Show Your Brain Some Love with Yoga & Meditation
March 22, 2020
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“Half an hour’s meditation every day is essential, except when you are busy. Then a full hour is needed.” - Saint Francis de Salles (erstwhile Bishop of Geneva).
Many global organizations dedicated to spreading awareness about the healing powers of yoga and meditation aim at doing just that: healing people through yoga and meditation. However, we’re nowadays too worked up in our own lives to give a damn about our health and well-being.
Perks of yoga and meditation
Yoga and meditation, when practiced together, can help you boost your brain's functionality to a great extent. Studies conducted by reputed universities reveal that there is an actual scientific basis for the claims that they can improve your brain's functionality and contribute positively towards your well-being. And you don’t need to go to an ashram to get these benefits, a short session of 15 minutes per day could do the trick.
Here are some of the ways in which your brain can benefit from meditation:
Increased attention span
Inattentiveness is something that millions of professionals suffer from all around the world. The most prominent benefit of combining yoga with mindfulness meditation is that it helps to increase your attention span.
These practices enhance your concentration, improving your cognitive skills and giving you a better quality of life through a more attentive approach.
Stress reduction
Going over a mundane routine every day and having to manage dozens of things at the same time leads to high-stress levels. This holds true especially for the urban working population in today’s fast-paced world.
That said, youngsters face similar problems too – with too many lectures to attend and so many assignments that need to be turned in, they feel too stressed with academic tasks at times. There’s no age to add yoga and meditation to your daily schedule!
Smart decision-making abilities
Giving your cognitive skills a brush-up, yoga and meditation could also help you make better decisions, be it in your professional or personal realm. The human brain has a unique quality that experts define as ‘neuroplasticity’. It is referred to the inherent quality of the human brain to be affected by and transformed through experience.
The benefits of yoga and meditation tap into this very quality as the brain adjusts to the new routine. With improved smartness and attention to detail, you will be able to make better decisions as your brain will be more relaxed and have a more rational outlook.
More compassion and empathy
Psychological research has revealed that the range and expression of human emotions are not entirely innate. They develop the experiences and our encounters as we proceed in our lives. While most of our feelings are usually a reflection of our personality, studies show that they can be modified through yoga and meditation.
This means that our beloved practice can increase our ability to feel compassionate. The portions that control emotion in our brains are triggered by mindful meditation and yoga practices. With a regularized routine, we can slowly walk towards a better self with increased empathy and compassion for our fellow beings.
Anti-degenerating effects
Another one of the long-term benefits that yoga and meditation offer is that of combating all of those signs of brain degeneration. Meditation helps to rejuvenate the grey cells and memory in the brain. This leads to the creation of a firewall protection against the degenerating diseases that tend to affect the human brain as we gradually age. such as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s.
Whether it is for only 30 minutes a day, keep some time aside for a yoga and/or meditation session every day. With too much stress and a super-fast lifestyle, it’s about time you took care of yourself.
How can you show your brain some love?
It is never too late to start and you can always do so by signing up for regular yoga lessons or finally signing up for that 200-hour yoga teacher training course you’ve wanted for a long time. Best done under expert supervision so you can become an expert too!
With increasing levels of stress and too many brain and neurological diseases affecting the young and old alike, it is time to bring in some changes in your lifestyle that help you start a healthier lifestyle.
Want to learn more about yoga and meditation? Sign up for a program to become a Kundalini Yoga Instructor!