Yoga offers practical tools with which you can help yourself and mobilize your own inner resources. Yoga is empowering because you are doing something for yourself: no-one is doing it for you. Cancer is a broad complex of illnesses in which a weakened immune system cannot cope with the proliferation of damaged cells. Of course yoga is not a "cure" for cancer but it can help to strengthen the immune system and encourage our inner healing forces. It works in various ways:
ü Relaxation - calms the nervous system and alleviates the stress and anxiety which lower immune functioning and hinder healing
ü Breathing Exercises - improves respiration, releases tension and restores balance and calm
ü Meditation - develops the detachment and clarity that enables us to acknowledge and accept the realities of our situation and to cope with our fears
ü Physical Posture - clears toxins, increases energy levels and enhances the functioning of our internal organs and systems
The simplest of yoga breathing, relaxation and meditation techniques can also help us to deal with the overwhelming emotions that come with the diagnosis of a life-changing illness: shock, anger, fear, and guilt to name the most obvious ones. And they can be of help in managing the stress, anxiety and pain of cancer surgery, chemotherapy and radiotherapy.
Cervical cancer is the second most common cancer among women and almost 4,000 cases were fatal just last year. Conventional treatments for cervical cancer such as chemotherapy, radiation, surgery, hysterectomy, or the removal of lymph nodes and ovaries can often leave the woman infertile. However, alternatives exist for women who seek a more holistic approach to improving their bodies' responses to cancer. Cervical cancer can be remedied in ways alternative to conventional, damaging treatments. Instead of harsh treatments that can wreak havoc on the body, a combination of yoga, meditation, and a raw vegan diet can be a much more gentle and beneficial method for healing.
A raw vegan diet, for instance, is based on unprocessed and uncooked plant foods such as fresh fruits and vegetables, seeds, sprouts, grains, nuts, beans, and seaweed. Raw foods and juices deliver pure, powerful nutrients straight to your system and are full of antioxidants and enzymes, which are vital to good health. Antioxidants, for example, reduce the cellular by-products of free radicals, which can lead to cancer. According to Leslie Kenton, author of Raw Energy, "Doctors and scientists confirm that raw diets not only prevent colds and flu and retard aging, but they can also help to cure cancer, diabetes, ulcers and arthritis."
When Amanda Deming learned she had cervical cancer from her pap smear results, she revised the way she prepared and ate food, instead of getting surgery to remove the cancerous cells. Not only did Deming decide against conventional treatment and chose to heal her body naturally, but she became a raw food chef, as well. "I think that you are what you eat and whatever you put into your body is definitely going to manifest. If you`re eating foods on a higher vibration, you`re going to run on a higher vibration," said Deming.
Everywhere else, Americans rush from their high-pressure jobs and tune in to the authoritatively mellow voice of an instructor, gently urging them to solder a union (the literal translation of the Sanskrit word yoga) between mind and body. These Types strivers want to become Type B seekers, to lose their blues in an asana (pose), to graduate from distress to de-stress. Fifteen million Americans include some form of yoga in their fitness regimen — twice as many as did five years ago; 75% of all U.S. health clubs offer yoga classes. Many in those classes are looking not inward but behind. As supermodel Christy Turlington, a serious practitioner, says, "Some of my friends simply want to have a yoga butt." But others come to the discipline in hopes of restoring their troubled bodies. Yoga makes me feel better, they say. Maybe it can cure what ails me.
Oprah Winfrey, arbiter of moral and literary betterment for millions of American women, devoted a whole show to the benefits of yoga earlier this month, with guest appearances by Turlington and stud-muffin guru Rodney Yee. Testimonials from everyday yogis and yoginis clogged the hour: I lost weight; I quit smoking; I conquered my fear of flying; I can sleep again; it saved my marriage; it improved my daughter's grades and attitude. "We are more centered as a team," declared the El Monte Firefighters of Los Altos Hills, Calif.
Sounds great. Namaste, as your instructor says at the end of a session: the divine in me bows to the divine in you. But let's up the ante a bit. Is yoga more than the power of positive breathing? Can it, say, cure cancer? Fend off heart attacks? Rejuvenate post-menopausal women? Just as important for yoga's application by mainstream doctors, can its presumed benefits be measured by conventional medical standards? Is yoga, in other words, a science?
0 comments:
Post a Comment