YOU ! but inverted.... Have you ever thought about stress this way ?

FunFormYep

There is a theoretical model about stress called the inverted U theory, that states that

There is an optimal level of stress that helps in better performance.

Imagine an inverted U, you get a normally distributed curve.

• On the left you have low stress that can be linked with inaction, letting go and sedentary behavior.
• On the right you have chronic high level stress which is also bad for performance leading to a state of fatigue, burnout, overtraining.
• Most importantly, on the top of the curve you have the optimum level of stress linked to optimal performance, higher creativity, better vigilance and concentration...

The theory was made in relation to sport performance but I like to link it to other everyday actions.
So basically there is a certain level of stress necessary to attain the level of arousal that incites the person on staying actively engaged in preparing for / doing something,

Ex1 (healthy eating) - Moving away from that chocolate bar or moving towards that delicious looking salad.

Ex 2 (studying) - You can also think about it as the stress level that incites you 2 days before the exam to start studying, or one month before ... which is potentially a better choice.

After reading this, can you reflect on your personal stress threshold in activities like staying healthy ? working out ?

If yes, do you think that you can use that to your advantage next time you face a stressful / arousing decision making situation ?

Xellercin

I prefer the paradigm of distress vs eustress, where there are healthy stresses and unhealthy stresses.

High amounts of healthy stresses can contribute to overall well being, but even low amounts of unhealthy stresses can cause cumulative damage.

What determines if a stress is healthy or not usually comes down to the degree of autonomy the person holds within the stressful situation. So for example, I've been extremely stressed but energized by it when self-employed and dealing with difficult patients, but I cannot tolerate even a moderate amount of unfairness or unreasonableness when working for someone else.

If your life is primarily filled with healthy stress, it's remarkable how much of it you can take, just as it's remarkable how unsustainable chronic unhealthy stress is.

FunFormYep

Xellercin wrote: »

I prefer the paradigm of distress vs eustress, where there are healthy stresses and unhealthy stresses.

High amounts of healthy stresses can contribute to overall well being, but even low amounts of unhealthy stresses can cause cumulative damage.

What determines if a stress is healthy or not usually comes down to the degree of autonomy the person holds within the stressful situation.

Autonomy is a major contributor to higher motivation especially when combined with a challenging/stimulating environment. I do agree with you on that one.

Xellercin wrote: »

So for example, I've been extremely stressed but energized by it when self-employed and dealing with difficult patients, but I cannot tolerate even a moderate amount of unfairness or unreasonableness when working for someone else.

If your life is primarily filled with healthy stress, it's remarkable how much of it you can take, just as it's remarkable how unsustainable chronic unhealthy stress is.

Working for someone else can be seen as taking away from the employee some autonomy which makes stress more annoying even unhealthy but nevertheless if it reaches the threshold of stress/arousal necessary for action it can still make the person do the right thing at the right time. Unfortunately a lot of employers benefit from that on the detriment of their employees health.

While on another hand, having a challenging community that you don't want to disappoint with your food choices is not technically working for them, but can still be stressful enough to keep you annoyingly away from that delicious chocolate bar !

• Is it healthy ? Unhealthy ? How do we judge stress here ?
• Is it better to stay away from unhealthy food rather than low on stress every time we have to make a food choice ?
• Or should we be looking to get a grab of our perfect "stress-autonomy-benefits" combination of our behavior that every time stress tries to play tricks with our minds more that we would like it to do, we recalibrate our thoughts on our sense of autonomy and the goals/benefits we have in mind ?

Lietchi

While I understand the stress for exercise and for work, I'm not grasping it regarding to food.
Not wanting to disappoint the community? I don't give a rat's *kitten* what others think of what I eat, or how much I eat 😉
What would be low stress regarding food intake and what would be high stress?
The only thing I can think of is how many 'rules' people give themselves regarding food quantity and food choices. For example very narrow definitions of what is healthy. Like in your question above above talking about 'unhealthy foods' 😉 where IMHO is not really a matter of unhealthy foods, but taking a wider view and looking at someone's diet on the whole. (a candy bar within a varied diet is fine, only candy bars is bad, carrots within a varied diet is fine, only carrots is bad)

Xellercin

FunFormYep wrote: »

Xellercin wrote: »

I prefer the paradigm of distress vs eustress, where there are healthy stresses and unhealthy stresses.

High amounts of healthy stresses can contribute to overall well being, but even low amounts of unhealthy stresses can cause cumulative damage.

What determines if a stress is healthy or not usually comes down to the degree of autonomy the person holds within the stressful situation.

Autonomy is a major contributor to higher motivation especially when combined with a challenging/stimulating environment. I do agree with you on that one.

Xellercin wrote: »

So for example, I've been extremely stressed but energized by it when self-employed and dealing with difficult patients, but I cannot tolerate even a moderate amount of unfairness or unreasonableness when working for someone else.

