How Yoga Can Improve & Boost Mental Health 5 Natural Ways

How Yoga Can Improve Your Mental Health and Depression | 5 Natural Ways to Boost Your Mental Health

The need for yoga was based on our goal of providing a holistic wellness for everyone, along with the increased attraction for yoga as a form of tension release and workout. Yoga is frequently been publicized as a helpful way to increase flexibility and gain strength, making it a go-to exercise for people looking for some serious training options. One of the current studies circulated in the British Journal of Sports Medicine proposes as yoga provides a strong mind-body connection also.

We live in a fast-paced world and look at us in this amid of COVID-19 infested world. Where we are heading we don’t know but for sure this year ie.2020 will be a memorable year for all of us. We try to balance between work, family, and personal time and this makes us crazy many times. Many of us becomes a victim of lifestyle diseases such as depression.

Many of us with very little time to worry to know about how yoga can improve your mental health. Having acknowledged the necessity of yoga within us to deal with mental health issues, I myself have experimented with several creativities and involvements.

There are various forms of yoga. In general, we refer these terms more often.

Table of Contents

Forms of Yoga

Hatha: The form most often associated with yoga, it combines a series of basic movements with breathing.
Vinyasa: A series of poses that flow smoothly into one another.
Power: A faster, higher-intensity practice that builds muscle.
Ashtanga. A series of poses, combined with a special breathing technique.
Bikram: Also known as “hot yoga,” it’s a series of 26 challenging poses performed in a room heated to a high temperature.
Iyengar: A type of yoga that uses props like blocks, straps, and chairs to help you move your body into the proper alignment.

My Journey for Yoga

I was a fan of yoga from my younger days. One of the best things I discovered during my schooldays was yogic kriyas (cleansing techniques) which I did once a week. There were six purification techniques to natural ways to boost your mental health to purify the upper intestinal tract.

I learned and I accomplished under the guidance of my PT teacher in school who was an experienced yogi. I taught these to many of my friends in my college also. The results were incredible and they started calling me “swam” nicknamed as “Swamy”. It was fun even though I got so much love from my pals.

Natural Ways to Boost Your Mental Health

The word Yoga, derived from Sanskrit and in English as, it means union or to join, connect, and unite. It’s a tool for your mental health and physical health construction. I always reassure people to start Yoga not just for the physical benefits but for their overall maintenance and improvement of your mental health & wellbeing. It is true for children also.

So if you want to become and stay physically and mentally fit, make sure your yoga practice includes a balance of poses that can improve your mental health and build strength, stamina, and flexibility for physical health. Do it along with breathwork and meditation to help develop body awareness.

Few more things if someone applies along with yoga the results gets doubled. Few natural ways to boost your mental health such as

1. Getting up early by 5 am
2. Performing yoga asanas for an hour in the morning.
3. Attending yogic discourse from spiritual gurus
4. Consuming sattvic breakfast
5. Performing unselfish actions (karma yoga),
6. Attending pranayama sessions
7. De-stressing yoga session in the afternoon
8. A light dinner by 7 pm.

In Pune, around 12 information technology firms analyzed four-week studies on yoga that included 450 employees as total people with diagnoses that included mental depression, anxiety, alcohol dependence, and post-traumatic stress disorder. They found that the more yoga that each person practiced each week, the fewer depressive symptoms they showed. This happens mainly as yoga has a prominence on observing your thoughts in a relaxed and tolerant method to progress.

5 Natural Ways to Boost Your Mental Health

Exercising

Several research studies have shown that exercising has various physical as well as mental benefits. People show significant progress in mental health when they perform exercises of their preference.

Exercise leads to the secretion of endorphins in the body, chemicals that are associated with happiness and pleasure. Yoga takes this theory to a different level.

If you are just doing 15 minutes of gentle yoga stretches three to four times a week, you will also need to do some other form of exercise to stay fit. yoga sessions must be comprised of breathwork and meditation in addition to typical yoga poses.

