meditation for stress

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Agitated responses cause everyday accidents – from dropping things to job-related errors and auto mishaps.

Bharat Savur, Business Line, Chennai, India: You’re striding down the street… you’re tense, preoccupied, and you trip on a curb and sprain your ankle. If it happens once too often, watch out. To untangle the mysteries of the twisting muscles, safety researchers tried to profile the `accident-prone personality’ as `someone who gets out of the wrong side of the bed, and falls out’. But surprise… they found the `accident-prone personality’ does not exist! Rather, anyone under stress can have an accident.

What kind of stress?

One of these comes “from life-changes,” says Dr Abraham Bergman, researcher, University of Washington, Seattle. Life-changes include moving to a new location (residence, school, office), illness in the family or divorce. The other comes from life-pressures; problems with parents, in-laws, school, job or finances.

The research elicited an interesting insight — four kinds of stress-responses predict accidents — smoking, insomnia, headaches and acidity. These agitated responses caused everyday accidents — dropping things, errors in judgement, job-related errors, tripping, nicking oneself while shaving or auto mishaps. At such times, “pay attention to your body’s ups and downs to avoid accidents,” stresses Dr Gay Luce, author of Body Time.

When we pay attention to our body we automatically alert our fuzzy mind. We become aware of what we are capable of at that moment and what we are not. Apparently, a large part of our stress settles in our unconscious. So, often, we may be more stressed than we think we are. For example, you’re the boss. You’ve just given your subordinate a thorough dressing down. You may think it hasn’t affected you. You’re not aware that you’re breathing a little faster and your head is buzzing. You get into your car. As you try to insert the key into the ignition, it slips from your fingers and falls down. Warning! That’s how stress steals over us.

In this state, it would be wiser to hail a cab. Or to sit quietly, breathe deeply, meditate or stroll around the campus until you feel different. Safety-researchers say it takes 90 minutes for the brain to switch from one mode to another. So, call your family and say you’ll be one-and-half-hour late. It’s worth it. Having a realistic sense of personal prowess — neither over nor under — prevents accidents.

Self-safety tip: Don’t light up a cigarette after an upsetting incident. Nicotine further unnerves frazzled nerves and moves your body into fifth gear. Instead, chew gum or mint. It refreshes and removes the bad taste in your mouth. Speaking of bad taste, safety researchers say our self-destructive attitudes leave a lingering unpleasantness in the body. This reduces concentration and interferes with our reflexes and… we set the stage for an accident to happen.

We can’t reverse an accident, but we can recognise and reverse our self-destructive attitudes. For example, you encounter a rude bank clerk. You can take the affront personally and rage, “How dare you?” This self-destructive attitude escalates your anger and, turning on your heel, you can walk straight into a door. Or you can good-humouredly shrug, “Having a bad day, huh?” and stroll serenely through the exit because you’ve chosen a self-constructive attitude.

Unfortunately, a destructive response occurs automatically. So, a constructive response has to be consciously and purposefully evoked mentally and physically as “a protective mechanism against overreaction to stress that leads to accidents,” say safety-researchers. Transcendental meditation de-escalates the sympathetic side of the nervous system. The pupils relax, blood pressure balances, heart and respiration rates decrease, blood-circulation moves towards the muscles and vital organs. All these physiological changes bring on “a state of profound rest and heightened awareness.”

Five months of daily meditation erases the knee-jerk need to mentally kick out at situations and people. Calm confidence replaces nervous aggression. Alongside, it is important to become conscious of our physicality — unexplained aches, discomforts, stiffness in the body suggest pent-up tensions flaring up. Likewise do changes in behaviour-patterns — drinking more coffee, eating or sleeping more/less, watching more TV. Unattended to, the body suddenly unleashes these tensions where we flail out clumsily and… ouch!

The waist-stretch exercise combined with meditation releases physical and mental tensions. Stand straight with your feet spread. Raise your left arm and point to the ceiling, palm facing the right side. Curve your right arm straight across your front waist. Now, bend from the waist to your right side as far as you can, extending your left arm parallel to the side of your head, and bend your right knee while straightening out your left leg. In this position, become aware of your breath. Now, along with the natural rhythm of your breathing, repeat `om’, `home’ or `calm’ in an undertone 10 times. Then, repeat the entire process on the other side. Five months later, you’ll be marvelling, “Boy! I didn’t sprain my ankle even once!”

