Yoga Therapy and Anxiety/Depression (PSYCH400)

Required reading: Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers by Robert Salpolski (Chapters 13-18) 

Materials to bring: standard yoga props (2 blocks, 2 blankets (or 1 blanket and 1 bolster), and strap), large bolster.

Course Overview

Using the Yoga Sutras and the ancient tools of yoga, this course explores the complex relationship between body and mind through a trauma-informed, spiritually rooted approach to mental health. Students gain practical skills in adapting yoga therapy for individuals experiencing anxiety or depression, with emphasis on nervous system regulation, pranic balance, and care-seeker empowerment. Yoga Psychology is understood here as the 'bottom-up' experiential knowledge of regulation — working at the somatic level where emotion is constructed moment to moment from interoceptive signals, memory, and context (Feldman Barrett, 2017). This is why yoga's cultivation of interoceptive awareness works at the very level where emotion is made. Students learn to assess care-seekers through the guna lens — recognizing tamasic presentations (low energy, withdrawal, foggy thinking, anhedonia) and rajasic presentations (restlessness, looping worry, hyperactivation, insomnia) — and to select solar/brahmana or lunar/langhana practices accordingly. Both anxiety and depression may involve a complex mixture of both guna patterns.

Asynchronous Students — Project Instructions

Using the case studies provided in class or a composite profile (no identifying information), complete the following:

1.Complete the Yoga Therapy Assessment & Planning Form for one case. Include:

A brief summary of the client's presentation, history, and stated goals

Observed or inferred guna patterns — tamasic, rajasic, or mixed — and how these present across physical, energetic, breath, and emotional layers

Your solar/brahmana or lunar/langhana approach and rationale, using the vocabulary map from the manual

2.Design a 30–45 minute yoga therapy session plan. Include:

At least 4 practices (asana, pranayama, meditation, relaxation) with specific rationale for each using the guna framework

Language and cueing considerations given the client's mental health presentation

Any contraindications or modifications, and referral considerations if applicable

3.Write a 1–2 page clinical reflection that addresses:

Your rationale for practice selection and how they support the guna pattern you identified

How you would monitor for over- or under-stimulation during the session

One area of uncertainty or growth you identified through this exercise

4.Upload your completed Assessment & Planning Form and reflection via the Pillar Project Template Form link.

*Page numbers given in lecture might not match up with the numbers in your source material if you are taking this course asynchronous

22 CEUs