I was so excited to finish my final module of my yoga therapy graduate certificate today. It took a full year of my life pushing my mind and body to the limit with assessments, case studies and research on top of what is already a very busy schedule. But now I’m finished, I’m left with this perplexing question, how do I get other people to understand what yoga therapy is?
This topic is something that we discussed considerably during our classes and there were so many great explanations put forward by my fellow students, but I’ve come up with my own (rather expanded) version, so here goes.
Yoga therapy takes the teachings of a 5000 plus year old philosophy that includes how to:
treat yourself and others
keep your body and mind healthy
live in deep harmony with your life,
and applies it to people’s life to help with physical and mental, health and wellbeing.
It does this through the use of asana (the physical movement that most people know as yoga), pranayama (the use of breath to build healthy energy in the body), mudra (hand gestures to help focus the mind), meditation (to still the mind) and many other ancient tools that are still relevant and more valuable today, than ever.
So, what does all this mean in real person speak? It means that yoga therapy can help people manage and in some cases alleviate the symptoms of a number of issues including physical conditions like:
Back pain
Musculoskeletal problems
Diabetes
High blood pressure
Parkinson’s
Asthma
COPD
Cancer
HIV
Alzheimer’s
Brain injury
Multiple sclerosis
Autoimmune diseases
IBS
Obesity
Heart disease
Insomnia
Arthritis
Osteoporosis
And mental health conditions such as:
Stress
Depression
Anxiety
PTSD
Schizophrenia
ADHD
Eating disorders
Addiction
Post-natal depression
It is a fantastic modality to work in conjunction with existing health practices and as it’s value is becoming more recognised by the western health industry, much more research is being done with outstanding results.
As our world continues to become more stressful and health issues continue to grow, as demand for medical help outstrips the number of providers, I personally think it will be modalities such as yoga therapy that will be able to step in to provide support to those in need.
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