Hunger is Overpowered
Written by Kyle Ligon - MovementLink Head Coach
Hunger is an ancient survival signal that is now an exaggerated, overpowered cue within the realities of our modern environment. Many have a relationship with the feelings of hunger that can drive them into a state of being “hangry” (angry + hungry) when things don’t go perfectly. Similar to how, if we perceive stress as enhancing, it is, simply how we view hunger can have a massive impact on how it actually affects our mood, our performance, and what types of foods we eat.
We are human. We will feel hungry. In this article, I want to lay out the perspective on hunger I use for myself and with my clients in the MOMENTUM Program, to help people dial back their freakouts and embrace the inevitable feelings of hunger as just an exaggerated feeling that provides us information. With this upgrade perspective, sticking to your nutrition plan when you’re feeling hungry becomes a much easier and comfortable path.
Why did I say hunger is an “overpowered cue”? From an evolutionary perspective, it is extremely important for us to feel hungry. As humans we have to eat to survive and without a signal, especially one that is as strong as hunger, humans wouldn’t have enough drive, and early enough, to put the time and energy into hunting, gathering, and eating. In fact, research has been done on mice with lesions on their lateral hypothalamus, ultimately leading the drive to seek and consume food to be eliminated. Even with food inches from their mouths, they would essentially starve to death if they were not force fed.
As hunter gatherers, the vast majority of our days and efforts were spent gathering and preparing food. With harvests and hunts being less than certain, it could take days to find food. It was imperative that our brain made food a top priority and therefore hunger one of the strongest signals we feel to ensure we prioritize food.
But just like many evolutionary mismatches (when our environment evolves faster than our bodies) of our modern world, we are not in the same hunter gatherer situations, our brains just don’t know it yet. In our privileged modern environment, our next meal is certain and the hunger signals we receive when our stomach is empty are simply earlier and stronger than they need to be. It worked for us for tens of thousands of years, but because of our very recent abundance of food, it’s now more of a distorted signal.
When we are managing the evolutionary mismatches that can cause us issues, there are two categories of strategies that are extremely helpful:
Better align the environment and physical stimuli with our body’s evolutionary needs,
Be mindful of what the signals actually mean.
Align with Evolutionary Needs
The hormone Ghrelin is known as the “hunger hormone” released by an empty stomach and Leptin is known as the “satiety hormone” released by fat cells. Our food choices dramatically influence the timing and strength of these signals.
When our diet consists mostly of real foods, high in protein, fat, and fiber, digestion slows down and satiety rises. So, the amount of time before we feel hungry again after eating 1,000 calories of steak and vegetables would be much longer than if we were to eat 1,000 calories of ice cream.
I’ve discussed this example in detail in my article, Surrounded by Supernormal Stimuli, so I’ll only briefly touch on it here. Imagine you are a hunter gatherer who came across a bee hive. They are rare to access and can be a lot of painful effort to get the honey. With the next month’s food unknown, it makes perfect sense that our brains would trigger us to eat as much as possible of this sugary, high calorie treat.
When our brains were triggered to eat and eat, we would always run out of honey well before it made us obese, so there were only long-term benefits to the eat-as-much-as-you-can signal.
Today, food is all around us, especially extremely palatable processed foods with tons of sodium and sugars. So now, when our brain triggers us to eat as much as possible, it’s a huge problem.
To align physical stimuli with our primitive body, by eating real foods and avoiding sugars, added sugars, and sugar substitutes (the triggers to this craving), our hunger signals will be dampened and delayed and it will help adjust our Body Fat Set Point to lean.
Hunger is Enhancing Mindset
Next, we want to use this knowledge to be mindful of what a hunger signal meant for us historically and what it means today. With food being scarce, it means it’s time to make food a top priority. In our modern world, it means our stomach is empty. It does not mean that if you don’t eat something right away you’re going to have an energy crash. It does not mean that you do not have enough body fat stored and are at risk of starving to death. The signal is strong, so sometimes we misinterpret it into these things, but it’s simply not the case today.
