Yoga, often seen as a transcendental experience, is actually a very pragmatic way to get in shape.

You will be amazed at the changes in your body, mind, and yes, your spirit, once you start yoga.

Lose Weight

Believe it or not, you can lose weight with yoga. This is simply because of the over-all benefits to your whole psyche, as well as your body.

With yoga, you have a self-paced workout regimen that starts by stretching out your muscles.

This is itself starts burning calories, as the muscle fibers experience an increase of circulation.

Any time your muscles work, they produce chemicals that enter the blood stream, increasing your energy level.

These chemicals will also make you sore, so drink plenty of water to cleanse your muscles and bloodstream.

This simple act of gentle stretching will awaken your metabolism, speeding it up if even slightly.

Quite often, you may notice a 2 or 3 pound weight loss because of this simple, introductory workout.

Some people say you are losing wager-weight, because it will come right back if you don’t work out any more.

But, the truth is, this is real weight loss that can be maintained with regular workouts.

Improved Mental State

Since yoga is uniquely suited to matching the participant’s abilities, stature, and physical condition,

you are more likely to experience immediate success with your exercises.

This, alone, is enough to keep people going with an exercise routine, improving with every session.

But, quick success is only part of the improvement.

Your increased circulation, the release of endorphins from working out, and the success of ability-based workouts also improves your mental state.

You’ll find that you tend to be more positive in your outlook due to the positive things happening in your body.

Your state of mind is not just limited to improvements in your body.

Yoga is a whole-human approach, teaching you to find inner balance and peace as you balance your body.

Part of your workout involves focusing all of your mental acuity on certain muscle groups, visualizing them moving into the position you want them in.

You also are trained to focus on your breathing, actually feeling the air as it enters and leaves your body.

With these areas of focus, you begin to leave stress and problems from the outside world behind, if for only a little while.

If you ascribe to the mystic side of yoga, you’ll find that you enter alternate consciousness, in what some call a transcendental state.

Overall Benefits

The overall benefits of yoga are mulch-faceted, and they interlock to give you more of a sense of wholeness.

Your increased energy level will help you to lose weight, and your more balanced mental state will help you to have the confidence to make better decisions for your body.

The physical benefits of yoga will start to make the weight drop off, and your mental state will keep it off. It’s sort of the best of everything.

Featured images:

Image by Smart Photo Stock

Image credit MyBlogGuest.com

Laura Green is a keen exerciser, after starting to lose weight almost a year ago, Laura has been practicing Yoga and exercising everyday.

She as been on all kinds of interesting courses such as detox weight loss retreats and fitness bootcamps.