Peta Jolley
Great Ocean Healing Centre - Yoga for Grief Program
Peta Jolley’s series of Yoga classes supports those who are grieving by facilitating conscious reconnection with their body, breath, voice and mind. This helps acknowledge and release emotions and pain held in the body for healing. By grounding participants and fostering presence, these classes offer a path to greater emotional well-being amid grief.
Grief yoga classes are founded on the understanding that suppressing grief can manifest as physical, emotional and spiritual distress.
“Grief and trauma are interconnected. Some grief has trauma. All trauma has grief. And sometimes grief and trauma from the past are re-activated with a fresh wound.” – David Kessler.
Peta has developed a program for those experiencing grief due to the death of a loved one or the loss of a significant bond. While grief centres on emotional loss, it also includes physical, cognitive, behavioural, social, cultural, spiritual and philosophical dimensions.
“When we learn to acknowledge, embrace and understand our suffering, we suffer much less…” - Thich Nhat Hanh
Loss is part of life. Without the teachings of yoga, we may spend our lives blinded by objects, people and places. Attachment, or kasaya, is the root of suffering and pain.
Experiencing the death of a loved one, changing homes, schools or jobs, or shifting social circles all constitute different forms of loss. All can lead to grief and, in some cases, trauma.
Yoga for Grief classes offer a pathway to understanding Vairagya, enabling detachment at various levels. This fosters a connection with our true nature, easing pain and suffering.
Grief often overwhelms and manifests as pain, ignorance, suffering and attachment. One or all of the three psychic knots—Brahma, Vishnu or Rudra, known as Granthis, can hold this. In grief yoga classes, careful use of bandhas and focused breathing gradually untangles these knots, releasing the associated suffering and promoting healing.
Peta’s classes focus on:
- Awareness in identifying and understanding where pain and struggle are in our bodies.
- Expression of emotions through movement/asana, sometimes using sound to release pain.
- Connection to remember to feel safe, internalising our awareness and reconnecting to Self, others, and spirit through movement, self-regulation and compassionate witnessing of grief.
- Surrender through the use of restorative asana, pranayama, bandha, mudra, mantra and meditations.
- Evolution and nurturing personal growth through Sankalpa, laughter yoga, yantra making and labyrinth walking for the next steps forward.
Greatoceanhealingcentre@gmail.com
http://www.greatoceanhealingcentre.com
Testimonials
Our sole mission is to create opportunities to do good for others through yoga.
And we’re making an impact.
A huge thank you to the Yoga For Good Foundation...
…for their incredible contribution to our Life Now Yoga and meditation programs!
This generous donation will mean we can buy new yoga equipment, run a new yoga class in Broome, and enhance our meditation program for cancer patients and their primary carers.
Cancer Council Western AustraliaSending out gratitude to the Yoga for Good Foundation.
Their grant is enabling me to offer FREE trauma informed therapeutic movement and relaxation to frontline mental health and social services staff in Bega.
Participants are really valuing the time out for themselves and experiencing integrated poly vagal theory. And I get to be in a teaching space, yay!
PremKranti CounsellingThe generous grant we've been awarded from the Yoga For Good Foundation...
…allows us to reach more underserved and vulnerable community groups who can benefit from a trauma-informed yoga and embodied mindfulness practice at zero cost to the participants.
Some of the community groups we’ll be serving in the current months include 000 Foundation, Men’s Walk and Talk and WAGEC.
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