Benefits and precautions of practicing yoga in winter

Most yoga practitioners generally believe that practicing yoga should sweat in order to achieve the effect of detoxification and weight loss. But in winter, when the temperature is lower, the amount of perspiration when practicing yoga will be greatly reduced. If you want to sweat a lot at this time, you must strengthen the warm-up process in the early stage. Preparation for warm-up before winter sports is very important. Let's take a look at the precautions:

1. Take a hot bath before starting to accelerate the blood flow in the body and achieve the effect of warming the body;

2. Drink a cup of warm water to warm your body; some people abroad like to drink coffee to warm your body, but personally do not recommend it.

3. Do some exercises to move joints, including toes, ankles, knees, hips, fingers, wrists, elbows, shoulders, neck, etc., wait until the joints of the body are slightly warm and fully stretched, and then start practicing postures;

4. People who have a certain foundation of practice can do a combination of prayers and pay attention not to stretch their bodies too much for the first time. Generally, after three times, their body temperature will rise and all joints in the body will be completely stretched.

5. When practicing breathing, you can put a blanket or shawl on your body to keep warm. The practice of breathing can calm your mind and concentrate, but it will also lower your body temperature.

6. Many people like outdoor yoga, but should try to avoid outdoor yoga in winter. First, due to the cold weather, people's bodies will become stiff outdoors and are prone to injuries; second, yoga is about an atmosphere. Work pressure at the end of the year is high, and many white-collar workers will intensify their work. In a good environment, yoga can effectively relieve tension. Nerves, so if you can't choose a good place outdoors, the atmosphere will be difficult to achieve, and the yoga effect will not achieve the best effect. Third, it is easy to catch cold outside, cold air invades the body, and people are easy to get sick.

7. In winter, we should focus on basic yoga asana practice, and do not practice overly difficult asana, especially reverse asana.

8. It is best to warm up the body in cold weather with big movements and repeated large muscle movements. For example, standing and doing leg muscle training will warm up the body faster. Although you don't have to sweat to warm up the body, the rise in body temperature after warming up can move the joints and muscles of the body, so that you won't feel that many movements are hard to do when the weather is cold.

9. In terms of postures, in winter, breathing should be coordinated with movements to do more in-depth. You can use ujayyi breathing (inhale into the floor of the lung cavity, with the diaphragm protruding out and making a hissing sound), or abdominal breathing (inhale into the abdominal cavity, with the abdomen protruding). As long as you focus on the coordination of movement and breathing during practice, sufficient oxygen can burn more calories and enter the practice situation faster.

10. A deeper posture means that when you stay in a certain posture, you don't just stop in place, but you have to constantly lengthen or twist it to make the posture deeper. But during a big break, remember to keep warm, otherwise you will easily catch a cold when you just sweat a little and the pores open.

11. Generally speaking, breathing through the left and right nostrils and rapid exhalation can make the body slightly warm, which is more suitable for winter practice.

Benefits of practicing yoga in winter:

1. Prevent weight gain and avoid depression

In cold and gloomy winter weather, many people prefer to stay warm in heated houses and eat more food instead of exercising to keep warm. However, eating more and exercising less not only makes you feel sleepy and lazy, but also makes you gain weight. When it was time to take off my winter clothes and change into spring clothes, I realized that my clothes were too small! Practicing yoga is a way to prevent weight gain and avoid depression. Whether it is winter or summer, it will make you feel energetic, healthier and happier!

(2) Accelerate blood circulation and avoid being a "cold beauty in winter"

Many women have cold hands and feet in winter, and practicing yoga can improve this situation. Traditional Chinese medicine believes that because the nerve endings of hands and feet are far away from the heart, the cold weather causes blood vessels to contract and insufficient blood supply, resulting in cold hands and feet. Practicing yoga will promote blood circulation, thus achieving the effect of warming hands and feet. Hiding from the cold in winter and lack of exercise will slow down your blood circulation, making your body feel colder than usual, so you may just want to run to the warmer or get under the covers to keep warm. However, once you start practicing yoga postures, your blood circulation will gradually increase and your whole body will be bathed in warmth and vitality, which will make you want to move more and more.

(3) Relieving accumulated tension and stress can help you lose weight

Yoga postures and relaxation techniques will make you more aware of how you feel-so you don't have the tendency to overeat or binge on unhealthy foods. When you practice yoga postures and some basic yoga breathing techniques, your body is like full of oxygen, which helps burn fat. If you do a complete yoga practice-including yoga relaxation techniques and yoga voice meditation-you will relieve accumulated tension and stress. And stress is known to cause people to overeat or choose unhealthy snacks.

(4) Enhanced body resistance, variable temperament beauty

Winter is the season with high incidence of many diseases, such as respiratory diseases, low immunity, colds, joint diseases, etc. Adhere to regular yoga practice, enhance the body's ability to adapt to the cold, improve the body's resistance, enhance cardiopulmonary function, reduce the incidence of diseases, allow us to gain more strength, extraordinary flexibility and good balance, and make our body stronger. Strong and straight. In the cold winter, we are still a healthy "temperament beauty"