Restorative Stillness: Why Restorative Yoga Heals a Grieving Heart

Summary
In this episode of Growth from Grief, host Susan Andersen discusses the journey of healing from grief through restorative yoga. She emphasizes the importance of allowing oneself to rest and the exhaustion that often accompanies grief. Susan explains the principles of restorative yoga, its benefits for the nervous system, and provides practical poses that can be done at home to aid in the healing process. The episode concludes with a reminder of the necessity of rest in the grieving process.

Takeaways

• Grief is exhausting and there is no wrong way to grieve.
• Restorative yoga helps regulate the nervous system, allows for emotional release and healing.
• Scientific evidence supports the benefits of restorative practices.
• Gentle poses can create a safe space for grief.
• Integrating rest into your daily routine is beneficial.

Thank you for listening! Visit www.sueandersenyoga.com for Yoga for Grief classes and additional resources.

Transcript

Susan Andersen (00:03.394)
Hello, I'm Sue Andersen, grief guide and yoga teacher dedicated to helping individuals navigate the challenging journey of loss. Welcome to Growth from Grief, where I aim to offer strategies to transition from the depths of grief to the path of healing. Whatever loss you are grappling with, here you'll discover support to ease both the physical and emotional burdens of grief. Together, let's embark on a journey towards strength, peace, and healing. I'm so glad you are here.

Susan Andersen (00:52.534)
Welcome to this episode of Growth from Grief. I'm your host, Sue Andersen. And if you're new to this podcast, welcome. Thank you for being here. I started this podcast a year ago in June as a way to get the word out to people as I've been doing through my teaching.

You know, my classes, classes, my blog posts, but just get the word out to people that you can grow from grief. You can once again find joy and hope and know that your grief will stay with you, but it will soften because your grief also is love, right? 

We're grieving something we lost and it's not going to go away, but it will soften and it will allow you to open up. It will allow you to find, as I mentioned, more joy and hope as you work through these physical, mental, and emotional areas of grief.

If you're looking for additional resources, can find them on my website, www.sueandersenyoga.com.

In today's episode, we're going to talk about why restorative yoga can help you heal your grieving heart.

Susan Andersen (02:44.353)
So you may be carrying heavy emotions as you're listening to this episode. And I'd like to offer you an invitation to soften and rest. So perhaps instead of listening to this episode in your car or while you're walking, maybe you listen to this episode while you're sitting on your couch or you're lying in bed.

Susan Andersen (03:21.63)
An invitation to soften and to rest as you listen.

Susan Andersen (03:31.191)
Grief affects our energy. It's a fact. If you have been grieving a loss and it's new, you know perhaps how difficult this is, how you feel like you're exhausted all the time. Or maybe your sleep is constantly disrupted so you're feeling fatigued.

Susan Andersen (04:08.98)
Our nervous system is on high alert.So our energy is sometimes just drained and we really need to rest. And perhaps it's been difficult to try to do that. I know for myself, I found it hard to just allow myself to rest because as soon as I was resting, then thoughts came back into my head. I didn't know how to quiet. I didn't know how to quiet my mind.

There were other times where all I felt was exhaustion and just knew I really needed to sleep. So don't feel like you're doing something wrong. Don't feel like you're lazy. You are not doing grief wrong. Grief is exhausting. End of story. That's it. It is exhausting.

And don't let anyone tell you otherwise. There is no wrong way. There is no right way. It's just your way to grieve.

Susan Andersen (05:36.362)
Restorative yoga. Let me talk a little bit about that for those of you who have never tried a restorative yoga class.

So restorative yoga is done generally on the floor, on a mat. You could certainly do it on any flat surface. And you're using different kinds of props, bolsters, blankets, pillows, and you're holding a particular posture for generally a good long time and by good long time I mean eight minutes, ten minutes, you could be there for twenty minutes.

It's different from yin yoga, which maybe you've heard of. Yin yoga tends to be seated postures. There are other postures that are not seated, but tends to be seated postures. And you do use props to help you.

But the purposes of these two yoga practices are different. Restorative yoga practice is to allow you to feel held. You're not trying to strive. You're not trying to do. 

Susan Andersen (07:19.986)
You are relaxing into this supported cushioned environment. In yin yoga you are doing a little bit of stretching and stressing of the fascia, the muscle fibers, the tendons. So it's a more active type of yoga although it's also practiced in stillness.

Susan Andersen (07:56.949)
Think about restorative yoga as surrendering, right? Just, just like let your body surrender. It's a great way to help regulate your nervous system.  You know, when you're able to have this kind of supported stillness.

