Yoga and Meditation

Quite a few people have suggested that I ought to give yoga a try. It seems a bit faddy to me; can you tell me a bit about it?

Yoga comes from India and is a way of achieving relaxation by controlling the body and the mind. It is the ability to learn relaxation techniques and meditation that are of value to the headache sufferer. The core principles of healthy food and regular meal patterns are also helpful in raising your headache or migraine threshold.

Today’s lives tend to be full and busy, and many people find yoga calming and relaxing. Any opportunity to have some protected time that will ease the stresses and pressures will be of benefit.

You have nothing to lose and possibly a lot to gain by giving it a go. Can meditation help my headache?

Meditation can help headache, chronic pain, anxiety, and stress. It is a way of promoting both physical and emotional relaxation. Making it part of the day can help raise the migraine threshold and reduce the chance of an attack being triggered.

You need to consider meditation as a way of focusing your attention away from the pain. The focus may be an image, sound, word or phrase; returning to this while you are meditating or experiencing the start of a headache helps prevent it from developing.

I have a lot of neck and head pain. Is relaxation and meditation likely to help?

Pain, especially chronic (long-term) pain, can be helped by relaxation techniques, and learning the art of meditation helps you learn how to relax. Relaxing and learning how to change negative stress to positive stress can only be a good thing in raising your migraine threshold or preventing your threshold from being pushed down.