Yoga For Epilepsy: What Mr Iyengar, The Yoga Doctors And The Research Say

By Chris Lalor, Certified Senior Iyengar Yoga Teacher and Certified Yoga Therapist, and Dr Stuart McGill, Yoga Teacher, Flametree Yoga Darwin

Do your seizures seem to come when life gets stressful? Many people with epilepsy notice it: a hard week, a poor night’s sleep, a worry that will not let go, and the risk of a seizure feels closer. Stress is the seizure trigger people report most often. This guide brings together what Mr BKS Iyengar, Dr Timothy McCall and the research say about yoga for epilepsy, and about pranayama (yogic breathing), meditation and mindfulness, for the seizures and for the worry that travels with them. Last updated: 9 November 2026.

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Does yoga help epilepsy? The short answer

Yes, yoga for epilepsy is well worth doing, alongside your usual medical care. In randomised trials, people with epilepsy who did yoga, meditation or mindfulness had less anxiety and low mood, less of the stigma that so often comes with epilepsy, and a better quality of life, and in some trials they had fewer seizures. In the largest yoga trial, 160 adults who did 3 months of yoga had about four times the odds of having their seizures halved, compared with people who did a sham routine. The seizure results are less consistent than the mood results: a 2026 review of five meditation studies found the fall in seizures was inconsistent and mostly not statistically significant, and the reviews rate the overall evidence as low certainty. Yoga and yogic breathing build the same calm, steady attention that the meditation and mindfulness trials taught. Mr BKS Iyengar set out a restful sequence of poses for epilepsy.

Two things to keep in mind as you read. First, the yoga trials in epilepsy tested yoga in general, as taught in hospital programmes, and some trials tested meditation or mindfulness courses rather than yoga poses. Second, no trial has yet tested Iyengar yoga, the style we teach, for epilepsy. In our view as certified Iyengar teachers, a class taught by a trained teacher, who adapts every pose and every breath to the person, is likely to go further. Why the kind of yoga matters.

The bottom line: five key moves for epilepsy

1. Go to a yoga class at your level, several times a week. Regular practice calms the stress response, and stress is the trigger people with epilepsy name most often. Tell your teacher about your condition before class.
2. Breathe slowly, never fast. A slow, quiet breath with a long out-breath calms the mind. Fast or forceful breathing is left out.
3. Practise calm attention. In the trials, meditation and mindfulness went with less low mood and a better quality of life, and in some trials with fewer seizures. Holding a yoga pose with steady attention builds the same skill.
4. Protect your sleep and rest. Mr Iyengar’s epilepsy sequence is a restful one, with lying and supported poses. Rest is where a busy nervous system slows down.
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.

Who was Mr BKS Iyengar? Iyengar yoga is the style we teach at Flametree. During the 20th century, Mr BKS Iyengar was the major teacher 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.

This guide in short

• Overall evidence: Moderate. Best study: A 2026 review of 118 studies of lifestyle approaches for epilepsy found that yoga, meditation and mindfulness had the highest response rate of any group: in the pooled results, 62% of people had their seizures cut by half or more soon after, and 79% at the last follow-up (Spurgeon 2026, 8 yoga, meditation and mindfulness studies). The largest single yoga trial, of 160 adults, backs it up: compared with a sham yoga routine, more people in the yoga group had their seizures halved or stopped (Kaur 2023).
• Mr BKS Iyengar: described epilepsy as abnormal impulses from the brain’s nerve cells, and set out a restful sequence of lying, forward bending and supported poses for it.
• Dr Timothy McCall, an American medical doctor and yoga therapist who studied with Mr BKS Iyengar, author of Yoga as Medicine: epilepsy is no. 31 on his list of conditions helped by yoga, resting on four studies.
• The research: randomised trials of yoga, meditation and mindfulness found less anxiety and low mood, less stigma and a better quality of life, and in some trials fewer seizures.
• Breathing: slow and quiet. Fast or forceful breathing is left out.
• Take it further: our free ebook Cutting Stress With Yoga, the 2027 masterclass on anxiety, upsets and anger, and classes in Darwin and online.

What epilepsy is

Epilepsy is a condition of the brain. Mr Iyengar described it this way: the nerve cells of the brain send out abnormal impulses that disturb the electrical signals by which the brain controls the body. Seizures come irregularly. He named head injuries, brain infections and an inherited tendency among the causes. Seizures can look very different from person to person, from a brief blank stare to a fall with jerking of the whole body.

