How to Break the Cycle of Overeating on Autopilot | TMOHP Episode 174

Hey everybody, welcome back to the podcast. This week inside my group coaching program, Your Missing Peace, a topic came up repeatedly and we had such a productive and fun coaching session that I decided it would be cool to share the ideas that we played with in that coaching session in this podcast episode.

The original topic that sparked so much coaching and conversation was about how to handle eating when you're overeating at certain times of day and when it's happening without even thinking about it.

So a member wanted help coming up with strategies for getting out of autopilot. How do I, not go on autopilot? How do I not eat without thinking about it? And she said, I, I want these strategies, but also, I need help remembering to use the strategies once I come up with them.

Here is the thing we, high achievers are awesome at creating plans and to-do lists and systems. We can do it in our sleep. I bet right now you could sketch out a plan for upgrading or changing your eating. You could do that very easily. But implementing the plan, that's where things start to fall apart or maybe never even get started. And this is where the overeating boomerang pattern that I want to talk with you about today comes into play.

Beth is somebody who's in the program. And by the way, the names I'm going to use in this episode are not people's real names. I want to protect their privacy and anonymity. So we're going to call this person Beth.

Beth is in Your Missing Peace, and she's got some great strategies for addressing the reasons that she overeats. They work for her. The problem is, as she puts it, between three to five in the afternoon on many days she completely forgets about all the things that work and that she does at other times of day. So her question is, how do I keep this stuff front of mind when I need it the most?

Alicia is another member and she has the same question. Her overeating usually happens later at night. But when we really work to nail it down, she estimates that there's this two-to-three-hour window that accounts for 50% of her overeating. And if she could figure out how to sail through these problematic evening hours without overeating, she would win massively.

Dani's in the program, and she's even more upfront about the struggle. She says she can completely relate to what everybody else has brought up on this topic. And on top of that, she says, sometimes I just say F it, I just say, F it. I don't want to do the right thing at certain moments, at certain times of day in certain situations.

And I know there's some nodding heads as I'm describing this. So what's the deal? Why is it that smart women. Capable women who understand some really important things about the reasons that they are eating, why is it that they go on autopilot and do the exact kind of eating that they don't want to do?

Let's talk about something that I am labeling the overeating boomerang. This is a mind trap. And it is a trap that way too many smart women create for themselves without even realizing it. And it is a trap that leads to a lot of overeating of emotional eating and even bingeing.

Let me give you some more examples. Beth. Remember, Beth loses track of her plan and her eating and ends up eating food She doesn't want to eat and isn't hungry for many days between three and five in the afternoon. And when I ask her how she's feeling between three and five, she says, I'm kind of tired. I feel like I'm not going to get everything done. Like I have a lot to do and it's not going to happen. I feel kind of untethered. I want a break.

Then when I ask her how she wants to feel between three and five. She says, I want to find something to redirect me into more productive energy. She wants to be able to keep going. I want to point out that Beth is retired. Beth doesn't have a firm deadline. She doesn't have a set of demands that have to be accomplished most days between three and five. But her inner driver wants her to be productive during that time.

Alicia's trouble Time with overeating happens at night. And, she has ideas. She knows some things. She can easily rattle off things that help her not eat when she's not hungry. When she's in the mood and when she has the energy to do them. Between eight and 10, that's usually not happening. Alicia always has more to do. And in her ideal world, when we start to explore that she wouldn't overeat at night. Instead, she'd be focused and she'd be able to get done the things that she needs to get done.

And here's Dani's situation. Dani has incredible energy and she knows that one of her strengths is the amazing energy that she brings to her life and to her work. And she loves being in that state. But sometimes the energy shifts and when she can't get back to that high energy, place, that groove that she likes to be in. When she can't get herself back on track, this is, when in her words, those F it feelings start. I just don't care anymore. F it. And she feels frustrated and then she feels frustrated with the eating that happens after that.

Here's the thing. All three of these women in Your Missing Peace are describing an overeating boomerang pattern. They are boomeranging between options their brain has decided they have to choose between. And this is why so much of their overeating and emotional eating is happening.

The mindset trap is that the ideal situation is to find a way to shift back into productivity. To shift back into a place where you want to keep getting things done. To shift back into a place where you feel different, where you feel more positive.

Not one of us can be in these types of states a hundred percent of the time. And each of these Missing Peace members has identified solidly a time of day or a specific situation or set of situations where they usually aren't in that state. They're tired, or maybe they're out of bandwidth, or maybe it is just the end of the day, and they've used up all their creative focus.

The situations that each of these women are describing are different. But all of their brains are telling them that they need to get back to a different place with their energy. They need to feel differently. They need to have more to give. And that's not going to happen

so much of the time, if you are a high achiever and your brain is telling you that the only acceptable thing is to do option A and you can't do it. It's just not possible, but you don't see another alternative. The alternative becomes too numb out. There's always a reason we eat. There's always a reason we overeat. And there's always a reason that we have a desire to eat or to overeat.

