Is Yoga Right For You?
Unlike many other activities and exercises, yoga is suitable for almost anybody at any age and in any condition. There are very few other forms of exercise that this statement can apply to. |
Is Yoga Right For You? |
Most people will find some form of benefit from doing yoga particularly if they do so consistently and follow the correct techniques.
From sedentary elderly people to the elite professional sports person, yoga can help to improve so many aspects of a person's life that it is beneficial to virtually anybody who try's it.
Due in part to the fact that yoga poses and exercises can be performed at any extent and degree that the person chooses, even those with injuries and illness will usually find that they will get some benefit by incorporating yoga into their lifestyle.
Add to that, the fact that yoga is extremely economical, with no need for any purchases of equipment and the convenience that it can be done almost anywhere and at any time and it becomes quite obvious why so many people are turning towards yoga to help them to create the balance in their life that has often been missing for so long.
So it is safe to say when the question is asked whether yoga is right for you or not that it is highly likely that you will find it to be one of the best forms of exercise and relaxation that you can do. It will certainly 'change your mind' in the way that you think about exercise.
It is also likely that you will see many positive changes in your life from doing yoga on a regular basis.
Even if it is used solely for the relaxation techniques and the relief of stress and the elimination of anxiety and other 'mind' related problems - there is always something that can be gained from yoga.
Relaxation The Natural State
Being relaxed is a natural state that both the mind and the body should be in as much as possible. Many people no longer realize this as they live from one day to another in a state of anxiety brought about by fast living and lifestyles that don't allow enough time to unwind and enjoy life as it should be.Yoga is one of the best ways to relearn this natural state for those people who have forgotten what it is like to be relaxed and feel free from all the burdens we bring upon ourselves.
By correcting your breathing techniques and allowing for relaxation to embrace your being you will also allow the energy to flow through your body reducing fatigue that many people seem to have accepted as part of their life.
It is unnatural to be constantly fatigued and chronic fatigue affects a great number of people. There are those people who are unable to make immediate changes to their current life situation however they are more likely than most to benefit from yoga exercises as this will help them to cope better, remain more relaxed no matter what they currently have to endure and also give them more energy to make the necessary changes that will result in an improvement in their lifestyle.
It doesn't cost anything to do yoga in your own time and you can do all the basic exercises that are necessary to bring about change without having to buy any equipment.
Also, no matter how tired you are and how little time you believe you have there is always time to adjust your breathing or stretch your muscles in yoga poses. Those few minutes that you take each day to perform the simplest of yoga exercises will give you the energy to achieve more throughout the day and to sleep better at night.
You will find that you have more time if you make yoga a part of your life.
Styles of Yoga
As with almost anything in life there are many different opinions on what style of yoga is the best.The reality of the situation is there is no one particular style that is better than another as individuals all have specific needs of their own and expectations and the best form of yoga is the one that suits you.
All forms of yoga are based on the same principles and that is to bring about harmony in the mind and body.
What works well for one person might not be as suitable for another even though most people will benefit from any type of yoga that they do.
Where there are specific injuries or illnesses that need to be considered then it is important to select a style of yoga that will aid in the recovery from those injuries or help to eliminate or cope with an illness.
Fortunately yoga can be customized to the individual's requirements and changed as they progress to the stage where they can accomplish more intense exercise. This is particularly beneficial for the sick and elderly as even light participation in yoga can bring about noticeable changes.
Yoga methods such as Bikram yoga are probably best avoided in the initial stages as beginners can be overcome with the intensity from having to perform their poses with the added element of increased temperatures to contend with.
The best policy is to start gradually until your body gets used to the stretching and you have built up enough strength to hold poses for the required time and then move on to more advanced techniques.
Yoga is something that you can always go further with and improve on more so there is no urgency in the beginning to over stretch and risk injury. All you are likely to do then is delay your opportunity to get to the next level.
Yoga Benefits
There are many different benefits that can be achieved by doing yoga on a regular basis and it is one of the best forms of exercise to bring about a balance in both the mind and the body and help to achieve harmony that is very difficult in today's world.Regular yoga exercise throughout a person's life will help them to stay a lot healthier as they age with a reduction in aches and pains that are normally associated with ageing.
By remaining more flexible and strengthening the supporting tissues and muscles a person who has done yoga on a regular basis will be less likely to succumb to falls that happen regularly with elderly people.
Yoga not only affects your muscles and a calming of your mind but it has a positive affect on the whole of your inner self including your emotional and endocrinal system.
It is regarded as the most effective whole body workout and surprises many people including professional athletes of how much benefit they get from yoga and how strenuous the exercises can be when taking advanced.
