Can Yoga Help in Losing Weight?

Yoga to Weight loss and there are tons of options available for losing weight and starting from exercise to diet and many other options like surgical to herbs. However, one option that people wholly ignore is how Yoga can help lose weight, and if it really can, then how?

Yoga can help make you physically, Mentally & spiritually more robust and gives you a daily boost that your mind and body crave. It doesn’t matter if you are a beginner or an expert. There are different types of Yoga, and we are not going into the details in this article; however, the one we are discussing is a more active type of Yoga. The advantage of this type of Yoga is that it will not only help you with your health but also help you lose weight and can also help lower your carb.

Many Yoga Guru has mentioned the advantage of Yoga in losing weight. Let’s look at some Yoga and try to add this practice to our daily lives. 

Yoga and Mental Health

I would say the main crux of Yoga is to increase the level of awareness or open those spiritual veins of your body. Developing Mindfulness and improving your body’s overall fitness, or we can call it the awakening of your brain.

This is no way to mean that you will suddenly get your brain activated to Lucy Level ( Hollywood Movie! ); however, it will make you calm and gives you a relaxed state of mind. It can also make you conscious of different things like food, body, or spirit.

Why Mindfulness is essential to losing weight? Yoga to Weight Loss!

We can take a simple example of a person who has been eating at MacDonald’s for over 10 years, and now all of a sudden, you gave him the Diet plan not to eat the Burgers anymore! What do you think this person will do? It is possible that he can avoid burgers, and it is more likely he can’t. However, in both possibilities, the mind plays a vital role.

This is precisely where the Yoga kicks in, and It will not only calms you down but doing Yoga regularly means you can beat your body’s cravings and have more control over your mind, and you can for sure resist those feelings. 

Tune in with your Body

Yoga can simply help your body connect or charge it or revitalize your whole body. Most of the time, people just keep eating because they don’t realize how much they have already eaten or are already full. 

Yoga can help breach this barrier, and now your stomach and brain are in tune with each other, and your belly will signal you to stop when it’s full. It’s something incredible, right? 

So it does not have a direct impact on losing weight. However, you can see that it has an indirect effect, but it’s huge, and this passive impact is so powerful that it can turn out to be the number 1 reason for your weight loss journey.

Yoga can only be performed empty stomach, so you are more likely to be careful once you start the Yoga, you are more likely to feel hungry, but at the same time, your consciousness will not allow you to eat processed or junk. You will be more likely to chew your meals correctly. Thus it helps in digestion, and you will eat less. 

All the above benefits will lead you directly to your weight loss journey.

Yoga and Sleep Cycle

Yoga can easily help to improve sleep quality. You will notice in just 2-3 weeks that you can relax not only quickly but also you will go very deep in your sleep cycle. This phenomenon is fairly common with Yoga or other high-intensity sessions as long as you keep your body active. 

This plays a vital role in our daily life, and it is associated with weight loss. Ideally, one should not sleep less than 6 hours and the ideal time is around 8 to 9 hours max. There is a detailed case on the effect of a power nap, and you can read it here

This study concluded that anyone who is sleeping ideal hours that is 6 to 9 every day will have a higher chance of losing weight than the one who is having fewer or has restricted naps of 5 times or less per week. Both groups were given lower calories than they could have per day, and this has suggested that inadequate nap hurt the body and also affects fat loss.

There is a special form of guided Yoga called Nindra that is particularly helpful in sleeping more deeply and aids Mindfulness.

There was a case in 2018 on healthcare workers who did Nindra for 8 weeks, which helped them gain their Mindfulness. You can read about this here.

Yoga and Fat burning

Yoga is undoubtedly not as physical exercise as aerobic, But Yoga has many different forms and one type is more physical than others, it is no brainer that a more physical type of Yoga will help you burn more and it may help in preventing excessive weight gain. Ashtanga and Power Yoga are known Yoga that can fall under the category of intense yoga workouts.

Power Yoga

Power Yoga includes moving very frequently, which helps you burn more. It is also known that it can help tune your muscle and help, activate metabolism activity, and have a good impact on your fitness.

Restorative Yoga

It’s not a very physical type however it has been found in the study that it can help overweight women to lose weight, including abdominal fat, and it is exciting and also promising for those who are overweight and can not perform power yoga. 

Yoga can not only help in your behavioral change but also help and aid in weight loss by burning calories, increasing awareness, and stress buster. Overall it can help your meal intake and stops you from overeating and ultimately improve your fitness.

Why is yoga good for you, and how often should you do it?

There is no doubt that Yoga can help nurture your body, mind, and soul. It helps you with your eating disorder, Calms you down, and works as a stress reducer giving you a zeel to do more, so there is no reason for you to avoid it.

You can do the more active types of yoga a minimum of 3 to 5 times per week, and the duration should be around 40 to 50 minutes. You can practice passive yoga on other days that can improve your brain awareness. 

If you are stating this for the first time, then we recommend starting with like 15 minutes and slowly building up from there. You will find in no time you can reach the desired time of around 1 hour. Do not push yourself too hard in the early days as you will not only get demotivated, but it will also increase the chance of injury, and as you grow slowly, you will build strength, muscle, and flexibility. You must make sure to give at least 24 hours of rest each week ( this is true for any form of exercise you do ) 

Yoga can be highly beneficial for heart patients as it does not immediately increase your heartbeat and help keep you calm, you can mix yoga with cycling, walking, or swimming, and you will multiply the effect.

As a general rule, we recommend that you fix a time to weigh each day and make sure you don’t do this after Yoga or heavy exercise as you lose water weight during such exercise and your weight will not be accurate. 

What kind of poses you can do at home?

