How Guided Meditation Can Help You Work on Diet & Nutrition

Do you set your mind to eating healthfully, but, despite mental determination, you just can’t stay on plan? Do you have some success, then fall off the wagon at some point? Does working on diet and nutrition seem like it would take too much effort? There’s an easy, all-natural tool you can use to help you make this important change more easily.

Meditation is a very effective means of assisting you to get where you want to be, because there are multiple positive effects of meditation on diet and nutrition. If you have difficulty meditating on your own, however, guided meditation is even more effective. Please contact me at Frances@RelieveYourMind.com to make an appointment for some guided meditation sessions to help you change your nutritional intake, so you can improve your health, feel better, and enjoy your life more.

How does meditation help my physical health?

It’s well-known that meditation improves physical health, because meditation and physical health are intimately linked. Meditation relaxes you. Since stress makes you less healthy, meditation is a pleasant antidote for getting into a healthier state. Meditation counteracts the negative effects of stress (e.g., the release of stress hormones, and stress eating), and it creates a healthier environment in your body and your mind. Your subconscious mind resists change — even positive change — making it difficult to stick to a healthy regimen.

Your subconscious, however, doesn’t know the difference between fantasy and reality. If you spend some time each day imagining that you are what you want to be, your subconscious will believe it’s true. It will realize that it’s safe and even pleasant to be healthy, and it will be less likely to resist. Combining meditation and physical health is an excellent, effective way to reach your goals.

If you do this meditation each day, you will note the positive changes happening.

How does meditation help with my nutrition?

There are many ways to use meditation for nutrition. As mentioned, your subconscious mind resists change, but it doesn’t know the difference between fantasy and reality. If you’re willing to spend a few minutes in meditation, imagining yourself eating the proper foods for your best nutrition, enjoying them, and experiencing the positive effects of doing so, you can have a productive effect on your subconscious mind and make it more likely that you will meet your goals. You’ll be using fantasy to make positive changes to your life.

How long does it take to see a result?

Results can be experienced the first time meditation is used. How long it will take you to reach your ultimate goal, however, depends on your unique situation. If you have been eating unhealthfully for a long time, it may take longer. If you don’t use meditation on a daily or consistent basis, you may find it takes longer. The positive effect of meditation on physical and mental health, however, has repeatedly been proven. Meditation makes excellent use of the mind in order to have multiple positive effects on the body. As long as you use meditation consistently and for a long enough time, you’ll experience positive results.

What is an example of meditation I can start?

Find a place where you can be undisturbed for at least ten minutes. Avoid any distractions, like people, pets, or devices. You can use a room in your home, your parked car, or you can even be outdoors. The location is not especially important, as long as you can relax there without disturbance. Get comfortable and relaxed. Make sure your entire body, including your head, is supported, unless you’re meditating in a sitting or upright position. If you must use your bed, make sure your body is in a different position than the one in which you sleep, so you don’t associate meditation with sleeping. Prop yourself up a bit, using an extra pillow or two. Use a blanket if necessary. If you find certain things help you to relax, like music or diffusing essential oils, feel free to use them.

Close your eyes. Take three long, slow, deep breaths, imagining that you’re drawing the breaths to the bottom of your abdomen, so your stomach expands on the inhale and contracts on the exhale. If you need to breathe that way longer to be relaxed, please do. When you’re ready, start with your toes, and relax each small increment of your body, until you’re completely physically relaxed. Make sure each area is relaxed before moving on to the next. When you’re completely relaxed, imagine that you’re standing at the top of a flight of twenty steps, which are descending before you. Imagine stepping down slowly, counting backward from twenty, one number per step, and releasing any stress or negative feelings with each step. When you reach the bottom, count zero and think, “I am very calm, very relaxed.”

Imagine yourself standing before a lovely, closed door. Behind this door is the most relaxing place you can bring to your mind. It can be a real place, an imagined one, someplace you’ve been, or someplace you’d like to go. It doesn’t matter where it is, only that it’s the most relaxing to you. Open the door, and step into this most relaxing place. Notice whatever there is to notice around you. If you can see things, notice the size, shape, and color. If you can hear sounds, notice what they sound like, and if they’re near to you or far. If you can touch something with your hand, notice how it feels against your skin. Now, imagine your life the way you want it to be: You’re eating healthy foods, exercising, enjoying it, and achieving the results you want to achieve. Notice how good that feels. What’s the same in your life and what’s different because of it? Do you have more confidence? How do you dress? Are others responding to you differently?

Spend as much time fantasizing as you want. Enjoy it. When you’re ready to stop, simply say goodbye to this most relaxing place, and exit through the same door through which you entered. Close the door behind you, leaving yourself open only to positive suggestions. Count yourself up to five, becoming more awake and alert on each count. When you reach five, say, “One, two, three, four five, eyes open, wide awake, ” a few times. Make sure that you are awake and alert before you get up and move onto something else.

If you feel like you may not yet be completely awake, press one of your forefingers firmly into the divot just below your nose, so you feel pressure in your upper gum. Hold it for two minutes or as long as you’re able. When you’re wide awake, go about the rest of your day knowing that you’ve begun the very positive process of changing the way you nourish and take care of yourself. If you do this meditation each day, you’ll notice positive changes occurring. Write them down to reinforce the positive effects of meditation. Your mind is very powerful. Using meditation to help you improve your life is all natural, very effective, and it will make you feel deservedly-proud of your accomplishment.

Frances O’Brien