The commonly understood practice of yoga, yoga postures, offer a healthy way for people dealing with addiction issues to relieve stress, exercise the body and relax. These benefits are an excellent, evidence based complement to other therapies for addiction. A broader yoga practice can yield additional, transformative benefits and expand understanding about therapy, recovery and prevention/wellness promotion.

Yoga techniques are generally co-opted into reductionist western medical model practices and yet yoga is founded on a broader spiritually oriented “science” that describes a model of causality and control which is multi-layered and integrated. The yoga knowledge base provides more subtle understandings of body (e.g. Chakras) and mind (e.g. Kosas) within a spiritual framework and this provides a foundation for addiction work that is more profoundly healing than typically experienced in a yoga class.

The benefits of yoga practice do not necessarily come from bottom up – e.g. stretch the muscles, rest the nervous system, relax the mind. Rather opening to the Source (or Causal Layer of Self) through practice leads to healing and wholeness.