Food and Eating

Hydration & Electrolytes

Get enough salt

Our neurons communicate through sodium. Adding a bit of salt improves things like kidney function, cravings and blood volume. It also gives you more energy and mental clarity

You need to get at least 3.2 g per day.

Every 15 minutes consume (in ounces) your body weight (in pounds) / 30

The Galpin equation, is a formula that Dr. Andy Galpin came up with. It gets you close to the exact amount that you should drink in ounces, which is your body weight in pounds divided by the number 30.

Get more sodium and potassium on low carb

Since carbohydrates hold water, and water, salt and potassium go hand in hand, if you're on a low carbohydrate diet, you might need to adjust your salt and potassium intake.

Mindset

You can get better at feeling full, with conscious awareness. "Oh, I'm not hungry, it's just my gut talking to my brain"

You can get better at registering sense of fullness or lack of fullness. So if you've eaten anything, even if it's a small amount of food in the last one to three hours, try to concentrate on sensing the neurons in your gut and how full you are.

Tell yourself a healthy food is good for you. You’ll hate it less

The way your mind perceives the food you’re eating has an impact on the way it tastes . So saying you like it or that it’s extremely good for you will change the way your body receives it.

Sugar & Cravings

Ingest lemon juice and cinnamon

Drinking a bit of lemon, lime juice or cinnamon mixed with water before a sugar intake, helps blunt the hyperglycemic effect.

If you expect a food to taste good and it doesn't, you get less addicted to it

Known as reward-prediction error

if the reward is lower than your expectation, you don't get the dopamine boost. In fact, it blunts it. So getting really excited for food you love might help you get over it.

You can use this by getting super excited for a food you like (ex. donut) and then eat one that doesn’t taste that good.

Eating sugar after tough workouts makes it less bad

After tough workouts, specifically high intensity ones, our bodies are better at handling sugar, by either storing it or circulating it.

So, in case you’re craving sugar, it’ll be smart to plan to eat dessert after an intense run or workout.

Sugar is bad when it doesn’t have fiber with it

This helps curb the spike that comes with eating sugar. Some research implied that the negative effects of sugar only came when they didn’t have fiber with them.

That’s why fruits are generally considered healthier

Eat healthy food with high-dopamine foods

Correlate the glycemic and dopamine spike with other, healthier foods to rewire your relationship with them and like them more.

So if you eat spinach with a donut, you start liking spinach more

Healthy alternatives to sugar can give you the same satisfaction

You think you’re craving the sweet taste but your body/gut is just looking for a specific molecule. You can find this molecule in other foods that are healthy for you and don’t make you feel lethargic.

Examples: carrots, apples, most fruit, dark chocolate, etc.

Gut Microbiome

Eat fermented foods

Ex. Yogurt, kimchi, refrigerated sauerkraut. Fermented foods turned out to be healthier than fiber for optimizing the gut microbiome.

You can find them at stores but they’re quite expensive. Here is a recipe you can make at home

Diversity is healthy

Creating a diverse of microbiota in your gut can set you up for long-term benefits in terms of brain to gut signaling, gut to brain signaling and general immune system improvements.

So eat different kinds of foods. When you go grocery shopping, try to get vegetables you don’t get often.