If you're trying to lose weight, you probably know what a frustrating experience it can be. It's all too easy to get caught up in the yo-yo cycle of losing and then regaining, and unfortunately many people never manage to break free of this. However, some are realising that there's more to losing weight than just controlling food intake and activity levels, and are discovering that meditation can be a valuable addition to any weight loss regime. In this article we'll take a look at meditation for weight loss in more detail.
Why Meditate?
Meditation has been widely studied in recent years, and science is coming to realise what wiser cultures around the world have known for centuries - that meditation as many benefits for physical and mental health.
Meditation can help keep stress levels under control, which can in turn make you less likely to develop a variety of illnesses, from heart disease to stroke. Meditation also has a beneficial effect on your mental health, and meditators often report being happier and more fulfilled than those who don't meditate.
Although for many people, meditation brings up images of sitting in an uncomfortable lotus position for hours on end and living an unpleasantly aesthetic lifestyle, in reality, there are many different ways to meditate, and there's no need to do anything that feels uncomfortable to you. Meditation can be as simple as sitting or lying down in a comfortable place and just putting your focus on your breathing for several minutes each day. It doesn't have to be hard work, and in fact, the simpler your meditation regime, the better, in many ways.
Using Meditation To Help You Lose Weight
Meditation can be a valuable weight loss aid for various reasons. We've already noted that meditation has a very calming effect on the mind. This makes it invaluable to anybody who's prone to overeating as a response to anxiety or stress - as very many overweight people are. By meditating regularly, you have an effective tool that helps to keep your stress levels under control without turning to food, and once this tendency to eat for emotional reasons has been brought in to check, weight loss becomes much easier.
Another way that meditation can help you lose weight is that it makes visualisation more effective. Visualising involves creating a mental image of whatever it is you want to achieve, so in this case you might visualise yourself being as slim, healthy and energetic as you want to be, and perhaps enjoying eating healthy food and exercise as well. (Despite the name by the way, it's not necessarily to form a visual image of your desired state in order to visualise - instead, you can focus on how it'll feel to reach your goal, or to hear positive comments from others. So don't be put off the notion of visualising if you're one of the many people who find it difficult to form mental pictures, as this isn't actually necessary.)
With meditation, visualisation is easier, because meditation makes it easier to deeply relax and quieten your mind, which in turn helps you to stay focused on your visualisation and to implant it more firmly into your subconscious. With regular practice, such a weight loss visualisation can be a very powerful way of changing your self-image, which in turn helps to eliminate self sabotaging behaviours, makes you feel better about yourself, and makes it easier to adopt a healthy lifestyle without having to force yourself to do so using willpower alone.
The only problem with using meditation for weight loss, is that many people find it difficult to meditate, simply because they're not used to keeping their minds under control. Fortunately however, a solution is available in the form of brainwave entrainment technologies such as binaural beats or isochronic tones.
What Is Brainwave Entrainment?
Briefly put, brainwave entrainment involves exposure to a repetitive stimulus such as sound of specific frequencies. The brain has a natural tendency to match its own brainwave output to the frequencies of sounds it's hearing. This is useful because when you enter a deeply relaxed state, your brain activity slows down naturally. If you find this level of relaxation hard to achieve on your own, listening to a brainwave entrainment recording can help to lead your brain down into the desired state.
In this way, using binaural beats or other methods makes meditation much easier and more accessible to those who don't have years of experience with it already. You can also begin to experience the benefits of meditation more quickly and easily than you would using traditional techniques, which may take a long time to master.
So, if you're tired of struggling to lose weight, and constantly battling cravings using willpower alone, you really should consider making meditation part of your weight loss efforts. It does work, because the whole fat loss process becomes much easier once you've got your own mind on your side, and using brainwave entrainment makes it easier still.
If you decide to use a weight loss meditation recording, you might like the 'Weight Loss' track from The Unexplainable Store. There's a lot of junk online, but fortunately this site has a great reputation for producing high-quality products, all of which are fully guaranteed. For more information, just go to http://www.brain-sync.com
Loren Mann is an experienced 'explorer of consciousness' who enjoys writing about self-development topics and sharing helpful, high quality resources, and may receive compensation as a result of making these recommendations.
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