How to Resist Sweet Cravings – 5 Easy Strategies

A bag of chips for the movie, chocolate on the go and cookies at the office – sweets and snacks taste nice and make happy. This is because sugars increase the amount of the “Happy Hormone” Serotonin. But in all happiness – snacks and sweets are not healthy and should only be enjoyed in moderation. Following are the best strategies for successfully dealing with sweet cravings.

Reduce Supplies

If you do not have it, you cannot be tempted by it. Close the chapter of your chocolate drawer or sweets shelf. From today on, do not accumulate any supplies of sweets. From today on, only purchase what you will eat immediately, in mini-quantities. That way you cannot overeat and you will not get tempted later on to finish that giant bag of chips.

Make It Hard To Get

In the eventuality that you do get some extra supply at home, which easily happens at birthdays, Christmas or other special occasions, make them as hard to reach as possible. Any food scrap that is in your direct reach can be consumed before clear thinking has a chance of kicking in.

If you first have to get up, walk across the corridor and then down the stairs in order to reach your food, you will usually think twice before doing it – particularly if the DVD has already started playing. So put all sweets into the furthest corner of the home or at least at the rear of the top kitchen shelf.

Create Distractions

Now some chocolate or a nice mouthful of chips. These thoughts of sweet cravings usually occur for one of two reasons – either due to stress or due to boredom (especially in front of the TV). Without much conscious thinking it is easy to keep eating and consume food amounts that we normally would not consume.

For this reason you will want to try a distraction strategy: Before eating anything, try to first get something else done. This could be leaving the room briefly, washing your hands, checking your email, sending that text message, or just slowly counting up to 30. Often you can get over the moment of weakness with this strategy and resist temptation successfully.

Exercise Discipline – Set Limits

You do not have to eat the entire bag of chips or finish off the whole bar of chocolate. But somehow we keep doing just that. You can practice and learn to be more disciplined though. Break off a piece of chocolate or put a few chips into a bowl. And then close the packaging again and move it out of the way (see strategy #1). Then take only that portion with you and consume it – and no more!

Choose Alternatives

Have a look into some alternative foods and snacks that can help you eat less or at least more healthy. For example, instead of chips you might try some baked Italian Grissini (bread sticks). They are nice and crunchy, and way healthier than any salted, fried chip you’ll ever find.

Or try fruit sherbet instead of ice cream. Dried apricots make a good alternative to jelly beans and other candy.

The list can go on and on, but the key is to ask yourself what can satisfy you sufficiently to stop your sweet cravings. Everyone is different and likes different things, so try some out and see what works best for you.

If you employ these five strategies to deal with your sweet cravings, you should experience a good deal of success. One last piece of advice: do not try and cut out completely what you crave for – that will usually only serve to drive you crazy and eventually you’ll give in and end up gorging yourself. Instead give yourself permission to have some, but not too much.

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