“I have to say that I am delighted with the Friday yoga class - I've done 4 now and I can already feel the benefit.”
“I have back problems, so I joined the classes because I needed to strengthen my core and back. Yoga has helped me both physically and mentally.”
These are just a couple of the comments I’ve received from students over the last year of teaching yoga.
I’ve been teaching now for over a year - and it’s wonderful to see students progress. Some of my students have been with me for that whole time - and some only for a few weeks - but it’s just so wonderful to not only see them improving in terms of what they can accomplish physically, but to have them feedback how they feel they’re benefiting from the practice.
Whilst there’s still a lot of work to be done, there’s a growing body of research showing how yoga practice can bring positive health results across a range of areas - particularly in terms of helping us as we age .
So what exactly IS therapeutic yoga?
Therapeutic yoga is defined as the application of yoga postures and practice
to the treatment of health conditions.
One study in 2011, reviewed all the literature they could find relating to “hatha yoga,” “therapeutic effects of yoga,” “stress,” “anxiety, “depression,” “pain,” and “chronic disease,” in order to provide a comprehensive review of the benefits of regular yoga practice.
Whilst many of the studies are small, and larger, more rigorous trials are needed, the results showed that overall, yoga practices:
- Enhance muscular strength and body flexibility
- Promote and improve respiratory and cardiovascular function
- Promote recovery from and treatment of, addiction
- Reduce stress, anxiety, depression and chronic pain
- Improve sleep patterns
- Enhance overall well-being and quality of life
How might yoga be helping these conditions?
There are four basic principles which underlie the teachings and practices of yoga:
- Yoga believes the body is a holistic entity, comprised of various, interrelated dimensions which cannot be separated from one another. If one dimension is unhealthy or out of balance, then it impacts on the other dimensions.
- Each individual is unique and therefore any treatment should be tailored to meet those individual needs.
- Yoga is self-empowering: the student is actively involved in their own healing journey - and the healing comes from within instead of from an outside source.
- Our quality and state of mind is crucial to the healing process. Positive mind states support the healing process, wheras an important role to play in supporting disease at any age. But the discipline of yoga offers a timeless and holistic model of health and healing. It is widely accepted there is an inescapable link between our physical and mental health. Yoga’s ability to gently work at both levels can help practitioners manage both the acute and chronic stress which so often accompanies illness and disease, leading to improved quality of life.
There is still much to learn - but one thing’s for sure: regular yoga practice seems to come with the potential to help manage and prevent many of the age-related conditions so prevalent in many cultures today.
You have nothing to lose - and a lot to gain, by spending some time on the mat!
