Month: June 2020

Have you ever noticed how our emotions get stuck in our body?  After a stressful day, our shoulders get tight.  When I’m feeling sad or mad, my lower back starts to hurt and my chest tightens.  We store our pent up emotions in our body.  It’s the “issues in our tissues”.

Welcome to Yin Yoga!

Yin yoga may look like it’s all about stretching our muscles…but it is actually working on our tendons, ligaments and joints.  Those areas don’t get much love or attention and that makes them the perfect hiding spot for emotions we don’t want to deal with.  During a Yin practice, we compress these tissues and then release them to get the synovial fluid to rinse out whatever is lingering in there.

To get us started, here is a yin practice that you can do at home using just a wall.  Give it a try and see how you feel after!

Let’s jump into a little yogic philosophy.  Don’t run away!  Follow me here!

If someone was to ask you, “what is yoga?” how would you likely respond?

Is it: exercize?  stretching?  chanting?  slow motion karate?

Long long ago, in a land far far away was this guy, Patanjali.  Patanjali studied yoga wisdom and read lots of books.  He listened to lots of teachers.  Then he compiled all the most important information in a condensed book called the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali.  This is the text that all yoga teachers learn from during their teacher trainings.

You know what Patanjali says yoga is?????

Yoga Sutra 1.2: Yogash citta vrtti nirodha

Yeah, that’s the sanskrit version…let me get you the english translation…

Yoga is the cessation of the fluctuations of the mind.

Let’s take another look at that one.

Yoga is stopping the chaos of the MIND!!! THE MIND!!!!

Patanjali doesn’t say anything about the body or physical activity in this statement.  In fact, in the whole book he only briefly mentions a couple of seated postures.

Why is yoga a great skill for managing our mental health?  Because it was designed to calm the mind!  Check out the video below for more information.

Today we have the first video in the Yoga for Mental Health series!!!  To start us off, I picked a restorative practice.

Restorative yoga is a form of yoga where we allow our body to drop into a resting form of a yoga posture.  We hold each pose for an extended period of time to allow gravity to move us deeper into the posture.  This also tells our nervous system that nothing is going on, and we are not in danger.  During most of the day, our nervous system is assessing for threats and trying to decide how to react so we survive.  This is our sympathetic nervous system and when it detects a threat, it sends us into fight, flight or freeze.  This speeds up our heart rate, tenses our muscles, inhibits digestion of our food and our breathing becomes shallow.

In order to balance this, we also have a parasympathetic nervous system that is also known as our “rest and digest” system.  This is where our heart rate slows down, our body relaxes and we feel calm and peaceful.  Our bodies used to be so much better at shifting between these two states, but our current culture often keeps us in a stressed stated.  We need to teach our nervous system how to find that calm spot again.

Here’s where restorative yoga shines!  Restorative practices are great for increasing comfort in the body, decreasing symptoms of stress and anxiety and can be amazing for retraining the nervous system to stay present and calm for people who have experienced dissociation from trauma.  Restorative yoga is safe for all levels and this practice does not require any fancy props.  You can use items you find around the house, or nothing at all.  Feel free to adjust the practice to suit your body so you feel comfortable.  If your mind wanders to places that don’t feel good, return your focus to your breath or on a mantra.

* The sound in the video cuts out right after the introduction because I rolled onto the reciever for the mic.  Turn the volume up when I move into the first pose.

Have you ever been told you should do yoga?

Have you heard people talk about how great it is for stress, anxiety, depression…the common cold, zombie apocalypse?  Okay, maybe not zombies…

Maybe you have even tried yoga before and thought it was….fine, I guess.

I am creating a new series of yoga videos on YouTube to help break down why yoga is helpful and how to make it best work for YOUR needs.

Come check it out!