What are the benefits of sitting cross-legged?

Sitting cross-legged actually means sitting with your legs crossed and overlapping, but you must place your feet on your thighs so that you can achieve the effect of sitting cross-legged. However, this method was generally used in ancient times. Only after health preservation has gradually become popular now, some people have tried the way of sitting cross-legged. This is also a basic yoga movement. If you sit cross-legged frequently, it will help our body's blood circulation to a certain extent, especially for people with poor blood circulation in the lower body, it can play an auxiliary therapeutic effect.

In fact, thousands of years ago, before humans had chairs, both Chinese and Indians had already started sitting cross-legged. Our ancestors discovered that sitting cross-legged allows them to sit more steadily and for longer periods of time, so they naturally adopted this sitting posture.

There are many ways to sit cross-legged. When people think of sitting cross-legged, they think of the lotus position and immediately feel that it is difficult and that they cannot sit like that. In fact, there are many ways to sit cross-legged. In addition to the lotus position that we often think of (that is, placing the left and right ankles on the thighs of the other foot respectively), there is also the "scattered position". What we often call Sanpan means that we just need to fold both feet towards the other thigh. It doesn't have to be placed on the other thigh. We can just place both ankles on the floor in front of the perineum.

Another way of sitting cross-legged is to pull the heels of the feet close to the body and press them against the perineum, with the left foot below and the right foot above, overlapping each other. This is also a common way of sitting cross-legged.

The purpose of sitting cross-legged is to use our open thighs and shins to help us sit with our tailbone pointing downward so that we can sit more steadily. Another benefit is that if we fold our legs and stay in the same position for a few minutes, blood will no longer flow to the lower body. That is, the path of our blood circulation becomes shorter, by more than half. This is very helpful in improving blood circulation in the upper body. Some people will feel a slight heat in their upper body after sitting cross-legged for a while, which is due to this reason.

In addition, after sitting cross-legged for a while, open and stretch your legs, you will feel the blood rushing to the lower body. This can also improve the blood circulation in the lower body for people who usually have poor blood circulation. However, many religious people sit cross-legged not to enhance blood circulation, but after sitting for a while, they will find that their thoughts slow down, which can help us calm down and enter the stage of meditation.

Because people nowadays are very busy at work, they are under great pressure in life and rarely have time to sit down and think about some problems. In this case, you can sit cross-legged to achieve the effect of holding your breath and relaxing your mind. This will reduce your stress and make your body feel less tired. It can help calm your emotions and develop a peaceful character.