I have been studying a psychotherapy system called Bodynamic for a year now. And in an article about it I am finding the following excerpt which if we take away some terminology sounds to me like a very good description of yoga.
I am not surprised anymore but I am still amazed by the common ground shared by somatic psychotherapy and yoga.
“We think of our work as a mirroring process that helps people sense what they do. Thus, we do not use a medical model of illness and cure, nor do we see therapy as simply a corrective experience. We assume that certain structures (character positions, ego functions, rigidities and resignations) have evolved with which the person may feel stuck.
Usually, they have seldom had a clear experience of these structures. When appropriate we may try to hold someone in the experience of a structure until they can sense it in their body. In relation to us they can begin to feel this structure, this place they live with. As we work with them to promote a new and positive experience, the power of the habitual structure (or lack of structure) diminishes. An opening to new, possibly unknown options becomes available. New capabilities are developed and the person has more choices available in their life.“
I have always thought of yoga as a special kind of mirror.
Yoga can show strengths and weaknesses. It shows us stuff that we can’t actually perceive with our eyes. Stuff that we can only sense and feel in our bodies but is very much relevant to how we choose to live.
Yoga can reflect back where we are stable and when we are wobbly, what we avoid and that which we are good at. It shows us if we are a bit reckless or vain or competitive today. If we are calm or anxious, if we feel confident, focused, grounded and centred.
And it opens the possibility for change, reveals more options to choose from. In the way we relate to ourselves and others. In the way we move and think, perceive and react.
And the more we practice, the more powerful it becomes.
I 
this.
Photo by Patrick Hendry on Unsplash
