06 Aug Free ourselves from the emotional kilos that poison us
With the warm weather back, we often want to lose weight to fit into our swimsuit. However, despite all our efforts and all kinds of deprivation, we are unable to lose an ounce. What if the culprits were the emotional kilos that poison our lives? Psychiatrist Stéphane Clerget addressed this issue in his 2009 book ” Les kilos émotionnels, Comment s’en libérer “. As the name suggests, emotional kilos are linked to our emotions, which can push us to eat more, and most of the time, a certain category of fatty or sugary foods. Which, as you can imagine, isn’t very good for your figure! According to a study published in April 2013, in theAmerican Journal of Clinical Nutrition, the risk of being overweight is 5 times higher in these people who seek to soothe negative feelings. When we’re in the midst of an emotional crisis, we can even store fat, without eating more than usual. Hormones act on our bodies in this way, without our being aware of it, in the event of anger, stress, general anxiety, etc.generalized anxiety… For example, chronic stress will make us put on weight via cortisone, and we’ll especially gain waist size, even if we’re basically slim. We tend to eat to digest our emotions. According to the American study cited above, 52% of women versus 20% of men eat on the spur of negative emotion. When we’re in distress or feeling frustrated, we’ll console ourselves by eating cake or sweets, just like our mother did. To prevent the vicious circle of emotional kilos from taking hold, it’s essential to introduce nutritional education from childhood, such as eating at the family table, practicing culinary activities with your child, not eating in front of the television… Children need to eat consciously and be able to express their feelings in ways other than by eating. People often fill their bellies to compensate for frustrations in their professional or private lives. As a result, they feel worse and worse about themselves, and become trapped in a vicious circle of weight gain, guilt and so on. In this type of situation, where we pounce on food without thinking, we need to ask ourselves whether we really feel hungry or whether this is a compensation process. We also need to become aware of our deepest desires and aspirations. In this way, you can free ourselves from our emotionsonce we’ve identified the reasons for our discomfort. In the end, to succeed in shedding emotional kilos, you need to make peace with yourself and learn to love yourself as you are, with all your qualities and faults. To succeed in becoming aware of all these emotions that parasitize us and prevent us from blossoming, it is often necessary to work on oneself in order to regain self-confidence . A professional will bring out what’s buried deep inside us, through psychotherapy or hypnosis for example. Photo credit: © kouchin – Fotolia