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The Ornish Diet is an extremely low fat, vegetarian diet plan. Correct application of the eating plan, exercise, and stress-management techniques of this diet results in weight loss and improved health for most people. Although this diet takes more dedication than many other diets, and often requires big lifestyle changes for the dieter, research shows that it is good for both weight loss and helping to reverse heart disease. With its emphasis on managing stress and healthy food choices, this diet is also a great candidate for use in conjunction with weight loss hypnosis.

The Ornish diet can be in one of two, very similar formulations, a Preventative diet and a Reversal diet. The Preventative diet is perfect for people who wish to shed pounds and lower their risk for heart disease. It is also a good plan for people wanting to reduce their cholesterol levels. The Reversal diet is designed for people already afflicted with heart disease who wish to reverse the symptoms of the condition and cut their risk of having heart attacks.

Both forms of the Ornish diet recommend a diet plan that is composed of 10% fat, 20% protein, and 70% complex carbohydrates. Under the diet, all meat, fish, and poultry are avoided. All fats, seeds, nuts, and oils are also banned. Refined carbohydrate foods such as sugar and white flour are also not permitted, but whole grain bread and pasta, beans, and legumes are fine.

Foods allowed in restricted quantities include egg whites and fat-free dairy products such as lowfat yogurt, milk, and cheese. Most convenience foods are to be avoided, since any prepackaged foods with over two grams of fat per serving are banned.

The diet lets you to eat beans, whole grains, fruit, and vegetables at every meal until you feel full. The good thing about this diet program is that since you are allowed to consume as much as you want of permitted foods, you can feel full and satisfied all the time. This diet program, unlike many others, is not based on unhealthy "starvation" techniques.

In addition to the diet plan, another essential component of the Ornish program is stress-management. There are a wide range of stress-reducing techniques you can use, such as yoga, meditation, and hypnosis. Hypnosis is ideal for reducing anxiety and tension while supporting natural weight loss. Hypnotherapy techniques work by guiding your unconscious mind to having positive thoughts instead of negative thoughts when you begin to feel stressed. These techniques are extremely effective in reducing stress levels.

While the Ornish diet is healthy and effective for most dieters, it can be challenging to follow because it involves many restrictions. This diet and others similar to it often fail because people cannot stick to them. Many people struggle with dieting because they suffer from an out-of-control appetite, uncontrollable cravings, compulsive overeating, or a simple lack of motivation to lose weight. These obstacles keep many hard-working dieters from maintaining their diet and achieving permanent success. Hypnotherapy helps you beat these obstacles, and is an effective complement to the Ornish diet approach because it provides motivation to stick to a weight loss plan.

Hypnosis works to regulate the appetite by "reprogramming" the unconscious mind to eliminate and replace bad habits with good ones. Years of unhealthy eating habits such as "emotional eating" can cause people to eat compulsively, even when they are not hungry. Hypnosis breaks unhealthy associations with food and our feelings to end this conditioned response and stop emotional eating. Hypnosis can further influence dieting success by replacing the overeating response with another activity, such as exercise. This way, instead of having urges to overeat, you will feel motivated to exercise for your health.

Hypnotherapy can also be used to eliminate the emotional anxieties that keep you from losing weight. For many people, being overweight provides a "secondary gain" in the form of a sense of emotional protection or safety. For example, many people with low self-esteem have a fear of people not liking them, so they use their weight as a reason to assume people will dislike and reject them. Through hypnosis, we can think more positively and focus on improving our health instead of feeling overcome by such anxieties. We can use therapeutic hypnosis to improve our self-esteem, to clearly see our self-worth and commit to our personal health.

Hypnosis therapy offers a strong, natural combination of stress-relief, motivation, and behavior regulation to promote weight loss and help you follow your diet program of choice. Using hypnosis with the Ornish diet is particularly effective, but hypnotherapy is perfect for helping dieters stay on any diet plan. Hypnosis promotes the success of diet plans along with natural weight loss so people can enjoy long-lasting results.

Alan B. Densky, CH has invested over 30 years specializing in weight loss. He offers several ways to lose weight, including weight loss CD and hypnosis for losing weight DVD. Visit his CD for self-help website for Free hypnosis newsletters, videos, and downloads.