Yoga is often celebrated for its ability to create harmony between body and mind, but its impact on the bodily systems goes deeper than what we might initially realize. Different elements of the practice support and engage unique aspects our anatomy and physiological processes. From head to toe, yogaâs influence reaches every layer of our physiology. In this article, weâll explore the dynamics between yoga and different bodily systems.
Thereâs a tremendous amount to cover here. We don’t want to get lost in detailed yoga anatomy and physiology so we’ll be covering the basics to give you a general sense of how this practice impacts the body at different levels.
If you’re looking to learn more about yoga anatomy, be sure to check out Joe Miller’s online yoga anatomy course.Â
Yoga and the Skeletal System
Skeletal System Overview and Function
Our skeletal system is comprised of our bones, cartilage, ligaments and other connective tissues that form joints. It has a few important functions for us, one of which of course is holding us upright. It also protects vital organs and is important for movement. There are some other functions, but for now these are the most relevant for what we’ll be discussing.
Yoga’s Impact on the Skeletal System
So how can yoga affect the skeletal system? For one, staying active can keep the body healthy which includes the tissues of the skeletal system. Cartilage has a limited blood supply, and there are living cells within cartilage just like there are living cells within our bones. Those cells need oxygen and nutrients and the way they get that oxygen and nutrients is through diffusion.
Diffusion can be thought of as the flow of molecules through a fluid. As we move our joints through a full range of motion, a little bit of pressure is put on the cartilage which helps to bring nutrients to those cells. So movement can be really healthy for the cartilage and the joint. Ligaments also respond positively to healthy levels of stress.
Weight bearing exercise is also important for the health of our bones. There does need to be a certain level of intensity in order for there to be a measurable impact though. Our bones respond to healthy levels of stress by becoming stronger. With inactivity, our bones begin to atrophy. This is known as Wolffâs Law.
Yoga For Osteoporosis
Most of us are probably familiar with the idea that as we age, we tend to lose bone density. If that gets bad enough, it can become what we call osteoporosis which is thinning of the bones. Osteoporosis can become problematic because it increases the risk of fracture to your bones, or breaking your bones. Often, people who are older in age may fall and if they land on their hip, they could break this upper part of the femur. Or maybe they injure a wrist. These types of injuries can be very serious in elderly people.
The good news is that bones respond to the stresses we put on them. So if we stay active and continue to do weight bearing exercise that is vigorous enough to place some positive stress on the bones it can actually help to keep our bones healthy. Of course we also need to ensure we’re getting enough calcium in our diet. Vitamin D is also important since it helps us absorb calcium into the digestive system.
These are just a couple of the ways that yoga can have a positive impact on the skeletal system. Now, lets take a look at the muscular system.
Yoga and the Muscular System
Muscular System Overview and Function
As the name suggests, our muscular system is comprised of all the muscles in our body. When we think of the muscular system we often think of the muscles we can see, however this is just one type of muscle called skeletal muscles. As you might have guessed, these are muscles that attach to our skeleton. They are very important for helping us move, whether its walking, running, or getting into a handstand.
Movement is important for other aspects of our body though, so we also find muscles that help us breath, or move our food through the digestive organs. The muscular system also helps with regulation of body temperature and other physiological processes like helping to regulate blood sugar.
How Yoga Impacts the Muscular System
Of all the bodily systems, the relationship between yoga and the muscular system is probably the most obvious. When weâre practicing yoga, weâre using muscles to move in and out of postures, stabilize the body and maintain balance. All of that can help to build muscular endurance.
One aspect of yoga that is particularly unique in physical movement is its impact on flexibility. Our muscles are elastic. If you envision a rubber band stretching, it will spring back to its normal size after being stretched out. This is the principle of elasticity in action and our muscles function similarly. For instance, when we go into a forward fold we are stretching our hamstrings. If we stay in the pose for a little while, our muscle fibers lengthen and overcome a bit of that elasticity. However once we come out of the pose, the muscles return back to its resting length.
So if our muscles return back to their resting length after a stretch, how do we increase flexibility? Well it actually seems to be largely related to our nervous system. Through practice, we are kind of giving reassurance to the nervous system that moving through a greater range of motion is okay. This allows us to gradually, over time, increase our flexibility.
So different practices of yoga can help us increase muscular strength and endurance, as well as flexibility.
Yoga and the Integumentary System
Integumentary System Overview and Function
The integumentary system is comprised of your skin, hair and nails. It plays an important role as a barrier between us and the outside world. It helps keep everything inside that needs to stay there, and helps to keep anything dangerous from outside getting in. Sensory nerves and receptors in the skin also help provide information about things like touch, pressure, temperature or pain. The integumentary system also plays a role in body temperature regulation and Vitamin D production.
