I’m a certified yoga instructor and have practiced yoga and meditation for the past 10 years. Yoga is the perfect supplement to your fitness regime because of the many health benefits. Doing yoga asanas (body postures) will help keep your muscles flexible, long and strong. Strength training activities like yoga are very important to incorporate to ensure bones stay strong and muscles developed.
However, there is more to yoga than the physical practice. Most people identify yoga with the physical practice or asana. However, the practice of yoga actually has eight limbs: the yamas (restraints), niyamas (observances), asana (postures), pranayama (breathing), pratyahara (withdrawal of senses), dharana (concentration), dhyani (meditation), and samadhi (enlightenment). The asana practice or the postures serve as the physical practice that gets your body prepared for meditation and concentration.
The top eight benefits of the physical yoga practice include:
1) Flexibility
You don’t have to bend like a pretzel to do yoga. People often say that they cannot do yoga because they are not flexible. We’ve all seen famous photos of masters of yoga doing various contortions. However, these multiple jointed, human pretzels are the exception versus the norm. Yoga is a practice to help you become more flexible as well as strong and lean.
According to Web MD’s article, The Health Benefits of Yoga, a study of yoga participants found after eight weeks of yoga up to 35% improvement in flexibility
The series of yoga poses called asanas work by safely stretching your muscles. This releases the lactic acid that builds up with muscle use and causes stiffness, tension, pain, and fatigue. In addition, yoga increases the range of motion in joints. It may also increase lubrication in the joints. The outcome is a sense of ease and fluidity throughout your body.
Yoga stretches not only your muscles but all of the soft tissues of your body. That includes ligaments, tendons, and the fascia sheath that surrounds your muscles.
2) Strength
More vigorous styles of yoga like power yoga will help you improve muscle tone. But even less vigorous styles of yoga can provide strength and endurance benefits. Poses like Downward Dog, Upward Dog and Plank, build upper-body strength. I often tell my students that this becomes even more crucial as people age. The standing poses held for multiple breaths can help build strength in hamstrings, quadriceps and abdominal muscles. When practiced properly, nearly all poses build core strength in the abdominal muscles.
3) Posture
I recently received a physical exam and when I was measured, I was actually taller than before! I sincerely believe yoga helped my spine and posture to the point that I stretched out one-quarter of an inch taller. According to Web MD,
Most standing and sitting poses develop core strength. That’s because you’re counting on your deep abdominals to support and maintain each pose. With a stronger core, you’re more likely to sit and stand “tall.” Another benefit of yoga is the increased body awareness. This heightened awareness tells you more quickly when you’re slouching or slumping so you can adjust your posture.
4) Breathing
Dancing will definitely help increase lung capacity but yoga also assists because of the deep, mindful breathing that takes place. Lung capacity can improve sports performance and endurance, which will ultimately help with dancing as well.
My yoga class and most forms of yoga focus on deepening and lengthening your breath. This stimulates the relaxation response, calming the nervous system. Additionally yoga offers specific breathing techniques that are very useful for stress management.
5) Calm state
Yoga helps you balance your mind and body and makes you less stressed and more relaxed. Yoga asanas are actually preparation for meditation because the physical practice calms the constant “mind chatter” that often underlies stress and makes you able to achieve a meditative state.
According to Web MD,
Among yoga’s anti-stress benefits are a host of biochemical responses. For example, there is a decrease in catecholamines, the hormones produced by the adrenal glands in response to stress. Lowering levels of hormone neurotransmitters — dopamine, norepinephrine, and epinephrine — creates a feeling of calm. Some research points to a boost in the hormone oxytocin. This is the so-called “trust” and “bonding” hormone that’s associated with feeling relaxed and connected to others. That may be why so many romances start in the yoga studio.
6) Concentration and mood
Our fast pace, multi-tasking society makes it more difficult for us to focus. Because yoga helps calm the mind, I’ve heard students say that yoga has helped them focus and concentrate better. According to Web MD, the same is true with mood, “Nearly every yoga student will tell you they feel happier and more contented after class. Recently, researchers have begun exploring the effects of yoga on depression, a benefit that may result from yoga’s boosting oxygen levels to the brain. Yoga is even being studied as an adjunct therapy to relieve symptoms of obsessive-compulsive disorder.
7) Heart benefits
More and more research shows the benefits of yoga on various medical conditions. Heart disease is one of the largest health problems our society faces and research shows wonderful benefits. According to Web MD,
Yoga has long been known to lower blood pressure and slow the heart rate. A slower heart rate can benefit people with hypertension, heart disease, and stroke. Yoga was a key component to the heart disease program designed by Dean Ornish, MD. This was the first program to partly reverse heart disease through lifestyle and diet rather than surgery. On a biochemical level, studies point to a possible anti-oxidant effect of yoga. And yoga has been associated with decreased cholesterol and triglyceride levels as well as a boost in immune system function.
Other benefits
Yoga provides many other surprising benefits for the mind and body. According to Web MD, “Some studies have suggested that yoga may have a positive effect on learning and memory. Other researchers have been studying whether yoga can slow the aging process, increase a person’s sense of self-acceptance, or improve energy levels.” Lastly, although it may be difficult to scientifically study but Web MD says, “yoga has been said to increase spiritual awareness.”
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