Epilepsy is not rare. In the 2017 to 2018 National Health Survey, about 151,000 Australians, or 0.6% of the population, said they had epilepsy (Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, Epilepsy in Australia). Epilepsy Australia puts the number higher, at more than 266,000. Beyond the seizures, epilepsy often brings anxiety, low mood, poor sleep and stigma, and reviews find these weigh on quality of life as much as the seizures themselves.

Stress matters here. A review in Epilepsy & Behavior found that stress is the seizure trigger people with epilepsy report most often, and named mindfulness and yoga among the ways to build self-control of stress, which may protect mood and may also reduce seizures (Kotwas 2017). Read the review.

How yoga breaks into the stress and seizure circle

Because stress, worry and sleep sit so close to epilepsy, several of our other guides go further on them:

• Yoga for anxiety and anger and stress and burnout
• Sleep and energy, as poor sleep is a common seizure trigger
• Brain health and memory, as epilepsy and its medicines can affect memory
• Depression and low mood

“The world may spin around you, but the mind is steady.”

What did Mr BKS Iyengar teach about epilepsy?

In short: he set out a restful, steadying sequence for epilepsy, and taught that regular practice relieves pressure on the brain and the whole nervous system.

In Yoga: The Path to Holistic Health, Mr Iyengar sets out a yoga approach for 72 health conditions, and epilepsy is one of them (p. 356). It sits in his section on the brain and nervous system, which opens with his view that regular practice of the recommended sequences “relieves pressure on the brain and the entire nervous system” (p. 351, his claim). The opening of the same chapter gives the idea behind all his courses: yoga teaches the brain to be calm and passive, so the body’s energy can go to recovery instead of to coping with stress (p. 263).

His epilepsy sequence is a restful one. As far as we can read it from our copy of the book, it includes:

• Lying, supported poses such as Reclining Hero Pose (Supta Virasana) and Reclining Bound Angle Pose (Supta Baddha Konasana)
• Forward bends such as the standing forward bend (Uttanasana), which quieten the front of the brain
• Supported inversions and backbends, such as Headstand (Salamba Sirsasana), a backbend over a chair (Viparita Dandasana) and a supported bridge (Setu Bandha Sarvangasana)

The inversions and backbends in his course are learned step by step, with props, under a teacher. Be guided by your teacher. The book gives no hold times, and makes no promise of a cure. Mr Iyengar’s own wording for serious conditions is that yoga may not bring full recovery but can ease some of the suffering (p. 260).

Mr Iyengar also wrote about overbreathing (hyperventilation) as its own condition in the same book: fast, deep breathing driven by stress, which leaves people dizzy with tingling hands and feet. His answer was a short, quiet, restful course. That matches what the research says about breathing in epilepsy, set out further down.

What does Dr Timothy McCall say?

In short: epilepsy is no. 31 on his list of 117 conditions helped by yoga.

Dr Timothy McCall is an American medical doctor and yoga therapist who studied with Mr BKS Iyengar, and the author of Yoga as Medicine. His June 2019 list, “117 Health Conditions Helped by Yoga”, includes epilepsy as no. 31. His reference list for it names four studies, all set out below: a randomised meditation trial in India (Panjwani 1996), a yoga meditation pilot in drug-resistant epilepsy (Rajesh 2006), a yoga trial on the heart’s calming rhythm (Sathyaprabha 2008), and a randomised yoga trial in children (Kanhere 2018). Since his list appeared, the largest yoga trial so far (Kaur 2023) and several mindfulness trials have been added.

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

What the research shows about yoga for epilepsy

Every study below was used alongside the person’s usual medical care. Each line gives the finding first, then who was studied. All are linked. None tested Iyengar yoga, the style we teach, and that matters: why the kind of yoga matters.

