International Yoga Day and Its Significance of Indian Heritage

The word yoga has been derived from the Sanskrit word Yuj (Yoke), which means bringing physical body and spirit together. Yoga is a physical, mental and spiritual practice that helps in the transformation of your body and mind. There are numerous proven benefits of yoga.

Yoga day – Its significance

The wealth of ancient India’s knowledge is quickly becoming the part of the people’s life style of Western Countries, especially across many countries of the US and Europe. However, in India, many of the ancient Indian practices never got an endorsement from the government – one among them is Yoga.

But, recently Narendra Modi, the Prime Minister of India, in his speech at the UN general assembly had made an appeal for observing International Yoga Day. After a span of three months of Modi’s speech at the biggest international forum, 175 members out of 193 of the UN countries agreed by an approval, declaring June 21 as the International Day of Yoga, in recognition of the ancient India’s “holistic approach to health and well-being”. The aim of this day is to promote yoga among the people for their well-being.

Modi also added a few words on yoga – many people across the world has made this yoga as an integral part of their lives and it’s going to inspire many other people towards yoga. Yoga has the power for uniting the mankind together; embodies the unity of mind and body; harmony between the man and power; thought and action; restraint and fulfillment. It beautifully combines the Gyan (knowledge), Karm (work) and Bhakti (devotion).

As a part of it, the UN general Assembly (UNGA) resolution said that the goal of the yoga day was “wider dissemination of information about the benefits of practicing yoga would be beneficial for the health of the world population.” The impact of this resolution may yoke these efforts in the area of Global health.

The diverse benefits that come from the yoga are promoting the “resilience against non-communicable diseases”, apart from helping the people in dealing with stress in emergency situations.

Physical and mental health benefits of yoga

There are various health benefits of practicing yoga on a regular basis – traditional yoga poses, breathing, meditation and exercise. At a time when people across the world struggle in order to get fitness and to have healthy life, particularly when the modern allopathic medicines are turning to be of no use, the yoga helps the people in a great way for getting a good quality of life. Few benefits that you can get from yoga are listed below:

• More flexibility and fitness
  Yoga has the power of acting upon each and every joint of the body, including the ones that are not visible on the radar screen and make them exercised giving the flexibility to the body. Fitness can be achieved when you are mentally and physically balanced. For this, yoga postures such as breathing (pranayama) and meditation helps a lot.

• Weight control
  Regular yoga practice keeps your digestion system function well. This brings a balance, when your body asks for food. Then, automatically you can observe the changes in your body weight.

• Enhanced energy
  A few minutes of everyday yoga will give you freshness and make you energetic, the entire day. 10 minutes of daily meditation keeps your mind peace and makes you recharge your energy.

• Better immunity
  Any irregularity in the body effects the mind and gives an unpleasant feeling or makes you restless. But as discussed, yoga poses help in strengthening the body organs; especially, the muscles. Meditation and breathing relieves your stress and improves the immunity.

• Improved intuition
  Meditation and yoga have the great power of improving the intuitive ability. So, you can have automatically have the clarity of what needs to be, when it needs to be done and where which gives you positive results. You can experience it yourself.

These are the few major health benefits of having yoga as a part of your life.