Yoga for Mental Health

People usually come to Hatha Yoga as a recreational activity, but gradually they discover that yoga helps them feel more at peace with themselves and the world. This quality of yoga makes it a wonderful adjunct therapy for a range of mental health issues.

Yoga Spirit Studios is a Wellbeing Centre and our business is your wellbeing. We do not regard ourselves as part of the fitness industry but as operating in the health and wellness space. Your wellbeing includes your mental health. We do not have a special program called Yoga for Mental Health, rather it is a big part of what we do. This article points you towards some of our programs that are especially helpful for your mental health.

The emphasis on breath, good posture and the cultivation of positive attitudes such as kindness and compassion are likely contributors to this effect of the practice of hatha yoga when practised somatically and holistically as we do.

Hatha yoga is also mindful and bringing practitioners into being centred in the present. The evidence is growing in psychological literature about the helpfulness of meditation and mindfulness in the treatment of mental illness.

Yoga Spirit Studios teaches hatha yoga through its Introductory courses for people who have little or no prior yoga experience, in its Ongoing Beginners drop-in classes and in three classes that each have a unique focus, Energy Balance Yoga, Vinyasa Flow and Prana Yoga Flow. Read about our class styles.

The regular practice of Restorative Yoga has a profoundly positive effect on mental health. We conduct regular two our classes in Restorative Yoga.

Yoga Spirit Studios also specializes in meditation practices that have been shown in evidence based research to be effective in the treatment of anxiety, depression and post traumatic stress disorder.

Staff member Anne Rodgers is a trained teacher in Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction and offers mindfulness courses at the studio. With forty years of experience and exposure to various meditative traditions, the Director of Yoga Spirit Studios, Tina Shettigara has also developed an introduction to meditation that covers a number of different techniques to get people started.

Find out more about our meditation and mindfulness courses.

iRest® Yoga Nidra is a modernized form of the ancient meditative practice of yoga nidra. Its developer, Dr Richard Miller PhD, is a clinical psychologist who was using traditional yoga nidra in his clinical practice in California, and began to make slight amendments to better meet the needs of his clients. It is now an accepted therapy in use in the US Department of Defense, and Department of Veterans Affairs and has been the subject of numerous evidence based studies. You can read more about this research at www.irest.us/research. Tina Shettigara is South Australia's first IRI Certified iRest Teacher®. She offers a weekly regular class featuring a yoga nidra practice and regular courses, workshops and retreats.

Find out more about iRest Yoga Nidra.

(Author, Tina Shettigara)