Taking vitamins to decrease bloating and other digestive complications goes hand in hand with having a consistent workout routine. To maintain a healthy digestive system, one must be diligent in what they consume and how they support their body. Yoga is a wonderful way to support your body – especially your digestive system! Yoga helps stimulate your vagus nerve and relieve pressure in different body parts. It is known for its meditative benefits, but let’s explain why you should consider adding yoga to your daily routine!
How Does Yoga Help Improve Your Digestive Health
The vagus nerve is a cranial nerve connecting several body parts, including the brain and gastrointestinal tract. Due to the connection between your brain and gut – commonly known as the gut-brain axis – stimulating the vagus nerve can help to improve your gut health. Deep breathing is a common way to stimulate the vagus nerve and is a pillar of yoga practice. Thus, when one does yoga, they are stimulating the vagus nerve. When you enable the vagus nerve, you signal to your body that it is time to relax and decompress. This can be especially helpful for those who struggle with irritable bowel syndrome or digestive complications due to stress.
The different movements that characterize a yoga routine also help to move the food you consume through the digestive tract. When you breathe, you trigger your diaphragm, stimulating your digestive organs. Certain yoga poses can be beneficial when one is experiencing constipation. Other practices, such as taking a supplement containing gut health enzymes, can help reduce constipation.
Lastly, yoga is a type of exercise that is low-impact yet effective. It is flexible in the time commitment and equipment it requires. To successfully live a healthy lifestyle, one must incorporate some form of exercise in their routine. Exercising helps to boost endorphins and even promotes digestion. Physical activity helps to promote blood flow to the digestive system, increasing its effectiveness. Due to the gut-brain axis, the endorphins one gets from physical activity can also, in turn, support your digestive health by supporting your mental health. Yoga can be a fantastic option for those seeking a stress-relieving yet effective exercise routine!
Other Benefits of Yoga That Will Improve Your Overall Health
Yoga is one of those triple-threat workouts that will leave you feeling happy and healthy in more ways than one! Here are some reasons why yoga should be on your shortlist for your workout routine this year.
1. Helps Improve Flexibility
Yoga is unique in that it requires you to use different parts of your body you have probably never thought of before. Where other types of exercise only need you to use certain parts of your body, yoga is a full-body workout. Due to this, yoga will stretch out your body in a way you have never experienced before. Flexibility is critical as we start to age because it helps support our range of motion and balance, both of which start to deteriorate as we age.
2. The Restorative Properties
Since yoga pushes different areas of your body, it can be a low-impact way to help with any pain or restrictive motion you might be experiencing. If you are someone who is recovering from an injury – with the go-ahead from your doctor – you might find that yoga can help get you back up to speed promptly.
3. Protects Your Immune System
Yoga can help to get you in a deep, meditative, and relaxed state. Your immune system thrives when you are relaxed and can fend off any intruding viruses or bacteria. When you are in a constant state of stress, your immune system will struggle to protect you. Be sure to add a relaxing activity to your day to help trigger your body into a relaxed state, thus avoiding being susceptible to more illnesses.
4. Helps With Posture and Balance
Flexibility and strength go hand in hand with proper posture. You are more likely to have poor posture when weak and inflexible. Yoga can be a great way to restore your posture little by little. Posture cannot be fixed overnight, but with a dedication to yoga, you will start to see the positive changes it offers you. Similarly, yoga can help with balance. Due to the different poses, one must maintain during yoga, your body must learn to balance itself out.
5. Teaches You How to Breathe
Breathing is an essential component of proper yoga practice. Yoga emphasizes slow breathing and learning how to become attuned to your breathing. This attention to your breathing is not something we practice often throughout our life, but can be a life-changing tool.
Different Yoga Poses That Specifically Help With Moving Along Digestion
As mentioned above, certain yoga poses can significantly help with digestion. Here are some examples:
- The Extended Puppy Pose - This pose requires you to place your hands and knees on the ground and then extend your arms all the way out in front of you until you can place your head on the ground. You should feel in a proper position to open your shoulders up. This pose helps to stretch your stomach, which can feel extremely relieving after consuming a large meal.
- The Half-Gas Release Pose - This pose requires you to lie on the ground and slowly bring one leg up toward your ribcage while keeping the other on the ground. This pose will help compress your colon and stimulate your digestive tract into releasing any excess gas or waste that might be struggling to get out of your body.
- The Bridge Pose - The bridge pose helps bring blood to your heart, giving you a new sense of energy. Due to the way it stretches your stomach can be especially helpful in relieving you of any pain you might be experiencing.
Be sure to look up these poses to act them out in your home appropriately. Yoga offers many benefits and can be your new form of exercise. Despite its lack of cardio, you will leave a yoga session feeling just as renewed as you would from a long run!