If your life is primarily filled with healthy stress, it's remarkable how much of it you can take, just as it's remarkable how unsustainable chronic unhealthy stress is.

Working for someone else can be seen as taking away from the employee some autonomy which makes stress more annoying even unhealthy but nevertheless if it reaches the threshold of stress/arousal necessary for action it can still make the person do the right thing at the right time. Unfortunately a lot of employers benefit from that on the detriment of their employees health.

While on another hand, having a challenging community that you don't want to disappoint with your food choices is not technically working for them, but can still be stressful enough to keep you annoyingly away from that delicious chocolate bar !

• Is it healthy ? Unhealthy ? How do we judge stress here ?
• Is it better to stay away from unhealthy food rather than low on stress every time we have to make a food choice ?
• Or should we be looking to get a grab of our perfect "stress-autonomy-benefits" combination of our behavior that every time stress tries to play tricks with our minds more that we would like it to do, we recalibrate our thoughts on our sense of autonomy and the goals/benefits we have in mind ?

I wasn't talking specifically about diet, I was just commenting about a different model of stress and outcome benefit.

However, if we want to talk about weight loss specifically, I personally disagree with making it more stressful.

I lost from obese to very lean and kept off the weight by making healthy choices as easy and pleasant as possible.

By systematically designing a habit-building protocol with incremental, sustainable changes, using basic behavioural psychology tools, it's not hard to engineer a pathway to making a healthy lifestyle the easiest option.

Basically, in my life, eating a chocolate bar would be more effort than eating carrots and hummus because I don't have a chocolate bar in my house, I would have to leave my house, go to the store and buy one.

Research shows quite predictably that people crave whatever is the quickest option. So if you have unhealthy options available to you that take less time to consume than healthy options, then you will crave the unhealthy options.

One of the main reasons people crave convenience foods is because they are convenient.

This is basic neuroscience. Narcotics that take time to have their affects are less addictive than drugs that get people less high, but act quicker.

Use that basic biological function in your favour and make healthy food the quickest option available. I do this by batch cooking and never having processed convenience foods in my house.

If I want junk food, I have to leave my house to get it. Sometimes that's worth doing, but most of the time I'll just grab the extremely convenient and extremely delicious food that's already prepared and ready to eat in the fridge.

By making healthy options the laziest option available, it takes no will power to eat healthy the vast majority of the time.

When healthy habits don't depend on discipline and will power, they are much more resilient in times of added stress.

If you want a behaviour to become a persistent daily habit, it's best to engineer a way to make it as easy as possible so that it is the last habit to fall when times get tough, because when that happens *something* has to give.

This is why most people gain a ton of weight when sh-- inevitably hits the fan in their lives. This is unavoidable, life will predictably throw unmanageable crap at everyone, but gaining weight as a result is avoidable if the habits that sustain your healthy weight aren't built on will power.

So I'm a big, big proponent of making healthy lifestyle behaviours as minimally stressful and as easy as humanly possible. Let laziness work for you, not against you.

FunFormYep

Lietchi wrote: »

While I understand the stress for exercise and for work, I'm not grasping it regarding to food.
Not wanting to disappoint the community? I don't give a rat's *kitten* what others think of what I eat, or how much I eat 😉

I understand your point of view. For me the community part is just another example I chose relating to commitment after seeing most of the people here look for people to support their weight loss journey. So basically I meant it like just another factor forcing us into the right direction.

Another thing that seems like I did not express well is the stress and food thing. I understand that maybe stress for you is like that intense feeling when you are handled a big work project or that feeling you get from that motivational talk your coach gives you 2 days before a big game. In the case of food choices, I was referring to people that are on a diet in a shared environment with "not on a diet people" like their brothers and sisters for example. In this case, bad food choices are always an option. Every time they open the fridge they get into that sense of stress of "One candy bar won't be bad but I am on a weight loss mission". Mission can sometimes refer to internal goals as well as shared goals with "a community". So that sense of "I am want to eat X thing but I have an opposite commitment" can help the person do the right thing but it can also exhaust him/her over time unless he/she is well prepared mentally. My goal was to share and discuss this whole dilemma with you.

(a candy bar within a varied diet is fine, only candy bars is bad, carrots within a varied diet is fine, only carrots is bad)

Even though I can see the big picture of a varied diet, I can't seem to agree with you on this one. Only carrots is bad is due to the lack of diversion while Only candy bars is bad is due to the high artificial sugar content in it which is the core of bad health effects of candy bars in any varied or unvaried diet.

FunFormYep

@Xellercin

Very good point, I totally agree with you. Unfortunately in fast food comes the word fast which is one example of easier access to unhealthy choices. Even in supermarkets, studies have shown that product placement affects consumer behavior. So I totally agree with you.

One obstacle I encountered during my healthy lifestyle journey is living in a shared environment like living with family or with roommates. In this case it is inevitable to getting exposed to unhealthy choices and food sharing invitations.

