Emma is a holistic health & wellness coach, yoga and barre teacher, mother of one beautiful boy, and founder of Barre Body. 

Why can’t I lose weight? Surely you’ve experienced this; you want to lose weight so you try really, really hard, but nothing happens. Then you stop trying, and lo and behold, you lose weight. Why? Because you let go of the notion of having to lose weight and stopped giving so much attention and energy to the idea of losing weight. 

The mind body connection The mind body connection is a powerful one; if you tell your mind something, the body makes it so. If you continually hold the thought that you have to lose weight, your mind sends your body that very message, creating the neural pathways that make it so and actually affecting change in the physical body.  

 The only problem here is that you are sending your body the wrong message. You are telling it that you “have to lose weight” so your body goes to work creating the neural pathways of “having to lose weight” rather than actually losing weight. 

 At the same time, you are clinging so tightly to this notion of needing to lose weight that you are creating an energy of holding (storing), rather than releasing (losing).  

A different message
What if you were to send a different message? What if you were to let go and stop thinking that you had to lose weight? Would your mind then send your body a message of letting go and releasing? You bet it would. 

Exercise 
Try this. Lie down on the floor on your back with your feet at least hip distance apart and arms at your sides with palms facing upwards. This is called savasana in yoga, the pose of total relaxation. 

Bring your awareness into your breath, noticing the sensations in your body as you inhale and exhale. As you exhale, say to yourself “let go”. Keep repeating this simple mantra for at least five minutes. While you are saying “let go” to yourself, hold the intention that, with every exhalation you will let go of feeling that you need to lose weight. As you continue this exercise, you will actually feel a physical sense of surrender and release. You will feel yourself letting go. 

Try this every morning for a week and see how you feel. If, during the day, the thought of needing to lose weight creeps into your head, simply say “let go” (and mean it) and see how you feel. 

If nothing else, it’s lovely to have a five minute lie-down.