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ELLEN KILEY, RYT, CSI is a graduate of Brown University, a Jivamukti certified Yoga Instructor, and KMI certified practitioner of Structural Integration.
She has been a yoga student of Sharon Gannon and David Life, co-founders of Jivamukti Yoga in New York, since 1996, and of Thomas Myers since 2005. She has had extensive spine-fusion surgery for scoliosis, and is experienced in creating modified yoga practices and hands-on myofascial massage for people with special needs. Her Yoga teaching is strongly influenced by the the breath centered, Viniyoga tradition, as well as the anatomical model developed by Tom Myers in his groundbreaking book, Anatomy Trains Myofascial Meridians. Ellen also works closely with Leslie Kaminoff at The Breathing Project in NYC and Susannah Nicholson, Yoga Therapist at the Martha Jefferson Hospital in Charlottesville, VA.
Structural Integration is a hands-on, myofascial massage and movement training technique which works well in conjunction with yoga for improving posture, relieving pain and increasing general well-being.
Ellen works privately with clients, and leads classes and workshops in Maine, Georgia, and throughout the US. The ScoliYoga program is intended to improve the effectiveness of appropriate medical care. It is not a substitute for medical advice.
Yoga Therapy for Scoliosis
Nowadays, many people with scoliosis are turning to yoga as either an alternative or supplement to physical therapy, bracing and/or surgery. So far nobody claims to have completely reversed a scoliosis curvature wiith yoga, but many have increased strength, decreased pain, and reduced their curvatures. Certainly there is widespread agreement that yoga helps people with scoliosis live fuller, happier, more physically engaged lives, and may prevent the further progression of a curve.
While there are specific yoga postures that can provide immediate pain relief, it is generally a practice that flowers through repetition. Over time, we learn what works for us in different conditions. However, one can learn to practice on one's own or with friends and family, so it is not necessarily as costly as some other options.
Yoga is both a physical and spiritual practice, offering a way of living with scoliosis that makes it seem more like a dance with Life and less like a disease.
Yoga Therapy is an approach to yoga which attends to the unique nature of each individual. A yoga therapist works together with the client to create a personal practice that suits their particular physical condition as well as their personality, goals and lifestyle. While people with scoliosis may have much in common, and can certainly learn from a group class situation, they will do better if they can also find a way to work privately with a yoga therapist or yoga instructor from time to time. This one-on-one, private instruction will teach them how to adapt standard yoga poses to their particular situation, and will challenge them to improve gradually and steadily, moving on from one step to the next, over time, with regular practice.
ScoliYoga
One of the difficulties for people trying to correct their own scoliosis is that what "feels symmetrical" to us is actually not. When an outsider straightens us out manually, we feel crooked or off-balance. Thus, the person with scoliosis has an inaccurate 'mental map', or understanding of their body in relation to Earth and Space. ScoliYoga program draws upon ancient yogic exercise and meditation techniques which finely tune the skills of proprioception. This allows the physical body to gradually respond more symmetrically to gravity and space , and learn to move more efficiently and with less fatigue.
Also, ScoliYoga is a breath-centered practice, where the mind is trained to fully experience each breath. This prevents musculo-skeletal strain and increases physical awareness, improving our ability to perceive and correct asymmetries. In addition, strengthening and deepening all the muscles of respiration, including the diaphragm, increases spinal extension and improves posture.
A breath centered practice also direct the students attention to the flow of Prana. Prana is a sanskrit word which doesn't yet have a good translation into English and so is the source of some debate. It is loosely referred to as "energy", or the Indian equivalent of the Chinese "Chi", or life force, and is carried by the flow of breath combined with a focused quality of attention. Right now, exhale a long breath out........ imagine a waterfall is rolling down your back and into the chair you are sitting on, and notice the subtle sensations of flow moving downward into the your seat. As you inhale feel the chest lift and create a feeling of lightness flowing upwrad into the neck and head. Continue for 3 breaths.
The important thing to know about Prana is that it flows through the body, and its main channel runs up and down the central axis, or Sushumna Nadi. You can experience it, learn to tune into it, like tuning a radio, and use it to make you feel more centered, graceful, and whole within. So that even if your body is not aligned physically, you can learn to align yourself energetically, connecting to your core, and feel the forces of gravity and levity playing through you. For example, sit and breathe for some time with the image of a golden thread is running up through your center. Just keep recalling that image as you sit and breathe, and when part of it lacks focus, increase your attention to that spot.
The specific ways that yoga has developed, over thousands of years, to refine the quality of breath and flow of prana, are why it appears to greatly improve the results of conventional Western medicine.
Scoli-Yoga techniques work with the 5 layers of being, called Koshas ("sheaths" or "bodies") carefully described in Classical Yoga teachings. Over time and with sustained practice, we explore the following areas:
Physical Body (ana-maya-kosha)
Postures, known as asanas, & breathwork specifically designed to relax chronically tight, contracted muscles and strengthen weak or overstretched ones. Drawing upon a variety of resistance & release techniques to gradually lengthen & strengthen the spine, improve symmery and increase breath capacity. Use of hands, mirrors, props to increase proprioception, or awareness of one's subtle postural habits.
Vital or Bioenergetic Body (prana-maya-kosha)
Learning to direct the flow of prana in each pose, rooting down into the earth with the flow of gravity and releasing upwards to the sun with the direction of light. Feeling our breath guide our movement as the smooth, continuous flow, like waves moving through the ocean. Using the Yogic techniques of the Bandhas, to align the core pranic energy of the chakras, allowing the physical body to gradually respond to the directed flow of prana in the energetic body.
Emotional Body (mano-maya-kosha)
- Coming together in retreat situations with other scoliosis patients in a supportive, listening, compassionate, and inspiring environment. Sharing stories and laughter. - Empowerment of the individual in their own healing process, increasing self-confidence. - Exploring the healing power of the voice through non-denominational, sacred chant (sanskrit).
Knowledge/Wisdom Body (vijnana-maya-kosha )
- Study of our own x-rays and anatomical/kineseological texts, and applying this directly to exploratory movement, to develop 'embodied anatomical awareness' - a well-informed, experiential understanding of the different systems of the body. - Study of philosophical & spiritual texts, to clarify understanding of the relationship between body, mind, and spirit. To explore our definitions of 'wellness'.
Spirit Body (Ananda-maya-kosha)
Meditation techniques which connect our experience of individual self with the Universal & Eternal. -Classical Yogic meditation on the "third-eye", which roughly corresponds to the location of the pineal gland, "which may play a role in the development and progression of some kinds of scoliosis". (see Kindsfater, Lowe, et al. JBJS 76A: 1187, 1994) - Chakra meditations, which help to integrate all the different levels of being, as well as improve energetic alignment.