Depression And Low Mood: What Mr Iyengar, The Yoga Doctors And The Research Say

Feeling flat, heavy or low for weeks on end? Getting out of bed feels like climbing a hill, and the things you used to enjoy have lost their colour? You are far from alone. Mr BKS Iyengar wrote about it, the medical doctors who worked with him wrote about it, and the research on yoga and depression has grown fast. They point the same way: a body that moves, a chest that opens and a breath that slows can lift a low mood. This guide brings together what each of them says about low mood, depression and grief. Last updated: 1 November 2026.

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Can yoga help low mood and depression? The short answer

Yes. In the trials, yoga lifted low mood and eased depression, and people who did yoga were more likely to come out of depression altogether. A 2024 review of 24 trials and 1,395 people with diagnosed depression found yoga eased how bad the depression was, and gave about two to three times the odds of remission (no longer depressed). The biggest review of exercise and depression, 218 trials and over 14,000 people, put yoga among the three most effective kinds of exercise, and one of the two people stuck with best. In a Boston trial of Iyengar yoga with slow breathing, 27 of the 30 people with major depression who finished 12 weeks ended below the depression cut-off. Low mood, feeling flat, mild depression and the heaviness of grief all respond to the same things: move the body, open the chest, slow the breath, and do it with other people, week after week.

One thing to keep in mind as you read: some of these trials tested Iyengar yoga, taught by trained Iyengar teachers, and many tested “yoga” of many styles. Both count, and both point the same way: different roads to the same place. In our view, well-taught Iyengar yoga, with its supported backbends, its careful inversions and its pranayama, is especially well suited to low mood. Why the kind of yoga matters.

The bottom line: five key moves for low mood

1. Go to a yoga class at your level, at least once a week, and better two or three times. In the trials, more sessions a week went with bigger drops in depression, and in the Boston trials the calming effect on the brain had faded about a week after the last class. Give it a season, not a fortnight.
2. Open the chest. Low mood has a shape: shoulders forward, chest sunk, eyes down. Supported backbends and standing poses lift and widen the chest, and the breath goes deeper. Patricia Walden, a senior Iyengar teacher who knew depression herself, built her approach on this.
3. Slow the breath with pranayama. A long, smooth out-breath calms a restless, wired mind. A deeper in-breath lifts a heavy, flat one. Breathing practice lowered depression scores in an 18-trial review.
4. Cut back on what keeps you stuck. Long days on the couch, poor sleep, going round and round the same thoughts, and too much time alone. A class gets you moving, gives the mind something else to do, and puts you in a room with people.
5. Start now. New to Flametree, or away 3 months or more? 2 free classes, then 10 at half price, in Darwin or LIVE online.

Iyengar yoga is the style we teach at Flametree. During the 20th century, Mr BKS Iyengar was the major person who codified traditional Indian yoga, through his seminal books and widespread teaching. He also pioneered the use of props, so poses can be adapted to almost any body. His style is sometimes called modern classical yoga. This guide is part of our encyclopaedia of yoga for health conditions, and covers Dr Timothy McCall’s Depression (no. 23) and, briefly, Prenatal and Postpartum Depression (no. 90).

This guide in short

• Mr BKS Iyengar: varied practice for depression, with standing poses, supported backbends, inversions, rest and breath. He knew dejection himself.
• Geeta S Iyengar: the chest opened, the sinking mind lifted; staircase and ocean breaths for moods and fear.
• Dr Timothy McCall: his depression chapter, with Patricia Walden, tells two kinds of low mood apart, restless and heavy, and meets each differently.
• Dr Krishna Raman: know the person first, and quiet the mind through steady practice.
• The research: 23 studies listed below, from small Iyengar trials to reviews of more than 14,000 people.
• Grief, pregnancy and men: short sections on each.
• Take it further: our free ebook Cutting Stress With Yoga, and classes in Darwin and online.

“A dull body begets a dull mind; a distracted body, a distraught mind.”

What is the difference between low mood and depression?

Everyone has low days. A low mood after bad news, a loss or a hard week is normal, and it usually lifts. Feeling flat for weeks, with no spark and no pleasure, is the point where many people start to wonder whether it is depression.

• Low mood: sad, flat, tired or irritable for a while, often with a clear cause. Life goes on, if more slowly.
• Mild depression: the low mood stays, and starts to drag on sleep, appetite, energy and focus.
• Clinical depression: Dr McCall describes the doctor’s check as at least five of nine signs for at least two weeks: low mood, loss of pleasure, changes in appetite or weight, sleep trouble, feeling agitated or slowed, tiredness, guilt or worthlessness, poor concentration, and thoughts of death.

