Jon Gabriel is one of the authority figures in the discourse of whether meditation help in weight loss or not. The bestselling author and coach lost 220 lbs (100 kilos) without diets or surgery. His story goes way back to 1990 when he started gaining weight for no apparent reason. Every diet made him put on further weight. By 2001, he was morbidly obese (186 kg).
It was only by a fluke of fate that he was not on the United States flight 93 hijacked by terrorists on 11 September 2001. The incident served as a wakeup call to realise that life is precious and not to be wasted.
Long story short, research and scientific background made him understand the true power of meditation and today, he is one of the world’s most known coaches on weight loss who advocates the power of meditation help in weight loss.
“Sustainable weight loss is not about tricking or forcing your body to be thin. It’s about changing your body from the inside out so your body actually wants to be thin. Visualization and meditation are the most effective tools I know to help you get started.”
Coming to our question –
How Does Meditation Help in Weight Loss?
Eating clean food and exercising do help but a greater benefit can be received through meditation. Meditation is the art of focussing your attention on a specific thing to achieve clarity and calmness of mind. Scientific researches have shown that meditation help in weight loss by assisting us to manage stress, which is one of the biggest reasons in the modern world for weight gain.
Various researches have shown that meditation has a direct role in helping you to lose weight. How? It makes you aware of your thoughts and actions. The MD and Executive Director of Duke Integrative Medicine, Adam Perlman, says: “People often put on weight from trying to comfort themselves with food”.
Meditation is an ancient practice. Usually practiced in the Eastern world, it went mainstream in the last few decades. It is now recommended by doctors and hospitals around the world as a stress-reducing technique. Its major health benefits include healthier arteries, reduced blood pressure and an enhanced sense of well-being. It requires serious commitment to stop and look within yourself. You need to become a witness of your own thoughts, learn to quieten the mind. Most of us are our own critic. While it is a good way to improve yourself, sometimes it is also a bane. You need to reframe the thinking process.
Meditation help in weight loss by making us aware of ourselves. It reduces negative emotions which is largely responsible for over-eating tendencies. It helps us to manage stress and become positively aware of our thoughts, emotions and feelings – moment to moment.
Answer this – when was the last time you stopped in middle of your daily hustle and bustle, and took notice of surroundings? Took notice of your existence? Took notice of your breathing?
Never? Rarely? Most probably!
Stress releases two hormones: adrenalin and cortisol. When body releases cortisol, the hormone stimulates fat and carbohydrate metabolism for faster energy and as a result, the appetite increases. Meditation acts as an antidote because during meditation, oxytocin (love hormone) and serotonin (feel good hormone) is released.
Scientifically speaking, you need more of oxytocin than cortisol. Mediation releases oxytocin and hence, it is good for your overall well-being.
Since meditation makes us more mindful of what we are doing, it controls the way we eat too. We become aware of our eating habits. We enjoy what we are eating and we eat a bit slower. We become conscious of the impulses that drive us to eat or overeat.
How to Meditate?
Anyone can mediate. All you need to do is find a quiet place and go into deep trance. There are numerous ways to meditate and all of them have four things in common:
- Quiet Location – Lie down, sit upright, go on a walk or anything else which makes you comfortable. It is completely up to you. Try to find a peaceful and quiet location.
- Comfortable Posture – sitting upright or lying down is preferable as it makes you go into a relaxed state of mind.
- Focus Attention – Your task is to stop the mind from wavering; stop all the scattering thoughts and focus on one thing instead. Begin to notice how you breathe. Concentrate on the simplest task of existence – breathe in, breathe out. It is very calming.
- Open Attitude – In the beginning, it is tough to concentrate as other thoughts will flood the mind. Make the effort to concentrate and think about one thing.
Speak sentences of affirmations. Try out Jon Gabriel’s 21-day meditation course. Why affirmations? To understand it, I need you to read: The Power of Believing Can Move Mountains. Meditation is all about powerful affirmations. The universe does not understand negative; it is only positive.
Meditation usually goes like this:
- Find a comfortable place and sit straight.
- Close eyes.
- Relax muscles. There should not be any tension.
- Focus your attention on natural breathing.
- When distracting thoughts occur, notice them and gently bring your attention back to your breath.
- Meditate for 5 minutes. Increase time to 10-20-30 minutes. You can meditate for hours as well.
- Practice meditation once or twice a day. It will bring a sense of relaxation, of peaceful mindfulness and from this peace, you will be able to make better choices.
Yellow Brick Cinema is an awesome resource of meditation music of all kinds. Search up the channel on YouTube. Begin by meditating for 5 minutes and increase time gradually.
Endnote
Losing weight is not tough. It is simple, provided you know what to do. It is the best tool for self-discovery. Does meditation help in weight loss? It does. It does it by changing our body, from the inside.
Leave a Reply