Yoga’s Impact on the Integumentary System
During more energy-intensive yoga practices like Vinyasa, the body can start producing heat or even sweating. Our body sweats to cool us off. If youâre practicing in a very hot or humid environment, it can become difficult for the sweat to evaporate and to dissipate some of that heat. So its always good to drink enough water to replenish some of the fluid getting lost through sweat. In these hot, humid conditions our blood flow is diverted toward the skin to help radiate that heat out. At the same time, our cardiovascular system is sending blood to our muscles so theyâre able to continue moving us and maintaining nutrients. This can get our heart-rate pumping higher as our heart works harder to get blood out to different areas of the body.
One key area that relates to yoga and the integumentary system is through sensation. Our skin gives us sensory awareness of whatâs going on in the world around us as well as the position of our body in space. So for instance, in a balancing pose like Tree, your brain is getting information about touch or pressure from the soles of your feet to influence the contraction of muscles and maintain balance.
Yoga and the Cardiovascular System
Cardiovascular System Overview and Function
The Cardiovascular system includes the heart, blood vessels and blood. It functions as a central transportation system within the body. At a high level, its job is to transport blood which in turn carries oxygen, nutrients and hormones to the cells. It also carries away waste, carbon dioxide, in a continual cycle. Thereâs a ton we could cover related to the cardiovascular system, but this should be enough to at least frame our look at how it relates to a yoga practice.
How Yoga Impacts The Cardiovascular System
One of the interesting things about yoga is how we put our bodies into all kinds of positions that change our normal relationship to gravity. Normally, when we are upright, the brain is higher than the heart. Blood pressure needs to be maintained to the brain. If we turn ourselves upside down during a pose like headstand, its going to change our relationship of the body to gravity. This means that now the hip, head or brain will be lower than the heart â which affects blood pressure.
In this circumstance, the arteries in the neck have baroreceptors that can sense the change in pressure. Theyâll send a signal to the brain and will take some steps to lower your blood pressure in order to bring it back down. This is important because you donât want to have too much blood flowing toward the brain.
This is one of the reasons why you donât want to stand up immediately after a headstand. If you do, it might cause you to feel a bit lightheaded. Moving into a pose like childâs pose after a headstand can bring your heart and head closer to the same level to help the body adjust to the transition.
High blood pressure or hypertension is a common problem. Thereâs a lot of serious health problems resulting from chronic hypertension. One issue is that the regulatory system might not be as effective as it should be. So the bodyâs reflex to lower blood pressure during an inversion might be not as responsive. This is one of the reasons why its generally recommended for those with uncontrolled high blood pressure to avoid inverted poses like headstand or shoulderstand.
We can contract muscles around the veins to help with blood flow to the heart. Breathing of course helps as well. Gravity can also help. In a pose like legs up the wall, with the legs elevated, gravity helps to bring blood from the lower legs back towards the heart.
Another area of yoga that can impact the cardiovascular system is through aerobic exercise. While it might not be as vigorous as running or swimming, yoga can have a beneficial level of intensity.
And finally, one of the big benefits for the cardiovascular system is that yoga can help us deal with stress. The physical, spiritual and philosophical elements of yoga all provide tools to help us manage and address stress or anxiety. Stress and anxiety can contribute to a host of problems within the cardiovascular system, so having tools to cope effectively can provide some relief in this area.
Yoga and the Lymphatic System
Lymphatic System Overview and Function
Many of us might not be as familiar with the lymphatic system as we are with the cardiovascular system but it plays an important role in moving fluid through the body and the function of our immune system. It also helps to absorb fats from the digestive system.
It is comprised of a network of lymphatic vessels, nodes, organs, tissue and lymph. Lymph is fluid that has been collected from around the cells and moves through lymphatic vessels and lymph nodes where the immune system will work to destroy pathogens and keep us healthy.
How Yoga Impacts The Lymphatic System
One of the major ways that yoga can help with the Lymphatic system is just the fact that weâre moving our bodies. Â When weâre practicing yoga, weâre contracting our muscles. Those contractions of the muscles help the process of pushing lymph through the lymph vessels and lymph nodes where the immune system functions to keep us healthy. Â Similar to the cardiovascular system, we can also assist in this movement by turning ourselves upside down.
So for instance, in a pose like shoulder stand or legs up the wall where we have the legs elevated, gravity will help to pull fluid from the legs through the lymphatic vessels and back in the direction of the heart.
In yoga, we do a lot of breathing practices, particularly practices with very full inhalation. When we breath in, a bit of negative pressure is created within the lungs which can help to pull lymph as well as blood through the veins.
There hasnât been a ton of strong research into the relationship between the Lymphatic system and yoga, but we could also speculate that yoga could be helpful for the immune system since stress can have a negative impact on the immune system.
Yoga and the Urinary System
Urinary System Overview and Function
The urinary system helps us maintain fluid levels within the body and filter blood. It helps to maintain homeostasis which in simple terms means to maintain a steady internal environment within the body. The urinary system includes the kidneys, ureters, bladder and urethra. The muscles of the pelvic floor also play a role in the function of the urinary system.
