Depression & Yoga

Depression and Yoga often come up in the same sentence. Today I want to share my understanding of their relationship, starting with what evidence we have from a western perspective to the philosophy of the eastern view.

Let’s begin by discussing major depression disorder(MDD). This is a clinical diagnosis that should come from your physician… not me, any other alternative health practitioner or google. If you do not have MDD, you may have another depression disorder or experience a depressive episode in your life because of circumstances. A quick google search brought up a stat from camp.bc.ca that ⅛ Canadians will experience MDD at some point in their lives. Many Canadians experience depression because of grief or another diagnosis like cancer. Let be clear, grieving or processing a diagnosis is different than depression. However, depression can also be a symptom of grieving or an illness.

Major depression disorder is complex. Many factors can play a role in MDD, such as genetics, biochemistry, personality and life circumstances. When speculating on how yoga could help reduce depression, we will be honing in on the life circumstances component. Chronic stress and challenges in emotional regulation are risk factors for depression which is why MDD is often considered a stress-related disorder. Some individuals show heightened stress hormone cortisol. It has been hypothesized that environmental factors can lead to an imbalance in the autonomic nervous system (ans). This imbalance would decrease the parasympathetic nervous system and increase the sympathetic nervous system (SNS) activity. There is a fair amount of existing research that suggests that yoga increases PNS activity.

Our bodies are meant to switch between the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous states all day long. Sometimes chronic depression can leave us in a chronic sympathetic condition. Yoga can help guide you back into a parasympathetic state. In a Yoga therapy class, your instructor should focus on teaching you simple techniques that you can use throughout your day to help guide your body into a parasympathetic state. This can and does include a wide array of movements, breathing and meditation techniques. It’s about finding one that works for you & that you will actually do.

In yoga therapy, we often view our students through what we call a kosha model. The kosha are like sheaths or layers to our experience. They are as follows,

Annamaya kosha - physical body

Pranayama kosha - breath & subtle body

Manomaya kosha - Part of the mind that feels and reacts

Vijanamaya kosha - This is the part of the mind that says “I” and analyzes 

Anandamaya kosha - Commonly known as the bliss body, or our connection to our deepest self

When we talked about the western perspective, it primarily focused on the physical body. A yoga therapist would layer on techniques that address any potential imbalances in the subtle body, along with addressing philosophies of the mind. One example might be getting curious about your sensations and experiences while letting go of judgements. This looks like going from “ugh, this hip is so sore, it’s my bad hip.” To “oh, interesting, there is soreness in this hip. Lastly, a yoga therapist would include some technique, likely a meditation, to support the student in connecting with their deepest self and the joy that may exist in that connection.

If you like to practice yoga on your own, you might enjoy using my recipe for yoga for depression class. This recipe is just simplified guiding principles for practice.