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5
Oct 11

Former NFL player has ALS, recounts managing personal change with yoga

Members of Atlanta yoga classes may once have disliked former New Orleans Saints safety Steve Gleason. After all, in the first game held in the Superdome after Hurricane Katrina, the former NFL safety blocked a key punt made by the Atlanta Falcons. However, today Gleason serves as an inspiration for most football fans, ever since he announced that he suffers from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).

Also known as Lou Gehrig's disease, the condition is a progressive neuromuscular disorder that increasingly impairs the ability of nerve cells to send signals to the muscles.

Despite experiencing serious reductions in his mobility, Gleason will act as honorary team captain in the upcoming game between the Saints and the Houston Texans, according to the New Orleans Times-Picayune.

The 34-year-old former NFL star has a history of being inspirational. Besides starting the literacy- and environmentalism-centric nonprofit One Sweet World Foundation, at one time he regularly donated to charity, studied Eastern philosophy and used yoga for managing personal change.

"Steve always marched to the beat of his own drum," former Saints player Scott Fujita told the news source. Even with his ALS, Gleason has no plans to slow down.

ALS affects roughly one in 20,000 Americans, according to the National Library of Medicine.

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26
Aug 11

Making personal changes through meditation is a time-honored tradition

"Where does self-discovery begin? Does it occur within, or can a person begin making personal changes unknowingly, spurred from without?" These questions are just one facet of the inner dialogue one might pursue during yoga meditation, a practice that has persisted in the U.S. for more than 150 years.

You may think of meditation as a trendy topic, something that only recently became popular in American yoga community centers or among practitioners of Zen. However, the history of inner contemplation in the Western world dates back to the Civil War at least.

In the middle of the 1800s, American thinkers like Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau and a group of open-minded individualists collectively called the Transcendentalists were using meditation and yoga-based personal change models to go on inner voyages.

The Transcendentalists believed in the primacy of nature. They felt that contemplating it could open doorways inside one's mind, leading to growth, satisfaction and peace.

In his history volume Meditation and the Evolution of Cosmic Consciousness, author Don Ayre says this group was instrumental in popularizing meditation and dialectics in the U.S.

"[They] looked to meditation as a means of bridging the gap between their ongoing self-discovery and the social action needed to create a community of mutual openness and support," Ayre states.

Since the 1800s, meditation has appeared in all sorts of Western texts. It makes a cameo of sorts in W. Somerset Maugham's The Razor Edge, a seminal novel about the effects of Eastern thought on a disillusioned Western man.

"'How could you stand it for tow years?' cried Isabel.
"'They passed like a flash. I've spent days that seemed to be unconscionably longer.'
"'What did you do with yourself all the time?'
"'I read. I took long walks. I went out in a boat on the lagoon. I meditated. Meditation is very hard work; after two or three hours of it you're…exhausted.'"

This passage points to the discipline required for yoga meditation, but also to its ability to sharpen focus and lead to personal change.

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16
Aug 11

Yoga, commitment, honesty aid in making personal changes

Making personal changes is rarely easy, particularly when modern life seems to throw so many obstacles in the way of our individual, personal change models. How can you change your life? Being honest is a start, and joining a yoga community is a good first step toward real candor.

You might be thinking, "I thought yoga was more of a physical fitness regimen." This may be true for some of the most tiring or high-intensity yoga systems, but those that promote peace and reflection often address the brain at least as much as they do the body.

In essence, the best, most effective yoga styles deal with the delicate connection between the mind and body. Becoming a better person, learning to accept oneself, achieving a state of equilibrium and inner peace – these are all goals that involve plenty of mental work.

Fortunately, yoga attends to the mental needs of practitioners. Holistic health contains all facets of a person – their inner self, the outer persona, their connection to the community, their affinity for nature, their commitment to mankind and their ability to be honest with and open to the world.

The inability to be honest and committed is one of the reasons that so many people enter yoga programs looking for a big personal change, not to mention the countless Americans pursuing ongoing therapy or counselling.

In fact, a whole therapeutic movement, called Radical Honesty, has sprung up around the perception that candor is supremely important. Its founder, Brad Blanton, maintains that "if you go out and tell each other the truth, you'll be happier. You're better nurtured in a world in which you're telling the truth than you are in a world in which you're cowering, hiding and lying."

Like many yoga instructors, Blanton – who called Esquire Magazine "pretentious" in an article published in, what else, Esquire Magazine – maintains that honesty and openness are the gateways to happiness and wholeness.

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12
Aug 11

Atlanta-based studies say yoga helps people improving health, managing personal change

There's great news for people taking Atlanta yoga classes! Given that yoga instruction is good for the mind, body and soul, researchers have performed a number of scientific investigations in Georgia's capital, establishing that yoga can contribute to heart health and a positive body image.

One such study, published in the journal Circulation, found that practicing yoga for as few as eight weeks may help reduce the symptoms associated with heart failure.

Researchers from Georgia State University (GSU) and the Emory University School of Medicine – both of which are based in Atlanta – came to this conclusion after giving either yoga-based treatments or traditional medical therapy to patients with heart failure.

