Yoga is a way of life involving attitudinal shifts, postures for flexibility and strength, sensory awareness, breathing exercises and meditation. In part one of this two part program Dr. Eleanor Criswell presents a perspective combining the classical yoga of Patanjali with modern somatic psychology. She demonstrates a basic pranayama breathing exercise, and discusses experiences that occur in yoga meditation, particularly sensations of light and sound.
In the hour-long part two, Dr. Criswell discusses the somatic principles of conscious body awareness. Then she demonstrates the "somatic cat stretch" exercise developed by Thomas Hanna. This is followed by a series of yoga postures or asanas including the corpse, the shoulderstand, the plough, the fish, the bow, and the tree. She concludes with the pratyahara relaxation exercise.
Eleanor Criswell, Ed.D., is a professor of psychology at Sonoma State University in California. She is past-president of the Association for Humanistic Psychology and is a founding director of the Saybrook Institute in San Francisco. She is director of the Novato Institute for Somatic Research and Training and is editor of Somatics: A Magazine/Journal of the Bodily Arts and Sciences. This program is based on Dr. Criswell's book How Yoga Works: An Introduction to Somatic Yoga.