Yoga : Not Just for the Limber

Fitness tops the list of New Year's resolutions. According to people who keep track of such things, "health and fitness" is the most popular category of New Year's resolutions, with approximately 22 percent of people having it at the top of their lists.

Exercise is recommended for lots of reasons: to lose weight; to prevent weight gain; to gain muscle; to improve balance and coordination; to reduce stress and improve mood; to lower insulin levels; to lower blood pressure and triglycerides; and even to sleep better.

Raising endorphins is another good reason to exercise. Stress causes the endorphin system to suffer. Scientists have discovered that regular exercise stimulate the endorphin to work more effectively. I am sure lots of people have stressful lives and need their endorphins balanced; I am a stay at home mom, and I know I need my endorphin level to increase.

It's also hard to know what type of exercise is actually going to be beneficial. Should you get up and jog every morning? Get a DVD and follow along with an exercise program at home? Tae bo? Kick boxing? Richard Simmons? Join a gym? How about a walking club? Should you lift weights? Swimming is good and burns lots of calories, right?

What about yoga? "Oh, wait" I can just hear you say, "I am not limber enough. Besides, don't you have to be a vegetarian, or Hindi, or a celebrity like Madonna to do (gulp) yoga?"

Let's take a look at the practice of yoga. Yoga does not require that you be limber before you begin. Practicing yoga will increase your flexibility in a gentle series of stretching, never going beyond what your body is willing to do that day.

And while the traditional practice of yoga teaches proper eating, no one need be a vegetarian to practice this ancient form of exercise.

And yes, lots of celebrities like Madonna do yoga. And they look great, too, right? It can't all be airbrushing. If it's good enough for Madonna, why not give practicing yoga a try?

Yoga begins with meditation, breathing, relaxation and cleansing. These elements of a yoga session do not require a belief in any particular deity or oneness with the universe. Meditation in yoga simply means paying attention to your breathing and allow the breath to do its relaxing and cleansing work. These aspects of yoga can benefit your metabolic system; help overcome stress and anxiety; and even change your attitude.

The yoga poses have been developed over hundreds of years of experience. You will experience an increased flexibility of your body, leading to a healthier body. Yoga helps to lose excess flab and weight which cause poor health, and is the number one reason people begin exercising. And doing yoga is essentially massaging all your internal organs, keeping them healthy.

Other benefits to doing yoga are:

• Increased lubrication of the joints, muscles and tendons, even ones that you aren't using in your yoga class
• Yoga ensures optimal blood supply to all parts of the body. This flushes out toxins and leads to benefits like increased energy and delayed ageing.

One of the biggest changes you will find from doing yoga is the increased awareness of your mind and body. Yoga harmonizes the mind with the body with all that breathing and relaxation and posing . By balancing the mind with the body, a person can live in greater awareness, with greater joy, with less stress, with more energy, with calmness and with a positive outlook.

Emotional and physical balance through yoga isn't a bad way to start the New Year, is it? So if you were one of the hundreds of thousands of people who vowed to get in shape this year, check out a nice, unthreatening yoga class at your local gym. It would be the best gift you could give yourself.