The benefits of epsom salts

THE HEAL ALL GO TO
I’m a big fan of the epsom bath. Playground cuts, bruises, tummy aches, and growing pain all get sent upstairs for an epsom bath in our house. As mentioned in my Finding Balance article, I had a somewhat humbling trip and fall walking back from school drops a month or two ago. Once I got over the annoyance of the injury, I took it on as a project to learn new ways to find natural healing methods. I decided to follow my own advice and have an epsom bath, everyday for a week, and use myself as a guinea pig to see how fast I could speed up the healing process of a decent sized cut knee, with a matching very impressive bruise on the other knee!

RAINBOW KNEES
With each day I could visibly see the progress of the recovery. The cut very quickly sealed over, and the bruise came to the surface and started changing from deep purple, to blue, to green within a matter of days. After one week the improvement was huge and my poor little knees were well on their road to recovery. Over the course of the week I started to notice lots of additional benefits to having a daily epsom bath. I knew they were very calming but there are so many more benefits that I didn’t know about till I tried it. Here are some of the benefits I notice:

• Speed up healing of bruises
• Speeds up healing of cuts
• Speeds up muscle strain and injury recovery
• Relieves muscle pain, tension and inflammation
• Softer and more even toned skin
• Relieves stress and promotes the production of serotonin (rest & restore hormone)
• Regular bowel movement
• Eliminates pre menstrual bloating and cramping
• Promotes a better night sleep
• Regulates blood sugar levels and reduces food cravings

MISSING MINERALS
Epsom salts are made of magnesium sulphate – an important mineral which is becoming harder to take in adequate required daily amounts. We usually get it in our diet from fresh fruit and veg, but with the high turn over in agriculture, the soils are becoming increasingly depleted in their minerals – magnesium sulphate being one of these many minerals along with a long list of others. High consumption of caffeine also strips our systems of the essential minerals.

It’s now almost two months later and I’m still loving my epsom baths. I’m still seeing the benefits and definitely feel more balanced on the days where I carve out a bit of time for even just a 10 minute soak. Like meditation, sometimes you might not be in the mood, or you feel you don't have time, but a little self push in the right direction is needed when you know the results are guaranteed!

Ruth Delahunty Yogaru

The benefits of meditation

DAILY PRACTICE
Establishing a daily meditation practice has been on my ‘to do’ list for quite a while. I have a well established yoga practice for over 15 years, but I struggled to settle long enough for daily meditation. Over the last two years I’ve dabbled with it, and done lots of meditation and mindfulness courses, but as much as I loved it and understood the huge benefits of it, I couldn’t get it to stick. Until last Christmas when my dad, the centre of my universe, became very sick and spent four difficult months in hospital. My yoga practice became my safe haven, where whatever was lurking under my brave exterior could flow, in all its shapes and forms. I practiced with such clarity, and was amazed by how the body knew exactly what it needed to do to support itself. I finally was ready to sit in silence and establish my daily meditation practice!

THE BENEFITS
It’s now three months since I started a consistent daily practice, and as I reflect over what the practice has brought me, I notice they are far greater than the value of the small amount of time required for your daily practice.

Here are some of the benefits I have noticed so far...

• Greater awareness and observation skills
• More self-compassion
• Learning the value of taking time to nourish myself by taking time out
• Less judgemental of myself and others
• Learning to pause before reacting to situation
• Feeling less overwhelmed by busy day
• Learning to declutter my day and let go of unnecessary tasks
• Happier to be me
• Feeling nourishment thrive from every cell
• Appreciation of my health
• Calmer and more attentive to the kids
• Deepening of my yoga practice
• Learning that not everything can be fixed, and sometimes it's not my job to fix it!

And many more benefits I look forward to along my meditation journey...

