• Check in, centering, balanced hatha yoga set considering contraindications, relaxation (with imagery as appropriate),
• Balanced pranayama considering contraindications, meditation/centering.
• Include at least one suggestion from Karma, Bhakti, Raja, or Jnana Yoga tailored for this client.

Her care plan thus far was adapted to mostly accommodate bhakti yoga and related practices, though I was initially planning to focus more on taking a multifaceted approach and touch on the various paths of yoga (Raja, Jnana, Karma) it became clear that she really needed and was very interested in tools related to emotional regulation first and foremost. So, rather than exploring and discussing various paths, we have been doing more work related to her emotional state. Now, moving forward, the care plan will likely be adjusted to move towards higher levels of discrimination and discernment, depending on what my mentor thinks about moving in that direction.

ITM's initial goals were improved breathing, inner peace, pain reduction, improved energy, and reduced stress and anxiety. She has been paying more attention to her breathing and has been telling me she does at least a few minutes of pranayama daily, specifically the librarian breath, dirga pranayama, and brahmari. She feels she has most improved in her breathing and improving her energy; she feels her physical experience has been shifting as she practices the asana, most specifically her experience of pain. Also, her mindset has been shifting with the loving-kindness meditations, affirmations, and other bhakti yoga related practices. I do feel that the goals could perhaps become more subtle, for example focusing on getting into the vijanamayakosha - practicing self-awareness, strengthening discernment and intuition, developing spiritual beliefs and resilience, and awaken her sense of connection to something greater.

ITM has made the most progress with her neck pain and TMJ; she has mentioned that she actually sometimes notices now when she is clenching her jaw. In the past, she reports that she never noticed it and would eventually wind up with a severe headache and would be forced to take time to unwind. She says that her sciatica seems to be improving as well, although she has said it has a history of coming and going. She has been improving in her movement patterns, feels that her posture is improving, says she is becoming more flexible, and generally feels more at ease in her body.

She has been improving in her breathing patterns and awareness, and has been feeling more relaxation and awareness in her upper body, which is allowing more energy to flow unobstructed through her nervous system. Her work with her breathing and the meditations she has been doing to reduce anger, competitiveness, and stress, and replace them with love, acceptance, and positivity, is definitely working wonders for her energetically, even if the benefits have not been fully realized yet. The goal is to continue to build awareness of her energy flow and how it shifts with her breathing, emotions, movement, and the varying experiences of life.

ITM has been reconditioning her emotional experience and establishing patterns of forgiveness, acceptance, loving-kindness, and nonjudgement as opposed to competitiveness, anger, attachment, and passion. To hear her describe her day to day experience, I do feel that she has some sensory overwhelm that has not quite improved yet, I was hoping to touch on prana, sense withdrawal, and how the sensory stimulation and withdrawal can affect prana and therefore her mood, but we have not had a chance to get into that yet. Based on what she has said, her emotional regulation is certainly improving though.

We have not had much of a chance to get into this level of being, though I do believe that she has been laying a strong foundation for work on this level. Through her work with the loving-kindness meditations, affirmations, pranayama, yoga nidra, and asana, she has been improving her discernment, practicing her witnessing, and building positivity and loving-kindness into her identity. I believe she would benefit from more explicit philosophical discussion and tools related to her sense of self, spirituality, life purpose, and ethics. I aim to work on that with her moving forward.

This client, at this point, would benefit most from having discussions around spirituality, and different aspects of life that provide meaning, purpose, and connection if the word "spirituality" brings up resistance within her. I do believe that we can work on accessing joy, connection, meaning, purpose, trust, unity, awe, and surrender, even if she does not want to work on her spirituality, which is something she has said before. We plan to continue to work together, which means we will work together on a support plan moving forward.

The feedback I have received so far has been quite positive, although I don't feel I deserve much of the credit. I have mentioned to her that yoga is a living technology that, when embodied, leads naturally to a process of transformation. In addition, I have mentioned the teachings are universal, timeless, and in harmony with the rhythms and energetic signature of life. As such, I have not taught her anything that she didn't already have access to somewhere in the heart. She did say that she feels what we have been working on is exactly what she feels she has been missing, though, which feels good to hear.

Practice breathwalking in nature, 5 minutes of therapeutic movement and 5 minutes of therapeutic breathing twice a day, take up some kind of devotion-adjacent practice: loving-kindness meditation, prayer, chanting, and/or a gratitude journal, twice a day, for at least 5 minutes each time, continue to do pranayama and asana at least 5 minutes twice a day, and begin to take notes on when and what bhakti yoga practices are being used: loving-kindness meditation, positive affirmation/mantra repetition, gratitude, prayer, compassion, chanting.

I feel that these sessions have been basically ideal, though I can see how there would have been benefit if I had insisted on touching on each of the paths in our first few sessions, as opposed to following her lead and continuing with bhakti yoga and adjacent emotion-related practices.

I do not have any pressing problems at this point in time, though I wouldn't be opposed to meeting before I do the capstone proposal, since I would like for this to be my capstone client.

I thoroughly enjoyed working with this client and am looking forward to continuing to work with her. I am really excited to finally get into my capstone!