By: Grace Blumer-Lamotte

Yoga is the practice of your physical, mental, and spiritual well-being. It is a physical form of exercise moving your body through various positions. Yoga comes in many different forms. Yoga can be physical exercises, such as vinyasa classes, which boost your heart rate with movement. It can also be mindfulness practice. Another form of yoga is breathing exercises.

Yoga can benefit your mental health. If you are suffering from depression, anxiety, PTSD, eating disorders, or other psychiatric disorders, yoga could help improve it. 

The connection between yoga and your mental health is this: It creates a safe, quiet, and still place for your body and mind. It can also create a space for you to express yourself.

According to Dai Manuel, a fitness speaker, these are 7 effective ways to improve your mental health with regular yoga practice: Increase your self-confidence, improve your level of concentration, make you physically fit, avoid stress, good posture, peaceful mind, and increase the quality of your sleep.

The way yoga increases your self confidence is by giving you a peaceful and private space for yourself to heal and learn from past mistakes.

Yoga can improve your level of concentration by focusing on an object or staring at a long distance view. This can enhance your level of concentration. Each pose takes concentration on what you are doing and where it is going on.

Yoga can also make you physically fit by practicing exercise regularly and putting in the effort.

It can help you avoid stress by having good yoga postures. According to Dai Manuel, “When you practice yoga 2 times a day (it’s enough at least you spare half an hour a day) it makes you feel relaxed and puts you away from your level of stress and helps you to become more healthy and successful in life.”

Good posture can also come from practicing yoga. Yoga can help your body maintain its position and relieve stress and inner pains. 

When you first start yoga, it is difficult to find the inner peaceful mind. When you practice yoga more and more you will soon feel and achieve what a peaceful mind feels like. Yoga is poses and breathing practice. Focusing on your breathing can help your brain find your inner peace.

Everyone knows that increasing your quality of sleep is difficult. Again, Dai Manuel has some thoughts on this: “At the end of your day try to spare around 15 minutes for you to recollect all your day memories and sit in your yoga position, try to concentrate on your breathing, which helps you to enter into a state of relaxation, overcoming your day’s hurdle.”