Month: July 2018

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3 Benefits of Meditation

Meditation involves mental exercises while comfortably lying or sitting down. Meditation focuses on a simple internal or external stimulus. This can be a word, one’s breathing pattern, or a visual object. In meditation, the person is physically still and has a much narrower focus of attention. Meditation has benefits that can have a positive effect on both your body and soul. Here are three ways meditating can benefit you.

  1. Physical Benefits. Meditation helps you gain control of your physical tension by eliciting the calming response. The heart rate and respiration rate slow down. Blood pressure diminishes.

  2. Reduce Stress. Over time, meditators tend to feel less daily anxiety, and tend to recover more quickly after highly anxious times.

  3. Change Perspective. Learning the skills of meditation can increase your ability to control your fearful thinking. This teaches you new ways to respond to your automatic thoughts, emotions, and images. For example, a panic-prone person dwells on his worries and pays attention to fearful thoughts. He is controlled by these experiences, instead of being in control of them. Once you learn to meditate, you learn to step away from these experiences. Once you observe your thoughts, emotions, and images from the outside, you can learn to control them. To reduce your anxiety reaction and halt your negative thinking, you must be capable of stepping back from them far enough to put them into perspective.

Thank you for reading! If you know of further benefits, or other helpful blog posts related to this topic, please comment below!

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In this photo, my beloved sister, Sarah, is wearing our ‘Camo Colorband’ from our ‘Original Collection!

 

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5 Ways to Be Kind to Yourself

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“Three things in human life are important: the first is to be kind; the second is to be kind; and the third is to be kind.”
-Henry James

In life, sometimes we spend too much time worrying and not enough time taking care of ourselves. Taking the time to put yourself first will enable you to feel happier and also improve your life in every aspect including relationships with others. Here are five ways to be kind to yourself.

  1. Self- Affirmations. The voice inside our heads sometimes reminds us that we are not good enough, as we can tend to be our toughest critic. However, if you spend time reciting or writing positive self-affirmations each day you can reverse that cycle.

  2. Reward Yourself for Getting Things Done. Reward yourself for your hard work, as you deserve to feel good for accomplishing your goals. Give yourself credit for your achievements, whether it be graduating, losing the last five pounds, or completing a DIY project by having a glass of wine or simply doing something you enjoy.

  3. Let Go of Past Mistakes. Instead of beating yourself up or dwelling on the past, remember that no one is perfect and mistakes happen. Find a way to forgive yourself. Make amends with those that you may have hurt in the process if it helps. After all, life is about learning lessons and those mistakes give us an opportunity to grow into better people.

  4. Treat Yourself to a Day of Pampering. Most of us spend time juggling work, chores, and our social life. Set aside a day completely devoted to yourself once a month or once a week by cooking your favorite food, indulging in a spa treatment, or taking a long bath. Self-care remedies will have you feeling fresh and positive.

  5. Respect Your Body. Take care of your body by getting enough sleep, eating healthy foods, and staying active. If you feel tired or sick take the time to recover and rest. You will feel better mentally by taking care of your physical health.

Thank you for reading! Please comment below ways that you practice at home.

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4 Surprising Ways Yoga Can Improve Your Life

 

The benefits of yoga surpass the improved posture and defined shoulders. Here are 4 surprising ways that yoga can improve your life.

  1. Improve Memory- Dharna is also known as concentration yoga. This portion of class focuses on meditation. Dharna involves fixing the mind and attention on a single object. This increases circulation to the brain, improving it’s ability to recall information.

  2. Sleep Better- Studies show that people who had insomnia practiced yoga for 45 minutes before bed for two months. Participants fell asleep fourteen minutes faster then they normally would have. This is because breathing and stretching helps people become physically and mentally relaxed. This allows the brain to switch off faster.

  3. Better Mental Health- Research shows that regular asana practice raises levels of the brain chemical GABA. Low levels of GABA are linked to depression. Asana is defined as a body posture or pose.

  4. Healthy Heart- Practicing yoga is beneficial for your heart and improves how your blood vessel functions. According to a recent study created from the Yale University School of Medicine, those who practiced yoga for six weeks improved the function of their blood vessel by 17 percent. People who practiced and had heart disease prior showed a tremendous improvement to the function of their vessel of about 70 percent.

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Click on the photo to read ‘8 Convincing Reasons to Start Running’
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4 Ways Practicing Yoga Outside Benefits You

 

Research has made a strong case that taking the time to practice yoga outside can enhance your practice in a different way than your studio does. 

