Morty Lefkoe – Lefkoe Eating Report

Emotional Eating Can Manifest in Different Ways

The single best book I’ve read for understanding all aspects of emotional eating is Geneen Roth’s best-seller, Women, Food and God.

Here are two approaches to emotional eating as she describes them:

… there are two kinds of compulsive eaters: Restrictors and Permitters.

Restrictors believe in control. Of themselves, their food intake, their environment. And whenever possible, they’d also like to control the entire world. Restrictors operate on the conviction that chaos is imminent and steps need to be taken now to minimize its impact.

For a Restrictor, deprivation is comforting because it provides a sense of control. If I limit my food intake, I limit my body size. If I limit my body size, I (believe I can) limit my suffering. If I limit my suffering, I can control my life. I make sure bad things don’t happen. That chaos stays away. …

Permitters find any kind of rules abhorrent. If they’ve ever lost weight on a diet, it was through wrenching, abject misery. They are suspicious of programs, guidelines, eating charts.

Permitters say, “I’ve gained fifty pounds in the last six months and I just can’t understand what happened.” Whereas a Restrictor operates with hypervigilence, with their antenna in constant motion like those of a sea anemone, Permitters prefer going though life in a daze. They way, they don’t need to feel pain—theirs or anyone else’s. If I’m not aware of it, there’s nothing to fix. If I go through life asleep, I don’t need to be concerned about the future because I won’t be aware of it. If I give up trying, I won’t be disappointed when I fail.

Like Restricters, Permitters operate on the need to be safe in what they consider hostile or dangerous situations. But unlike Restrictors, who try to manage the chaos, Permitters merge with it. They see no point in trying to control the uncontrollable and have decided it’s best to be blurry and numb and join the party. Have a good time. …

Restricting and permitting are subtypes of compulsive eating, which is the metadefense. A compulsion is a way to protect ourselves from feeling what we believe is unfeelable, what we are convinced is intolerable. It is a compulsion because we are compelled to engage in it. Because in the moment we are acting it out, we believe we have no choice. …

A few last words about labels. Everyone is both Permitter and Restrictor. A Restrictor turns into a Permitter the moment she binges. A Permitter becomes a Restrictor every time she decides she is going to follow a program, even if that resolution lasts two hours.

Both these types of emotional eaters feel compelled to eat and the compulsion is caused primarily by conditioning and to some extent by beliefs, as I explain in my eBook, The Secret to Ending Overeating for Good. http://emotionaleatingreport.com. For example, you will feel compelled to eat whenever you experience one of your specific triggers, such as loneliness, boredom, feeling unlovable, feeling anxiety, etc.

But it is possible for Restrictors and Permitters to de-condition their conditionings and eliminate their negative beliefs, reaching a peaceful state where their emotional eating is nothing more than a distant memory instead of a constant cycle of pain.

Research Validates Our Approach

A reader of my eBook on emotional eating, Susan Vendeland, just posted on my blog. Because she points out that a lot of current research validates my approach for eliminating overeating, I wanted to share it with you.

“Thank you for your generous sharing of your report. [http://emotionaleatingreport.com] I began teaching a college course this last semester, the Prevention of Obesity and Eating Disorders. We talked about emotional eating both as a personal problem linked to obesity and eating disorders and as a community health problem.

“I appreciate your insight into the genesis and healing of emotional eating and this is consistent with approaches taken by those who treat eating disorders including binge eating disorder. A report by the Hartman group, a market research firm in Seattle, addresses the cultural aspects of overeating in America and basically describes the widespread social acceptance of emotional eating as the driver for the ‘obesity epidemic.’

“In my course, we focus on emotional self-awareness, intuitive eating, awareness of weight discrimination and self and body acceptance to address out of control eating.

I listened to the video and appreciate what Donna [Bauer, http://emotionaleatingreport.com/blog/donna/] said about celebratory eating as well. Researchers at UCSF (Mary Dallman’s group) and others have provided evidence and a neuro-physiological explanatory model for comfort or stress eating so acceptance in the scientific community of this adverse habit is growing.

“Do you have plans to demonstrate the effectiveness of your treatment in a randomized controlled trial anytime soon?  [I am very interested in conducting such a study as soon as we find a university that wants to do such a study with us.]

