- FACILITATE PSYCHOTHERAPY: Brown et al. describe six ways that yoga, in addition to
reducing stress and promoting healing, can facilitate psychotherapy:
When people in treatment acquire tools like yoga for reducing anxiety, they are better
able to tolerate the painful memories and emotions that arise during therapy sessions
as well as in their outside daily life.
Yoga philosophy and techniques are compatible with most psychotherapeutic
approaches in that they teach nonjudgmental awareness and dispassionate observation
of thoughts, feelings, and sensations.
By practicing yoga, people learn how to observe themselves, how to direct their
attention, and how to shift their awareness between experiencing emotions and
observing from a safe distance.
If treatment has been blocked by emotional numbing, repression, suppression, denial,
dissociation, or isolation of affect, yoga can sometimes move the treatment forward.
Yoga can “improve cognitive-emotional integration” and bring unconscious content into
consciousness.
Introducing mind-body techniques can strengthen the therapeutic alliance by
empowering the individual to deal directly with stress and reducing dependence on the
therapist or medication. It is an essential building block of recovery to use tools like yoga
and meditation to support development of mastery and independence.
As a person engages in yoga practices, greater awareness, access to memories, and new
insights often emerge. The therapist can use this material and validate the person under
treatment in an active and collaborative rather than passive or inferior role in the
process.^26
7. SIDE EFFECTS AND DRUG INTERACTIONS
Brown et al. caution that some physical conditions limit practicing yoga and other mind-
body techniques. Pregnancy, uncontrolled hypertension, a recent heart attack or serious
heart disease, seizure disorders, migraine headaches, chronic obstructive pulmonary