The writer is co-author of the book `Fitness for Life’.

Practical, yes, practical aspect of meditation (Akron Beacon Journal, Ohio)

October 1, 2004

Diane Evans, Beacon Journal: Dear Readers,

We will host a live online chat on the subject of meditation on Oct. 12 from 7 to 8 p.m. at the Beacon Journal’s Web site at www.ohio.com. All are invited to participate, and no special preparations are required.

The goal is to develop a better understanding of what meditation is, and how to practice it.

Our guests at the chat will be Howard Hall of Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine; Bhikkhuni Sudhamma, a Buddhist nun who will log on from a monastery in South Carolina; and Joan Fox, director of the Center for Integrative Medicine at the Cleveland Clinic. Hall has published research findings relating to mind training in healing. Fox is a meditation practitioner with a research interest in the physiological changes that take place in the body as a result of meditation.

You will have the opportunity to ask questions and chat with our guests as you like.

We’re approaching our live online chat on meditation on Oct. 12, and leading up to that, I’ve written a lot about this subject, both in the newspaper and on our forum discussion page on the Beacon Journal’s Web site at www.ohio.com.

I don’t know why, but all a sudden, something about this whole subject reminds me of childbirth. Like childbirth, meditation is hard to explain to someone who has never experienced it. There are aspects that we don’t quite understand, yet people have been doing it since the beginning of time. There is nothing new about meditation.

Recently, I had the opportunity to speak with a famous researcher in the field of meditation: Herbert Benson of Harvard Medical School. As founding president of Boston’s Mind/Body Medical Institute, Benson has written more than 170 scientific papers and seven books relating to the physiological effects of meditation on the body.

His best-selling book, titled The Relaxation Response, discusses what happens when a person relaxes. Blood pressure goes down, for example, and breathing and heart rates slow.

What I liked most about our conversation is that Benson stripped away the high-minded mysticism surrounding meditation and talked about the practical side — including the idea that some people may practice forms of meditation without even knowing it.

Instead of trying to paraphrase his comments, I’m just going to give you the conversation, almost in its entirety:

Q: Dr. Benson, how would you explain meditation?

A: First, let’s take a step back to stress.

When we’re under stress — and by that, I mean any situation that requires behavioral change — we evoke what we call a fight-or-flight response. That means we increase heart rate, rate of breathing, metabolism, blood pressure and the flow of blood to our limbs.

All these physiological changes prepare us for running or for fighting. But we don’t run, and we don’t fight. But these hormones are there, not being used as they should, and this leads to anxiety, depression, anger and hostility, high blood pressure, cardiac irregularity, insomnia. It doesn’t cause pain, but it makes pain worse. Over 60 percent of visits to doctors are due to stress and these mind/body reactions.

Q: So how do we know about stress reduction?

A: Opposite the fight-or-flight response, we have within us something called the relaxation response.

But two steps are necessary to bring it about. The first is a repetition. That repetition can be a word, a sound, a prayer, a phrase or even a repetitive motion.

The second step is when other thoughts come to mind, you return to the repetition. There are scores of techniques that can bring about the relaxation response.

Q: What’s an example of a repetition?

A: For example, the rosary in Catholicism. Or it could be jogging, knitting, crocheting, yoga or the Lamaze breathing exercises.

All that is different is the sound or the phrase. Every culture has the same steps. So there is nothing unique about meditation. The essence is just to break the train of everyday thought.

Q: Does that mean somehow transcending where we’re at now?

A: Forget transcending. It’s not so much transcending as it is shutting off. You’re allowing your body to revert to an innate, quieting capacity.

Religious people will say it’s God-given. Nonreligious people will say it came from evolution.

Either way, we’ve got this capacity within ourselves, and there is no reason to look East. The West has its own traditions. East or West, we have it within us. And what we have within us is the relaxation response. If we can get that across to people, it would be wonderful.

