Seniors and Disability Yoga Exercises and Information

Introduction

Yoga includes physical exercise, but it is also a lifestyle practice for which exercise is just one component. Training your mind, body, and breath, as well as connecting with your spirituality, are the main goals of the yoga lifestyle.

Main Document

Yoga is defined as a physical, mental, and spiritual practice or discipline that denotes a variety of schools, practices, and goals in Hinduism, Buddhism (including Vajrayana and Tibetan Buddhism) and Jainism, the best-known being Hatha yoga and Raja yoga. The objective of Yoga is Moksha (liberation) though the exact definition of what form this takes depends on the philosophical or theological system with which it is conjugated.

Yoga Benefits

It can improve flexibility, strength, balance, and stamina. In addition, many people who practice yoga say that it reduces anxiety and stress, improves mental clarity, and even helps them sleep better.

Although there are different schools of traditional yoga (i.e., Bhakti Yoga, Karma Yoga, Patanjali's Ashtanga Yoga, Jnana Yoga, Kundalini Yoga, Swara Yoga, Raja Yoga, Kriya Yoga, and Mantra Yoga), Hatha Yoga is the most popular form practiced in the West.

Yoga can be beneficial for individuals with disabilities or chronic health conditions through both the physical postures and breath-work. Each pose can be modified or adapted to meet the needs of the student. Yoga Asana can be performed while seated in a chair or wheelchair. In a yoga class for individuals with disabilities, yoga Asana are modified or adapted, and may be performed with the instructor's active assistance as needed.

Yoga can lay claims to being one of the world's best exercise routines. Practicing yoga can keep you fit, nimble and youthful. Yoga itself is a great strength building form of exercise. It is also good for maintaining flexibility to your body. Given the nature of yoga, however, it can often be difficult to obtain the raised heart rate that is necessary to actually burn calories and melt away fat. You don't have to practice yoga to lose weight. However, yoga can facilitate the weight loss in many aspects. In fact, if you love yoga and want to practice it - it might be the only thing you need to lose weight.

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Different Techniques

The different yoga techniques that are available are all dependent on what you want to achieve with Yoga.

• Increased Flexibility: Yoga techniques, if done correctly and done regularly, can lead to increased flexibility of your body. The techniques are used to make your body more flexible to allow you to achieve what you are looking for.
• Yoga and Meditation: These 2 disciplines used with each other can provide you with an inner healing. Both these techniques are perfect to release stress, anxiety and also to allow you to relax. Both these techniques are difficult to master together, but there are courses out there that can help with that.
• Massaging of all body parts: With differing Yoga techniques, you can massage all of your body parts. Yoga is really the only technique used that will reach your internal organs and allow them to get more benefit.
• Excellent toning of muscles: Many people use yoga techniques to tone up their muscles. Numerous body builders and athletes use these techniques along with their daily routine to tone the muscles.
• Increased Lubrication of all joints, ligaments, and tendons: This helps tremendously as all joints, tendons, and ligaments work at a higher level if they are provided with more lubrication. Think about your car. Do you think it would run smoothly without any oil? Well, the body is the same, it needs lubrication to work at an optimum level.

Yoga for Kids

The power of yoga to improve the quality of life for our children is starting to dawn on parents throughout the western world. Although yoga has been popular with adults for many years, only recently have kids yoga classes started to make their presence felt. Children's yoga can increase self-awareness, build self-esteem and strengthen young bodies. It can help coordinate brain functions, balance right and left brain and aid relaxation. Yoga has also been proven to improve concentration, so around exam time a course of children's yoga sessions could make all the difference. Anxious children also see the benefit, so again, a children's yoga course around stressful times of the year could have a significant positive impact.