Through yoga, we can learn to inhabit our bodies.

Yoga is the practice of developing self-compassion and body and mind awareness through movement, breath and stillness. There exists an opportunity, when we practice yoga, to connect for the first time (or reconnect) with the needs of our bodies. We can learn, over time, to open up this space by bringing deeper awareness into the self and a capacity to care more for ourselves. This somatic experience, through yoga practice, can help us to experience a pleasure – no matter how small – in self-care. Learning to inhabit our bodies, alongside this notion of self-care, is at the core of how yoga has the potential to empower people who have experienced trauma with their recovery. Trauma informed yoga invites people to start to feel their bodies as a resource and supports them to feel safety in their body.

Harnessing the power of yoga to understand trauma’s impact on the body is a growing field of research and practice. Trauma sensitive yoga (TSY) or trauma informed yoga (TIY) is about moving and feeling and cultivating a sense of agency; it is not about getting a yoga asana posture “right” and it is not about telling students what to feel or experience. In TSY, the language use is very invitational and orientated around choice, helping the student to experience their own agency. The language use of the TIY teacher creates one of the main distinctions between a yoga teacher and a trauma informed yoga teacher. For a TIF yoga teacher, the language she uses in facilitating a class should not be directive or hierarchical, with an aim to reduce/eliminate any power dynamics between teacher and student.

Defining Trauma

Trauma – and complex trauma – has many layers; it may be intergenerational, structural, or the result of oppression, violence and control. It may be the result of early childhood trauma, or a volatile childhood, or being a part of a minority group. Trauma presents in a multitude of different ways. For Judith Herman, traumatic events cause psychological distress in the survivor, varying in severity and duration. Traumatic events can instill a feeling of terror and helplessness in the survivor and often occur through power abuses on a family or societal level, with cases consisting of abuses of authority and control and in extreme cases, sadism and cruelty (Judith Herman Trauma and Recovery, 1992, p.3).

According to David Emerson, trauma is about relational power dynamics; people who have experienced trauma are used to being in relationships where there is a top down power play (David Emerson, episode 186, Trauma Therapist Podcast). Trauma may be a response to overwhelming experiences and not necessarily a pathology. There is a spectrum of traumatic disorders, ranging from the impact of a single traumatic event to the complex impact of prolonged and repeated abuse (J. Herman, Trauma and Recovery 1992, p.3). Survivors of trauma often present with feelings of detachment and disassociation from the self and others, often finding it difficult to cultivate a sense of being present.

With helplessness and isolation being the core experiences of psychological trauma, empowerment, choice and reconnection form the core experiences of recovery (J. Herman, Trauma and Recovery 1992, p.197). Taking power and having choices in real life situations often involves a conscious choice to face danger, potential reminders of the trauma or perceived threat. Recovery, however, often involves both ‘psychological mastery and physiological conditioning’ (J. Herman, Trauma and Recovery 1992, p.198), for example this may look like self-defense classes for women, or yoga classes to experience body connection/ reconnection. In doing so, ‘she establishes a degree of control over her own bodily and emotional responses that reaffirms a sense of power’, this way a survivor of trauma can learn to feel she is in possession of herself and not just possessed by her traumatic past (J. Herman, Trauma and Recovery 1992, p.203)

Trauma and the Body: The Role of the Autonomic Nervous System

Some people who use talking therapies (such as psychiatric or psychological therapy, or other forms of psychotherapy) develop very good cognitive awareness and understanding of their trauma and what caused it, but can still have a huge cognitive and body disconnect in which the nervous system is still operating at trauma level. Meaning the nervous system is responding at trauma level with high degrees of flight or fight mode, high degrees of stress and adrenaline and a low ability to self-regulate these reactions and experience the present or a sense of being in the present (Nicky Mosely, Trauma Sensitive Yoga from The Addicted Mind Podcast).

This idea that trauma is held in the body started gaining traction as practitioners began to think of ways to help survivors of trauma to tap into their bodies, to connect with their bodies and to notice sensations that were coming up in the body. Looking at how stress and trauma can manifest in the body, Robert Sapolsky describes the effect that ongoing stress and traumatic stress can have on the digestive system; traumatic stress early in life is proven to increase the risk of irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) in adulthood. Childhood trauma can create a vulnerability in the digestive system, making it hyperreactive to stress in the long term –animal studies have proved this (Sapolsky, 2004, p.83).

