This is a transcript of an Interview that Eddie gave to House of Yoga, an online Yoga Studio. We are blessed that Eddie visited us in early April to offer a lecture and Mysore sessions. Here’s to hoping he’ll be back soon!
I think the world responds to what people in the world need and thus people respond to how the world is at any given time. A lot of illness is caused by stress;high blood pressure, diabetes, inflammatory disease- are all stress related. Learning stress reducing techniques is going to be on the rise as these illnesses increase. There’s much more opportunity for us to be stressed these days because of our phones, computers and the amount of time that we are active and online. We have constant access to information and stimulation. I believe that the radiation and light coming off those machines disturbs our circadian rhythms and makes us want to stay awake much longer than we should. Our sleep patterns and the quality of our sleep is affected.When this happens we produce more adrenaline so the sympathetic nervous system is turned on all the time. Consequently our ability to digest food decreases and we cant nourish ourselves well. Mental cloudiness, irritability, lack of focus. The technology we use encourages us to be distracted all of the time and we just don’t switch off.
That’s why a lot of people are going to yoga classes. Its one of the times when we can switch off. the sympathetic nervous system gets turned off and the parasympathetic nervous system gets switched on.You start to feel more relaxed; your digestion, your mood, your ability to self regulate improves. You become less reactive and more focused. So Yoga is going to do all of these things for us pretty much regardless of the type.
I think the need of the day is not just how to learn how to turn off but how to regulate how much information we expose ourselves to and how to discipline ourselves when it comes time to rest.
A certain amount of discipline and regulation comes from having a Yoga practice.From getting on your mat and switching off.Yoga helps people moderate the flow of information and the pressures of work that we have coming in all of the time so that we can be happier and less stressed.