Reviews of many trials

• Yoga, meditation and mindfulness had the highest response rate of any lifestyle approach for halving seizures. In pooled results, 62% of people had their seizures cut by half or more soon after, and 79% at the last follow-up, against 30 to 35% for exercise and supplements. Spurgeon and others, 2026, Epilepsia: a review and meta-analysis of 118 studies, 8 of them on yoga, meditation and mindfulness. The authors say study design and quality vary, and many studies had no comparison group. Read the study.
• Yoga did better than sham yoga or no added practice on seizure frequency and duration, but the evidence is low quality. Panebianco, Sridharan and Ramaratnam, 2017, Cochrane review “Yoga for epilepsy”: two trials, 50 people with hard-to-control epilepsy. Yoga and a talking therapy (acceptance and commitment therapy) did about as well as each other. The reviewers said no firm conclusions can yet be drawn and called for larger trials. Read the study.
• Mind-body approaches may lower seizures slightly, by about 3 a month, at 6 to 8 weeks. Huang and others, 2025, Cochrane review of 36 trials and 5,834 adults across all behavioural and self-help approaches; the mind-body group held 3 studies and 148 people. Low certainty, and two other studies found no change in seizures. Read the study.

• A 2026 review of five meditation studies found the fall in seizures was inconsistent and mostly not statistically significant. Singh and others, 2026, a mini review of 2 randomised trials, 2 open studies and 1 case report. Mood, anxiety, concentration and quality of life improved more clearly than seizure counts did, so the case for meditation rests mostly on how people feel, not yet on fewer seizures. Read the study.
• Psychological approaches, including mindfulness, gave a clinically meaningful gain in quality of life. Michaelis and others, 2017, Cochrane review of 24 trials and 2,439 people; quality of life rose by 5.68 points on the epilepsy scale, above the level that counts as a real change. Moderate-quality evidence. Read the study.
• Mind-body therapies improved quality of life in people with epilepsy. Luo and others, 2025, network meta-analysis of 58 randomised trials and 6,541 people. Read the study.

Yoga trials

• Yoga cut stigma and raised the odds of seizures halving about fourfold, and of stopping about sevenfold, compared with a sham routine. Kaur and others, 2023, Neurology: a randomised trial of 160 adults in India, with the assessors blinded. Three months of yoga plus education against a sham yoga routine plus the same education, followed for 6 months. The yoga group also had less anxiety, better thinking and memory scores, more mindfulness and a better quality of life. Read the study.

• Yoga improved the heart’s calming (parasympathetic) rhythm and lowered seizure scores; simple exercise did not. Sathyaprabha and others, 2008, Epilepsy & Behavior: 34 people with hard-to-control epilepsy, 10 weeks of daily yoga (18) or simple exercise (16). Two people in the yoga group reached normal readings. Read the study.
• Both yoga and a talking therapy lowered seizures and lifted quality of life over a year. Lundgren and others, 2008, Epilepsy & Behavior: 18 adults with hard-to-control seizures, randomised to yoga or acceptance and commitment therapy, 12 hours of sessions. The talking therapy lowered seizures more; the yoga group gained more on life satisfaction. Read the study.
• No child in the yoga group had a seizure at 3 or 6 months, and their brain-wave recordings (EEG) improved. Kanhere and others, 2018, Journal of Pediatric Neurosciences: 20 children aged 8 to 12, 10 one-hour yoga sessions. In the comparison group, 4 and then 3 children had seizures; abnormal EEGs at 6 months were 1 in the yoga group against 7. Read the study.
• After 3 months of a yoga meditation routine, all but one person had fewer seizures, and everyone who kept going past 6 months had fewer. Rajesh and others, 2006, Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine: 20 people with drug-resistant epilepsy, 20 minutes twice a day at home plus a weekly supervised session. An early study with no comparison group. Read the study.

Iyengar yoga trials

No trial has yet tested Iyengar yoga for epilepsy. Not yet studied is not the same as not working. The yoga trials above taught yoga in general, mostly in hospital programmes in India. In our view as certified Iyengar teachers, a class where a long-trained teacher adapts each pose and each breath to the person is likely to show more, as Iyengar trials in other conditions have.