Trauma specialists, alongside movement specialists (including yoga teachers) began to realise the benefits in trauma-sensitive movement practice in helping victims/survivors of trauma to feel their bodies as a resource in their recovery. Supporting the nervous system needs a person to connect to the body; with the premise that if people can change what they’re feeling in the body, they then have the capacity to change the physical reactions to their triggers. Trauma informed yoga can help people to know they have choice when they start to notice sensations in the body.

Dr Bessel Van Der Kolk, a Professor of Psychiatry and one of the world’s leading specialists on traumatic stress describes and author of the groundbreaking book ‘The Body Keeps the Score: Mind, Brain and Body in Trauma Transformation’ started the movement of trauma informed yoga through the Trauma Centre (part of the Justice Resource Institute) in Boston, Massachusetts. Trauma Informed Yoga (TIY), a form of yoga therapy, is an evidence-based technique that has predominantly emerged out of the work of David Emerson and Bessel Van Der Kolk in the Trauma Centre.

Heart Rate Variability and Wellbeing

The involvement of yoga as a tool to help with healing from trauma came about when Van Der Kolk and Hopper learned about the new biological marker – heart rate variability (HRV) in 1998 – which was discovered to be a good measure of how well the autonomic nervous system is working (Van Der Kolk, 2014, p.266). The autonomic nervous system (ANS) is our brain’s instinctive survival system, with 2 branches regulating the body: the sympathetic nervous system (SNS) and the parasympathetic nervous system (PNS). The SNS fuels the body and brain to act via the release of adrenaline (among other chemicals), designed to keep us safe and alive; the PNS uses chemicals such as acetylcholine to help us regulate sleep patterns/cycles, digestion, wound healing among others. When we are functioning well, these two systems work well and in harmony with one another, with HRV measuring the relative balance between the SNS and the PNS (Van Der Kolk, 2014, p.267). On an inhale, we stimulate the PNS which increases the heart rate, exhales stimulate the PNS and slows the heart rate. Good HRV indicates basic overall wellbeing and health.

So, Why is Good HRV Significant?

Put simply, if our autonomic nervous system is well balanced, we have a reasonable amount of control over how we react to difficult or challenging situations; we can calmly assess how we feel and why. When we stay relatively calm, we can then choose how to respond, instead of being governed by our impulses/emotions. However, in people with a poorly modulated ANS, those individuals are ‘easily thrown off balance both mentally and physically’ (Van Der Kolk, 2014, p.267). Hereby, ‘poor HRV (in response to poor ANS regulation) with a lack of fluctuation in the heart rate in response to breathing results in negative effects of thinking, feeling and how the body reacts to stress’ (Van Der Kolk, 2014, p.267). This lack of balance and regulation between the HRV and ANS makes people increasingly vulnerable to physical illness and poor mental health, including post- traumatic stress disorders (PTSD) and depression. In victims of trauma, very often these individuals present with poor to very poor regulation of their ANS and HRV. Failure to keep this system in balance is one reason why traumatised people are so vulnerable to overreaction to relatively minor stresses in life: the body’s biological system designed to help us cope with life is so thrown out of sync it’s unable to do its job.

How can yoga help with better regulation of the ANS and improving HRV in cases of trauma victims? Much research has been done in the last two decades confirming that changing the breath patterns has a beneficial impact on how we respond to anxiety, anger and depression and that yoga can further improve the body’s ability to regulate things such as blood pressure, stress hormone production etc. A study in the Trauma Centre in 2014 showed that yoga practice improved arousal problems in cases of PTSD and ‘dramatically improved the subjects’ relationships to their own bodies’; what’s more, this study evolved from a focus on learning about how yoga affects HRV (which it does) to ‘helping traumatised people learn to comfortably inhabit their tortured bodies’ (Van Der Kolk, 2014, p.270). The aspect of yoga geared toward breath manipulation helps to enhance capacity for emotion regulation. Thus, yoga reduces the overall intensity of the stress response and improves the ability to self-soothe.

