Learning About Yoga for Depression

by Nina

Terri Alexander, Age 55 
(Backbends can be uplifting for people with depression)

This morning I received an email from new reader in Japan who wants to introduce yoga for depression to the Japanese people and add the choice of yoga “in their pocket.” What an admirable goal! This has been one of my areas of interest for a long time because I feel yoga has so much to offer in the area of emotional wellbeing. So because I can’t teach this woman what I know in person and there is apparently no one teaching on this topic who lives in Japan (correct me if I’m wrong), I started thinking about how I could coach her a bit from a distance.  

I realized quite quickly that there were some basic things anyone needs to start by understanding before they can really study yoga for depression, and since I was going to write them down for her, I thought I should share them with you as well.  

Learn about Yoga for Stress Management

I feel the first place to start is to learn about the functions of the autonomic nervous system and chronic stress. The reason for this is that stress is one of the things that can cause depression, and for people whose depression has other causes, being stressed can exacerbate the depression (and being depressed can cause you to stress out!). So it is important to understand what chronic stress does to your nervous system and how you can use yoga to help manage your basic stress levels. Personally, as someone who has suffered from two bouts of agitated depression, this knowledge has been extremely valuable, enabling me to keep myself healthy for the past two decades.

So start by learning about the autonomic nervous system in general by reading my post Life-Changer: Understanding Your Autonomic Nervous System. Then, after you’ve learned about the nervous system itself, learn about the difference between acute and chronic stress by reading my post About Stress: Acute vs. Chronic. Finally, learn about how to use yoga for stress management by reading The Relaxation Response and Yoga. And if you are not doing so already, try practicing yoga stress management techniques on a regular basis so you are really familiar with them and the differences between them. (This is because while stress management in general is beneficial for all, some techniques will work well for various people with depression while others may not. For example, Savasana with eyes closed can be very challenging for people with depression while a supported inverted pose with eyes open could work very well. And meditation may even be harmful—see Friday Q&A: Depression, Medication, and Meditation.)  

Learn About the Types of Depression

Another very important subject area to study is the two types of depression, which are very different and need to be addressed differently with yoga. In my post Tamasic and Rajasic Depression, I discuss the differences between clinical depression (tamasic) and agitated depression (rajasic), and describe the different approaches you need to take for the two. Generally, because of the lethargic aspect of clinical depression, people with this form of depression need energizing as well as uplifting while because the anxious/agitated aspect of agitated depression, people with this form of depression need calming and soothing, rather than energizing. The more you understand about these two different forms of depression, the better you will be able to help someone (or yourself) who is suffering from one or the other. 

Some other posts with information about yoga for depression that you might find useful include: Balancing Your Emotional Body with Counter-Poses and Balancing Your Emotions with Your Breath.

I also highly recommend reading the book The Noonday Demon: An Atlas of Depression by Andrew Solomon as a way to learn even more about the different types of depression. (Even though—bad Andrew—the only thing he says about yoga is snide and ignorant.)

Yoga is Not a Standalone Cure

Finally, always keep in mind that yoga is a supplementary treatment for depression, not a standalone cure. You can use it to help someone who is recovering from depression or to help someone who has once suffered from it to prevent its recurrence. But serious depression (as opposed to, say, just feeling mildly depressed about life) can be a life-threatening disease and someone with serious depression should be under professional care. While yoga teachers can work with someone who has serious depression, the teacher should always make sure the student is also seeing a trained professional. See Drawing a Line in the Sand: Where Yoga Teachers Should Not Go and No Shame, Please! (Western Medicine and Yoga are Complementary).

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Practicing Yoga for Depression An Overview

by Nina

Morning Glory by Hiroshige

Last week in my post Can You Guide Me Online?, I promised I would write something about how to use yoga for depression. And today’s the day! But because I’ve already written several posts about depression over the years, I decided that today I’d just provide overview of the topic, with links to relevant posts from the past. And because I feel that it’s beneficial to take your time to understand your particular situation and needs rather than just jumping into practice, I’m going to recommend approaching practicing yoga for depression in a series of steps. 

