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Have you ever witnessed a friend, a family member, or a colleague at work who creates suffering or patterns of suffering for himself? If yes then there is exquisite news for them. We are not actually stuck in this carousel of suffering. We already know what the solution is, but, our egos are too strong to permit us to act on it. The solution to eradicate our endless anguishes is Yoga. Yoga is a Sanskrit word and in Sanskrit “YUJ” which means unite and integrate, and it has a very long history. It was started in the sub-continent some 5000 years ago and to this day it is still practiced throughout the world. Yoga is not just a physical exercise as per to the popular belief, it is an art— an art of living happily. Yoga has been studied and …show more content…
Yoga and meditation have become much more effective in helping people deal with stress and anxiety to make their life comfortable and serene. In modern day, people from all over the world are becoming increasingly prone to the worldly displeasure and sadness. Yoga and meditation have the answers to such key problems. Meditation and yoga makes the human body prepares for the unexpected possibilities which in turn make the body easily tide over to the problems that show up suddenly in this modern age. Stress is inevitable in such times and so spending an hour everyday on yoga will only help a person deal with unfavorable circumstances. The Dalai Lama explained in his book The Art of Happiness that “This is happening because we are so habituated to understanding our mind in terms of external objects; we tend to look at the world through our concepts, images and so on” (314). Author defines this that as humans we are always under the influence of our daily happenings and it creates mental disturbances, and impaired quality of life. Dalai Lama said “I should warn that in this type of meditation, since there is no specific object to focus on, there is a danger of falling asleep”(314). Author defines the benefits of meditation that if we do meditation with true spirit we can get peace and comfort of mind and spend better life. It is a way of calming our mind amidst our everyday problems, and a calm mind is free of stress, depression, tension etc. Hence, making yoga a way of life will help discover that inner peace and happiness that everyone has been searching
Yoga, as a way to achieve higher self-awareness, was around as early as 200 B.C. in India and has been gradually growing in popularity in the western world over the past four decades. Traditional styles of yoga, including Hatha yoga, which consists of thousands of poses, have long been studied as an effective form of complimentary or alternative medicine (CAM).
Yoga is a discipline with a scientific background that was developed over 2000 years ago. In this system of self-development the restless mind is calmed and energy is placed into constructive channels. It is not a religion as some people may be led to believe. It is a philosophy of life. The lessons learned are just as relevant today as they were when they were first created, still keeping the main principle that before you can train your mind to reach a higher consciousness you must first discipline your body. Yoga's popularity is largely due to its wide range of benefits, including therapeutic effects, muscle toning, energy increasing and concentration of the mind.
Meditation is an important psychological practice that protects the brain against aging as well as enhancing an individual’s ability to learn new things. This practice achieves this through sharpening focus, lessening stress, lowering blood pressure, and relieving chronic pain. Generally, it helps a person to experience greater calm, connect with deepest feelings, and challenges tendencies of self-judgment. Consequently, meditation leads to open doors for actual and accessible happiness for an individual. According to Salzberg (2011), meditation is basically training an individual’s attention in order to become more aware of inner workings and external incidents (p.7). After becoming more aware of inner workings and external incidents, a person can choose his/her actions towards things that are visible. While each global religion incorporates some kind of thoughtful exercise, meditation in today’s world is usually practiced separately from any belief system.
Yoga has been practiced for thousands of years, throughout many cultures to help with the balance of physical and mental well-being. Throughout the years yoga has also been incorporated with many healings, whether with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression, or many other things that cause us mental and physical pain. However, recently yoga has been intertwined with cancer patients who have just been diagnosed, are currently going through the treatments, and for the miraculous people who have survived this destructive disease.
In Eastern cultures, meditation has been practiced for over two thousand years. Through this training a culture has developed in which an individual is empowered to engaged in preventative behaviors, which reduce stress and morbidity, resulting in a general state of wellbeing, with stability and mental peace in the face of everyday challenges (Richardson and Lutz, 2008). Over the last half-century, the western-scientific community has begun to evaluate the efficacy of the eastern methods of meditation. In the modern western world there is an over abundance of stress, pressure and over stimulation. These conditions often result in stress-related morbidity, high levels of anxiety and mental illnesses. This cause and effect relationship is well established, and typically emphasis is placed on symptom control and less on preventative behavior modification. There are clinically documented see table 1, meditation practices that can be taught over a short period of time to an individual which have been shown to have positive results. Meditation can be used preventatively in supporting immune function and during illness as a method to aid healing and wellbeing for nominal costs. This paper will make an literary examination of a variety of studies of which examine the role of meditation training in regards to promoting immune function in athletes, recovering cancer patients, in addition to reducing stress and promoting well being in business professionals, cancer patients and seasoned meditation practitioners.