Trauma Informed Yoga: Developing Agency and Interoception

Trauma sensitive yoga can support people to feel safety in their body, perhaps for the first time. As Van Der Kolk and Emerson point out, they often witness the difficulty traumatised participants have in feeling relaxed (to varying extents) and safe in their own bodies; through TIY they can begin to learn this process of safe surrender (2014, p. 271). Trauma informed yoga is engineered to help its participants become more embodied, not to process the details of one’s trauma in the yoga class setting.

The key distinction between trauma informed and trauma sensitive yoga is that trauma sensitive yoga tends to occur within a more clinical setting, with clients simultaneously receiving talking therapy. Trauma informed yoga can be looser in its application, with clients perhaps requiring less psychological or psychiatric intervention.

Nicky Mosely (on Trauma Sensitive Yoga from The Addicted Mind Podcast) studied somatic/body healing with David Emerson, in particular trauma movement practice – not necessarily yoga – but a movement practice to invite people to start to notice sensation in their body and inviting people to reconnect with their body and the breath, or connect for the first time. Most yoga programs for helping people who’ve experienced trauma consists of a combination of breath work (pranayama), postures (asana) and elements of mindfulness. The emphasis in TIY classes to keep this combination very simple; many students have little to no breath or body awareness, so it’s paring the yoga right back to basics. For example, if I myself teach complete beginners in a yoga class, the emphasis is on slowly cultivating breath and body awareness, there is no force or rush. I would introduce simple breath awareness practices (observing and counting the breath) followed later by 3-part breathing; this may be similar to a TIY class.

Exteroception and Interoception

Within the context of trauma understanding, exteroception means relating or responding to external stimuli, and traumatised people may be very proficient with exteroception. This can also relate to trauma survivors having very good cognitive awareness of external factors relating to their trauma, but conversely have very low levels of interoception. Interoception is very important in recovering from trauma, this is defined as having a perception of sensations inside the body. This could be recognising feelings such as hunger, needing the toilet, feeling the heartbeat, feeling heat or cold, through to tiredness, energy levels and mood. Trauma survivors may have low levels of interoception, even with sensations such as hunger and temperature. Within the scope of practice for TIY, a participant should have a therapist (or equivalent) for the frontal lobe work combined with yoga for the deep learning of how to feel into the body and developing interoceptive awareness.

The Importance and Suggestibility of Language – the Challenges for a TIY Facilitator

Trauma informed yoga, according to Amy Hoare (Trauma Sensitive Yoga, The Connected Yoga Teacher podcast) is about moving and feeling and cultivating a sense of agency. It is not about doing a yoga posture “right” and TIY teachers do not tell people how to perform asana or what to feel, the language is very non-hierarchical and invitational. There is little to no hierarchy between teacher and student, there is no telling people what to do or feel. The sequences are often designed to emphasis how the body feels in certain postures, helping participants notice which muscles are switched on, building a rhythm between tension and relaxation. Hands-on assists are almost never given in TIY settings.

Giving participants control in how they choose to move or feel is key to the success of TIY – participants are active, not passive. Suggestive language is used by the TIY facilitator, inviting people to notice sensations, giving people space to have an experience no matter how small, letting people be curious. There is no directive language; the most important aspect is for the facilitator to create a safe and predictable container for people to practice within and help create the space for people to develop an empowering practice with choices (I.e. to continue with a posture or breath practice or not) (Mosley, from Trauma Sensitive Yoga, The Addicted Mind Podcast). As Amy Hoare notes, students will always do what you say as opposed to what they need, students want validation, especially those with trauma, they want to ‘do well’ and please the teacher (Hoare, Trauma Sensitive Yoga: The Connected Yoga Teacher podcast).

