Help through Sahaja Yoga to overcome stress
Sahaja-Yoga works on awakening of primordial energy within us called Kundalini. When the Kundalini rises and crosses the sixth energy centre, it brings us into a state of thoughtless-awareness - no distracting thoughts from future or past are bombarding the mind. All conflicts residing in the mind that create stress, evaporate. We enter into a state of peace within, remaining completely in the present and aware of everything around us.
Sahaja-Yoga meditation brings us into balance.
As mentioned about the human subtle system, we have a subtle body within us that consists of seven energy centres and three channels. In our daily life, either one of these channels can be more active leading to a certain state of our behavior. If we move to the right channel, we become overactive, restless, stressed and tense. If we move to the left channel, we become depressed and lethargic. But if we remain in the centre channel, we become dynamic, energetic, moral - all leading to an integrated personality. The regular practice of Sahaja-Yoga helps us to activate the centre channel.
Finally, Sahaja-Yoga connects us to the All Pervading power. We become one with the energy source, which creates, manages and nourishes the nature and is the primal spring of the energy that is called Kundalini. As we are always connected to the source of the energy, our energy centres are constantly nourished by this All Pervading power. So we always remain fresh and cheerful and do not get fatigued, tired and stressed out and completely enjoy every activity we are involved in.
Medical Research on effects of Sahaja Yoga on Hypertension
Medical Research conducted by physiology department of the Lady Hardinge Medical College, New Delhi, India and Sucheta Kripalani Hospital on varied groups of individual Sahaja-Yoga meditators has revealed that the practice of Sahaja-Yoga is accompanied by a decrease in tension, stress, anxiety, depression and hypertension.
These studies were conducted upon 10 people in the age group of 35 to 50. They were from the department of Physiology and had no previous training in any form of yoga, meditation. They were given two days training by a qualified Sahaja-Yoga teacher in the physiology department. Thereafter they practiced it 20 minutes daily, for a few weeks, under the watchful eyes of the tutor.
At fixed intervals doctors studied the effect of Sahaja-Yoga on the heart rate, blood pressure, the level of the blood lactic acid, VMA in urine, which indicates secretion of adrenalin by the body and the galvanic skin resistance (GSR), which shows whether the patients were tensed or relaxed. All 10 were patients of hypertension; some of them were on drugs. As the Sahaja-Yoga practice progressed, the medicines were reduced and finally stopped. In the 12 weeks the diastolic blood pressure dropped from the 100 to 80 and the adrenalin flow, also dropped. The GSR in the group changed from 43.9 kohms to 164.7 kohms; Mean level being 103.9 kohms
Many people practicing Sahaja Yoga regularly had already reported empirically what has now been confirmed by medical research. The outcomes of the research have shown that practice of Sahaja yoga has had various healing effects on the mind and body leading to improvements in quality of life. Various other benefits of Sahaja yoga on all living things including plant growth etc are being considerably researched around the globe.
Man is the culmination of evolutionary process that has been at work for thousand of years, and has been given extraordinary powers compared to other living organisms, to regulate and control the environment around him. But the ultimate frontier, and one which acts as the source and suffers as the receptor of stress, is the human mind. Shri Mataji Nirmala Devi has given the mankind a unique gift in form of her discovery of Sahaja Yoga, which should be utilized fully by the being for achieving peace and harmony in his/her daily life while remaining free from stress and tensions.
Effect of Sahaja yoga practice on stress management in patients of epilepsy.
Defence Institute of Physiology and Allied Sciences, Delhi.
An attempt was made to evaluate the effect of Sahaja yoga meditation in stress management in patients of epilepsy. The study was carried out on 32 patients of epilepsy who were rendomly divided into 3 groups: group I subjects practised Sahaja yoga meditation for 6 months, group II subjects practised postural exercises mimicking Sahaja yoga and group III served as the epileptic control group. Galvanic skin resistance (GSR), blood lactate and urinary vinyl mandelic acid (U-VMA) were recorded at 0, 3 and 6 months. There were significant changes at 3 & 6 months as compared to 0 month values in GSR, blood lactate and U-VMA levels in group I subjects, but not in group II and group III subjects. The results indicate that reduction in stress following Sahaja yoga practice may be responsible for clinical improvement which had been earlier reported in patients who practised Sahaja yoga.
Sahaja yoga in the management of moderate to severe asthma: a randomised controlled trial.
Natural Therapies Unit, Royal Hospital for Women, NSW, Australia.
