Yoga contributes to mid-life weight loss

• Researchers found that overweight people in their 50s who regularly practiced yoga lost about five pounds over 10 years, while a group in the same age range gained about 13 1/2 pounds over the same period.
• Middle-aged people of normal weight generally put on pounds over 10 years, but those who did yoga gained less weight than those who didn't practice yoga.
• The link between yoga and weight loss has nothing to do with burning calories, said Alan Kristal, one of the researchers from the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center who co-authored the study.
• Instead, he thinks yoga helps keep people more in tune with their bodies and eating habits and aware of bad habits, such as eating because of stress, boredom or depression.
• The findings, published in the July/August issue of Alternative Therapies in Health and Medicine, showed that those who practiced yoga tended to avoid junk food and overeating because they wanted to respect their bodies.
• Mary Imani, a yoga teacher at 8 Limbs Yoga Center, said it's difficult to eat heavily and do yoga.
• Gary Miller, who studies obesity and weight loss at Wake Forest University in North Carolina, called the research encouraging, but said it's difficult to prove a direct influence from a single study.
• Most yoga fans say weight loss is just an added bonus from the disciplined form of meditation, controlled breathing and prescribed postures.
• "Yoga does many things," said Kathleen Hayes, who has practiced yoga for four years and manages a yoga studio in Seattle.
• For the 47-year-old Imani, a yoga practitioner for nearly two decades whose weight has fluctuated since she became menopausal, "It's all about trying to find harmony and balance."