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62

july 2016

yogajournal.com.au

You can definitely feel that vibe at

Bhakti Fest, a yoga and music festival

launched in 2009 that hosts massive yoga

classes, around-the-clock kirtan chanting

sessions, and wisdom workshops daily.

“We’re building a spiritual community –

thousands of people gathered under the

same roof, with one intention,” says

founder Sridhar Silberfein. “People come

out talking about how many friends they’ve

made.”

University of Oxford researchers have

found another reason why yoga in a group

may help us connect: When we exercise en

masse, they suggest, we feel safer and more

supported than when we do so alone. As a

result, there may be less pain and fatigue

which are two biological signifiers of a

potential threat. In fact, we actually release

higher quantities of endorphins and

endocannabinoids, nature’s chemical pain

relievers and mood enhancers, into our

nervous systems. Therefore, we feel better,

which rewards our cooperation as a group.

“Experiencing this ‘social high’ may bring

us closer together,” offers Arran Davis, a

Yoga facilitates exchanges

between people of different

backgrounds.

PMRI’s Ornish, who’s studied yoga for

40 years, likes to tell a story about his late

friend Sri Swami Satchidananda, the

influential founder of Integral Yoga. When

Satchidananda opened his New York City

studio, the guru asked his students to

answer the phone by saying, “Hello, how

may I serve you?” “Some of the students

said, ‘That sounds so debasing,’” Ornish

remembers. “But [Satchidananda] would

say, ‘No! When someone gives you the

opportunity to serve them, it helps you.’”

Yoga’s call to seva, or service, can nurture

a sense of humility, gratitude, and respect

that positively impacts relationships. “When

we do the work of seva together, we see that

we’re interdependent, interconnected,”

says Suzanne Sterling, co-founder of the

non-profit Off the Mat Into the World

network and director of its Global Seva

Challenge. Over the past decade, Sterling

has led teams that built birthing centres in

Uganda,installed water-filtration systems

cognitive and evolutionary anthropologist

at Oxford.

When we engage in a group chant or

meditation that induces a feeling of mutual

transcendence, the brain literally shrinks its

perception of distance between ourselves

and others. “In deep spiritual moments,

we’ve observed decreased activity in the

parietal lobe, which regulates the

boundaries between the self and the world,”

says neuroscientist Andrew Newberg.

“When that activity reduces, people feel a

connectedness, an intermingling between

their selves and everyone else’s.”

TRY IT Communities used to form

naturally, via the companies at which

we worked or the religious institutions

we attended, Ornish says. These days,

we have to be more purposeful about

building communities. To find a

community of your own, strike out and

shake things up: join a yoga circle in

your area or make this your year to try

a new yoga festival or retreat.

When to go solo

So what if you want to be alone on

occasion? That’s okay, says Robert Jon

Waldinger, MD, director of Harvard’s Study

of Adult Development. “Some people need

a lot of solitude, and it’s good for them,”

he says. “One size does not fit all.” While

it’s true that the subjective experience of

loneliness hastens cognitive and physical

decline as you age, that’s only if you feel

the absence of others keenly, rather than

take pleasure in solitude.

“There’s a difference between loneliness

and solitude, scientifically speaking,”

adds Alan Teo, MD, assistant professor of

psychiatry at Oregon Health and Science

University. “If you feel lonely when you’re

alone, it’s not healthy. But for people who

find it restorative, it can be beneficial.” In a

ten-year study of 4672 adults, Teo and his

team discovered that if your interactions

with a partner are hurtful or negative, it’s

actually better for your mental health to

be alone. “It’s the quality of relationships

that matters,” he says.

Teo’s advice? Try to fit some alone time

into every day. Even if you like to be around

others, there may be diminished benefits

to overdoing it. Socialising with any single

individual (aside from the ones you live

with) more than three times a week isn’t

proven to have positive health effects.

PHOTO: SKYNESHER;HSTOCKS/ISTOCKPHOTO.COM