Why Meditation Is My Number-One Weight Loss Tip
Starting a meditation practice is my best weight loss tip I share with clients and my Target 100 community. It’s the only way I see that people are able to stop the eternal background noise prompted by the hectic marketing-driven world.
Leave the burden of constant busy-ness behind, and learn how to make space for what matters most. Meditation gives you the ability to focus your attention throughout the day, in addition to finding calm and clarity. It helps with weight loss specifically when it teaches you to bring awareness to your thoughts and actions.
I’ve been giving weight loss tips for over 15 years and as I look back, it’s amazing to see that my top weight loss tip has changed several times. Years ago, it was “track your food.” Then my best weight loss tip was to “get support,” and eventually “focus on behavior modification,” then to “separate movement from exercise.”
As times change, our challenges evolve. Without a doubt, we’ve become more sedentary and find ourselves at the mercy of endless new distractions each day via technology. I was recently asked in an interview for my number-one weight loss tip and I surprised myself with my answer because it has nothing to do with food or exercise. If you want to see better progress with your weight loss efforts, start a daily meditation practice. It can help you reduce stress and get control of your thoughts. The link between stress and weight loss is so strong, I made it one of the six pillars of my Target 100 weight loss program.
How Meditation Helps Your Health—and Your Weight
A regular meditation practice helps your health in the following ways:
It stimulates the parasympathetic nervous system (part of your peripheral nervous system that helps your body return to calm after the threat of danger)
It leads to better quality sleep.
It improves athletic performance by refining your ability to focus on a goal.
It boosts your immune system by slowing the production of the stress hormone cortisol.
It reduces anxiety and depression by enabling your body to balance its own neurochemical system.
It improves decision-making and critical thinking skills.
It helps break unhealthy habits by teaching you to detach emotions from the action.
It improves communication with yourself, leading to a better understanding of your thought processes and how to control your thoughts.
How You Accidentally Overeat when You Aren’t Focused
These days, we’re battling an extremely difficult environment that’s full of distractions and temptations. These distractions completely sidetrack our ability to focus on our longer-term weight loss goals. I hear from my clients that they’re shocked by recent weight gain because they don’t feel they’re eating that much more.
Some weight loss clients tell me that they feel like food is controlling them and find themselves eating when they’re not hungry as if they’re not able to resist. I’m not surprised they’re unaware of what’s happening to them because much of it is habitual, mindless, and not in their control.
Studies show that we respond when exposed to food—images, smell, even talk about it. These days we’re increasingly driven by the pleasure derived from food, rather than by actual need. Scientists refer to this eating in the absence of hunger as “hedonic hunger”.
Stoking the fire of extra food consumption are continual food cues blasted at us throughout the day. From the moment we wake up to ads on our smartphones, to billboards along the drive to work, to the pop-up ads on our computers, to commercials on TV … we are drowning in food cues!
The top reason I love to recommend meditation as a weight loss tool—even more so than exercise—is because you can do it anywhere. You don’t need any equipment or special shoes. You simply need a quiet spot to close your eyes. I highly recommend downloading one of many free apps on your smartphone and carrying a small pair of earphones in your bag at all times.
Start slowly, experiment with shorter periods and different types of meditation.
Your intention is to create a new habit, so set up reminders to create dedicated intention. The results will be very subtle at first. You will likely notice that you are not as anxious about your weight loss, more confident, and ultimately more in control of all of your eating and food choices. Soon you’ll find yourself making weight loss progress.