Saturday, July 28th, 2012

Yoga is a great form of exercise to connect with inner self and keep your body healthy and fit. It helps to calm your mind and body through deep breathing exercises, stretching and mindful exercises. And also helps stay away from stress related diseases. Yoga is an ancient form of exercise that has been practiced since ages. We can also incorporate yoga in our lifestyle easily and benefit from its numerous benefits for our mind, body and soul. Yoga is an exercise that suits all sizes and shapes of body.

Here we look how yoga helps to keep healthy and fit:

Lower Stress: Stress is one word that makes us go crazy. Almost all of us suffer from stress in one form or the other. Stress harms our body both mentally and physically. Stress releases hormones in the body which increase the blood sugar, heart rate and blood pressure. Stress reduces the immunity of the body and makes our body more prone to diseases. Practicing yoga helps to combat stress, reduce depression and relieve from acute headache. Include breathing exercises ( pranayamas ) and stretching exercises ( asanas ) to get relief from stress .

Maintain Body Weight: Practicing yoga can help you stay in shape and maintain your body weight. Overweight invites many chronic diseases and makes you more prone to different forms of cancer. Yoga can help you keep all these risks away. In yoga, it is really important that you do all the poses or asanas correctly in order to reap benefits of yoga asanas. Yoga also helps in increasing the strength and flexibility.

Helps Asthma Patients: Asthma patients can benefits from yoga by practicing pranayams, breathing exercises daily. Studies have shown that asthmatics who practiced yoga for over 10 weeks had improved quality of life and less symptoms of asthma.

Helps Cancer Patients: Cancer patients and survivors who practice yoga are able to sleep better and fight stress and depression effectively. According to recent study, yoga reduces stress levels and improves immunity system.

Releasing Toxins: Another benefit of yoga is that it helps in release of toxins from body organs while you are squeezing your muscles.

How to start practicing yoga : We need to keep few things in mind before starting yoga.

You should go for a style that suits your body type. Yoga poses may differ for people with different body types. Some may focus on deep breathing and meditation while others might indulge in strenuous poses and exercises.

You and your body type are unique. Don’t try to imitate yoga poses as pictured in fitness magazines or videos. Each person has his own level of flexibility and we should understand that they achieved such flexibility over years by practicing yoga regularly.

You should always listen to your body and should not force yourself into any asana. You should stop when your body can’t take it anymore.

Wear comfortable clothing which can help you bend and stretch easily while exercising.

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