How Yoga Impacts The Urinary System
In the urinary system, the pelvic floor helps to maintain continence and ensure we donât go to the bathroom when we donât want to. There are yoga practices that involve the pelvic floor which you might be familiar with. In Sanskrit, we call the contraction of the pelvic floor Mula Bandha. Mula meaning root and bundha meaning lock.
The pelvic floor is involved in breathing. When the diaphragm contracts and we inhale, it pushes down on the abdominal organs. That tends to push the pelvic floor downward a little bit. When we breath out, the pelvic floor lifts up. So if engaged in a breathing practice that keeps the pelvic floor engaged, its going to create a little bit of resistance to the movement of the diaphragm.
One of the important ways in which we can help to prevent incontinence is by maintaining the health of the pelvic floor. We also need to be able to void the bladder when we need to.  Because of this, we need a pelvic floor  that can contract when its supposed to contract and relax when its supposed to relax.
Yoga and the Digestive System
Digestive System Overview and Function
The digestive system helps us break down and absorb nutrients to produce energy. The three main functions of the digestive system are digestion, absorption and elimination. Digestion is when food is broken down from larger molecules to smaller molecules and absorbed by the body. Â Absorption is the process of absorbing nutrients and water within the small intestine, stomach and large intestine. As the name suggests, elimination is the removal of waste.
How Yoga Impacts the Digestive System
Movement plays an important role in digestion. Smooth muscle within the esophagus, stomach and intestines help to move food. All of these organs do have to move in order to push food through. It is a bit speculative once again, but it would make sense that as weâre using skeletal muscles to move our body through a yoga practice, compressing and stretching certain areas of the body can help with this movement.
Thereâs also quite a bit of research showing that physical activity in general is very good for keeping stuff moving through the digestive system. Particularly when it comes to preventing constipation.
The parasympathetic nervous system is also very much tied into the process of digestion. This part of our nervous system is often referred to as the ârest and digestâ system. When our body encounters stress, it redirects energy that might be used for processes like digestion to combat that stress. So once again, yogaâs ability to help us cope with and manage stress may play a role in helping us digest our food.
Yoga and the Respiratory System
Respiratory System Overview and Function
The Respiratory System brings oxygen into the body and gets rid of carbon dioxide. As a reminder, our cells need oxygen to metabolize nutrients and product energy. Carbon dioxide is a biproduct of this process, so the respiratory system is also responsible for expelling carbon dioxide. In this sense, the respiratory system functions as an internal interface between the atmosphere and the bloodstream. It has a couple other functions as well, like making noise or speaking, helping to regulate blood pressure and pH balance of the body.
How Yoga Impacts The Respiratory System
A big part of any yoga practice is bringing attention to our breathing, and in some cases even consciously changing our breathing patterns through the practice of pranayama. One of the reasons breathing became such a big part of yoga is this idea that it serves as a linkage between the voluntary and involuntary parts of the nervous system. Between conscious and unconscious. So by slowing down our breathing, we are sending a signal to the central nervous system that everything is okay and weâre safe to shift into that parasympathetic state of ârest and digest.â
If you’re interested in exploring this more, our online course ‘Breathing 101’ explores yoga and the anatomy of breathwork in more detail.
Yoga and the Nervous System
Nervous System Overview and Function
The nervous system is a control center of the body. It collects information throughout the entire body, processes that information and then forms and delivers a response. As a simple example, lets say youâre going to take a shower. You turn on the water in the faucet, and then feel the temperature of the water. Your fingers have sensors in the skin that give you information about the temperature. Those sensors send information up to the brain. Your brain then makes some decisions. Is the water too hot? Is it too cold? Do we need to adjust? It makes a decision and then sends a signal out through what we call motor neurons out to the muscles of your arms so you can take hold of the faucet, adjust the temperature to whatever you find suitable.
This is obviously a simple example, but itâs the basic framework for everything that the nervous system is doing. It collects information, determines any adjustments that need to be made, and then make decisions that affect those changes.
How Yoga Impacts The Nervous System
Once again, yogaâs role in dealing with stress can have a positive impact here. Yoga provides several tools for dealing with stress, and there are some specific aspects of the practice which can more directly influence the nervous system. As mentioned earlier, by slowing our breath rate we can send a signal to the nervous system that everything is okay and we can shift towards the parasympathetic state.
Our parasympathetic nervous system functions unconsciously. We aren’t able to control it like we can with our muscular system, it functions behind the scenes. So while we can’t tell our stress responders to ‘turn off’ we can help to influence it through aspects of yoga like breathwork.
Explore More on Yoga Anatomy and Physiology
If you’re interested in exploring this subject is more detail, check out this online course by Joe Miller on yoga and the bodily systems.
Or if you’d like to really get in depth, enroll in his online yoga anatomy course here.
