I used to take sculpture as an elective in High School. I was a lousy painter and couldn’t draw a straight line. But when it came to molding clay I felt at ease. Perhaps, because, in the process of sculpting the qualities of plasticity and malleability were honed. As a dancer I used the same plasticity to convey emotional landscapes and abstract images. My dancing actually picked up when I committed to regular sculpting classes.I learned that lines were not flat vectors in space, but rather one-dimensional curves that led viewers’ eyes in, around and through form. They could be actual or implied. I figured that planes were not only two dimensional surfaces but could be sued to define edges or to change the flow of movement to a different level. I gathered that color enhanced the meaning and that form was a condensation of energy. I experimented with highlights, shadows to enhance contrast and mold relief. I played with positive and negative spaces to create balance. I attributed sculpture to the inherent plasticity of the body and brain and always felt I had a live organism in my hands telling me what to leave and what to take away.

If you think of sculpture just as a way for carving imagery you fall short of its magic. But if you see it as an entirety that is being reduced to particularity you realize that you are working with a shape-shifting mass of energy that guides you into the state or image that you need to attain. You are no longer sculpting something concrete. To the contrary, you are allowing the building block to mold itself. It is for a reason that the rule of thumbs in sculpting was uttered by Auguste Rodin in a moment of “satori” – “I choose a block of marble and chop off whatever I don’t need.” Likewise, in Yoga we strip away the unnecessary – all the attachments, conditionings, imprints, emotional blockages and impediments to pave way for the spirit. And in this process of weeding and removing, of unlearning and shedding conditioned shells we carve our true identity and discard the imposed self. It is the way of “via negativa”, a path to transformation and clearing -similar to the process physical detoxification and cleansing, which every weight loss. Whether we shed pounds, fears and angst, or peel away layers of conditioning we chisel away the excess and keeping the essentials.

Weight loss has always been an obsession. A lot of people think it’s about starving yourself to death or exercising until you burn the midnight oil. It is neither. But rather, a process of purification that comes with a host of life style changes. Effective weight loss requires a change of diet, resorting to balanced exercise and adopting a centered and unimposing mindset. If you starve yourself forcefully to the point that you suppress your food cravings, or catch yourself fantasizing about the bikini you’d like to fit in, you’ve surely failed. In our eat-and-run, massive-portion-sized culture, maintaining a healthy weight is all about striking the body, mind, sprit balance. And weight is indeed a balancing act, but the equation is simple: If you eat more calories than you burn, you gain weight. And if you eat fewer calories than you burn, you lose weight.

All you need to do from a diet perspective is to focus largely on vegetable or meat protein, full fat dairy products, while banishing carbohydrates such as bread, refined sugar, rice, and pasta. Restricting carbohydrate intake and favoring healthier, unsaturated fats found in nuts and fish, while allowing more whole grains, fruits, and vegetables is the way to go.

We should also remember that we live in a fast-paced world where eating has become mindless. We eat on the run, at our desk while we’re working, and in front of the TV screen. The result is that we consume much more than we need, often without realizing it. Yoga teaches us to counter this tendency by practicing “mindful” eating: paying attention to what we eat, avoiding distractions, chewing food thoroughly, savoring each bite, and choosing foods that are both nourishing and enjoyable.

I personally like to combine this healthy diet with drinking plenty of water, turning off the TV at night and meditating on the perfect body, soul, mind and spirit synergy that will enable me to be more productive and focused the next day. Isometric training is my favorite way to stay fit. It happens when you hold a position without moving for several seconds to a minute, imagining that the air is a solid wall that you push against. Your muscles are straining against each other and creating resistance-based strengthening. You stimulate the metabolism directly and you start to burn fat easier than when you do interval training. It is similar to the principle of sculpting an image – you use the oppositional pull of polar forces to create the optimal balance between tension and release. It is safer for your joints and stimulates the muscular contraction which burns more calories than fat.

However, consistency is the key. As the yoga poses progress the strength is build by holding different positions against gravity. There is a misconception that yoga is just stretching and relaxing. Depending on the flow, the workout can be heavier on cardiovascular, strength, or stretching. As you maintain a positive mindset and free up time for meditation and creative visualization you are speeding the metabolic process and rebooting the way the body converts sugar into fat by using the plasticity of your body and brain. It’s a psycho physical process of carving the best image of you – it is not a process of deprivation, but an act of chiseling away the unnecessary and leaving only the necessary. Then like Rodin, you become the sculptor of your dreams.