Mr Iyengar’s own description in Yoga: The Path to Holistic Health (p. 367) is close to this, in our words: a sense of having no control, anger and frustration, changes in appetite and sleep, low self-esteem, tiredness, restlessness and poor focus. Depression and anxiety often come together, and our guide to anxiety, upsets and anger covers the anxious side.

If things feel very dark, Lifeline is there any time, day or night, on 13 11 14.

“The moment the body shrinks, the brain becomes heavy and dull.”

What Mr BKS Iyengar taught about depression

In short: a varied practice, with standing poses, supported backbends, inversions, rest and the breath, so that a heavy body and a heavy mind lift together.

In Yoga: The Path to Holistic Health, Mr Iyengar sets out a yoga approach for 72 health conditions, including depression (p. 367). In our words, his course for depression is varied: standing poses, supported backbends, inversions, rest, and breath work, including the smooth, sounding ocean breath (Ujjayi). A few ideas run through his teaching on mood:

• Posture shapes mood. In Light on Life he links a slouched, collapsed body with a heavy, dull mind. Lift the body and the mind lifts with it.
• Stay in the opening poses. For dejection, he describes staying quietly for some minutes in supported poses such as the bridge (Setu Bandha). The time in the pose matters, not only the shape.
• Mental tiredness is serious. He lists low mood, forgetfulness, boredom and confusion among the signs of mental fatigue, from poor sleep, loss or work stress, and says its seriousness is underestimated (p. 360).
• The standing forward bend. He names anxiety and depression among the conditions Uttanasana helps (p. 92). His claim, from a lifetime of teaching.
• Friendliness, compassion, joy and an even mind. In The Tree of Yoga he draws on Patanjali’s four attitudes as the mind’s answer to emotional upheaval.
• He knew dejection himself. Writing of his early years of pranayama, he tells of failure after failure, dejection and discontent, and of going on with the practice anyway.

We do not publish his sequences. A sequence needs a teacher who can see you and adapt each pose, which is what a class is for.

“With failure after failure, dejection and discontent, I restlessly persisted with the practice of pranayama.”

What Geeta S Iyengar taught about moods

In short: open the chest, and the sinking mind lifts. Then steady it with the breath.

Geeta S Iyengar, Mr Iyengar’s daughter, wrote Yoga: A Gem for Women. We follow her approach to pranayama at Flametree, and she wrote often about moods. Her views, in our words:

• Backbends for the low. She gives supported backbends over a bench or stool for “beginners, the weak and the sad” (pp. 249 to 251), and writes that the chest expansion gives a feeling of happiness and joy.
• The standing forward bend calms the brain. She says Uttanasana relieves depression and calms the brain (p. 138). Her claim, from her own long practice and teaching.
• Inversions for a tired mind. She lists mental tiredness and depression among the things headstand and shoulder stand ease, and says shoulder stand brings patience and emotional steadiness (pp. 196, 216). These are taught step by step, only when you are ready.
• The breath for moods. Staircase breath (Viloma) is, in her words, “ideal for women who have moods” (p. 318). She gives deep breathing for depression and low vitality (p. 313), and the ocean breath (Ujjayi) for fear (pp. 320 to 321).
• Her own experience. In a 2000 interview she said that when she did asanas she felt better, and her sinking mind was lifted.

She also tells the old story of Kausalya, mother of Rama in the Ramayana, overcome by grief, who practised asana and breath until she was calm. For low mood in the menopause years, which she wrote about too, see our menopause guide.

“The chest expansion gives a feeling of happiness and joy.”

What Dr Timothy McCall says

In short: yoga suits depression because it works on the stressed body, the collapsed posture and the stuck mind at once, and the practice should fit the kind of low mood you have.

