Yoga and mental health issues

[rydra_wong]

Because I'm guessing I'm not the only person in the comm who's dealing with some form of crazy, I thought we might talk about it a bit.

How does yoga affect your mental health issues? For example, do you find that yoga is helpful in coping with anxiety or depression? Is it helpful at some times but not others? Or is it more something that happens alongside whatever issues you may be dealing with?

Conversely, how do your mental health issues affect your yoga? How do you manage to keep a consistent practice when you have a Bad Brain Day? Or do you have to accept that sometimes, practice just ain't happening today?

For me, it's been hard to acknowledge that yoga is not going to change my depression directly, even though it's been a lifeline for me through it. And when I'm feeling terrible anyway, beating myself up for not practicing doesn't help.

Comments

[recessional]

I've had to accept that practice just ain't happening for a few months now. =\

Yoga . . . depends. When I'm really bad, it's actually toxic: it's too much time spent with too little to distract my brain with a body that's never quite as good at what I'm doing as I want it to be. This is a similar reason I don't meditate or do other tasks that allow me too much time to think clearly (because of the way my brain works, most physical activity just takes the distraction of my body and the world away; my best trance states are when walking with an iPod).

Hyping up my awareness is really bad for me, if the inside of my brain is made of rusty nails: I just wind up MORE crazy. When you add that to the inertia problems I get when the MDD, is reeeeally bad. (Because then I'm fighting the inertia problems to do something everyone says should make me feel better, but it doesn't, and now I'm crazy AND wrong, at the same time!) So I just sort of put it aside, then.

I'm getting back to a state where I should start going back, though, because once I'm not needing to actively make a lot of mental noise to make the ideation go away, it becomes way more beneficial, and of course brings the exercise-caused good-chemicals with it.

[rydra_wong]

When I'm really bad, it's actually toxic

That happened with me and meditation; I had to take a break from it completely. I'm now back to the point where informal mindfulness is helpful again, but only just.

For me, yoga hasn't caused that particular problem, maybe because I don't particularly have issues with my body not being able to do things (I expect my body to be terrible at anything physical, so I'm still in the throes of amazement and glee at any progress). And I'm easily distracted by physical things, so it can occupy my brain to a certain extent.

But I had a patch when the prospect of trying to do anything (yoga or anything remotely constructive) made me want to lie on the floor and scream.

Um. It's been a fun year.

[recessional]

I think for me the trouble is that it provides just enough distraction to make me incapable of doing the mental equivalent of putting my hands over my ears and going "LA LA LA CAN'T HEAR YOU!" to whatever awful thing the Crazy is shouting at me at the time.

And yeah, I grew up as the inflexible, broad-shouldered girl in the company of a bunch of future professional ballerinas. Me and what my body can do, we have some issues. It's something to work on, but when I'm badly off is so not the time, you know?