• Stress management
• Eases anxiety
• Eases tension
• Eases depression
• Improves cognitive function
• Improved attention span
• Builds focus & concentration
• Builds connections with others
• Increases empathy & compassion
• Improves quality of sleep
• Balances nervous system
• Reduces blood pressure
• Slows biological ageing
• Aids pain management
• Increases immune system

GETTING STARTED
All that in just a few minutes a day! If, like me, you find it hard to get your daily practice going, keep chipping away at it - learning, reading, listening to podcasts and playing around with different methods of meditation, until eventually it will stick. Start with just 3 mins a day and build up from there. You don’t have to be meditating for an hour a day to make a difference to you life. Small, regular practices are more beneficial than one 30min practice a week. Remember that the mind will wander, and when it does, gently guide it back to the breath, without judgement. When I feel myself getting involved in internal chatter, I label them ‘stories’ and return to the breath without making a fuss. For people with kids, those 3 mins of meditation are the most important minutes of your day, take it from a mum and her three kids.

TOOLS FOR LIFE
I now look forward to my meditation and to the lovely feeling of clarity I know it will give me for the rest of the day. Meditation is not a miracle fix glue for life – there will still be plenty of life's challenges, but when you do encounter moments of stress, it gives you the ability to pause and observe, before you react. Your mind will thank you for helping it to take a break from the days planning and list making. Ciara Cronin of The Yoga Room runs a continuous Mindfulness & Meditation 4 week course. The studio is a beautiful space and is always warm and welcoming. Ciaras knowledge and guidance of mindfulness meditation help you to cross the bridge safely into the unknown. Before you know it, you’re meditating and you’ve started your new journey!

“Most people are aware that the benefits of mindfulness include relief from stress and anxiety and a calmer state of mind, but it also has a profound restorative effect on all the physical systems of the body; improving our immunity to illness, aiding digestion, balancing metabolism, relaxing the nervous system, and increasing our creativity, empathy and compassion.” Ciara Cronin, The Yoga Room

Ruth Delahunty Yogaru

Develop a home practice

YOUR SUPPORTIVE SPACE
Yoga is medicine for the mind body & spirit. Developing a home practice helps support you in times of need – combating moments of tension in the workplace, dealing with kiddie tantrums, or whatever your daily challenges are.

Putting aside some time for yourself, and cultivating a safe space at arms length, is becoming an increasing mechanism to counteract the busy, fast pace of our lives. Getting to know your own practice – your strengths, your limitations, your favourite asana – helps you create a practice to suit your needs, in your own time. It gives you the tools to support yourself, rather than looking to others for support, and is an empowering experience to feel you can respond to constantly changing life circumstances rapidly before they evolve.

JUST EXPLORE
Some days your home practice can be as simple as 5 minutes of Sun Salutations, or when you have put aside some time for yourself, a longer practice to get creative with. Learn to listen to what you need on each particular day, and have no expectations of your strength or flexibility. The body reacts differently to the practice each day, and within each day, each hour is different too. Finding your way onto your mat, through home practice and yoga classes, consistently and regularly, accumulates and intensifies the benefits of the practice.

GET STARTED
Try out some of the sequences here to get you started. As you become more in tune with what your body needs, delve into the asana section. Print out the Yoga Matrix graphics below, to have at hand and ask yourself ‘what do I need today? Practice poses that are familiar and safe, that you have explored in class with the support of your yoga teacher. Start listening to alignment cues in class to try out at home. All you need is enough space to roll out a yoga mat! Remember to always take Savasana at the end of your practice to assimilate all the work and re-enter your day. But most of all, own your practice, and enjoy it!

Ruth Delahunty Yogaru

The benefits of a morning practice

ONE STEP AHEAD
There’s a reason why the birds sing in the morning - they know that it’s the best part of the day! When you exercise in the morning, you take back a part of your day from all the phone calls, messages and emails. It’s a peaceful and sacred time, which these days is rare!

If you’re thinking ‘I’m not a morning person’, don’t worry, it gets easier the more you do it, and very soon it’ll be second nature to you! Early morning starts also encourage you to get to bed on time and, as a extra bonus, get a better night's sleep. When you have a morning routine it’s easier to stick to it, with the added benefit of leaving your evenings free. With the best will in the world, a busy day, or other evening commitments, can often stop you from getting onto your mat.