“I would also like to tell you that I really appreciated the way you tried to encourage Donna to get in touch with how good she feels in multiple dimensions from gaining control of her eating (and the self-respect that accompanies that) rather than just the pleasure of losing weight and receiving myriad compliments.

“There are many people who emotionally eat but are not necessarily overweight. They may do large or even excessive amounts of exercise to compensate so weight loss should not be the goal, but rather energy, health, vitality, wellness, feeling in control, and knowing how to deal with the reality of our emotional selves. [Our goal is to help clients stop their emotional eating, which will ultimately reduce their weight, but our focus is not on weight loss as such. That is focusing on a symptom, not the cause.]

“Thanks again. You are doing very good work.”

For more details, please see my eBook, The Secret to Ending Overeating For Good, at http://emotionaleatingreport.com. You also can get answers to specific questions at my office, 415-884-0552.

You Don’t Need A Crutch

Emotional eating is the way we cope with negative feelings we don’t want to feel. By eating, even when we aren’t hungry, we get distracted from the feelings we don’t want to feel and experience a pleasurable feeling instead.

These negative feelings ultimately become conditioned and act as “triggers” that result in automatic, compulsive overeating.

When you use the Lefkoe De-conditioning Process to de-condition your many triggers, you realize that earlier in life you had (unconsciously) chosen eating as the best way to pleasurably distract yourself from your negative feelings (such as anxiety, feeling unlovable, depression, and boredom). It wasn’t that eating was necessarily the best way to cope with the negative feelings, it was just that you ate three times a day and noticed that, whenever you ate, you focused on the pleasure of eating instead of the negative feelings. That’s how eating got conditioned as an automatic response to the negative feelings.

You also realize that, in fact, there are many other things that might have worked to distract yourself from the negative feelings; you just hadn’t thought of them earlier in your life. Some activities that might have worked as a coping mechanism include a hot bath, exercise, a walk, talking to a friend, reading a book, or listening to music.

But using eating or any of these other activities to distract ourselves from our negative feelings implies that we are unable to cope with our negative feelings and that we need something to keep ourselves from facing them. In fact, although negative feelings can feel overwhelming, distracting ourselves with eating doesn’t really work. Not only doesn’t the distraction last for long, we end up feeling worse (guilty and bloated) after we stuff ourselves when we aren’t hungry. The negative consequences of other distracting activities aren’t quite as bad, but they still are only a temporary respite and the negative feelings are still there when we finish eating (or any other activity).

It actually is possible to just allow ourselves to experience our negative feelings and to realize that while we “have” these feelings, they are not who we are. We don’t have to use eating or any other distraction to deal with our negative feelings; we can just feel them and know they will pass.

If you really want to “handle” your negative feelings, the best way is not to pretend they don’t exist for a few minutes (which is the only respite eating gives you), but, instead, to eliminate the beliefs and conditionings that cause them. Every negative feeling you have is either the result of beliefs and conditionings, or the meaning you are giving current events. Events, as such, cannot make you feel anything.

Eating to feel good

If you eat to make yourself feel good, as opposed to eating to cover up negative feelings, there is a much better solution than eating, which only gives you a “high” for the few minutes you are eating.

Use the Who Am I Really? (WAIR?) Process, which enables you to experience yourself as the creator of your life, with anything possible and nothing missing. People who have used that Process report a feeling of bliss and unlimited possibilities that can easily be a substitute for eating. You can download an MP3 of that Process at http://recreateyourlife.com/free/who-am-i-really-mp3.php.

The only precondition for using the WAIR? Process is eliminating at least one belief using the Lefkoe Belief Process. You can do that free of charge at http://recreateyourlife.com.

For more details, please see my eBook, The Secret to Ending Overeating For Good, at http://emotionaleatingreport.com. You also can get answers to specific questions at my office, 415-884-0552.

She was gaining weight again

A week or so ago I called a woman who had been a client of mine several months earlier about her emotional eating problem. She had used the Lefkoe De-conditioning Process to get rid of all the triggers we could find and the Lefkoe Belief Process to eliminate all the relevant beliefs. For several months after our last session she had been eating normally and healthily and had been losing weight.

