The African Nations Cup for 2008 is finally kicking off, this tournament is huge and millions of people from across the world will be watching.

South Africa, Benin, Tunisia, Morocco, Zambia, Namibia, Mali, Guinea, Senegal, Angola, Cameroon, Sudan, Egypt, Nigeria, Ivory Coast and Ghana will be participating in this years competition.

This years tournament should be very interesting with such new young rising talent.

If you want to watch the tournament you will need satellite or cable and the channels that broadcast the tournament, a few of the channels that will broadcast it will be Euro Sport, Sky sports and ESPN. If you do not have cable or satellite, or you simply live in a country that does not broadcast any of The African Nations Cup games, you will need another way to watch the tournament. I know, as a huge football fan that I would never miss a tournament.

For fans wanting to watch The African Nations Cup, you may want to check out satellite TV for PC software if you do not have the channels that broadcast it. You will be able to pick up live streams from all across the world and never miss any of The African Nations cup matches, as well as this you will never have to pay any monthly fees, so this may be something you want to consider if you want to watch this years tournament, thousands of people will be using this to watch the tournament.

This years tournament should be very good with so many young aspiring African footballers, I highly advise you to get satellite TV for PC if you are worried about missing any games, as this will give you access to every single game live.

Good Luck and I hope you enjoy the tournament.

There would be little point in practicing meditation if it had no benefits, but from my own limited experience, the benefits of meditation are numerous. I can only imagine what benefits will be obtained by those who have practiced meditation more regularly, and with more expertise, over a longer number of years, than I have.

Before listing some of my own personal benefits, those that have been clear to me through experience, let us just consider meditation itself. meditation is a powerful spiritual practice, and the regular act of meditation can help a great deal in ones spiritual development. Through the practice of meditation, the person meditating is able to focus on each part of his or her body, something I learnt in my first yoga lesson. Simply by doing this, a great level of relaxation can be achieved, which has the potential in providing many health benefits.

meditation has been used since ancient times, especially in Eastern cultures, which tend to be more spiritually aware than the rest of us. Holy men and mystics, psychics and occultists, spiritualists and alternative therapists, have long understood the amazing powers of meditation. Since the 1960's and the Beatles' indulgence in Transcendental meditation in India, more and more people have come to appreciate the powers that meditation can bring to our lives, whether spiritually, physically, or psychologically.

Benefits of meditation I Have Experienced

My first "formal" experience of meditation was in yoga lessons, which I started at a time shortly after some major emotional upheavals in my life. It is not something you can really imagine fully without experiencing, which may be why many people dismiss meditation as some weird practice of Eastern mystics. In fact, meditation could not be more natural.

Interestingly, the yoga class I was in a few years back was sponsored by the British National health Service, and was for people with some physical limitation which prevented them from practicing full yoga exercises. Being limited to some extent by spine and hip degradation, caused by Ankylosing Spondylitis in my youth, I could not do the full range of yoga exercises. I was therefore delighted to find this class existed in my own little town. I was the only one under 50 years of age in the class, and, unsurprisingly, the healthiest looking and feeling. To most people I seemed "normal"; it was only when it came to bending my spine and at the hips that any problem would be seen.

I can still, some 7 years later, recall leaving that first lesson, after a final 30-45 minute relaxation/meditation session. I felt a totally different person, in tune with every part of my body and totally relaxed in every way. It was as if I had been transported to a different land, when in fact all I had been doing was communicating with my inner self and each part of my body, to achieve the desired state.

I felt the health benefits after every session, and ever since then I have used yoga style relaxation techniques and meditation to:

1. Bring down my blood pressure from its "high normal" level.

2. Bring more calmness into my life.

3. Increase self awareness.

4. In conjunction with setting personal objectives, help me achieve goals.

5. Help me feel in control of my own existence.

I know that meditation, even with my limited training and ability to perform it, will always be in my health and personal achievement armoury. Sometimes, too, I think back to those mostly elderly people who attended the same yoga class. Aged 60-80 plus, they were all suffering from some chronic disease. One I remember had Parkinson's Disease, and as long as she was strong enough to get to the lesson, she would be there every week, and claimed it helped her considerably.

So, my personal experience of the benefits of yoga, and what was guided meditation, go beyond my own direct experience, and into the experience of a class of chronically ill. Everyone in that class felt benefits; none attended for any social need, as there was no time for idle chat.

Finally, a few years back my son went on a 6 month trek around India, and throughout that time assured me not to worry about his blood sugar level, because of his lack of control over his diet there. He told me that, even with the imperfect diet, he had no trouble controlling his blood sugar level, as he could now do so through meditation. Even without my own direct experience that would have been enough to convince me that meditation could play an important role in health, and that it was indeed possible to use meditation to communicate with every part of the body.

This meditation and yoga article was written by Roy Thomsitt, owner and part author of the Routes To Self Improvement web site, where you will find other articles on topics such as Transcendental Meditation and yoga obstacles.

The results are in: yoga breathing can significantly improve memory. In particular, yoga breathing can improve spatial memory. This is the part of memory responsible for recording information about your environment. Spatial memory keeps track of where things are that you can see, where things are that you cant see, where you are, and how that all fits together. If you tend to have difficulty remembering where you put your keys or finding your way around large cities, then you may benefit from some intentional breathing.

What exactly is meant by yoga breathing? Several types of yoga breathing were included in the studies that revealed the astounding improvement in spatial memory. These included pranayama (voluntary regulation of breathing), nostril breathing (left, right, or alternating), and simple breathe awareness.

Heavy breathing during aerobic exercise wont cut it. One study of 85 elderly adults found that 16 weeks of aerobic training yielded no improvement in memory retrieval scores. Yet, a study of 108 individuals practicing nostril breathing or breathe awareness, found that they experienced an average 87% improvement in spatial memory scores after only 10 days. Another study had 30 children practice yoga breathing for 10 days. The children experienced a 43% increase in spatial memory scores.

yoga breathing is easy to do and can be done just about anywhere at any time. The following is a simple nostril breathing exercise. Try this exercise for at least a week to experience the benefits of intentional breathing:

-Try to sit with your head, neck and spine in a straight line.

-You will inhale through one nostril, hold the breath, then exhale through the other nostril in a ratio of 2:8:4 counts.

-Use the thumb and ring/pinky fingers of your right hand to close the right and left nostrils respectively, and close both nostrils when you hold the breath.

-Once each nostril has had a chance to inhale and exhale, this is called a round. Start with 3 rounds a day and build up slowly to twenty rounds, extending the count within the 2:8:4 ratio (for example, 4:16:8).

There are many other benefits ascribed to breathe awareness besides improved memory, including stress relief and increased attention span. Improving your mental health can have significant positive effects on your physical health as well. As the above studies show, we all have the power to create profound results for our own well-being.

References:

Madden DJ, Blumenthal JA, Allen PA, Emery CF. Improving aerobic capacity in healthy older adults does not necessarily lead to improved cognitive performance. Psychol Aging. 1989 Sep;4(3):307-20.

Manjunath NK, Telles S. Spatial and verbal memory test scores following yoga and fine arts camps for school children. Indian J Physiol Pharmacol. 2004 Jul;48(3):353-6.

Naveen KV, Nagarathna R, Nagendra HR, Telles S. yoga breathing through a particular nostril increases spatial memory scores without lateralized effects. Psychol Rep. 1997 Oct;81(2):555-61.

Nicole Evans is an alternative medicine researcher/developer turned medical student. She also enjoys working with King Bio, a homeopathic company dedicated to empowering people to safely and naturally improve their health. For cutting edge water-based homeopathics visit http://www.kingbio.com .