It is not unusual to see professional athletes having difficulty performing the poses and exercises that elderly people are doing effortlessly.
The sooner you get involved with yoga the sooner you are going to reap the rewards that yoga can bring helping you to get more out of life and ultimately to live longer.
Yoga has proven to reduce and eliminate various different health ailments that affect many people.
It is often recommended by medical practitioners in recuperation of injuries and for those who are suffering from depression as it is suitable for people of all ages and all levels of health or lack thereof.
Even a minimal amount of Yoga performed regularly can have a noticeable effect on a person's state of health.
Yoga Can Help With Depression
Yoga is a very powerful method of helping people to come out of the depths that depression can hold them in.When people get depressed they have an unbalanced view on life and it is very difficult to change the thought patterns that create this outlook.
It is not possible for the majority of people to do so without some form of assistance and for the majority of depression sufferers that assistance is generally in the form of anti depressant medication.
That in itself can cause other problems and often the anti depressants are worse than the depression itself as they can unbalance hormones and create bigger problems that the depressed person will then have to deal with.
Yoga and in particular the breathing techniques that are taught in yoga will help to bring about a calmness in the mind with a reduction in the anxiety that is associated with depression.
These breathing techniques are an extremely powerful way of handling and reducing negative thoughts. As the depressed person has less and less of these negative thoughts it becomes easier to focus on the things in life that are good, positive and make them happy.
Inward negative thinking begins to get replaced with positive thoughts and the endorphins that yoga helps to release add to the powerful action in the fight against depression.
It is often said that people use yoga to cure depression when all the medications have failed to work.
For people who have used medication to solve their depression problems there is the necessity for many of them to deal with the process of coming off their medication and that too can be assisted considerably with yoga.
The more often yoga is practiced the more powerful the force against depression will be. Once people begin to see the positive results they are getting it usually isn't too difficult for them to find time for yoga on a daily basis.
Yoga For Slimming
What many people don't seem to realize is that yoga can be a very effective way to lose weight and to get in shape.It's understandable that doing yoga on a regular basis will help you to get in shape but it is also very effective way of reducing fat.
Yoga exercise helps to detoxify your body and to help improve your digestive and elimination systems.
In doing so it helps you to get more nutrition from the foods that you eat and to eliminate those that are clogging up your body.
By helping to strengthen and improve your muscles this also helps to burn the fat in your body as muscle burns fat. So there are several processes that go on within your body when performing the yoga exercises that help you to get into better shape and reduce body fat.
There is another factor that has a huge bearing on your ability to lose weight and keep that weight off permanently. That factor is your mind and Yoga helps you to get a more positive outlook on life, improve your self-worth and self-confidence and eliminate any bad habits that are often the main source of over eating and getting fat.
It is quite surprising the changes that people see without expecting them when they begin doing yoga on a regular basis.
Many people never intended it as a source of weight reduction and find that it is a pleasant bonus when they get on the scales after a few weeks.
Yoga helps to tone the body and in doing so assists your posture and that alone can make you appear slimmer in itself.
Often the change that comes about in your mind from doing yoga makes you start to consider all areas of your health including the foods that you eat. Each positive aspect of these lifestyle changes affects the other and the compound benefits of all can bring about quite startling results.
Yoga often delivers the benefits that other forms of slimming fail to do.
Your Basic Yoga Equipment
One of the aspects about yoga that appeals to many people is the fact that you don't need a lot of equipment to perform the exercises.In fact you don't need any equipment to perform most of the basic exercises which makes it very easy for yoga to be practiced almost anywhere.
It also makes it easy for people of all ages to participate in yoga exercises and get the benefits that it will present to them.
Not only is it one of the most beneficial forms of exercise that you could undertake but it is also one of the few that requires virtually no investment of money other than some loose clothing to ensure that you can perform the poses comfortably.
Traditionally yoga is done in bare feet so you don't even need to buy any special footwear to do yoga.
Unlike many sports you don't even need to rely on additional supplements, vitamins and minerals to make up for any deficiencies that can be caused through specific forms of exercise. Yoga in itself will improve your health and well-being and if anything reduce your dependence on the need to take additional supplements to compensate other factors that are lacking in your health and fitness.
As you become more advanced with your yoga exercises you might feel the need to add some additional equipment to assist in taking yourself to higher levels.
This can be as many as simple as a mat that will reduce the chance of slipping when doing your standing poses.
You might also like to get straps that can assist with your stretching although even these don't need to be anything more than a piece of rope or a belt that you've probably got lying around the house.
Yoga is practiced extensively in countries where the people cannot afford to spend money on exercise equipment.
