What YOGA means to me...
Yoga is a vehicle for self change. It means so much more than poses and stretching. Recently I completed a 200 hour Yoga teacher training. I learned so much about healing and now have the tools I need to help myself and others.
Yoga brings inner peace, emotional stability, physical health, and heathy relationships. It teaches me to be a healthy example to those around me. The most impactful way to facilitate healing and neuroplasticity through yoga is to utilize a combination of breath work, postures, and meditation.
Yoga teaches us to practice presence. To stay in life and show up fully. Practicing Yoga with Presence gives us the ability to work on our physical body while balancing our nervous system. To practice yoga we must be present to for stability, growth and change. It forces us to get in our bodies and experience sensation. Yoga can help rewire our brains. It has helped me understand there are 3 secrets to being present without defending something, promoting something, or fearing something.
Science teaches us that the brain is constantly remodeling itself based on what we do, experience, and practice. Our brains neuroplasticity is the brains ability to change and adapt by growing new neural pathways.
Breathing is a direct link to a healthy mind-body connection. Breath work used in Yoga and meditation can help balance different hemispheres of the brain, bring us calmness and tranquility. Our breath work in yoga diffuses stress, and is a helpful tool to use during our practice but also in stressful situations. Our breath also helps us come back to the present moment.
Yoga aids us in balancing our Sympathetic and Parasympathetic Nervous system.
As the Sympathetic nervous system is essential to get tasks done, it leads from an emotional state that creates the flight or fight reactions in our bodies.. However, it is responsible for increased blood pressure, anxiety, and it leads to stress. If the SNS not balanced with the Parasympathetic Nervous System (PSNS) it can cause many health issues such as digestion problems, high blood pressure, immune and hormonal imbalances.
The Parasympathetic nervous system heals the body with relaxation. It stimulates the hormones to release and facilitate relaxing muscles, slowing the heart rate, aiding our digestion ad preparing the body for rest. The PNS can mitigate the SNS with mindful breath work to balance our physiological, energetic, emotional, and mental systems. When the two stems work together it brings the body to optimal engagement.
The physical body can be healthy and strong through Yoga.
Yoga poses help our physical bodes to keep the tissue that surrounds our cells and muscles known as fascia open to receiving water and collagen and preventing adhesions. Yoga movement opens areas that are stuck to receive nutrients to stay healthy and free of pain and injury. Movement is essential to heal pain.
Yoga keeps our bodies optimal, healthy, strong, and aligned. As we age yoga aids our bodies in staying young and with mobility and optimal health.
Our bodies can change with yoga’s assistance and heal itself.
Yoga’s ethical practices and guidelines are essential in living skillfully. Yoga teaches us to grow through mental and physical discomfort that we can practice in our daily lives. Using our thought in a positive way and our bodies through movement are the tools we need for handling stress and reactions.
* As we learn to stop fighting life we live skillfully. – The Yamas and Niyamas.
I’ve learned through teaching to lead and learn about personality types, and come from a place of understanding and empathy.
Yoga teaches us to be grateful for what our bodies can do, and working toward something creates motivation to achieve what our bodies will do in time with perseverance and practice. Repetitive actions create change in where you place your energy and focus.
Mediation in yoga heals your mental, emotional and physical being.
While meditating you know where your headed, instead of what your running away from. It helps generate kindness to yourself and others. Your mediation practice helps you land and be present in your own body.
Meditation trains your mind to stay in life, and relax all thoughts. It helps you to balance in your mind, body and heart. It teaches us to wake up to our senses, release anxiety, give our minds a break from thinking, while raising awareness we need to be present. The benefits to mediation are many that can help us live a better quality of life. Some of these include stress relief, inflammation, adrenal fatigue, PTSD, IBS, emotional health, anxiety, depression, focus and attention span, insomnia, memory loss, and aging.
This practice we call YOGA is so much more than poses. It has brought healing to my aching body, and calmness to my emotions, allowing me to be present to nurture my relationships and be more spiritually open and has drawn me closer to my faith. I am forever grateful for me teachers Mandy Roberts and Shari Fox of FORM YOGA and SOUL NOURISH RETREATS.
The light in me sees the light in you (Namaste)..
Location:Tulum with Soul Nourish Retreats Photo by: Thu Tran www.2tphoto.com