Looking to adorn yourself with nurture, beauty and confidence? Yoga may just be the solution for you. Learn why millions of people around the world, celebrate this divine practice and how it can positively affect and impact your mentality, physique and overall health.
Since ancient times, yoga has been widely celebrated for its effectiveness. One of its more crucial and invaluable contributions is the energy and vibrancy it charges in the yogist. This transcends the mere ‘feel-good’ sensation but is a more intimate, in-depth feeling of wellbeing and satisfaction. Many associate yogism with spirituality. They claim that this simple discipline helps them become more spiritually ‘alive’ and ‘aware’ of themselves and those around them. This can hardly be disputed as several medical scholars, researchers and medical practitioners attribute the soundness of the human soul as being the primary and core tenet of human wellbeing.
In contributing to the state of soundness and satisfaction, plus size yoga helps boost self-confidence and general positivity. Unlike regular workouts, sports, or leisure activities, yoga is characterized by immense rejuvenation once undertaken. It does so by mystically connecting one’s soul, spirit and body in perfect equilibrium and harmony. It won’t be long before you notice the changes in your vibrancy and self-confidence. Many practitioners of yoga become vibrant, self-accepting and enthusiastic members of society. Their aura gradually grows to convey positivity, happiness, self-love and harmony.
In this regard, yoga offers an array of benefits to plus size women. It offers the perfect solution to anyone who is struggling with body image issues or is constantly absorbed by their inability to shed the extra pounds and look a certain way. If you are in search of a long term solution to these devastating thought patterns and heinous body image cycles, I would encourage you to try yoga. Yoga transforms you from the inside out. Its greatest effect is on your outlook, perspective, and will which are products of your soul and mind.
If you are a plus size woman and are still not convinced about why you need to practice yoga, here are a further 10 reasons to love your curves with yoga.
1. Peace of Mind
Occasionally, the inevitable and tragic happens. However, yoga can help you offset the tide of gloom and act as a natural stress and anxiety reliever. One of the greatest yoga philosophies is its incessancy on being ‘present in the moment.’ This philosophy underpins the various techniques, movements, and solemn meditations that are common exhibits of the practice. By learning how to be present in a moment and fully attentive to what you do, you can learn to avert or manage any looming stress and anxiety.
Generally, stress and anxiety are caused by consistent attention and worry over a negative situation. Yoga is an excellent art that teaches you how to master your faculties, especially your mind. By learning the various meditation techniques, one can keep calm even in the toughest of times and learn not to succumb to the pressure, grief, stress or overwhelming fear. Science has proved that yoga helps lower the production of cortisol, which is the hormone that promotes depression and mood changes. It also reduces adrenaline levels keeping anxiety attacks at bay.
Additionally, yoga specializes in a type of deep breathing known as pranayama. This technique helps you to easily relax and get a handle on your emotions. It also contributes to good breathing.
2. Plus Size Yoga for Natural Weight Loss
You can agree that managing your weight is not the easiest thing to do. Even the best of us struggle with their weight at some point in their lives. Sticking to a strict diet regimen and regular exercise may also not have been so forthcoming, however, yoga offers an easier and long term method to burn the calories.
Yoga is embellished with several movements and postures that help tone your body muscles and increase strength. A wide majority of yoga poses and stretches engage several muscle groups at a go with little to no movement needed. Some of the more popular isometric yoga poses include the plank and bow pose. These poses need no equipment but utilize your body weight and are seamlessly incorporated basic yoga routines. Fortunately for plus size girls, you can burn the carbs without trying as hard. The movements are effective in increasing body metabolism and thus the rate at which your body burns carbs. Additionally, they work to improve your flexibility, keeping you in great shape and with delightful body endurance and stamina.
3. Promotes Healthy Eating Habits
As the intricate yoga philosophy goes, being present in the moment helps you to savor your food and eat mindfully. It helps you exercise requisite control over your eating, allowing your brain and stomach ample time to communicate and relay whether you are full or not.
The feeling of ‘helplessness/compulsion’ associated with eating disorders such as binge eating and bulimia begins to be eroded, as the practice of yoga teaches you how to control your mind and body. Eventually, the reflex state of over-indulging in food becomes controllable and surmountable. Over time, the gradual practice of yoga enables you to avoid stuffing yourself with food thus allowing you to develop healthier and sustainable eating habits and patterns.
4. Improves Concentration and Memory
Scientists have conducted many kinds of research on this and have found that yoga indeed helps in increasing one’s concentration span and recollection of past events (memory). The art of meditation enables one to focus on a given thing for an extended duration of time. Meditation, therefore, can help you build and develop your concentration span enabling you to focus for longer periods at a go.
Yoga also helps one maintain an accurate record of the state of affairs or happenings. You will be able to retain particular thoughts and occurrences for longer and retrace them easily. This can primarily be attributed to the state of ‘awareness’ and ‘presentness’ in a moment that yoga induces amongst its practitioners. This will inevitably increase the sharpness of your mind.
