Improve Energy With Yoga
Yoga is a powerful tool to improve your energy levels. It can help you to stay alert throughout the day, tackle fatigue and avoid any health issues.
Practicing yoga helps boost your ‘prana’ or life force energy by removing blockages along the spinal cord and smoothening the flow of energy in the body. It also improves your flexibility and balance.
1. Breathing Exercises
Breathing exercises are an excellent way to improve energy, because they help your body and mind relax. They also have a positive effect on the immune system and can lower your stress levels.
When you inhale, your diaphragm contracts and expands your lungs, drawing air into your rib cage. This allows more oxygen to reach your cells and muscles, increasing your energy.
Another great breathing exercise is the “bellows breath,” also known as the “bhastrika.” This is traditionally used in yoga to boost your “life force” and clear your mind.
The exercise is best practiced with a trained yoga teacher, but you can start by trying it on your own.
This simple breath exercise, which involves pressing your first fingers on the tragus cartilage that partially covers your ear canal as you inhale, can be extremely calming and is easy to do on the go. It is especially useful for those who are prone to anxiety, as it can help you calm down and focus your mind during stressful situations or when you need to get out of a tight spot.
2. Strengthening Exercises
Practicing yoga is great for overall health, but it can also be helpful when you want to improve energy levels. Studies show that yoga can boost energy, especially in people who feel fatigued (Bower et al., 2012).
Another benefit of practicing yoga is that it increases awareness of how your body works and moves. This can help you avoid injury and ensure you’re doing exercises properly, Courtney says.
The right poses can also help you build strength in your core, hips, and pelvis, she adds. This is especially helpful if you’re older, since it can help you balance better.
Performing these simple strength-building exercises at home is a great way to build a strong foundation for your yoga practice, Kline says. They’re also good for reducing back pain. Start with easy versions of these exercises and work up to more challenging versions as you increase your strength.
3. Flexibility Exercises
Flexibility exercises can improve your energy by reducing joint and muscle stiffness. They also reduce stress, which in turn helps improve your mood.
Stretching is an essential part of any fitness routine. It’s one of the three most important components, along with cardiovascular endurance and muscle strength.
But many people neglect flexibility training because they think it’s unnecessary or takes too much time, especially when there are plenty of other things to do. And they often don’t realize that flexibility can also increase your energy levels.
If you want to improve your flexibility, consider taking yoga classes or doing yoga poses at home. Hatha, Vinyasa, and Yin styles are all great options. Yin yoga is great for stretching deeper tissues such as fascia, joints and tendons. It may not be as dynamic as Vinyasa flow but it can be held for longer periods of time. Yin yoga also helps improve your mental focus and breathing.
4. Relaxation Exercises
If you feel like your energy is flagging, try one or more of these relaxation exercises to ease the strain on your body. These can be done anywhere, anytime, and are particularly effective if they’re regularly repeated.
Progressive muscle relaxation is a great way to combat the tension that can arise as a result of anxiety or stress. It involves tensing and relaxing muscles gradually to train your body to recognize tension and relaxation, which can help you manage it better in the future.
Another type of relaxation exercise is guided imagery. This technique allows you to create mental images and sensations, such as the smell of a room or the sound of crashing waves. These techniques can also be used during a yoga practice, to help you relax in the middle of a pose. They can be very helpful at night, when many people struggle to fall asleep, because they help you calm your mind and prepare your body for sleep.
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