How Yoga Benefits the Respiratory System?
From yoga perspective, when you aren’t breathing well, your prana, or vital energy, is not flowing property. From a physiological perspective, when your respiratory system is not efficient, neither are your cardiovascular, digestive, endocrine, or nervous systems.
You take a breath 12-20 times per minute. The purpose of your breath is to get oxygen to your cells and to get rid of waste like carbon dioxide. The respiratory system includes the nasal cavities, air passageway tubes, and lungs.
Breathing mechanism is a part of our autonomic nervous system. It means that we don’t have to think to breath, as we don’t have to think about beating of our heart. This is an obligation of our autonomic nervous system.
However, yogis claim that by controlling your breath, you can control all aspects of being. Science reveals that your breath is an access point to regulating your nervous system.
How we breathe?
When you inhale, the breath enters your nose, throat, and then your lungs. Your lungs and ribcage expand three-dimensionally in all directions; your diaphragm engages to flatten down. When you exhale, your diaphragm relaxes to ascend, your lungs and ribcage compress, and the air release out of your throat and then nose.
Function of respiratory system
– full body breathing massages our internal organs, oscillate our joints, and alternately tone and release tension from all the muscles in the body.
– completely subconscious yet we can exert conscious control.
– sustains our life, nourishes our organs, helps expel waste.
– affects our emotional state by acting on our nervous system.
– transformative part of yoga practice.
– allow us to deeper into yoga poses.
– go deeper into relaxation.
– let go of distracting thoughts or emotions and make space for positive or calming one.
Pranayama – Yogis breathwork practices
Yogis use pranayama or breathwork to control their prana and anchor to the present moment. The word prana in Sanskrit means vital energy or life force energy that permeates through us and everything. Interestingly, prana simultaneously means breath. Yogis believe that you can change the flow and qualities of your energetics by breath control.
Modern yogic use breathwork for health benefits, including overcoming inefficient breathing patterns from a culture of poor posture and stress. Through altering your breath, you change your state of mind.
When you slouch, you have limited lung capacity, along with restricted movement of your diaphragm.
Yoga standing poses help us to stay tall and correct our posture.
Yoga backbending poses help us to open our ribcage and make place for the lungs.
Different types of pranayama help us to better our breathing habits.
This article is written by using the helpful information from my yoga textbook and the book “Science of Yoga” by Ann Swanson
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