The circulatory system is an essential part
of what keeps us going. It is also
referred to as the cardio-vascular system and consists of the heart and the
blood vessels. The hearts job is to pump
blood to different parts of the body and this blood carries vital nutrients and
oxygen to the different organs. It
travels via the blood vessels. The heart
is divided into four compartments that each has a different role. The compartment on the upper right is
responsible for collecting the incoming impure blood from all over the body and
moving it on to the lower right compartment.
The lower right compartment sends the blood on to the lungs for
purification. The purified blood is then
returned to the heart - this time in the upper left ventricle from where it is
moved into the lower left compartment and then back out as fresh, pure blood to
the remainder of the body.
The blood is primarily carries through main
arteries that are thick tube like structures leading from the heart around the
body. The arteries branch into many sub
arteries which in turn will divide into thin-walled capillaries. The capillaries interact with the organs
directly and due to their thin walls they pass oxygen and nutrients to the
organs and tissues that need them the most.
The used resources are ejected from the tissue and back into the
capillaries to be fed on through specialized veins to return the impure blood
back to the heart to start the entire process once more. This is a difficult job as the pressure has
decreased this far from the heart so the veins are assisted by valves to
regulate the flow.
The important thing to understand about the
way the circulatory system is set up is that it has two main parts, the blood
system and the lymphatic system. It is
the job of the lymphatic system to remove waste from the circulatory
system. The two different systems run
almost side by side but while the blood system has a pump - the heart - the
lymphatic system does not have a single organ designed to power its
operations. This job falls to the
muscles, which pump the lymphatic system by contracting and expanding. This is of course where Yoga comes in.
Yoga is a discipline unique in its
combination of focus on body, mind and spirit.
The body component is taken care of with a series of poses and postures,
which are designed to clear blockages in the circulatory system and ensure that
everything is flowing as it should at an even regular rate. It also flexes the muscles and strengthens
them very efficiently over time with a minimal amount of 'grunt'. This strengthening and constant working of
these muscles pumps the lymphatic system and makes out body many times more
efficient at the removal of waste matter.
As a result people who practice Yoga regularly can expect that they will
have a greatly enhanced immune response system and be able to deal with
infection and disease better than their non-Yogi counterparts.
Furthermore the benefits start before
this. Yoga sessions will usually being
with a series of standing exercises emphasizing long slow breathing
exercises. These breathing exercises are
common to all forms of yoga and force us to concentrate on our breath and its
pathway trough the body each time we take a fresh breath. The exercises are designed especially so that
people are not restricted in where and when they can practice them and ideally
would use them instead of our slower shallower normal breathing pattern.
Because the breaths are longer and deeper the
oxygen intake is increased. Combined
with the enhancing effects that the exercises have on the regularity of
circulation in the blood system the oxygen is much more efficiently transported
to the muscles of the body. If these
muscles, along with our other organs and tissues are not receiving the oxygen
and nutrients we need then we starve them and become ill as a result.
As you can see Yoga is of great assistance to
the complex and interlocking system of circulation. It recognizes the basis and importance of the
system and helps to bring it back into balance.
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