Are You an Experienced Yogi or Looking for Something Fun? Alternative yoga offers a great way to find inner peace – Alachua County offers several choices including Baby Goat Yoga!
Integrative yoga therapy is a mind-body practice that includes relaxing postures, breathing techniques and meditation to promote better body image, self-confidence and mindfulness.
Body Structural Yoga
Your body functions optimally when its strength and flexibility are in harmony, but when illness, injury or structural abnormalities disrupt this equilibrium, yoga can be an invaluable healing modality. A yoga therapist trained in Body Structural Yoga may teach those with movement restrictions or injuries an adaptive yoga practice designed to optimize physical wellbeing.
Yoga has long been used to address human ailments, from arthritis and back pain to anxiety and stress relief. Unfortunately, when not applied specifically to each condition it may even exacerbate them further.
Structural Yoga caters to the specific needs of each individual. This form of teaching blends timeless yogic teachings with contemporary anatomy and therapeutics in order to address the whole body as an integrated unit, including finding solutions to root cause issues as well as teaching techniques to facilitate recovery, rehabilitation and overall wellness.
A teacher certified in Body Structural Yoga will ask many questions to understand your individual needs before creatively adapting traditional poses to suit both your abilities and limitations, helping you feel the poses in their proper places to promote healing while preventing further injury.
Body Structural Yoga therapists are specially trained to monitor your performance of corrective poses. She will notice when you move too aggressively or passively and provide alternatives ways of performing them so as to bring about desired effects.
Yoga Loka offers several specialized classes, such as back care yoga and chair yoga, that are specifically tailored for people living with various medical conditions. A yoga therapist who specializes in this field is also on hand to help improve posture and alleviate symptoms associated with chronic illnesses.
Iyengar Yoga
Iyengar yoga is a form of hatha yoga that emphasizes an in-depth knowledge of posture and movement principles, with particular attention paid to detail when it comes to physical alignment. The practice requires guidance from an Iyengar Yoga Instructor Certified Iyengar Yoga Trainer (CIYT). Furthermore, this form of yoga serves both therapeutic and fitness benefits; improving circulation and hydration while increasing muscle endurance and strengthening immune systems – as well as relieving any back or neck discomforts.
B.K.S. Iyengar pioneered the use of props such as blocks, chairs, blankets and belts to make yoga accessible for people of all ages and physical abilities. According to him, props help students achieve correct alignment within poses while minimising injury risks – this approach was widely adopted by other yoga teachers such as Certified Iyengar Yoga Teachers (CIYTs). This form of practice remains popular today through classes taught by CIYTs.
Iyengar yoga goes beyond traditional poses to include therapeutic elements such as deep relaxation and meditation. With its emphasis on precise physical alignment, this practice seeks to promote greater health while using props makes for a safe yet rewarding practice for any level of experience or physical limitations.
Iyengar teachers must undergo extensive training in order to adapt poses to accommodate for various health conditions and physical abilities, making the Iyengar method accessible for people from diverse backgrounds and health conditions. A certified Iyengar yoga teacher (CIYT) may also help students whose health or injuries prevent them from attending regular classes by offering therapy classes.
CIYTs possess an in-depth knowledge of how the body functions, and can guide students through sequences that will gradually build skill over time. A typical Iyengar class typically begins with basic postures such as parivrtta trikonasana (revolved triangle pose) and ardha uttanasana (half forward bend), progressing onto forward and back bends, twists, inversions and inversions before ending each class in corpse pose (deeply restorative pose). Each class ends in corpse pose which allows participants to rejuvenate and restore.
Recently, Iyengar yoga was evaluated as an effective therapy for chronic low back pain (CLBP). Participants were randomly assigned either 24-week yoga therapy or standard medical care (SMC) intervention and followed for six months following trial completion. Results demonstrated significant improvements in functional disability, pain intensity and depression when compared with control groups who received SMC; yoga-related reductions in CLBP were maintained at follow-up timepoints of six months post trial completion.
Restorative Yoga
Restorative yoga classes provide longer holds that enable you to sink deeper into each pose, providing relief from tension and stress. These asanas, commonly referred to as restorative poses, allow the mind and body to relax into each posture, helping release any tension or anxiety and enhance sleep quality while activating the parasympathetic nervous system which triggers relaxation response – helping balance out fight or flight hormones that raise heart rates, blood pressure levels and cause muscle tension.
At a restorative yoga session, you’ll lay in different positions supported by pillows, blankets and bolsters. At home or a studio you may use couch cushions or sleeping bags as props; otherwise these tools allow your body to completely relax and heal itself while supporting poses held for five to 10 minutes in every direction that allows your muscles to release tension.
Restorative yoga can benefit anyone, including those who are inflexible or recovering from injury. Unlike more vigorous forms of yoga, restorative practices cater to each person by finding their most comfortable position with props supporting the body. Many find it comforting when falling asleep during a restorative yoga session – this indicates deep relaxation needed to heal both body and mind.
Try the following restorative pose to relax both body and mind: Sit on your mat with legs spread wide, placing one bolster under each knee. Lower your back onto these bolsters while relaxing all of the tension from shoulders and neck muscles, before gently extending arms in front of you with palms facing each other, palms together. This asana has been shown to ease menstrual cramps as well as lower back pain in women in particular; relieve stress, reduce depressive symptoms and aid insomnia; it is an ideal way to practice regularly which will improve both mood and self-esteem!
Meditation
Yoga therapy employs meditation techniques to focus your attention and reduce stress, whether alone or with help from a trained therapist. Studies have demonstrated its efficacy at alleviating anxiety and improving mental health; additionally it can ease pain while improving sleep.
Meditation can refer to a broad array of practices from diverse traditions and cultures. From sitting quietly to chanting or textual study to physical exercise, this term encompasses an expansive system of beliefs and practices which may include codified rules or monasteries in certain settings.
Many people have tried meditation as a means of managing anxiety, but it’s important to realize it’s not the sole solution. While meditation may provide some relaxation benefits, other ways exist which may prove just as helpful or even more so – one such strategy being mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR), which combines meditation and yoga into an integrative treatment program for depression or other psychological conditions.
Yogic breathing and visualization techniques offer another means of managing anxiety. By encouraging inner peace and tranquility that can be brought back during stressful moments, these practices have proven highly successful at relieving anxiety while even helping reduce blood pressure levels. Studies have demonstrated how effective these methods are at relieving tension.
Yoga can be used as a complementary treatment alongside other types of therapy, including EMDR and cognitive behavioral therapy. Some studies have even revealed that combining EMDR with yoga may increase its effectiveness as an approach for trauma treatment and other psychological issues.
Alternative therapies are growing increasingly popular and becoming a mainstream component of medicine. Yoga and meditation as therapies to alleviate stress have seen significant growth since 2002; yoga use alone increased 29 percent. This increase is likely attributable to several factors, including an increasing desire among patients for alternatives to pharmaceutical medications and increasing body of scientific evidence supporting these practices. Furthermore, millennials are more accepting of such approaches as yoga than previous generations were;