Q: What doesn’t get across?

A: Some people think it’s Eastern, that it’s foreign, that it’s not in their belief system. It doesn’t matter. You choose your own words or sounds or phrases.

Q: What does the research on meditation tell us?

A:. I’ve been studying this for more than 35 years. What we have discovered is that there are distinct bodily changes when the relaxation response has been brought forth — decreased heart rate, blood pressure, rate of breathing, and slower brain waves. The activity in the brain is quieted.

Q: How long does the effect last?

A: It lasts as long as you do it, but then there is a carry-over effect throughout a 24 hour period.

To the extent any disease or disorder is caused or made worse by stress, bringing forth the relaxation response is an effective therapy. This inborn capacity we have to counteract stress is effective in counteracting stress-related disorders.

If you do this once or twice a day for 10 or 20 minutes, you you become more efficient. Excessive stress causes inefficiency.

•

To read more about meditation, go to our forum discussion at the Beacon Journal’s Web site at www.ohio.com. Just click on “Diane Evans” in the blue shaded section, then click where it says “Forums Link: Book Club Forums Discussion.”

This week’s newsletter, which is posted, discusses meditation from the perspective of a friend of mine, Ravi Kulasekere, who practices Buddhist meditation. Kulasekere is a physicist who formerly worked at Goodyear and is now employed at the University of Michigan Health System.

Diane Evans is a Beacon Journal columnist. You can reach her by mail at the Beacon Journal, P.O. Box 640, Akron, OH 44309-0640, by e-mail at livingwell@thebeaconjournal.com or by phone at 330-996-3587.

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Sri Sri Ravi Shankar calls for stress free South Asia (Times of India)

July 20, 2004

An Indian scholar who teaches people how to overcome stress by using the "art of breathing" called for making South Asia a violence-free society during a trip to Pakistan Tuesday. Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, who uses the double honorific of "Sri Sri" so as not to be confused with the Indian sitar maestro, is respected among a number of his students for guiding them to overcome stress through meditation and new techniques of breathing.

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It’s Not Just Quiet Time (Palm Beach Post, Florida)

July 15, 2004

Carolyn Susman: In a stressed-out world, many find the road to peace comes by way of meditation and relaxation.

An old woman sits on a couch, bent over her rosary beads, fingering and fondling them, and repeating her prayers.

Another spends time saying a Hebrew prayer over and over: The Lord is God. The Lord is One.

Is either of these women meditating?

Neither might think so, but thousands of years of reflection by spiritual masters and mental health experts say otherwise.

“Every major religion has some form of meditation connected with it,” Daniel Goleman, author of Destructive Emotions: A Scientific Dialogue with the Dalai Lama, explained last year on CNN. “There’s the centering prayer in Catholicism. There are Jewish meditations. Mindfulness has its roots in Buddhism.

“Transcendental meditation has its roots in India. Those forms have been taken out of the religious context and put into a format that anybody, no matter what your religious belief, can benefit from.”

Continuing experiments show the benefit of meditation, and so-called “focused breathing,” for physical and spiritual health – arguably the most famous being Dr. Herbert Benson’s 1975 book, The Relaxation Response.

“We have… shown how the Relaxation Response may be used as a new approach to aid in the treatment and perhaps prevention of diseases such as hypertension,” Benson maintained, a ground-breaking approach at the time.

Just a few years before, in 1968, Beatles John Lennon and George Harrison and their wives had gone to India to study transcendental meditation with the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, elevating this elegant form of breathing and concentration to popular acceptance.

“We have shown how the Relaxation Response may be used as a new approach to aid in the treatment and perhaps prevention of diseases such as hypertension,” Benson maintained, a ground-breaking approach at the time,
Just a few years before, in 1968, Beatles John Lennon and George Harrison and their wives had gone to India to study transcendental meditation with the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, elevating this elegant form of breathing and concentration to popular acceptance.

In our stressed-out world, the advice “Take a deep breath” has renewed meaning.

One of the most recent studies to attest to the value of meditation –simply defined as deep breathing combined with focused attention to relax the body – is published in the April issue of the “American Journal of Hypertension.”