Dr McCall is a US medical doctor and yoga therapist, author of Yoga as Medicine and former medical editor of Yoga Journal. Depression is no. 23 on his June 2019 list of conditions helped by yoga, and it has its own chapter in the book, written with Patricia Walden, a senior Iyengar teacher who has taught since 1977. Walden had clinical depression herself, and says it lifted through Mr Iyengar’s teaching. Their views, in our words:

• Why yoga fits. Dr McCall points to long-held stress in the nervous system and high cortisol (the stress hormone), to the link between posture and mood, and to tension held in the belly, jaw and brows. Yoga works on all of these.
• “Open the armpits.” Walden describes her own posture before yoga as collapsed and sunken. Mr Iyengar’s cue to open the armpits lifts and widens the chest, so the breath goes deeper, and she felt the change in her mood.
• Soften the eyes. Mr Iyengar noticed tension around the eyes in depressed students, and asked them to let the eyes soften back towards the temples and ears.
• Self-study (svadhyaya). Practice gives room to ask whether a relationship, a job or a lack of time for yourself needs to change.
• A path back. The memory of how practice has helped before can bring you back to the mat on the hard days.
• The evidence he reports. An Indian trial comparing yoga with an antidepressant over 6 months, where most of the yoga group improved in sleep, mood and social life; a UCLA trial of Iyengar yoga for mild depression (listed below); and mindfulness programmes that include gentle yoga, with benefits lasting years.

Walden’s central idea is that there are two kinds of low mood, and they need different things.

Dr McCall also tells the story of one of Walden’s students, a woman whose childhood love of dance had been discouraged, and whose depression returned after a film stirred old feelings. She talked to Walden after class, and they began working together. The episode lifted in about six weeks, and afterwards, in her words as he reports them, she had more tools in her tool basket.

He adds practical cautions: someone heavy and flat may need more active poses first, with less focus on fine alignment; headstand is learnt under an experienced teacher; and chanting, ideally with others, can help. Always follow the directions of any doctor you are consulting.

“Fear and fatigue block the mind. Face both, then courage and confidence flow into you.”

What Dr Krishna Raman says

In short: know the person first, then let steady practice quiet the mind.

Dr Raman is a Chennai physician who trained in yoga under Mr Iyengar. His question-and-answer book on yoga and medical science covers depression among the conditions of the mind and nerves. His views, in our words:

• Know the person. With depression, he likes to know the person well before starting yoga. Personal attention matters: in a class, that means a teacher who knows you and adapts the poses.
• The feel-good chemicals. He discusses beta-endorphin, one of the body’s own feel-good chemicals, and how practice affects it.
• A quiet mind comes from practice. In his view the mind is quieted by steady practice, and breath and mind move together, so slowing one slows the other.

Other yoga voices on low mood

• Five stars for low mood and depression. Mary Flaherty, in Does Yoga Work?, gives yoga her top rating for normal low mood and for clinical depression, and finds it effective for depression, including major depression (p. 41). She notes that the gains last as long as the practice does.
• “Breath became my lifeline.” A Montreal Iyengar teacher, writing for Iyengar Yoga Canada, says that when depression left her unable to think clearly, she grounded herself with supported poses and long-held openings, and used the breath to reach her mind. Her story.
• Grounded in her body. Another Canadian Iyengar teacher came to her first class in 1998 in an emotional crisis. She says it left her feeling grounded in her body, and credits Iyengar yoga, and pranayama above all, with helping her through depressive anxiety and, later, grief. Her story.

“I felt life within myself. The sinking mind got uplifted.”

What the research on depression and yoga shows

In short: yoga and depression is one of the best-studied areas in yoga research. Yoga eased depression, raised the odds of remission and did well against other kinds of exercise. Iyengar yoga trials, most of them small, found large drops in depression. Breathing practice and mindfulness helped too. Why the kind of yoga matters.

Yoga of many styles: reviews and trials

• Yoga eased how bad the depression was, and people who did yoga had about three times the odds of remission against no extra help, and about twice the odds against other active programmes. The authors say yoga should be considered as an option. Moosburner 2024, a review of 24 trials and 1,395 people with diagnosed depression. Read the study.
• Yoga gave a moderate drop in depression, among the three best kinds of exercise with walking or jogging and strength training, and yoga was one of the two that people stuck with best. Noetel 2024, in the BMJ, a review of 218 trials and 14,170 people with major depression. Read the study.
• Yoga lowered depression in people with a diagnosed mental health condition, and more sessions a week went with bigger drops. Brinsley 2021, a review of 19 studies; 13 trials and 632 people pooled. Read the study.
• Yoga-based programmes did better than control groups for depression in people with depressive disorders. Martinez-Calderon 2023, a review of 23 studies and 1,420 people, covering yoga, tai chi and qigong. Read the study.
• Depression fell further with yoga than with education classes, and more of the yoga group reached remission. Ninety-minute hatha yoga classes twice a week for 8 weeks, on its own. Prathikanti 2017, 38 adults with mild to moderate major depression in San Francisco. Read the study. Hatha yoga in general, not Iyengar yoga. Why it matters.
• For people still depressed despite antidepressants, adding weekly yoga meant lower depression over the following months, and at 6 months 51% of the yoga group had responded, against 31% of the health education group. Weekly classes for 10 weeks. Uebelacker 2017, 122 people at Brown University. The authors say the benefits of yoga may build over time. Read the study. Hatha yoga in general, not Iyengar yoga. Why it matters.
• Yoga gave greater gains in mood and greater falls in anxiety than walking matched for effort, and the brain’s calming chemical GABA moved with mood. An hour three times a week for 12 weeks. Streeter 2010, 34 healthy adults, Boston University. Read the study.

