Donalee Campbell – Yoga Association of Alberta

Trauma-Informed Yoga: Providing Support Where It Is Needed Most

Donalee Campbell — Fri, 29 Nov 2024 22:21:15 +0000

by Donalee Campbell, Executive Director
Originally published in Yoga Bridge - WINTER 2025 VOLUME 25 ISSUE 1

The YAA’s vision is to enable everyone to experience well-being, wholeness and community through yoga. Not everyone has equal opportunity to access the healing power of yoga. The YAA’s commitment to inclusivity and accessibility is at the heart of its mission to support equitable access for all Albertans, especially marginalized and under-served communities.

Since 1976, the YAA has been reaching out to various groups including low-income families, seniors, indigenous communities and newcomers across Alberta, offering yoga as a pathway to foster healing, peace, and empowerment. The yoga programs that the YAA runs in correctional facilities are a natural and powerful extension of this work, addressing the unique needs of some of the most vulnerable populations in the province, and serving in some of the most challenging and high-stress environments.

This initiative is especially vital for historically marginalized populations, who not only face systemic disadvantages but may also carry the heavy burden of unhealed personal and generational trauma. Incarceration compounds their pain, trapping them in high-stress environments, perpetuating cycles of stress, anxiety, and reactivity. The relentless pressures of confinement, layered with the weight of unresolved trauma, can make their struggles feel overwhelming and insurmountable.

Healing Through Trauma-Informed Yoga

The YAA’s trauma-informed yoga programs offer support and tools to manage stress, process trauma, and reconnect with inner strength. Participants are given a rare opportunity to let down their guard, explore their thoughts and feelings in a safe space, and reclaim a sense of calm control over their lives.

The YAA’s outreach programs create space for transformative experiences, offering the potential of healing over time. In environments where healing seems impossible, yoga opens a door to hope, giving those in the harshest settings a chance to connect with spirit, build self-worth, and begin a journey of transformation.

A Trauma-Sensitive Approach

A new emphasis in these programs is on trauma-sensitivity, offering trauma-informed yoga as a critical intervention. Trauma-informed practices respect personal boundaries and help individuals regain a sense of agency – the feeling of control over their own actions and decisions—creating a safe space where they can reconnect with their bodies and minds, often for the first time since their trauma. This compassionate approach provides inmates with invaluable skills like self-awareness, mindfulness, emotional regulation and stress management—coping tools essential in the high-stress environment of correctional facilities.

For inmates, many of whom are disproportionately affected by adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) such as abuse, neglect, and exposure to violence, unaddressed trauma often manifests as anxiety, depression, PTSD, and emotional dysregulation. Indigenous and other marginalized communities are particularly affected, with 15 to 20 percent of the Indigenous prison population in Canada having attended residential schools. Traditional rehabilitation methods may not address these deep-seated issues, making trauma-informed yoga a valuable pathway to self-awareness, emotional stability, and constructive decision-making, which can reduce recidivism and foster resilience.

Yoga as a Path to Rehabilitation

Yoga’s benefits extend far beyond physical health. It provides a pathway to emotional and psychological healing that is uniquely suited to the challenges faced by incarcerated individuals. Yoga teaches values such as non-violence, self-compassion, and respect, all of which are essential for individuals seeking to rebuild their lives. Moreover, yoga fosters mindfulness and emotional regulation, helping participants develop skills needed to reduce reactive behavior and make thoughtful decisions in the future.

One of the most profound aspects of trauma-informed yoga is how it creates a safe space for vulnerability, even in environments where vulnerability is often seen as weakness. In a prison setting, where inmates must constantly guard themselves and appear “tough,” yoga offers a rare opportunity to let down those defenses. YAA facilitator Dianne Hucal recalls seeing this shift firsthand: “The men often come in tough, but as the class progresses, they soften. They feel safe enough to show their softer side, and I’ve seen trust and a sense of community grow among them.” This sense of community is vital for individuals who are often isolated and lonely, providing a much-needed space for connection and emotional expression.

Yoga can also play a significant role in rehabilitation by giving inmates tools they can use not only while incarcerated but also once they are released. Yoga teaches principles of self-awareness and self-control that can help individuals break cycles of reactive and destructive behavior. These skills, combined with the mindfulness practices learned through yoga, can help reduce recidivism and offer a new way forward for individuals who might otherwise return to old patterns. For a personal account, see Alistair Middleton’s article, on page 10 of this issue.