Conducted by Dr. Vernon A. Barnes, a physiologist at the Medical College of Georgia, the study showed that African-American teenagers, at risk for having high blood pressure, lowered their day-time blood pressures over four months by practicing 15 minutes of transcendental meditation twice daily.

“Allowing your mind to go to that state of inner quietness and be there for a time has an effect on the physiology by reducing stress hormone levels like cortisol and reducing activation of the fight-or-flight response,” Barnes said when the study was released.

Nothing is new here, except that Barnes’ study is fueling the idea that meditation should become a part of classroom learning and an option for children at risk for or suffering with conditions ranging from high blood pressure, to anxiety and depression, to attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.

Balancing emotions

As a society, we are always looking for methods of dealing with emotional and physical illness that can reduce or eliminate drugs.

One of those on that search was Dr. Kamara Elaine Altman of Jupiter, a holistic health counselor and yoga therapist. Thirteen years ago, she went from a public relations career to teaching stress reduction techniques (she has studied with Benson and another renowned stress-reduction clinician, Dr. Jon Kabat-Zinn).

Altman says she overcame a debilitating fatigue and irritability when she incorporated yoga and relaxation techniques into her life. “When people are under stress, they are irritable, emotionally vulnerable. I would get angry quickly, raise my voice, and I had very little patience. So I think it gave me the tools, time and commitment to relax myself and calm myself and center myself. I was able to balance my emotions better.”

She defines meditation as “the process of liberating your mind from distracting thoughts. The physical aspect of sitting down, slowing down, slows your heart rate and respiration rate. You are occupying your mind so distracting thoughts don’t come in.”

Meditators say the process actually reprograms your brain, accelerating physical healing.

Altman credits meditation and focused breathing with helping her concentrate on what she considers important, her inner peace. “If I find my mind wandering off, I take a centering breath to let go of distractions, not be reactive (to surroundings) and to bring myself into the present moment.”

She can practice focused breathing – relaxing breaths without the intensity of meditation – anywhere, doing a grocery list, at the dentist’s office or sitting in a car.

Especially when she’s caught in traffic, she finds the technique helpful.

“I put my hands on my belly and relax. It reminds me there is nothing I can do. I’m not so reactive.”

In her personal relationship, she finds it helpful, too, with the man she is dating.

“He could do something that in the past would have been irritating.” she says. “I can listen now and let it be.

And I’ll do my breathing and think, ‘Is this a good time to discuss this?'” Perspective and inner peace were also the goals sought by therapist Miriam R. Davis of West Palm Beach when she sought out meditation to ease her mind more than 30 years ago.

Davis, a single mother at the time, describes her state as one of “constant mind chatter that allowed me no peace.”
She went to England to study with The Beatles’ guru, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, and practiced the technique twice a day, 20 minutes at a time.

“I began to clear my mind. It’s not positive thinking: it’s not a way to change your thinking by thinking more. It involves watching your thoughts without being drawn into them,” she explains.

“By dwelling inwardly for extend ed periods,” she says of her meditating, “I came to realize the poverty of always looking outside myself for happiness, understanding and wisdom.”

Today she uses meditation and relaxation techniques with clients who are anxious, depressed or have high blood pressure or chronic pain.

Tools for managing stress

I was introduced to a form of meditation when a perceptive rheumatologist years ago handed me a book about the Catholic technique of centering prayer — very similar to meditation — when I visited him with complaints of strange muscle cramping that others couldn’t diagnose.

This doesn’t shock Davis. “Meditation and relaxation are powerful tools for managing stress,” she says, “and stress can lead to extreme body tension that can affect your health.

So much so that Benson, the “Relaxation Response” author and a Harvard Medical School associate professor, has just released a book that discusses how depression, anger and hostility can adversely affect your heart.

One of the goals of “Mind Your Heart, A Mind/Body Approach to Stress Management, Exercise and Nutrition for Heart Health” (Free Press, $12) is to maintain calm and “allow blood to flow more easily throughout the body.”

Stress can damage the heart, Benson points out. But with meditation, yoga and focused breathing, it is possible to prevent and reduce heart damage, and even avoid and manage other illnesses.

