How to Keep Your Blood Pressure and Hypertension Under Control

Blood pressure is a common disease in India. Stress, high anxiety, worries and to add to all lack of exercise brings high blood pressure in human bodies. In seventies and eighties, it was usual among the Indians under the age of forty to come under the influence of this disease. But surprisingly now teenagers and very young persons in their early twenties have started having the problem of blood pressure. The symptoms of this is very unusual flaring up of moods even at the slightest provocation and at times feeling unease and giddy due to stress and this also paves the way for hyper tension in the human body. 

In a televised show on yoga and naturopathy, which was also very widely attended by medical fraternity of India, the doctors were asked to narrate their experiences in medical profession. Majority of them said that their own family members lost their lives due to hypertension and blood pressure. Once the treatment for both these diseases begin it virtually becomes unstoppable; the consumption of pills goes on increasing day-by-day. Yet medicines only provide a suppression of tension for a temporary period and as it is said blood pressure and hypertension are all but incurable. It is also said genetic hyper-tension brings insanity to family members of subsequent generations. 

Blood pressure is also caused by failure of kidney and other neurological disorders. But stress and in many cases an acquired taste for alcohol remain the chief causes of blood pressure and hypertension. There are people who have hyper-anxiety at an early age and gradually that grows into fits of hypertension. Blood pressure and hypertension have claimed highest lives in this modern age of rat race of human living. 

But the good news is hypertension, high blood pressure and insomnia can be controlled in most of the cases and many patients have been cured by practice of “pranayama”-Indian breathing exercises. There are three important breathing exercises in yoga, which relax tension in the body to a great extent. Those are Sithali, Sitkari and Sadant.

One has to wake up early in the morning and do the breathing practices in an empty stomach. Let’s us see how those are done. 

Prior to the breathing exercises, it would be wise to do a bit of light exercises. But caution has to be taken that in no case there is pressure on one’s respiratory system. The heart of a person suffering from high blood pressure and hyper tension is very susceptible to strain and there can be damaging effects. Those who are obese and are not able to do much exercise can do these breathing practices without an exercise regimen. A morning walk for fifteen minute

Before starting the aforesaid breathing exercises, do the simple inhaling and exhaling practice for sometime.

How to practice the PRANAYAMA daily

Wake up early in the morning: -

Early to bed, early to rise, makes you healthy, wealthy and wise. This old proverb is a bright guiding principle in living a happy life. Regrettably now-a-days most of the people suffer from lack of sound sleep. The reasons are consumption of alcohol, smoking, junk foods and a hyper-tensed work atmosphere. Most of the industrial workers sleep late in the night and wake up never before eight o’clock in the morning. A sound seven to eight hour dreamless sleep can come only if these breathing practices are done thoroughly. It is best to retire to bed at nine o’clock in the night and sleep up to five in the morning.

Drink plenty of water regularly before going to toilet: -

Once you wake up and before cleaning your teeth, drink at least four glasses of water and then go to the toilet. Water cleanses your bowel completely. Lot of toxic in the shape of night soil is stored inside the stomach. A number of persons who suffer from high blood- pressure and hypertension also has gastric and indigestion problems. After coming back from toilet, finish brushing of teeth.

Start practice of PRANAYAMA: -

Intake of water in the morning reduces blood-pressure and hyper-tension to a good extent. Now your stomach is almost empty. Sit down on the floor. Close your eyes. The first breathing exercise before the said three breathing practices is inhaling and exhaling. It is called in India Vastrika. This is also known as panacea for all the diseases of body. Well there are two types of practices in it. One is fast and the other one is slow. 
The people without any heart and blood pressure ailments can go for the fast practice but the people with blood pressure and heart problems must do it slowly. So sit on the floor and start doing. The slow practice is deep inhaling and long exhaling. Continue it with your eyes closed. Please do not listen to your mind’s dictates to stop. One can do it for five to fifteen minutes without putting strain on the breathing. Simple deep inhaling and exhaling can give a lot of fresh oxygen to your body. The fast practice is divided into three steps. The first one is simple inhaling and exhaling as it is told in the earlier slow practice. The second phase of practice must start after doing the first one for sometime. In the second round, do the breathing a little faster. Throw the breath outside completely in one go giving pressure on your navel point. Inhaling will take place automatically. Repeat this again and again. The third practice is very fast round. It is done by making your head up and down. Do the breathing fast while moving your head up and down. Do it for at best for three minutes. In both the practices of slow and fast, your body will experience vibrations. As you stop, you will feel as if your body is getting condensed; the tension within it is draining out. 

The Sithali Pranayama: 

After you finish the first round of breathing exercise, please sit on the floor for sometime. Feel the vibrations in your body. The entire body is full of fresh oxygen. Mind is calm from the effects of it. Do not open eyes; sit in that position as before. The next one is Sithali pranayama. Open your mouth and get the tongue outside. Place it on your lower lip while bending it slightly upward. Pull the breath inside and close your mouth while letting it go through your nostrils. Do it for five minutes. Again you will feel the body vibrating. The stored up toxic inside the cells of the body is getting drained out rejuvenating each part of body.

The Sitkari Pranayama: 

The next practice will be slightly different one from the first one. Open your mouth and this time bend your tongue backward and make it touch your upper jaw. Literally the tongue should comfortably stay on the upper jaw. After that, start pulling breath inside your mouth and close it. Make the air go out through your nostrils. Repeat it steadily. Gradually you will find that inside of your body there is a lot of coolness and body is vibrating. Slowly the body will creep into the tomb of coolness. 

The Sadant Pranayama:

The last one is Sadant breathing practice. It is different from the earlier two ones. In this, you open your lips but keep the teeth of lower and upper jaws pressed. Draw breath though the clenched teeth with a slight hissing sound, only audible to you. Again the body will vibrate and the coolness will increase.

The last act

• There must be a space of few moments within the aforesaid four breathing practices. 
• The four breathing practices combined must not be done for than half an hour.
• Please stop if you are feeling pain in your heart. It might be you are overdoing the 
  practices. 
• After completing the four exercises, sit calmly on the floor without doing anything with eyes still closed for five to ten minutes. The more you sit in silence, the better for your mental equilibrium.

The benefits 

The benefits will be felt by you automatically. You will find that in an extremely charged and tensed atmosphere, you are not getting perturbed. Gradually your blood pressure will be normal. But please do not stop medicine forthwith. Slowly but surely you will gain your composure to a great extent.