This is part three of the series, “How I quit eating fast food”. If you enjoy this post, please consider receiving AlmostFit articles in your inbox. Thanks.

In parts one and two of this series, I described how I’ve quit eating fast food using 3 basic steps: Educating myself, Deciding to quit, and Acting on my convictions. In this final part of the series I’m describing the actions I’ve used to successfully break the fast food habit.

20 tactics to kill the fast food habit

1. Start out with a ridiculously simple goal - So simple that you can’t fail. Leo Babauta’s book, Zen To Done, (an excellent book by the way), highlights this concept. If you start out excessively simple, you can build on that success to reach your goals over time. Here’s an example: I first realized that soda, regular or otherwise, is bad for me for one specific reason: in the end, even diet soda simply perpetuated my desire for the stuff. I realized that I could easily give up soda if I wanted to - it never tastes the same at a fast food place anyway, and I always drink too much of it. It was simple and attainable. And the more I did it, the more “power” to change that I felt.

2. Treat the decision to quit fast food as a habit, not a lifelong commitment. The idea is to make it your habit to seek out real food, at the expense of spending time and money on fast food. It doesn’t need to be a lifelong political position. You want healthful choices to become second nature. That way when you do give into that impulse desire, which you likely will at some point in the future, you will not have “failed”. Take it slow, and be proud of your many small accomplishments that will lead to a bigger success of building a healthy habit of eating.

3. Make yourself as publicly accountable as possible. Blog about it. Tell your friends that you are doing it. Use that concept of peer pressure to your advantage by putting pressure on yourself to stick to it. Everyone you know should be shocked if they see you walking out with a weighted paper sack with an ever-expanding grease spot on the bottom where the fries are trying to dig their way to freedom.

4. Don’t buy into the “healthy alternatives” concept that fast food is trying to sell to you. This is basic marketing 101, and is one of the greatest “dupes” since the famous Roman campaign for the healthfulness of lead cups (OK I made that up - but it sounds plausible). The basic idea is to find any way possible to get customers into the store. That is the hardest part. Once customers are in, add-ons are the name of the game. Want that salad? Bundle it with a cheaply sweetened fruit cup and a large diet soda.

“And ya know, since it’s better for you, well, it is going to cost a little more. But that is the price you’ll have to pay for a “healthy” choice. . .”

Sound Fishy? It should. It is malarkey.

Let me put it to you this way: Using basic common sense - If Add-ons and upselling didn’t work, no one would bother to do it.The truth is, IT WORKS. The answer? Don’t enter in the first place.

5. Don’t enter in the first place. This deserves repeating (See the previous tip to understand why). This is hard to do, without question. It may take a while before you can make that a habit, but think of it this way: If you suffered from an addiction to alcohol, does common sense say it’s your best move to buy your groceries at the liquor store? It is common sense, no matter how we try to rationalize it. Believe me - I’ve tried.

6. Reduce your exposure to fast food advertising. This is going to sound crazy, but if you watch less commercial TV, you will be less inclined to eat fast food. Why? Again, common sense. Big Industry pays hundreds of millions of dollars a year trying to find ways of convincing you in a 30-second spot that eating their new sandwich will change your life for good, forever. And their tactics simply work. If you are exposed less, you will be influenced less. Exposed to more - influenced more.

That said, does that mean I have to give up watching Top Chef? I don’t think so. If you want to see who gets voted off the island this week, go for it - but DVR it if you have the option, and then skip the commercials. Of course, if you want to go hardcore, just give up TV altogether. It’s almost guaranteed you will be less influenced if you reduce your exposure.

Want scientific proof? It’s simple: Corporations are all out for one thing: MONEY. If gigantic ad campaigns, which mean repeated exposure, didn’t actually work, do you think they would spend their money on it? Trust THEIR money-making science - they truly do know exactly what they’re doing.

7. Be a cheapskate. Don’t confuse quantity with value, throwing your money away because it is sold to you as a “good deal”. Fast food depends on the idea that you will be foolish enough to believe that a big pile of garbage has more value than a little pile of quality food. Stick with the quality food. Learn to cook. Make enough for leftovers. Lather, rinse, repeat.

One other thing on being cheap as a method of motivation: Remember that when you eat a pile of junk food for $5.00, the one thing you are NOT getting is decent nutrition. Nutritional deficit may be the single greatest cause of all classically Western diseases. So in the end, you’re going to pay for it anyway. And in the mean time, the fast food CEO will be using his $18,000,000 dollar salary to eat excessively well at your expense.

