This qualitative study explored how a brief, five-day yoga programme was experienced by university students reporting academic stress. Four female undergraduates completed semi-structured video interviews before and after the intervention. Using reflexive thematic analysis integrating verbal accounts and embodied indicators (e.g. breathing patterns, posture, gestures, and vocal expression),...
Abstract Breathwork techniques such as diaphragmatic, paced, and box breathing are increasingly used in psychotherapy and embodied clinical practice yet their efficacy and mechanisms remain unevenly documented. This systematic review and meta-analysis synthesised controlled studies examining breathwork as a stand-alone or adjunctive intervention for psychological (anxiety, depression, stress)...
This article follows a path linking the discipline of authentic movement with Nature connectedness. This deep empathic practice seeks to change empathy from the interpersonal solely to an interspecies dialogue, cultivating a shift from human-focussed to an earthly perspective of the world. It offers the author's reflections and examples from practice of an adapted model of the discipline of...
This paper offers a model for integrating a dance/movement therapy practice with some of the themes that show up in literature on shamanic healing ritual. The proposed model is based on literature on shamanism and within the field of dance/movement therapy. It is intended as a first step in an exploration between intersections of the two fields. The model proposes cultivating a sacred container...
AbstractThe use of conscious breathing practices for the purpose of physical, psychological, emotional and spiritual healing has a long and extremely varied history, yet little work has been done to bring these practices into a coherent and unified form that contributes to the field of body psychotherapy (BP). This article focuses on translating theoretical themes developed in a previous...
This article presents a vision of an emergent ecosomatic psychology that integrates somatic psychology's theories and practices of embodiment with ecopsychology's insights about embedment. Branches within somatic psychology, dance/movement therapy, and body psychotherapy have honed therapeutic practices for embodying the self, engaging in embodied relationships, and opening up to possibilities...
The use of conscious breathing practices for the purpose of physical, psychological, emotional, and spiritual healing has a long and extremely varied history, yet little work has been done to see if these practices can be brought into a coherent and unified form that contributes to the field of body psychotherapy. This article attempts to meta-analyse the literature and research on breathwork...
Authentic Movement facilitates a descent into the inner world of the psyche through natural movement. Through the process we are reconnected with deeper instinctual resources and spiritual intelligence that dwell in the molecular structure of the cells, and recover unlived parts of our nature on intrapersonal, interpersonal and transpersonal levels. The practice develops a sense of embodied...