Yoga -

The system of Yoga is thousands of years old and contains deep understanding about our bodies and our nervous systems. It provides us with many powerful tools to open and strengthen our bodies and regulate our nervous system.

I integrate yoga that is specific to nervous system regulation into my online program “Healing Trauma through the Body” and I also offer one-on one sessions to teach you yoga practices that are specifically tailored to your needs.

Many of the tools that yoga offers are incredibly useful in healing from trauma. For example, breathwork is one of the most powerful ways to influence our autonomic nervous system, which is the aspect of our nervous system that often gets dysregulated by trauma. This part of our nervous system functions mostly beyond our conscious control, but there are some ways we can “talk to it” and influence it and using our breath in particular ways is one of those ways. Yoga provides us with a whole array of breath practices that can help us regulate our nervous system.

Read more about why nervous system regulation is so important here.

In addition, the effects of trauma often get stored in the body as holding and tension. We might lose connection to certain parts of our bodies. Yoga practice can help to release tension and open parts of the body that have been shut down. And it is helpful in waking up the parts that we have been disconnected from.

When you are working with healing from the effects of past trauma it is recommended to receive private yoga instruction rather than go to a class. In that way, we can work at your own pace, make sure that your body feels safe with what we are doing and tailor the practice to your needs. One of the main elements of trauma healing is to learn to connect to your body in a safe way.

There might be elements in a group class that do not work for your body or the class might go at a fast pace which makes it hard to stay connected to your body.