How yoga can improve your spiritual health? Helpful links included.
When most guys think about yoga they picture people sitting on a mat stretching. Some guys view yoga as not intense, womanly, and not having any benefit to your spirit.
What if I told you yoga is intense, is something beneficial for both sexes, and has a string benefit to your spiritual health.
In this blog I will discuss some of the spiritual benefits of yoga. I am not saying that I am an expert in yoga. To be honest I haven’t attempted one yoga exercise in my life. I am going to do the research and incorporate yoga into my journey for better spiritual health.
WHAT IS YOGA??
We must first begin with what is yoga. Yoga began in India with a sage. Yoga consists of 8 limbs: restraints, observances, postures, breathing, withdrawal of senses, concentration, meditation, and absorption. Most people who do yoga only focus on postures (Asana). People forget that the postures of yoga were designed to strengthen the body and purify the mind to prepare for meditation. When you only practice the postures of yoga your only getting 1/8th of the power of yoga.
Hatha yoga is a type of yoga that has certain postures that aim to align your spine. When your spine is aligned your energy flows freely. Hatha yoga also helps balance the forces within our body. When our forces are aligned are spirit is balanced.
Some people chant mantras (think the word “OM”). The reason this is done doing MEDITATION and yoga is because the universe is in constant motion. Chanting om creates vibration within our body which aligns our spirit to the rest of the universe.
HOW DOES YOGA BENEFIT ME SPIRITUALLY??
As we stated earlier yoga is a balance of 8 limbs. Some of these limbs are strongly connected to your spirit. Concentration, meditation, and withdrawal of senses all strengthen your Spirit.
When someone concentrates it focuses there spirit on one thing. As people we some times live a hectic life. We never slow down and focus on one thing. Yoga allows us to take that time and concentrate on our postures and breathing.
Meditation has tremendous benefits on the spirit. I discussed many benefits of meditation in this article. I also discussed how to get started meditating for beginners.
CLICK HERE.
Withdrawal of senses plays a role in concentrating. When we withdraw our senses we are eliminating distraction. We are only focusing on our spirit. Withdrawal of senses allows one’s spirit to self evaluate and to start the process of healing in needed.
Yoga helps the spirit become creative. It helps people feel as though they have compete control over there mind, body, and spirit.
WHERE TO LEARN YOGA??
Here are a few links to blogs that I found helpful to learn the postures of yoga.
1. https://www.nytimes.com/guides/well/beginner-yoga
2. https://www.menshealth.com/uk/fitness/a28537883/yoga-for-beginners/
Here is a YouTube page that helps men learn the basics of yoga postures
1. https://youtu.be/2ymyRJwFtV8
2. https://youtu.be/NQzDFgnyYAo
Remember yoga is more than just postures so dig deeper and allow yoga to help your spiritual health grow stronger.
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