Yoga As Medicine (YAM), Level 2:
​Yoga Therapy for the Nervous System

To learn more about the course, please watch the video above. N.B. Taking YAM 1 first is highly recommended — but not required — for all YAM 2 courses. If you can't take YAM 1 first, if possible before attending please read the first seven chapters of Yoga as Medicine: The Yogic Prescription for Health and Healing (Bantam). 

We live in a world where most people have nervous systems that are out of balance. This can be due to stressful lives, inadequate rest, a history of significant trauma, or from the effects of disease itself. Yoga, including a wide variety of yogic tools from chanting to poses to meditation has proven itself to be one of the best ways to balance the body’s autonomic nervous system (ANS). Due to its strong connection to the ANS, there will be a major focus on the breath in this training, both as a contributor to nervous system maladies when it is dysfunctional, and its use to help heal such conditions.
 
The format for this course is the same as for YAM 1, a five-day training of six hours per day, with group case work playing a big part in the learning. Lectures will focus on topics related to the nervous system including its role in autoimmune diseases like MS and Parkinson's. We'll also explore the role of yoga in trauma and PTSD, which can transform a previously normal nervous system into one that overreacts to perceived threats. Case work will explore how asana, pranayama, restoratives, meditation, yoga nidra and other yogic techniques can help re-pattern abnormal stress responses, both over- and under-activity, common among those with everything from anxiety and depression to insomnia, fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome and autoimmune conditions.
 
In our yoga practices, we will work to move progressively toward profound relaxation of the nervous system. The asana will be mostly gentle with an emphasis on skillful use of the breath both in movement and in stillness. The practices will build on each other over the course of the five days, and we hope the effects will ripple out into your personal yoga practices — as well as your professional work and personal lives — in the weeks and months after the training!

Dr. Timothy McCall's
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 All Photos © from Yoga as Medicine by Michal Venera