How To Outsmart Cravings: Why White-Knuckling Doesn’t Work

Summer is a popular time to address habits such as smoking or emotional eating: we are surrounded by images of healthy lifestyles in the media, and the new year resolutions have long faded from view. However, anyone who’s tried and failed to change a habit that has a grip on them will know it’s not as easy as just deciding to quit. 

Forcing yourself to resist an urge - white knuckling - doesn’t work in the long term, because it requires a huge amount of willpower and energy, and most people break eventually. Here’s a look at what’s going on in our brains when a craving kicks in, and why learning how to emotionally detach from them can put you back in the driving seat. 

The neuroscience behind cravings

Certain substances such as sugar and nicotine, or behaviours such as endlessly scrolling social media, activate the dopamine system in the brain, which is the reward pathway that helps us to feel temporarily soothed and released from uncomfortable emotions. The brain immediately tells us that this feels good and it wants more. 

However, the pleasurable feelings are short-lived, and over time we need a bigger hit to get the same high. This leads to a repetitive cycle of behaviour, and our brains love predictable habits: it forms neural shortcuts so that we follow automatic patterns rather than have to expend effort and energy thinking about our actions. 

This habit forming trait is necessary for survival: if we had to do every daily task as though we were learning it for the first time, we would never become functioning and productive adults. However, sometimes it’s hard to filter out the unhelpful stuff. When we try and fail, we can feel guilty and ashamed, and this leads right back to the craving.

Why white knuckling doesn’t work

When we try to suppress our cravings through force, it activates the ‘fight or flight response’ in the brain. The stress of trying to resist a chemical urge tells the brain it is under threat, and over time the emotional pressure leads us back even more strongly to the addictive substance or behaviour for comfort and release.

It’s a bit like trying to open a door by pushing it inwards instead of pulling the handle: eventually you might force the door down, but you’ll probably do yourself some lasting damage in the process (not to mention the door). The trick is to learn how to open the mental door to recovery with the handle.  

Rewiring the brain

The root of cravings lie in the limbic system, which is the part of the brain that processes emotion and memory. The key to rewiring a habit is to introduce the prefrontal cortex, which is responsible for awareness and logic, into our responses. 

Stand back and observe your craving

When you feel a craving, it’s your limbic system asking for comfort and it happens at a subconscious level. We barely need to think about ingrained habits, so before you know it, you’ve lit a cigarette or reached for the biscuit tin. 

Next time, try to anticipate a trigger for your craving, such as boredom or a stressful meeting, and press pause and observe what’s going on. Say out loud: “This is a craving driven by my nervous system.” This puts you in conscious control of the urge, so it’s no longer just an impulse. 

The 90-second rule

According to the neuroscientist Jill Bolte Taylor, when we react to a stimulus, it triggers a 90-second chemical process in our brain. Any emotions or urges after that are because we consciously choose to stay in the loop. Therefore when a craving kicks in, try setting a timer for 90 seconds.

During that window, use grounding techniques to challenge any inner voices that may be judging you or egging you on to give in. This might be through deep breathing, or engaging your senses and naming five things around you that you can see, hear or feel. 

Be curious about your emotional state before and afterwards. Probably you had to outride some uncomfortable feelings, but you made it to the other side. Eventually, you will learn to tolerate the discomfort without acting on impulses. 

You don’t have to do it alone

It’s not always enough to understand what’s going on in your mind: emotional habits are incredibly powerful and if you can’t break them alone, it’s not a sign of weakness or failure. You might be interested in exploring hypnotherapy, which we offer at our Harley Street clinic.