This helps shift the body from that fight flight mode to a rest and digest mode, the parasympathetic nervous system. So allowing ourselves to surrender to be supported in stillness, helps our body. Release. Let go and rest, which is so, so important.

Susan Andersen (09:15.176)
And you might be wondering, okay, that sounds pretty good, but, you know, where's the evidence? Well, there is scientific evidence.  Restorative practices reduce stress hormones, lower heart rate, improve your sleep.

Susan Andersen (09:43.848)
I think one of the most important benefits here too for those grieving is that when we're held in stillness, we give our heart space time to breathe, to feel, to release. You may just start crying.  Yahoo! You've released some of the emotion that's been held so tight in your body. something that we need to do, right? 

Now,If you go to a restorative yoga class in a yoga studio, different yoga teachers will have sometimes a little bit of a poem and then allow for stillness in a pose. You will have more than one pose.

So generally if a class is 90 minutes, you might do, you know, I don't know, five poses. Some poses are held longer than others because they're deeply restorative. Like, for example, poses where you're lying on your back. Sometimes a child's pose is held a little a little bit longer.

Susan Andersen (11:22.322)
Some teachers have music and they don't talk during the poses. They allow that they're there for support. They can help you get more props if you need them. So you'll find that, you know, there's different support systems out there, if you will, right? Gentle music, late music or poetry, gentle words, reflections.

You may also find that in classes online, right? So many practitioners have YouTube videos, there's live classes. So don't feel like you have to go to a yoga studio to experience this practice. You don't. Especially if you're feeling vulnerable. Try a class from a reputable yoga teacher online.

Susan Andersen (12:35.112)
I'd like to offer you three practices that you could just try at home.  One is called reclined bound angle pose or I also think about it as reclined butterfly pose.

So you can have yourself on a little bit of an incline if you'd like by just propping up bed pillows. So find yourself on your couch or on your bed or if you have a yoga mat, you're on your yoga mat. If you don't have yoga props, you don't need them for this practice. Don't worry about it. Get yourself on a comfortable flat surface before sitting down and getting into the pose, grab three or four pillows, like a couple of pillows, a couple of couch throw pillows, a couple of towels, a couple of blankets, anything that's nice and soft and that you can use to prop yourself up. 

For this pose, the reclined bound angle, or reclined butterfly pose, you can prop yourself up by stacking up those pillows behind you, those bed pillows. And so you're gonna lie yourself against those bed pillows, just as if you were, you know, propping yourself up in bed to read. And then you take the soles of your feet and you can put them together and your knees are apart. And you can put a couch throw pillow under each knee so your knees are supported here. You can roll up towels. You want to feel as supported as possible. You can put blankets under your arms.

Susan Andersen (14:51.209)
So you're setting yourself up kind of in this little soft cradle, if you will. So that's a really softening, great pose, heart opening, allowing you to soften. If you like music, again, before you get yourself set up, put on some really soft, gentle spa kind of music.

Susan Andersen (15:25.423)
Another pose that you can try is called legs up the wall. So you can do this by just lying on your rug in your living room. Again, having some kind of cushion underneath you. You can put a blanket on top of you and rest your legs on your couch, soften into this supporting something under your head. That's a great pose to take as well.

And another pose to take that's very accessible, unless you really have issues with your knees and you're not supposed to be kneeling, you can try a supported child's pose. Taking that same setup with your pillows that were on a little bit of an angle you can just drape your body over that pillow. Your knees are apart and maybe you have something behind your knees like a light blanket. You can have something under your knees. So you're resting your head. This is a nice one to do in bed I think. Maybe before you fall asleep.

Susan Andersen (17:08.338)
Think about having a timer, setting a timer. Maybe start with just five minutes and see how this feels to you. Notice your breath, notice sensations without judgment. Just allow it to happen. Soften, and just notice how that feels for you.

Perhaps think about integrating these resting practices as part of your healing. Maybe you take five minutes a day and you lie down with a pillow under your knees covering yourself with a blanket.

Susan Andersen (18:12.506)
One thing that's so great about these poses is they can be just a gentle container for grief. A great place to cry, to breathe, to rest without expectation.

Susan Andersen (18:33.862)
So as I close this episode, I want to remind you that you deserve rest. Grief, it's exhausting. Rest is not an indulgence. It's essential. It's essential for your health. Take even just a moment today to pause and soften if you're not able to try one of these practices. Sit in your chair, relax your shoulders and breathe.

Susan Andersen (19:24.166)
I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you are returning listener, thank you for returning and coming back. Please share this podcast with others in your life that can use the support.

Susan Andersen (19:48.506)
I wish you rest and stillness as part of your day today. Thanks for listening. Bye bye.