What is Yoga Therapy?
Yoga Therapy is a 1 - on - 1 personal movement, breath, and diet practice designed for each individual according to their current health status, life circumstances, age, location on the globe, season, family situation, and more.
Yoga Therapy integrates traditional yoga practices (eg, poses, philosophy, breathwork, and meditation) and Ayurvedic diet and lifestyle wisdoms with modern medical and psychological knowledge; it's considered a holistic or complementary medicine modality.
One of the goals of yoga in this lineage is to support the individual to get to know themselves and their needs so deeply, unencumbered by habit or emotion, that they can shift their daily practice as needed to keep themselves in healthy balance.
Read this article for a great description of the differences between a yoga class and a yoga therapy session:
https://yogainternational.com/article/view/The-Distinction-Between-a-Yoga-Class-and-a-Yoga-Therapy-Session
Yoga Therapy integrates traditional yoga practices (eg, poses, philosophy, breathwork, and meditation) and Ayurvedic diet and lifestyle wisdoms with modern medical and psychological knowledge; it's considered a holistic or complementary medicine modality.
One of the goals of yoga in this lineage is to support the individual to get to know themselves and their needs so deeply, unencumbered by habit or emotion, that they can shift their daily practice as needed to keep themselves in healthy balance.
Read this article for a great description of the differences between a yoga class and a yoga therapy session:
https://yogainternational.com/article/view/The-Distinction-Between-a-Yoga-Class-and-a-Yoga-Therapy-Session
What Are My Goals for You In Sharing This Work?
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Usually students come to me with specific concerns – a desire to ease pain, reduce anxiety, manage their diabetes, improve their breathing, heal from surgery, lose weight etc. As a complementary healing modality, I think of Yoga Therapy as holistic lifestyle coaching for optimal health through breathing, movement, and diet. It is person oriented, and not disease oriented: we would address the diabetes living in Niya the 24 year old, single accountant living in Edmonton very differently from the diabetes living in Frank the 65 year old mechanic with 3 kids and 5 grandkids living in Florida. Their practice is tailored to address their individual diabetes AND their individual life circumstances, health status, age, location, and other concerns. And this practice necessarily changes over time, because of the same factors listed above. Any practice done for the appropriate amount of time can save your life, any practice done for too long can ruin your health.
Yoga Therapy works very well as a complementary medicine modality in conjunction with any other allopathic, medical, or psychological practices you may be doing. I have seen peoples pain reduced, medication dosages lowered, anxiety ceased, fertility change, outlook on life shift completely, and more.
If you let me know your goals, we can work together and build you personalized plan for lifestyle shifts, daily movement and breathing practice to optimize the health of your whole being – health of mind, body, heart, and spirit. In Sanskrit, Yoga Therapy translates as Yoga Cikitsa. The root word of Cikitsa is “icca”, or desire. Yoga Therapy works at its best when there is a desire to help in the Therapist, and a committment to practice from the student. Just like a medication won't work if you only take the pill one time, Yoga Therapy is most effective when you commit to your practice daily.
Yoga Therapy works very well as a complementary medicine modality in conjunction with any other allopathic, medical, or psychological practices you may be doing. I have seen peoples pain reduced, medication dosages lowered, anxiety ceased, fertility change, outlook on life shift completely, and more.
If you let me know your goals, we can work together and build you personalized plan for lifestyle shifts, daily movement and breathing practice to optimize the health of your whole being – health of mind, body, heart, and spirit. In Sanskrit, Yoga Therapy translates as Yoga Cikitsa. The root word of Cikitsa is “icca”, or desire. Yoga Therapy works at its best when there is a desire to help in the Therapist, and a committment to practice from the student. Just like a medication won't work if you only take the pill one time, Yoga Therapy is most effective when you commit to your practice daily.
Who can benefit?
Yoga Therapy as part of the healing process is often used in chronic or long term conditions like:
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What Should I Expect in a Session?
Free 15 Minute Consultation
If you'd like to connect with me to chat and see if you think we'd be a good fit to work together, please book a free 15 minute consultation and we can discuss your concerns and hopes, and you can ask me any questions you might have about our work together.
Intake
When you decide to book a first session with me, you will need to fill out an intake online before we meet. It goes over relevant medical and personal information and should take between 10-20 minutes to fill out. You can email me any documents that you'd like to add to the intake form to my email at yogawithkassandra@gmail.com.
First Session
We will go over your intake form together and I may ask you some clarifying questions. We will then do a few simple assessment movements and observe your breathing.
Session offerings
TKV Desikachar speaks of his father, Krishnamacharya (my lineage's founder) and the art of designing a practice for the specific individual as thus: “My father had adapted underlying principles of Yoga to the specific problems, not merely drawn upon a traditional repertoire.” With that in mind, we don’t only look at using āsana familiar from pictures we may see on the internet, we may do any number of things to address your long-term health goals as they are appropriate, including:
Take-Home
After your session you will take home a diagram of your suggested practices or an audio/video recording of your practice, plus notes on lifestyle shifts to practice daily as suggested. Specific effects cannot be guaranteed, but if you practice, be assured, something will happen!
Follow Ups
As you deepen in your practice, we can meet and make shifts to refine it as you need. Many people do this every 3 or 4 weeks, but sometimes weekly or bi-weekly is beneficial if you are committing to quick changes in habits, or are working with mental health concerns. My ultimate longterm goal for each student is for them to know themselves well enough that they understand how to modify their daily practice as needed to keep themselves in balance. This will look different for every single individual I meet depending on their goals, commitment to practice, and stage in their journey towards healing.
