Health & Wellness

Our chair borne/ sedentary lives coupled with hours of working on computers, mobile phones and driving long distances, our cosy sofa sets, badly designed chairs as well as soft mattresses or thick pillows and watching TV in awkward positions and suddenly lifting weights in an awkward position,  overweight particularly around waistline all resulting in bad posture contributes to a great extend in causing backache, cervical Spondylitis, dizziness, sciatica, slipped disc/herniated disc in a vast majority of people around the world.

Chronic back pain could also be a symptom of any of these serious conditions:-

• A kidney infection/Stone
• Reproductive problems in human/prostate problem in men
• scoliosis the Man curvature of the spine

The simplest self care for your back can be found in the most of the cases if you give your back complete rest for 2-3 days or give a contrast bath of hot and cold pack on the affected area.

Resume your normal activities but take things easy for a few days then only start with yoga for a permanbnet cure of your back pain and related problems.

Back surgery is not a safe and lasting solution at all for your back pain even if an Orthopaedic Surgeon advises you.

Instead! Before you panic and decide to go for a risky back surgery you need to know the facts that not all ruptured/herniated disc cause pain.

The study of 98 people with no back pain revealed that over half of them had one or more ruptured discs and still were not experiencing any pain in the back, it might be a co-incidence that pain is  could be due to a herniated disc that should not push you to go for the surgery

Discs are the soft rounded cartilage between the vertebrae/ bone of the spine. A herniated disc occurs a Jelly like interior of the disc is pushed out of its usual place/socket and extends beyond the bones of the spine.

These are the most common sources of back pain fortunately they are also the least serious because if reasonable care is taken the usually cure themselves.

Usually doctors don’t know why your back hurts. Doctors aren’t able to identify a definite cause of pain in 85 percent of the people who come to them with back complaints. In addition, the number of surgeries on the lumbar spine, or lower back, increases with the growth of new imaging techniques, such as MRI. When an MRI reveals a ruptured disk, doctors are likely to point to that as the cause of your back pain. The cure they will probably suggest – surgery.

But interpretations of an MRI scan can vary from a doctor to another doctor. If your doctor suggests back surgery based on the results of imaging testing, get a second opinion. Keep in mind that 96 percent of all back injuries will heal with rest and rehabilitative exercises.

In my 60 years of yoga therapy career I have discovered that prolonged bad posture  during sitting ,standing ,sleeping ,lying down or working can also sometimes cause trembling of the hands and affect your body balance while walking besides all  above stated health problems, almost similar to the symptoms of Parkinson disease.

Even aesthetically you need to maintain a good posture. For example, if your shoulders slouch while walking or sitting you will look ugly and unattractive and if you stand, sit and walk   tall, you immediately look smarter and confident.

Without holding a good straight posture, the organs of your body cannot work properly and, in the cases of children, they cannot grow to their full potential. These are some of the good reasons for you to remember to keep your posture straight & seeds of spinal pain are sown in early childhood itself.

Practise the following yoga postures for attaining and maintaining a good posture……..