Expanding the Reach of Trauma-Informed Yoga

The YAA has a long history of offering outreach programs at correctional facilities throughout Alberta, with programs in Edmonton, Red Deer, Bowden, Drumheller and Calgary. The YAA’s outreach program at the Edmonton Remand Centre (ERC) has been running since 2015, earning high praise from participants and highlighting its positive impact on their well-being. In recent surveys, all respondents reported enjoying the classes, and almost all expressed a desire for more sessions. Participants in the ERC program shared how the practice helps them improve their physical health while also making significant mental and emotional shifts. One inmate expressed, “If I had done yoga before I went to jail, I probably wouldn’t have ended up here.” Another reflected, “I felt peace, which you don’t get to feel a lot in here.” Many have experienced feelings that they expressed in terms including “calm”, “light”, “relaxed”, “happy”, “loved”, “free” and “more connected to Spirit”. These testimonials reveal the power of trauma-informed yoga in helping individuals cope with the immense pressures of incarceration.

The success of the trauma-informed yoga program at the ERC has led to increased demand for more classes, along with requests for similar programs in other correctional facilities. Class size is limited at the ERC for security reasons, and turnover is high, so frequent classes are needed to reach more inmates on a more consistent basis. There have also been requests from other institutions to facilitate classes for women and youth, two groups that face significant trauma and have limited opportunities for healing. Expanding the program to reach these populations is a crucial next step in YAA’s mission to bring healing and empowerment to vulnerable groups.

In response to this growing demand, the YAA is actively building capacity to offer more trauma-informed yoga programs. Since 2022, 74 Certified Yoga Teachers have completed trauma-informed training workshops through the YAA, and many more attended one-hour webinars led by professionals experienced in trauma work. This training equips facilitators with specialized skills to support vulnerable populations, ensuring they can offer safe, effective, and compassionate guidance. More trauma-informed workshops and webinars are planned, including an upcoming webinar on Indigenous cultural sensitivity, which will enhance the facilitators’ ability to engage respectfully with Indigenous cultures and provide a safe space for healing trauma.

How You Can Help: A Call to Action

The success of YAA’s trauma-informed yoga programs relies on the generosity of donors like you. With grant funding becoming increasingly scarce and competitive, your tax-deductible donations are more essential than ever. Continuing and expanding these programs to reach more inmates in response to demand requires funding for trained facilitators, program materials, and tools to measure impact. Your generosity allows us to reach more participants, offer additional classes, and continue providing long-term support, including free memberships and ongoing access to yoga resources after release.

In addition to donations, growing the YAA’s membership base is crucial to sustaining and expanding these programs. By increasing membership, we strengthen our collective voice, which allows us to better advocate for grant funding. Membership supports the YAA’s outreach efforts and builds a community of people dedicated to inclusivity, healing, and empowerment through yoga. Encourage your friends, family, students and colleagues to join—the first year is free for all Alberta residents, and every new member makes a difference.

Every contribution counts. Together, we can make a lasting difference in the lives of those who need it most. Please consider donating or signing up for a membership today to help bring the healing power of yoga through YAA outreach programs such as these.

Why Your Support Matters

Research shows that trauma-informed yoga programs can significantly reduce stress, anxiety, and PTSD symptoms in participants. Inmates who participate in yoga are more likely to engage in positive behaviors and make healthier choices, both during incarceration and after release. By supporting the YAA’s outreach programs, you give individuals a chance to break the cycle of trauma and incarceration, offering hope for a better future.

Together, we can bring healing, resilience, and transformation directly to the people and places where it’s urgently needed, making yoga accessible to vulnerable communities and offering a lifeline of support. Thank you for being a part of this life-changing initiative.

Why Certify with the YAA?

Donalee Campbell — Tue, 12 Mar 2024 14:10:52 +0000

By Donalee Campbell
Executive Director and Coordinator, Teacher Training & Certification Program

Adapted from the original article published in the Autumn 2011 edition of the Yoga Bridge

There is currently no legislation or licensing requirements for regulating yoga teachers in Alberta. Anyone can teach yoga in the province. Furthermore, teacher training programs exist that can train you to teach yoga in as little as one week, with no prior yoga experience required. So why would a yoga teacher voluntarily submit to the stringent certification and recertification requirements set by the Yoga Association of Alberta (YAA)?

