The Hook, the Addiction, and the Challenge!

When it comes to food everyone, just like Peter Pan, has at least one or more hooks in their lives, depending upon emotional states and eating habits. Can you say no to your "hooks?" Chances are you can if you have adopted smart eating strategies, such as those lined out in the 12 Steps to Wholeness guide.

Chapter Three of Original Fast Foods addresses addictive eating patterns and discusses the powerful physiological effects of certain foods which stimulate the release of dopamine within the pleasure response pathway. This powerful drug always causes us to want more of whatever stimulates its production in the first place. Just one bite is enough to set it off.

Smart eating choices trump willpower when it comes to these powerful forces that are built into your physiological makeup. By comparison, unwise eating choices hook you by stimulating the release of dopamine, which produces an addictive response every time.

More and more research studies effectively demonstrate that certain foods have real addictive influences upon us. At the top of the list of addictive foods is junk food. Why? Because food scientists who are hired by food companies understand the addictive qualities of certain ingredients (salt, fat, sugar, chocolate, caesin, etc.). They spend their laboratory time formulating junk food that is designed to "hook" you by preying upon your physiological makeup. They add the ingredients to their products which cause the release of dopamine. As you eat junk foods, even a single bite will stimulate the release of dopamine in your brain, which produces an overpowering desire to eat more of whatever you just ate which produced the response. Of course, they are scientists and their job is to get you to eat what their company sells.

Ironically yet sadly the saying, "Nobody can eat just one," was designed as a part of a promotion for junk food back in the 1960s (Lays Potato Chips). Study Chapter Three of Original Fast Foods carefully. Come to understand why the recommendations in 12-Steps to Wholeness are smart and why it is they support stable blood-sugar levels within you and help you to resist that first bite of truly addictive foods.

If you don't want to end up being "One Big Family" then master the simple eating pattern that fills you up without filling you out.