As I incorporated meditation and yoga in my life, I realized that the concepts are not only spiritual, but also psychological says Yogacharya Ashutosh Kumar of Nayati Medicity

When I came across meditation and yoga in the early days, I encountered a rather complex picture of the practices due to their subjective portrayal as per their impact on the lives of people. However, as I incorporated them in my life, I realized that, for me, the concepts are not only spiritual, but psychological too.

Meditation and yoga are simple, yet effective techniques that are instrumental in bringing the mind at rest, irrespective of the situation. Fundamentally, both come across as concentration techniques that help to disconnect from the mental spirals and process of over thinking by focusing the attention on a single object. This could be a mandala, a physical object, a memory, or just the sound of breathing – it varies according to the level of practitioner.

These techniques have been known to provide mental wellness and improve decision making abilities. The underlying idea behind meditation or yoga is to calm the mind to the point where one can control their thoughts instead of vice-versa. Once I started practicing it, I realized that witnessing your own thoughts is the first step to eliminate the non-productive ones. Once this was done, I experienced calmness and relaxation of mind. When your mind is calm and relaxed, your quality of observation improves and when you observe better your understanding capacity improves and you take better decisions about the situations, problems, and life.

Psychological benefits

Initially, meditation and yoga seem like a challenging task, but we should not be afraid or lose hope. This can be attributed to the fact that while everyone knows the importance of sleep for physically relaxing the body, most of us do not factor in the dire need of relaxing the mind. Consider this, the lifestyle of a majority of people consists of constantly juggling between long working hours, professional stress, and personal duties. In such times where the mind is constantly running on different tangents, practicing yoga and meditation, in my opinion, becomes imperative. Here are some of the psychological benefits that I have experienced after regularly practicing yoga and meditation for nearly a decade:-

• Live the moment

Stress and emotional impulses often get the best of you as an individual continues to fret upon the past and worry about the future. With yoga and meditation, you can discover what it feels like to live in the movement by stopping mental chatter, which further allows you to analyze situations and handle them in a subsequent manner.

• Creativity Quotient

Every job requires an individual to have a creative approach and provide innovative solutions. However, excessive mental baggage can easily deprive one of delivering the best. Yoga and meditation help in removing this hurdle.

• Relieve stress

The psychology of meditation supports the argument that a person learns to let go of the routine problems that cloud the mind and try to go with the flow. Meditation allows one to relieve stress by sidelining the thoughts that constantly revolve in your head and enables you to take control of the circumstances.

Yoga At Nayati Healthcare

Yoga and meditation can broaden perspective towards life and help empathize with people on a psychological level. Ms Niira Radia, Chairperson of Nayati Healthcare understands the difference yoga can make in people’s lives. She introduced the idea of regular yoga and meditation sessions at Nayati Medicity at Mathura. Often, the people accompanying patients or those who come to visit their relatives or loved ones in the hospital are under a lot of stress as they tend to overthink about the worst-case scenarios. In order to alleviate stress, relatives are offered yoga sessions at the hospital premises. This not only keeps the relatives calm and engaged, but this initiative has created a lot of goodwill for Nayati in the region.

Anyone who works long hours is vulnerable to burnout. Nurses, doctors, and other medical professionals are especially susceptible to this. Healthcare professionals’ often encounter physical and emotional burnout which can have a negative impact on the overall quality of life. At Nayati Medicity, yoga and meditation sessions are being held for the caregivers daily in the morning and evening, this helps them clear their mind and stay positive.

In addition, with a vision to provide holistic health to the vulnerable communities, Nayati Healthcare has reached out to more than 80,000 villagers who are below the poverty line, around Mathura and Agra and taught them the benefits of practicing Yoga.

Yoga and meditation is the most ancient, scientific, simple and powerful platform which helps in learning how to handle stress – physical, mental, emotional or psychological.

Read more updates on Niira Radia and Nayati Healthcare.