Muscle relaxation: the Indian way

oleh: Prabhakar Korada

Format: Article
Diterbitkan: Wolters Kluwer Medknow Publications 2012-01-01

Deskripsi

Relaxation therapy is the buzz word in mental health parlance. Several therapies have been developed by the related professionals. Most of these therapies focus on the importance of relaxing the muscles with the expectation that the relaxed muscles would calm the mind through bio-feedback mechanism. Muscle relaxation certainly makes sense and is beneficial to many; but this type of therapy does not address the psychological components of anxiety, and therefore may be considered incomplete and deficient. That which could make it complete is available in the first half of Patanjali Yoga Sutras, as the Bahiranga Saadhana. The word Bahiranga in Sanskrit means external, open or public; saadhana means habituate/practice. Here it relates to the external aids to the practice of yoga. The steps advocated by Yogi Patanjali as the Bahiranga Saadhana, in his Ashtaanga yoga sutras, lead to total muscle as well as mind relaxation. Relaxation therapists and their patients would benefit if the basics of this science is borrowed and incorporated in their therapies. The relaxation therapists often instruct their patients to ‘let go’ in an attempt at achieving relaxation of the muscle and the mind; but they do not specify what to let go. This article attempts at clearing such a dilemma; it deals with the importance of putting in practice the yoga sutras, step by step, as a prerequisite to successful and sustained relaxation of the body and the mind.