Fifteen years ago my life looked very different than it does today. I was a young mother of two beautiful boys, one six months, the other three years old. I had retired from my career as a corporate meeting planner and, like many other young moms, wondered what the next chapter of my life would look like. On August 16, 1996, the direction of my new life began to take form. It was on that day that my dad, at the age of 56, took his own life. My father’s suicide was and continues to be THE defining moment in my life; from that day forward, I have thought of my life as before and after that event.
As I approach the 15th anniversary of my dad’s death, it feels like a perfect time to share my story and how the beautiful and ancient practice of yoga has changed my life. As a result of many of those changes, I have been given the opportunity to share yoga with others as a healing tool in navigating the long and arduous journey through loss.
Today, I am a licensed social worker, a registered yoga teacher (RYT) through the Yoga Alliance, as well as a member of the International Association of Yoga Therapists (IAYT). I have been a volunteer with the Catholic Charities Program Loving Outreach for Survivors of Suicide (LOSS) since 1999 and an active community volunteer and speaker for the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention (AFSP). I work as an advocate for grieving children, families, and communities through my work with Willow House, and was instrumental in creating a program specifically for families with children grieving the death of a parent or sibling by suicide. At the inception of this program at Willow House in 2004, there were no other services or programs available in the Chicago area for this specific population. So while I would never say that my father’s death in its raw and most painful form was a “gift,” I do believe that from that experience of that particular “box full of darkness,” to quote Mary Oliver, I have and continue to receive gifts of beauty and hope daily.
At some point early in my grieving process, I found my way onto a yoga mat for the first time. I knew instantly that yoga had something special to offer as I struggled to make sense of my loss. Within a short period of time, yoga became my primary practice of self-care while juggling graduate school, working internships, family illness, and young children. While I hesitated in allowing myself to fully embrace the concept of teaching yoga, I could not help but introduce the concept of pranayama (breath work) when working with grieving individuals. The fit is just so perfect.
As the Buddha so succinctly reflected, “Thousands of candles can be lit from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared.” What I came to realize is that the seeds that had been planted, the spark that had been lit by yoga, needed space to grow. What has blossomed from those initial seeds of awareness is the Bereavement Support Program, Connecting Through Yoga. In this program, grieving individuals are given an opportunity to come together to connect with others traveling similar paths and safely explore their own feelings and complex emotions surrounding their losses in a new way using the practice and teachings of yoga. The lessons and tools are both endless and empowering.
How one expresses and wrestles with these feelings and emotions varies greatly from person to person. William Shakespeare wrote in Macbeth , “Give sorrow words: the grief that does not speak whispers the o’er-fraught heart and bids it break.” While I have no desire to counter Shakespeare’s brilliance, I have come to recognize that words alone may not be enough to heal a grieving heart. It has been my experience that we must give sorrow an avenue for expression, integration, and acknowledgement. And that is where the practice of yoga truly shines. Yoga gives us the opportunity to reconnect to our true selves. It allows us to come home to that quiet space of love and light that resides within our hearts–even those of the broken hearted. Yoga reminds us that no matter how dark the world seems, there is always a place of light within.
Think back for a moment to a time of loss in your own life. Whom do you recall being with? Did you talk about your feelings? Were you able to share your feelings and emotions freely? What smells, sights, voices, or physical sensations do you remember? The experience of loss can leave one feeling isolated and alone, separated from the familiar, and thrown into an unfamiliar place of pain and discomfort. The feelings of separation and disconnection from others can also be experienced as a disconnection from self and personal isolation. Loss can make us feel fragmented and broken. Focus and concentration become difficult, and the physical manifestations of grief can be truly painful and debilitating, causing stomachaches, headaches, fatigue, to name just a few. The death of a loved one can also feel traumatic. It is important to understand that trauma is not just a physical wound or shock to the body but can be experienced as an emotional or psychological wound.
Yoga, when introduced gently to grieving individuals, gives them opportunities to recognize what they have lost; but at the same time, it allows them to explore what still remains. Identifying our places of strength during difficult times can be extraordinarily helpful through the healing process.
We don’t just experience loss in our “thinking” minds, we absorb it in every cell and system within our bodies; a person may not be able to talk about a memory, but a smell, sound, or visual reminder can elicit strong sensory triggers of the event. In visualizing the body using the koshas (the sheaths or layers that protect our true selves), yoga works in grieving individuals by peeling back these layers, reintegrating the fragmented pieces, and, ultimately, creating a sense of peace and wholeness. We begin by calming the mind and simply noticing what comes up. From a place of nonjudgment, we move through the layers, deeper and deeper, beginning to create a new picture and sense of wholeness. Through this slow and gentle movement inward, grieving individuals begin to notice where they may be stuck or holding negative or harmful emotions. Amazingly, often just the awareness and acknowledgement of these particular thoughts and emotions reduce their power. Yoga had a profound effect on one recent participant in the Bereavement Support Program, who shared, “The words were finally able to flow! I felt more UNSTUCK. I am beginning to feel like I can let go and heal.”
In addition to the numerous psychological benefits and freedom that yoga offers during the grieving process, there are physical benefits as well:
- Decrease in cortisol (stress hormone) levels
- Increase in heart rate variability
- Relaxation of chronic muscle tension
- Restoration of natural breathing
- Improvement in oxygen absorption and carbon dioxide elimination
- Calming of the sympathetic nervous system (associated with the “flight or fight response” to danger)
- Activation of the parasympathetic nervous system (associated with “rest and digest” activities when the body is quiet)
- Provision of an additional tool for self-soothing
TVK Desikachar , son and student of the legendary yoga master T. Krishnamacharya and founder of the Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandiram, a non-profit public charitable trust in Chennai, India, to honor his father and share his teachings stated, “In broad terms, the purpose of yoga is to reduce disturbance and return an individual to his or her inherent peace and power.” To illustrate the power of this practice, a woman grieving the death of her son noted that the most valuable lesson she learned from participating in the bereavement yoga program was “finding [that] peace and comfort inside is still possible.” In those few words, there is a strong sense of hope for the future.
There is no doubt that the grieving process continues through our entire lives, yet it is that sense of hope, that glimmer of potential peace and healing, that continues to astound and humble me in this work. It seems so simple, yet more often than not, it takes years of practice to be able to recognize the gifts that come from our sorrow.
This is a post by Nancy Perlson. She is a licensed social worker who has extensive experience working in the field of grief and loss through her affiliations and work with several local and national organizations serving grieving individuals. She is a member of the International Association of Yoga Therapists and uses her yoga and therapy training to help heal the mind-body connection that is often fractured by trauma and loss. Contact her at 847.445.3388 or nbperl@aol.com. Reposted with permission. Original post here.
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