Body to Brain, Bite-sizing and Buy-in (2 of 3)

Bite-sizing our thoughts for better results in goal-setting
Jason Steed Primal Health Coach
Jason Steed Certified Primal Health Coach
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Part 2: Bite-size your Thoughts so your Brain will Buy In

I’m part of a Jody Moore life coaching group. Jody reminded me "A belief is a thought that we keep thinking. We can re-craft beliefs first by reframing thoughts.” Reframing thoughts can be a lifelong pursuit, fraught with failure after failure. Simply put, your brain won’t reframe unless it’s on board. This is where the body-to-brain bite-sizing comes in! Read on...

Our brains want nothing to do with change. Bite-sizing is a powerful change agent.

September 18, 2020
New Stresses during a Real Food Reset (3:02)
Hooray, your real food reset is reducing a lot of body stress. But what other stresses have shown up?

You’re probably asking, “How do I even do something my brain doesn’t want to do or doesn’t believe will help?” Simply put, you don’t. Your brain has to be in agreement, or at least slightly curious and open to the possibility. Good news, though: Your brain ultimately wants what your body wants. You just need to bite-size your healthy actions.

Brains Don't Like Over-portioning

Psychology reminds us that when we introduce something new to our brain, it will resist. After all, the new thought wasn’t part of yesterday’s 100% survival rate formula. But brains also like to plan for future contingencies. So as long as your brain doesn’t think your body is being irrational and reckless, you’re likely to pique your brain’s curiosity. There’s the hitch—when your brain senses reckless behavior then it takes over, and the stress hormones and energy packing yo-yo patterns start all over again. Think of this as brain over-portioning.

Oer-portioning our brain psychology of body balance

Over-portioning vs. Bite-sizing

Let’s compare a few thoughts and actions that your brain may either reject or accept, based on believability:

Over-portioning vs. Bite-sizing
Exercise
Over-portioning with strenuous exercise (breakdown and injury): If you exert your body beyond what it’s ready for then your brain will rebel and react by releasing lactic acid, adrenaline, and cortisol, resulting in system-wide inflammation. Regions of your muscles could calcify, leading to poor circulation, restricted range of motion, compromised tendon strength, and more. Even if you exercise regularly, repeated high-intensity sessions are beyond your body’s ability to adapt to and sustain.
Bite-sizing with tuned-in exercise (sustained energy): Your body has so much to tell your brain about individualizing your exercise. If you’re currently active, please dial back the “no pain, no gain” mentality, and lets your body’s hormones once again do their job. If you're just getting back into a fitness routine, keep your workout schedule flexible, moderate your pace and intensity, and feed yourself ample calories for energy.
Dieting
Over-portioning with restricted calorie diets (yo-yo weight loss/gain): Your brain wants nothing to do with a shift to too little fuel, and your body will get the message to store energy in fat cells for later use. As with ill-prepared fasting, your body suffers under the duress of cortisol spikes, malfunctioning hormonal signals, and fatigue.
Bite-sizing with nutrient-dense calorie diets (sustained weight loss/balance): With ample calories from nutritious foods, your brain will tolerate your shift to better-quality foods as it takes positive signals from your body, such as reduced visceral and subcutaneous fat, reduced inflammation, and boosted stamina. Your brain fog will also lift—another indicator that your brain is on board.
Fasting
Over-portioning with glucose-wired fasting (cellular damage): If your body burns glucose as its preferred fuel, then during a fasting period your brain will hit the panic button, and many of the intended body benefits of fasting simply won’t be realized. Cortisol and adrenaline scramble and overtax cellular functions, creating reactive oxygen species or boxes oxidative stress to cells and dna. It’s a pretty big mess when our brains aren’t on board.
Bite-sizing with fat-adapted fasting (cellular regeneration): If your body burns fat as its preferred fuel, then during a fasting period your brain knows how to pull needed energy from your fat stores. To quote Mark Sisson, “It’s an amazing concept that your body can be taught to look for its next meal either from your plate or from your butt and thighs." Fat-adapted fasting benefits include cell-rejuvenation, activation of stem cells for localized tissue building, and killing off of older and weaker cells—a process known as autophagy and apoptosis.
Parenting a Difficult Teen
Over-portioning with lofty expectations (unrealistic, unsustainable): If we decided today we would understand our daughter’s viewpoint completely and provide her with solid solutions, our brain would not accept that. It’s simply too extreme and overwhelming. Outcomes would likely include continued frustrations, heightened emotions, and underlying stress.
Bite-sizing with restating concerns (realistic, sustainable): If we instead decided today that, when confronted with one of our daughter’s viewpoints, we would simply “restate” her concern, showing that we understand it. That’s a commitment that our brains could get on board with. What might be your next bite-sized step? Your brain will likely feel up to that task.

Action: Get Your Brain on Paper

Now that you know how to bite-size your thoughts, you’re beginning to reframe thoughts and re-craft beliefs. Getting your thoughts out of your head and other a page is an essential step for feeding the information back to your brain and making it believable. Essentially, you’re feeding your brains thoughts back to itself by verbalizing them with others, or writing them down. Let your brain see and hear what it’s thinking. You’ll likely be surprised with the traction this simple act can create.

Bite-sizing from Thoughts to Goal Setting

This has been all about getting your brain on your team by creating bite-sized thoughts that your brain can see and believe. You can do the same strategy as you start to set new goals. There’s a lot of traction in goal-setting and goal-keeping with your brain working for you instead of against you. Learn more about setting and checking off bite-sized goals here.