Over twenty-five hundred years ago, Buddha Guatama practiced meditation and came to what is known as “The Four Noble Truth,” an important principle in Buddhism (Elder, 2010). This principle informs the reader of what suffering is and how affect is. This is a great example of how valuable meditation is- on the very first session ever recorded, the awareness that came from it would later be the foundation of a new religion. This proves how powerful meditation can be. Furthermore, some form of meditation can be found in various religions. Although the styles, techniques, and ideology behind the meditation can vary per religion, personal transformation is the key goal (Modi, Singh, 2012). Today, in Western society, mindful meditation (a form of meditation) has grown in popularity, used for relaxation and to help treat those who suffer from mental illness’ and mood disorders. Viewed as alternative medicine for the mind and soul, it is beneficial for our emotional and mental
OK. So you’ve heard, that meditation is beneficial for you, maybe you’ve read lists about the advantages of meditation. A ton of different kind of meditations are on-line, and you found several resources, articles, blog posts about the theme to select from. These articles state, that the meditation has countless benefits, which are also proven by scientific research. You can believe them, since eminent scientists carried out extensive research on this subject. And they suggest, you should try them, and of course you should practice it each day. Every day - or you won’t have those benefits.
Anxiety impacts approximately 25% of 13-18 at some point (Merikangas et al., n.d.). Anxiety that no longer signals danger can become pathological when it is excessive and persistent (Upadhyay, 2016). According to Upadhyay (2016), this type of pathological worry known as anxiety is a major component of an unhealthy lifestyle. Excessive worry is an indicator of anxiety and it is believed that yoga is effective due to its emphasis on focusing on the present moment rather than focusing on the past or future (Khalsa et al., 2011). Yoga outside of psychotherapy can improve emotional regulation and mental health functioning in youth. Participants obtained skills to breathe and use movement to calm down and learned to pay better attention to their thoughts, body, and feelings (Beltran, et al., 2016). Another study conducted by Upadhyay (2016) found that after a 12-week yoga program adolescents saw a decrease in anxiety scores on Becks Anxiety Inventory and reported a decrease in tension, depression, and anger. Another unique form of therapy that is utilized for anxiety is Yoga-Enhanced Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (Y-BT) (Khalsa, et al., 2011). Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) is a theory used in a clinical setting that targets maladaptive thought patterns to seek behavioral change. Y-CBT uses this therapeutic process and also incorporate yoga during the process. This is because CBT trains the individual to identify and replace maladaptive thoughts and yoga and meditation often reduce the tendency for the thoughts to happen in general. The study utilizing Y-CBT saw a significant improvement in anxiety levels and a significant decrease in symptoms of comorbid depression and panic in participants diagnosed with ...
Everyday society assumes yoga is just a physical health practice that will make people substantially fit. Social media is making people believe that Yoga is mostly good for exercising in a social, trendy fashion environment. What society does not know is Yoga plays a huge role in emotional hygiene, more so than physical health, Yoga develops a healthy emotional stability for its participants that lead to a healthy lifestyle. Emotionally, Yoga can develop a healthy emotional lifestyle for its participants while leaving a person with more positivity, determination and strength in the human mind.
In a world full of skepticism towards the alternative, Yoga has created a place of growing belief for itself. As Timothy McCall, M.D. states in his book Yoga As Medicine: The Yogic Prescription for Health & Healing: A Yoga Journal Book:
The benefits of yoga are endless. It affects the human mind and body in a variety of ways. Roughly 15 million Americans practice yoga, annually there is an expected increase of twenty percent in participants in the United States ("Yoga Statistics"). While Yoga is often thought of as a practice that involves circus-like poses and seemingly impossible flexibility, it is not. Even bedridden patients can gain benefit from imagining themselves going through the poses and practicing breathing techniques that are appropriate to them (Dickenson 24-25).
They noticed that the conditions related to their muscular system, respiratory system, nervous system, and the digestive system improved notably. It has been studied and suggested that regular practice of Yoga increases the brain gamma-Aminobutyric acid levels which helps in regulating the excitability of the nervous system and muscle tone as well. This helps in reducing anxiety and improving mood functions, letting people lead much more emotionally balanced lives. Apart from the abovementioned advantages, yoga also helps in keeping cardiovascular diseases in check. The three principles of yoga: asana (exercise), pranayama (breathing), and drishti (meditation) help in monitoring heart activities and keeping it functioning healthily. It does so by reducing blood pressure, speeding up recovery related to heart failures or cardiac arrests, and lower other cardiovascular risk factors that some people might have genetically imbibed in them. Similarly, it helps people with chronic back aches. Regular practice of yoga can bring relief over a period of time, than medications alone. Pain medications for back ache or spine-related spasms generally have dangerous side effects such as gastric problems, nausea, and the relief they provide last for a very short period of time. Yoga on the other hand gives back pain sufferers a much necessary relief through stretching exercises and also by meditating which plays a major role in alleviating any kind of
I won’t ask who has gained this weight, but by a raise of hands, how many of you have thought to yourself, “Are my jeans getting tighter?”
Meditation is good, safe and cost-effective. Actually its free. The only real expense youll have is really a meditation pad, which is not especially necessary-a minimum of from my experience. Meditation has existed for five,000 years, and it was initially a non secular element of yoga.
The goal of this study was to identify the ways in which engaging in yoga practices would alter psychological well being, and allow people to engage more fully in their lives and flourish in health and happiness. The pre and post test set up of this study allowed the researchers to see the ways in which students had been affected by their participation in the yoga teacher training. Yoga training students were engaged in a four week program. They were administered tests and the beginning of the study, prior to engaging in the program, at the end of the program, after completion, and then again at a 3 month follow up. Multiple factors were assessed, however the significant and important ones which relate directly to our understanding of healthy, happiness and wellness and the course content are extremely