Yoga can be a fun way to improve your physical, mental, and spiritual health. The few minutes of sitting mindfully on a mat bring so many positive changes in your life. Now that you are searching for yoga, we thought to give you a glimpse of how this is one of the best ways to improve your overall well-being.
Effective yoga practice is all about getting most of this physical activity and you can do so by mastering poses the right way. So now you know what yoga is all about, let’s get to discuss 9 ways yoga can improve your physical, mental, and spiritual health
1. Get Into the Mountain Pose
It is one of the basic yoga poses that is commonly practiced around the world. Importantly, it’s an easy stretch that brings so many health benefits. Let’s first discuss how you can get yourself in the mountain pose and then we’ll discuss how this is an effective way of improving your physical, mental and spiritual health.
Getting into mountain pose is easy as all you need is to stand straight on a flat platform like the floor or a yoga mat as most yogi’s love. Now, these are some actions you need to perform one after another to get most of this pose; Lift your toes, place them back on the floor, Pull up your kneecaps, inhale and lift from your waist, breathe and hold for 4 to 8 breaths, now exhale and drop the shoulders down, and finally repeat these steps without losing the balance for like 10 minutes and more.
So, why should you practice the mountain pose frequently? Essentially, this particular pose promotes calm along with aiding mindfulness, refining balancing skills, improving concentration, increasing awareness of the body, and encouraging better body alignment & posture. Plus, it also helps in toning the liver, spleen, kidneys, and abdominal region. Hence, pretty much everything you need for improved physical, mental, and spiritual health.
2. How Is Upward-Facing Dog Stretch Useful?
Well, not just useful but very useful indeed for your overall well being. Although this one is not that simple to master but with consistency and repetition, you can get most of this one too. Let’s first tell you how you can practice it and then we’ll discuss how you can perform it accurately.
Precision is what you need if you want to perform this pose effectively as you have to lift your head slightly, elongate the neck, place your hands straight and align them with your shoulders, charge your chest forward, and draw your belly in and up. Alongside, lift your knees from the floor, make your glutes relaxed, lift thighs away from the floor, and make the top of your feet firmly pressing into the floor. Maintain this balance for as long as you can.
Now, how is the upward-facing dog stretch useful? Because it helps in improving posture, stimulating abdominal organs, strengthening the spine, arm, and wrists, stretching the chest and lungs. Moreover, this pose relieves depression, fatigue, and increases lung capacity to relieve the symptoms of asthma.
3. What About the Downward-Facing Dog?
It May sound similar to the upward-facing dog but they both are different in many ways.
Let’s start with how you can get into this pose. You can start with getting in the conventional dog pose where you are down on your knees and your hands are on the exercise mat or the floor. Now, push yourself up from the abdomen in such a way that your hands and feet are intact and balanced in their original form. Stretch to the point you can and stay there for as long as you can.
Now we will go with discussing the benefits of this yoga pose in some detail. The first and the most important perk with this pose is that it helps in eradicating back muscles pain, then you can love this one for better digestion, and do not forget how effective it is to relieve depression, fatigue, and uneasiness. So, that’s why it is on no.3 in our 9 ways yoga can improve your physical, mental, and spiritual health.
Read: 9 Yoga Positions for Weight Loss
4. Heading Towards the Child’s Pose That Stretches the Lower Back
That’s one of the easiest yoga poses and hence you must have seen most of the people performing it everywhere. Nevertheless, it brings so many health and mental benefits and before we discuss them, let’s first teach you how you can get into it.
Start with sitting in Virasana position on the yoga mat and now slowly stretch your arms on the mat to the maximum you can without disturbing the balance of your back or waist. Stay in this position for as long as you can.
Although a very simple yoga pose, it has so many health, mental, and spiritual benefits as it helps in alleviating stress and anxiety, stretches hips, thighs, and ankles, and also stretches muscles, tendons, and ligaments in the knee.
5. Wall Pose It Is!
Wall pose can be your savior if you are one of the many who often face difficulty in falling asleep quickly at night. Since this one refreshes the body by making the blood flow in the opposite direction against the gravity that also revives the legs. Now to make you understand about other benefits of this pose, let’s first discuss how you can get into it.
Place your exercise mat closer to the wall, lay halfway on it, and slowly push your legs on the wall to the point you feel like sitting on it from the side angle. Stay there for as long as you can.
Let’s discuss this yoga pose’s benefits and apart from helping you fall asleep quickly, it improves digestion, restores tired feet, relieves swollen ankles, alleviates menstrual cramps, and more.
6. Time to Fly Like a Butterfly but on the Exercise Mat
Yes, this pose sounds cute but that could get difficult as you need to keep yourself balanced in it for long. And, it brings so many health benefits that we’ll discuss after teaching you how to practice this one effectively.
All you need here is to get yourself sitting with your legs spread to seem like the wings of a butterfly. Keep your back straight and wrap your hands around the feet so you can feel stretch in the back, arms, and shoulders.
And this one like others relieves stress, improves blood circulation, stimulates the prostate gland, and such others. That’s why it fits our list of 9 ways yoga can improve your physical, mental, and spiritual health.
7. It’s Time to Become a Corpse
Enough of trying some difficult yoga poses, let’s get to the easiest of them all and that’s what we call the yoga corpse pose. It’s similar to how its name indicates but don’t worry you’ll still be breathing.
All you need to do is to lay straight on the yoga mat and let go holding your legs straight so they free fall to either side. Similarly, let go of holding or pressurizing other parts of your body including your arms. Now breathe freely and stay mindful of the circumstances. Stay like this for 10 minutes and more.
The first and the most important advantage of this pose is that it relieves stress and anxiety, secondly, it removes back pain, regulates the blood circulation, improves cardiovascular health, and provides relief from the headache as well. So, becoming a corpse for a time being isn’t too bad, is it?
8. How About You Become a Boat?
The boat pose is what we want to discuss and it’s not among the easiest of yoga poses but it’s a very effective way of improving your physical, mental and spiritual health.
All you need for getting into this pose is to sit on the mat with your legs spread straight. Now bring them closer and try to lift both of them together to a height that looks like a boat. Just make sure to keep your back straight and maintain a good posture throughout the workout.
This one effectively Stretches hamstrings and quadriceps muscles, improves the alignment of the entire body, improves the balance of your body, and importantly, relieves stress and anxiety.
9. Let’s Talk About Our Last Yoga Pose and That Is the ‘Chair Pose’
Don’t take the name wrong as it doesn’t mean that you’ll have to sit peacefully on a chair for this pose. In fact, you need to become one here and stay like this for a while to get most of it. First, let’s learn how you can practice it, and then we’ll jump to the benefits that it brings.
Just as some other yoga poses, you need to stand tall on the mat, raise your hands straight towards the roof, and have to bring them closer. Now being in this state, make yourself sit in the air so it looks like you are sitting on the chair. Stay like this for as long as you can.
This pose in particular improves the strength of your legs, shoulders as well as upper back. Plus, you learn to embrace patience as well, since your thighs work very hard during the practice.
Conclusion
So, these are 9 ways we know yoga can improve your physical, mental & spiritual health. Since yoga is all about poses, therefore, we have focused on how you can perform them effectively to take most of them.
If you think we have missed including some information here, please make use of the comment box to let us know.