Iyengar yoga studies

These trials tested Iyengar yoga specifically, taught by trained Iyengar teachers. Most are small, and several compared two amounts of Iyengar yoga rather than yoga against no yoga. They found large drops in depression.

• Depression fell sharply: 27 of the 30 people who finished ended below the depression cut-off, whether they did two or three classes a week. Twelve weeks of Iyengar yoga with coherent breathing (five slow breaths a minute), 90-minute classes plus home practice. Streeter 2017, 30 adults with major depression, Boston. Read the study.
• Depression, anxiety and sleep improved and positive feelings rose in both groups, with benefits building with the total amount of practice. Twelve weeks of Iyengar yoga and coherent breathing, two or three classes a week. Scott 2019, 32 adults with major depression. Read the study.
• Depression scores fell, and the brain’s calming chemical GABA rose after a class in people who had practised about 4 days earlier, but not in those whose last class was about 8 days earlier. The authors suggest at least one session a week. Streeter 2020, the same Boston programme, with brain scans. Read the study.
• Self-reported depression and anxiety fell, by the middle of the course, and held to the end. Negative mood and tiredness dropped after each class. Two one-hour Iyengar classes a week for 5 weeks, against a waitlist. Woolery 2004, 28 young adults with mild depression, UCLA. Read the study.
• Depression, anger and anxiety fell, and 11 of the 17 who finished reached remission. Twenty classes led by senior Iyengar teachers. Shapiro 2007, UCLA, people with major depression only partly helped by antidepressants. Read the study.
• Stress, anxiety, depression, mood and quality of life all improved against a waitlist, and once a week did as well as twice. Ninety-minute Iyengar classes over 3 months. Michalsen 2012, 72 distressed women in Germany. Read the study.
• Iyengar yoga gave better overall mood and vitality. Ten classes over 5 weeks, against two other mind-body programmes. Bowden 2012, 35 healthy adults. Read the study.

Breathing practice (pranayama) and breathwork

“Breathwork” is a loose word, and these trials tested different things. Sudarshan Kriya is a set of rhythmic breaths with meditation; coherent breathing is slow breathing at about five breaths a minute; cyclic sighing is a long out-breath. Where they overlap with pranayama, slow and steady, they calm. The pranayama we teach (staircase, ocean, alternate nostril, humming and a gentle shining skull breath) is slow, nasal and taught step by step. Why the kind of breathing matters.

• For people still depressed despite antidepressants, depression scores fell by nearly 10 points with the breathing programme, while the waitlist did not improve. Anxiety fell too, and no side effects were reported. Sudarshan Kriya breathing for 8 weeks. Sharma 2017, 25 adults with major depression, University of Pennsylvania. Read the study.
• Breathwork lowered depressive symptoms, as well as stress and anxiety. Fincham 2023, a review of randomised trials; 18 trials for depression. Read the study.
• Depression scores fell by about 5 points, with less stress and burnout, against stress education. Sudarshan Kriya online, about 30 minutes a day for 2 months. Korkmaz 2024, 129 doctors. Read the study.
• Five minutes a day of breathing with a long out-breath lifted mood more than mindfulness meditation did. Cyclic sighing for a month. Balban 2023, Stanford, a trial in the general public. Read the study.
• Pranayama eased symptoms in people with mental health conditions, about as well as standard care. Fast breathing had more side effects than slow breathing. Mutze 2025, a review of 6 trials and 517 people with PTSD, depression and other conditions. Read the study. On depression alone the result was not clear, which is a reason to look at what was taught. Slow breathing is what we teach.

Meditation and mindfulness

Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) is an eight-week course of mindfulness meditation, gentle movement and ways of noticing thoughts. In our view it overlaps with yoga and pranayama: you cannot hold a pose or follow the breath without being in the present moment.