This condition has a number of causes, including weakened cardiac muscles, poor vascular health, coronary artery disease, hypertension and diabetes.

In essence, heart failure consists primarily of the gradual inability of the heart to pump blood through the body, as the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI) defines it.

The Georgia group found that people who engaged in yoga and meditation for eight weeks reduced their heart failure-related inflammation, increased their exercise tolerance and improve their overall quality of life.

This news may cheer up the more than 5.7 million Americans believed by the NHLBI to have cardiac failure.

Of course, yoga is also good for the mind, in that it aids in reducing stress and managing personal change. Consider a study conducted by scientists at GSU to determine whether yoga helps children improve their self-image.

The results appeared in the Journal of Clinical Child Psychology. Researchers asked a dozen third-graders to engage in several weeks of mindfulness exercises as a way to cope with poor physical coordination and negative body image.

The team found that children who engaged in yoga displayed improved self-image after the awareness-training sessions.

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10
Aug 11

How to get started making personal changes with yoga

Are you looking to make personal changes in your life, to get into shape, to escape from spiraling stress or to simply discover who you really are? Perhaps someone you know has suggested you try yoga. (There are plenty of beginner's Atlanta yoga classes to go around, that's for sure.) If so, here is a list of a few simple things to do or think about as you try yoga for the first time.

1. First of all, you need to think about what areas of your life you hope to change, improve or emphasize. After all, various styles of yoga address different aspects of your being, from your strength and flexibility to your peace of mind and sense of community, the Charlestown Patch recently noted. Only a few truly optimal yoga regimens polish every facet of an individual.

2. Prepare a bit, both logistically and practically. Are there any yoga programs or community centers in your areas? Are you realistically physically prepared to do a little stretching and posing? Do you own a loose, two-piece, natural-fiber outfit, something long-sleeved and appropriate for yoga classes of all venues? Do you want to practice alone or with others? According to PsychCentral, these are questions you should address before getting into the swing of yoga.

3. Choose a yoga program that looks right for you. There is no need to commit to an extended period of classes. Most community centers allow you a trial period, during which you can see if the locale, classes, instructors and fellow students all suit you.

4. Finally, be open-minded. The Patch story emphasizes this, as does an article on Men's Health. If yoga feels a little funny at first, it is probably because you are unaccustomed to such a simple, novel routine. Riding a bicycle feels awkward at first, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't keep at it. After all, all the fun is yet to come!

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24
Mar 11

Yoga attunes inmates to responsibility, interpersonal well-being

At its core, Dahn Yoga helps practitioners develop confidence and integrity through self-awareness. Selfhood is important, and working on bettering the self can have positive consequences for the mind and the body, but yoga also emphasizes the inseparable connection between the individual and the collective group.

Perhaps this is why some prison programs are utilizing yoga as a method of pacification, reflection and healing behind bars.

Giving inmates time to reflect on their lives and to pursue spiritual fulfillment may help keep the penitentiary environment a tranquil one. It may even reduce jail time by keeping prisoners occupied and content, Fox News Orlando reports.

Several studies have shown that yoga can improve behavior in a prison population. A 2005 report published in the Californian Journal of Health Promotion found that inmates who practiced yoga had a more positive outlook and felt more connection and compassion for others.

A similar study conducted the same year and appearing in the Contemporary Justice Review determined that yoga and meditation helped prisoners find a sense of truth and meaningfulness that they did not possess before.

This sort of mental exploration is the goal of Dahn Yoga, a system which promotes mental healing as much as physical health.

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26
Jan 10

Brain Education For World Peace

It has been said that peace is not just the absence of war, the harmony between the internal being of a person and the environment. This definition of peace is best observed in human development and study of behavioral sciences. It has long been observed that an adult is more often than not the result of his or her childhood experiences. If child is exposed to violence, then he or she is likely to be violent when it gets to be a fully developed adult.

Similarly, medics have observed that persons who are religious and strictly observe their religious practices or meditate a lot are likely to be live longer. This is because they experience less illness and even when sick, are likely to recuperate faster.

These are evidence that what is observed in a society is the sum total of what is in the emotions and the physic of the people. For example, due to the high quality of life in Nordic countries, the people report less incidences and prevalence of mental illness. The people are also relatively more peaceful.

By emphasizing the training for people on how to manage the internal environment, for example by managing the fears, negative feelings, pressure, stress, and other sources of negative energy in the body, then one is able to contribute to world peace. There will be more peace makers in such as community than the trouble makers.

Brain education provides such an opportunity or tool to bridge the gap between inner peace and the external environment. It can contribute to world peace because those who train in it are equipped with the skills for management of the cognitive and motors.

Brain education practitioners have also recognized that the optimum functionality of the brain is achieved through regular exercise. This exercise is not limited to the physical exercises alone, but also to the cognitive exercises.

When several people are healthier in the brain because of the exercises and brain education, we shall have a population of tolerant men and women. They will be slow to anger and will not need to secure their individual survival. Dahn Yoga employs simple exercises based on ancient Korean healing traditions for its members and instructors.

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