Why Do I Crave Unhealthy Food Even When I'm Not Hungry?

Why do you crave unhealthy food even when you’re not hungry? Two likely reasons.

Hurting equals urgent need for pizza:

1) Because you, like almost everyone these days, are hurting emotionally, and unhealthy food at least gives you a smidge of temporary mouth pleasure which distracts you from your emotional pain for a brief spell. 

I’ll spare you any lengthy diatribes about the raging epidemic of loneliness that’s ravaging first-world countries. Or about the Stygian darkness of anti-human, meaningless materialism crushing everyone’s souls. Or about the fact that our whole culture is rooted in buried trauma and shame, which is why everyone everywhere is addicted to everything.

I will also resist giving you any overheated lectures about the brutal-yet-wondrous odyssey of healing and transformation to which life is inviting all of us, which Joseph Campbell famously called the Hero’s Journey, and which usually involves some rollicking combination of good therapy and authentic spiritual practice. 

The festering evil of big pharma/agra

2) But that’s not the only reason you crave naughty food even when you’re not hungry. Not by a long shot. Because the unholy corporations that sell ultra-processed, refined non-foods work overtime to exploit that emotional pain.  

The way they do that is by paying armies of depraved scientists to make their toxic products biologically addictive. This is not hyperbole. It is literally true. There are whole books about it.

But it gets worse. Because then those same unholy corporations pay advertising “creatives” to make ad campaigns that use military-grade psyops to program, propagandize, and manipulate you into buying their scientifically addictive, toxic products. We all swim in these ads. They sink into us by osmosis. It’s super gross. 

Point being, your non-hungry cravings for unfriendly foods are not your fault. 

But that doesn’t mean that, moving forward, there aren’t a ton of very cool things you can do to tame, vanquish, and/or vaporize your unhealthy cravings. Because there are. Read on.

A magical esoteric health-nerd secret

To get this first anti-craving strategy, you have to understand that an acidic body craves acidic foods. Now what the hell does that mean?

In a nutshell, there’s this thing called the Acid/Alkaline model of health. The Acid/Alkaline model of health says that foods like meat, dairy, sugar, alcohol, coffee, bread, pasta, chips, crackers, and baked goods are “acidic.” That means they make the pH of your ECF (extra cellular fluid) or lymph slightly more acid. 

Conversely, fresh fruits and veggies are alkaline. 

If you eat too many acidic foods (as 98% of people in the US do), your body is acidic in its pH. And so yeah, an acidic body craves acidic foods. Meaning: the more shitty food you eat, the more shitty food you yearn for. It’s chemistry, bro! 

Here’s some excellent news, though. The opposite is also true: an alkaline body craves alkaline foods. The more alkaline foods you eat (fresh fruits and veggies… especially dark leafy greens, as featured in green smoothies and big, bushy, jungley salads), the more you’ll actually crave fresh fruits and veggies. This is a real thing.

The basic idea is that transforming your biology is a million times easier than fighting it. 

Shameless self-serving plug

So guess what? Turns out I spent 25 years creating a real-world system designed to turn regular people into what I call wildly regenerative eaters. And this is probably obvious but: wildly regenerative eaters have way less cravings for nasty food. 

My system is based on 9 main tactics plus a bunch of other sneaky tips, hints, tricks, and techniques, designed to vanquish cravings. You can jump into the Wildly Regenerative Eating system through coaching (small group or one-on-one) or by splurging on my flagship book, Wildly Regenerative Eating: The ultimate guide to get yourself to eat absurd amounts of whole plants for vibrant health, tigery leanness, and shocking longevity.

And by the way, one anti-craving technique, a real banger, is in my free eBook, Conquer Your Cravings: Through the Badass Superpower of Visualization. If you haven’t read it yet, check it out. 

Thanks for stopping by. 

Y’all come back real soon, now.