Enlightened: How I Lost 40 Pounds with a Yoga Mat, Fresh Pineapples, and a Beagle-Pointer

Meet your new healthy best friend and yoga guru: Jessica Berger Gross. For years, Jessica struggled with fluctuating weight and bouts of unhappiness. Then she took a yoga class. It changed her life. Not because she suddenly became a human pretzel, but because yoga gave her an entirely new way of looking at the world, and at what she was eating and why she was eating it. The core principles of yoga philosophy offer guidance that leads to eating smartly, living right, and losing weight. In a step-by-step process, this new paperback edition will teach you how these principles, or sutras, can help you to lose the physical weight and gain the emotional wisdom to keep it off. For example:
• Truthfulness, or satya, requires the yogi to be honest. Maybe you already eat salad for lunch, but if you're throwing in chunks of breaded chicken and cheese, you're not really watching your weight.

• Moderation, or brahmacarya, suggests that you make being only three-quarters full the new “I'm stuffed.” You'll be surprised at how well it works.

• Nonviolence, or ahimsa, sets out a compelling case for a vegetarian diet, or at least the need to eat only free-range, ethically-produced meat, and less of it.

Go beyond trendy diets, unsustainable exercise routines, and the quest for the “perfect” figure. With spiritual philosophy and an inspiring personal story, enLIGHTened will set you on a journey to self-acceptance, peace, and long-term health.