There are certain situations where my food noise gets especially loud.

Case in point: I usually go to my cabin for at least one night on Sundays.

On the way down and back, I like to stop for a coffee.

And when I do, my food noise chimes in at the sight of all the candy and snacks you see at most gas station convenience stores.

“I need some trail mix. Oooh, or a Diet Coke.”

The fact I’ve eaten all my calories for the day never matters to my food noise.

It also doesn’t matter if I’m not even hungry. The food noise thinks I need to grab extras for the drive.

Another example: Hazel (my dog) and I often walk to a supermarket called Winco.

I LOVE Winco. I love the selection, I love the prices, I love that it’s employee-owned.

What I don’t love is that Winco, like most supermarkets, has a TON of processed crap food.

And when I go in, my food noise usually tries to negotiate buying something I don’t need to buy.

Seriously, how easy would it be to just grab a processed snack or two and screw up the progress I’m making with my current goal?

REALLY easy, right?

Especially when the food noise is blaring like a protester with a megaphone.

So what do I do in these situations to be successful in spite of all that food noise?

Well, with the black coffee at a gas station, I get in, buy the coffee, and get out.

With the supermarket, walking to the store with Hazel ensures I can’t overload myself with a bunch of extra groceries.

I also keep my eye on the prize, as it were, just like I do when I get the black coffee.

Get in, get what I need, get out. Stay focused on why I’m there and move quickly…so my food noise doesn’t have enough time to talk me into things.

It also helps to recognize what’s actually behind the food noise.

Sometimes food noise is there just because you’re hungry. You’re eating for weight loss, and your body’s trying to get you to eat more because that’s part of its job.

Sometimes, food noise is there because of how and what you’re eating. Sugar, lack of nutrients, eating processed, addictive stuff, not eating enough fat – it makes food noise SUPER loud.

Food noise is also tied to how we’re used to coping when life gets challenging. (Meaning, if you’re used to coping with food, that’s a factor in your food noise.)

When you start replacing eating with better (healthier) ways of navigating life, you can get it to back down.

It also helps to look at what’s going on in your life when the food noise is really loud. If there’s stress or uncertainty – even if it seems like there’s not – then it could be feeding your food noise. (SOMETHING is, so don’t rule out what’s happening in your life, or even the world, just because it’s not obvious at first.)

Bottom line: Food noise can be exhausting. I get it.

AND it’s just as exhausting to be fat, sick, and miserable.

Seriously, would you rather get a limb amputated due to unchecked diabetes, or would you rather navigate a little food noise?

Would you rather try and sleep with heartburn so bad, it feels like you swallowed a box of boiling hot coals, or would you rather navigate food noise?

Would you rather feel like a beached whale all the time, or would you rather feel great, confident, and free in your own skin while also navigating some food noise?

There’s a reason we say “pick your hard because it’s all hard” on Code Red.

It IS hard to deal with food noise.

But it’s hard to suffer the consequences of giving in to it all the time, too.

Which hard will YOU choose?