Local meditator: Dr. Jean Malecki

When you have to deal with anthrax and terrorism, having an inner sanctuary is essential.

Dr. Jean Malecki, Palm Beach County Health Department director, has nurtured that private place since she was studying pre-med in college, “I majored in pre-med and minored in religion and philosophy. I’ve been studying it for a long time. I spend a lot of my free time pursuing it,” she said.

“Some people call it prayer. Others call it meditation. It’s a time of quiet, silence in your surrounding. It’s time set aside from the normal day when you think, contemplate. I usually do it in the early morning hours, and it brings me a lot of energy and satisfaction. I couldn’t do what I do every day if I didn’t have that connection.”

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Meditation helps folks disengage, see clearly, release stress, improve health (Go Memphis, Tennessee)

July 9, 2004

B. Blair Dedrick, SCRIPPS HOWARD NEWS SERVICE: “You can’t see anything in a cascading river,” said the Memphis, Tenn., teacher of insight meditation. “But when the water gets to a lake, you can see the sky clearly.”

To see clearly is the point of meditation. It can be a path to better health or spiritual enlightenment, or simply a way to stay attentive to the present.

“When you are thinking, you are always in the past or the future, never in the moment,” Greer said. “When you slow down your mind, you return to where life is most real — where you are living.”

Insight meditation is not a clearing of the mind as much as the ability to have thoughts, acknowledge them and let them go, said Greer, a retired University of Memphis professor.

Mark Muesse decided to try meditation almost 20 years ago to help ease stress. The Rhodes College professor of religion stayed with it because it was successful.

“I’m one of those people who likes to control things.” Muesse said. “Meditation teaches you the more you try to control, the more you suffer. The more you relinquish control, the happier you will be.”

For Daniel Lamontagne and his students, the issue is health.

Lamontagne is the head of Healing Meditation, a business in Memphis that teaches meditation designed to help with everything from improving cholesterol and blood pressure levels to ending alcohol and drug use.

“Good health is a combination of mind, body and spirit,” Lamontagne said. “Meditation is just another aspect of good health.”

Various scientific studies have found that meditation lowers blood pressure, chemical levels associated with stress and the risk for heart disease.

“It’s like a preventative.” Lamontagne said. “Eating well helps, exercise helps and alleviating stress and fear helps.”

When Candia Ludy and her husband were sent on a three-year tour to the African nation of Tanzania in 1981 by Catholic Relief Services, the country was suffering from a severe food and water shortage, its factories were closing, its roads were in disrepair.

“It was a stressful time,” Ludy said. “Probably the worst time in Tanzanian history.”

She took along two books by Buddhist teacher Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche and another by a Zen teacher, used them, and has been meditating ever since.

“I’m sure not stopping.” she said. “It’s my life.”

Buddhism teaches that there are many paths to the same end. Ludy said, “You have to find out what works for you.”
Ludy likens this type of meditation to a gentle form of therapy.

“If you put attention, loving attention, on a problem, it will start to melt away,” she said. “Meditation is a very organic, very natural way to make life sweeter.”

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Stress can be good for your body (BBC)

July 5, 2004

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BBC News: Getting stressed now and again may be good for your health, research suggests.

A short burst of stress, such as that caused by giving a speech, may strengthen your body’s immune system.

But long-term stress, such as living with a permanent disability, may render you less able to fight infections, say the study authors.

Dr Suzanne Segerstrom and Dr Gregory Miller report their findings in the journal Psychological Bulletin.

Scientists have known for some time that stress can have a negative effect on the body.

Now the American and Canadian pair from the University of Kentucky and the University of British Columbia say some psychological stress can be good for you….

Some women say meditation, relaxation help battle cancer (Kansas City Channel)

June 10, 2004

Original article no longer available…

Kelly Eckerman, KMBC: Turning Point Offers Free Programs

Fighting cancer takes a lot and modern medicine alone isn’t always enough, which is why some cancer patients are turning to meditation, KMBC’s Kelly Eckerman reported.

Meditation has become a way to relax and relieve stress, but for one group of women it has become so much more. They all share a tremendous bond — they’re all battling late-stage cancer, and so far, they have all beaten the odds.