If you'd like to connect with me to chat and see if you think we'd be a good fit to work together, please book a free 15 minute consultation and we can discuss your concerns and hopes, and you can ask me any questions you might have about our work together.
Intake
When you decide to book a first session with me, you will need to fill out an intake online before we meet. It goes over relevant medical and personal information and should take between 10-20 minutes to fill out. You can email me any documents that you'd like to add to the intake form to my email at yogawithkassandra@gmail.com.
First Session
We will go over your intake form together and I may ask you some clarifying questions. We will then do a few simple assessment movements and observe your breathing.
Session offerings
TKV Desikachar speaks of his father, Krishnamacharya (my lineage's founder) and the art of designing a practice for the specific individual as thus: “My father had adapted underlying principles of Yoga to the specific problems, not merely drawn upon a traditional repertoire.” With that in mind, we don’t only look at using āsana familiar from pictures we may see on the internet, we may do any number of things to address your long-term health goals as they are appropriate, including:
- Individually tailored and appropriately sequenced yoga movements (āsana)
- Diet and lifestyle recommendations based in the wisdoms of Indian Naturopathy: Ayurveda
- Conscious breathing practices (prāṇāyāma, chanting sounds or mantra-s)
- Therapeutic ball rolling (tissue release / self massage)
- Mindfulness and visualization practices and potentially guided meditations, prayers, or affirmations as appropriate
Take-Home
After your session you will take home a diagram of your suggested practices or an audio/video recording of your practice, plus notes on lifestyle shifts to practice daily as suggested. Specific effects cannot be guaranteed, but if you practice, be assured, something will happen!
Follow Ups
As you deepen in your practice, we can meet and make shifts to refine it as you need. Many people do this every 3 or 4 weeks, but sometimes weekly or bi-weekly is beneficial if you are committing to quick changes in habits, or are working with mental health concerns. My ultimate longterm goal for each student is for them to know themselves well enough that they understand how to modify their daily practice as needed to keep themselves in balance. This will look different for every single individual I meet depending on their goals, commitment to practice, and stage in their journey towards healing.
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Rates
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90-120min "Intake" (Online on Zoom)
**schedule in EST** Market Rate: $100-120+hst Benefactor Rate: $130+hst or more Community Rate: $90+hst *Includes a take home audio/video recording of your personalized breath and movement practice PLUS personalized diet and lifestyle suggestions for optimal health* |
60min "Follow Up" (Online on Zoom)
**schedule in EST** Market Rate: $70-80+hst Benefactor Rate: $90+hst or more Community Rate: $60+hst *Includes a take home audio/video recording of your new or modified personalized breath and movement practice PLUS personalized diet and lifestyle suggestions for optimal health* |
30min "Check In" (Online on Zoom)
**schedule in EST** Market Rate: $40-50+hst Benefactor Rate: $60+hst or more Community Rate: $30+hst *Includes adjusting your personalized breath and movement practice and making any modifications to your personalized diet and lifestyle suggestions as dictated by changing life circumstances* |
Market Rates – suggested for those with livable income and can meet basic needs
Benefactor Rates – suggested for those with a salary, health benefits, property ownership, savings, family/spousal support
Community Rates – suggested for those on minimum wage or precarious work, on social assistance, no family financial support
**If the community rate is still out of reach, please connect and we can discuss an exchange that feels mutually abundant**
Benefactor Rates – suggested for those with a salary, health benefits, property ownership, savings, family/spousal support
Community Rates – suggested for those on minimum wage or precarious work, on social assistance, no family financial support
**If the community rate is still out of reach, please connect and we can discuss an exchange that feels mutually abundant**
Testimonials
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"Kassandra & their Yoga Therapy practice gifted me with a renewed sense of hope and a beautiful reconnection to myself. I struggled through so much pain & despair for three months resulting from a shoulder injury. Even with regular online physiotherapy sessions (owing to Covid-19) I experienced so many setbacks, heightened feelings of isolation and, at my lowest point, a deep severance between my physical self and myself as a spiritual and emotional being. After just one session with Kass I felt a resonant, radiant mind-body-spirit reconnection. My shoulder started to heal steadily. Kass breathed light, strength and balance back into my life, reminding me to listen, trust, and let go. My sense of self was restored. I cannot overstate how much I believe you should book a session with Kass … they are the BEST. Period. Learning to work with instead of against yourself physically and emotionally is such a gift!! THANK YOU KASS!!"
Joëlle
"Kass noticed that I have a problem breathing through my nose (I broke my nose almost 30 years ago). Kass gave me some specific breathing exercises for it, and in 10 weeks I've gone from 75% blocked to 25% blocked! I feel that Kass really cares about my whole well-being. Kass took the time to understand the many problems plaguing my body and mind, and has crafted a series of routines to help me fix them. We've met for 10 weeks, and Kass evolved my routine from very gentle and simple actions to more advanced ones as I've progressed. This is the longest I've ever done daily activities in my life! Thanks Kass!"
Matthew G
"Yoga therapy really works but you have to do the exercises. If you need amendments, they can be done. Don't be afraid to ask for those adjustments. This therapy helped me so much. Its hard for me to imagine that now I sleep in when before I started this therapy, I couldn't sleep much and not well. Invest in yourself. You are worth it. You will receive lots of tips and guidance. Explore it all."
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Mary-Ann L
