Meditation and Yoga

The practices of meditation and yoga have their rooted in ancient traditions and cultures. Meditation and yoga when practiced together strengthen the mind and body connection, improving body fitness and general well-being. Most poses of yoga are associated with meditation, which include controlled breathing throughout the yoga poses. You can meditate without yoga also by simply breathing, relaxing, concentrating and clearing your mind. 

According to the National Health Interview Survey, “More than 20 million Americans meditate regularly and over 13 million do yoga”. Meditation and yoga together are a complete package of good health, a peaceful mind, and strong body. The benefits of meditation and yoga are countless. Here, we look at top 5 benefits of practicing meditation & yoga:

Stress management: Regular yoga and meditation practice helps reduce stress and control body conditions such as panic disorders, cardiovascular disease and high blood pressure. It also keeps you fresh and active throughout the entire day.

Increase body flexibility: Today people are bound by sedentary employment, which leads to reduced body flexibility, fitness and muscle mass. Yoga helps in improving body flexibility as the poses focus on lengthening and stretching the body muscles. 

Emotional boost: Both meditation and yoga increase mental focus and provide relief to our brain. Meditation provides an emotional boost through deep concentration and relaxation. It can be done anywhere in your home, office desk or park. 

Weight loss: Surya Namaskar, Pranayama and Kapal Bhati are the most prominent forms of yoga, when followed by meditation, they help in reducing body weight. Yoga is the most natural way of decreasing extra body weight.

Improves overall health: Mediation and yoga help in improve overall health. Today life is full of stress, anxiety disorders, fatigue, allergies and few hour of sleep. Adding meditation and yoga to your life will improve the quality of life.

These were just a few benefits that can be achieved through meditation and yoga. We hope all this makes you think to start meditation and yoga. If you just want to take your health and fitness at the top level, start practicing it daily.

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Low Salt Diet

One step to a healthy life is healthy eating, which includes maintaining a low-salt diet. Salt, a sodium chloride, is a key ingredient in food. It adds flavor, enriches color and is an important part of any seasoning. It is difficult to imagine food without the taste of salt. Salt helps nerves and muscles work properly. It also helps to transmit nerve signals and balance body fluids. However, salt is also a major contributor to high blood pressure. High intake of salt can have many negative health effects, such as hypertension, osteoporosis, kidney failure, stomach cancer, and other heart diseases.

According to The Food and Drug Administration, 2400 milligrams (mg) is the ideal salt intake per day for a healthy adult. On the other hand, people with heart disease and high blood pressure should cut down salt consumption to 1500 mg daily. It’s not easy to reduce the salt intake as our taste bud will not like it. But, we can control the consumption of salt by many other ways, such as:

• We should avoid eating processed and preserved food, like chips, cheese, salted nuts, pickles, etc. as it contains high-level of sodium and can increase the salt intake by almost double.
• Start adding more fruits and vegetables to your diet. Fruits and vegetables generally don’t have a lot of sodium and are good for health.
• Instead of adding salt to your food, use olive oil or balsamic vinaigrette. Add more herbs and fresh spices to your food which would reduce the intake of salt.
• Choose foods with high potassium, such as potatoes, yoghurt, green leafy vegetables, fish, squash, and more. Potassium counters the impact of sodium and help regulating body blood pressure.

The point is, you only can take control of the salt intake. All it takes is the willingness to do it and a little effort. A recent study has shown, people with high sodium intake have a higher risk of death than people with less sodium intake. Learn to read food labels and ingredient list. Always check the label information on food packages to help you pick the best low-sodium choices.

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Benefits of Statin in Lower Risk Patients

According to a research presented by the American College of Cardiology, Chicago, “Cholesterol-lowering statins can prevent the danger of heart attacks, strokes and heart failure in older people”. The study involved about over 13,000 men and women with greater heart risks because of increased cholesterol, diabetes, high blood pressure, physical inactivity or other heart conditions. The patients involved were mostly white and from different regions, like Europe, South America, China, Canada and South Africa.

The study further revealed that one can decrease heart disease by using a statin or blood pressure drugs or a combination of the two. Moreover, the patients involved in the research, who consumed the drug did not have any heart problem and faced lower risks of developing it. Also, the statin approach worked faster and better.

As per Dr. Salim Yusuf, a medicine professes at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, “The effective result of this study can be seen in people across the globe”.

The result revealed that men, aged 55 and women, aged 60 are at higher risk of getting heart attacks and strokes. Cholesterol-lowering statins can reduce the danger of getting heart related problems by 25%. Blood pressure drugs alone worked better for patients who had high blood pressure. Although there were few side-effects of satin seen in patients such as weakness and muscle pain.

