“Listen to your gut.”

We use phrases like this all the time. But it looks like we might actually be listening a lot more than we realize. Research suggests the bacteria within our gut biome actually influence our thinking. This takes the phrase ‘you are what you eat’ to a whole new level!

What we eat determines the makeup of our gut biome, and our gut biome sends messages to our brain. Our brains literally get craving messages from our gut, and just like a drug addiction, these signals can control our behaviour. One food that acts a lot like addictive drugs do is sugar.

I’m going to issue a challenge. I want you to go into your pantry and choose any 10 items that you enjoy eating. Include condiments, cereal, sauces, treats, and even a few things you consider healthy. Now look for the Sugar in the ingredients. How many of these items have sugar as one of the first four ingredients?

In case you didn’t know, ingredients on labels are ordered from largest to smallest amounts, so if sugar is one of the top 4 ingredients, that likely means there is a considerable amount of sugar in the product. Some labels will also have Nutritional Facts that show how many grams of sugar are in a single serving. And that single serving is likely smaller than what you serve yourself.

It’s almost impossible to avoid large doses of sugar in your diet. It takes effort. With high levels of sugar in so many things, if you aren’t intentionally thinking about it, you are literally creating sugar-hungry, mind-controlling monsters in your gut.

The next time you get a food craving, is it really your mind doing the craving or is it the bacteria in your gut taking control of you?