GET MOVING
Life is more static than ever before. In the past people were used to daily manual labour and physical activity. These days we have cleverly designed electrical devices to do all the work for us, and we’ve replaced this ‘free time’ with sitting at our desks. To every action there is a reaction, and physical labour has been replaced by overworking our poor brains in a very static environment. Businesses are starting to see the detrimental effect this has on the health of their staff, and are beginning to encourage more activity and mindfulness. In return, they reap the benefits of staff who feel cared for, more alert and productive throughout the day. The physical and mental benefits to your health are well-documented and a hot topic in the media.

THE BENEFITS OF YOGA
Yoga has an abundant range of benefits at any time of day – from an early morning stretch to a lunchtime de-stress or an evening wind-down. The time of day that works best for me is early morning, before I start my day. It resets my system and prepares me for whatever is in store. Starting your day with movement gets you ready for the day and, for those with desk jobs, helps you sit with ease for the rest of your day. Yoga breath awareness helps you use the breath throughout the day to cultivate calm and combat moments of tension in the workplace, with your children, or whatever your daily challenges are, reminding you to pause before you react to situations.

Because of the variety of movements yoga offers, it stretches and strengthens your whole body and helps alleviate morning stiffness. It lubricates and stretches all the connective fascial tissue, which supports the entire musculoskeletal system. It also helps to build a healthy spine - a spine that has been well oiled first thing in the morning is less likely to pinch or tweak during the day. All the supporting muscles have been switched on, and are ready to support the spine for the day. Yoga also improves balance and coordination, building spatial awareness which helps prevent injury.

We are all beginning to understand the importance of good digestion to all-round health. A morning practice wakes up the digestive system. Twisting, stimulating and massaging all our internal organs, it alleviates bloating and helps with a good morning elimination! It also raises the metabolism and keeps it elevated for hours afterwards.

Putting aside some time for yourself is the kindest and most nourishing gift you can give to yourself. This kindness encourages you to make healthy choices for the rest of the day by starting as you mean to go on. Set an intention or a focus and revisit it throughout your day. It’ll bring you back to your mat, your ‘happy space’, and give you renewed strength for the day.

The illustration below shows the huge variety of the benefits yoga offers. If we could start our day with even one or two of the benefits wouldn’t it be worth that little push to roll yourself out of bed and onto your mat to the tune of the early birds?

Ruth Delahunty Yogaru

The benefits of Savasana

ASSIMILATION
Savasana, or Corpse Pose, is the ultimate asana for reintegration. It is considered to be one of the most essential, and the most tricky asana to master! It gives the challenge of relaxing, while remaining conscious, in order to absorb the effects of the asana and let go of all the efforts of our practice. During the practise a wide range of different muscle groups have been worked. Finishing the practice with Savasana gives the body a chance to reset and settle. Yoga poses were cleverly designed over 2,600 years ago, to help achieve this. A muscle is much more willing to submit and melt when it has been gently stretched and strengthened. By letting all the muscles dissolve into the support of the ground, it helps to release stress.

TAKE YOUR TIME
Stress can be emotional or physical, but the result of it is the same. It is linked to many mental and physical ailments. Learning to relieve stress is a very important tool in the hectic society we live in. It is recommended to take 5min of Savasana for every 30min of practise. Surrendering to the moment, and letting the teacher control when we re-enter the busy outside world, gives us permission to totally let go, slow down and absorb. This is something so many people don’t allow themselves to do very often.

Savasana reduces fatigue and headaches, helps relieve stress and mild depression, relaxes the breath, lowers blood pressure, triggers the parasympathetic nervous system and increases blood flow to all the organs of the body, nourishing your whole system. All the benefits of each asana from the practice, continue to process through the system. When we take time to build a bridge, that connects from the practice back out to our busy lives, the integration is smoother, and we carry the tranquillity we have cultivated into our day. We are better able to tackle the outside world again!

Ruth Delahunty Yogaru