In fact, especially when fat loss is a goal, we need our stomach empty and to dip into our fat stores. Not only will it use our body fat for fuel, but our fat can be a preferred fuel. Although a couple of days with an empty stomach would be a hindered state, simply having your stomach empty for a few hours absolutely is not. It is perfectly OK and necessary to reduce body fat.
When we allow our stomach to be empty for a few hours, we activate crucial processes beyond just using fat stores:
Improves metabolic flexibility - our body being able to run on different proportions of carbohydrate, fats, and proteins and use these macronutrients more dynamically.
Insulin sensitivity - when unfed, the pancreas secretes very little insulin keeping our cells responsive to normal amounts of insulin being released in our fed state.
Organ health and cellular clean-up - when we are fed, we are in build mode, but when we are unfed we are in repair and clean-up mode, fixing damaged cells and getting rid of dead ones.
Gut microbiome support - being unfed gives our intestinal walls a rest helping prevent leaky gut while also shifting the composition of our gut bacteria, favoring beneficial species.
We have an improved quality of sleep when we are in an unfed state.
We have enhanced mental clarity due to shifts in brain chemistry.
Also, surprising to most, because hunger is driven by hormones, the feeling of being hungry will actually come and go, with or without food. When I do find myself hungry between meals, I find it very useful to remind myself that hunger is just a feeling, my body has all the energy and resources it needs to thrive, and I’m lucky enough to be certain that I’m not about to go a day without eating.
Without this type of thinking, when we are hungry, our primitive brain does not know it’s not life or death for us. So, if we are less proactive and let ourselves get swept away in it, our brain pushes us to eat high calorie, fast digesting foods…exactly the types of foods that trigger more and more cravings, increase our blood sugar, have low nutrient density, and foods that we want to extremely limit in our diet.
MOMENTUM Nutrition Strategies in Action
When we start putting our new relationship with hunger into practice in the real world, we can see how other MOMENTUM nutrition strategies synergize with this perspective:
Eat mostly real food - helps us feel satiated longer.
No snacks / If you’re hungry eat a full meal - we are better equipped to wait patiently for our next meal and understand that we are not hindered from feeling a little hungry.
Consume all your calories within 2-3 meals and a 6-12 hour eating window - when you’re within your eating window, you don’t have to wait long for your next meal.
Plan your meals - when you know what you’re going to eat and about what time, it’s easier to push the hunger signals aside.
Center meals around protein - protein helps us feel satiated longer.
Eat a lot of fibrous foods - fiber helps us feel satiated longer.
Extremely limit
Processed foods - processed foods are highly triggering and digest fast. Replacing processed foods with real foods helps us feel satiated longer.
Sugars, Added Sugars, and Sugar Substitutes - reduces cravings dramatically.
Healthy, Predictable Hunger
The goal is not constant hunger, but it’s also not never feeling hungry.
It’s important to mention that once you establish a healthy relationship with hunger, when it arrives, it won’t feel like a battle. It becomes a minor, informative signal that gets easier and easier to handle. Yes, being unfed feels different than being fed, but neither state is a hindrance.
The goal is not to be hungry all the time and just learn to deal with it! You should be eating amounts that make when you feel hungry make sense. I don’t eat my first meal until around 10:30 am. It makes sense that I tend to start feeling hungry around 9:30 am. If I am going to bed every night starving, I am likely not eating enough food. When our body fat set point is at a lean level, the amount of food you eat, following the MOMENTUM Nutrition Strategies, should 1) make you feel satiated and 2) only sustain lean levels of body fat.
One last note: when we do make a change to our diet, eating windows, etc., we can expect, in the short-term, more and stronger hunger and cravings than we will after a week or two. Just like our body has gotten used to our current routines and will ask for them, it will get used to our new routines and, because they are healthier, they will love them even more!