Lietchi

FunFormYep wrote: »

Lietchi wrote: »

While I understand the stress for exercise and for work, I'm not grasping it regarding to food.
Not wanting to disappoint the community? I don't give a rat's *kitten* what others think of what I eat, or how much I eat 😉

I understand your point of view. For me the community part is just another example I chose relating to commitment after seeing most of the people here look for people to support their weight loss journey. So basically I meant it like just another factor forcing us into the right direction.

Another thing that seems like I did not express well is the stress and food thing. I understand that maybe stress for you is like that intense feeling when you are handled a big work project or that feeling you get from that motivational talk your coach gives you 2 days before a big game. In the case of food choices, I was referring to people that are on a diet in a shared environment with "not on a diet people" like their brothers and sisters for example. In this case, bad food choices are always an option. Every time they open the fridge they get into that sense of stress of "One candy bar won't be bad but I am on a weight loss mission". Mission can sometimes refer to internal goals as well as shared goals with "a community". So that sense of "I am want to eat X thing but I have an opposite commitment" can help the person do the right thing but it can also exhaust him/her over time unless he/she is well prepared mentally. My goal was to share and discuss this whole dilemma with you.

(a candy bar within a varied diet is fine, only candy bars is bad, carrots within a varied diet is fine, only carrots is bad)

Even though I can see the big picture of a varied diet, I can't seem to agree with you on this one. Only carrots is bad is due to the lack of diversion while Only candy bars is bad is due to the high artificial sugar content in it which is the core of bad health effects of candy bars in any varied or unvaried diet.

The first part of your post: I have to be honest, I don't really understand what you're talking about. Food choices are stressful when around people 'not on a diet'? Just this distinction of 'on a diet' and 'not on a diet' already is alien to me, in the sense that I am not on a diet, I'm managing my weight. I eat the foods I enjoy, just like most people around me. I'm just mindful of quantities and the calorie impact of some of those choices, and even within that mindfulness my choices will vary (sometimes aiming for a deficit, sometimes going over but as part of general weight management when I aim for general balance).
Yet again, it's not a matter of bad or good food choices, but whether or not those choices help us achieve our goals. Sometimes the goal 'enjoying myself' is more important than the goal 'I want to improve my body composition', which is (imho) a healthy approach to life, as long as we have balance and for the most part these are actual choices we make.
But the link to the stress curve still isn't really clear to me.

Second part of your post:
Only carrots = bad, because (even though carrots are more nutrient dense) it would be very one-sided in nutrients and severely lacking in protein and fats
Only candy bars = bad because it's one-sided and nutrient poor and very high sugar, but in itself the added sugar is not bad within limits (and provided we're not diabetic of course)
I'm guessing that if you would look at my diet, you would see 'bad foods' in my diary on a daily basis. I will share an entire pint of Ben & Jerry's ice-cream with my boyfriend when I want and when I have room for it in my calorie allotment. Zero guilt, because I eat a lot of home-cooked foods and tonnes of vegetables as well.

This is what I mean with what stress relating to food evoked in my mind: we need some 'rules' to manage our weight (number of calories at the very least) but the more rules we impose on ourselves, the more stressful it tends to become, for example:
- minding your macros: a light approach to this would be, for example, aiming for a minimum of protein, looking at daily intake over a weekly average. A more stressful approach would be to micromanage macros, aiming for precise goals each day or even each meal.
- allowed and not allowed food choices: Sometimes this is due to allergies/medical conditions. Sometimes this is because they know some foods lead to binges: in that case, while banning foods might be stressful, there is also less stress because they don't have to worry about binges. And then there are people who ban foods they think are 'bad', often foods they enjoy. Which is a high stress choice - often an unsustainable approach in the long run and then people quit.
- meal timing: for some intermittent fasting is a low stress way of losing weight (no food choices to be made during part of the day +easier to stay within calories). For others this will be stressful, because they have a lot of social occasions where they feel pressured to eat anyway within their fasting time period.
More stress: more likely that the person gives up because it's too uncomfortable (and that goes for food as well as, for example, imposing a super rigid exercise regime etc.)

AnnPT77

I'm wondering what the point of this discussion is for you, OP: What are you actually hoping to learn or accomplish in terms of real-world tactics or outcomes?

I do think the inverted U theory of stress makes sense in a physical training setting, but don't think that generalizes well to all forms of stress in all scenarios.

I don't have any particular credentials in the subject, but my personal operating idea is that stress is an energy expenditure. In a way, it's like a cost, a price tag.

As with dollar costs, I can spend my stress "budget" in various ways. Some of them are an investment, can lead to a productive outcome that's useful to me. (Well-managed exercise is an example of that, or a moderate calorie deficit that leads me to a healthy weight.)

