Holistic Tips on Weight Loss

Summer is here and it's shorts and swimsuit time. Naturally thoughts have turned to losing weight. A friend was asking me about diets and how I lost 25#, so I thought I would pass along some information.

In a trial of overweight adults, sniffing green apple, peppermint, and banana helped participants lose weight.

Eat foods with a high water content. That means fruits, vegetables, soups, and grains. They naturally suppress your appetite and aid weight loss.

In a recent study, patients using hypnosis lost more than double the amount of weight than patients in a weight loss program who didn't use hypnosis. You can find hypnosis programs for weight loss here.

Drink a cup of hot peppermint tea with your meals. It aids your digestion, promotes the absorption of nutrients, and improves the satisfaction you derive from your food.

A surprising benefit to weight lifting: It helps curb cravings. Research at Brigham Young University showed that in a 12-week program of three-times-a-week weight lifting, subjects had voluntarily cut back their intake of fat by 30%, when compared with a group in the study that did stretching exercises instead of weight lifting.

Learn to do relaxation exercises, like deep breathing and visualization. As you learn to quiet your mind and control your thoughts, add aromatherapy. Use the scent of apricot oil when you do your relaxation exercises. The scent will become linked to the relaxed feeling so that whenever you feel stressed or anxious and want to pig out, just reach for your apricot oil and sniff.

Try adding mustard seed, cayenne pepper or other fiery spices to your food. Peppers speed up metabolism, making your body burn more calories. And you’ll drink more water, which will fill you up and make you eat less.

Chew your food more thoroughly. You’ve probably been told to chew your food 12 to 15 times before you swallow. Try chewing thirty or forty times before you swallow. Digestion begins in your mouth as food combines with saliva. Chewing more will aid digestion plus give your stomach time to signal the brain that you’re full so you’ll eat less.

Use your imagination. See yourself in the best shape you can be- in top physical form and emotionally healthy. Positive visualizations will help the body manifest what you see and think about in your mind.

Try the herb Stevia as a sweetener instead of sugar or artificial sweeteners. It’s actually sweeter than sugar and does not adversely affect blood-sugar levels.

Never skip a meal. This is a signal to your body to conserve energy and store fat.

Drinking enough water is critical for weight loss. You should drink at least 48 to 64 ounces of water daily. Water helps flush toxins from the body, too. Avoid caffeine, salt, and alcohol that cause you to retain water and actually gain weight.

When you're trying to lose weight, limit your drinks to water and herbal teas. If you aren't familiar with herbal teas, now is the time to experiment. As we said earlier, peppermint tea is excellent for digestion. So is ginger tea. Chamomile is great for late night cravings because it is a great sleep aid. Of course green tea is always a good choice due to its anti-oxidant properties. A relatively new tea is Rhooibos. To try this tea, go here.

These are just a few tips I came up with. If anyone has a tip that worked for them, let me know. Comments are always welcome.

Wishing you Good Health,
Liz