Let your students/clients be your teacher and your guide. Encourage your students’/clients’ own self-awareness. Observe, listen, and learn from your students/clients.

The client selects 4 to 5 personally uncomfortable asana from her yoga practice to explore together. Collaboratively adapt or further adapt the poses with the goal of lessening strain and creating more stability, ease, and calm. Focus on the client’s inner awareness. After 10 days/5 group yoga classes with adaptions, meet to assess adaptations.

Female, 82 3/4 years old, widowed. Physically strong and mentally capable. Medical conditions: degenerative discs from neck to low back, mild spinal stenosis, right ankle edema, neuropathy in both ankles/feet, weakness in right hip; occasional tremors in hands and shoulders. She lives in her own home with her miniature poodle. Her son and daughter-in-law live next door. She is active, takes a yoga class online 3 times per week, and is writing her memoir. Loneliness is troubling to her.

The plan was designed for the client to be the discoverer with me as the facilitator. It is four part. First, the client considers and expresses which asana are troublesome or aggravating to her. Second, we meet in-person, with the client demonstrating the poses while communicating what makes them uncomfortable, then working collaboratively adjust the positioning and support of the poses, cultivating stability and ease. Thirdly, the client uses the adaptions in her ongoing Zoom group yoga classes for 10 days. Finally, the client and I meet in-person again to unpack her experience using the adaptations, revisiting the selected asana and making further changes as appropriate to her expression of them so that she may experience the essence of the pose free of strain.

Raja. Sutras 2:46 sthira sukham asanam; 1.12 &1.13 abyhasa & vairagya; 2.18, rajas, tamas and sattva; 2.5- 2.8, the first four kleshas: avidya, asmita, raga and dvesa. In my opinion, the common theme among these sutras is freedom and peace. Freedom from restrictive thoughts, habits, negative self-talk; hindering relationships, even relationship to self, and clinging to the past is relevant. By embodying a comfortable, steady pose, a sense of peaceful awareness arises, free of past experiences or expectations of what should be, the mind and body are allowed to simply be. Once the practice is over, we let it go, vairagya.

Jnana. Practicing self-awareness and self-analysis as the witness, the observer makes it possible for the client to discern how best to adapt poses to her body, without comparison or judging.

During intake, the client described poses challenging her. She chose six poses: warrior I/II, boat, reclined twist, side lying, and viparita karani. While speaking of them, he exhibited tightness in her torso and face, grimacing and holding her breath. After talking, she gave a sigh, showing relief and some resignation.

Meeting in-person, the client shared what she was experiencing in each pose. As she raised her arms in Warrior I, she inhaled, held her breath and stiffened. She described an overriding preoccupation with fear of falling. Lowering her arms with the chair to her side grounded her and opened her breath, alleviating her fear. Each pose brought new insights. During the 2nd in-person meeting, she evaluated the poses from a before & after perspective. She was delighted to create positive change in her yoga practice. Creating adaptations fostered agency. See uploaded notes.

Incorporate the adaptations into her ongoing yoga practice. Continue to foster her sensory awareness in all movements and poses, making adjustments to support her balance, stability and calm was advised. Cultivating the witness and honoring her needs was also advised.

The plan was implemented as intended. Please see previous sections.

The goal was achieved. The client led the way. I served to observe and further adapt from my knowledge base. The client progressively became more confident in her own ability to inform her practice from her own needs without striving to look a certain way or muscle through. She came to know that sometimes she is better served to do less or stop doing, recharging before returning to any type of exertion. She made choices by sensing her body, connecting to her body’s inner voice with certainty and clarity.

I created an evaluation form to standardize assessing the effectiveness of the adaptations. In our second meeting the client revisited the poses as practiced before and after adaptation. She compared the effects on the physical body, the breath, and quality of mind. Please see my uploaded evaluation form and notes.

The client suggested repurposing a PT foam wedge for use in viparita karani rather than a block or blanket for support. It worked well.

Some adaptations can be almost imperceptible and quite effective. A slight change in stance or a thin cushioned support under a shoulder can shift a movement or a still reclined shape from being aggravating to being peaceful.

Exploration is empowering. It leads to subtle awareness and creativity.

Sincere collaboration with compassionate listening builds stronger relationships.

I would use the same approach, with a revised evaluation form. Isolating poses for analysis does not demonstrate the viability of incorporating adaptations in a group yoga class. I would add another follow-up session to fit the adaptations into the flow of a class, giving time for client feedback.

The client was sincere, interested, and open. She tapped into her developed inner awareness. Incorporating yoga spiritual practices would have made the sessions more fulfilling.

The client presented a bit frustrated with her aging body and changing needs in her yoga practice. She expressed fear of falling that inhibited her ability to concentrate beyond avoiding falling. She had adapted some poses by herself before our meeting, creating varying degrees of stability and ease. Through inner exploration and invention, the client created small changes that delivered substantial, affirming results. From my observation and the client’s own description, she moved from fear to assurance; from aggravated discomfort to comfort and acceptance; from struggle to letting go; from overdoing to being; and from stuckness to creativity and insight. All positive, affirming results.