Other stressors are a pure cost, but necessary. I might think of that as analogous to spending money on something tedious but necessary, like a car repair or the light bill. For example, my job included a good bit of stress, but I needed to accommodate some amount of stress on that front in order to have needful amounts of food, clothing, and shelter.

Another loose category would be (frankly) kind of dumb, optional stress. That's analogous to what we do with what's usually called discretionary spending, on the money front (though sometimes people do them with the rent money). There are a range of stressors there, some more dumb/optional than others. Staying up late at night and short-changing sleep might feel fun at the time, but it's high stress, and the fruits of the expenditure are bad outcomes, especially if I do too much of it. Staying in an overly-stressful job - if there are alternatives, but I'm scared to job-hunt, might be another example. There are tradeoffs in this category, sometimes, of short-term vs. long-term costs and benefits.

Overall, though, I have limited energy I can spend on stress - productive stress or dumb stress, cumulatively in total - before I crash and burn in some way. It's a budget that I need to manage.

IMO, that's part of the message of the inverted U for considering effects of physical training. The inflection point of the U is the cost/benefit change between productive stress and dumb stress. In other realms, the inverted U model might not apply as clearly.

If I stand back and squint, I'd say it applies in some ways to eating, but it's pretty approximate. For example, there's theoretically a calorie intake level where I achieve my weight goals (productive) but without damaging my health, without tanking my energy level to the detriment of my daily life, etc. (which would be dumb). I won't belabor it, but I could see some vaguely similar effects in terms of the tradeoffs between good nutrition, treats, and sustainability of an overall eating strategy. It's sort of straining the abstraction, though, IMO.

I'm going to pick at a specific point you made on the eating front, because I disagree with it pretty strongly:

Even though I can see the big picture of a varied diet, I can't seem to agree with you on this one. Only carrots is bad is due to the lack of diversion while Only candy bars is bad is due to the high artificial sugar content in it which is the core of bad health effects of candy bars in any varied or unvaried diet.

Only carrots is bad because it doesn't result in overall good nutrition, which is unhealthful. Only candy bars is bad because it doesn't result in overall good nutrition, which is unhealthful. It's all just food, with calories and nutrient tradeoffs.

Sure, in the "overall varied diet" that lietchi posited as the context for moderating either/both, we might need to moderate those two things in different ways in different amounts, because their calorie levels and nutrient density differ.

I'd say this, though, even though it's a silly reductio: If I had to choose one of the two diets, all carrots or all candy bars, I'd take the candy bars for nutrition as long as I get to choose the candy bar. Some of them have nuts, dairy, even raisins or stuff like that in them, so can be a more nutritionally varied, balanced stupid way of eating than the all-carrots stupid way of eating.

100g of carrots have 4.7g of sugar, and only 0.9g of protein. I'd need to eat around 11kg of carrots to hit my daily protein goal, at a cost of 4500ish calories. That would give me a whopping 521g of sugar, and sugar is sugar. I can't eat 11kg of carrots per day, I'd explode: 308g fiber, only 26g fat? Yikes - unholy digestive backup!

To hit my daily protein goal, I'd need to eat about 27 (50g) Snickers almond candy bars, which is admittedly more calories (6777) , but maybe not as much more sugar as you'd think (656g). I could eat 27 Snickers bars daily. Yeah, micronutrients would suffer, but I didn't even pick a candy bar with dried fruit in it, like Cadbury Fruit and Nut. I think that would probably kill me more slowly than the all-carrots diet would. (There's enough fiber for basic needs, and excess fats, of course, so no gut disasters in the short run, at least.)

Mono-diets are way stupid. The tradeoffs aren't always what you'd think. What matters is how a food fits in your overall diet. Y'know, some people need added sugar to thrive, such as endurance athletes who need to fuel long workouts without digestive distress. Pure glucose is better, in that scenario, than either candy bars or carrots.

Backing up again to the general point: I generally agree with Xellercin here from a theoretical standpoint (as I often do in threads), but I'm more hedonistic in my personal behavior so our tactics/tradeoffs differ. No need to belabor that. I also tend to agree with Lietchi, as I often do on a practical level.

I'm going to back to my starting question in my post: I'm wondering what the point of this discussion is for you, OP: What are you actually hoping to learn or accomplish in terms of real-world tactics or outcomes?

It's a super-theoretical question, which can be fun as an intellectual exercise. I'm not saying you're like me (I'd guarantee you're not, in diverse ways). For me, sometimes theorizing and over-analyzing is a scam I run on myself to avoid engaging with the concrete issue (IMO) of practical action (behavior) that leads to outcomes in my life . . . analysis paralysis is a snarky name for it. Like I said, that may not be where you're sitting on this thread, but my recognizing this as a weak point in me is what makes me wonder what you're hoping to achieve via this discussion.

Best wishes, sincerely, regardless of the point. It's a fun thing to talk about.