But instead of hearing that the weight had continued to fall away, she told me during my follow-up call that she had gained back all the weight she had lost and was eating badly again. I asked her why she hadn’t called me and asked for help. She said she didn’t know why she hadn’t called

In a situation like this, there are two possible explanations: First, what we had done hadn’t worked. Second, it had worked and there was some other explanation. I decided to check out the second possibility first.

I asked her to tell me everything about her life for the past few months. She told me that she had had knee surgery last December and had been unable to walk, much less exercise for over two months. That could partially account for the increase in weight, but it wouldn’t account for overeating and unhealthy eating. For example, she had totally stopped drinking Pepsi for several months but had gone back to several bottles a day. She was eating pizza for dinner frequently.

Almost in passing she mentioned that after she realized that she would be unable to exercise—which meant to her that the constant weight loss she had been experiencing probably would stop—she had the thought: What’s the use. I’ll never lose weight no matter how hard I try.

That was a new belief that partially explained the re-emergence of her eating problem. So she eliminated that belief. During the session she found and eliminated another, older, belief that had contributed to the problem: Even if I lose weight, no one will ever be interested in me, so why bother.

When we talked the following week she told me that she was not consciously doing anything different, but she was drinking far less Pepsi and had stopped her overeating. She noticed that she would unconsciously go to the pantry, look in, then realize that she wasn’t hungry, and close the door and walk away.

In a second session a week later she told me why she had not been eating healthily during the prior couple of months. Because she was unable to shop and cook for herself because of the foot surgery, she ate whatever her children brought home—usually pizza—and wouldn’t ask them to buy her something healthier and less fattening.

The beliefs she identified and eliminated that caused this behavior included: I can’t count on other people. I’m not worthy. I have to do it on my own. These beliefs explained by why hadn’t asked her children or friends to buy the food that she normally purchased for herself.

A few days later I received the following note from her:

“I just want to thank you again. It is awesome to experience hunger! Before, I was eating all the time and never got hungry. I’m so happy. I feel in control of myself again. I thought if I called you, I was a failure, but now I see how we can still take on bad beliefs that we need to get rid of. I won’t wait next time. Thank you again. I appreciate you so much!”

So although her “relapse” could have meant that the de-conditioning and the belief eliminating hadn’t worked to stop her emotional eating problem, on further investigation we discovered that what we had done previously had worked—and there was a little more that needed to be done.

Don’t ever give up hope. It is possible to totally stop your emotional eating problem.

For more details, please see my eBook, The Secret to Ending Overeating For Good, at http://emotionaleatingreport.com. You also can get answers to specific questions at my office, 415-884-0552.

Why Do You Keep Eating After You’re Full?

In order to understand why people with an emotional eating problem keep eating after they are full, you have to understand what eating means to them.

Emotional eaters don’t want to face unpleasantness in their lives. They don’t want to feel any negative feelings. So they eat to get a pleasurable distraction from the feelings, to numb themselves, or to go unconscious when negative feelings show up in their lives. (I call these negative feelings “triggers,” because they “trigger” eating as an automatic response.)

How long are you able to escape the negative feelings? Usually only for as long as you are eating! So if you are having feelings you want to escape from, how long would you want to eat? … For as long as you possibly can, because the feelings will be suppressed only while you are eating and will re-surface as soon as you stop eating.

So you will start eating whether you are hungry or not in response to your triggers. And you will keep eating long past the point of being hungry whenever the triggers are present. Most emotional eaters have at least 15 different triggers, so at least one is present almost all the time.(As I point out in my free eBook, How To Stop Emotional Eating For Good, http://emotionaleatingreport.com/, triggers are the main source of emotional eating, but beliefs usually are involved also for most people. And the beliefs are affecting you all the time.)

When you de-condition eating as the conditioned response to the triggers, you will no longer automatically want to eat when a trigger appears in your life. At that point you can choose other things to distract you from the negative feelings; you can find alternative ways to cope with the triggers.

But there is a better way to handle the negative feelings.

Instead of looking for a healthier way to suppress your negative feelings, why not just allow them to be? True, they don’t feel good, but what if you just allowed yourself to feel bored, lonely, stressed, anxious, etc. when those feelings arose? What if you faced your feelings instead of looking for some way to avoid them?

Here is a suggestion on how to do it.