• People with recurring depression who did the mindfulness course had about a third lower risk of the depression coming back over the next 60 weeks, and did better than other active approaches, including antidepressants. Kuyken 2016, a review of 9 trials and 1,258 people, using each person’s own data. Read the study.
• Rumination (going round and round the same thoughts) fell, and stayed lower; depression and anxiety fell too. Wei 2025, a review of 29 trials and 2,535 people. Read the study.

How do you deal with grief? What yoga offers

Grief is not depression, but it can feel very like it: heavy, tired, flat and alone. Many people search for how to deal with grief when the first weeks have passed and the heaviness has not.

• In a first trial for prolonged grief in later life, both groups improved in grief and in depressive symptoms, and nearly everyone stayed to the end. An hour of Iyengar yoga a week for 10 weeks, against health education. Goveas 2025, 39 bereaved adults with a median age of 62. Read the study.

Mr Iyengar wrote in The Tree of Yoga that loneliness leads to dejection. A weekly class gives grief somewhere to go: a body that moves, a breath that slows, and a room of people who expect to see you next week. Geeta Iyengar’s story of Kausalya, calming her grief with asana and breath, is one of the oldest versions of this idea.

“Loneliness leads to dejection and emptiness to inertia.”

Low mood around pregnancy and birth

Low mood in pregnancy and after birth is common. The research so far is mostly in pregnancy:

• Depression levels were lower in pregnant women who did yoga than in those with standard care or exercise. Yoga with breathing, meditation or deep rest worked; exercise-style yoga on its own did less. Gong 2015, a review of 6 trials and 375 pregnant women. Read the study.

Pregnancy changes the practice: no shining skull breath (Kapalabhati), fast bellows breath, uneven breath ratios or long breath holds. Tell your teacher you are pregnant, and the poses are adapted for you. Yoga after the birth has now been tested too: in a 2025 review of 6 trials and 443 women, postnatal yoga lowered low mood scores (Ruan 2025, read the study). Our guide to yoga in pregnancy and after the birth has all the studies and Flametree’s pregnancy rules.

For men: low mood often hides

Dr McCall notes that depression is widely missed, especially in men, and especially when it shows up in the body: tiredness, aches, poor sleep or irritability rather than sadness. Many men would not call it low mood at all. They might say they feel flat, or wound up, or just tired.

Yet men do far less yoga than women. In a national survey of Australian yoga practitioners, 85% were women. The things on this page, a class that gets you moving, a breath that slows you down, and a room of people who notice when you are not there, suit men just as well. About a third of the people in Flametree’s classes are men. Bring a mate or come alone, but give it 12 weeks.

How this comes together in a Flametree class

Everything above points the same way, and it is how we teach in Darwin and online.

• Standing poses to wake a heavy body. Strong, steady standing poses get the legs and the blood moving, and give a restless mind something to do.
• Supported backbends to open the chest. Over a bolster, a chair or a bench, the chest lifts with little effort, and the breath deepens.
• Inversions, step by step. Supported head-down poses and, when you are ready, shoulder stand and headstand, taught carefully.
• Props in every class: chairs, blocks, belts, blankets and the wall, so each pose fits your body on a good day or a flat one.
• Classes adapted to the people in them. No one-size-fits-all. If you are having a low week, tell your teacher, and the poses are chosen for you.
• Breath and rest: every class ends in rest, our restorative yoga classes go slower, and our pranayama classes go further.
• Company. The same faces, week after week. In the trials the people who kept coming kept improving.

In Darwin, the long build-up and the wet season can make anyone feel flat. A regular class is one steady, bright point in the week, whatever the weather.

Read more on low mood, depression and calm

• Yoga for depression: what the research says, and Iyengar poses for low mood
• Yoga for low mood: how your posture shapes how you feel
• How to increase GABA, the brain’s own calming chemical
• Yoga for anxiety, and breathing exercises that help
• Cyclic sighing: the long out-breath tested at Stanford
• How to lower cortisol naturally
• Vagus nerve exercises
• Nervous system regulation
• How to recover from burnout
• PTSD and trauma: our full guide, and yoga for complex PTSD
• Related guides: anxiety, upsets and anger, stress and burnout, sleep and energy and menopause

Take it further

• Classes, in Darwin or LIVE online: new, or away 3 months or more? 2 free classes, then 10 at half price. Already practising yoga? See the non-beginner half price pass. See every class time.
• Masterclasses: our 2027 Sunday Arvo Masterclasses with Chris Lalor, Certified Senior Iyengar Yoga Teacher and certified Yoga Therapist, include Yoga For Sleep And Energy (10 January) and Yoga For Anxiety And Anger (18 April), two of the biggest everyday drains on mood. You come away with the poses, sequences and breath practice to put this guide into action. See the masterclasses.
• Retreats: a week of daily, adapted yoga in Bali. See the retreats.