When you have a mindset that your job is to deny or disregard or ignore the reason that is compelling you or that is propelling you to walk into your pantry and put your hand in the bag of chocolate chips, then you're stuck in a place that leaves you feeling pretty ineffective.

This is what's happening for these women who are eating on autopilot, whose stories I'm sharing with you. They have a mindset that is telling them that they need to deny or disregard or ignore the reason that they want to eat.

Beth, who was mindlessly eating in the afternoon, she was telling herself she needed to not be tired. She needed to have energy, she needed to keep on going, keep working, keep being productive. So she either had to find a way to not be tired and get back to work, or go on autopilot and eat through her feelings or numb her feelings. Many afternoons, she chooses eating and then she gets mad at herself.

Alicia was tired. Her brain was tired. She just wanted to relax and do something easy and fluffy. But her mind, her beliefs and the stories she told herself, told her that it wasn't okay to take some downtime in the evening to relax. Her mind told her that that wasn't a productive thing to do. That wasn't the right thing to do. So she eats to avoid the feelings and the thoughts instead. Those are the alternatives.

Dani pushes herself to create that good energy. And by the way, she's really good at it. But when she isn't feeling it and when she doesn't have the bandwidth to get back to that good energy, the alternative becomes I need to just numb out with food because I can't do the thing that I feel like I'm supposed to do.

When the alternatives are either to find a way to be superhuman. And deny your needs. Deny your feelings. Deny your current state. Or go on autopilot so you can use food as a way to cope with your needs and your feelings in your current state. Or so that you can use food to numb or push down your feelings or your needs with food. Then you've got a dilemma. Those two choices keep you stuck.

When the alternatives are to find a way to be superhuman and deny your needs and any other alternative doesn't feel acceptable. Then it's a recipe for eating, overeating and emotional eating as a way to numb or to soothe or to comfort, or to procrastinate or to feed your hidden hungers in some other kind of way.

When we coached on this in the group this week, none of the members realized at first that they were giving themselves only two options. Be superhuman or numb out.

Nobody realized this. It was operating below the surface.

And not only did they not realize that they were stuck between these two options. Neither option was workable.

 To stop boomeranging between superwoman and overeating, you need a third choice. You need an option that pays attention to first by asking, and then by acknowledging how you're feeling, what you need, what you want.

You need an option that includes compassion for the reality of your situation. Even if there's not anything you can do about it. If the reality is that you are tired or out of bandwidth or frightened, or anxious or bored, or whatever it is, you need an option that has compassion and kindness for the reality of your situation.

You need an option that acknowledges your feelings. Your emotional feelings, your physical state, one that acknowledges these things, instead of telling yourself to suck it up buttercup, you need to keep going. You need to not be tired.

During your most challenging times of day with food. You need an option that probably looks a lot more like one you would offer someone else. Like the way that you would treat everyone else in your life. Which is probably nicer and more kindly than the way you talk to yourself and set your own expectations.

As you play with this stuff, it's going to be a work in progress. So as we left the coaching session, Beth is going to experiment with no longer thinking of the hours between three to five as productive time. They are not productive hours for her. Alicia is experimenting with giving herself permission to do non-productive things in the evening. Which ironically might be more productive because when you think about it, what she's discovered is that if she could take care of the overeating during these couple of hours in the evening, it would heal 50% of her overeating.

So the possibility is that doing non-productive things in the evening might be the most productive thing she could do to address this issue. Right. I think that's pretty awesome. Dani is going to experiment with what it might be like to be kind to herself when she doesn't feel full to the brim with amazing energy instead of always pushing herself to make it happen.

All of these women are experimenting with allowing themselves to be tired or in a bad mood or less than perfect, and to have compassion about the situation. This is how you escape the overeating boomerang cycle. You start by checking in with yourself so that you can learn more about your cycle with overeating or emotional eating or bingeing. So that you can learn more about your trouble spots and also about how you're feeling when it happens.

How you can care for these feelings and these situations instead of pushing yourself to make them be different, to make you be different, to make how you feel different. How can you take care of yourself the way you are? How can you take care of yourself in this challenging situation, given the way things really are?

Now, I'm wondering if as you listen to this episode, you're maybe thinking of a place where you get stuck. In that place are you expecting yourself to be or do or feel things that just aren't realistic, that just aren't going to happen?

Are you stuck between a superwoman expectation and having to use food as a way out or an escape or a numbing device? If this is the case, it's time to ask yourself what your alternative might look like or feel like.

I am telling you, even if you don't know the answer right now, these are powerful questions. This is the kind of work we do inside Your Missing Peace. and it is so fun and freeing to see the magic that it creates.

Try this out, play with it, and then let me know what this episode sparks for you. I want to hear.

I'll talk to you soon.