FunFormYep

@Lietchi

I understand your point of view concerning moderation and considering stress as a vulnerability factor for relapsing. This is why I created this discussion and shared the inverted U model. Sources of stress are always looked at as negative stimuli. I wanted to share the idea that stress can sometimes be a positive thing for doing the right thing even if it's too uncomfortable.
Imagine the following 3 scenarios,

1. dissonance --> stress ---> feeling uncomfortable ---> productive behavior (healthy choice) ---> feeling proud
2. dissonance ---> stress ---> feeling uncomfortable ---> productive behavior (healthy choice) ---> feeling bad because chips are delicious and I like it
3. dissonance ---> stress ---> feeling uncomfortable ---> unhealthy choice (stress avoidance) ---> feeling comfortable

For people who are on a mission, combating diabetes or else, they will usually fall in one of the first 2 scenarios. If they manage to look at stress as a positive source of alertness by their body to do the more productive thing then they may adapt better to their situation.
With the same vision, people with fitness/health targets to achieve might find it more comfortable to choose that protein rich salad instead of that delicious burger combo they used to crave when out with friends who are not on the same journey as they are.

On another hand, I totally agree with you that stress can a lot of times be excessive and negatively affect the person's functioning. This is why I think that with positive approaches like the one mentioned above sometimes we can increase our stress tolerance for us to deal with the healthier decision more comfortably.

Concerning whether there are unhealthy food or not, I think that in the world we live in where everything is easily accessible moderation is the right approach to life. At the same time, moderation could be a double edge sword because at any time the healthy/unhealthy choices ratio could go into one way or another.
Unhealthy is not decided by the amount consumed but by the effect the product has on health and it's contribution as a risk factor to different diseases. This is why I can't agree with you on the unhealthy food point, I think there are unhealthy food that are accessible for us and we psychologically enjoy eating them in different amounts but they are bad for our health no matter what.

FunFormYep

AnnPT77 wrote: »

I'm wondering what the point of this discussion is for you, OP: What are you actually hoping to learn or accomplish in terms of real-world tactics or outcomes?

I do think the inverted U theory of stress makes sense in a physical training setting, but don't think that generalizes well to all forms of stress in all scenarios.

I don't have any particular credentials in the subject, but my personal operating idea is that stress is an energy expenditure. In a way, it's like a cost, a price tag.

Overall, though, I have limited energy I can spend on stress - productive stress or dumb stress, cumulatively in total - before I crash and burn in some way. It's a budget that I need to manage.

IMO, that's part of the message of the inverted U for considering effects of physical training. The inflection point of the U is the cost/benefit change between productive stress and dumb stress. In other realms, the inverted U model might not apply as clearly.

Like I said to Lietchi in my last post, my goal was to see how people on here will react to the idea that we can see stress as a positive source of functioning. And maybe help them reflect on how they see stress, what is their own stress/arousal threshold for optimal functioning etc... and of course discuss just like we are doing !

Effectively, we managed to create a very good discussion. You people noted some interesting stuff that lack in the inverted U model and are usually used against it as a critic. Personal factors like sense of autonomy, psychology and mental & physical resources are not taken into consideration by the inverted U model.

Unhealthy is not decided by the amount consumed but by the effect the product has on health and it's contribution as a risk factor to different diseases. This is why I can't agree with you on the unhealthy food point, I think there are unhealthy food that are accessible for us and we psychologically enjoy eating them in different amounts but they are bad for our health no matter what.

This is what I just answered Lietchi and I stand by it. Mono-diets are not a good example unless someone is in a weird situation. I took it as a metaphorical example. But if you had the option to get your sugar from a candy bar or from a carrot, which would you choose? I will choose carrot every time. Food source, nutrient quality and insulin resistance are all better in the case of carrots instead of artificial processed sugar.

Lietchi

FunFormYep wrote: »

@Lietchi

Unhealthy is not decided by the amount consumed but by the effect the product has on health and it's contribution as a risk factor to different diseases. This is why I can't agree with you on the unhealthy food point, I think there are unhealthy food that are accessible for us and we psychologically enjoy eating them in different amounts but they are bad for our health no matter what.

The effect the product has on health will depend on quantity and the overall diet.
Or are you honestly saying that eating 10gr of added sugar has the same effect as 100gr? Or consuming for example 30gr of saturated fat a day versus 60, and both those quantities with ample unsaturated fats alongside or not?
I dislike extremes on the whole, and specifically regarding food. I'm not talking about medical conditions here, in those cases there could be severe justified restrictions. But unnecessarily restrictive diets with 'banned' foods, strict definitions of what is healthy,... are rarely a good idea. The stress of it will often be excessive and counterproductive to the idea of sustainable habits for good health.
But you do you of course.

I will, on the other hand, agree that sometimes stress can have a good effect too. I'm thinking specifically of the negative effects of being overweight (not finding clothes in the right size, lack of confidence, being out of breath, etc) which can push people in the direction of accepting the uncomfortable enterprise of changing habits.