1. Start by determining whether you have tamasic (clinical) or rajasic (agitated) depression. Read Tamasic and Rajasic Depression. If you can’t decide based on this post (though I hope you can!), discuss it with your doctor, therapist, or health care provider. These two forms of depression are very different, so you’ll probably find that different poses and practices will help you. While everyone with depression needs some uplifting, people with tamasic depression may benefit from energizing poses and practices while people with rajasic depression may need calming poses and practices. My post discusses why and makes some suggestions.
2. Learn as much as you can about depression and also about your nervous system because having a deeper understanding about your body and your condition will help you learn more about what is going to help you. See Learning About Yoga for Depression for some ideas.
3. Practice stress management. Because stress can cause and/or exacerbate depression, I recommend incorporating stress management practices into your daily life. See Stress Management for When You're Stressed. Experiment with different techniques to see what works best for you, and practice whatever you find effective or just prefer. If you don’t already have a strong meditation practice that doesn’t cause you to brood or you aren’t working with a teacher who is experienced at teaching people with depression, it may be wise to skip meditation practice for now because being alone with your thoughts can cause a downward spiral in some people. 
4. Learn about the emotional effects that poses and breath practices have on you. See Balancing Your Emotional Body with Counter-Poses to get a general idea of how poses typically affect practitioners and Balancing Your Emotions with Your Breath for information on breath practices, but keep in mind that your own experience is key, even if your personal experience seems to contradict what I or any other teacher says.
5. Using your knowledge of what makes you feel better, either on your own or with help from your teacher, combine these poses and practices into sequences that uplift you, energize you, or calm you as needed and practice them. You can just use these on an as-needed basis, or you can practice them regularly during bad periods. 
6. Don’t do what makes you feel worse, even if someone tells you it should make you feel better. See When Relaxing Isn’t Relaxing for some alternatives to poses and practices that may not be not be working for you. 
7. If you are combining yoga with other forms of treatment for depression, please try to let go of any shame about that. Shame about needing more than just yoga can be generated internally (see Yoga is a great thing but...) or even externally (see No Shame Please! (Western Medicine and Yoga Are Complementary)). But these negative judgments are not helpful for your healing. Try instead to cultivate gratitude for whatever is helping (that’s what I’ve done) or use the technique of cultivating the opposite. See It's not finding gratitude that matters; it is remembering to look for it in the first place. and Transforming Unhelpful Core Beliefs.

Please let me know if any of these recommends help you. And if any of you have experiences or recommendations you’d like to share with others, please tell me! 

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Acupuncture For Depression And Why Professionals Should Consider Them

By Joseph Robinson

Aside from taking good care of your body, make sure to be careful when it comes to your emotional a and mental health. These three are highly related. If one of them are not functioning well, you would greatly experience tons of problems and issues at the end. Even if a certain issue is not that big problem after all, since you are in a great panic, your body tends to act stiffer.

That also goes to your mind. As a human being, it is pretty normal to feel stressed sometimes. However, if you let this thing gets into your mind, it would surely devour you. Of course, mostly, these stress and depression were only caused due to your poor body condition. In that case, make sure to always watch it. For this matter, you may have the acupuncture for depression Boca Raton. Acupuncture is a popular type of an alternative medicine.

For your prospect, assure that there are some practitioners from town capable of helping you. They have practiced these medicines for how many years. Truly, acupuncture treatment is a kind of an alternative treatment. Even for that fact, since they are very effective, the industry still remains in the industry for quite sometimes.

You could even tell that they are still popular even today. Hence, consider it out. There are many good reasons why you need to consider this out. Of course, as a professional yourself, it would be up to you whether you like to try it or not. It might not be ideal, especially, for those patients who are afraid or needles.

That is a good thing, though. It is a sign of progress. Before your entire body betrays you, you got to cling to that ray of hope. Do whatever it takes to bring back your healthy mind and body. You would need them, particularly, in moving forward. You must never take this matter too lightly. For you, it might be a small matter.

Before you knew it, it might be too late for you to cure it. Your body operates in a systematic matter as revealed above. That is why, if one of its parts or components failed to function accordingly, the other components would also be affected. This is how it works and operates. Knowing this matter, you must take good care of it more.

You got some options. There is the internet too. You could use the world wide web in finding your ideal prospect. Most of these facilities had their online site. By using these, checking and reviewing their programs become quite easy. Of course, doing such things are very important. Before you get or acquire their service, you should know them better first.

Check their ability. Better know their reputation too. Do not try to associate yourself, especially, to those experts who cannot give you any competitive service. You deserve better than them. Of course, in order to keep your investment secure, you must play and perform all your parts too. By making some thorough reviews and evaluations, you would be able to avoid such problems.

More than helping you, though, most of these clients only want to vent out their stress and disappointments. Of course, there are some good reports too. However, usually, instead of telling how effective the service, they tend to consider the price and even the customer service of the place. As a customer, you might like to take this chance to figure out the best practitioner for the service.

About the Author:

Find a list of the advantages of receiving acupuncture for depression Boca Raton area and more info about a knowledgeable acupuncturist at http://acupuncturebocaraton.com/depression-benefitted-acupuncture-meditation now.