Can yoga help with depression? - yoga

Low mood and depression affect more people than we think. The numbers alone help us to understand this better: after (link removed), “the suicide and Wales rose to 5.691 more in 2019 (321 more compared to the previous year). The odds for women under the age of 25 have risen by 93.8% in 2019.” /> Taking these figures into account, we examine how pandemic has affected our mental health and how we look at mindfulness and well -being in a different way since many of us have been isolated indoors for more than a year.
I was inspired to be trained as a yoga teacher after I personally learned how much yoga contributed to improving my intellectual health and well -being. Many of us know that this is true, but how well can we articulate science behind why and can yoga help with depression?

It is important to mention that I am in no way a doctor. This blog article is a summary of an incoming research contribution that I have created for my 500-hour yoga teacher training, which is about how yoga can help with depression. Therefore, there are references and links to scientific studies and medical institutions that are experts in this area if you want to learn more.

What is depression?

Before we can understand how yoga can help with depression, we have to understand what depression is actually. It is a slightly cloudy topic that the medical world does not know technically exactly what it is, apart from the brain regions and neurochemicals involved. Instead, it is defined by a collection of symptoms that can range from slightly to chronic and from recurring to constant.

For the purposes of this blog article, I will concentrate on the mild and often recurring forms of depression whose main symptoms are:

• I feel sluggish
• I fight to find joy in anything
• avoid social situations
• don't eat well or take care of yourself
• It is difficult for me to concentrate or go to work
• lack of meaning in life
• I feel fearful
• uncontrollable mood swings

Investigations have shown that some people can lead to depression too few neurotransmitter that trigger signals around the brain. The three neurotransmitters involved in depression are:

• serotonin improves willpower, motivation and mood
• Noradrenalin promotes thinking, concentration and dealing with stress (it is also a hormone that is connected to the regulation of our “struggle or escape” reaction).
• dopamine increases enjoyment and is necessary to change bad habits

Even with the help of medication that can help to compensate for these specific neurotransmitters in the brain, depression is a highly complex disease. What turns out to be effective treatment for a person with depression may not work for another person. Something that has worked well for someone in the past can become less effective over time or even stop working completely. That is why many people turn to natural treatments for bad mood and depression - including yoga .

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How can Yoga Depression help by increasing these chemicals in the brain?

First of all, Asana exercise is a form of practice and physical movement One of the simplest ways to promote these neurochemicals. It is recommended that every type of regular movement is useful to treat people with light to moderate depression. Sport not only releases positive endorphins to improve their mood, but also increases energy, improves sleep, strengthens self -confidence and reduces stress hormones. Already 30 minutes of training three to five days a week can be enough to see improvements.

This helps to explain how movement can be a great means to combat depression, but can yoga special help? yoga is much more than just a physical exercise offer these advantages; It also includes breathing work, meditation, stretching, singing, setting intentions, gratitude and much more.

biofeedback and vagalton

Here the body-spirit connection of the biofeedback comes into play. The biofeedback loop is the brain that changes its activity based on the activities of the body. We can literally send signals to the brain to change our stress level, mood and our thoughts.

yoga mainly influences the biofeedback by stimulating and improving the tone of the vagus nerve. The vagus nerve is the longest nerve in the body that comes from the brain, wanders down the neck and then surrounds the digestive system, the liver, the spleen, the pancreas, heart and lungs. The stimulation of the vagalton is the key to activating the parasympathetic nervous system or the calm and digestive mode.

According to the international (link removed) (IAHE), the vagalton is measured by pursuing your heart rate next to your breathing rate. Your heart rate accelerates a little when inhaling and slows down something when exhaling. The greater the difference between its inhalation heart frequency and its exhalation frequency, the higher your vagalton.

A higher vagalton means that your body can relax faster after stress. It is also associated with a better mood, less fear and more stress resilience as well as many improvements in the body system.

This in particular identifies the following yoga practices to improve the vagalton:

• slow, rhythmic, diaphragm
• buzzing or repeating the sound 'om'
• meditation, in particular loving kindness meditation, the feelings of good will promotes yourself and others

mindfulness

Finally, the NHS recommends developing mindfulness practice to treat depression and claims that we can enjoy the world around us more if we become more aware of the current moment:

(link removed)

From the above definition it is easy to see how the yogic philosophies and old practices of meditation or the "breastfeeding of the mind" meet all the criteria of modern mindfulness. Patañjali even defines Yoga as "Chitta Vritti Nirodhah", translated by Sri Swami Satchidananda as "to breastfeed the fluctuations of the mind".

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