Individual Yoga Therapy
Healing your relationship with your body is complex work–you don’t have to do it alone
As a yoga therapist, my training covers many areas, including eastern and western psychology, spirituality, ayurveda, movement, breathwork, meditation, and relaxation; all of which can support you in your journey towards body liberation.
What is Yoga Therapy?
Simply defined by the International Association of Yoga Therapists, yoga therapy is “the process of empowering individuals to progress toward improved health and well-being through the application of the teachings and practices of Yoga.”
There are yoga therapists who specialize in all sorts of areas: chronic pain, diabetes, pelvic floor health, cancer, asthma, trauma, and many many more. My training and experience has been focused since 2019 on supporting people with chronic stress and burnout associated with dieting and anti-fat bias, eating disorder recovery, depression and anxiety, chronic pain, and diabetes. Of course, everything I do is from an anti-diet, Health at Every Size, body positive, fat positive lens.
What’s the difference between private Yoga lessons and Individual Yoga Therapy?
Yoga Therapy involves an in-depth intake session and often involves recommendations that go beyond just a physical yoga practice. There are usually underlying issues that affect our experience in our body–yoga therapy provides more context for our work together, allowing me to address each individual as a whole human being: body, mind, and spirit.
What will our work look like together?
As you might imagine, this varies widely from person to person, depending on your goals and interests. Here are some general examples of what sessions might look like, based on certain types of goals.
-
Main goal: gaining physical strength and addressing internal criticism and resistance that comes up with movement.
• The sessions: We explore movement together, finding postures and exercises that accommodate your individual needs. We give space to air the thoughts and judgments that arise, and practice mindfulness.
• You receive a recording of an individualized yoga sequence for you to practice on your own between sessions and the suggestion to journal after each practice.
• I recommend a book to help you unpack internalized anti-fat bias
• Together we create a realistic affirmation to help move the mind in the direction we are wanting it to go, no toxic positivity involved.
-
Main goal: creating space, safety, and tolerance for relaxation and releasing long-held stress in the body.
• The sessions: Movement to help the body prepare for relaxation, followed by Yoga Nidra, a deep, guided relaxation practice.
• You receive a recording to use on your own. Over time, we gradually increase the length of the relaxation practice to improve your tolerance for stillness and relaxation.
• Unpack mindset around discomfort with slowing down/rest, explore yoga philosophy concepts to support new ways of thinking and managing the mind
-
Main goal: Increasing comfort with being present in the body in order to increase regular movement practice and improve health and mobility
• The sessions: We find movements that feel relatively neutral and gradually, gently introduce movements that are less comfortable. Practice pendulating (switching back and forth) between movements/focus on parts of the body that are neutral, and brief encounters with movements/parts of the body that are uncomfortable. Over time, we gradually increase the amount of time spent on movements and focus that are uncomfortable as tolerance increases.
• Ayurvedic self-massage (abhyanga) at home to increase comfort and familiarity with the body.
• Art practice to explore the physical form and help shift the way you see it
How It Works
Because Yoga Therapy is a subtle practice and the benefits can take time to be felt, I require a minimum of 12 sessions for new clients who are interested in one-on-one sessions.
We’ll begin with a free call to discuss your goals and interests and confirm that this will be a good fit for you. From there, we’ll schedule our first session and I’ll send you payment details and my intake form.
Our first session (an hour and a half) will involve a discussion in which we go over your form together, so I can get a clear picture and understanding of your goals and what’s going on for you. In our next session (also an hour and a half), I’ll share my recommendations and ideas for our approach to working together, as well as thoughts for practices you might work on at home. Our sessions thereafter will be one hour each, unless agreed upon otherwise.
Total investment: $2000
Payment plans are available.
Added Bonus
In addition to our sessions, you will also get three months of access to my online membership, The Sanctuary (3 live classes per week, a bank of class recordings, and one community session per month–this would normally cost a total of $510 for the three months).