Cravings Are Like Seagulls

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Have you ever had a food craving that felt so loud and overwhelming that you thought the only way to make it stop was to give in?

In this episode, I'm sharing a simple story from a day at the beach that I believe is a good metaphor for cravings. As my family sat down to eat, a group of seagulls became increasingly loud and aggressive, constantly trying to get our food. But when we refused to feed them, something interesting happened: eventually, they quieted down and flew away.

Cravings can work the same way. The more we feed them, the louder and more persistent they can become. But when we learn to pause, wait, and let the craving pass instead of immediately giving in, we can discover that the intensity doesn't last forever.

If you're struggling with sugar cravings, food obsession, or feeling like you have to satisfy every urge to eat, this episode will encourage you to try something different. The next time a craving feels loud and overwhelming, don't automatically feed it. Give yourself a few minutes. Let the feeling rise, settle, and pass.

You may be surprised by how quickly the craving loses its power. 

In This Episode:

✨ Why cravings can feel loud, urgent, and impossible to ignore
✨ What seagulls taught me about food cravings
✨ Why giving in can reinforce the cycle of cravings
✨ How to practice pausing instead of immediately responding
✨ A simple 2–3 minute strategy for riding out a craving
✨ Why you don't have to obey every craving you experience

Make it a great day!

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:20

All right, I'm gonna set the stage here. Last week I was at the beach and we love to go to the beach. And one of the things my family likes to do is take our dinner or our lunch to the beach. So in the back of my car, I had loaded up a cooler with some cheese and fruit, um, some vegetables and some crackers for my kids, and we were gonna have our lunch. And it's just kind of a fun thing we do get our chairs, get blankets, whatever, make a plate of food. Well, if you know anything about the beach, there's always seagulls, okay? And the seagulls love when people feed them. So as soon as we start opening up the food, the cooler, getting it on our plates, having it on our hands, the seagulls started being incessant, making noises, coming near, just literally almost trying to get in the back of the car, trying to grab cracker from my kids' hands. They won't stop until you feed them, typically. And so the inclination is feed them. Let's give them something. Let's throw a cracker out really far. And so then they get the cracker and then they go away. That's not what happens. As soon as you feed those seagulls, they get louder. They get crazier, they get wild. They literally start attacking you, your food, your area, your car, whatever it is, to try and get a piece of food. It doesn't even matter what it is, they just want it. And they are incessant, loud, wild, crazy, and they won't stop until you feed them. Now, I told my kids, please do not throw anything out. They will go away if we don't feed them. I promise you. And they looked at me like I was crazy. These birds are not gonna go away. They're gonna stay here. I said, Don't feed them, they will go away. Within a few minutes, they flew away and they landed on the ground. They settled down, they stopped hounding us for the food. They calmed down, they quieted down, they went away. That is exactly what happens with food cravings. They feel loud, they're aggressive, they don't stop, they're incessant, and we feel like we have to just eat the craving to get it to go away. But I can promise you it will be exactly like those seagulls if you don't give in to it. Give yourself a few minutes, set a timer, and within two or three minutes, the craving goes away. It settles down, it calms, it quiets. So the next time you have a craving that feels heavy, loud, exhausting, wild, crazy, just let it pass. Don't feed it, commit to give it a couple minutes and it will go away. Think of it like a seagull that's just gonna annoy you and pester you and be loud and almost try and peck at you to get it to feed it. Don't feed it and it will go away. I'm not suggesting it's not gonna come back at some point, but if we can practice that two to three minute window, they settle, they calm, and the cravings go away.