After you eliminate a belief using the Lefkoe Belief Process (if you haven’t already done so, go to http://recreateyourlife.com/free where you can eliminate some of the most common beliefs free), you go into an altered state of consciousness where you have the profound experience that you are the creator of your life. You no longer experience yourself as the sum total of your beliefs; you experience yourself as the creator of the beliefs, as consciousness.

In that state it is clear you have feelings, but you are not your feelings. You have thoughts, but you are not your thoughts.

When you are in that state it is easy to make a distinction between your “self” and your “SELF.” After you’ve made that distinction you are able to observe your feelings (which still feel very real) without being at the effect of them, without being run by them.

When I use this method when I am having an upset, I imagine myself outside my body, looking at Morty, and saying to him: “Morty, you are really upset. I wonder what you believe that is causing this upset.” The mere act of talking to myself in this way enables me to distinguish between who I really am and the “Morty” who is having the feelings. And doing that significantly minimizes the impact of the feelings.

Whatever technique you use, once you have de-conditioned eating so it is no longer an automatic, unconscious response to your triggers, see if you can allow yourself to experience your feelings. They might not feel good. But you will survive them, I promise. And facing them is the first step to getting rid of them permanently.

For more details, please see my eBook, The Secret to Ending Overeating For Good, at http://emotionaleatingreport.com. You also can get answers to specific questions at my office, 415-884-0552.

It’s About Escape, Not Food

If you truly want to understand the nature of emotional eating, you should study Geneen Roth’s best-selling book, Women, Food and God. It is beautifully written and filled with really useful information.

“I tell them [people in my retreats]that if compulsive eating is anything, it’s a way we leave ourselves when life gets hard. When we don’t want to notice what is going on. Compulsive eating is a way we distance ourselves from the way things are when they are not how we want them to be. I tell them that ending the obsession with food is all about the capacity to stay in the present moment. To not leave themselves. I tell them that they don’t have to make a choice between losing weight and doing this. Weight loss is the easy part; anytime you truly listen to your hunger and fullness, you lost weight. But I also tell them that compulsive eating is basically a refusal to be fully alive. No matter what we weigh, those of us who are compulsive eaters have anorexia of the soul. We refuse to take in what sustains us. We live lives of deprivation. And when we can’t stand it any longer, we binge. The way we are able to accomplish all of this is by the simple act of bolting—of leaving ourselves—hundreds of times a day.”

Apart from the lovely way that Geneen says this, she is extremely perceptive when she says that compulsive/emotional eating is the refusal to face reality, the refusal to face anything uncomfortable or difficult. So emotional eating is a way to escape reality.

Again Geneen describes the real issue so well:

“Her [the compulsive eater] problem is not about the food she consumes. Her problem, though it eventually would become excess weight, is not weight. It’s that she doesn’t know—no one ever taught her—how to “face” (as she calls it) her “deficiency.” The emptiness. The dissatisfaction.”

I’ve found over 20 distinct triggers that cause emotional eating. But what they all have in common is something uncomfortable that we don’t want to face. Emotional eaters chose eating as a way to numb themselves to that discomfort. But as Geneen clearly points out, the real issue is not the eating, it’s our unwillingness to live in the moment and face the uncomfortable.

Solving this problem is three-fold:

First, you need to de-condition eating, so it isn’t what you automatically use to go unconscious, in order to numb yourself to the uncomfortable thoughts and feelings you don’t want to face. Once you’ve done that, you will no longer eat automatically whenever you have uncomfortable feelings you want to escape.

Second, you need to eliminate the beliefs and conditionings that cause the thoughts and feelings that are so scary to you.

Third, you need to discover that you have thoughts and feelings, but they are not who you are. (The “Who Am I Really?” Process will help you with this.) That realization will make it easier to allow yourself to experience and just “be with” your negative thoughts and feelings, without needing to do anything to escape them.

For more details, please see my eBook, The Secret to Ending Overeating For Good, at http://emotionaleatingreport.com. You also can get answers to specific questions at my office, 415-884-0552.

Weight Problems Are NOT Inherited

According to a recent article in The News & Observer (Raleigh-Durham, NC) that was reprinted by the Life Extension Institute, research is now showing that much emotional eating is due to our genes.

