Gaiam Yoga Conditioning For Weight Loss

Founded in 1989 by Jirka Rysavy, Gaiam sells yoga mats, videos and DVDs for people who want to practice yoga without benefit of live instruction. In the new millenium, the Louisville, Colorado-based company developed 13 different yoga programs for the cable network Discovery Health. As of 2011, Gaiam offers a wide variety of eco-friendly products and yoga instructional DVDs, as well as an online community dedicated to learning and practicing yoga.

AM/PM Yoga DVD

Gaiam offers an "AM/PM Yoga for Beginners" workout DVD designed for twice-daily use. As the name implies, it is built around morning and evening yoga routines, each lasting 25 minutes. A guidebook provides instructions on how to effectively implement yoga to achieve lasting weight loss. The morning routine is designed to energize you, while the evening one helps you relax and establish a sense of calmness.

Considerations

Although yoga can't match the calorie-burning power of aerobic exercise, it aids in weight loss by creating better body awareness and self-discipline, while toning and strengthening muscles in your stomach, buttocks and legs. Yoga may assist with long-term weight management, according to a study by Alan Kristal and colleagues at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle. Their 10-year survey of 15,500 men and women found that overweight people who practiced yoga lost 5 lbs. while overweight people who did not participate in yoga gained 14 lbs. during the decade, according to the study published in July 2005 in "Alternative Therapies in Health and Medicine."

Review

Dietspotlight.com, a website that has reviewed more than 5,831 diets and weight loss products, states that the "AM/PM" DVD and accompanying book work well together but each could be used as a stand-alone product. It added that the book, written by yoga instructor Suzanne Deason, provides easy-to-follow illustrations and clearly explains the role of yoga in mind-body connections and overall health. Deason writes that yoga goes beyond the mathematics of weight loss -- calorie in versus calorie burned -- because it helps people develop personal, lifelong way solutions to attaining and maintaining a healthy weight.

Benefits

Yoga helps you embrace not just a workout program but a lifestyle that you need to maintain long-standing weight loss. Surgeon Mehmet Oz, host of "The Dr. Oz Show," recommends that you practice yoga for a minimum of seven minutes daily. He says the conditioning benefits of yoga lie not in the ability to twist into the most complex position but in breathing, relaxing and stretching to get into a pose. If you do not wish to join a yoga class to learn poses and breathing techniques, Gaiam provides a method of at-home learning that may help you reach your weight-loss goals.