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What yoga does to your body and brain

Explore the ancient tradition of yoga and discover how the combination of physical and mental exercises affects your health.

There are many different approaches to modern yoga, but most forms share three core elements: physical postures, breathing exercises, and spiritual meditation. This blend of physical and mental practices is said to offer unique health benefits. But does yoga truly benefit health? Join Krishna Sudhir as we explore how this ancient tradition impacts the body and mind.

At some point between the 1st and 5th centuries AD, the Hindu sage Patañjali systematized ancient meditation traditions throughout India. He recorded time-honored techniques that have lasted as long as Indian civilization itself in a 196-verse guide called the Yoga Sutras.

These texts define yoga as “yoking,” a way of restraining the mind, focusing away from external objects in an effort to reach a state of pure consciousness.

Over time, yoga has incorporated physical elements from gymnastics and wrestling. Today, there are countless approaches to modern yoga—although most maintain the three core elements of Patañjali’s practice: physical postures, breathing exercises, and spiritual meditation.

This mix of physical and mental exercises is believed to provide a unique combination of health advantages. For example, it can improve strength and flexibility, enhance heart and lung function, and boost mental health. But what do current studies reveal about the benefits of this ancient tradition?

Despite the efforts of many researchers, it is challenging to make specific claims about the benefits of yoga. The unique combination of activities in yoga complicates the identification of which component contributes to a specific health benefit. Additionally, yoga studies are often conducted with small sample sizes, lacking diversity, and heavily reliant on self-reporting, which can skew results.

However, there are some health benefits that are more strongly supported by science than others. Specifically:

Yoga Affects Flexibility and Strength

Twisting your body into physical yoga poses stretches many muscle groups. In the short term, muscle stretching can change the water content of muscles, ligaments, and tendons, making them more elastic.

Over time, regular stretching stimulates stem cells to differentiate into new muscle tissue and other cells that produce elastic collagen. Regular stretching also reduces the body’s natural reflex to contract muscles, enhancing your pain tolerance for movements requiring flexibility.

Researchers have not identified one form of yoga that improves flexibility better than another, so the effects of specific poses remain unclear.

However, like other low-impact exercises, yoga reliably improves fitness and flexibility in healthy individuals.

Yoga as a Therapeutic Tool

Practicing yoga has also been shown to be a powerful potential therapeutic tool. In studies involving patients with various musculoskeletal disorders, yoga was more beneficial in reducing pain and improving mobility compared to other forms of low-impact exercise.

Incorporating yoga into an existing exercise routine can enhance strength and flexibility for difficult-to-treat conditions such as chronic back pain, rheumatoid arthritis, and osteoporosis.

Yoga and Its Impact on Heart and Lung Health

The combination of exercise and focused breathing in yoga has proven to be similarly beneficial for lung health. Lung diseases such as chronic bronchitis, emphysema, and asthma narrow the pathways that carry oxygen while weakening the membranes that transfer oxygen into the blood. Breathing exercises similar to those found in yoga help improve oxygen diffusion.

Yoga also helps increase blood oxygen levels, which is particularly beneficial for individuals with weak heart muscles who struggle to pump enough oxygen throughout the body. For those with healthy hearts, practicing yoga can reduce blood pressure and lower cardiovascular disease risk factors.

Yoga and Its Psychological Effects

The most celebrated benefit of yoga may be the most challenging to prove: its psychological effects.

While there is a long-standing relationship between yoga and mental health, convincing evidence on how it impacts mental well-being is scarce. One of the most significant claims is that yoga improves symptoms of depression and anxiety disorders.

Because diagnosing these conditions varies widely in origin and severity, it’s difficult to quantify yoga’s impact. However, there is evidence that yoga can help reduce stress symptoms, as well as meditation or relaxation techniques.

Research on the effects of yoga is still evolving. In the future, we will need larger studies with diverse participants to measure yoga’s impact on heart attacks, cancer rates, cognitive function, and more. But for now, yoga can continue its ancient tradition as a means of exercise, introspection, and relaxation.

This information was summarized from the video “What yoga does to your body and brain” on the TED-Ed channel.

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