From helping you battle stress to developing cognitive skills, yoga has a host of benefits to offer for aspiring entrepreneurs.
The physical benefits of yoga are vast and extensively written about. This article is not to rehash those.
But for entrepreneurs, as well as those aspiring to be, yoga addresses a set of key needs -- be it enhanced powers of processing information, increased levels of creativity and productivity, stronger ammunition to beat stress and a resilient psyche among others.
The cognitive, psychological and neurological benefits of yoga are infinite.
Whether an amateur or an expert, practising this ancient art even for few minutes a day will enable you to turn your body and mind into a powerhouse of resources.
Psychological Benefits
Therapists use yoga as an adjunct method to treat obsessive compulsive disorders and attention deficit disorders.
Researches claim that yoga improves the flow of oxygen to the brain and thus keeps depression at bay.
You will develop as much mental satisfaction from a consistent dependence on yoga as much as you do physical.
After an intense yoga session, you will feel cleansed from within.
Your mood will be much improved and you will experience a truly positive outlook in life.
Most entrepreneurs are fitness buffs, yet there is little priority given to mental hygiene.
This is unfortunate because leading the hectic start-up lifestyle makes a burnout is inevitable.
That is unless you take active steps to counter the heavy physical and mental demands that such a lifestyle imposes upon your being.
Yoga is a godsend in that respect.
Stress Benefits
It is not harmful for the body to generate stress.
For the early man, stress was a crucial survival strategy.
It helped him stay alive and protected from predators, fellow enemies and the violent natural disasters that was common during prehistoric times.
Thanks to our forefathers, stress is embedded in our genes.
It is a fallacy all entrepreneurs will be familiar with.
When you are working tirelessly from the ground up to build your business, the body is the first to take a hit.
The gruelling schedule and brutal deadlines churn out stress in clumps.
As mentioned, it is not harmful for the body to generate stress. But it is fatal for the body when the stress refuses to leave the system.
It flushes your organs with acid.
One research study found that human beings experience the same level of stress when they are stuck in a traffic jam, presumably getting late for work, as giraffes and zebras feel in the African wild when being chase by lions!
Stress is a key causal factor of most common twenty first century diseases such as heart and brain problems, blood pressure, diabetes and other organ diseases
Even the most inexperienced individuals who try yoga for the first time feel calm and relaxed after their very first session.
Those who have been doing it for a while have likely extinguished stress from their system.
Yoga uses key techniques and mediation tactics that help silence the constant motion of the human mind that results in the stress we feel.
Easy as it may sound, not thinking anything is the hardest thing to do.
Yoga silences the mind and gives it a calm canvas to rest on. This harmonises the body and mind beyond belief.
Neurological Benefits
When we practice yoga, the brain rewires itself into a healthier mode automatically, which consequently affects the body likewise.
Balance is restored between the physical and neurological points of communication and an unrestricted flow of holistic energy occurs that soothes the mind, body and brain.
Yoga also improves memory and learning, enhances cognitive abilities and clears vision. It improves coordination and depth perception manifold.
Biochemical Benefits
The biochemical benefits of yoga are too many to count.
To give a cursory glance, it decreases glucose and sodium levels in the blood.
ATPase, Haematocrit and Haemoglobin levels face an increase while lymphocyte and white blood cell count face a reduction.
Thyroxin, Vitamin C and Protein Serums also increase heavily. The sympathetic nervous system dominates our subconscious, helping us lead a better quality of life.
To put it simply, when you are in the peak pinnacle of your health, your output will be that much better.
Creativity and Intuition
In this age of worshipping productivity and being constantly on the lookout for the next big idea, it is worthwhile to remember that our inner selves are where the best ideas come from.
Yoga helps you reconnect with your soul, honing the skills entrepreneurs desire above all- creativity and intuition.
Yoga reduces anxiety and depression and helps kill self-doubt.
It increases somatic and kinaesthetic awareness.
As a result, self-acceptance and actualization become achieveable boundaries which help us churn out the creative gems within us that is unique in each and every individual.
Social skills, wellbeing, attention span and confidence improves by leaps and bounds while hostility levels face a total rejection.
Tension in the mind and body eat away our cores, bury our instincts and leave us as hollow shells rather than happy and vibrant human beings.
Yoga dispels this stress and tension, thereby enhancing our powers of perception and intuition.
It hones our nature given sense of instincts into a superfine level.
This is the closest we can come to being super humans.
Photograph: Andrew Whalley/Creative Commons
