Author Archive
Amy Weintraub
Director of the LifeForce Yoga Healing Institute, author of the bestselling Yoga for Depression and the groundbreaking Yoga Skills for Therapists, has been a pioneer in the field of yoga and mental health for over 20 years. She trains health and yoga professionals and offers workshops for everyday practitioners. The LifeForce Yoga protocol is being used in residential treatment centers, hospitals and by healthcare providers around the world. She is involved in ongoing research on the effects of yoga on mood, and has produced an award-winning library of evidence-based yoga and meditation CDs and DVDs for mood management.
Balance Your Body
A working woman knows all about balance.
From juggling appointments, to taking care of kids, to taking care of herself, she’s always walking a tightrope. Of course she needs to know all about balance.
A great way to find your center of gravity? Yoga.
Balancing Ourselves The practice of yoga can help us stay connected with ourselves emotionally.
If we’re paying attention to our breathing and to sensation in the body as we practice, yoga becomes a portal into what we are truly feeling. The practice allows us to witness what is arising in the body-mind, with less reactivity, so we are able to respond to life’s challenges without reacting to them.
Balancing Our Emotions
Yoga helps support overall emotional health.
First, there’s the cultivation of what the yogi’s call “witness consciousness.” This sense of witnessing helps us realize that yes, we have emotions, but we are so much more than the current mood, so much more than the self-limiting beliefs we may have about ourselves or the world.
Yoga, including yogic breathing called pranayama, begins to clear the constrictions we may have around the everyday challenges we face. We feel more expansive and spacious within, and more connected to others without. It’s not surprising that we have this subjective experience of reconnecting with ourselves and with others, because that’s exactly what’s happening biochemically.
Research has shown that we are lowering the stress hormone cortisol when we practice yoga, and we are raising GABA levels, a neurotransmitter that protects us from anxiety and depression. We are also raising oxytocin levels, the ”bonding” hormone that allows us to feel more connected to others.
Balancing Our Bodies
Although there are specific poses that a beginner can do that can help us keep emotionally balanced and connected it’s hard to isolate poses out of the context of a breathing and centering practice. I would recommend a class or an instructional DVD—some type of formal instruction for a beginner.
In general, a simple forward bend is calming. Back-bending poses are more energizing. A simple supported backbend, combined with deep yogic diaphragmatic breathing through the nostrils, extending the exhalation longer than the inhalation can both lift the mood and calm the central nervous system. Balancing Our Life In my own life, to stay balanced, wherever I am (and I travel quite a bit!) I practice every morning, usually at sunrise, and wherever I am, I try to be outside as the sun rises to practice some pranayama breathing and some standing, strengthening poses. Throughout the day, I may stop for a moment to shift the energy with a smile breath.
I begin by closing my eyes and breathing deeply into the bottom of the lungs. Next, I drop my chin to my chest as I exhale. Then I lift the corners of my mouth, lift my head, inhale and open my eyes. It’s a five-second lightening-up mood elevator. Smile breath creates a real paradigm shift in my mood.
Before I get out of bed, I start my morning with yoga nidra, which means Yogic sleep. Yoga Nidra is a guided meditation that reminds me of who I truly am, beneath the current mood or the morning stiffness in my body.
So use yoga to find balance in your life!