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Yoga for Weight Loss

When your metabolic rate decreases you may lead to weight gain. Now what is metabolism or metabolic rate? It is the rate at which our body will use energy, better known as burning calories. If your body can burn calories faster then there is no excessive weight gain. Now the more you exercise, the better gets your metabolism. And with a higher metabolism you will burn calories more efficiently.

Psychologists believe that people who experience a sense of insecurity, which may be due to real or imagined threats, may find comfort and protection in food. This results in food cravings and emotional indulge eating.

Take 30 – 60 minutes of free hand yoga exercise per day to stay healthy.

Take Yoga foods:

Food is the first thing you need to watch. Take Yoga foods.  Take the fruits and vegetables that are packed with beneficial fibers, vitamins and antioxidants. They fill up your stomach fast so you feel full earlier. They are also low in calories and helps to keep your calorie count low.

Set your yoga weight loss target

Your weight loss goals should not simply be to lose weight. Weight loss is not an exercise you have to do once and then forget about it. A successful weight loss is when you manage to lose weight by changing your lifestyle and eating habits and not by just saving calories and making calculations. Eating healthy should become your second nature and exercising should become your daily friend. So, instead of just setting arithmetic goals concentrate on how to change your lifestyle to match a healthier living.

Separate eating from your other emotions

A lot of people have associated eating with their emotions. It is very common for people to eat because they are feeling stress, anxiety, depression, anger etc. This is a bad and very unhealthy habit. Usually the food you eat when in this state is unhealthy and full of fats and calories. You need to realize that food is not the medicine for your emotions. Food is a pleasure and a way to provide your body with the energy it needs to function properly. If you want to lose weight then you should seriously consider this situation and disassociate food with emotions.

Cobra Pose : Lie on your stomach. Place your hands facing down on the floor beside your ears. Supporting your weight on your palms, push up and raise the chest, looking up towards the ceiling. Breathe in while rising, and hold your breath in that position for 10 seconds. Come down to the original position while breathing out. Practice eight times.

cobra posture
cobra posture

Long Salutation Pose: Kneel down with your buttocks resting on your heels and your toes pointing forward. With your palms together, extend your arms up vertically next to your ears. Slowly bring your arms and head down as one, first bending your neck, then the whole upper body, until your fingers hit the floor, keeping your buttocks on your heels all the time. Now stretch out with your forehead and nose resting on the floor. Breathe out as you go down, and stay there with your breath held out for 8 seconds. Then rise up breathing in. Practice eight times.

Yoga relaxation:

Using the same blanket as for asanas, lie on your back with your arms by your side, making sure that your breathing is calm and relaxed. Now go through your whole body, starting at your feet, consciously making sure that each part is completely relaxed – with no muscular tension at all. Go from the feet up the legs, consciously checking each part, into the groin area, into the abdomen (also feeling that your internal organs are relaxed), into the chest and shoulders, from the fingers and hands up the arms, then into the neck and up into the face, relaxing the facial muscles, including the eyes, and finally to the top of the head, feeling that your brain is also relaxed. Check once more that you are breathing calmly, and stay like that – fully relaxed – for a few more minutes.
Yoga relaxation is especially important for those who do a lot of mental work. Do it as often as you like throughout the day. Whenever you feel mentally fatigued, even just a couple of minutes can be enough to rejuvenate and revive you.

Common Yoga postures  for weight loss:

  • Paschimottanasana
  • Ardhakapotasana
  • Trikonasana
  • Uttanasana
  • Ardhasarvangasana
  • Virabhadrasana

Dance Yoga

Dance yoga is a marvelously unified and dynamic composition expressing the rhythm and harmony of life.  There are hundreds of  dances  such as kathak, garba, Bhangra and special dances observed in regional festivals.  However, yoga dances are slightly different. You are your own master. Let your body mind and soul dance together. You are your own judge.
Dance Yoga
Dance Yoga
There are several  benefits of dance yoga:
* improve and maintain mobility

* to build and improve confidence

* to learn and develop new skills

* to help and improve coordination

* to help and maintain weight control

* develop, learn and maintain communicating skills

* removes the blockages and provides enjoyment.

The requirements for dance yoga are:

Devotion — This is a grace. To willingly submit ourselves to Allah/God in Whom we live, and move, and have our being. Hypocrisy may be the only sin. How wonderful it is when we actually feel like bowing in humility before the eternal truth. These dances can be worship: the celebration of the Divine Presence.

Watch your Breath — Breath is life. Breath is movement. Voice is breath. Let breath breathe. Return to awareness of breath in silence between dances. Notice the subtle changes in breath with each dance.

Listen — Don’t simply recite the sacred phrase. Listen to the other voices. Listen to the person directing the dance. When you listen, your voice automatically begin to harmonize. Find the center of the sound.

Feel — The dances are designed to take us more and more into the universe of feeling. Stay with your feeling. If you go off into the world of thoughts, don’t judge yourself; simply bring your concentration back to feeling. The heart center, found in the middle of the chest, is the natural place to begin.

Ecstasy — These dances can lead to states of ecstasy. Joyously invigorating! In dances where you are brought to the center of the circle, especially soar. But soar with your whole being. Taste all planes at the same time. If your feet are grounded on the earth, then your head can be in the heavens.

Amin (ah-meen) — These mean “so be it”. We say this at the conclusion of many dances. (Other phrases such as the Sanskrit Svaha, or the Native American Ho, are also used. The important thing is not to say it, but to mean it, to affirm with one’s whole being.

Silence — There may be a silent meditation before the dance starts… As the sound and music of the dance stop, enter the Silence. This is your opportunity to hear what has been created. In this silence one can absorb the qualities evoked during the dance. This is the most important part of the dance. It becomes all-encompassing.