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Indeed, yoga can be a useful tool in the battle
of the bulge. But before you stop reading and cry, "Sign me up!" you
need to understand that there are caveats to this statement. Books,
videos, and classes that simply label themselves "Yoga for Weight Loss"
without explaining exactly why or how a particular yoga is conducive to
slimming are doing you a disservice. They are over-simplifying a
complex problem, and quite possibly presenting a misleading impression that
yoga and yoga alone can solve your weight problems. It can't.
Weight management is extremely complicated. No one activity or method
will by itself take care of the problem. The reality remains that even
with yoga, weight loss is slow, painstaking, arduous, and a battle for the
long haul. It is rooted in lifestyle, diet choices, exercise, and
numerous behavioral, psychological, social, and even economic factors that
yoga alone will not fix. Yoga can help, but it will need to be just
one of many different tools you will need in order to enjoy long-term
success.
That may sound pragmatic and perhaps a bit
depressing, but which would you rather receive? Over-hyped,
we'll-sell-you-anything-we-can-get-you-to-believe "good" news? Or
balanced, realistic, sound advice? I thought so. Read on!
First, let's look at the positive uses of yoga
for weight loss. For starters, the study of yoga allows us to slowly
recognize the need to answer to our body's
unique physiology, undistracted by outside influences. We learn,
through practice, that
no two people will perform a given pose in the exact same manner. The individual
differences are the result of each person answering to what reflects their
own personal comfort zone. In a similar vein, no two approaches to weight management
will be the same. You have to, in the deepest core of your being,
resign yourself to this fact before you can proceed. This means you
must stop reading those articles that promise to divulge some celebrity's
diet secrets. You must turn off your local news whose teaser promises
to reveal the "latest diet rage, tonight at 10." Upon learning
of a colleague's recent weight loss, you must resist the urge to treat the
answer to, "How'd you do it?" as a written-in-stone model for how you should
eat, or what trendy exercise program you should be following.
Here's an example: Remember the Subway
Diet? One man allowed his instincts to lead him to a
quirky "diet" that was within his body's caloric needs,
easy for him to adhere to, and reasonably nutritious. That worked for HIM,
and for three
key reasons: 1) he was ready to tackle the problem; 2) he put in the hard
work to achieve the goal; 3) he didn't run out and read a diet book and let
someone else tell him what to eat--he decided that for himself.
Obviously, there's nothing "special" or "magical" in Subway sandwiches with
regard to weight loss. But you'd never know this based on the response by
consumers upon learning of his weight loss success. Suddenly, electronic message boards across the country
lit up with people asking, "What is in the diet? Someone give me the
Subway Diet!" These inquirers were missing the lesson entirely.
The lesson was that this scheme worked for HIM. In order to duplicate
such a success, THEY now needed to figure out and find what works for THEM;
they needed to be READY to commit to such an undertaking, and they needed to
work hard every day, renewing this commitment without becoming distracted,
bored, or impatient. Imposing someone else's quirks just because that
someone else succeeded in losing weight is like thinking that the only
worthwhile vacation destination is the one that "worked" for someone else.
There are many wonderful places to go on vacation, and what is relaxing and
enjoyable to one person can turn out to be boring and stressful to another.
Listen to your body. It's the only way to find success. Don't
impose the preferences of someone else. You'll only continue to stray
further away from being in touch with yourself....and in doing so, stray
further away from finding your own personal road to success. The only
exception to this rule is if you seek input from a registered dietician.
Then, by all means, follow that person's advice. People tend to hear
"consult a dietician" with only half an ear, but this is a mistake.
Registered dieticians are highly educated, highly knowledgeable
professionals who literally can hold the key not only in helping you toward
your weight loss goals, but other health-related concerns, as well.
Getting back to yoga....So, yoga helps put you in touch with your own
innermost needs. Yoga also teaches you to answer to those needs.
Here's an example: you're going into a stretch such as the Cow Face Pose
(for the uninitiated, this is a challenging hip stretch). You position
your legs into the pose and evaluate how this feels. You decide you're
relatively comfortable, and can take the next step of gently leaning
forward. The person next to you has already begun to do this, and in
fact is able to attain a dramatic forward bend in this position. Is
this cause for you to do the same? Of course not, you're monitoring
your own body closely to determine where it feels appropriate for YOU.
