Lose Weight By Reducing Stress

One of the most common New Year's Resolutions is to lose weight. Many people spend loads of energy and money this time of year trying to lose pounds only to end up frustrated.

The secret to losing weight and maintaining your healthy weight is keeping stress in check.

How Does Stress Effect Weight?
Recently Whole Living Magazine reported that hormones govern everything in our bodies including "what we eat, why we eat it and what happens to it once the food is down our throats".

Robert Greene, M.D., goes on to say, "There are at least 40 chemicals in our bodies that influence our appetite and what we eat." He states the most important hormones in regulating weight are the thyroid and cortisol (responsible for the fight or flight stress reaction). People who regularly feel stressed have excess cortisol leading to heightened appetite and cravings for sugar.

The article recommends the following things to get the best hormonal mix:

. Eat whole foods
. Move
. Check your stress
. Get plenty of sleep
. Raise endorphins through exercise, fun hobby, music, basically anything you enjoy doing

In the article Marci Gluck, Ph.D., a research clinical psychologist at the National Institutes of Health, goes on to say that basic stress relief measures lead to better hormonal balance. Having your hormones in balance will make keeping your weight in check much easier.

How to Reduce Stress
Here are the stress relief practices I use myself and regularly teach clients:

. Take 10 deep belly breaths each morning
. Take 10 deep belly breaths each night
. When you notice that you are either stressed or breathing shallowly, take 3 deep belly breaths. Notice how you are breathing at meal times. Food is metabolized more effectively when the body is less stressed, you can breathe deeply to immediately lower stress.
. Some other great stress reduction techniques are meditation and yoga. One study published last year in the Journal of the American Dietetic Association showed that middle aged people who practiced yoga 3 days a week gained less weight over a 10-year period than those who didn't practice yoga.

Result
Using these stress reduction techniques each day will help reduce your cortisol levels which will help reduce cravings. Ultimately you'll feel less stressed, your hormones will be more balanced, and your belly will be smaller.


Jacqueline Ryan Brodnitzki, RYT helps companies reduce stress and increase productivity and their bottom line. As an executive coach she helps clients experience greater calm, reduce stress, and increase effectiveness and success at work and at home. Learn more about Jacqueline's current programs and receive '10 Stress Reduction Techniques' at http://www.conscioussuccess.net/index.html

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/expert/Jacqueline_Brodnitzki/735638

Losing Weight - Stress Can Make You Fat

Scientists have shown the stress can make you fat. A little bit of stress every day is normal and the body can cope with it. If the stress occurs at large levels then we start to have a problem. Stress stuffs up how our body works.

Looking into how stress affects our body we will find that stress causes our body to release stress hormones. Cortisol and neuropeptide Y are released and have different affect on our bodies. Cortisol tends to act directly on our fatty deposits. It makes us gain fat, especially around our bellies. Neuropeptide Y causes the making of new fat cells. It also increases new blood vessels going to cells. It is generally in charge of growth and development.

When we are stressed our bodies react by fighting back. Our brains sends messages to the cortisol receptors in our abdomen. By fighting back the body develops fat around the abdomen to prepare it for lack of food or life threatening situations.

So there is a direct correlation between stress and fat. If we are stressed, we will tend to get fat. When humans get fat the body goes into panic mode. During this panic mode, metabolism slows down and we want to eat more. Also our body we store more fat for future usage.

The best way to stop being stressed is to just relax after a long days work. Exercising helps a lot to reduce stress by making our bodies release endorphins which calm us down. It also helps reduce the stress hormones in the body. Exercising is great for our health and we get to burn fat in the process.

Staying healthy is not just about eating right and doing exercise. You need to fix the mind and make it feel relaxed. Being all tensed up and stressed affects our health immensely. If you want to lose weight fast then getting the right amount of exercise and food in our body is essential.

We can now see that stress affects our bodies in losing weight. Reduce the stress and you will see a large difference in your overall health. A lot of people love to go for a long walk after work or head off to the gym. For those that want better relaxation can take up yoga or pilates. Tai chi is also a great way to reduce our stress levels and hence help us lose weight.

In conclusion, losing weight is affected by the amount of stress we are experiencing on a day to day basis. If we are constantly stressed we might consider relaxing through exercising. Exercises like yoga and pilates help greatly.


Learn about more about how to lose weight at my blog: http://lose-weight-ultra-fast.blogspot.com

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Chun-Lam_S_Lo