8. Find inspiration in others. I read a LOT of blogs on the subject of diet and exercise. Why? Partly because this blogging community is becoming my community, but of equal importance is the inspiration I receive. Be inspired by the successes of others. Be supportive yourself - it’s contagious.

9. If you do go to a fast food restaurant, use it as a stop gap. Don’t eat your whole meal there. There are times when fast food feels like it truly is the only option. For example, that 24-drive thru on a road trip, when it’s 2:30AM and everything else is closed. Let’s face it: There are times when fast food feels like it is truly the only choice. That is OK. That is why I focus on the habit of eliminating fast food, not viewing it as a lifelong commitment. That said, if you DO go through the drive thru, try to treat it like it is only a stop gap until you can get “real” food. Usually just a few bites is all you need to “get you through”. You don’t need the double whopper with extra mayo and double bacon, upsized to gargantuan.

10. Have a contingent plan. Be prepared so that you prevent “starvation mode.” By Starvation mode I mean the feeling that you are too hungry to make good food decisions - you feel like you just need something - ANYTHING. This is a common suggestion, but it works: Bring a pack of nuts with you wherever you go, just in case. Something that will provide sustenance for those “in between” times when you might normally default to the convenience of a double whopper.

11. Recognize that you are being duped by fast food chains, and let that feeling fester for a while. No one likes to feel like they are that guy who bought the “too good to be true” timeshare in the Florida swamps. Well that is what happens each time we buy into the advertising campaigns of major food industry corporations that tell us we are part of modern culture if we just buy their product. We are being played. We are made to be the fool, and that CEO is “loving it”. How does it feel to be the sucker? Run with that feeling the next time you “want it your way”, and maybe you’ll think twice before you buy in again.

12. Take responsibility for your own longterm healthcare expenses. At the risk of getting slightly political here, we spend an awful lot of time in this country sitting back, waiting for someone else to fix the healthcare system. “Oh if only this elected official would fix this, or if congress would just pass that”… blah blah blah. The fact is, the power to prevent the vast majority of health problems sits squarely on our individual shoulders. If everyone took responsibility for their long term health by eating better and exercising, do you know what I think would happen? Health care costs would decrease naturally, over time, simply because demand for care would decrease. With what result? Health care would focus on things we can’t yet prevent, rather than fixing up problems that we could have avoided by changes earlier. Which ultimately means the quality of care would improve. Problems like severe complications from diabetes are mostly preventable by making changes earlier in life. Heart disease? Almost 100% preventable.

So if you’re still healthy, take ownership of your health, and stop waiting for someone else to fix the broken system.

That might sound harsh, but every time we sacrifice our health for the sake of “convenience”, we are individually contributing to the problem.

13. Improve the quality of the food you eat, but offset the cost by eating less of it. We are chronically overfed in this country by nearly any anthropological measure. We eat constantly, from snacking all day long, even being told that we have to eat at least 6-8 times a day just to maintain a healthy metabolism. What is the result? We simply have to buy more to accommodate the quantities we are told we need. Sound familiar?

If you train yourself to eat good quality food in smaller portions, you begin to expect that standard everywhere. And fast food, sorry to say, does not meet the quality bar. If you train yourself to eat better, and less, your desire for fast food diminishes because your standards increase.

Remember the whole goal of fast food is to get you to buy - and EAT - more. More is better. More of everything. More more more (thanks Mr. Idol). Even if it kills ya.

14. Learn what “real food” tastes like. Many of us think that beef that tastes like a lump of stained cardboard is simply what beef is supposed to taste like. In reality, this is just basic conditioning, and not true. If you start to eat better, you can train your tastes to recognize garbage.

15. Question the way you view cheap food - it is costing us more than you think. Have you ever wondered how in the world you can have a complete double cheeseburger for just .99 cents? I mean, even just the beef - all the labor to raise the cattle, slaughter, fortify and process, pack, freeze, ship, receive, unpack, reship, store, advertise, reheat, and sell - who pays for that? The answer is, everyone along the line pays for it out of their livelihood so we can have it cheaper.

