Hatha Yoga

Hatha yoga is a form of yoga that involves holding specific body postures, called asanas, to work on muscle strength and connect your mind with your body.

Hatha is one of the most popular types of yoga practiced in the US and research shows that it has been linked to mental and physical health benefits like stress management and stronger core muscles.

Here’s what you need to know about Hatha yoga and how it can benefit your physical and mental health.

What is hatha yoga?

The word Hatha means “discipline of force” in Sanskrit, and the goal of Hatha yoga is to strengthen your muscles and create a mindful connection to your body. The word yoga means union.

Hatha yoga is actually an umbrella term that refers to any yoga practice that uses the common yoga postures you may have encountered in a yoga class, like downward-facing dog or child’s pose. You can see examples of Hatha yoga poses here.

However, if you go to a yoga class labeled “Hatha” in the US, you will usually find that it emphasizes holding poses for long periods, as opposed to classes like Vinyasa yoga that move more quickly and fluidly through poses.

According to Neha Gothe, PhD, director of the Exercise Psychology Lab at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Hatha yoga is made up of three main practices:

• Body postures (asanas)
• Breathing techniques (pranayama)
• Relaxation and meditation (dyana)

In a Hatha yoga class, you may learn about different ways of controlling your breath or how to sit in meditation in addition to doing yoga poses.

“Yoga began as a spiritual practice, but it has become popular as a way of promoting physical and mental well-being,” Gothe says. You may know that yoga can help tone muscles and make you more flexible, but there are many other health benefits you can get from practicing Hatha yoga.

Here are some of the health benefits to your mind and body that you can get from regularly practicing Hatha yoga:

1. Hatha yoga strengthens your core muscles

Doing Hatha yoga poses like plank pose and warrior I pose can help strengthen your core muscles, which include the muscles in your abdomen, sides, pelvis, and back.

Core muscles are important for overall body function since strong core muscles can help prevent lower back pain, improve your balance, and make you less likely to have a muscle injury.

Yoga can also be a good option for people who want to strengthen their core but can’t do higher intensity exercises like running or weight lifting, such as older adults or people with certain disabilities, Gothe says.

2. Hatha yoga helps you get a better night’s sleep

Doing Hatha yoga can reduce your levels of cortisol, a hormone that is tied to your sleep cycle. Low cortisol levels signal to your body that it’s time to sleep, so doing yoga before bed can help you fall asleep more quickly.

Some experts believe that yoga also benefits sleep because it emphasizes mindful breathing and meditation, which can help relax your mind and body before heading to bed.

A review published in 2013 in Frontiers in Psychiatry looked at three small studies on the effect of yoga on sleeping patterns. The studies used different time periods of yoga practices — some yoga classes went on for as little as 7 weeks while others continued for 6 months.

The research found that in all studies, doing yoga helped people fall asleep faster and improved their overall quality of sleep.

3. Hatha yoga may improve depression symptoms

Experts believe that Hatha yoga helps ease depression because it acts on the neurotransmitters in your brain in a similar way to antidepressants.

For example, doing yoga increases the levels of neurotransmitters like serotonin and gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) in your brain. GABA calms your nervous system and can help soothe anxious feelings brought on by depression, while serotonin helps to regulate your emotions.

The same 2013 review in Frontiers in Psychiatry looked at four small studies on how Hatha yoga affects depression symptoms. Results showed that people who did yoga once a week for as few as 5 weeks reported significantly lower scores on surveys measuring depression.

4. Hatha yoga can help you manage stress

While Hatha yoga can be physically demanding, it can also help you relax and de-stress. This is because doing yoga affects your nervous and endocrine systems, which control bodily functions like the release of hormones and blood pressure changes.

When you become stressed, both your cortisol levels and your blood pressure tend to rise. But a study published in 2017 in Complementary Therapies in Medicine found that people who did a Hatha yoga session before completing a stressful task had lower levels of cortisol and lower blood pressure afterward than people who did not do yoga. Participants who did Hatha yoga also reported feeling more confident about their performance in the stressful task.

Yoga tips for beginners

These 15 yoga tips will help you get a better workout, practice yoga with confidence, and get results quicker. It’s important to have an open mind and be ready to sweat. Even if you’re active and fit, yoga can be very challenging especially for beginners and for men even more so.

1. It’s going to feel weird.

If you’ve never done yoga before, many of the postures are going to feel weird or strange, because it involves movements that your body isn’t accustomed to. You might even feel vulnerable in some positions but fear not! The soreness you’ll feel the day after is a sign that your body is getting stronger as it adapts to these new movements.

2. You’re not going to be good at it.

Many people can bust out a few push-ups or run a mile without training for it, but yoga is another beast entirely. Flexibility and mobility is a strength that you actively have to work on in order to improve it. If you haven’t been doing any flexibility training, then yoga going to be a challenge – regardless of whether or not you can run a mile in 7 minutes or win a push-up contest. Be humble, push yourself outside of your comfort zones, and you’ll notice improvements in just a few weeks.

3. Know the difference between discomfort and pain.

You may get into an unfamiliar posture and immediately think to yourself, “Jeez, this hurts like a [insert expletive here]!” There’s a difference between discomfort and pain, though. Pain is sharp and intense. Pain is your body telling you, “Don’t do that.” Discomfort, on the other hand, is different. Discomfort could be your body getting used to a particular pose, your body stretching in an unfamiliar way, or muscles being activated in a way they’re not used to. Use your intuition, and pay attention what the instructor is saying if you’re unsure of how you’re supposed to be feeling in a particular pose.

4. Focus on yourself; not on other people.

Everyone has different bodies, with varying strength, flexibility, and control. Mirroring what other people do instead of focusing on the posture in a way that works for your body and your fitness level could mean you aren’t getting the benefits of the pose. All beginners especially men shouldn’t try to stretch into an advanced yoga pose, because at worst, it means that you’re going to hurt yourself.

5. Sensation over depth.

It isn’t important how flexible you are, or how deep you can get into a posture. Pushing yourself beyond a level of flexibility that your body isn’t ready for is a great way to get injured – so let’s avoid that. Instead, focus on achieving the correct sensation in your body. This means feeling stretching in certain muscles, while feeling active engagement (flexing or muscle engagement) in others.

6. Use your whole body.

Yoga is different than your typical gym workouts because almost all of the postures and exercises in yoga involve your whole body. That means that in order for you to do the exercises correctly, you have to use the total sum parts of your body, or you could be creating an imbalance, missing out an building strength or flexibility in a particular muscle, or flat out setting yourself up for injury.

7. Control your breath; control your body.

One of the best yoga tips is control your breathing. If you can control your breath, you can control your body. This is especially true in yoga because of the intense focus on breathing. Breathing controls the natural rise and fall of your body. Inhaling lifts and lengthens your body, while exhaling helps you sink deeper into the poses and relax your muscles. Focus on your breath, and the control of your body will follow.

Hatha yoga resources:

• What to expect in a Hatha yoga class
• 15 Hatha yoga poses

Adapted from an article published in Business Insider, 4 benefits of Hatha yoga and how it can improve your physical and mental health