Yoga and Its Benefits for a Healthy Lifestyle
This lockdown has made us realize so many things and most importantly to maintain a healthy lifestyle. By eating healthy foods, maintaining hygiene, and taking care of our body by exercising. But many people just don’t want to follow these and eat their hearts out! This leads to many health problems like obesity, cholesterol, tiredness, etc.
Many don’t prefer heavy workouts and exercises but still want to do some kind of exercise to maintain their health and body. For those, yoga is the best option. You will not need any types of equipment except a yoga mat or any other mats which are lying around your house and learning the basics.
Or you can also learn it from a yoga teacher or even become a yoga instructor by completing a yoga teacher training course and help people around you to learn yoga correctly.
Origin of yoga
Yoga originated in India thousands of years ago even before religions existed. So yoga is not based on any religion. The word yoga comes from a Sanskrit word “Yuj” which means “to unite” or “to join”.
Yoga is a subtle science that helps to unite our “mind and body” and “man and nature” which eventually leads to a healthy life. There are several fossils and seals found in the excavation of Indus Saraswati valley civilization which has motives and figures performing yoga.
And many historic shreds of evidence of yoga are found in works of literature like Vedas, Puranas, the teaching of Buddhism, etc. and yoga started spreading in India in the time of 500BC to 800AD by great teachers like Mahavir and Buddha.
Types of yoga
There are many different styles of yoga and most of them are all based on the same basic poses called “Asanas”. But still, it can be divided into the below basic groups.
- Karma yoga
- Bhakti yoga
- Raja yoga
- Hatha yoga
- Jnana yoga
Karma yoga
Karma yoga involves the active aspects of the mind. It mainly focuses on learning kindness and compassion and living selflessly. Karma yoga is something more than just asanas. It is learning to live serving others without any expectations and leaving our ego behind. This provided us with a healthy mind.
Bhakti yoga
Bhakti means devotion. Bhakti yoga involves the active aspects of our emotions through a devotional approach. It involves surrendering yourself to God and channeling your emotions in devotion, humanity, and surrendering.
Raja yoga
Raja yoga involves the active aspects of mind control. It is composed of hatha yoga and ashtanga yoga postures which help to control the mind, body, and senses.
Hatha yoga
Hatha means sun and moon which refers to Praana and Apaana which are the energy channels of our body. Hatha yoga includes asanas and pranayama which help to bring peace to mind and body.
Jnana yoga
Jnana means knowledge. Jnana yoga is associated with intelligence. It is finding the knowledge by using our mind to enquire ourselves and self-analysis.
Benefits of yoga
Yoga can be considered as an exercise or a therapy based on your needs. It is an osteopathic approach to wellness that focuses on your mind, body, and soul which helps in self-healing and good health.
You can also build a career in yoga by completing a yoga teacher training course and become a yoga instructor. The benefits of yoga can be classified as below:
- Physical health benefits of yoga
- Mental health benefits of yoga
Physical health benefits of yoga
You can gain numerous physical health benefits from yoga which helps you to gain a healthy and relaxed body. Those benefits include:
Flexibility
Most of the asanas help you to improve the flexibility of your body. By performing yoga daily, you will notice changes like joint pains and aches disappearing because of the increased flexibility.
Improves muscle strength tones your body
Yoga helps you to build muscle strength without lifting weights and increases your balance. this also helps in perfecting your posture.
Balanced metabolism and weight reduction
Relaxing yoga helps to increase the blood flow in your body and boosts immunity. This will help in digestion and weight reduction.
Mental health benefits of yoga
Relieves stress
Oga can be relaxing for both your body and your mind. Continuous practice of it will help you to find peace and relieve stress.
Good sleep
The continuous practice of yoga can help you relieve stress which brings you a good sleep. It can also help in depression as it helps to relax and calm your mind.
So what are you waiting for? Practicing yoga brings a change in your lifestyle in a good way.