Lock down has been declared in almost every state. The majority of the fortunate ones were ready by stocking up food, groceries, and medications. Most of us were prepared to handle the next few weeks. As I work in a corporate, I used to attend calls and meetings throughout the day. In the lockdown, I realized that my mind and body are going to have a turn to the worse in the upcoming few days.
Also swamped with housework, my job, and my kids, it was really difficult to manage it all. I was becoming frustrated about the ongoing situation. The only light at the end of the tunnel was that of many of my friends, who suggested that I should do Yoga. I started my yoga routine (I am a yoga teacher) and as we all know Yoga helps to reduce anxiety.
Since the 1970s, meditation and other stress-reduction techniques have been studied as possible treatments for depression and nervousness. One such practice is yoga. It has received much less attention in the medical literature, even though it has become more and more popular in recent decades. One national survey estimated, as an instance, that roughly 7.5% of U.S. adults had tried yoga at least once, and that almost 4 % practiced yoga in the preceding year.
You can practise yoga from gentle and accommodating to strenuous and hard; the alternative of style will be based on physical ability and personal taste. Hatha yoga, the most common type of yoga practiced in the USA, combines three components: physical poses, called asanas; controlled breathing practiced in conjunction with asanas; and a short period of deep relaxation or meditation.
I did not wish to perform any high-intensity workout in the event I pulled a muscle or twisted a joint (no physiotherapist around the corner!). I created videos of simple asanas (Yoga Poses) which can be done in the living room or passage area or simply outside the apartment, another one was just standing in one place, inside the confines of restricted distance one can get to perform a complete body workout. By doing this, I got these benefits mentioned below:
Natural pressure relief
Yoga practices can decrease the effect of exaggerated stress responses and may be helpful for both anxiety and depression. In my case, yoga acted like other self-soothing methods, like meditation, relaxation, exercise, or even socializing with friends.
By reducing perceived anxiety and nervousness, yoga seems to modulate stress response systems. This, in turn, decreases physiological stimulation — for example, reducing the heart rate, lowering blood pressure, and easing respiration. There is also evidence that yoga practices help boost heart rate variability, an indicator of the body’s ability to respond to pressure more flexibly.
Stress reaction
I read about a small study conducted at the University of Utah that provided some insight into the impact of yoga on the stress response by taking a look at the participants’ responses to pain. The researchers noted that people who have a badly controlled response to stress can also be more sensitive to pain.
When the three groups have been subjected to more or less debilitating thumbnail pressure, the participants together with fibromyalgia — as anticipated — sensed pain at reduced pressure levels compared with the other subjects. Functional MRIs revealed they also had the greatest activity in regions of the brain associated with the pain response. By comparison, the yoga practitioners had maximum pain tolerance and lowest pain-related brain activity during the MRI. The study underscores the value of techniques, such as yoga, that could help a person regulate their stress and, therefore, pain reactions.
But during the lockdown many people might suffer from anxiety, or stress, and yoga might be the best way to better manage it. Indeed, the scientific study of yoga demonstrates mental and physical health are not just closely intertwined but are essentially equivalent. So start practising yoga today and if you are a beginner then check out beginners guide from Nobe Yoga in Miami Beach.
