Do you struggle to manage your blood pressure and keep it at healthy levels? It’s known that one in three adults suffer from high blood pressure – Say what?! So here are two ways that you can lower those pesky levels within 7 days!
High Blood Pressure
While high blood pressure does affect you in various ways, there’s a lot you can do to limit its impact on your body. Using simple diet and Yoga routines you can start today to easily manage your health risks. Let’s start by saying that Yoga is an excellent anti-aging tool, capable of relieving symptoms and in some cases improving medical outcomes. It doesn’t matter where you’re starting from or how old you are—movement and yoga can help manage your high blood pressure. Another way to manage your high blood pressure is through diet.
Now if you’re like most Americans we love our salty, sugary, acidic foods. Although they taste great these kinds of foods actually promote high blood pressure so it’s imperative that we control how much we eat of these foods and when or better yet eliminate these foods from your diet altogether.
So before I get into it, let’s talk about what causes high blood pressure and how you can do to mitigate it from a diet standpoint.
The exact causes of high blood pressure are not known, but several things may play a role, including:
- Smoking
- Being overweight or obese
- Lack of physical activity
- Too much salt in the diet
- Too much alcohol consumption (more than 1 to 2 drinks per day)
- Stress
- Older age
- Genetics
- Family history of high blood pressure
- Chronic kidney disease
- Adrenal and thyroid disorders
- Sleep apnea
Now as you can see there are SEVERAL causes to high blood pressure but with this simple diet routine that I am going to share with you from a partner with Evolved Life, Ben Azadi where you’ll be able to start managing your high blood pressure with ease starting today. Ben even hosts a fasting and keto diet course on our membership platform for those of you who are ready to start today.
Ketogenic Diet
Don’t know what the Ketogenic Diet is? Then let me explain keto real quick. The ketogenic diet is a high-fat, adequate-protein, low-carbohydrate diet. This diet forces the body to burn fats rather than carbohydrates and if you suffer from weight loss then this type of diet can help you significantly. Being overweight has also proven to affect your blood pressure levels. This simple diet mixed with intermittent fasting will get your high blood pressure under control quickly. Now let’s explain Intermittent Fasting.
Intermittent Fasting
Now there are many ways to do intermittent fasting and I am going to share only one. Of course, I always recommend seeing a health professional before undertaking any of these diet routines to ensure your health and safety.
The 16/8 Method: Fast for 16 hours each day.
The 16/8 Method involves fasting every day for 14-16 hours and restricting your daily eating window to 8-10 hours.
Within the eating window, you can fit in two, three or more meals. This method is also known as the Leangains protocol and was popularized by fitness expert Martin Berkhan.
Doing this method of fasting can actually be as simple as not eating anything after dinner, and skipping breakfast.
For example, if you finish your last meal at 8 pm and then don’t eat until 12 noon the next day, then you are technically fasting for 16 hours between meals.
It is generally recommended that women only fast 14-15 hours because they seem to do better with slightly shorter fasts.
For people who get hungry in the morning and like to eat breakfast, then this can be hard to get used to at first. However, many breakfast skippers actually instinctively eat this way. You can drink water, coffee, and other non-caloric beverages during the fast, and this can help reduce hunger levels.
It is very important to eat mostly healthy foods during your eating window. This won’t work if you eat lots of junk food or excessive amounts of carbohydrates.
I personally eat this way and find it to be one of the most natural transitions. I have found that I can regulate my energy levels easier and tune into my body with ease.
Now that you understand how you can use diet and fasting to your advantage to lower your blood pressure let’s talk about how body movement AKA Yoga can assist your blood pressure as well.
Yoga and High Blood Pressure
You might not attribute working out to solving your high blood pressure but moving your body actually does wonders not just for blood pressure and many other benefits as well. (I will make another article on the benefits of yoga for those who are interested in learning more.)Â Again, it’s important to remember that high blood pressure is one of the most common ailments that affect adults as they age.
So let’s see how Yoga can help you: Some studies show that regular yoga can lower blood pressure, so a routine yoga practice will help you bring down the risky numbers. Yoga promotes blood flow so as you move avoid transitions that put your head below your heart, and opt out of sequences that require you to move quickly from standing to forward folding (This may create dizziness and we want to avoid that).
REMINDER: Yoga is about moving energy throughout the energetic body. Energy is more than just your physical body and is why with intention and visualization Yoga can help strengthen this energetic body.
Here are some poses that you can use for your high blood pressure:
- Bridge Pose: This pose is for any beginner and will help you to circulate blood flow through your hips, glutes, and lower back.
- Downward facing dog: A great one to stretch the entire back, shoulders, and glutes. Remember this is about moving energy in those tight centers!
- Head To Knee Forward Bend: As easy as sitting on the floor and touching those toes! Or knees. It’s all about progress and moving that body!
If you practice these 3 simple movements then you’ll find better focus and blood flow throughout the entire body. This is meant to get you moving and to lower that pesky blood pressure. All in all, between the ketogenic diet, intermittent fasting, and simple Yoga routines you’ll find that you can reduce your blood pressure without having to take all those medications that your doctors prescribe. Now, I highly recommend you still visit a doctor and receive the correct treatments but with these added to your health practices, you’ll start seeing progress as soon as your first 7 days.
I hope this helps!
(Disclaimer: I am not a health professional and I totally recommend seeing someone who can assess your situation and help you in the correct manner. Evolved Life or any of its partners are not responsible for any actions taken from this article.)
