Yoga for Anxiety and Depression

We live in stressful times. The amount of stress people carry along is hard to believe. Being mentally fit is as important as being physically. However, there are millions in the world who fight different kinds of stress. Stress is hard to avoid. There may be different situations in life that affect people at different times in their lives. Everybody reacts differently to events or incidents that happen to them. Such incidents and reactions may even have deeper psychological effects on an individual’s mind and affect his or her personality and behavior to similar situations in the future.

Yoga for Depression

Sometimes, stress may also lead to physical ailments. Experiencing fluctuations in blood pressure, sugar levels and hormones are fairly common problems that are stress-induced. While there are a lot of options to consult psychologists, doctors and other specialists, doing Yoga can be that one solution to your healing. Yoga works inside-out. While Yoga cannot replace medication and other therapy, it can play a very critical role in your healing. For all the psychological disorder there is one major cause – anxiety and depression.

Anxiety

Simply put Anxiety means worrying. Worrying of all kinds. When a loved one is late in reaching home, anxiety in the individual rises. The mind will bring thoughts of all sorts to come to a conclusion of what might be the reason of the delay. Students worrying during examinations are very common phenomena. The anxiety before examination results are out can be so high that students tend to fall sick with fever, weakness and loss of appetite. Anxiety over six months can turn chronic. Chronic Anxiety leads to several health problems and can be diagnosed. Chronic anxiety puts an individual under constant stress. It is virtually a repetition of thoughts that becomes the way of thinking. With lack of exercise and bad eating habits, anxiety can worsen. A good yoga routine takes care of anxiety. It calms the mind and brings stillness. Yoga builds a restful state and the mind goes back to rest and lowers anxiety. Anxiety can also lead to panic disorders. A high level of anxiety leads to a panic attack. Panic attacks are brief periods of episodes that include sweating, dizziness, black outs, chest pain, trembling and fear of dying.

A different form of anxiety attacks is PTSD or ‘Post Traumatic Stress Disorder’. It is a form of anxiety that is caused after experiencing a traumatic situation. For example, an accident or a near-miss accident is difficult to forget, and every time a similar situation arises in everyday life one starts feeling anxious. Medication, therapy and Yoga can help take control of this problem.Anxiety disorders are not cured overnight. It takes time, patience and commitment to heal fully. Relief from anxiety is possible with a holistic combination of medication, care at home, therapy and a good yoga routine.

Depression

Depression is a severe state of anxiety. It looms heavy on an individual. An individual finds futility and emptiness in daily activities. A relationship gone bad, financial loss, death of a loved one and other situations where an individual is emotionally hurt are reasons of depression. Depression doesn’t just go away. It affects your ability to concentrate, getting your proper quota of sleep and even creates loss of appetite. The sad part about depression is that the ones suffering from it may not even know they are affected by depression.

Diagnosing depression is difficult because most individuals who are depressed may not even seek treatment. Most people view it as a personal problem or a lack in their own behavior and believe that they not like others around them. Depression may be veiled under lack of motivation and fatigue. Constant feeling of being tired and not having the motivation to do things is a good sign that depression may be the underlying cause of it.

Yoga for Good Mental Health

Both Anxiety and Depression are health problems that are interlinked with family history, life situations and many other conditions that affect the brain. After studying the neurotransmitters in depressed individuals and finding how the brain chemicals work, strong anti depressants have been developed. Anti depressants work on the brain chemicals and induce a relaxing effect and even work on the individual’s energy levels. The sluggishness and the quality of energy that seems to affect the individual the most changes with medication and therapy.

Once the medication is taken care of, Yoga can be started in small sessions. Brief 20-minute sessions can start to calm the mind and balance the body. Yoga works on the body and the mind. It starts to bring down restlessness and puts the mind in a still state. A regular practice of Yoga or an exercise helps the body release endorphins. The endorphin hormone is a happy hormone. Yoga can help supplement medication and therapy. It can give you power to change your life. It can bring you from sickness back to health and life. It can bring about holistic healing. Being mindful and developing awareness can be the first step to fight anxiety and depression.

To hire a personal yoga trainer to cure your depression and anxiety attacks, call us on 98206 07875 and we will send a certified and empathetic personal trainer to your house the very same day so that you can begin the journey to end depression right from today!

Author – Chloe Dodd

Chloe is a celeb yoga teacher based in Mumbai with over 10 years of teaching experience. She lives for Yoga and is a highly dedicated and passionate teacher who trains her students in private as well as group classes all over Mumbai. She teaches Vinyasa Flow and Ashtanga Yoga apart from Meditation and Chakra healing. She writes about Yoga once a week on the Wellintra Blog.