BACKGROUND: Sahaja Yoga is a traditional system of meditation based on yogic principles which may be used for therapeutic purposes. A study was undertaken to assess the effectiveness of this therapy as an adjunctive tool in the management of asthma in adult patients who remained symptomatic on moderate to high doses of inhaled steroids. METHODS: A parallel group, double blind, randomised controlled trial was conducted. Subjects were randomly allocated to Sahaja yoga and control intervention groups. Both the yoga and the control interventions required the subjects to attend a 2 hour session once a week for 4 months. Asthma related quality of life (AQLQ, range 0-4), Profile of Mood States (POMS), level of airway hyperresponsiveness to methacholine (AHR), and a diary card based combined asthma score (CAS, range 0-12) reflecting symptoms, bronchodilator usage, and peak expiratory flow rates were measured at the end of the treatment period and again 2 months later. RESULTS: Twenty one of 30 subjects randomised to the yoga intervention and 26 of 29 subjects randomised to the control group were available for assessment at the end of treatment. The improvement in AHR at the end of treatment was 1.5 doubling doses (95% confidence interval (CI) 0.0 to 2.9, p=0.047) greater in the yoga intervention group than in the control group. Differences in AQLQ score (0.41, 95% CI -0.04 to 0.86) and CAS (0.9, 95% CI -0.9 to 2.7) were not significant (p>0.05). The AQLQ mood subscale did improve more in the yoga group than in the control group (difference 0.63, 95% CI 0.06 to 1.20), as did the summary POMS score (difference 18.4, 95% CI 0.2 to 36.5, p=0.05). There were no significant differences between the two groups at the 2 month follow up assessment. CONCLUSIONS: This randomised controlled trial has shown that the practice of Sahaja yoga does have limited beneficial effects on some objective and subjective measures of the impact of asthma. Further work is required to understand the mechanism underlying the observed effects and to establish whether elements of this intervention may be clinically valuable in patients with severe asthma.
A pilot study of mind-body changes in adults with asthma who practice mental imagery.
he Mount Sinai Medical Center, New York, NY, USA.
CONTEXT: Despite the growing number of studies of imagery and the use of complementary and alternative modalities as treatments for asthma, research on mental imagery in adults with asthma is practically, nonexistent. The purpose of this feasibility study was to lay groundwork for a larger follow-up clinical trial. OBJECTIVE: To determine whether pulmonary function, asthma symptoms, quality of life, depression, anxiety, and power differ over time in adults with asthma who do and do not practice mental imagery (MI). (Power is the ability to make aware choices with the intention of freely involving oneself in creating desired change.) DESIGN: Randomized controlled study using univariate repeated measures analysis of variance (ANOVA) and replacement through block design. SETTING: Lenox Hill Hospital, an affiliate of New York University Medical School, New York, NY. SUBJECTS: Sixty-eight adults with symptomatic asthma, after 4 weeks of baseline data collection and analysis, met requirements for this randomized controlled study. Thirty-three completed pulmonary function as well as self-report tests at 4 time points over 17 weeks. The 16 experimental participants also completed the 4-session imagery protocol. INTERVENTION: Individual imagery instruction (week 1) and follow-up (weeks 4, 9, 15). Participants were given 7 imagery exercises to select from and practice 3 times a day for a total of 15 minutes. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: 1) Spirometry (FEV1); 2) medication use; 3) Asthma Quality of Life Questionnaire; 4) Beck Depression Inventory; 5) Spielberger Anxiety Scales (A-State and A-Trait); 6) Barrett Power as Knowing Participation in Change Tool, Version II; 7) Epstein Balloon Test of Ability to Image. RESULTS: There was little evidence of statistical change in this feasibility study; yet, valuable lessons were learned. Paired t-tests indicated there was a significant difference in the total power scores in the imagery group, and in the expected direction (two-tailed, t-statistic = -2.3, P = 0.035) and the choices sub-scale (two-tailed, tstatistic = -2.93, P = 0.01) of the power instrument from weeks one to 16 of the study. Eight of 17 (47%) participants in the MI group reduced or discontinued their medications. Three of 16 (19%) participants in the control group reduced their medications; none discontinued. Chi-square indicated differences between groups (X2 = 4.66, P = 0.05). Persons who reduced or discontinued their medications showed neither an increase in pulmonary function prior to medication discontinuation, nor a fall in these parameters following discontinuation.
CONCLUSIONS: Findings related to major outcome measures must be viewed with caution due to the small sample size resulting from attrition related to labor intensiveness and, therefore, low statistical power. However, the study did provide significant data to plan a larger scale study of the use of mental imagery with adult asthmatics. The study also demonstrated that imagery is inexpensive, safe and, with training, can be used as an adjunct therapy by patients themselves. Its efficacy needs additional exploration. Further research for adults with asthma who practice imagery is important, as current treatments are not entirely efficacious. Lessons learned in this study may facilitate improvement in research designs.
Effects of relaxation intervention in phase II cardiac rehabilitation: replication and extension.
University of Michigan Medical Center, Ann Arbor 48109-0378, USA.
OBJECTIVES: To examine the effects of progressive muscle relaxation and guided imagery on psychological and physiologic outcomes in adults with cardiovascular disease who were participating in a phase II cardiac rehabilitation program. To examine tension levels, practice patterns, and perceived helpfulness of the intervention reported by subjects. DESIGN: Prospective, quasi-experimental, with random group assignment within sites. Independent replication and extension of a study by Bohachik (1984). SETTING: Four midwestern hospital-based phase II cardiac rehabilitation programs. PATIENTS: Fifty patients who within the preceding 12 weeks had had acute myocardial infarction or coronary artery bypass surgery or both, studied during 6 weeks of participation in a phase II cardiac rehabilitation program. OUTCOME MEASURES: Psychological measures included state and trait anxiety scores on the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory and reported symptoms on the Symptom Checklist-90-Revised. Physiologic measures were resting heart rate and blood pressure. Subjective tension levels before and after home practice, practice patterns, and perceived helpfulness of the intervention were examined. INTERVENTION: Individual instruction session in progressive muscle relaxation and guided imagery at the phase II cardiac rehabilitation program, followed by daily home practice with audiotape instructions over a 6-week period. RESULTS: No statistical differences at the p
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