Weight, Stress and Meditation

Post by Brittany Sandoval, Holistic Nutritionist and Certified Meditation Instructor

Meditation can be a wonderful practice in supporting your weight-loss journey. But let me be clear, this does not mean you can eat all of the cookies and cheese you want, meditate and expect the scale to plummet. What meditation gives you is a deeper sense of awareness. Meditation gives you an understanding of your habits that are serving you and those that may be sabotaging your efforts toward health and happiness.

Stress can be a hindrance to your weight-loss plan. And meditation is an antidote to stress. Studies show that increased levels of the stress hormone, cortisol, is linked to excess weight, specifically around the midsection. Studies also show meditation can decrease cortisol production, therefore lowering both stress and anxiety. A daily meditation practice can also increase your serotonin and oxytocin, the feel good hormones.

Developing a meditation practice supports mindful eating. When you begin to create a meditation practice, you naturally begin to pay more attention and become more mindful to whatever you are doing, including eating. This greater understanding of your body helps you to distinguish between a physical craving for food and one based on unmet emotional needs. Meditation and mindfulness teaches you how to better react with these emotions rather than sitting with your good friends, Ben and Jerry.

I don’t think it was a coincidence that when I started a dedicated daily meditation practice those last stubborn pounds shed. And to be honest it wasn’t my intention either. And what is really interesting about losing those last few pounds was how much I didn’t care. My relationship to my body and food is what really shifted. I stopped getting on the scale all together. Instead I looked to how I was feeling in my body and mind. I began making healthier choices around food and exercise not because I had to or I should but because I wanted to nourish my body with what it needed.

Join Brittany for this Saturday at 3 pm for her Meditation for Weight Loss and Stress Management workshop at Nourish Northwest.  Cost: $15.  Sign up by clicking here.