A challenge for the new TIY teacher/facilitator is to lose the agenda of being a teacher. This agenda is replaced by creating an experimental journey for the students, free of all power dynamics or hierarchy. Over time, and with regular practice, students of TIY may start to notice that they are sleeping better, or they’re calmer at work. This may not be conscious but the benefits start to slowly integrate into daily life; this is a very subtle, intangible, experiential process – it’s not necessarily cognitive. As a lifelong student of yoga myself (and more recently a teacher of yoga), I can definitely relate to the subtlety of this journey. Amy Hoare notes that yoga teachers are often in a position of power and that this can become a performative mindset, as opposed to being present and holding the space for the students they hold the space unwittingly for themselves (Hoare, Trauma Sensitive Yoga: The Connected Yoga Teacher podcast). Within the remit of TIY, the teacher and participant would ideally have a shared authentic connection; this attachment would be safe and boundaried through adequate training on the part of the facilitator. Yoga teachers, when working within a TIY way, would actively practice non-attachment to outcomes – the yoga postures are of secondary importance, what is vital is encouraging the students to bring awareness inwards (Hoare, Trauma Sensitive Yoga: The Connected Yoga Teacher podcast). Hereby the teacher would normalise feeling nothing in postures!

Key Considerations for a TIY Teacher:

To safely and authentically hold the space
To be available and present for the students and having a shared, authentic experience
Practice ahimsa (in own life, in demonstrable way and in holding space for others), no coercion
of your students
Practice non-attachment (aparigraha) to the yoga, to your role as a ‘teacher’ or the postures
Emphasis of the practice is on whole journey, not getting to a certain ‘destination’
Be very mindful of the language you use, invite more humility

TIY advocates a form of yoga on ‘how to take care’, and this is something that we can all benefit from. Most of the human population has experienced some degree of trauma, not matter how small, and teaching yoga from a trauma informed/sensitive way is potentially useful for all students and practitioners of yoga.

The Evolution of Thinking About Trauma and the Body: A Multidisciplinary Approach

Understanding trauma and its effect on the body has evolved enormously in recent years; yoga has played a significant role in this multidisciplinary development. This evolution has moved from the effect on thinking (frontal lobe trauma) to the effect of trauma on the organism as a whole and its impact on the body, for example the neuro-physiological impact of trauma and other somatic experiences. David Emerson notes, from his work as a TIY facilitator in the Trauma Centre, that traumatised people who come to use TIY classes often present with an extreme lack of choice; they have a feeling they are chronically at risk and never knowing where they’re safe, often this is in a relational context (David Emerson, Episode 186: Trauma Therapist Podcast). If someone was a victim of sexual or physical abuse, they experience an extreme lack of choice about what happens to their body; in cases of chronic abuse, their body is under the control of another person. Yoga, in cases such as these, can serve as a facilitator to create space for traumatised people to have some choice over their own bodies, possibly for the first time. Let’s let that sink in; it’s monumental stuff.

Within this multidisciplinary approach to thinking about trauma – involving psychiatry, clinicians and yoga teachers – empowering questions are now being asked, through the use of TIY, such as ‘what is it like to have a body?’, or ‘what does it mean to be in the body?’ in helping people to navigate their own recovery and experience choice in using their own bodies in a way that involves developing this sense of interoception. This aspect of trauma recovery, through the medium of yoga, creates opportunities for trauma survivors to be in power of their own bodies. This is hugely significant: for the trauma survivor to live a better life and, crucially, one with hope; and on more macro level in terms of advancing the thinking and research on trauma in a neuro-physiological, multidisciplinary and evidence-based way.

Follow Marianne on Instagram @marianne_swift_yoga

Bibliography

Amy Hoare, Trauma Sensitive Yoga at The Trauma Centre, The Connected Yoga Teacher podcast
Bessel Van Der Kolk, The Body Keeps The Score: Mind, Brain and Body in the Transformation of Trauma, 2014
Brendon Abram, Teaching Trauma Sensitive Yoga: A Practical Guide, 2018
David Emerson, episode 186, Trauma Therapist Podcast
David Emerson & Elizabeth Hopper, Overcoming Trauma through Yoga: Reclaiming Your Body, 2011
Judith Herman Trauma and Recovery, 1992
Judith Herman YouTube Talk
Mark Stephens, Teaching Yoga: Essential Foundations and Techniques, 2010
Nicky Mosely, Trauma Sensitive Yoga from The Addicted Mind Podcast
Ranju Roy and David Charlton, Embodying the Yoga Sutra, 2019
Robert M Sapolsky, Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers: The Acclaimed Guide to Stress, Stress-Related Diseases and Coping, 2004
Sri Swami Satchidananda, The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, 2018 printing