Fortunately basic equipment such as Yoga mats that will provide some form of cushioning and slip resistance on the floor, and bolsters that will help to get your body in the correct position, providing alignment for your spine and legs can be purchased for very little expense.
Even the genuine Yoga straps that will help you to achieve more flexibility by helping you to perform poses that you couldn't otherwise do without the assistance of the strap, cost very little to purchase.
And the only other item that you could possibly need would be a blanket that most everybody has anyway.
Anxiety Attacks
If you have had or know of anyone who has had anxiety attacks then you will understand just how badly this affects the freedom to cope with something as simple as everyday life.The fear of something happening is often so powerful that people become confined to their own homes unable to venture out in public.
Medication is often a choice that people will make to help them cope but some of these very same medications can create anxiety too. People take sleeping tablets to help them to sleep without knowing that one of the common side effects of sleeping tablets is increased anxiety.
Obviously a natural alternative will be a better option unless you consider some of the herbal products that are on the market as many of these can have a reaction with some people.
Yoga on the other hand is a natural solution to the problem that is more effective than all else and has absolutely no side effects.
Besides that it is free to do, it can be done in the privacy of your own home and it is not something that you need to 'come off' after it has achieved the desired result. Quite to the contrary where most people who start yoga continue to use what they have learned for the rest of their life in one form or another.
When people constantly suffer from anxiety attacks and start to withdraw into themselves they get a distorted outlook on life and will tend to look at most things in a negative light.
By bringing about a balance in the mind there is no room for these negative thoughts and as a person becomes more positive they also recover confidence and that in turn helps them to venture out and become more active.
Inactivity is a concern with elderly people in particular and is responsible for increased levels of stress and frustration. This often leads them to resort to alternatives such as alcohol to 'help' cope when in fact these solutions do quite the opposite.
Yoga is certainly the best solution minimizing anxiety attacks.
Yoga Can Help With High Blood Pressure
Yoga has proven to be an effective method of controlling high blood pressure when specific exercises are used.Contrary to what many people with high blood pressure are lead to believe the inverted yoga positions can have a very positive affect on your high blood pressure.
Now before going any further you should be warned that if you do have high blood pressure you will need to consult with your doctor so as to ensure that you are not doing anything that will endanger your health as all people are affected differently depending on their state of health.
Having said that I can explain a little further about the inverted yoga positions and how they can affect your blood pressure and bring about necessary improvements.
When your body is in an inverted position you can reverse the effect that gravity has on your body as your legs and abdomen are in a position higher than your heart.
This assists in the blood flowing more easily through the veins to the heart and thereby reducing the blood pressure at the feet and lower parts of the body giving them the opportunity to rest.
This drainage of the blood and the waste from the lower part of the body can also help reduce the incidence of other problems such as swollen ankles and varicose veins.
The change in the effect that gravity has on the circulation of the blood through your body helps to cleanse your body and in doing so improves the health and condition of your veins and your circulation system.
This improves circulation and the removal of toxins from your system has shown to help many people reduce the blood pressure to more acceptable levels without the need to medication.
Performing this poses on a regular basis will continue to improve your circulation and for some people this has resulted in the elimination of the need to take medication at all.
For many people high blood pressure is also a result of other factors in their lives such as anxiety and this can be reduced somewhat by doing yoga exercises regularly.
A Healthier Lifestyle More Easily
It's not surprising to find that most people who do yoga regularly begin to develop a healthier lifestyle in many other areas.Once they see the benefits that yoga can bring about and feel their energy levels increasing it is encouraging to make more changes to get even more out of life.
Diets are often changed where food of low nutritional value is substituted with healthier foods.
Lingering illness is often disposed of in a short period of time.
Sleeping patterns become better and old habits that were so difficult to cast aside prior to starting yoga are more easily sorted.
People become more aware of themselves and can see where there are factors in their life that have held them back either in health, mentally or other areas.
Old emotional problems that have dragged them down for years are suddenly set free and it is this new found freedom that makes many people seek more of the 'good stuff' that life has available for those who wish to take advantage of it.
And this powerful positive energy force becomes greater as it spills over into more and more areas of a person's lifestyle. Each area brings the body and the mind into greater harmony with one another.
By eliminating the imbalance there is no longer the constant conflict that the various areas find by fighting with one another.
There comes a desire to live a healthier life because that is the natural state that we should all be living in and it is a state that makes you feel good. It opens up the mind to see more opportunities and to achieve higher levels of success.
Yoga is such a powerful source that once embraced the changes can be unstoppable and that is a good thing to look forward to.