Finally, the asanas used in these studies included not just aerobically challenging sequences, like Sun Salutations, but also many strengthening poses, like Virabhadrasana (Warrior Pose), Vrksasana (Tree Pose), Trikonasana (Triangle Pose), Adho Mukha Svanasana (Downward-Facing Dog Pose), Navasana (Boat Pose), Sarvangasana (Shoulderstand), Setu Bandha Sarvangasana (Bridge Pose), and Plank.

Fitness

What actually means by “Fitness” is a person is ready to perform in all aspects of life. It’s as simple as that. Swami Vivekananda once said, “strength is life, and weakness is death”. It is true for being fit mentally as well as physically.

Addressing a ‘profound human problem’ the issue with depression sometimes appears alongside other mental health issues, such as anxiety and psychosis. Some physical health issues can also lead to mental health issues. According to an article in the Journal of Affective Disorders, many experts associate a lack of physical activity with depression.

Asanas

Performing the asanas is not only a physical challenge but a mental one as well. It tests your flexibility and at the same time, mental endurance. The ability to hold a static stretch for a long period of time while maintaining a rhythmic breathing and clear mind is a feat of mental and physical strength.

In today’s age, everyone is stressed almost constantly and the mind never stops. Yoga provides an outlet for mental health to rest and rejuvenate in the form of maintaining clarity while holding a possibly difficult asana.

Physical Activity

Doctors often encourage people with depression to take part in physical activity to prevent the adverse physical health effects of inactivity, such as cardiovascular disease. Even reading inspirational books about life also leads to improve mental health for them.

Physical activity is an effective treatment for depression. So physically active yoga may play a valuable role. There is a range of different types of yoga, but the practice typically combines physical movement, breathing exercises, meditation, and mindfulness.

In a latest research published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine recommends a regular yoga practice surely an important factor to maintain and improve your mental health and brings down a lot of depression issues. Depression is the leading cause of disability worldwide.

According to an article in the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, it is “one of the most profound human problems currently facing the global health care system.” The main message is that yoga can be a helpful part of treatment, as it can have a significant effect on mental health.

Postural Effort

Yoga is unique as it combines Asanas and postural effort. It provides emphasis on observing your thoughts and bodily sensations with an attitude of non-judgment and acceptance. That can be beneficial for anybody. yoga has the main effect on stress by providing benefits related to greater wellness, such as pain management and better sleep.

Another recent study in the International Journal of Preventive Medicine initiates in a group of 52 women after 12 sessions of a regular yoga practice that anxiety, depression, and stress was lowered significantly.

Other studies have noted thatSuryanamaskar (Sun Salutations) and other continuously linked poses increase the heart rate, making yoga aerobically challenging. And many yoga poses—particularly standing poses, balancing poses, and inversions—build quite a bit of strength because they require sustained isometric contractions of many large and small muscles.

People experiencing depressive symptoms from other mental health disorders may benefit from doing physically active yoga. Many times we found that people with some issues with mental health diagnoses who regularly engage in physically active yoga are likely to have fewer depressive symptoms and experience a boost in mental health than those who practice less often or engage in other forms of intervention.

Conclusion

Finally, yoga harmonies you into your body and helps to take care of your mental health and mental coordinate your actions. When you bring your breath, your awareness, and your physical body into harmony, you allow your body to work at its maximum mental fitness capacity.

Yoga session is merely a laboratory for how to bring harmony in mental health with the body in every activity outside of yoga. This improved physical wellness and fluidity enhance not just the physical well-being but also boost your mental health by infiltrating all levels of our being.

References

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6515727/
https://www.mentalhealth.org.uk/
https://www.yogaindailylife.org/practice-yoga/overview-yoga/system-pillars/hatha-yoga-kriyas
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3193654/
https://www.brightquest.com/blog/can-anxiety-lead-to-psychosis-treating-psychotic-disorders-vs-anxiety-
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18235195/
https://www.quora.com/What-are-best-yoga-asanas-for-staying-active-all-day-long

Author: AC