“When you get a prognosis of cancer, you seek out many ways to help you. You feel a need to encompass everything in life you think might benefit you,” cancer survivor Nancy Holt said.

The stress of battling an aggressive disease can be overwhelming. While they can’t prove meditation prolongs life, they agree it has become an important part of their therapy.

“I just have to stop, check focus and go on. That’s how I’ve dealt with cancer. That’s how I deal with life,” cancer survivor Dee Finsley said.

“Cancer is a series of stressors, especially if you’re dealing with recurrences. That brings a whole new set of stress to the table. What meditation does is help manage the stress of life, not just of having the disease, but the everyday stressors of life,” said Moira Mulhern, Turning Point’s co-founder.

Research shows meditation can reduce anxiety, decrease depression and boost the immune system. But some benefits go beyond measure.

“It helps us get through the day with calmness and enlightenment and a little bit of peace,” Holt said.

The meditation and relaxation class is offered through Turning Point, which offers free programs for individuals and families living with serious illness.

More Information:

To learn more about Turning Point and its services, click here.

Yoga, more popular than ever, flexes body and mind (Seattle Times)

April 28, 2004

Tyrone Beason, Seattle Times: Ever since Oprah featured a segment on yoga and Madonna beat back her nasty side with namastes, Americans can’t get enough of the ancient Indian practice.

Though 5,000 years old, yoga has boomed in recent years, with private instructors, gyms, community centers, even churches offering classes to help people wind down, focus, get limber and stay fit.

Yoga Journal magazine estimates that 15 million people in the United States practice yoga, twice as many as five years ago.

The nationally recognized instructor Aadil Palkhivala said when he opened Yoga Centers in Bellevue, Wash., 12 years ago, his was the only such facility in the area. Today there are dozens of yoga studios – “within walking distance,” he joked.

So what’s behind the yoga craze?

For starters, Americans are more passionate about fitness in general, instructors say. At the same time, yoga’s exotic image has transformed into one that appeals to mainstream, Western tastes.

More important, yoga seems to work.

Yoga emphasizes stretching, building core body strength, controlled breathing, enhanced circulation and deep relaxation.

For these reasons, doctors in this country have started to recommend yoga for their patients based on its value as a fitness routine alone. Coupled with meditation, it is also used to reduce stress and high blood pressure, bolster the immune system and even treat depression. Many cancer and AIDS patients, as well as pregnant women, practice yoga. More vigorous types of yoga – which induce increased heart rates and sweating – have become popular among people who want to lose weight.

“There are very few people, from kids on up to seniors, who wouldn’t benefit from it,” said Dr. Peter McGough, chief of the University of Washington Medicine Factoria Clinic.

McGough noted yoga’s positive effects on musculoskeletal disorders – such as arthritis – in particular.

But while studies in India, Europe and the United States point to yoga’s potential benefits in a number of areas, even some yoga supporters concede more research is needed to track its long-term effects.

Yoga has become so commonplace that it’s easy to lose sight of its roots and original purpose. The word itself is a Sanskrit expression that refers to a “yoke” or “union.” As both a philosophy for living and a physical exercise, yoga unites the mind, body and spirit, bringing mental clarity, health and balance, its adherents say.

The ultimate goal of a yoga student is to reach a state of enlightenment, or ecstasy, through disciplined meditation.

But most Americans practice some form of hatha yoga, which focuses on breathing exercises and striking complex poses, or “asanas,” that encourage flexibility, balance, strength and good energy flow through the body. Traditionally, hatha yoga serves as a foundation for other, more cerebral types.

“Hatha yoga is just the bait,” Palkhivala said in his soothing, breathy delivery. “The mind is much more subtle and the emotions even more subtle.” As students learn the physical techniques and begin to feel the benefits, he said, some may want to venture deeper.

Palkhivala says yoga has become popular as more and more people grapple to find a real purpose in their lives, something to aspire to. They’re seeking spiritual fitness, as well as elastic hamstrings. He believes it’s important for people to shop around for an instructor who can teach not just physical techniques but yoga’s deeper principles.