  1. Natural Scenery Can Heighten Awareness. Nature will help you to be in the present. Practicing yoga outside will help quiet mind chatter, as your mind will be focused on all that is going on around you. Endorphins are released when looking at beautiful scenery. Connecting with the actual, physical earth will help you feel more grounded.

  2. Spending Time in Nature Can Replenish Depleted Energy. Studies show that spending time outdoors can give us more energy. A group of researchers from several Canadian universities conducted an experiment to learn more about vitality. They defined vitality as “having physical and mental energy…that one can harness for or regulate for purposive actions.” Participants took a fifteen minute walk. Half of them spent the walk inside and the other half walked outside regardless of the weather. The participants who spent there walk outside felt a significant increase in how energized they felt.

  3. Fresh Air Can Motivate People to Take Deeper Breaths. More oxygen that comes into the body will enable you to improve your body’s systems and relaxation. 

  4. The Outdoors can Further Boost the Benefits of Meditation. This is because being outside helps people clear their minds and offer a new perspective. A clear and balanced mind will enable the practitioner to make better decisions. Yoga outside will essentially reconnect you with nature and de-stress the mind.

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5 Reasons to Start Meal Prepping

Meal preparation is a weekly preparation of meals for a period of time longer than two days. Planning, cooking, and packaging food for the upcoming week can save time and money. There are many benefits and it is not as intimidating as it looks! Here are my top 5 reasons to start.

  1. Save Time– Planning ahead is a key component in staying on track, reaching your goals, and saving time. Planning your meals in advance requires you to create a list of all the ingredients you will need for that week’s meals. In doing so, you can eliminate the possibility of running back and forth to the grocery store for last minute items.

  2. Save Money- You will save money through buying in bulk and eliminating restaurant markup. 

  3. Decrease Stress–  Throughout life, people are encouraged to stay organized by creating to-do lists in order to fulfill obligations without last minute stress. This same philosophy applies when aiming to maintain a healthy, nutritious diet. As your schedule becomes hectic, it seems juggling nutrition with the rest of your life is impossible, however, meal preparation is one way to reduce stress and give you one less thing to worry about. 

  4. Make Healthier Choices-Preparing meals yourself enables you to include healthier and unprocessed ingredients. 

  5. Eat Higher Quality Foods– Instead of reaching quick processed and prepackaged snacks or meals that go over your caloric needs, you will now be able to eat home cooked healthier foods in proper portions.

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6 Reasons to Practice Yoga

 

 

Practicing yoga is a positive journey for both your physical and mental health. Mentally, you will notice more strength to move away from negative situations. Physically, you will become more flexible and improve your posture. Here are my top six reasons to start practicing yoga.

1.    Relieve Stress.  One major component of yoga is meditation. Yoga meditation was designed to calm your mind and move into a deeply meditative state. This is mainly practiced in order to be more relaxed. Meditating often will help control stress, decrease anxiety, and improve your cardiovascular health. Learning to focus your mind on one thing at a time seems difficult at first, but with practice you start to develop new habits towards a more relaxed internal state. Meditating becomes easier changing your life for the better.

2.    Breathe More Effectively. Yoga mainly focuses on pranayama techniques giving you the opportunity to use your entire lung capacity. Practicing enables you to learn how to breathe better. These techniques have an extremely calming effect.

3.    Become Stronger Mentally. Not only will you notice that you will become more positive, but you will be able to accept whatever life brings to the table. Not all life experiences are good. Yoga teaches you that both positive and negative things in life come and go. Understanding this on a deeper level makes it easier to accept, stay present, and be positive. You will slowly become more aware of how things influence you. You will naturally make changes that will impact your life in a favorable way. Overall, you will become more aware of everything in life. Once you develop self-awareness you are able to change your thoughts and interpretations.

4.    Become Stronger Physically. Yoga is a full body workout that targets muscles within the body through specific poses and postures. Yoga increases mobility and flexibility bringing more ease into your movement. Essentially you won’t feel so stuck within your body. You will notice that your posture will improve.

5.    Be in the Present. People tend to get bogged down thinking about the past or the future and in today’s society checking out completely into the land of cell phones or social media however, yoga gives you the ability to unplug and focus on what is going on in your body and in your life right now. Happiness can only be found here and now in the present.

6. Manage Your Pain. Studies suggest that practicing yoga reduces pain for people with conditions including hypertension or arthritis cancer.

Do you practice yoga? Will you consider trying a yoga class after hearing these benefits?

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