Yoga can be an ideal exercise for older adults. It can help prevent osteoporosis and arthritis by strengthening bones while improving balance and stability.
Reducing wrinkles through improved cell and DNA repair processes is also key in slowing the aging process.
1. Improved Blood Circulation
Yoga integrates body postures with breath work and meditative practices in order to increase physical flexibility, mental clarity and reduce stress while improving cardiovascular health. Yoga may even help slow the rate of aging so individuals can better adapt and cope with its inevitable process with grace and balance.
Yoga may offer molecular and cellular anti-oxidant benefits that could help mitigate some of the detrimental biological processes associated with aging, such as oxidative stress or accumulation of advanced glycation end-products in tissues [24].
One study discovered that regular yoga practice increased levels of glutathione, an antioxidant present in blood. This resulted in less oxidative damage being done to DNA and proteins by this practice.
Yoga’s benefits to an aging body also extend to improving balance and stability, helping prevent falls or injuries due to compromised balance as people age. This effect becomes especially helpful as individuals’ balance begins to diminish with age.
Yoga can also aid digestion, which often suffers with age. Furthermore, it can tone the limbs that have become flabby with age while relieving any tension from eyes that cause dark circles or other conditions.
Yoga can be an incredible asset to any fitness routine, but in order to reap its full benefits, it’s essential that you locate an experienced instructor and follow his or her instructions exactly. Furthermore, pairing yoga with other forms of exercise such as strength training or high intensity interval training (HIIT) provides an all-around workout designed to make you look and feel your best!
2. Increased Flexibility
Avoid retirement homes and bingo nights–yoga mats are truly the fountain of youth! This ancient practice of bending into pretzel shapes while breathing like an overcaffeinated koala can act as an effective anti-ageing therapy, strengthening muscles while keeping joints flexible so you’ll still be able to reach out for that delicious top shelf cookie without experiencing hip flexor pain!
Running is also an excellent way to strengthen balance, keeping wobbly knees from taking you down, while acting as an effective stress reducer and helping lower cortisol levels in the blood.
But don’t think yoga requires being as flexible as a contortionist for you to enjoy it – beginner-friendly styles like chair yoga are readily available and low impact options are perfect for older bodies. Remember to breathe deeply while taking it slow – doing this will allow you to fully experience its anti-ageing benefits! Remember it’s not about looking younger – it’s about feeling better and living longer too, so get out there and namaste (don’t forget your Sour Patch Kids too)!
3. Reduced Stress
Stress is one of the primary contributors to accelerated cellular aging and can negatively affect mental, physical and reproductive fitness. This occurs due to abnormal fat accumulation, imbalanced oxidative stress and pro-inflammatory response systems and formation of advanced glycation end products (AGEs) in tissues. Chronic stress and inflammation has been linked with various lifestyle diseases including depression anxiety hypertension diabetes heart disease among others; Studies demonstrate how yoga helps improve cardiovascular and metabolic parameters such as lipid profile stress biomarkers brain derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF). Yoga also improves cardiovascular and metabolic parameters improving cardiovascular and metabolic parameters thus leading to improved cellular longevity [2, 3].
Yoga combines physical postures, breathing techniques and meditation that relax both mind and body. Studies have demonstrated its effectiveness at lowering cortisol levels – an indicator of chronic stress – while increasing brain derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), which promotes memory retention and learning. These changes result from reduced activity within the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis and sympathetic nervous system which become overactivated due to modern western lifestyles.
Yoga offers a meditative practice to reduce stress and anxiety. Furthermore, practicing yoga helps improve balance and stability which are crucial components of maintaining an active, healthy lifestyle – particularly as we age since balance and coordination tend to decline with age.
Researchers have recently demonstrated that participating in a 12-week yoga and meditation program was effective at decreasing key markers of cellular aging, such as advanced glycation end-products and advanced glycation end-products, increasing BDNF production while simultaneously decreasing pro-inflammatory biomarkers such as IL-6 and cytokines levels. Their results suggest YMLI may have potential to improve fitness while protecting against disorders associated with aging such as oxidative stress, metabolic syndrome, sarcopenia and infertility.
Research has demonstrated that Yoga slows cellular and DNA aging by decreasing oxidative damage, increasing gene expression, and activating DNA damage response pathways. Yoga also can reduce stress-related oxidative damage and cellular senescence – factors associated with lower risks of dementia and Alzheimer’s disease – by balancing immune reactions against ROS while stimulating appropriate gene expressions and improving cognition. While therapeutic antioxidants may decrease ROS production temporarily, YMLI offers additional stress protection while simultaneously decreasing stress-related oxidative damage by modulating immune responses against ROS while simultaneously activating DNA damage response pathways and activating DNA damage response pathways – without detriment to cognition or cognition.
4. Improved Mental Health
Anyone who has taken yoga class knows its soothing effects – leaving behind all worries to focus on breathing, gentle movements, healing stretches and guided meditation. But studies indicate that its benefits extend well beyond relieving stress and anxiety; yoga could even boost brain power, counter cognitive decline and prevent dementia altogether.
Scientists believe yoga improves mental health through its effects on the autonomic nervous system. Yoga integrates top-down processes initiated consciously in the cerebral cortex such as attention regulation and intention setting with bottom-up processes that stimulate skeletal muscle movement and deep breathing, creating bidirectional pathways between brain and body – this results in creating “whole-body” states which help relieve symptoms of stress and depression while simultaneously decreasing inflammation levels, cortisol levels, cortomerase reverse transcriptase activity which extends telomere length length extending biological ageing processs further.
Study findings demonstrated that an intensive 12-week yoga therapy program significantly increased QOL and cognitive functioning for those living with Alzheimer’s disease. It marked the first evaluation of such culturally grounded interventions without pharmaceutical drugs in this population.
Researchers conducted neurocognitive and quality-of-life (QOL) assessments before and after participating in a 12-week yoga program, as well as conducting surveys about their QOL. Participants who engaged in yoga showed improvement across multiple domains of cognitive functioning such as memory, speed of processing, orientation. Researchers also reported decreased depression and an increase in spirituality among participants of yoga programs, leading them to experience decreased stress levels and an increase in parasympathetic nervous system activity, both of which are found in yoga classes. Scientists believe these improvements in cognitive function may also be attributable to reduced stress levels, as well as an increase in parasympathetic activity due to yoga practice; enhanced cell and mitochondrial health also play a part in improving cognition by decreasing oxidative stress, increasing ATP production, and slowing biological aging through telomere attrition – factors contributing to improvements.