“There is an urge to find something greater than the humdrum repetition of an unfulfilling existence,” he insisted. “People are beginning to ask the question, ‘So what?’ ”

Whether or not people reach an end to spiritual suffering through yoga, its physical effects alone keep people coming back.

“What yoga does is it moves the body in all different directions,” without the repetitive motion of say, an aerobics routine, said Joseph Rodin, director of Northwest Yoga Festival, a four-day event featuring lectures, yoga classes and performances at Seattle Center that kicks off tomorrow. “It takes your body through its full range of motion.”

Doctors and physical therapists agree yoga benefits a variety of age groups, body types and physical conditions, but they are reluctant to rank it higher than other forms of exercise.

Some people get more pleasure from – and are therefore more likely to stick with – aerobics, pilates or sports, which also promote fitness and stress relief.

New yoga styles are springing up all the time to accommodate different needs, including some people’s desire for a routine that gets the blood pumping.

One of the hottest – literally and figuratively – is bikram yoga, which uses high room temperatures to loosen muscles and promote the release of toxins through sweat.

Whereas the iyengar style of yoga taught at Palkhivala’s studio emphasizes meditation and holding individual poses for long periods to perfect form, bikram yoga involves a set of 26 poses that flow from one to the other. The faster pace and saunalike conditions offer a stimulating cardiovascular workout.

At The Sweat Box on Seattle’s Capitol Hill, “Hot Yoga” instructors crank up the heat to 105-110 degrees Fahrenheit for each 90-minute class in the bikram style.

It may sound excruciating, but the studio’s co-founder, Frankie Oser, said more than 2,300 students have taken classes in 3 1/2 years of business, and many of those are repeat customers.

Oser said Hot Yoga helps deliver more blood to muscles, speeds the breakdown of glucose and fatty acids, improves coordination, makes muscles less prone to injury, reduces heart irregularities and burns fat.

It’s a total body experience, Oser said, “from head to toe, inside and out. … Your whole body is worked out every time you come in.”

McGough advises people with pre-existing medical conditions or who are on certain types of medication – blood-pressure drugs, for example – to consult a doctor before joining a particular yoga class, just to make sure the style is appropriate for them.

While yoga instructors usually ask students about medical concerns before classes begin, most are not equipped to do in-depth screenings. It’s up to the student to bring up any issues.

A person who has especially tight hamstrings, for example, may want to avoid yoga routines that call for strenuous forward bends, because this might lead to injury.

Another aspect of yoga classes that may attract people is the lack of competitiveness.

While yoga students strive to be more self-aware, they also work at being less self-conscious in relation to those around them.

But to eliminate the social pressure altogether, some yoga students prefer one-on-one sessions.

Many instructors offer classes in studios built onto their homes or in neighborhood storefronts. In settings like these, the feeling is more intimate and the embarrassment of making a mistake is minimal, since nobody’s watching.

Jo Leffingwell, a former Seattle theater actress, exercised patience and grace as she coached this reporter through a series of warm-up stretches, breathing exercises and iyengar poses, followed by 10 minutes of meditation and a lesson in yoga teachings, at her studio in Seattle.

Leffingwell explained that just as a person’s mind has tendencies and cravings that lead to an imbalanced life, that person’s body has tendencies that can lead to physical imbalance, discomfort and pain. It could be shortness of breath, an inability to twist in one direction, or simple tightness in the back or legs resulting from a lack of exercise, stress or a previous injury. Yoga, she said, “shows you what the tendencies are in your body and brings you back to a more balanced state.”

She encourages her students, as they bend and flex into position, to take their time and truly “experience the posture.” If you can’t bend over and touch your ankles on the first few visits, or balance your body on one leg, that’s fine.

“What you’re trying to do is be present in your body, moment by moment,” she said.

Leffingwell explained that an essential part of yoga study is learning sutras, or words of wisdom about yoga, the self and the universe, many of which have been passed along for thousands of years.

One prominent idea embodied in both the physical and mental aspects of yoga is the belief that inside each person is a being that “sees” everything clearly. Some might think of it as the conscience, or intuition.

