Balance Your Home and Work Life With Yoga
With stressful working environments and hectic schedules, many people struggle with the negative impact of their busy work lives. Those who have difficulty managing their personal and work lives in balance with each other are increasingly turning to yoga exercises. Yoga helps them achieve peace of mind and helps them reach that ideal work-life balance.
Interest in this traditional practice has been piqued by the mind-body connection, and studies reveal that it can lower stress levels and blood pressure, enhance on-the-job performance, and even slow the aging process.
Although the focus on yoga may be different depending on the environment, its basic premise is to relax the body while keeping the mind focused and alert. For example, when you do yoga, you focus on body movement, breath, sound or even an object. If your thoughts turn to other things, as they probably will, just return your mind to your object of focus and continue on.
The ancient practice of yoga garnered renewed interest in the 1960s, when those interested in consciousness began to follow its practices. But after this, yoga started to decline in popularity. It may have been because yoga is not quite like other types of exercise.
For instance, to get all the benefits, patience is critical. The results are slow but steady. This is in sharp contrast to the fast and frantic pace of aerobics.
Lots of people hurry out to exercise energetically during their lunch break, and then dash back to their workplace. No doubt there are physical benefits, but nevertheless it increases the pressure of an already busy life. Yoga, by contrast, offers a less competitive and stressful way to work out, while supporting and even causing an overall feeling of simply “being.”
One of the major reasons yoga is making a comeback is because it can be so healing as an activity. The intense focus on fitness created by workout routines such as weight lifting, running and aerobics has led to an increase in injury, particularly strained knees and back and neck pain.
These days, it’s not uncommon for the mainstream medical profession, including orthopedic surgeons, neurologists and chiropractors, to recommend yoga to their patients.
In fact, it’s moving to the mainstream increasingly. Many business and hospitals are now offering yoga classes; books on yoga are on the bestseller list, and internet discussion groups on the topic abound.
Interestingly, even the U.S. Army has demonstrated its interest in yoga. It has requested that the National Academy of Sciences research New Age practices like meditation to discover if they can improve the performance of soldiers.
In addition, yoga has become a pursuit for some runners, weight trainers or aerobic dancers who don’t find peace in their exercise regimes and want the de-stressing aspects of yoga to be part of their workouts.
Around 60 to 90 percent of visits to the doctor in the U.S. are tied to stress. Mind-body approaches offer cost-effective and safe treatments for this ailment that don’t involve drugs or surgery. Among people who use these techniques, 34% of patients who are infertile get pregnant within six months, while 70% of those who have trouble sleeping or even have medically defined insomnia become regular sleepers. In addition, the numbers of those suffering from pain and making regular doctor visits because of it go down by 36%.
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