Meditation and mindfulness trials

• Meditation cut seizures by 62% at 3 months and 86% at 6 months, and shifted brain waves towards a calmer pattern. Panjwani and others, 1996, Indian Journal of Medical Research: 32 people randomised to 6 months of meditation, exercises that only looked like it, or no change. The other two groups did not change. A companion paper found stress markers fell in the meditation group only. Read the study.
• Mindfulness gave a bigger lift in quality of life than social support, with less low mood and anxiety, fewer seizures and better memory. Tang, Poon and Kwan, 2015, Neurology: a randomised trial of 60 people with drug-resistant epilepsy, 4 sessions, assessors blinded. 11 people in the mindfulness group reached a real gain in quality of life, against 4. Read the study.
• A six-week mindfulness course lowered low mood and raised quality of life, and the gains held 6 weeks later. Lai and others, 2021, Epilepsy & Behavior: a randomised trial of 28 people. Anxiety did not change significantly. Read the study.
• Twenty minutes of mindful breathing, twice a week, improved low mood and quality of life within two weeks. Lim and others, 2024, Epilepsy & Behavior: a pilot randomised trial of 20 people using a guided video. It taught mindful attention to the breath. Read the study.
• Mindfulness lowered low mood in people with epilepsy. Sun and others, 2026, review of 22 studies; the authors rate the certainty as low. Read the study.

Pranayama and breathing

No trial has yet tested pranayama on its own for epilepsy. The one breathing study, above, used mindful attention to the breath, and it helped low mood and quality of life. There is an important reason the breath stays slow. Fast, deep overbreathing (hyperventilation) is used by doctors as a test, because it can bring on seizures: a 2024 review found it brings on seizure-type brain waves in more than 90% of children with childhood absence epilepsy, and an absence seizure, usually within 90 seconds (Rao and Kuperman 2024). Read the review.

So fast or forceful breathing, such as shining skull breath (kapalabhati) and bellows breath (bhastrika), is not for people with epilepsy unless your teacher advises it. For breath holds and any other technique, tell your teacher about your condition, so the practice can be chosen for you. Slow, quiet breathing with a long out-breath is the kind that calms.

What the research does not yet show

An audit of 15 studies of yoga in epilepsy found the reporting was often poor and the risk of bias high (Das 2022, read the audit), and a review of yoga across brain conditions found too little to judge epilepsy on quality of life (Lenoir Dit Caron 2021, read the review). Most trials are of 18 to 60 people, and none has yet tested Iyengar yoga. That is a reason for larger trials, not a reason to wait. The trials that have been done point the same way, and the classes that build calm can be started now, with the breath kept slow and your teacher told about your condition.

“You can never do pranayama with an upset mind.”

Yoga, pranayama and mindfulness: how they work together

Several of the epilepsy studies above tested meditation and mindfulness courses, not yoga poses. That still counts for our classes. Mindfulness is steady, present attention, and yoga poses and pranayama (yogic breathing) are old routes to that same state. So the meditation and mindfulness trials in epilepsy also show what a good yoga and pranayama class can build. No trial separates which part does the work.

We suggest coming to both a yoga class and a pranayama class. Mr Iyengar taught that asana (poses), pranayama and meditation are not divided, and in our experience the two together do more than either alone. See every class time. We trace the history and the links in Yoga And Mindfulness: Why The Mindfulness Research Points Back To Yoga And The Breath. With epilepsy, tell your pranayama teacher about your condition, so the breathing stays slow and calm.

How this comes together in a Flametree class

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

• Tell your teacher about your epilepsy. Classes are adapted to the people in them, and to how you feel on the day.
• Props in every class: blankets, bolsters, belts, blocks, chairs and the wall, so poses are steady and supported.
• Steady, focused work. Holding a pose with care gives a busy mind one job to do, which is mindfulness in action.
• Slow breath, always. Our pranayama classes build a slow, quiet breath step by step, and fast or forceful techniques are left out for you.
• Quieter options: gentle yoga and restorative yoga for tired or stressed days.

See the timetable and book a class. Always follow the directions of any doctor you are consulting. Body, then breath, then a quieter mind: that is the path a class follows, and it is why we offer poses and breathing together.

Read more on stress, sleep and the breath

• Yoga and anxiety
• Yoga and sleep
• Brain health, memory and dementia risk
• Yoga for stress and burnout
• Is pranayama safe? Who adjusts the practice, including people with epilepsy
• Breath of fire: what kapalabhati really is, and why it comes last
• Breathwork for beginners

Four ways to put yoga for epilepsy into action

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 the timetable and book.
• Masterclasses: Yoga for anxiety, upsets and anger, Sunday 18 April 2027, one of our 2027 masterclasses with Chris Lalor, where you get the supported forward bends, restful poses and calming breath that settle the stress response. See the 2027 masterclasses.
• Retreats: a week of daily yoga in Bali. See the retreats.

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

Yoga for epilepsy: questions people ask

Does yoga help epilepsy?