Xellercin

FunFormYep wrote: »

AnnPT77 wrote: »

I'm wondering what the point of this discussion is for you, OP: What are you actually hoping to learn or accomplish in terms of real-world tactics or outcomes?

I do think the inverted U theory of stress makes sense in a physical training setting, but don't think that generalizes well to all forms of stress in all scenarios.

I don't have any particular credentials in the subject, but my personal operating idea is that stress is an energy expenditure. In a way, it's like a cost, a price tag.

Overall, though, I have limited energy I can spend on stress - productive stress or dumb stress, cumulatively in total - before I crash and burn in some way. It's a budget that I need to manage.

IMO, that's part of the message of the inverted U for considering effects of physical training. The inflection point of the U is the cost/benefit change between productive stress and dumb stress. In other realms, the inverted U model might not apply as clearly.

Like I said to Lietchi in my last post, my goal was to see how people on here will react to the idea that we can see stress as a positive source of functioning. And maybe help them reflect on how they see stress, what is their own stress/arousal threshold for optimal functioning etc... and of course discuss just like we are doing !

Effectively, we managed to create a very good discussion. You people noted some interesting stuff that lack in the inverted U model and are usually used against it as a critic. Personal factors like sense of autonomy, psychology and mental & physical resources are not taken into consideration by the inverted U model.

Unhealthy is not decided by the amount consumed but by the effect the product has on health and it's contribution as a risk factor to different diseases. This is why I can't agree with you on the unhealthy food point, I think there are unhealthy food that are accessible for us and we psychologically enjoy eating them in different amounts but they are bad for our health no matter what.

This is what I just answered Lietchi and I stand by it. Mono-diets are not a good example unless someone is in a weird situation. I took it as a metaphorical example. But if you had the option to get your sugar from a candy bar or from a carrot, which would you choose? I will choose carrot every time. Food source, nutrient quality and insulin resistance are all better in the case of carrots instead of artificial processed sugar.

But has this ever actually been in question?

A lot of behaviour is motivated by stress, that's always been factually self evident.

It's not a question of whether or not stress is motivating, it is. The question is whether or not the person is working within their adaptive capacity or not.

If they aren't, then added stress will just contribute to more burnout and breakdown in their function over time.

Whether or not someone is functioning within their adaptive capacity comes down to how much unhealthy stress they are facing and for how long.

People don't generally fail to lose weight due to a lack of pressure, they fail due to a lack of adaptive capacity.

AnnPT77

FunFormYep wrote: »

(snip to highlight the idea I want to reply to)

This is what I just answered Lietchi and I stand by it. Mono-diets are not a good example unless someone is in a weird situation. I took it as a metaphorical example. But if you had the option to get your sugar from a candy bar or from a carrot, which would you choose? I will choose carrot every time. Food source, nutrient quality and insulin resistance are all better in the case of carrots instead of artificial processed sugar.

Really? I definitely would not choose a carrot every time.

Context is everything. I'm quite committed to good overall nutrition. I make it a point to get 10 x 80g servings of varied, colorful veggies and fruits nearly every day, and nearly always do - a bare minimum of 5 x 80g, but it's rare to be anywhere near that low.

Still, if I were planning an all-day canoe jaunt, with several hours of paddling, and predict that I'll want quick energy at some point, I'm not going to pack a pound of carrots to get its 21g of sugars. A candy bar is a much better idea, in that context: The carrots are bulky, the fiber will slow down absorption of that meager amount of sugar for the situation, and they'd take a long time to eat and are heavier on the portages, besides. In my world, that would be a ridiculous choice, in that context. Sure, sometimes I might choose a sugar-dense dried fruit or something instead, but the candy bar is pretty on point for calorie needs in that situation: Relatively low fiber, quick to eat, easy to carry, tasty, quick-absorbing carbs. It fits the rational nutritional need.

Overall good nutrition is important. What that means at any given moment is context-dependent. To me, "always choose carrots" seems like orthorexia, not targeted, sensible eating.

Clearly, we differ on this.

FunFormYep

Lietchi wrote: »

FunFormYep wrote: »

@Lietchi

Unhealthy is not decided by the amount consumed but by the effect the product has on health and it's contribution as a risk factor to different diseases. This is why I can't agree with you on the unhealthy food point, I think there are unhealthy food that are accessible for us and we psychologically enjoy eating them in different amounts but they are bad for our health no matter what.

The effect the product has on health will depend on quantity and the overall diet.

+ @AnnPT77

Cocaine is bad because it has an addictive potential that destroys health over time. But we don't take that risk and snort cocaine once in a while.
Sugar has an addictive potential along side other acute (i.e. inflammatory) and chronic effects (i.e. insulin resistance). Why would I risk it and include artificial sugar in my diet ?

