How You Feel Before and After Giving in to Your Chocolate Craving
Giving in to Your Craving
How You Feel Before and After Giving in to Your Chocolate Craving
Interesting reading from Kelly McGonigal’s book THE WILLPOWER INSTINCT, about how you feel before and after giving in to your chocolate craving. She writes that researchers have observed a mixed inner experience of desire and stress in women who crave chocolate.
She goes on to say the women show a startle response when they see images of chocolate, a physiological reflex associated with alarm and arousal, as if spotting a predator in the wild.
When the women were asked what they were feeling, they said both pleasure and anxiety along with feeling out of control.
They learned that the tasting of the chocolate never reflected the strength of the desire and anxiety. Once you learn that the reward isn’t as valuable as having control over the alarm of the craving, you can be sure of your ability to resist chocolate and make a choice to enjoy it or not.