Visualization for Weight Loss -The Gabriel Method

Easy Applications of the Principles in Part II

Month Two: The Daily Session Once you have spent a month creating the habit of practicing visualization morning and evening, you can now focus on creating the habit of a daily SMART Mode session. This daily session is not absolutely necessary, but it is useful if you have the time and the inclination. The session should be around ten minutes long. Of course, the longer the better, and you may find that you really enjoy being in the state of SMART Mode. Many studies have shown that it reduces stress 1 and cortisol lev- els. 2 Elevated cortisol levels can cause the body to activate the FAT Programs, 3 so just the act of being in SMART Mode can help you to turn off the FAT Programs (there’s more about cor- tisol in the next section). For now, however, the purpose is to develop the habit of having a SMART Mode session every day for at least ten min- utes. In ten minutes, you can accomplish a lot. You can spend five minutes getting into SMART Mode (see chapter 5), and once you’re in SMART Mode, you can spend five minutes practicing various visualizations. Ideally, your SMART Mode sessions should be in the same location and at the same time of the day every day. It should be a place where noise or other people won’t disturb you. Make sure you unplug the phone and tell the other members of your household that you don’t want to be disturbed. By far the best time of the day to have this SMART Mode ses- sion is first thing in the morning. In fact, the more of your life you can live in the morning the better. I strongly recommend that, if you’re not doing so now, you find a way to carve out a block of time just for yourself when you first wake up. If you only need ten minutes for a SMART Mode session, it really only means going to sleep ten minutes earlier. By having a SMART Mode session first thing in the morning, you can flush out all of the accumulated stress from the previ- ous day. You start the day fresh, centered, and focused, so that any potentially stressful events that may occur in the coming day will be less likely to unbalance you.

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