Seane Corn, co-founder of Off The Mat, Into The World and author of Revolution of the Soul welcomes the launch of this beautiful and important book Yoga and Resilience: Empowering Practices for Survivors of Sexual Trauma, published in collaboration with the Yoga Service Council and Omega Institute:
⠀⠀
‘Yoga and Resilience is essential reading for any yoga teacher, regardless of their level of experience, to be able to skilfully teach yoga and facilitate a healing space to people with sexual trauma; which includes so many of our students.⠀
⠀
This book is also a blueprint for yoga teachers who specifically want to teach to survivors, which hasn’t been available until now. I’m grateful that yoga has evolved to produce texts like this so that survivors can heal in our classes rather than be re-traumatized because of ignorance or lack of fundamental training. As yoga teachers, it is so important that we learn the necessary skills to understand the specific needs of sexual violence survivors and work towards creating a classroom experience that is informed, mindful and responsible. This book is a resource that can do that. I highly recommend it.’⠀

In the wake of the #MeToo movement, ongoing sexual justice activism, and growing empirical evidence supporting the utilization of yoga and mindfulness practices as adjunctive treatment strategies for addressing the many impacts of trauma and stress, Yoga and Resilience addresses sexual trauma and yoga in an integrated and practical way. This text provides tangible tools, rooted in empirical and experiential data, that support those seeking to use yoga and mindfulness practices as a tool to address the physiological and psychological impacts of sexual trauma. This work is a call for both action and activism in addressing sexual trauma and violence.’ Seane Corn (https://seanecorn.com)

Yoga and Resilience is part of a larger series put out by the Yoga Service Council in collaboration with the Omega Institute. To date, there have been three texts published: Best Practices for Yoga in Schools, Best Practices for Yoga with Veterans, and Best Practices for Yoga in the Criminal Justice System. This body of work takes a unique and groundbreaking approach of co-creation, calling on a diverse array of leading experts in the fields of trauma and yoga, to collaborate and distill best practices that will inform the fields of mental health, trauma-informed yoga, yoga service, and yoga more generally. Contributors and authors met during two symposia and engaged in an ongoing collaborative process resulting in the current text.

Yoga and Resilience: Empowering Practices for Survivors of Sexual Trauma:

• Supports a holistic approach to ameliorating the impacts of traumatic stress, and specifically the impacts of sexual trauma.

• Serves as a resource to survivors, yoga teachers and practitioners, yoga service providers, trauma practitioners, and agency administrators among others.

• Presents a foundational understanding of sexual trauma and illuminates current best practices for integrating trauma-informed yoga and mindfulness practices into work with persons and systems impacted by sexual trauma.

• Explores an approach that moves beyond trauma-informed practice to a focus on resilience and universal inclusivity.

• Provides concrete tools to serve survivors better and to ensure that teachers and administrators not only seek to minimize harm but also combat sexual violence and its perpetration within yoga contexts.

Contributors to the book:

Keyona Aviles, Jacoby Ballard, Lisa Boldin, Maya Breuer, Regine Clermont, Colleen DeVirgiliis, Alexis Donahue, Pamela Stokes Eggleston, Jennifer Cohen Harper, Dani Harris, Nan Herron, Daniel Hickman, Diana Hoscheit, Beth Jones, Sue Jones, James Jurgensen, Mark A. Lilly, Jana Long, Anneke Lucas, Amanda J.G. Napior, Amina Naru, Emanuel “Manny” Salazar, Austin K. Sanderson, Lidia Snyder, Nicole Steward, Rosa Vissers, Kimberleigh Weiss-Lewit, Ann Wilkinson