Soothe stress and anxiety in 20 minutes with this specially-designed yoga session

The festive season can be a stressful time, but this yoga session is designed to ease anxiety in just 20 minutes. Featuring poses and movements that are low to the ground, it's a slow-paced routine that doesn't require you to put too much weight through your hands. 

This particular sequence is so gentle that you don't really need a mat to complete it; a carpet or rug is likely to offer enough support. We'd still recommend investing in one of the best yoga mats for more intense, sweaty sessions – but this gentle stretching series doesn't require one.

The yoga routine was posted by Yoga With Adriene, a popular YouTube channel run by Adriene Mishler. She aims to provide high-quality practices on yoga and mindfulness to "inspire people of all ages, shapes and sizes across the globe." 

Watch her video below to try this yoga for anxiety session yourself.

Watch Yoga With Adriene's Yoga For Anxiety session

There's lots of research showing that yoga can be an effective method for dealing with stress. For example, a 2018 study published in the International Journal of Preventative Medicine showed that depression, anxiety and stress decreased in a group of 52 women after four weeks of tri-weekly yoga sessions. 

And that isn't the only health benefit. According to the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health, yoga can also help people improve their sleep, lose weight and provide relief from lower back pain.

If you want to slip this flow into your fitness routine, we think it can easily fit around your existing commitments. As a low-intensity activity, it's a great way to recover from strength training sessions and cardio bouts alike. It shouldn't leave you too tired to take on a workout the following day either. 

Want to learn more about yoga? Try these anti-aging yoga moves, give a seated yoga flow a go, or find out what happened when our writer did yoga every day for 30 days.