Snacking

Adults should avoid snacking.* The reasons are (i) to allow your body to switch its focus from digestion to its many other biochemical tasks, and (ii) to learn to eat when you are hungry and not eat when you are not hungry.

The body's appetite regulation system is complex and involves several different mechanisms. Stomach cramping, fatigue, or headache due to detoxification of caffeine or other substances are often mistaken for true hunger. Many Americans don't even know the experience of true hunger, which is not an unpleasant sensation (unless your overall diet really isn't providing enough calories and nutrients).

Try to eat only three or even two times a day. This is easier than it sounds. A nutritarian meal which includes some beans and healthy fats will stave off hunger much longer than nutrient-poor low-fiber fare, and will help extinguish between-meal food cravings, which are often due to unmet nutritional needs. If you really do get hungry between meals, eat more nutritious and, if necessary, larger meals.

Your body is very smart, and you can't somehow trick it into enjoying food more by eating more often, or by eating food it doesn't need. True hunger greatly enhances one's enjoyment of food. But food taken beyond the body's needs is just nursing food or other addictions, not real pleasure.

* This does not apply to children. Children who are eating a nutritarian diet are the best judges of how much they need to eat, and when.