- What is Trauma-Informed Yoga?
- Impact of Trauma
- Principles of Trauma-Informed Yoga
- Techniques for Trauma-Informed Yoga
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When we hear the term “trauma,” we think of the worst times in our lives The most severe wounds, however, can occasionally be caused by quite mundane events. Trauma can affect every aspect of your life.
Many people can begin to develop a sense of security and find comfort by turning to trauma-informed approaches. Yoga is one of them.
Yoga is known for its positive effects on the body and its ability to relieve stress. When taught by qualified teachers and used in a therapeutic setting, it also has the potential to be a treatment method for people who have experienced trauma.
Yoga uses breath and movement to target the changes in the brain and neurological system caused by trauma.
What is trauma-informed yoga?
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Trauma-Informed Yoga is a method of teaching yoga that acknowledges that most people have experienced some form of trauma in their lives. By using specific tools and techniques, this approach aims to address the unique needs of trauma survivors.
Core Principles
- Breath and Body Awareness: By connecting with the breath and developing body awareness, trauma-informed yoga creates a safe and encouraging environment. This helps students develop their emotional regulation skills.
- Inclusive Practice: Trauma-informed yoga can be practiced in almost any style. Each session is thoughtfully designed to provide a sense of safety, comfort, and calm, supporting the processing and release of traumatic experiences.
- Self-Control Techniques: These techniques help develop a safe and controlled body awareness, making individuals feel more secure physically, mentally, and emotionally. They also address dysregulation of the nervous system, dissociation, and feelings of disconnection from one’s body or environment, which are common after trauma.
Goals of trauma-informed yoga
The primary goal of trauma-informed yoga is not to revisit the source of the trauma but to increase awareness of what is happening in the body. By engaging with the body, individuals can begin to release pent-up emotions, stress, and tension.
Trauma-informed yoga provides a compassionate approach to healing, offering a supportive space for individuals to reconnect with their bodies and emotions in a safe and nurturing environment
Understanding trauma
- What is trauma?
The American Psychological Association (APA) defines trauma as “an emotional reaction to a terrible event such as an accident, rape, or natural disaster”.
But any event that a person finds to be physically or emotionally threatening or damaging may trigger trauma as a reaction. Traumatic incidents can occur once or often throughout time. After witnessing something unpleasant occur to someone else, a person may likewise suffer from trauma.
- Emotional response determines trauma
It is your emotional reaction to the event that determines whether it qualifies as traumatic, not the objective conditions. You are more prone to experience trauma the more terrified and helpless you feel.
You can experience traumatic events at any age, and they can have a long-lasting impact on your physical and emotional health. Although each person’s experience is different, post-traumatic stress disorder has some common origins and widespread symptoms, including anxiety, flashbacks, and disturbed sleep.
While situations that make you feel overwhelmed and alone can cause trauma, even those that do not include physical injury but leave you feeling threatened with your life or safety can be traumatic.
- Types of trauma
Acute Trauma – This is caused by a single incident or terrible event.
Chronic Trauma – This arises from repeated or prolonged exposure to trauma such as bullying, child abuse, sexual or physical abuse, etc.
Complex Trauma – This is when you have been exposed to multiple traumatic events over a long period.
Vicarious (Secondary) Trauma – in this type, you experience trauma because you have witnessed something terrible. While you were directly not involved in the incident or event, the scene/site of the event was horrible to trigger your response.
The impact of trauma on physical and mental health
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Because your nervous system is overworked, your body and mind are unable to completely digest the traumatic events as they are occurring. This results in post-traumatic stress symptoms. The fight, flight, or freeze reaction is activated by acute stress, which overwhelms the body and mind.
The person’s health can be negatively impacted by trauma for a long time. Depending on how long you take to absorb the upsetting incident, the symptoms usually endure from a few days to a few months.
The symptoms of trauma can be both psychological and physical.
Psychological symptoms include:
- Intrusive thoughts, flashbacks, or nightmares
- Avoiding trauma-inducing/triggering people, places, or objects
- Hypervigilance, being hyperaware of danger
- Easily startled or “jumpy”, anxiety, fear
- Consciously or subconsciously activated by trauma triggers
- Changes in self-perception, such as feeling excess guilt or shame or seeing yourself in a negative way
- Minimal tolerance, feeling easily overwhelmed, or having difficulty controlling your emotions
- Shock, denial, or disbelief
- Edginess, agitation, Confusion, difficulty concentrating
- Anger, irritability, mood swings
- Withdrawing from others
- Feeling sad, hopeless, disconnected, or numb
Physical or somatic symptoms include:
- Fatigue, Insomnia
- Chronic Headache
- Racing heartbeat, chest pains
- Aches and pains, Muscle tension
- Digestive problems
- Sweating when reminded or triggered by a traumatic event
The principles of trauma-informed yoga
One of the simplest ways to make certain that yoga classes and services are inherently accessible and supportive is to incorporate the concepts of trauma-informed care into the yoga space. These principles are general guidelines for the teacher to make their class as safe, secure, and calm as possible.
Some Such principles are:
- Understanding the effects of trauma on people and communities.
- Encouraging and Creating a safe and supportive environment.
- Empowering students to make choices, take control, and exercise autonomy.
- Emphasizing body awareness and breath.
- Fostering a sense of community.
- Ensuring that all staff is culturally sensitive.
- Being optimistic about recovery.
Techniques for trauma-Informed yoga
The main difference between a general hatha yoga class and a trauma-informed yoga class is the way the asanas and breathwork are taught and performed.
Grounding techniques
Grounding techniques play a role when you see someone getting anxious or restless. This is quite common as emotions are bound to come up when energy moves within the body. Try using the 5-4-3-2-1 grounding technique on your learner if they seem disturbed to pull them back to the present.
Ask the student to name (to themselves):
- 5 things they see
- 4 things they hear
- 3 things they can feel
- 2 things they smell
- 1 thing they taste (or it can be anything that aligns with the practice or student)
Doing this will gently bring them back to focus on their surroundings and gradually calm them down. They can also be used more readily off the mat if they are practiced in a setting where people feel safe.
Gentle movements
A sitting breathing exercise is used at the beginning of trauma-sensitive yoga, which is then continued by slow, fluid movements.
The teacher leads the class through a sequence of physical postures at a level of intensity appropriate to the student’s abilities while following the parameters of the five fundamental aspects environment, exercises, teaching style, modifications, and language.
Using props for support
Props are often used in yoga asanas to support a posture, however, in trauma-informed yoga, care must be taken to use the right kind of props. More often than not, ropes, belts, and straps can be triggering to abuse survivors and thus should be avoided.
Before starting a session, make sure that you are well acquainted with the props you might be using during the class. Blankets, blocks, or even the walls are the best and most commonly available props in any yoga studio. If you are uncomfortable with any props, make sure you inform the instructor as soon as possible.
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