The trouble with most diets is they don’t address the person’s mental state. They do not consider fundamental reasons why you keep putting on weight, and why you go through phases of heavy-light. And they don’t ever consider that, by now, you have the most superbly trained body you can get – it is trained to store every ounce of fat it can to ward against the next period of starvation.

This book does.

In Easy Weight Loss Yoga, Patricia Bacall discusses, in a straightforward way, the reasons why we diet to fail. The physical, mental and emotional reasons. She explains about endocrine systems and hormones and glands, and how we need to keep all these systems working. She talks about the physiological reason why losing weight is more difficult with age. She suggests that some of the reasons we eat unhealthily is because we are missing key nutritional needs in our diets, and our bodies search around to fill the gap. This chimes with other theories – like not understanding the thirsty signal from our bodies, and eating instead.

Ms Bacall presents yoga as an opportunity to address our mental and physical states, focusing on 12 key poses in a yoga programme that would stimulate our endocrine system and vital organs. She recommends finding a suitable yoga class or teacher to help you get going. This is not a ‘how to do yoga’ book. It’s a companion volume to a yoga programme, or an exercise programme, for a person who wants to understand what the specific poses can do to help their metabolism. I like her style.

I don’t know yet whether it does what it says in the title. But I have access to a weekly yoga class, and I know in the past I have been able to do many of these poses. I just need to get my mental state into gear to do it.

This is a book that is never really 'read' as it needs to be beside you until the poses are automatic, and even after to remind you of the mental approach.

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