My point here is that the potential destructiveness of the product determines if it's healthy or unhealthy no matter if we have easy access to it or if we like to consume it or not. Unfortunately in our modern world, for example, sugar is unnecessarily included in quasi-every processed product on the supermarket's shelf. And it is because of that addictive like potential that will keep people coming for more. Artificial sugar is basically unnecessary and better glucose quality can be found in any other fresh fruit. If you don't agree on carrots you can still eat bananas for quick energy supplementation.

It's not orthorexia @AnnPT77 nor am I preaching. I am as vulnerable as everybody else concerning exposure to unhealthy choices. My goal is to discuss different visions and thank you for participating !

FunFormYep

Xellercin wrote: »

FunFormYep wrote: »

AnnPT77 wrote: »

I'm wondering what the point of this discussion is for you, OP: What are you actually hoping to learn or accomplish in terms of real-world tactics or outcomes?

I do think the inverted U theory of stress makes sense in a physical training setting, but don't think that generalizes well to all forms of stress in all scenarios.

I don't have any particular credentials in the subject, but my personal operating idea is that stress is an energy expenditure. In a way, it's like a cost, a price tag.

Overall, though, I have limited energy I can spend on stress - productive stress or dumb stress, cumulatively in total - before I crash and burn in some way. It's a budget that I need to manage.

IMO, that's part of the message of the inverted U for considering effects of physical training. The inflection point of the U is the cost/benefit change between productive stress and dumb stress. In other realms, the inverted U model might not apply as clearly.

Like I said to Lietchi in my last post, my goal was to see how people on here will react to the idea that we can see stress as a positive source of functioning. And maybe help them reflect on how they see stress, what is their own stress/arousal threshold for optimal functioning etc... and of course discuss just like we are doing !

Effectively, we managed to create a very good discussion. You people noted some interesting stuff that lack in the inverted U model and are usually used against it as a critic. Personal factors like sense of autonomy, psychology and mental & physical resources are not taken into consideration by the inverted U model.

Unhealthy is not decided by the amount consumed but by the effect the product has on health and it's contribution as a risk factor to different diseases. This is why I can't agree with you on the unhealthy food point, I think there are unhealthy food that are accessible for us and we psychologically enjoy eating them in different amounts but they are bad for our health no matter what.

This is what I just answered Lietchi and I stand by it. Mono-diets are not a good example unless someone is in a weird situation. I took it as a metaphorical example. But if you had the option to get your sugar from a candy bar or from a carrot, which would you choose? I will choose carrot every time. Food source, nutrient quality and insulin resistance are all better in the case of carrots instead of artificial processed sugar.

But has this ever actually been in question?

A lot of behavior is motivated by stress, that's always been factually self evident.

It's not a question of whether or not stress is motivating, it is. The question is whether or not the person is working within their adaptive capacity or not.

If they aren't, then added stress will just contribute to more burnout and breakdown in their function over time.

Whether or not someone is functioning within their adaptive capacity comes down to how much unhealthy stress they are facing and for how long.

People don't generally fail to lose weight due to a lack of pressure, they fail due to a lack of adaptive capacity.

I totally agree with you. I consider "appraising stress as a motivator to go in the more productive direction" as a tool for better stress handling and thus reinforcing one's own adaptive capacity. This is how I interacted with the information about optimal stress when I was first introduced to the inverted U model and I wanted to share it here maybe some people would reflect and benefit the same way I did from this information.

I am not saying people should add stress to their lives. I wanted people to see if people see stress as beneficial sometimes and do they think of that adaptive capacity of theirs as a threshold for optimal stress ? Can stress be used to our advantage if we look at it differently ? This is how it worked for me, I wanted to check if people can relate to such a functioning.

Lietchi

FunFormYep wrote: »

Lietchi wrote: »

FunFormYep wrote: »

@Lietchi

Unhealthy is not decided by the amount consumed but by the effect the product has on health and it's contribution as a risk factor to different diseases. This is why I can't agree with you on the unhealthy food point, I think there are unhealthy food that are accessible for us and we psychologically enjoy eating them in different amounts but they are bad for our health no matter what.

The effect the product has on health will depend on quantity and the overall diet.

+ @AnnPT77

Cocaine is bad because it has an addictive potential that destroys health over time. But we don't take that risk and snort cocaine once in a while.
Sugar has an addictive potential along side other acute (i.e. inflammatory) and chronic effects (i.e. insulin resistance). Why would I risk it and include artificial sugar in my diet ?

My point here is that the potential destructiveness of the product determines if it's healthy or unhealthy no matter if we have easy access to it or if we like to consume it or not. Unfortunately in our modern world, for example, sugar is unnecessarily included in quasi-every processed product on the supermarket's shelf. And it is because of that addictive like potential that will keep people coming for more. Artificial sugar is basically unnecessary and better glucose quality can be found in any other fresh fruit. If you don't agree on carrots you can still eat bananas for quick energy supplementation.