“Rich foods work much like heroin on the brain, making it hard to stop eating them. A recent study indicates a genetic link between overeating and drug addiction, explaining why obese people have such intense cravings and build up such tolerance. …

“A team of scientists that included UNC-Chapel Hill researchers reported in 2009 that they had found a gene, NRXN3, associated with obesity in some people. The same gene previously was identified as playing a role in substance abuse.

“Keri Monda, an epidemiologist at the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health and one of the study’s authors, said the finding draws a strong inherited link between overeating and drug addiction, problems characterized by difficulties limiting enjoyable experiences.

“‘We do know there are common underpinnings,’ Monda said, adding that additional studies are needed to make a definitive association.”

The problem with “evidence” showing that psychological problems really are biological/physiological problems is that the psychological problems go away when the psychological aspects are resolved.

Depression is not a brain problem

Several years ago Time reported a study that used magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to detect distinct changes in the brains of chronically depressed people compared to the brains of non-depressed people. This was interpreted to mean that the cause of the depression was the changes in the brain. The article went on to report that after a few months of cognitive-behavioral therapy, the patients reported their depression was gone. At which time the MRI showed a “normal” brain.

In other words, the different brain state was not a cause of the depression, it was the result of the depression.

Genes do not cause overeating

Similarly, there might be genes that predispose one to eat sweets or to continue to eat when one is not hungry, but my personal evidence that genes are not the cause of emotional eating and being overweight is that when people eliminate all the conditionings and beliefs that appear to be the source of the eating problem, overeating stops. Without any changes in the genes.

Dr. Bruce Lipton is a former medical school professor and research scientist. His experiments, and that of other leading edge scientists, have examined in great detail the processes by which cells receive information. The implications of this research radically change our understanding of life. It shows that genes and DNA do not control our biology; that instead DNA is controlled by signals from outside the cell, including the energetic messages emanating from our positive and negative thoughts. (See his book, The Biology of Belief.)

In other words, our genes and DNA only contribute a “potential” that must be activated by our interactions with reality and by our beliefs. If the outside environment (the source of our belief and conditionings) does not activate a gene, it has no impact on us at all.

As many biologists have said, “Genes load the gun, but environment pulls the trigger.”

That being the case, don’t worry about whether or not you have the wrong genes or brain structure. If you have an emotional eating problem, get rid of the conditionings and beliefs that really cause it and the overeating will stop— regardless of your genes and brain structure.

For more details, please see my eBook, The Secret to Ending Overeating For Good, at http://emotionaleatingreport.com. You also can get answers to specific questions at my office, 415-884-0552.

Most Overeating Is Emotional Eating

Although the term “emotional eating” is still not in common usage, more and more people are realizing that overeating is almost always the result of eating for emotional reasons, as distinct from eating when hungry.

If you ask Google to notify you about every blog post or article published on the Internet on “emotional eating,” you will discover there are several everyday.

One such recent blog post had some excellent material on how to know if you are eating emotionally. I’d like to quote some excerpts from that post here and provide you with a link so you can read the rest of the post.

“Emotional eating can be said to occur when we eat to satisfy a desire other than physical hunger. Emotional eating usually takes place when a person is depressed or angry, stressed or vulnerable. It can be triggered in response to some distressing news, an argument with a loved one or simply boredom. There are any numbers of reasons that can send us heading straight for the cookie jar.

“You may go to a movie and although it is only an hour or so since you ate a meal you sit and eat a large carton of popcorn, then a coke or perhaps an ice cream. Perhaps you do the same sort of thing most evenings at home in front of the TV, just steadily munching away at various foods although you are not really hungry at all.

How do I know when I am emotionally eating?

“You can tell emotional hunger because it usually comes on very quickly whereas physical hunger will build up gradually.

“Emotional hunger needs to be immediately satisfied and with whatever food you are craving, physical hunger will wait.

“Emotional hunger usually brings with it a desire for certain foods. You may have a burning desire to eat chocolate or cakes or ice cream, maybe only pizza will satisfy your craving. With physical hunger you are more adaptable with what you eat.

“You may not be able to stop overeating. The emotion that has caused you to begin eating may not be satisfied and you are unable to stop eating junk food.

“After emotional eating it is likely that there will be feelings of guilt, this does not occur with physical hunger.”

