CONTENTS Title Page Dedication Epigraph Author’s Note How to Use This Book Introduction: A Leap of Faith PART ONE: YOGA AS MEDICINE 1. Yoga as Medicine 2. The Science of Yoga 3. Yoga for Stress Relief 4. Bringing a Yogic Perspective to Your Health Care PART TWO: THE PRACTICE OF YOGA 5. Doing Yoga Safely 6. Choosing a Style of Yoga and a Teacher 7. Getting Started and Keeping It Going PART THREE: YOGA THERAPY IN ACTION 8. Anxiety and Panic Attacks 9. Arthritis 10. Asthma 11. Back Pain 12. Cancer 13. Carpal Tunnel Syndrome 14. Chronic Fatigue Syndrome 15. Depression 16. Diabetes 17. Fibromyalgia 18. Headaches 19. Heart Disease 20. High Blood Pressure 21. HIV/AIDS 22. Infertility 23. Insomnia 24. Irritable Bowel Syndrome 25. Menopause 26. Multiple Sclerosis (MS) 27. Overweight and Obesity Afterword: The Future of Yoga as Medicine Appendix 1. Avoiding Common Yoga Injuries Appendix 2. Sources of Further Information Appendix 3. Sanskrit Glossary Appendix 4. Sanskrit Words in Asana Names Notes Acknowledgments Teacher Photo Credits Copyright For my mother, Mary Elizabeth (Betty) McCall, who didn’t get to name me but who named this book Words fail to convey the total value of yoga. It has to be experienced. —B. K. S. IYENGAR The book contains general information about the healing potential of yoga and is for informational purposes only. As each individual situation is unique, you should use proper discretion, in consultation with a health care practitioner, before undertaking any of the exercises and techniques described in this book. The author and publisher expressly disclaim responsibility for any adverse effects that may result from the use or application of the information contained in this book. HOW TO USE THIS BOOK THIS BOOK IS DIVIDED INTO THREE PARTS. The four chapters that make up part 1 provide an overview of yoga as medicine, the science behind it, the relationship of stress to health and healing, and a yogic approach to health care. Reading chapter 2, on the science of yoga, is not essential to getting the full benefit of this book. But for those who are skeptical or intellectually curious, chapter 2’s reviews of the scientific studies that investigate yoga’s healing powers will be of interest. That chapter also provides possible explanations for yoga’s benefits that are compatible with Western science, and discusses how science and yoga provide complementary perspectives. Part 2 contains material that many readers will find useful. Most would benefit from reading chapter 5, “Doing Yoga Safely.” Readers wanting more information on this topic, including more details on anatomy, should look at appendix 1, “Avoiding Common Yoga Injuries.” Chapter 6 compares different systems of yoga and provides guidelines on finding a good teacher. Chapter 7 details a step-by-step plan for starting and maintaining a yoga practice. Part 1 of the book also contains a number of Experiential Exercises, in which you can try specific yoga practices and judge the effects for yourself. You’ll get much more out of the book if you do these exercises as you read, especially if you’re new to yoga. Yoga is more about practice than theory. To understand it, you must do it, and these exercises provide a gentle—yet quite palpable— introduction to the effects of yoga on the body and mind. Part 3 of the book contains twenty chapters on specific health conditions and concerns, from anxiety to weight loss. Although you may be tempted to go directly to the chapter or chapters that describe conditions you are dealing with, this material will have more meaning to you if you’ve read all or most of parts 1 and 2. For each of the chapters in part 3, a seasoned yoga teacher describes his or her approach with a specific student who had the condition in question. If you follow yoga, you may recognize many of these teachers as some of yoga’s leading lights in the United States. I’ve chosen a few, however, who are not household names, even in the yoga world. I think you’ll find they, too, have very interesting things to say. Keep in mind that many of the experts could have just as easily been the authority for another condition. For example, just because Shanti Shanti Kaur Khalsa, a teacher in the Kundalini yoga tradition, is the consultant for HIV and AIDS does not imply that her approach is the best for this condition, or that Kundalini yoga might work less well for a different problem. I simply hope to show you over the course of these twenty chapters how some of the top teachers from different traditions work. So even if you don’t have chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS), you may be interested in the Viniyoga approach taken by Gary Kraftsow in chapter 14. If you want to know about the traditional Indian medical system of Ayurveda, you might look at Sandra Summerfield Kozak’s approach to diabetes in chapter 16. Keep in mind that the chapters in part 3 are descriptive, not prescriptive. Judith Hanson Lasater, for example, outlines in the back pain chapter the approach she took with one student who had sciatica and describes why she recommended what she did. This is not necessarily what she would recommend for another student with back pain, and might be quite different from what another teacher might have suggested for the same student. Still, with these caveats in mind, I believe anyone with back pain will find helpful information in the chapter. You may also benefit from looking at chapters in part 3 that discuss conditions other than your major concern. Depression, for example, can affect your recovery from many conditions, from heart disease to cancer, so many readers will benefit from reading chapter 15. People with fibromyalgia syndrome or CFS may want to read the chapter on insomnia, since poor sleep is often a prominent component of those conditions. People with diabetes, especially the more common adult onset variety (type 2), may want to look at the chapter on weight loss, since overweight plays a big role in that disease. In addition to the perspectives of the yoga teacher consultants, in each chapter of part 3 I’ll provide an overview of the condition in question from my