The problem for many people, Leffingwell said, is that they make decisions that contradict their own higher instincts. They get swept away by a jumble of thoughts, memories, fears, frustrations, expectations and desires, and life loses focus and meaning.

While many experts are pleased that people are introducing themselves to more physical types of yoga, they say the greatest path to a healthy life is connecting with that inner being.

“Yoga helps bring out what you are,” Palkhivala said. “You have to face it, and sometimes it’s not pleasant.”

But if mastering yoga poses and getting a good workout are all you’re looking for, that’s OK, too, he said.

“The house is huge,” Palkhivala said, referring to all the yoga choices people have available to them. “Where you want to live in it is your choice.”

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YOGA TIPS FROM THE EXPERTS

– Shop around and find an instructor whose technique and teaching style suit you. This is very important, instructors say. Many yoga teachers are poorly trained or don’t work well with clients. If you don’t have a good feeling about the first class or two, move on.

-Take it easy. Yoga is about self-awareness, but also patience. You shouldn’t expect to be able to perform every asana, or yoga pose, after a couple of tries. Some require a high level of flexibility, so you may have to work your way up to them. Trying too hard at the beginning also may lead to muscle and joint injury. Focus instead on breathing deeply and understanding how your body moves and where the most tension occurs. Let the instructor know about any past injuries and health concerns before the class begins.

-Don’t worry about your neighbors. Yoga is not a competitive sport, so if the student next to you can fold himself in half while standing, don’t be discouraged. Focus on your own ability level and progress.

-Go with your emotions. Yoga is ultimately about transcendence and liberation – from pain, memories, anxiety, this month’s household budget, everything that keeps you from being at peace with yourself. Think of yoga as a way of identifying obstacles in the mind and body and working through them.

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YOGA GLOSSARY

-Yoga (YOH ga) – Sanskrit for “yoke” or “union,” in this case, a union of mind, body and spirit. There are eight progressive “limbs” in yoga ranging from moral discipline, self-restraint, posture, breath control, sensory inhibition, concentration and meditation to ecstasy, all leading to “liberation.”

-Asana (AH suh nuh) – A physical posture, or yoga pose.

-Hatha (HAH thuh) – The method of yoga most practiced in the United States, focusing on asanas and breathing skills. Many styles of yoga fit under this umbrella, from slower-paced iyengar yoga to flowing ashtanga yoga to bikram or “Hot Yoga.”

-Ashtanga (Ahsh TONG guh) – A type of yoga that uses a fast-paced series of postures in a nonstop sequence, providing a solid workout. A variation is called “Power Yoga.”

-Bikram (BEE krum) – Another flowing style of yoga that incorporates temperatures over 100 degrees to help loosen muscles and cleanse the body through sweat. Also called “Hot Yoga.”

-Viniyoga (VEN ee yo guh) – A milder category of yoga that is tailored to the emotional and physical needs of the student.

-Iyengar (I YEN gar) – This popular yoga features a slower pace, focusing on precision and proper alignment. Students breathe methodically and hold each posture for extended periods, working to refine them over time. Students can use props, such as blocks and straps, to help achieve their postures.

-Ananda (Ah NAHN da) – A more spiritual form of hatha yoga that uses breathing, postures, silent affirmations and meditation.

-Namaste (Nah mas TAY) – A traditional yoga salutation meaning, “I bow to you.” It’s one person’s humble recognition of another’s soul. To give the greeting, press the hands together at the chest, as in prayer, close your eyes, and bow your head. It’s OK, but not customary, to say the word aloud.

-Pranayama (Prah nah YA ma) – Breath-control exercise.

-Mantra (MAHN trah) – A sacred sound that has a transforming effect on the person saying it.

-Om – A common mantra, just one syllable but spoken in a deep, resonant, elongated breath.

-Sources: Yoga Journal, Joseph Rodin, Aadil Palkhivala and Jo Leffingwell

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RESOURCES

-Yoga Journal has an online site with interviews and practical information on various types of yoga, as well a directory of yoga studios at www.yogajournal.com.

Buddha’s way is best if you want to combat stress (The Times, London)

April 8, 2004