Exercise Gratitude to Lose Weight
Besides just focusing on nutrition and working out, I am trying different avenues to help you and me maintain a good, healthy, happy weight. One of the things I recently discovered is that exercise in gratitude can lead to losing weight.
What’s the idea behind exercising gratitude to lose weight? It doesn’t seem like the two should be connected in any way. But actually it does make a lot of sense. The first thing when practicing gratitude is it’s going to lower your stress levels. The more you focus on the positive in your life, the more you crowd out the negative. And that lowers your stress. For many of us, when we’re stressed, we eat. So, if we can control our stress through practicing gratitude, we can reduce our eating triggers.
The next is exercising gratitude creates better decision making. Our thoughts create our feelings; and our feelings create our actions and reactions in the world. You can control your thoughts. Even though sometimes it doesn’t feel that way. So, if you are expressing gratitude, you’re going to start to cultivate more positive thoughts, which will translate into feelings, which will translate into how you’re reacting to the world in a positive way. This also means you are going to be making more healthful decisions, more positive decisions, and decisions that are going to create a better life for you.
Learn to exercise gratitude for your body. I know for so many of us, it’s really a challenge to appreciate our body. We look in the mirror and the first thing we do is focus on the negative. Take a moment to stop doing that. Start to listen to what you’re saying to yourself. Would you say that to your best friend? Would you say that to your daughter? No, of course not. Why? Because you love them. You don’t want to hurt their feelings. You want them to feel like they’re in an environment where they can grow and blossom. That’s why it’s important to watch your self talk. Cultivate and grow your self love. Learn to appreciate your body. Focus on little things like, I am so grateful that my heart is beating right now, I am so grateful that I can breathe in and out.
The other great thing about expressing an exercise in gratitude is it going to increase your motivation. Positive attitude will lead to positive goals. As you’re setting your positive goals do the “five why’s” to really uncover your compelling reason for that goal. It’s never the first “why” are you doing something, you have to dig deeper and deeper and deeper. Usually it takes about five whys to get to the bottom of why you desire your goal. Once you uncover that compelling reason, you’ve got the motivation. Now you’ll be showing up for that goal.
Exercising gratitude is going to translate into better sleep. You’re not going to have that chatter in your head, your mind is going to be at peace, it’s going to be calm, and your cortisol levels are going to drop. It’s going to allow you to have a better night’s sleep. Which means your hormones that control your hunger are going to be balanced. You’re not going to wake up the next day craving refined carbs and sugary treats.
Peace and Love