5. It Increases Creativity
The state of wellbeing and oneness with your soul and mind stimulates creativity. Interestingly, the energy conveyed while meditating or performing a yoga routine has overwhelming creative ability. Fresh and new ideas flash through your conscious mind from your subconscious offering you great and innovative solutions to common life or business problems. Scientists have proven that this state of heightened creativity comes from the dominance of the subconscious mind over the ever-active conscious mind.
The energy in the form of songs, creative writing, poetry, innovation can be readily experienced during or soon after a yoga and meditation session. You will feel more capable of tackling what seemed impossible and prior daunting tasks will seem to be doable. If you are in a creative rut, this will do the trick.
6. Pain Reliever
Many plus size women struggle with back pain and fatigue around their legs and calves as they walk about. Commonly this is a result of bad posture or being overweight. Whereas you may turn to medicine to relieve these joint and muscle pains you can advisably opt for a more efficient and sustainable form of relief – yoga.
Yoga is attributed with helping your body and mind adapt to strenuous activity. The stretches and movements in yoga, enable your body to move more freely and knot-free at the joint regions. The mental training in yoga enables you to subdue and conquer the ‘feeling’ of pain to enjoy wholeness and health.
A research conducted in 2003 showed that Yoga can help decrease the frequency of chronic migraines. Additionally, in a further study, it was discovered that patients suffering from arthritis reported having less severe pains after attending 9-15 weeks of yoga sessions. Practising yoga also helps reduce inflammation as it stimulates the decrease of the C-Reactive Proteins in your blood. Now that’s great news!
7. Healthy Heart
Another astounding benefit of yoga to your state of health is its ability to minimize and even avert heart problems. Yoga helps boost the release of HDL cholesterol which is good for the body and decreases the secretion of LDL cholesterol which is potentially hazardous to the body. Problems such as hyperventilation, cardiovascular arrest (heart attack) and heart failure become less probable for persons who continuously practice yoga.
It also helps to boost blood circulation throughout the body. This translates to healthier and more effective working body organs. Organs such as the lungs, heart, liver, kidney and skin receive a constant and lush supply of nutrients and oxygen enabling their ease of operation. Illnesses such as low blood sugar are also mitigated through yoga. How? Yoga helps to make the body more responsive to insulin. This helps regulate the secretion of the hormone and govern its level in the blood. Consequentially, this fastens uptake and assimilation of insulin by the body.
8. Restful Night Sleep
There is nothing better than a relaxing nap time at the end of the day. Sleep time is vital to our body functions as most of our brain activity and body repair and growth mechanisms take place while we are asleep. There are several reasons for poor sleep quality, such as obesity, aches, stress and depression. Among plus size women, these are the rampant and leading causes of poor sleep.
Yoga helps to drastically improve your sleep by annulling the common causes of sleep disorders. It helps curb indigestion and bloating by conditioning you to eat more mindfully. It also aids in averting stress and anxiety and increases the secretion of melatonin hormone, which regulates the state of sleep and awakeness. The outcome is a substantial decrease in sleep disturbances, and feeling well-rested and energized in the morning.
9. Personal Discipline and Resilience
A class in yoga is also a class in self-discipline. Yogism teaches you to be more consistent in the application for you to reap the full benefits. An individual therefore gradually grows to appreciate and celebrate the virtue of self-discipline, self-control and resilience in difficult circumstances. This lesson can be translated into real life as only the diligent and adamant get to where they want to. In a study of the benefits of yoga, several yoga beginners who had adopted the practice weeks or months ago did report that they have grown more consistent in perfoming their duties and obligations in various contexts. This may be due to the positivity and enthusiasm one develops as they continue to practice yoga.
10. Improves the Overall Quality of Your Life
Not only does yoga give you great physical benefits but it also works on your mind and heart. You become a more healthy, glowing, calm, creative and empathetic human being. With the virtues learnt, meditation and relaxation techniques mastered and general state of soundness and wellness that stems from the inside, you can become a better wife, girlfriend, business lady, boss, mother, daughter, sister, aunt or friend. Being at peace with yourself will enable you to be a peace and a joy to others. You become such a delight to those around you as your positivity will impact and resonate with those around you.
Final Thoughts
It takes time to master the techniques and disciplines cultivated in yoga, but once you do the results are sure to steadily follow suit. Surprisingly, you need only 15-30 minutes of your day to start your yoga journey. Before contacting the nearest residential yoga center or sign up for online or physical yoga classes, take some time to do the following in preparation for your journey. You can purchase a yoga mat and yoga blocks on Amazon.
1. Pen down both your long term and short term goals. Preferably categorize them into spiritual, mental, physical and social.
2. Work on carving out time in the morning or the evening before you go to bed for your yoga classes. Advisably, you could wake up earlier than the kids or other members of your household.
3. Identify a suitable yoga program. It should be workable with your everyday schedule.
4. Engage an accountability partner – perhaps a close friend or someone attending the same yoga class with you. This will help you stay on course and have some positive support around you.
5. Track and periodically review your performance.
6. Reward yourself, once you attain your short term goals as an incentive to continue with the great job.
Be sure to check out some of our other health & fitness articles. With that, I wish you nothing but the absolute best in your yoga journey.
