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Yoga and Depression - Part Two

© Jennifer M. Witkowski

Note: This is part two of a two part article about the way yoga can help alleviate depression.

To say it had been a bad year for *Cathy would be an understatement. In May, she lost a job she dearly loved. In September, her husband asked her for a divorce and demanded she leave the house she had called home for 5 years immediately. To make matters worse, her family, with their Catholic background, blamed her for the whole mess, and were barely speaking to her at a time she really needed the extra support. Cathy had a history of depression as a teenager, and with the sudden upheaval in her life, it came back full force. Luckily, Cathy knew to turn to her physician for help. But to complement the medical help she recieved, she had also learned some alternative coping mechanisms to help in her healing.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Depression is a serious illness that can be treated. This article in no way means to serve as a panacea, only to offer some natural tips that may aid in recovery. For more information on depression, contact your doctor. You may also want to check out John McManamy's excellent series of articles on depression here on Suite 101 by clicking here.

In the last article, ways in which yoga can help alleviate the physical/physiological symptoms of depression were discussed. But yoga is a holistic form of exercise, and its benefits extend beyond the physical, and into the mental and emotional fields as well. Since depression primarily affects how we feel and how we think, yoga can be a beneficial addition to a medically prescribed treatment plan, and may help alleviate the mental/emotional symptoms of depression more quickly.

One of the core components of most yoga systems is the practice of meditation. Meditation can help to alleviate the mental symptoms of depression in two ways: by quieting the mind and eliminating repeated negative messages, and by focusing the mind on positive thoughts and images. Depression, whether due to a chemical imbalance or due to outside stressors, or a combination of the two, often brings with it a near endless stream of negative thinking. Thoughts like, "What's the point of doing anything, I can't do anything right anyway," and "Things will never get better, I don't know why I even try," tend to multiply in a person suffering from depression. Unfortunately, the more negative thoughts a person has, the worse the person feels, which brings on more negative thinking, on and on, in a downward spiral into despair. The meditation practiced in yoga can serve as a temporary interruption of this negative thought stream. Through meditation, the practitioner is able to clear the mind, and focus solely on physical motion, or on deep breathing. This quiets the mind, giving the sufferer of depression a respite from the negative messages.