10 ways that yoga changed my life, and can change yours too!

1. Stress Relief

Yoga minimises the physical effects of stress on the your body. By encouraging relaxation, yoga will help lower the levels of the stress hormone cortisol in your body. Related benefits also include the lowering of blood pressure and heart rate, improving the process of digestion and boosting the immune system. Yoga is also known for easing symptoms of conditions such as anxiety, depression, fatigue, asthma and insomnia.

1. Pain Relief

Yoga is known to ease pain. Research shows that practicing yoga postures, meditation or a combination of the two, will reduce pain for people with conditions such as cancer, multiple sclerosis, auto-immune diseases. As well as arthritis, back and neck pain, and other chronic conditions. In some cases its said that even emotional pain can be eased through the practice of yoga.

1. Better Breathing

When training in Yoga you are taught to take much slower, deeper breaths than you usually would to help improve lung function, trigger the body’s relaxation response and increase the amount of oxygen available to you.

4.Flexibility

The improvements of flexibility and mobility are vast when training in yoga reducing aches and pains throughout the body. For most, I agree that touching your toes is pretty simple but I promise you this isn’t the case for us all. Many people enter their first yoga class as stiff as a board and unable to reach their toes. Gradually this changes as they start to use the correct muscles. Over time, ligaments, tendons and muscles lengthen, increasing elasticity, making such a task more possible. Yoga also helps to improve body alignment resulting in better overall posture and helping relieve those creaky backs, necks and joints.

5.Increased strength

We all like to be strong, don’t we? Well with yoga comes greater strength quite literally from head to toe. What’s better is that whilst getting stronger your muscles are also getting more flexible and looser which cant be said for most strength increasing exercises.

1. Weight Management

Yoga (Even the less vigorous kind) can aid weight control efforts by reducing the cortisol levels whilst kicking calories and stress out of the body. Yoga makes us feel good and as a result encourages healthy eating habits and provides a heightened sense of well-being and self-esteem.

7.Improved circulation

Yoga helps to improve circulation and as a result of the various poses it more efficiently moves oxygenated blood to your body’s cells.

8.Cardio Conditioning

Any yoga, even the gentle kind will provide cardiovascular benefits by lowering your heart rate when resting, increasing endurance and improving the way you take in oxygen during a workout.

9.Focus on the current

Yoga helps you focus on the current. It helps you become more aware and help create health in both your mind and body. Believe it or not yoga will help your concentration, coordination, memory and reaction time.

10,Inner peace

Many people see yoga as meditation and they’d be correct to some degree. The meditative aspects of yoga help many to reach a deeper, more spiritual place in their lives. Don’t get me wrong, this part isn’t for everyone but if you’re open to it then this really can become an essential part of your everyday life.