How Tapping Helps Us Stick to Our Healthy Eating Plan

One day when I was getting a pedicure, I overheard a woman say, “I was good all day and then I ate an entire pint of ice cream.  I have no idea why I did it.” While her friend did try to make her feel better, she didn’t have an actual solution. I wish I could have shared how tapping helps us stick to our healthy eating plan?

It was really hard to mind my own business because I know exactly why she did it. I also know exactly how to help her to stop abandoning her healthy eating goals over and over again.

If you have ever felt like this woman, then I am excited to share how tapping helps us stick to our healthy eating plan.

The first step is understanding why she ate the ice cream in the first place.  You might think it’s because she lacks willpower or has no self-control.

But the real reason she ate the ice cream is because she was stuck in the Chronic Stress Loop.

Let’s take a look at how we get stuck.

Stuck in The Chronic Stress Loop

Our personal Eating Well Blockers (stressors, subconscious blocks and default habits) are what keep us stuck in the Chronic Stress Loop.  Once we are stuck, until we identify, release and reprogram our Eating Well Blockers it’s really hard to stick with our healthy eating goals.  

Let’s take a closer look at how Eating Well Blockers sabotage our best intentions over and over.

Eating Well Blocker:  Stressors

There are five main categories of stressors that throw us into the Chronic Stress Loop:  

• Daily Stress: traffic, finances, work, poor sleep, children
• Environmental Triggers: vacation, seeing food, time of day, pairing
• Stressful Events: death, illness, moving, divorce, unemployment
• Stressful Emotions: unsatisfied, anxious, bored, frustrated, overwhelmed, guilty
• Stressful Relationships: humiliated, rejected, judged, excluded, unappreciated, unsupported

Eating Well Blocker:  Subconscious Blocks

Once we are in a stressed state, it becomes our brain’s primary goal to get us back into a relaxed state.  Our brain will activate our subconscious thoughts and beliefs based on our values and core experiences that help us justify why it’s okay to abandon our healthy eating goals. (sometimes these thoughts activate cravings) 

For the women who ate the pint of ice cream, her thoughts might have been something like:

• Just a little won’t hurt.
• I never follow through with my commitments.
• I’ll be “good” tomorrow.
• I am a loser.
• It’s been a terrible day, I deserve this.
• I never get what I want.
• If it’s in the house, I have no self-control.

Even though we aren’t always aware of these thoughts, they control between 80-90% of our conscious actions. Once the stress and subconscious blocks are activated, we rely on our default habit to soothe ourselves.

Eating Well Blocker:  Default Habits

If you are here, then your default habit is likely overeating or not prioritizing habits that support your healthy eating goals like meal planning, grocery shopping, cooking healthy meals, exercise, self-care and sleep.

This woman’s default habit was to eat ice cream, but for me, it was always candy. 

Unwanted Manifestation:

If you continually abandon your healthy eating plan, eventually, a manifestation like extra weight or guilt for not sticking to your healthy eating plan begins to present itself.  

The extra weight or guilt becomes an additional stressor and you get stuck in The Chronic Stress Loop.

How Tapping Helps Us Break Out of the Chronic Stress Loop

Instead of eating a pint of ice cream to soothe herself, this woman could have replaced her default habit with tapping, calmed her stress, stayed out of the Chronic Stress Loop and stuck to her healthy eating plan. 

Let’s take a look at why tapping reduces stress so well.

When we feel stress, our fight and flight response is activated.  Our ancestors’ main stress was survival, so the amygdala starts pumping out hormones like cortisol and adrenaline, to help us run away or fight dangerous situations like being chased by a tiger.

While this was perfect when our reaction to stress required physical movement, today, stress happens mostly in our minds.  Today’s tigers are our Eating Well Blockers.  

If we don’t release the stress, it builds and builds to the point where our subconscious mind helps us remember the quickest way to soothe our stress.

If your default habit is to eat the ice cream, no amount of willpower is going to help you resist the urge because your brain thinks your life is in danger.  Escaping the “tiger” is more important to your survival than resisting the ice cream.

Tapping Tames Today’s Tigers

Today’s tigers are our Eating Well Blockers (stressors, subconscious blocks and default habits) that keep us stuck in The Chronic Stress Loop.

The Emotional Freedom Technique (tapping) helps us tame these tigers because it reduces our stress by releasing it from our body.  

The Emotional Freedom Technique is based on lightly tapping on meridian points similar to acupuncture.  When you tap on these points, it has been scientifically proven that a relaxation signal is sent to your brain.

Even though you are saying stress-inducing statements while tapping through the points, your body remains calm and does not pump out unnecessary hormones.  

This allows you to safely and easily release your Eating Well Blockers and you’re able to break out of The Chronic Stress Loop and actually stick to your healthy eating plan.

Tapping to Stick to a Healthy Eating Plan

While there is a basic tapping sequence that you can learn HERE, I teach numerous styles of tapping techniques.  Each tapping technique addresses different Eating Well Blockers to help you break out of The Chronic Stress Loop and stick to your healthy eating plan.

I teach all of these Tapping Techniques in The Peaceful Eating Method.  If you are ready to take a deep dive and learn all the different strategies to become a Peaceful Eater and stick to your healthy eating plan, then check out The Peaceful Eating Method.

However, if you want to learn how to use tapping to stick to your healthy eating plan, then The Stress-Free Eating Jumpstart is a great option.  Go HERE to learn more.

Remember, our brain is wired to prioritize reducing stress.  If eating the icecream is the fastest way our brain knows to do that, then we will continually abandon our healthy eating plan and eat the ice cream.  Start tapping into your brainpower versus willpower today and finally stick to your healthy eating plan.