Yoga Nidra and Healing Trauma, October 21 – 23, 2022
Yoga Nidra and Healing Trauma
With Lynn Fraser
October 21 – 23, 2020
Zoom Online
Lynn Fraser is a trauma specialist and meditation teacher. She is the founder of the Stillpoint Method of Healing Trauma and specialises in holding a safe, trusted space for healing trauma in her online groups, classes and private sessions. She also is a senior teacher in the Himalayan Yoga Meditation tradition and a Certified Facilitator of the Kiloby Inquiries, a somatic mindfulness approach to healing developed by Scott Kiloby. Lynn has been interviewed on major podcasts in her field and is the author of Healing Ordinary Trauma, the Stillpoint Method, a suggested resource for this workshop. Her website https://lynnfraserstillpoint.com/ includes trauma education, links to recent podcasts and interviews, and the latest information on classes, small groups and working with Lynn. She lives near family, ocean and forest in Nova Scotia, Canada.
This workshop consisted of three 90-minute sessions. Each session included a talk, resource materials, guided practice and time for participants to share their experience and ask questions. Yoga Nidra offers deep nourishing rest, and the experience of stillness in the mind. Participants can experience staying grounded in the present – the only moment where we can breathe, relax and heal. It includes a state of conscious sleep in which a person is both alert and deeply relaxed on a physical, nervous system, mental and emotional level. It supports and improves physical and mental health and calms our nervous system survival responses of fight, flight, and freeze. By quieting the mind, Yoga Nidra can help enable a transformative shift in consciousness. As J. Krishnamurti points out, “If you as a human being transform yourself, you affect the consciousness of the rest of the world.”
Lynn shared with the group a basic understanding of trauma, which arises from the pain of human life. Many of us don’t know we are scared, hurt or only just coping, because these feelings are the water we have always swum in. We don’t know we have ordinary trauma, or that we are living with core beliefs of unworthiness. What we don’t know and can’t afford to feel, we can’t heal.
Lynn pointed out that we process collective fear and grief on top of our own individual pain. In this time of crisis, it is more urgent than ever to settle our nervous system, and to cultivate kindness for ourselves and others. When we look at life through a trauma lens, it becomes easier to understand the intensity of people’s actions and beliefs, and to have compassion. Lynn shared a cornucopia of techniques and practices for calming the mind and letting go of self judgement and fear of being overwhelmed by feelings and emotions. Practitioners are able to gradually access deeper levels and states of being, including deep sleep and turiya, the space beyond states. Dreaming diminishes and Presence increases, bringing many benefits. Participants reported sleeping better than usual at night. Lynn’s presentation was an experiential program of relaxation without any sense of right or wrong as we explored different centres in the body, aspects of the subconscious mind, conscious breathing, and mindful awareness. It was a restful dipping into a deeper sense of Being, which seemed to be most welcome for the attendees. Lynn invited us to join her online classes and presentations.
