At first this seems like the most obvious thing in the world. The reason I say this is not so obvious, so stick with me and let me know what you think.

Another common pattern I have noticed about my own hunger is that the more I generally eat for a meal, the more I have to eat to satisfy my hunger. It is literally as though my stomach expands and needs more to fill it.

Technically, that is what happens. Your body simply adjusts to what you are doing. If you give it a lot to do, then at first, it finds it tough, but soon it gets good at clearing all the food from the stomach and moving it through the digestive system. It doesn’t care about calories and what your body needs. The stomach is in charge of digesting food, and if you give it lots of food regularly, it will simply ask for more resources and get the job done.

What this means is that the stomach just creates more digestive juices and everything it needs to do its job. The brain tells it when it next needs to be ready to digest a meal again, so the stomach becomes more and more efficient at digesting food. It’s kind of obvious, really.

Since you’re now eating so much, it seems silly to set your signals for feeling full at your original smaller level so the brain and stomach also agree on new standards of fullness. Essentially, they wait for the stomach to expand more than it used to before triggering the feeling of being full.

That’s the basic idea. The bigger the meals that you eat, the bigger the meal your body will expect. I’ve been playing with this principle for years now and found it pretty reliable. So, if I want to lose weight, I find ways to eat less per meal. Most importantly, though, I find it takes 2-3 days for your brain and stomach to realise this is a permanent change and adjust their sensitive signals. So you have to wait a few days before your feeling of being full will correspond with eating a smaller meal and being full.

I don’t encourage really small meals. You need to eat enough to be healthy. That is why I prefer activity so you can eat plenty and still lose weight. I just wanted to share what I’ve learnt about controlling my hunger. It no longer rules me, and hopefully, it will no longer rule you.

Have you tried this before? How did it go?