Boat Poses (Paripurna Navasana)

1. Start in a seated position with your legs together and your knees bent. Place your hands behind you and lift onto your fingertips. Lift your chest up while drawing in your ribs and navel.

2. Lean back just enough to come to the back of your sit bones and lift your legs. Point your toes, squeeze your inner thighs together, and engage your core.

3. For an extra challenge, send your arms forward in line with your legs. For even more of a challenge, straighten your legs and lift your chest and your gaze.

Sun Salutations (Surya Namskar)

1. Place your feet together at the top of the mat, pressing into the ground

2. Touch your hands overhead, lifting your ribs off of your waist

3. Fold forward, keeping length in your spine

4. Touch your hands to the ground in line with your toes or your shins to stretch your back 5. Lift your chest and send your sternum forward

6. Fold back down and place your hands on the ground

7. Step back to plank pose

8. Pause in plank poses, pressing your hands away from your back, heels pressing toward the back, neutral spine, core engaged

9. Lower yourself down in plank OR place your knees down, intentionally arch your back, place your elbows by your armpits, and slide forward

10. Slide into the cobra with your hands by your ribs, press into the tops of your feet, and engage your legs, lifting them from the ground

11. Press into your palms, and send your hips back into downward facing dog

12. Bend your knees, look at where you’re going, then walk or hop to the top of your mat

13. Stand & repeat! 

Plank Pose

1. From the tabletop position, step your feet back with your heels lifted.
2. Bring your body into a straight line or keep the knee on the floor.
3. It is essential to make sure you focus on core, arm, and leg muscles.
4. Make sure to keep in this position for at least 60 seconds

Benefits of Yoga Beyond Burning Fat

We can not go into the details of all the benefits however I have mentioned the most useful ones here so you can have some motivation to do this every day.

1. It helps you manage your stress level as you will lose weight

2. Increase your awareness

3. As you are more active, it will also help with your snaking. 

4. Keeps your body healthy and fit

5. It helps you revitalize your body, and you will light, again one of the passive benefits of losing weight.

Yoga is very effective, and some of the Yoga exercises can help you burn as much as 460 calories per session, and this is a fantastic start if you are seriously thinking of losing weight. 

What Else to Add With Your Yoga to Make it Super Effective?

There are a couple of things that you must follow or make it a routine if you are serious about your weight loss journey. Please read some of the best tips to lose weight.

It’s all about your Mornings 

You should always have your breakfast, and there is a false belief that skipping breakfast will help you to manage your weight. However, if you skip your healthy breakfast, you will feel hungry throughout the day, and you end up eating more like snakes.

Eat Healthy & On Time!

Eating on time and a daily schedule will help you burn more calories than without any schedule. It also helps you reduce your sugar cravings and fat intake.

Fruits, Vegetables, and Nuts

Fruits and Veg are very low in calories (especially veg or salads), and it’s fulling too, high in fiber and low in fat, all these are essential to lose weight.

Exercise and Be Active

Practicing an active lifestyle is more important than exercising for a few minutes, Don’t get me wrong, exercise is essential for your health, but at the same time, if you are just sitting on a couch for 15 hours, then it will impact your health. You must make sure to keep yourself active. Practice the art of being active! 

Drink Water

I have seen many people get confused between their craving for food and water. You really need a glass of water, but you end up eating junk! So keep yourself hydrated. Do not forget to have your medicine.

Eating Food That is High in Fibre

Lots of fiber in your daily food intake can do wonders as it keeps you full, helps with digestion, burns more fat, and many more. You can get fiber from lentils, fruits, Veg, Pasta, wholegrain, Oats, and brown rice.

Check Nutrition Informaiton

Reading food labels and the information can greatly help you understand how to manage your food intake. It can help you review your weight loss plan. You can get more information from the article here on how to read the labels and practice it with your daily shopping. Keep your medicine in mind if you are taking any.

Half a Plate is Better Than Full 

When you plan for weight loss, you will realize that you are craving more food; however, instead of eating a full plate, try to change it to smaller, and by cutting your food plate, you are effectively cutting the fat associated with extra or large plate. It takes around 20 minutes for the stomach to tell your brain that you are full, so eat slowly and make it a habit.

No Need to Ban Certain food

When you start reading your food labels, you will know exactly how much you are taking, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with treating yourself as long as you keep a close eye on your daily intake. If you ban food, then your mind will crave that food more. Instead, signal that you will have it occasionally. 

Practice reducing Alcohol Intake

A glass of wine may contain as many carbs as chocolate, You must start to practice a healthy lifestyle, including cutting on Alcohol. Drinking too much can negatively impact your health and increase your BMI.

On-Time Every Time 

Try to plan your breakfast, lunch, and dinner and also accommodate some snacks. Calculate daily energy requirements and shop around your plan. It will help you in keeping you on your plan and also helps you make health a priority and follow medical advice.

Stress Management

Stress plays a vital role in your weight gain, and Meditation can give you excellent results if you are stressed for work or any other reason. Remember life has so much to offer and nothing in this world is permanent and everything has to go! Try to join local stress management classes as they are highly effective. You can always ask for medical advice.

What is the role of protein in your weight loss?

It is often neglected however protein plays a vital role in gaining or losing weight. If you are on the journey to decrease your overall BMI, you should target 1.6 and 2.2 grams/ per kilogram of your body mass. You can always get advice from your gym instructor as they can calculate it per your needs. Remember to ask your instructor about it.

Conclusion

There is a vast yoga community that can help you improve your Yoga and gives you valuable advice review, and there are tons of information available. Many articles are written that can help you. No matter what kind of workout you do, taking a class is essential as it helps you be motivated, and you can do different types of workouts. 

Whether you are a beginner or an expert, You need to answer some questions about yourself and how you can continue your journey and make this a habit that will help you strengthen your body and mind.