Yes, I’m totally with you there! For all the recommendations I’ve seen about snacking throughout the day, I have not found that it works well for me to be able to listen to my body’s hunger cues. Similarly, longer gaps between meals seem to promote better self-cleansing of the small intestine, improved nutritional absorption, and better hormonal regulation.

I find there is a big psychological component to food enjoyment as well. If you decide you don’t like a food in advance, you will go in hating it. Make the grimace that a 4 year old makes eating kale and bite into anything - the muscle activation sets off a cascade of emotional reactions that could make you hate your favorite food. I have enjoyed learning to cook and trying different ways to prepare foods that can be more difficult to love - now I enjoy the Brussels sprouts that I hated so much as a child.

My ground rule that helped me most with weight loss was to avoid single serve packaging and any foods that are shelf-stable that should not be without many added preservatives. If I’m craving sweets, I will make my own granola bars or banana bread - and likely with a fraction of the sugar of a pre-packaged alternative. But when I’m only choosing less processed foods, my body seems to know what to eat when the added-sugar noise is mostly eliminated.