I’ve likened your gut to the epicenter of your very own universe many times.

In this, I mean that it is generally at the very core of your health. We once thought its role was super simple. That it digested food and allowed us to assimilate nutrients to meet the demands of our body. This much is still true, but as time has gone on, we have gotten more of a glimpse into how the gut is so much more than a compost heap. Your gut dictates so much about you, it contains more bacteria than we may ever comprehend (it’s said that we are actually more bacteria than we are human!) and has been labeled the second brain, this all aside from the fact that it helps create an avenue for you to rid of things you don’t want both physically and metaphysically.

Your gut is indeed at the center of your health.

When we look at weight loss specifically we understand that food plays a big role in dictating where that may go. If we over indulge, we may find our jeans on the tight side and our love handles exponentially bigger. But there’s more to healthy weight loss than consumption alone and whilst it is certainly a large part, it’s one piece of the puzzle.

If your gut health is compromised be it by overgrowth of unwanted and unkind bacteria or because it’s digestive processes are sluggish, weight gain may be inevitable. It may mean our body continues to crave food as it asks for more, not because you’re hungry but perhaps because your daily nutrient requirements haven’t been met. But more specifically, if this intricate balance is denied, if our body is forever operating from a place of internal deficiency, we may find not only our weight is out of control but our emotions too, and they tend to influence each other. Your gut is your emotion centre. I’m sure you’ve received bad news and felt sick to your stomach or been nervous and felt you’ve had a stitch. The relationship between how you feel and operate comes far more from your gut than your brain, it’s imperative that we feed it love not just with nutrients but with our thoughts too.

Perhaps you know somebody who is forever telling you they are ‘sick and tired of being sick and tired.’ They may live in this perpetual state of disharmony often, because their gut is sluggish and they are feeding fuel to the fire by reinforcing this with their words and thoughts. Your words and thoughts are powerful and we’ve gone hundreds if not thousands of years dismissing this. Here’s an example. For all of my married life, my husband has always joked when I go out solo. I’m a social being and I love being with family and friends and I’m sometimes known to be the last man (or woman) standing. He will often ask what time I intend on being home. I might say 9 or 10pm and jokingly he will say, “see you at midnight.”  Every single time without fail, I walk in the door at midnight even if it is my intention to be home early. It’s as if his words concrete it in and try as I might, for some reason or another (that is often out of my control), I never get in before the clock strikes 12am. Every. Time. It’s this same force that drives the ‘sick and tired’ friend. They are repeating these words and the body listens, responding accordingly.

So what’s this got to do with weight loss?

When we are uncomfortable in our skin, maybe find ourselves overweight and again operating out of this physically deficient state, we are most likely emotionally deficient too (because remember they are linked via the gut). We tend to focus on what we don’t like about ourselves, concreting this in with words perhaps when we look in the mirror or when we talk to others. Maybe you might recall a loved one paying you a compliment, commenting on how they love your outfit and your immediate response is, “thanks I need to lose some weight.” Thing is, they weren’t asking about your weight, they were paying you a compliment. But our focus being on the negative has reinforced the fact, our body has eves-dropped and followed your lead.

The bottom line is, our gut is responsive to both our emotional and external environment and these two factors together are the winning or the failing combo. So next time you find yourself down and out because the scales keep climbing it might be time to check in with what’s going on via in that internal dialogue. Are you feeding your body thoughts that take you where you want to go or only reinforcing what you don’t want. It takes a little practice to be privy to the mind chatter but once you do, it can be a game changer. Have your positive words at the ready to switch the track and take you where you want to go.

It may be something like “I choose to feel comfortable in my skin.”

This alongside supporting health gut function may be another rung on the board to better health and weight loss.