Life is Full of Stresses, Why Make Yoga Another Stressor in Your Life?

According to Newton’s 3rd law of motion, ‘for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction’. When I was a high school student I wasn’t so clear about the implication of this law. But after giving up dancing and regular work outs I started to realize the actual meaning of it. I generally fond of fast foods so it wasn’t so late, when I figured out that I put some extra weight and my body is not as toned as before.

Most often, to fulfill our apatite we lost our control over eating resulting unattractive figure with some funny and rude (most of the time) nicks. It’s like a gamble. At this point, exercise or yoga is the best options to choose (with proper diet of course) I guess. I had a feeling that yoga and exercise is same. But after doing some research I was shocked when I came to know that yoga was not exercise. This finding breathed new belief into my mind. It gave me an awareness of differences between yoga versus exercise, the yogasanam. Asanam is the name given to the postures by the yoga practitioners. The principle of the yoga is “Sthira Sukhamasanam” in a succinct way. It has three words; Sthira (stable), Sukham (pleasant), Asanam (posture). From this, we can interpret that yoga asanam should be stable and pleasant which in return thus gives us a stable and pleasant mind setup. Here’s the big difference between yoga and exercises. Doing yoga, we get internal changes while exercise brings changes that show externally

Practicing yoga in a steady and stable way energizes our body, mind and soul. It stimulates the parasympathetic nervous system which reduces the respiratory rate and metabolism (which is associated with speeding up the aging process), results slowing aging process and also slows down heart beat rate. On the other hand exercise stimulates the sympathetic response, which is a stress response in the body, as well as increasing metabolism. Exercise increases blood pressures whereas yoga helps to lower blood pressures. Not to mention that joints and muscles can experience more tension through jarring exercise and imbalances that occur from repetitive movements thus many people complete their exercise regime and exhausted. Yoga encourages practicing belly breath which leaves us feeling energized, relaxed and calm and also it increases the power of lunges and blood circulation system. The whole yoga concept stands upon the stress management theory.