COLUMBIA, MO -- Take a deep breath and relax for this story.
The health benefits of yoga make it more than just a pose.
Diane Oerly said it took her 50 years to find an exercise that was the right fit for her.
"I was looking for a way to cope with the stress that I had, and I just really liked yoga," Oerly said.
She, like some people, was skeptical about yoga, but once she tried it she was hooked.
"It is not mystical, not magical. It is just simply breathing, which is something we already do," said Lynn Rossy, Ph.D.
Rossy, a health psychologist with the University of Missouri system, believes busy lives lead to shallow breathing, which is bad for the body.
She teaches yoga as part of the university’s wellness program.
“I love yoga because anybody can do yoga, and I do mean anybody.”
According to Rossy, practicing yoga can help lower blood pressure, relieve symptoms of asthma, back pain and arthritis, and even help people suffering from depression.
"It's not about pushing yourself into postures or getting your leg behind your head,” Rossy explained. “Yoga is a wonderful way of letting the body be more relaxed and to ease away some of those pains that we get in the body from being so stressed and tense all the time."
The health psychologist offers free yoga videos online for those who want to try it without an audience.
"If I don't do yoga, I am beat by 5:00, but yoga kind of that just few minutes of time relaxing and breathing and getting out of your brain really helps," Oerly explained.
Rossy agrees.
"You can do five minutes of yoga practice and feel a whole lot better."
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