In randomised trials, yes, alongside usual medical care. In the largest trial, 160 adults who did 3 months of yoga had about four times the odds of having their seizures halved, compared with people who did a sham routine, and had less stigma and anxiety (Kaur 2023). A 2026 review of 118 lifestyle studies found yoga, meditation and mindfulness had the highest response rate for halving seizures (Spurgeon 2026). The reviews rate the quality of the evidence as low, so larger trials are needed. A 2026 review of five meditation studies found the fall in seizures was inconsistent and mostly not statistically significant, while mood, anxiety and quality of life improved more clearly (Singh 2026).

Can yoga cure epilepsy?

No. No practice can promise to make epilepsy go away, and Mr Iyengar himself wrote that in serious conditions yoga may not bring full recovery but can ease some of the suffering. What the trials point to is fewer seizures for some people, less anxiety and low mood, less stigma and a better quality of life. Always follow the directions of any doctor you are consulting.

Is yoga safe if I have epilepsy?

In the trials, yoga was used alongside usual medical care. Tell your teacher about your condition before class, so poses and breathing can be chosen for you. Inversions such as Headstand are learned step by step with props under a teacher, and fast or forceful breathing is left out.

Which breathing exercises should people with epilepsy avoid?

Fast or forceful breathing, such as shining skull breath (kapalabhati) and bellows breath (bhastrika), is not for people with epilepsy unless your teacher advises it. Fast, deep overbreathing can bring on seizures in some kinds of epilepsy: doctors use it as a test (Rao 2024). For breath holds and other techniques, tell your teacher about your condition. Slow, quiet breathing with a long out-breath is the kind that calms.

Can stress bring on a seizure?

Stress is the seizure trigger people with epilepsy report most often, and reviews name mindfulness and yoga among the ways to build self-control of stress (Kotwas 2017). Poor sleep matters too: in one common form, juvenile myoclonic epilepsy, about two-thirds of people say seizures are brought on by things such as stress, tiredness and sleep (Kasteleijn-Nolst Trenité 2013). That is why a calming yoga and pranayama practice is part of the picture.

Does meditation or mindfulness help epilepsy?

Some trials say yes. Meditation cut seizures by 86% at 6 months in an early trial (Panjwani 1996), and a mindfulness course gave a bigger lift in quality of life than social support, with less low mood and fewer seizures (Tang 2015). Reviews find mindfulness eases low mood and lifts quality of life, with low-certainty evidence. A 2026 review of five meditation studies found the fall in seizures inconsistent and mostly not statistically significant, while mood, anxiety and quality of life improved more clearly (Singh 2026).

Can children with epilepsy do yoga?

In a trial of 20 children aged 8 to 12, no child in the yoga group had a seizure at 3 or 6 months, and their brain-wave recordings improved (Kanhere 2018). It was an early trial. Children practise with a teacher who knows about their condition, with the breath kept slow.

Which poses did Mr Iyengar suggest for epilepsy?

In Yoga: The Path to Holistic Health (p. 356), his sequence for epilepsy is a restful one. It includes lying, supported poses such as Reclining Hero and Reclining Bound Angle, forward bends such as Uttanasana, and supported inversions and backbends such as Headstand, a backbend over a chair and a supported bridge. The inversions are learned step by step. Be guided by your teacher.

Can I do yoga for epilepsy in Darwin or online?

Yes. Flametree Yoga teaches Iyengar yoga in Woolner and Coolalinga in Darwin, and LIVE online, with pranayama classes for a slow, calm breath and gentle and restorative classes for tired days. New students can begin with our new-student offer of 2 free classes, then 10 at half price. Book a class

“It is better to do a good pose minimum than a bad pose maximum.”

Where this comes from: BKS Iyengar, Yoga: The Path to Holistic Health (Epilepsy, p. 356; Brain and Nervous System, p. 351; Yoga for Ailments, pp. 260 to 263; Hyperventilation), Light on Life and Iyengar: His Life and Work. Timothy McCall MD, his June 2019 list of 117 health conditions helped by yoga and its reference list, and Yoga as Medicine (Bantam). Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, Epilepsy in Australia (ABS National Health Survey 2017 to 2018), and Epilepsy Australia. Studies as linked above, each looked up in PubMed in November 2026, including Panjwani 1996, “Effect of Sahaja yoga practice on seizure control and EEG changes in patients of epilepsy”. Everything is summarised in our own words.

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