Yoga is not only good for the body, spirit, and mind, but the practice could help people deal with grief. Researchers found that those who completed a four to six week class of yoga therapy noticed a significant improvement in their mood, energy, and dealing harmful emotions.

Grief can put the body out of whack, it increase tension in muscles, people notice more lower back pain, and tightness in their chest, loss of sleep, and the deterioration of mental health. For example locus pose helps clear blocked emotions, and child’s pose calms the nervous system.

Practicing asana yoga, using backbends, and twists have showed to improve people’s backs, as a lot of pain is stored there and in the spine, hence a release of any emotional pain. Additionally, yoga help the body open up by incorporation stretches like child’s pose, cobra, and downward dog. Grief yoga is a combination of different practices like Hatha, Vinyassa Flow and breath work.

The truth is everyone deals with grief differently, and there is no right or wrong way to grieve, and experts are seeing body and mind connection. Paul Denniston teaches grief yoga in Los Angeles and works with those in hospice, he writes that yoga connects us to the present moment, which also allows us onto a path to acceptance.

“Yoga’s healing power and wisdom can help you embrace the grief that resides within your mind and body and help open your heart.”

How do you start? Try researching grief yoga instructors in your area. If not, you can do it at home, since there are many free videos to help you get started. YouTube has some great videos to help get you started, if you are a beginnner.

If you choose move forward with yoga to help you during this season of your life, try it for 15 minutes a day in the morning and night. If you are new to yoga all together, try a beginner’s class for basic poses and to ease into to it slowly. There is no reason to pressure yourself, the entire point of grief or mourning yoga is to release pain physically and emotionally at your pace.