thoughts of anticipation. My brain doesn't get activated, because I've been able to internalize that rule and I follow that rule and it becomes automatic.

This does look interesting (and very no-s like).

I certainly hope the title proves an accurate prediction!

Think I'll try to get my hands on a copy...

Marleah wrote:

The only downside is that I can really see people reading it and saying yeah that it makes sense, but it's kind of vague and doesn't give people a real standard to live by.

Which is where no-s comes in!



Reinhard

Since it's a Friday, I'll go with NO S's:

Exactly what I wa_ thinking--that old KI_ _ adage- Keep it _imple _tupid!--i_ exactly what No _ doe_ to all "the moderation, behave like _kinny people do, but you can _till have a life philo_ophy" -- it _imply provide_ 14 (I like the 14 word ver_ion better than the 13!) little word_ that _um it up in one _entence.

The Weekend Version of This Post:
Exactly what I was thinking--that old KISS adage- Keep it simple stupid!--is exactly what No S does to all "the moderation, behave like skinny people do, but you can still have a life philosophy" -- it simply provides 14 (I like the 14 word version better than the 13!) little words that sum it up in one sentence.

No, I'm not going to keep doing this for all my posts but it seemed like a good idea for this one!

I listened to this book on audio a few weeks ago and a lot of it really does correlate with much of No S. It is actually what inspired me to restart with No S. (I gained 10 pounds this winter, left to my own devices, so obviously that wasn't working for me. ) Hopefully others will find their way here (or back) as well ...

"Rules can help calm down the brain activation."

I skimmed the book at a bookstore while I was buying other books, and it does look interesting. I already have it on reserve at the library.

The sentence above summarizes what I think is the key point of the book. With No S, there are three simple rules -- but there are all sorts of people following modified versions of this.

What I find different from No S (what The End of Overeating doesn't seem to have) is the concept of the S Day. I actually think the S Day concept is more important than the No S rules. Kessler is on edge like many dieters, thinking -- as Valerie Bertinelli put it in People Magazine -- you're just one halapena pepper away from being fat again.

I like the calming effect of knowing you can eat whatever you want and however much you want on an S Day, and I think that is what makes this diet really work. It's one thing to face the rest of your life with limited portion sizes and foods that are healthy for you but not exactly what you crave. It's another thing entirely to only have to wait a few days to have whatever you want.

Kathleen

reinhard wrote: Marleah wrote:

The only downside is that I can really see people reading it and saying yeah that it makes sense, but it's kind of vague and doesn't give people a real standard to live by.

Which is where no-s comes in!



Reinhard

In the trailers for the movie Food, Inc., Michael Pollan says that our relationship with food has changed more in the last 50 years than in the previous 10,000. I wondered, "what's happened in the last 50 years?"

A lot of things have happened. But I think there's one change that made us more vulnerable to the other changes: women left the kitchen.

In truth, it's not even that we left the kitchen. In years past, many women "of means" never entered the kitchen. But they had authority over what happened in the kitchen and in the dining room. They set the standard for not only what was cooked, but when and how it was consumed. The habits surrounding eating, if you will.

I've heard Pollan say in an interview that initially the food industry had a hard time convincing women to use their new products. But as more and more of us entered the workforce, it became easier for them to convince us to use their products. We trusted them; we handed over our authority to them. Turns out not to have been a wise move.

Now the food industry, media and advertising are the authorities. Look what they've accomplished in 50 years! I have friends who don't believe in the power of those habits, but they were what kept us on the straight and narrow for those 10,000 years. They were as powerful as the food habits we follow for religious reasons. It was as unthinkable to not follow them as it was for a Catholic to eat meat on Friday, or for a Jewish person or a Muslim to eat pork. It just wasn't done.

Unfortunately, one of the things they've done is to make us believe that we can't make a wise decision regarding food. We need to look to some "authority" to make sure we're making wise decisions. That authority is no longer our mothers or grandmothers. Also unfortunately, most of the authorities don't agree! Ironically, while there were some differences between the mothers and grandmothers around the world, their teachings were more alike than different.

It frustrates and amazes me that in just a couple of generations, we've lost so much of the knowledge and authority we once had. I get most frustrated when I see intelligent, well-educated people not being able to make a simple decision regarding food -- either the cooking or the eating of it.

Maybe we need not only to go back to eating what our grandmothers or great-grandmothers recognize as food, but follow the same habits they did, too.

We're eating, in essence, adult baby food. Twenty years ago the average chews per bite was about 20, now it's two or three.

I got a chuckle out of Kessler's characterization of "hyper-palatable" foods layered with sugar/fat/salt as "adult baby food", but then it occurred to me that this might be a useful line of thought when tempted to fall back on processed foods ...

From today's Well blog:

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/06/2 ... /#comments