Yoga is not just for the fit and healthy.  Yoga is not just posture work.  It is not just about sweating and looking good on the yoga mat.  It is not an ego-trip to make us feel good .  It is more than getting a rush of adrenaline.  Living an already hectic lifestyle, most of us don’t need a hard aggressive and insensitive practice at the end of the day that will overload and exhaust the body further.  This may well be what our mind wants, but our body is craving for relaxation and the mind won’t allow it.  So we keep going that way until the body packs up one way or another and the price to pay is a bad back, a stiff neck, bad knees, wrist pain, torn hamstrings, the list is endless.  Do you think that this is what union of mind body and spirit is?  If people get hurt they cannot have been doing mindful yoga.

So yoga is not just about making the body strong and supple when all is well.  Yoga is also here for the special times of our lives, it is also here when we get hurt.   People need to know that yoga can make a difference in their life, there is a real and desperate need to spread the good news about yoga therapy.  Yoga’s benefits are manifold and even if certain postures are out of our reach temporarily or permanently, there are other restorative ones that can be done, there are the breathing techniques which will help us connect our mind and our body through mindful breathing, there are meditation and relaxation, etc..  Yoga therapy is known to help people of all ages, from the youngest to the oldest, men or women, irrespective of their creed or nationality. Yoga therapy is helpful for absolutely everybody and most especially for:

• those who have hurt themselves through postural bad habits, sport injury, accident, etc.
• those with physical ailments from mild ones to very severe ones (life-threatening diseases, degenerative diseases, etc.)
• those with emotional or mental problems from stress to severe depression and many addictions.
• those with physical disabilities (permanent or not) who may be wheelchair-bound or bed-ridden

Even though a lot of these people have learned to cope admirably well, wouldn’t it be fantastic if they could all receive the gift of yoga therapy?  So many of these people live isolated, so wouldn’t it be beautiful for them to meet other people with similar health considerations by joining an appropriate class, and to find a supportive and structured environment if they want to?  Wouldn’t it be wonderful to make them feel that there are safe ways of doing yoga and that some are suitable for them?   Breathing techniques (pranayama) are most probably the best thing one can be given at any time in one’s life.  The breath is the intelligence of the body and with the help of visualizations it has very powerful recuperative and regenerative qualities that go well beyond any expectation.  You can send the breath to every single cell of your body and each time you breathe out, let the breath wash away all the impurities, all the debris all that is making you unwell.  How can the body be expected to heal itself if all its precious energy goes to wasteful mental energy?  Yoga therapy gives us the tools to heal ourselves.

How do you know when you go to a general yoga class that it is right for you?  You don’t.  How do you know it won’t put additional strain on your body?  You don’t.  And this is what is happening in the yoga world today.  More and more people are seeking the help of their osteopath, physiotherapist or chiropractor, after hurting themselves by doing a  form of yoga that is wrong for them.  In the fast-paced yoga styles we are all expected to follow the teacher’s pace even if it does not feel right. With often the sad result that what was intended to make our body strong and supple has ended in an injury that could have been prevented.

When you go to a class run by a YBT yoga therapist you know you are in safe hands.  You can be assessed by one of their therapists prior to going to a class which will provide you with valuable professional advice as to what you can and cannot do and you will be given guidance and exercises tailored to your specific needs.  All the YBT yoga therapists are highly qualified people who have undergone a thorough medical training in addition to their existing teachers’ qualifications.   You can be sure that the postures and the adjustments given by YBT are totally safe for you. So yoga therapy is more than just yoga.  It is yoga with an added dimension, it is yoga with a heightened sense of body awareness.  It is yoga for the people, it is yoga for those with bad backs, with diabetes, with breathing difficulties, with MS, with ME, with osteo and rheumatoid arthritis, with digestive problems, etc.  It is yoga for pregnant mothers and young babies.  It is yoga which can help adolescents deal with their own puberty, women go smoothly through the life changes.  Structured yoga postures can help speed up post-operation recovery.  Yoga therapy is an irreplaceable source of comfort for those of us with terminal illnesses, and is an invaluable resource for old people.

Yoga therapy is still in its infancy stage but it is in the interest of each one of us to let it grow bigger.  We believe that all yoga teachers should have some basic grounding in yoga therapy.   They are dealing with real bodies and real minds.  Students want to feel safe and their needs understood and met when they go to a class.  Teachers should always enquire about their students’ state of health prior to starting a class in a non-invasive and respectful way.  Students should also use their own discretion to inform their teachers.  In an age where communication has made so much progress, there has never been so little communication on a human level.

The Life Centre, which is running a very successful yoga teacher training course has recently joined up with Dr Monro and a Foundation Course in Yoga Therapy Skills is now available to already qualified teachers with the possibility of going on to a full Diploma Course in Yoga Therapy if they so wish.  We sincerely hope that many other yoga schools will join them in including this most fundamental aspect of yoga into their training.  After all it is in our interest to go to a class where the teacher knows about yoga therapy.

For the past twenty years, Dr Monro has been working towards the recognition of yoga therapy, in a discreet but most effective way.  His genuine compassion to relieve the sufferings of people is highly commendable in a world where many are only concerned with making a difference to their own lives.

Yoga-life magazine also believes that yoga therapy is the way forward for yoga and it will gladly publish any material that it feels will help towards its recognition. As more and more YBT teachers qualify, more and more people are enabled to benefit from yoga therapy.

We wish Dr Monro well in the pursuit of his journey into yoga therapy.

For any more details regarding classes or teachers’ training at the Yoga Biomedical Trust, please visit its website: www.yogatherapy.org