Stress And Weight Loss: Learn Deep Breathing Exercises For Stress To Get Thin

Stress and weight loss don't go together, period. If you want to get thin, try learning deep breathing exercises for stress.

There are many deep breathing benefits, but one of the biggest ones is stress relief. And a corollary to that is the benefit of weight loss.

Because breathing exercises lower stress levels, you can actually increase your metabolism just by breathing. Here are two exercises that can help you burn fat.

1. Ratio Breathing

This breath is easy to learn, and when you combine it with an affirmation, it really can help you get skinny.

Here's how you do it. However many counts you breathe in, for example, four counts, you hold your breath for four times that long. So if you breathe in for four counts, you hold it for sixteen counts. Then you breathe out for two times the number of counts when you breathed in. So in this example, you'd breathe out for eight counts.

The amount of counts you do is up to you. It's a ratio. If you breathe in for three seconds, you hold your breath for twelve seconds and breathe out for six seconds.

I'm not much for counting, so what I do is use an affirmation. When I first started doing this exercise, I used the affirmation, "I'm a sexy, beautiful, slender healthy woman."

So I'd inhale while I thought, "I'm a sexy, beautiful, slender, healthy woman."

I'd hold my breath while I thought that same affirmation four times. Then I'd exhale while I thought it twice.

As my lung capacity increased, I lengthened the affirmation. (One of the great deep breathing benefits is increased lung capacity.) But I kept the same ratio.

The beauty of doing the breath to an affirmation is that it focuses your mind on the way you want to look and feel. So you combine stress relief with weight loss visualization.

2. Alternate Nostril Breathing

This technique is just what the name suggests. You breathe through alternate nostrils.

Place a hand on your nose so your ring and middle fingers are on one side of your nose and your thumb is on the other. Now close off your left nostril with your fingers, and breathe in through your right nostril to a count of four. Pause and then cover your right nostril with your thumb and release your fingers from your left nostril. Breathe out through your left nostril to a count of four. Pause and then breathe in through your left nostril to a count of four. Pause and then cover your left nostril with your fingers and breathe out through your right nostril to a count of four.

This is how you do one round of the exercise. You can do as many rounds as you like, but it's good to do at least five.

Both of these breaths have wonderful calming effects that lower stress levels. By learning these deep breathing exercises for stress, you can stop the stress and weight loss conflict to get thin.