You can find the full post at http://www.howcanistopeating.com/eating-disorders-–-stop-emotional-eating.

Unfortunately, despite the useful information about emotional eating, this post—like most other articles and books written on the subject—does not provide a workable solution. I am convinced based on my experience with a number of clients who had this problem, that emotional eating is the result of two distinct processes:

First, eating has been conditioned to occur whenever certain triggers or the desire for specific rewards are present and,

Second, beliefs that have been formed about eating, food, and weight.

When you eliminate all the conditionings and beliefs, emotional eating will stop.

For more details, please see my eBook, The Secret to Ending Your Overeating For Good, at http://emotionaleatingreport.com.

How Our Parents Can Unwittingly Cause Emotional Eating Problems

Most overeating is the result of emotional eating. And a significant cause of all emotional eating is conditioning. In other words, eating becomes a conditioned response to a number of triggers, such as loneliness, anxiety, depression, and feeling unlovable. When those triggers appear in your life, you are conditioned to want to eat.

In addition, however, another important cause of overeating is beliefs, most of which were formed in childhood as a result of interactions with parents.

Here are just a few of the common things parents say and do that lead to beliefs that, in turn, lead to emotional eating.

“Finish everything on your plate (whether you are hungry or not).”

“It’s time to eat (whether you are hungry or not).”

“Don’t eat that or you’ll gain weight.”

“Good” foods and ”bad” foods.

“If you gain weight you won’t have any friends.”

“Shoulds” and “shouldn’ts” around food and eating.

Parents who are often on diets or who have an eating problem.

Which of these situations were present in your household?

Here are just a few of the possible beliefs that can result from this type of parental behavior and comment.

If I don’t control my eating I’ll put on weight.

The way to stay thin is to control my food and exercise a lot.
If I’m heavy I’ll be rejected.
I can’t trust my body (to tell me when to eat or stop eating).
I can’t trust myself to know how much to eat and when to eat.
The only way to know what and when to eat is to keep things the same.
If I look fat I’ll be rejected.
If I gain a few pounds it means I’m out of control.
My body is revolting. (One woman with this belief is 5’9” and weighs 110 pounds)
I need to exercise to deserve food.
I’m not deserving.
I have to be deserving to eat.
I’m a fake.
Sense of self: big, chunky, uncoordinated.

If I can’t eat “bad” foods, I’m missing out.

Bad” foods make you fat.

To lose weight you can’t eat anything “bad.”

The way to keep food from running my life (like it did my mom’s) is to eat whatever I want to eat.

If I don’t eat when there’s food around there won’t be any later.

The way to be in control is to eat what I want, when I want.

The way to keep from being hungry is to have a lot of food in the house.

Which of these beliefs did you form?

It is possible to permanently stop emotional eating by de-conditioning eating as the response to triggers and the desire for certain rewards, and by eliminating all the relevant beliefs.

For more details, please see my eBook, The Secret to Ending Your Overeating For Good, at http://emotionaleatingreport.com.

Why Do People Gain All Their Weight Back After A Diet?

It isn’t that difficult to lose weight on a diet. There are many diets that will produce a weight loss if followed rigorously. The problem, as people with an emotional eating problem know all too well, is that when you stop dieting, the weight usually comes back even faster than it left.

Why? When you stop a diet—which is eating food you normally wouldn’t eat, in quantities you normally wouldn’t eat—you start eating the way you had before the diet.

But there is another very important reason for gaining all the weight back.

Many people who obsess about their weight believe that if only they could weigh what they wanted (which is much less than they currently weigh), their life would be perfect. In other words, they attribute most of what doesn’t work in their life to their excess weight.

After people get down to the weight they thought would make them happy and it doesn’t, they would have to acknowledge that weight was not the real cause of their unhappiness, because they are still unhappy despite being at their “target” weight. For some people, it is too difficult to acknowledge this. So they gain back all the weight they lost so they can continue to blame their unhappiness on the number of pounds they weigh.

For such people, it is important to deal with the emotional aspects of their eating problem before they lose weight. If they can take responsibility for what isn’t working in their lives and do something about it, they will be able to lose weight and not need to gain it all back.

For more details on emotional eating, please see my eBook, The Secret to Ending Your Overeating For Good, at http://emotionaleatingreport.com.