After beginning to lean forward, you realize that this feels a bit too tight
on one of your knees. So, you lift your body and place a folded towel
under your hips. This takes pressure off your knee, allowing you to
fold forward with less tension. As you hold the forward position,
you're aware that while your knee feels better, your hips have yet to relax,
as the stretch is quite challenging on those muscles. To encourage the
relaxation, you take a deep breath in, then focus on the muscles in question
as you exhale. Time passes before you begin to feel a change, but sure
enough, sooner or later your hips begin to slowly submit to the stretch.
Eventually, your breathing resumes a normal, comfortable pace, and you relax
more effortlessly into the pose. Through the teachings of yoga, you
can take that same approach to other aspects of your life, including
your quest for weight management. By attuning yourself to your body's
needs, your daily activities, and goals that reflect both your true desires
and a realistic expectation of achievement, you can tailor your eating and
exercise in a way that works for you....and only you.
Increasing an awareness of your individual needs
is only one potential benefit of yoga for weight loss. Yoga is also a
great stress reliever. For those who engage in "stressful eating," that is, who are
more likely to eat high-carbohydrate and/or high-fat foods when under higher
amounts of stress, it would stand to reason that reducing that stress will
also reduce the frequency and/or intensity of stressful eating.
This means that with relatively few conscious changes in your diet, you can
still wind up sparing a large amount of calories from your overall intake,
which can in turn result in weight loss. Furthermore, the deep respect
for one's body and health, which is part of yoga's philosophy, can help to
inspire a motivation to eat in a manner that nurture's the body. For example, instead of viewing fruits as "a
low-calorie alternative to the foods I'd rather be eating," you might start
viewing fruit as it really is: "a tasty and highly nutritious food
that will help nurture my body and soul." Such changes in thinking are
not instantaneous, but then again, usually, neither was the years-long
process of acquiring ingrained bad eating habits.
So yoga is potentially helpful in putting you in
touch with your needs and in helping to modify your behaviors in such a way
that promotes health and weight management. Another benefit
potentially available with yoga is the fact that it's a source of lower impact exercise.
Depending on how much excess weight you are carrying, high-impact exercise
may be too stressful on your body right off the bat. Yoga offers an
alternative to instill an enjoyment of exercise, gently tone the muscles,
nourish the joints, and alleviate tension in key muscles such as the low
back. Also, yoga's supportive, calming, non-competitive environment
can be a welcome breath of fresh air to those who worry that a more
traditional aerobic class will put them amidst Barbie Doll, fitness-loving
bodies and lots of confusing combinations of movement.
These benefits sound so promising, you wouldn't
think that there could be a "down" side to turning to yoga for weight loss,
would you? Well, maybe the word "down" is a bit harsh, but you should
know of some potential shortcomings in turning to yoga as your primarily
means of seeking weight loss.
First of all, most forms of yoga do not burn
significant amounts of calories. This is important, as a strong
predictor of long-term weight loss success lies partly in the ability to
exercise for maximum energy output. While yoga can certainly fatigue
the muscles and require a great deal of effort, the net energy expenditure
from yoga is not likely to be high enough to promote the all-important
caloric deficit, which is what you need to lose weight. There's an
easy solution to this: simply make sure that in addition to yoga,
you're engaged in some form of enjoyable aerobic exercise--walking, for
example. You should plan on getting at least three aerobic workouts
per week, though five will improve your chances of successful weight loss.
Also, while yoga can have far-reaching
weight-related benefits, it doesn't negate the need to eat sensibly.
While it is wise to avoid extremes in dieting, you will need to take in
fewer calories than you expend in order to show a weight loss. You
should also make it your goal to eat nutritiously for health's sake, which
means plenty of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, lean proteins, and water.
Limit your intake of caffeine, alcohol, refined sugar, simple carbohydrates,
and trans fatty acids such as margarine.
As with all weight management tools, yoga can
become a powerful partner in helping you achieve your goals, as long as you
set reasonable expectations as to its strengths and limitations.
Address your weight loss goals from a multi-pronged approach, and you'll
swing the odds greatly in favor of seeing that new, lean, fit body emerge!
-ep
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