29) Know Your Yoga Therapy (part 1)
Meet yoga therapist Jess Goulding, C-IAYT in the 2nd part of her interview. We talk about ways to integrate the yoga teachings in everyday life. This includes having self-awareness and agency, which is your power to make choices to influence your wellness.
Jess has more than 15 years as a yoga teacher. She earned her bachelor of fine arts in dance at the University of Texas at Austin and danced professionally in New York City. There she became a certified yoga teacher at the Yoga Mandalee studio.
➤RESOURCES
Jess Goulding – Online Yoga Teacher: https://www.JessGoulding.com
Free Worksheet: https://www.YourTruthRevealed.com
➤SUMMARY
You say that people have agency as it relates to their wellness. What does this mean to you?
* Agency is the capacity of individuals to act independently and to make their own free choices.
* People have agency in their wellness state physically, mentally, and emotionally. Don’t have to outsource. There’s a lot you can do on your own. More wisdom within than someone on the outside.
* There’s a 5 step self-check in: body, mind, emotions, personality, and energy. The monkey mind agitates your system. The breath serves as a mirror. Develop your inner wisdom.
* Kaivalyam is Sanskrit for freedom. The freedom to have space between stimulus and response. We have agency to practice this. Mindful breathing. Control of the breath. There’s something within you that’s thinking about the breath. There is something that’s thinking about thinking. Observing. FREEDOM – Ego identity.
Psychologist Rick Hanson says the mind is like Velcro for negative experiences and Teflon for positive ones. Can you share more about that?
* There’s a negativity bias—an evolutionary throwback that means our brains are hardwired to remember negative experiences and quickly forget positive experiences. While this once kept us alive, in modern times it is more often just a source of anxiety, irritability, and sadness.
* If you look at something beautiful, wait for 15 seconds. Then you will feel more present, at peace, and calm. Linking – what you take in through all your senses matters. Everything you see, hear, absorb has an affect on you. Are you linking to beauty or violence? That will be your perspective.
How does someone choose the right style of yoga for them?
* Yoga has SO many styles and lineages, there is a yoga for everyone. Flexibility is not required. Yoga is the ability to keep your attention in one direction.
* Believing in god or deity is not required. All the spiritual teachings have the same underbelly. Loving compassion, care for others, recommendations for self-care. All the laws are about self-care. Life is easier if you believe in something bigger.
Yoga is at least 5,000 years old. How is neuroscience and western psychology catching up with ancient observations of mental health?
* Teachings are ancient, rich, applicable, relevant. And being shown as true through modern science and psychology.
* Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) helps you become aware of inaccurate or negative thinking so you can view challenging situations more clearly and respond to them in a more effective way. Learning to recognize one’s distortions in thinking that are creating problems, and then to reevaluate them in light of reality. CBT in the sutras.
* Pratipaksha bhavanam is quite simply the practice of cultivating the opposite, the contrary, when it comes to unnecessary harm. By cultivating the opposite, a positive thought, in the thick of turbulence, emotional, mental, or otherwise, we are paving a new way toward self-healing. With a negative thought, apply the opposite thought pattern.
There is much more to yoga than the postures, or asanas. What more more does yoga offer?
* Postures are not the end. They can be a means to an end. They can help you feel better if your knee is hurt. The purpose is to feel better, not touch your toes. Open and prepare the body to sit comfortably. If back aches, can’t meditate. Yoga is the appetizer to the meal, which is meditation.
* One of eight limbs of yoga. Asana is one part. The eight limbs of yoga are yama (abstinences), niyama (observances), asana (yoga postures), pranayama (breath control), pratyahara (withdrawal of the senses), dharana (concentration), dhyana (meditation), and samadhi (absorption).”