Other conditions are in our encyclopaedia of yoga for health conditions.

Low mood, depression and yoga: questions people ask

Why do I feel flat all the time, and can yoga help?

Feeling flat for weeks often comes with a slumped body, shallow breathing, poor sleep and too little movement, and each one feeds the others. Mr BKS Iyengar linked a collapsed body with a heavy, dull mind. Yoga works on all of them at once: standing poses wake the body, supported backbends open the chest, and slow breathing steadies the mind. In a 2024 review of 24 trials, yoga eased depression and raised the odds of remission.

Does it matter whether my low mood is restless or heavy?

Yes, in the approach of Patricia Walden, the senior Iyengar teacher who wrote the depression chapter of Dr Timothy McCall’s Yoga as Medicine. Restless, wired low mood (rajasic) often needs an active practice first, then a long, smooth out-breath. Heavy, flat low mood (tamasic) needs active, chest-opening poses and a deeper in-breath. A teacher who sees which kind you bring that day can choose the practice to match.

Does yoga help mild depression?

Yes. In a UCLA trial of young adults with mild depression, two one-hour Iyengar yoga classes a week for 5 weeks lowered depression and anxiety, and the change showed by the middle of the course. In a San Francisco trial of mild to moderate major depression, 8 weeks of yoga twice a week lowered depression more than education classes, and more of the yoga group reached remission.

How quickly did people feel better in the trials?

Some felt lighter after a single class: in the UCLA Iyengar trial, negative mood and tiredness dropped after each session, and depression scores fell by the middle of a 5-week course. The bigger changes came over 8 to 12 weeks. In the Boston Iyengar trials, 27 of 30 people with major depression ended below the depression cut-off after 12 weeks, and in a Brown University trial the benefits kept growing for 6 months.

Can yoga help if antidepressants have not been enough?

In the trials, yes. At Brown University, people still depressed despite antidepressants who added weekly yoga had lower depression over the following months, and at 6 months 51% had responded, against 31% in health education classes. In a UCLA trial led by senior Iyengar teachers, 11 of 17 people with depression only partly helped by medication reached remission. Always follow the directions of any doctor you are consulting.

How do you deal with grief, and can yoga help?

Grief is not an illness, but when the heaviness stays it can feel very like depression. In a first trial of Iyengar yoga for prolonged grief in later life, people who did an hour a week for 10 weeks improved in grief and in depressive symptoms, as did a health education group, and nearly all stayed to the end. Mr Iyengar wrote that loneliness leads to dejection, and a weekly class puts you among people who expect to see you.

What is rumination, and can yoga or mindfulness help?

Rumination is going round and round the same thoughts, and it keeps low mood going. In a 2025 review of 29 trials and 2,535 people, a mindfulness course lowered rumination, and it stayed lower, with less depression and anxiety too. Yoga trains the same skill: holding a pose while you attend to your feet, spine and breath leaves little room for the same old loop.

Does yoga help low mood in pregnancy?

In a review of 6 trials and 375 pregnant women, depression levels were lower with yoga than with standard care or exercise, and yoga that included breathing, meditation or deep rest worked best. Pregnancy changes the practice: no shining skull breath, fast breathing or long breath holds. Flametree teaches in Darwin and LIVE online; tell your teacher you are pregnant and the poses are adapted for you.

Where this comes from: BKS Iyengar, Yoga: The Path to Holistic Health (Dorling Kindersley), depression (p. 367), mental fatigue (p. 360) and Uttanasana (p. 92); Light on Life; The Tree of Yoga; Yoga Wisdom and Practice; Iyengar: His Life and Work. Geeta S Iyengar, Yoga: A Gem for Women, and her interview in Yoga Rahasya, 2000. Timothy McCall MD, Yoga as Medicine (Bantam), the depression chapter with Patricia Walden, and his June 2019 list of health conditions helped by yoga. Krishna Raman MD and S. Suresh MD, Yoga and Medical Science: FAQ. Mary Flaherty, Does Yoga Work?. Iyengar Yoga Canada, teachers’ stories, as linked. Penman and others, Yoga in Australia, a national survey, 2012 (link). Studies as linked above. Everything is summarised in our own words.

This page is general information, not medical advice. Flametree Yoga Studio, Darwin and LIVE online.