•Cardiovascular Endurance
Yoga plays an important role in lowering the heart rate and therefore improving the level of oxygenation in the human body.
An idyllic combination of lowered heart rate and improved oxygenation results in higher cardiovascular endurance.
•Respiratory – Improved Breathing
Lower respiratory rate is accomplished if the lungs are working to their best efficiency. This is in particular achieved through regular exercising of yoga and better fitness.
Yoga includes breathing practices known as pranayama, which can be effective for reducing our stress response, improving lung function, and encouraging relaxation.
Many pranayamas emphasize slowing down and deepening the breath, which activates the body’s parasympathetic system, or relaxation response.
One thing that I noticed with yoga was that when I changed my pattern of breathing, it significantly affected my body’s experience and its response to stress. This may be one of the most profound lessons I learned from yoga practice.
•Stress Relief
I managed to reduce the physical effects of stress on my body by practicing yoga. When the body responds to stress through a fight-or-flight response, it releases Cortisol – the stress hormone from the adrenal glands.
People measure stress response through Cortisol on most occasions. Yoga practice reduces the levels of Cortisol. Also, most yoga classes end with savasana, a relaxation pose, which further reduces the experience of stress.
•Pain Relief
Yoga can ease pain. Studies have shown that practicing yoga asanas (postures), meditation, or a combination of the two, reduced pain for people with conditions such as cancer, multiple sclerosis, autoimmune diseases and hypertension as well as arthritis, back and neck pain and other chronic conditions.
•Flexibility
Yoga can improve flexibility and mobility and increase range of motion. Over time, the ligaments, tendons, and muscles lengthen, increasing elasticity.
•Increased Strength
Yoga asanas use every muscle in the body, increasing strength literally from head to toe. Regular yoga practice can also relieve muscular tension throughout the whole body.
•Weight Loss
While most of the evidence for the effects of yoga on weight loss is anecdotal or experiential, yoga teachers, students, and practitioners across the country find that yoga helps to support weight loss.
Many teachers specialize in yoga programs to promote weight management, and find that even gentle yoga practices help support weight loss. People don’t have to practice the most vigorous forms of yoga to lose weight. Yoga encourages development of a positive self-image with more attention paid to nutrition and the body as a whole.
•Cardiovascular Conditioning
Even gentle yoga practice can provide cardiovascular benefits by lowering resting heart rate, increasing endurance, and improving oxygen uptake during exercise.
•Increased Awareness
Yoga connects us with the present moment. I can tell you from personal experience that the more I practiced, the more aware I became of my surroundings and the world around me. Yoga helped me achieve improved concentration, coordination, reaction time, and memory.
•Inner Peace
I can tell you that the meditative effects of a consistent yoga practice helped me cultivate inner peace and calm.
Common Yoga Practices
Yoga practice requires you to take out half an hour each day for it. For a successful yoga experience, it’s important that you’re able to enjoy it, and to truly enjoy this experience you need to know your limits.
Knowing your limit is important, because if you push too hard, it’s highly likely that you won’t enjoy the activity. Also, you could hurt yourself by pushing too hard. Once you’ve established this fact in your mind, you’re all set to take advantage of yoga practice.
Most successful people around the world and I practice some of the following on day-to-day basis:
Recommended Videos and Instructions
http://www.yogaoutlet.com/guides
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCFKE7WVJfvaHW5q283SxchA
http://www.abc-of-yoga.com/yogapractice/sunsalutation.asp
One: Yoga Exercise – Savasana (Corpse Pose)
You may call the Corpse Yoga Pose as a classic relaxation Yoga Pose, practiced before or in between Asanas as well as a final relaxation. While it looks deceptively simple, it’s actually difficult to perform.
Shava means Corpse, and Asana means Pose.
The asana is pronounced as Shuh-vah-sana. It gets its name from the reclining posture of a dead body. It’s very simple and everyone can do this asana but needs lots of concentration on each part of the body.
It’s a position of rest and relaxation, which is usually practiced towards the end of a yoga session – a session that typically begins with activity and ends in rest. It can, however, be used at the beginning to calm the body before practice or in the middle of a sequence to rest. When used at the end of a yoga practice it’s usually followed by a seated meditation period to re-integrate the body-mind-spirit back into the world.
Steps to Do the Corpse Pose (Shavasana)
1.Lie flat on your back, like our sleeping pose, preferably without any props or cushions. Use small pillow below your neck if needed.
2.Let the arms and legs drop open, with the arms about 45 degrees from the side of your body. Keep your legs apart and let your feet and knees relax completely, toes facing to the sides and your palms open, facing upward. Make sure you’re warm and comfortable, and you may place blankets under or over your body if necessary. You may also place a bolster or blankets under the low back and/or knees to straighten your back.
3.Close your eyes, and take slow deep breaths through the nose. Allow your whole body to become soft and heavy, letting it relax into the floor. As the body relaxes, feel the whole body rising and falling with each breath.
4.Scan your entire body from the toes to fingers yips to the crown of the head, looking for tension, tightness and contracted muscles. Taking your attention to different body parts one by one, slowly relax your entire body. Consciously release and relax any areas that you find. You may rock or wiggle parts of your body from side to side to encourage further release.
5.Begin with bringing your awareness to the right foot, move on to the right knee. When you complete the first leg, move your attention on to the other leg, and so on, and slowly move upwards to your head, relaxing each part of the body. Release all control of the breath, the mind, and the body. Let your body move deeper and deeper into a state of total relaxation.
6.To release, slowly deepen the breath, wiggle the fingers and toes, reach the arms over your head and stretch the whole body. Keep breathing slowly, gently, and deeply and allow