Dr. Clyde Yancy, Cardiology Chief at Northwestern Medicine, Chicago adds that this drug has favoring results of reducing heart problems. However, he also emphasized that a healthy lifestyle, a good diet and physical activity should be included in people’s daily life to stay fit.

Through this program, it has become easy for people to fight with the heart disease, including stroke and high blood pressure. A recent study shows that heart disease can claim the ultimate cost, as the most common cause is death.

However, the research only looked at short-term results and is not sure whether this program can lead to long-lasting health benefits. The success of this program has encouraged the researchers to extend their research in various sectors to improve the health of the people. This program is a step in the right direction for the well-being of the people.

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Mind Strengthening

To do any activity successfully, you need a good mind-set. A strong mind depends on the health of your brain. The human brain is a very flexible organ, it continuously changes and adapts. As your body needs a daily workout to be healthy, your brains also need a workout to enhance your memory and mental strength. There are some techniques to improve your mental performance and increase cognitive skills and learn new things.

Having a good healthy diet full of vitamins and minerals is good for your mind. Good healthy food promotes physical health and so our mental health. Similarly, physical games are good to improve body fitness, but one should play memory games also, such as puzzles and brain teasers to improve problem solving abilities. Adopt a hobby of doing word puzzles such as crossword puzzles or logic puzzles, like Sudoku. You should avoid drinking too much of alcohol as it can affect your brain negatively.

Meditation can actually change your brain. It transforms the brainwave pattern into an Alpha level that promotes healing and mind becomes relaxed, fresh, calm and beautiful. Daily practice of meditation can result in decrease of anxiety and increase in creativity and happiness. It’s recommended to do meditation for a minimum of 15 minutes a day to improve the brain power.

These were the few easy and simple tips to strength your mind. Moreover, there are many other ways to strengthen the brain, from playing board games, learning new skills, reading books and taking enough sleep and more. Remember the brain is the most vital part of our body and regulates other body organs. It’s important to keep it healthy and active by giving it a regular exercise. So stimulate your brain in different ways regularly, and you will always be stronger and smarter.

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Physical Inactivity Can Lead to The Risk of Thrombosis

Physical activity is a must for a healthier life as it reduces the risk of several deadly diseases. People of all ages can benefit from being physically active. People with poor physical activity or fitness display higher platelet activation compared to people who have an average to good fitness level. According to a research conducted by MedUni Vienna Institute for Physiology and University of Vienna Institute for Sports Sciences, physical inactivity can lead to the development of blood clots in our body. These blood clots can block blood vessels and cut off the blood supply to organs.

The researchers further revealed that if people increase their fitness level by endurance training, such as running for a maximum 45 minutes just twice or thrice in a week. They can normalize the body’s platelet function. This can be achieved over a three-month period.

Cardiovascular diseases, like heart attack and stroke are the most common reason of death throughout the world. These diseases impact the function of various target body cells. Physical activity can increase the movement of blood platelets that results in clumping of the body cells. This could lead to the development of a thrombus (clot), which impedes blood flow in the body. Activated platelets also contribute to the inflammatory processes by releasing a number of mediators that facilitates the development of atherosclerotic vascular changes and reduce the risk of cardiovascular diseases.

However the results show that even moderate exercise can bring about tremendous improvements in cardiovascular activities within a comparatively very short time. In the end all that matters is the consistency to do the exercise, therefore any type of physical activity is better than no activity at all.

Hope, now you know the benefits of being physically active. Put this knowledge in your daily schedule and make your quality of life better.

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Impact of Eating Rice Cereals or Rice Products

Food made from rice or rice cereals is our first choice for feeding babies, due to it being easily available in stores and short prep time. It’s important to note that rice contains high levels of inorganic arsenic, which is harmful for babies and can cause cancer or skin diseases. A market study has revealed that children who eat rice cereals and other rice-based products have more than three times the level of arsenic in their urine as compared to children who eat less or avoid rice products. This study has raised a concern among parents.

The research involved nearly 750 infants living in New Hampshire to analyze the eating habits of the babies. Scientists concluded that, by age 1, about 80 % of babies had been introduced to rice products. It’s surprising to know that such a high number of babies are consuming rice products. It has been suggested that parents should reduce using rice products during this important phase of a child’s development and also include other food product in baby’s diet.

The Food and Drug Administration have tested around 76 samples of rice cereals for verifying the concentrations of inorganic arsenic and found that most of the samples contained arsenic. So, the agency has advised parents, not to be dependent only on rice products or cereals. They should give a balance diet to the babies, including grains, wheat, oats and barley.

A wide variety of a balanced diet will reduce the danger of high arsenic level in babies. Pregnant women should also decrease the intake of rice and include other grains in their diet. We can also decrease arsenic in rice products by cooking them with water. Cook rice with high amount of water, and after boiling, drain off the extra water. It will reduce the arsenic content in rice by 50% to 60%.

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