Are you working too hard? How many hours a week do you spend at work – 30, 40, 50 maybe 60 hours? Do you find yourself regularly taking work home or coming in to the office extra early to catch up?
If you are a working woman, you probably have to come home, cook dinner, sort out the laundry, help your children with their homework or pick them up from an after school activity. It is almost as if you have a “second night shift” when you come home. Some men do assist with the household chores but generally, even in this day and age, women generally carry the major burden of domestic and child care/parenting roles. All of this adds to you feeling exhausted, tired and drained when you go to bed.
You may desire to live a simpler life, to spend more quality time with your family, to work fewer hours or even change jobs and retrain and follow your childhood dream job. However, with the increased cost of living, higher medical bills and the ever real threat of redundancy and unemployment it is difficult for you to take time to rest, relax and reconnect with family and friends.
Constant overworking and lack of rest affects your physical, emotional and spiritual health and well being. When was the last time you cooked an evening meal and ate it with your family, undisturbed by the television, computers or even text messages?
This steady pressure and sense of rush pervades all life and if left unchecked leads to anxiety, depression, stress related disorders and even alcoholism and drug dependency.
What can you do to manage your time more effectively? To protect your body from physically breaking down and your mind from crashing in with all the demands placed on you.
Yoga, an ancient form of health care could well be the modern panacea – a way for you to finally beat stress and gain more control and balance in your life.
Here are five benefits you gain when you practice yoga as a way to reduce stress and tension in your life.
1. Yoga offers you a holistic approach to dealing with stress. Yoga exercises, breathing techniques and relaxation affects your mind, body and spirit.
2. Yogic breathing exercises help calm your nervous system and increase oxygen levels and blood supply to the internal organs, all of which leads to a deeper sense of calm, inner peace and balance. Learning how to breathe correctly is a wonderful skill you can use anytime during the day when you feel overwhelmed, confused and anxious.
3. Yoga poses help to release blockages and stimulate and energise your body. Yoga poses work on the energy centres (chakras) and as energy is released, it flows easily and readily through your body; so you have more energy and vitality to cope with demanding tasks.
4. Yoga exercises detox your body and can help to speed up the removal of toxins and bacteria in the body. Twisting poses in particular give a deep and gentle massage to the internal organs of your body.
5. Meditation techniques deepen your experience of relaxation and rest. During meditation your body undergoes certain physiological effects which counteract the negative effects of stress; your brain activity slows down as there is an increase in alpha brain wave activity and your heartbeat and breathing rate slow down and blood lactate levels drop.
As you can see, yoga helps to de-stress you on a physical, emotional and spiritual level. Regular practice will empower you to release stress quicker and regain a deeper sense of calm, balance and happiness in your life. Try a yoga class and see what difference it makes to your ability to cope with stressful situations.
