Why Yoga Changes How You Think and Feel
Yoga does much more than work on the musculoskeletal system! It can significantly impact your entire state. As holistic models of health tend to more readily recognise, the state of the physiology in our body also impacts our emotional and mental faculties, which is why embodied practices – such as yoga – which support our physiology, can be so therapeutic.
When we practice yoga it stimulates connective tissue which in turn influences the effective functioning of the organs, which then in turn creates a therapeutic response in our thoughts and feelings. This is where we can also see a cross-over of how yoga works similarly to therapies like Acupuncture. Here I explain how yoga practice helped transform my acute state of fatigue back to balance by shifting an internal ‘energy block’.
There are also of course many other layers as to why yoga makes you feel better! Living in overstimulating, often stressful urban environments can also lead to hormonal imbalances as a result of being in varying degrees of ‘fight or flight’. As yoga relaxes the nervous system, it counteracts the effect of excessive cortisol production which can often leave you feeling ‘frazzled’. But alongside this ‘decompression,’ as you rebalance and relax you also start to feel more present in the moment and in your senses, which of course adds to our subtle satisfaction in life! When you are stressed life seems to just past us by without us being receptive to engage with what appears in front of us – where the good stuff is! The alleviation of aches and pains from postural correction is also another feel good factor, as is the fantastic capacity for it to disperse emotional tension in the body (This relates to our earlier point around connective tissue relating to different organs, as it’s also organs that store emotional tension).
Yoga practice also improves your creative capacity and efficiency, so your work / life balance can improve alongside again your subtle satisfaction!