I get a lot of questions on “What is Cortisol and Why is it Making Me Fat?”

Well, cortisol is a hormone and when stressed these levels rise. Cortisol will increase blood sugar levels, blood pressure, and suppresses the immune system, which is part of the body’s fight-or-flight response. It has two effects on weight. At first it suppresses the appetite in order to do battle ‘fight or flight’, but then afterwards the cortisol will increase your appetite and store fat trying to get your body back into what it thinks is balance. It is thinking you should have used up the extra carbohydrates and fat while ‘fleeing’. It can also slow down your metabolism.

So you can be doing everything right as far as eating and exercise and still not be loosing weight do to stress and cortisol.

Here are some things to consider …

When your body is holding emotional and physical stress….your body is in defense so it produces again a hormone called cortisol. This will not harm you and what it will do is make your body hold onto unnecessary weight and make you feel ‘heavy.’

Now, with practice you can help yourself. You have to move with your body and acknowledge what she/he is feeling. Move your body. In this way the feeling will be less intense, and therefore move out of your body (thereby feeling lighter)…and when you feel lighter you make better choices in all areas of your life.

Cultivating optimum health is a way to support the intelligence of the body. When your body and emotions function optimally, you are better equipped to turn around the body’s stress drug—cortisol—converting it rather than storing it. Maintaining a state of mental and emotional well being boosts your immune system. When your immune system isn’t working properly, your body holds on to cortisol, increasing the tendency to store fat. The body thinks she needs to fill herself up to respond to stress. If you keep developing internal health, other aspects of health are likely to follow.

Make sure you are doing the right things to keep you healthy and as stress-free as possible.

Let me know if you found this post helpful.

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“Ooooo!” Frances, my client, exclaimed while practicing the Body Knowledge System® Dance as she released the anger she felt for her ex-husband during the final stages of their divorce. When I asked her how that compared to the chronic headaches and abdominal distress she had suffered over the past year, she giggled. “Those were ‘ouches’, this is release.”

In this case, “dance” is defined as motion. We believe the motion expressed in physical action reflects the emotions inspiring it. If those emotions are joyful, the dance reflects their happiness. If, on the other hand, the emotional energy behind the movement is less than positive—the physical exertion allows release of that negativity, which in turn releases the physical pain that resulted from it.

Traditional and alternative health and wellness experts seek drug free methods to cope with their patients’ chronic pain from injuries, illness, or their imagination. Involving breathing, heat/cold therapies, drugs, aromas, massage, pain management specialists run down their menu of treatments depending upon their focus on what works for them and their patients. As medicine became more specialized on individual body parts in the last century, practitioners lost sight of the whole person. The previous narrow approach still applies to a broken bone, but only applies to back pain if the patient’s back is broken. With the dawn of the new millennium, medicine expanded their perspective to a holistic approach to treatment of the individual.

When treating pain, every expert considers the source. Pain is our body’s early warning system that something is wrong. The challenge is to locate the problem. Often the source has no physical origins, and even when it does, once the physical problem is “cured”, the pain can continue. When developing the Body Knowledge System® I became aware of the importance of constant communication with your body to interrupt and stop the cycle of pain associated with personal challenges—whether they are physical, emotional, or spiritual.

When my clients, and practitioners, seek trustworthy guidance for any life choice, the first place they look is to their bodies. They begin the conversation with movement in their Body Knowledge Dance. This movement is as individual as the partnership performing it. My client and her body have developed their movements over the course of renewing the intimate relationship they enjoyed at birth. Through ending the estrangement with their bodies, my clients can go directly to the source of their pain when performing the Body Knowledge Dance.

Your key to success is through the link of your visualized intention with the movement in your dance. “The BKS® is harmony. It brings body, mind and spirit together.” (Page 12, Body Knowledge System®, An Awesome Intelligence, 2010)

People in harmony with their bodies seldom experience pain in the physical sense. On the rare occasion they do, their open communication with their bodies allows them to process their pain and release it through movement. After practicing the Body Knowledge System® Dance, body-mind-spirit balance is restored and the BKS® dancer glides gracefully through life—their life, their way.

This Dance of Motion is great to do to release any physical or emotional pain you are experiencing. This unique method is easy to learn and fun No need to keep suffering.

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Learn one tool of many that will help you to not gain weight this holiday season.