Industrial food production workers often pay for it with poor health and living conditions. Dock workers in this country pay for it when they face layoffs and cutbacks to save money so that our burgers can be as cheap as possible. As fuel prices skyrocket, truck drivers pay for it in their shrinking benefits and pensions (if any, these days) since food prices can’t defray that cost. The lady behind the counter at the restaurant pays for it by taking a barely livable wage with no benefits, often working two or more 30 hour a week jobs because corporations keep them just under the full time hours mark. You get the idea. Everyone else pays for it, so that we can “have it our way”. You know who doesn’t pay for it? That obscenely wealthy CEO. In the end everyone is paying him, and he is laughing all the way to the bank.

16. When you see an ad for big fast food, think about where your food comes from. Cheap food at fast food restaurants starts out in one place 99% of the time: Big industrial food producers with one thing in mind: protect the profit margin. How do industrial food producers keep costs down? They certainly can’t keep prices in check by cutting fuel costs. Rather, the quality is simply decreased. We get cheap food products so the CEO doesn’t have to settle for last year’s Maserati.

17. Buy the coolest, most useful thermos and lunch box you can find. Apple has made it very clear that if you create a product that feels good to use, no matter how much it costs, people will use it (and love it). Use that principle to your advantage. If you have a portable dining set that you LOVE, you will be more inclined to use it. It’s worth the investment, particularly where your health is at stake. Here’s a great example: the Zojirushi Classic Stainless Lunch Jar. They are incredibly useful for keeping leftovers ready to eat for lunch or on the go, and they don’t look bad either.(I WISH someone would make a Six Million Dollar Man ultra-cool lunchbox set for adults, but so far I haven’t found one.)

18. If all else fails, use the shock technique. Every once in a while a good jolt of reality helps to solidify a decision. In this case, indulge the taboo for a second and really investigate the cleanliness standards of fast food places. If you really want to know, it turns out that those sneeze guards over the salad bar are next to useless. Read this article for a first hand description of why a former fast food worker is a little skiddish about trusting a fast food chain to keep things clean. Be forewarned…it’s not for the weak of stomach.

7 Reasons to avoid fast food restaurants

Watch this famous video of Rats at a fast food joint in New York, if you’re not convinced - and note that this restaurant was OPEN the night before:

19. Go ahead - after 30 days, eat some. But make it the greasiest, worst thing you can buy and see how it makes you feel. So a word of caution on this one…It worked for me, but it MAY NOT work for you. You be the judge. This actually happened to me inadvertently, but it seemed to work. After I wrote the first article in this series I remembered that I did indeed have fast food once near the end of the first month. That said, here was the result (and why, in my mind, I didn’t count it): I bought that greasy double-bacon cheeseburger with the loads of mayo and a sliver of lettuce with the purpose of enjoying the indulgence. So how’d it go? Because I’d been eating really well, and less, it actually made me feel sick. I couldn’t finish it. I stopped myself halfway through the sandwich, skipped the fries, and tossed the soda. And this coming from a guy who’s idea of restraint was limiting myself to only ONE of those.

20. Do it for your loved ones. Fast food clearly does not contribute to longer life and better health (although the preservatives may make you “last” longer, when all is said, done, boxed up, and buried). This tactic needs no further explanation - I think you know what I’m saying.

So it’s that easy?

Has eating all of this swiss chard and quinoa purged my mind of the desire for concentrated simple carbohydrates in a bucket, be it liquid or in the form of a deep-fried wing? Far from it. I still crave fast food at times, particularly when stress comes around.

That said however, I feel pretty good in saying that I have learned to manage it. Although I don’t believe it is a mentionable physical addiction (KFC notwithstanding), I DO think for people of my generation it has become a more than insignificant emotional addiction. After all, Fast Food, my lifelong friend, my ever available and constant companion, my, “you had me at double-bacon” beacon, if you will, will always hold a special place in my heart.

Of course, that place is caked with hideous, sticky coronary plaque build-up, and is somewhere near my spleen, though I don’t have specific proof. But really, I don’t think I need it.

One last thing? In case you wondered, these photos hit close to home - I just took a brief walk and photographed the culverts on our street. It wasn’t difficult to find fast food garbage strewn about. I think the photos speak for themselves.

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Related posts:

1. Stop eating fast food in three steps
2. How I quit eating fast food - part 1
3. 30 days to form a new habit? On the moon, maybe
4. Eat Real Food - It’s what your Grandma would do
5. Food, Drink, and Decadence: How the French stay thin