It's not orthorexia @AnnPT77 nor am I preaching. I am as vulnerable as everybody else concerning exposure to unhealthy choices. My goal is to discuss different visions and thank you for participating !

The anti added sugar force is strong in you 😉 yeah no, I totally disagree with the analogy between sugar and cocaïne. If it's addictive (big if, but that's another discussion) it is so for fewer people than cocaïne, and it definitely does not have the same destructive effects as cocaïne on health. (unless, obviously, you have diabetes for example).

AnnPT77

FunFormYep wrote: »

Lietchi wrote: »

FunFormYep wrote: »

@Lietchi

Unhealthy is not decided by the amount consumed but by the effect the product has on health and it's contribution as a risk factor to different diseases. This is why I can't agree with you on the unhealthy food point, I think there are unhealthy food that are accessible for us and we psychologically enjoy eating them in different amounts but they are bad for our health no matter what.

The effect the product has on health will depend on quantity and the overall diet.

+ @AnnPT77

Cocaine is bad because it has an addictive potential that destroys health over time. But we don't take that risk and snort cocaine once in a while.
Sugar has an addictive potential along side other acute (i.e. inflammatory) and chronic effects (i.e. insulin resistance). Why would I risk it and include artificial sugar in my diet ?

My point here is that the potential destructiveness of the product determines if it's healthy or unhealthy no matter if we have easy access to it or if we like to consume it or not. Unfortunately in our modern world, for example, sugar is unnecessarily included in quasi-every processed product on the supermarket's shelf. And it is because of that addictive like potential that will keep people coming for more. Artificial sugar is basically unnecessary and better glucose quality can be found in any other fresh fruit. If you don't agree on carrots you can still eat bananas for quick energy supplementation.

It's not orthorexia @AnnPT77 nor am I preaching. I am as vulnerable as everybody else concerning exposure to unhealthy choices. My goal is to discuss different visions and thank you for participating !

When food is broken down during the digestive process, the sugar from carrots is indistinguishable from the sugar from candy. It's all sugar (glucose, fructose , sucrose, lactose, etc.). The food sources differ quite dramatically in overall nutritional qualities, and the food's composition can affect things like the speed with which the sugars will be metabolized, of course. (Slowly metabolized sugar is not always better, either, as I've explained above - it's situational. Sometimes fast sugar is needful.)

If you read the details behind recommendations from outfits like WHO that recommend limiting added sugars, it's because sugar-dense foods are often nutrient-sparse and not very filling, so if someone consumes excessive added sugar, they're likely to either get poor nutrition at adequate calories, or adequate nutrition at excess calories, or (worse yet) excess calories and poor nutrition. Those things, and dental cavities, are the big issues.

When it comes to sugar, including added sugars, context and dosage matters.

Personally, I eat relatively little of added sugars (typically well below the WHO recommended levels, for example). I'm not a big sweet tooth person other than liking some whole fruit every day, but I'm much more likely to over-indulge on rich (fatty), savory, or salty foods. I was obese for decades for a reason!

Even so, I now very intentionally put an "added sugar", blackstrap molasses, in my oatmeal every day. A good brand of that stuff has some surprisingly good levels of potassium and iron for its calories, plus some other lesser micros, and I like its flavor plus a little sweetness in my oatmeal. IMO, this is perfectly reasonable way to think (and eat). "Added sugar always bad" is not a thing I can subscribe to.

As an aside, you may not realize that I'm old enough to have been not only alive but adult in the 1970s-80s. In that context, your "we don't take that risk and snort cocaine once in a while" might be making some unwarranted assumptions. I admit, I now think of it as youthful d**m foolishness, but in practice I didn't like it, didn't repeat it - though I know a number of people (most still alive and reasonably healthy, BTW) who did. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone, nonetheless.

For clarity, those I know who died, died of other things - we're reasonably old, and it happens to all of us eventually. People did die from cocaine overdose, of course, in the larger world; or cumulative excess use, in one way or another. I just didn't/don't know any of them. 🤷‍♀️

FunFormYep

I do understand your approach @AnnPT77 @Lietchi . I personally can't agree with it. Don't get me wrong I am exposed to sugar as much as you are every day, but being exposed and surviving after exposure doesn't make it good or healthy.
Of course there is no one contributing factor to disease, but there is a combo of factors between which there is a major contributor (the most risky). Sugar is usually associated with inflammation, cancer, diabetes, food addiction and excess weight. Plus it is not nutrient dense, so for me it is an unnecessary risky ingredient and every product that contains it (especially in excessive amounts like candy, soda and almost all processed and highly processed foods) is an unhealthy choice compared to fresh fruits / fresh fruits juice, maple syrup, honey, etc...

In the end we took the discussion to a whole new place, I was glad we shared our different approaches with each other. Have a great weekend !