Private Yoga

When you’re dealing with chronic pain, generalized yoga classes and videos can exacerbate it - especially if you’re new to yoga and unsure of how to modify for your pain! Yoga sessions for pain clients are like physical therapy using yoga and pranayama (breath-work). We dialogue throughout each session, feel out which movements create relief, and build a plan of action for rebalancing movement patterns to alleviate and prevent pain.

Many people come to me for single sessions to learn a few techniques or poses to practice on their own. Most report feeling significant pain relief by the end of the session, and continue to use the techniques I’ve taught them on their own.

For clients dealing with complex chronic pain that’s exacerbated by ingrained movement patterns, weekly sessions (Dedicated Practice) offer the solution. Through our work, my clients gradually strengthen functionally supportive muscles and release structural tightness that’s contributing to the pain. Once the pain is no longer an issue, we use yoga to increase strength and range of motion throughout the body.

Some of the most common types of pain we address include:

• Low back pain

• Knee pain

• Wrist pain

• Tension headaches & migraines

• Menstrual pain

• Shoulder and neck pain

As detailed as I get in teaching group classes, they can’t be sequenced 100% for one individual’s body and personal goals. In one-on-one session, I can focus in on the details of your ingrained movement patterns, take into account your energy level on any given day, and give you an asana practice that strengthens, stretches, and lifts or grounds your energy.

A personalized practice can be:

• Active: vigorous physical practice geared toward developing your asana practice in any direction you choose

• Restorative: guided relaxation with supported yoga poses

• Modified specifically for you: injuries, medical conditions, pregnancy, and other stage-of-life shifts in how your body feels and move can make it difficult to follow along in regular group classes - many poses need to be changed or modified to make them safe or effective. Private sessions mean you get exactly what YOU need from yoga

• Focused: if there’s a pose or an aspect of yoga that interests you most, we can focus on it in more detail one-on-one

• Informative: in a private session, there’s more freedom for you to ask questions as they arise during practice; you’ll learn more about your body and anatomy, the philosophy and practice of yoga, and be able to fine-tune and understand poses in more depth

Whether you’re simply seeking a regular personalized yoga practice or actively working toward a specific pose, weekly sessions are a great way to deepen your practice.

In modern America, the focus in yoga is often on the physical practice (asana), and the idea of “deepening your practice” often relates to strength, flexibility, and achieving more challenging poses. While this is one component of yoga, there are seven others that relate to self-awareness, opening and stilling the mind, and deepening sensitivity to energy.

When clients are interested in delving deeper into the philosophy and energetics of yoga, sessions are often based in dialogue, guided meditation, chakra connection, and pranayama. I may recommend books to read and practices to do between sessions to enhance your yoga journey.

Students often dream of dedicating time each day to practicing on their own, but struggle to think of what to do once they roll out the mat!

With clients seeking to develop a self-led practice, we discuss the basics of sequencing poses, safely warming the body for deeper movement, and listening to the body to practice intuitively. In these sessions, we create sequences that they can repeat on their own; discuss issues and questions that arise between our weekly sessions; and I often recommend readings or give “homework” journaling assignments to stimulate their inner process with their practice.

We often have chronically “stuck” areas, dysregulated nervous systems, or unresolved trauma that group classes don’t quite address.

Unresolved trauma in the body may present as:

• feeling disconnected from a “sense of self” - like you’re going through the motions of living, but never really feel alive

• an inability to move your body in a way that seems like it should be accessible - an area that always feels “stuck”, no matter how much stretching you do

• chronic anxiety that doesn’t abate with regular practice

• emotional backlog that consistently surfaces in certain poses

Private sessions provide nurturing support and experienced guidance as you explore your body’s emotional patterning and cultivate a deeper body-mind connection. Sessions often include dialogue, anatomy lessons, somatic trauma resolution practices, and yoga to get to the root of the disconnect and create integration and emotional connection.

As a seasoned prenatal and postpartum yoga teacher, I offer yoga support throughout all stages of pregnancy, including the “fourth trimester”!

As your body transforms during pregnancy, new aches and imbalances present weekly, and pregnancy hormones create hyperflexibility. Even a seasoned yogi must modify their regular practice to accommodate this internal evolution. A weekly prenatal yoga practice soothes pregnancy-related aches and pains, prepress the body for labor, and helps manage the emotional roller coaster so you can maintain a grounded connection to your body and Self.

Postpartum, your body is recovering from a massive transformation - muscular imbalances and disconnects in the core and pelvic floor, strained shoulders from breast-feeding and baby-carrying, along with the sleeplessness and the new stresses of caring for your baby. A regular postpartum yoga practice provides much-needed “me” time for new moms, strengthens functional support muscles, relieves the physical aches and pains, and reawakens your connection to your core.