• Question: How does yoga or meditation relax the brain?

    Asked by Resh@science to Hayley, Jimi on 17 Mar 2016.
    • Photo: Hayley Moulding

      Hayley Moulding answered on 17 Mar 2016:

      Ah good question. Yoga needs us to be relaxed and calm. What it does as it helps us to learn how to relax our bodies and keep our minds ‘open’. What this actually means is to reduce the activity of the brain so it is working automatically at a low activity. It increases what is called ‘alpha’ waves. These waves help us to relax and our brains to be in standby mode.

    • Photo: Jimi Wills

      Jimi Wills answered on 17 Mar 2016:

      yoga and meditation make you focus on one thing and:

      1. stop you interacting with the world around you
      2. stop you thinking about other things
      3. make you pay attention to your body
      4. make you focus on breathing, which helps regulate your breath
      5. stop you looking at your phone

      all this helps you to ignore things that are stressing you out, an reconnect with yourself.

      this means your brain isn’t trying to juggle lots of information all at once, and it also means relaxing hormones are released that help stabilise the activity of the whole nervous system.

      i highly recommend both yoga and meditation!

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