Yoga & Brain Health

Here are some tips about yoga and brain health that you need to know. Maybe you are already experiencing the benefits of practicing yoga on the brain. Perhaps you would like to start a yoga practice and need more motivation to stay consistent. Find out five remarkable benefits that practicing yoga can have on your brain's health.

1. Make Brain Connections

Yoga can lead your brain cells into making new connections.

When your brain cells make these new connections, it can help with brain function and improve cognitive skills. These new brain connections that your brain makes contribute to all of the benefits of yoga on the brain. Studies have shown that people who practice yoga longer term have a thicker cerebral cortex and hippocampus.

The cerebral cortex impacts areas of the brain that process information. The hippocampus effects our learning and memory. By strengthening these parts of the brain, you keep your brain in good shape throughout your life.

2. Gain Focus

Practicing yoga has been shown to improve focus and attention.

Yoga is made up of three main elements: postures, breathing, and yoga-based meditative practices. Practicing these three combined elements has shown an increase in activity in the DMN (Default mode network).

After practicing yoga for a time, you might find that you are better at focusing. You might also notice an increase in your attention span. Choosing to meditate and utilize breathwork might really help you with focusing and where you choose to place your attention. We all are given the same amount of time in life, how you choose to spend it does matter.

3. Improve Self-Awareness

Yoga will take you into your own self.

Yoga causes you to think deeply. You will find yourself becoming more self-aware the more you sit with yourself. Yoga is all about the unification of your mind, body and spirit. By working to unify these three aspects of yourself, you will become more self-aware.

By getting to know yourself better you will become self-aware. Self-awareness is important and you might see your confidence increase as your self-awareness does. You might also have to work through emotions as you become more self-aware and recognize things in yourself needing change.

4. Slow Cognitive Decline

Yoga can be used as an intervention for typical and pathological cognitive decline.

As we age, we all experience cognitive decline, though some more pronounced than others. If you could help prevent cognitive decline, would you? The same area of the brain that is affected by Alzheimer's has been shown to decline at a slower rate in those who consistently practiced yoga.

Yoga can be used to mitigate neurodegenerative declines, which will improve your future self. Stress and depression have been linked to cognitive decline. Yoga can help alleviate stress and anxiety, helping you help yourself and slowing cognitive decline.

5. Improved Memory

Yoga can improve parts of your brain that affect memory.

Yoga has been shown to improve verbal memory performance due to the increased brain connections that your brain begins to make. Yoga has also been shown to increase action in the DMN (Default mode network) portion of the brain. This portion of the brain contributes to memory function.

The hippocampus portion of the brain that was shown to increase in size among yoga practitioners deals directly with learning and memory processing. So you can do a yoga practice a few times a week to improve your memory function in the future.

This post was written to give you information on yoga and brain health. Yoga can be used as an intervention for pathological and typical cognitive decline in older patients. Yoga can also be used as a lifelong practice or habit to prevent future cognitive decline. All of this information came from a study of active participants. Due to challenges and limitations that come with a live participant study, further studies on yoga and brain health are needed to further and fully establish yoga's full effects on the brains function and cognition.