Overcoming Trauma With Yoga
by Bessel van der Kolk
Integrating Yoga into a Clinical Practice
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You can be on the front edge of healing the body based emotions that re-trigger the mind while earning CEUs
Clinical therapists have begun to view yoga as a viable therapy option for their patients.
We are learning from a sizable amount of research coming forward that individuals generally cannot be healed by talk therapy and medication alone. Through this research it’s now proven that our bodies hold stress and trauma that affect and retrigger our mental state. As therapists have become aware of the need to address the body they often recommend yoga as part of the therapeutic modality.
How It's Playing Out In The Yoga Community
Nationwide there has been a huge influx of yoga teachers coming forward. Very few have had trauma informed training, student ethics training and many have interacted with students in ways that have retraumatized them. Many have been told "just keep breathing" or "just sit quietly and it will pass" when triggers come up. In our community teachers have been implicated in sexual transgressions with students, touch breach and lack of education around triggers. Even without these physical violations, common yoga classes may reactivate dissociation.
What Can Be Done
At Clinical Yoga Institute we teach clinicians how to integrate yoga into private and group therapy sessions. Through our training, you will be able to facilitate chair yoga, breath techniques or something as advanced as a complete yoga class. Our program is a full yoga teacher training with an accent on trauma informed movement and mindfulness. Our therapists have been able to bill insurances for group yoga sessions as group therapy, start programs that include the public or family members if desired, and individuate their yoga program for their practice, all through a combination of online and contact hours while earning CEUs