I am person that values fitness and working out. I value fitness and working out very highly because I strongly believe that they are essential components to a happy and healthy lifestyle. With that being said, I am always looking for new and exciting workouts to try because falling into a boring routine can be lethal to success. Recently, I have stumbled upon yoga because they offer classes at the White building, which is one of the fitness facilities on campus for those of you who many not know. I found the yoga classes to be not only a workout but very calming, so this had me thinking if yoga has the ability to relax people can it help treat diseases like depression as well? I decided to research that specific topic and luckily there were many studies done on how yoga affects people with depression.
Science unrelated, my major is Recreation Park Tourism Management so I love hearing of therapeutic recreation activities that can beneficial to a person’s health, like help lowering depression rates. Depression can be caused by various reasons, but the main factor is stress. Every person experiences a wide variety of stressors throughout their life. For example, losing a family member, failing a test, spilling you coffee and many more. Stress to the point of causing depression can drastically affect the normality of a person’s life. It is more than likely that every person at least in their lifetime will unfortunately experience stress to a certain level that they are considered depressed.
An article by PubMed Central titled “How Might Yoga Help Depression? A Neurobiological Perspective” examined yoga in conjunction with depression. PubMed Central acknowledged through their findings that yoga can help a person through depression in many different aspects. For example, while engaging in yoga the participant reaches a point of relaxation where they only focus on the present and forget about the issues that may be going on in their daily lives. The ability to release is important and this is a technique that is heavily taught within any type of yoga class. Also, the article by PubMed Central suggests that yoga assists in depression by improving a person’s mood because it recognized that everyone has the power over how they feel.
A randomized control trial(s) study was done by the Official Journal of ADAA that also examined yoga in conjunction to depression levels. This study took a total of 619 participants with various levels of depression and had them participate in yoga exercises. During the yoga that the participants participated in, their depression levels would sink. Depression levels would sink because yoga was providing a momentary escape. The study conducted by the Official Journal of ADAA concluded in their results that yoga does indeed help with depression, even if it is only for a short period of time.
There are many more studies that examine yoga in conjunction to depression, so if this blog post interested you I suggest you check them out. Overall, I am very pleased to see a simple activity, that anyone can participate in, being able to affect a life in such a positive way. Even if you are not depressed, you should try yoga! As mentioned above, yoga can have many beneficial aspects and most importantly it can help out with the daily stressors we experience on a day to day basis.