The Yoga Sutras call for steady practice over an extended period of time, along with devotion, discipline, deep understanding and faith. The Bhagavad Gita defines yoga as skill in action. Yoga teachers and yoga teacher training should exemplify these qualities.

It is precisely because they believed in setting high standards that dedicated local yoga teachers banded together to form the Yoga Association of Alberta over forty years ago. In an effort to support each other’s efforts, to benefit and protect the public; and to establish credentials that would be accepted by other professional bodies, the YAA was formed as a grassroots organization that cared deeply about the well-being of its community. As a registered charitable organization, run by a board of volunteers and a few staff, the YAA coordinates the work and activities of yoga practitioners province-wide and promotes yoga as a holistic system of fitness and health for Albertans. The YAA Outreach Program offers opportunities for rural and underprivileged communities to benefit from yoga. The YAA Teacher Training and Certification Program sets and maintains standards for Hatha Yoga teacher training and certification; evaluates requests for YAA Certification from other teacher training programs; and administrates its own Teacher Training Program (TTP) which can be taken on its own or concurrently with other studio-based programs offered by senior teachers within the province. YAA Certified Senior Teachers may run their own teacher training programs under the auspices of the YAA TTP.

YAA Certification offers much more than a costly registry service with minimal standards and a cookie-cutter approach to the approval of training centres. In addition to offering a free registry service for all yoga teachers regardless of affiliation or style, the YAA Teacher Training and Certification Program offers serious yoga practitioners the opportunity to maintain high standards of training while following the lineage of their choice. Through the YAA TTP, teacher training students are able to choose their own teachers and workshops and to adapt their learning programs to their own interests and schedules on a “pay-as-you-go” basis, thus offering individualized and specialized training from the best teachers available. Teachers who took training from other teacher training programs across the world also can be granted YAA Certification when they have met equivalent requirements. Graduates from shorter-term programs, or those missing some components, can easily upgrade to meet YAA requirements.

YAA Certified Hatha Yoga teachers are recognized throughout Canada and the U.S., and are leading the way with some of the highest standards. Over the years, the standards set by the YAA have been revisited and revised in order to keep up with the changing needs of the community. As an ancient science and art that has been handed down from teacher to student since antiquity, however, some elements have stayed the same to ensure the integrity of the teaching remains. Minimum time requirements have been set to allow for integration of learning in a two-year mentorship with an experienced and qualified Senior Teacher, which includes regular classes and practice teaching. Along with the training on the components of asana technique, anatomy and special needs considerations and modifications, there is a strong emphasis on the philosophy behind the form, as well as training in the advanced practices of pranayama and meditation. The Senior Teacher workshop requirements allow for a breadth of knowledge and an introduction to other styles and forms.

The current requirements for YAA Certification are listed on the following pages:

200-Hour Teacher Training Program

Equivalency Certification Program (for teachers trained through other programs)

Advanced Training Levels (500-, 750-, and 1,000-Hour Levels)

The Yoga Sutras call for steady practice over an extended period of time, along with devotion, discipline, deep understanding and faith. The Bhagavad Gita defines yoga as skill in action. Yoga teachers and yoga teacher training should exemplify these qualities. If you are a yoga teacher who has not yet applied for YAA Certification, or if you are considering yoga teacher training, are you ready to step up to the challenge?

For more information email cert@yoga.ca.

Responsibility and Relevance: Ethics in the Yoga Community

Donalee Campbell — Mon, 19 Feb 2024 22:29:28 +0000

Coordinator's Message

Responsibility and Relevance: Ethics in the Yoga Community

By Donalee Campbell, Coordinator, Teacher Training & Equivalency Certification Programs

(published in the Yoga Bridge Newsletter Autumn, 2017)

With the arrest warrant issued for Bikram Choudhury in May, a guru has come under suspicion and censure for misconduct.

It’s a situation that challenges anyone who is practising yoga to consider because few lineages have been left untouched by scandal. For the world, it creates more cynicism of that which already seems foreign and dangerous. For those on the inside, it resurrects all-too-familiar feelings of fear, doubt and mistrust.

I remember when John Friend made headlines in 2012, effectively crushing Anusara Yoga, which was then the fastest-growing yoga in North America. Many of us who had been deeply inspired by Friend and his methods put their money, time and dedication into obtaining certification under the Anusara name, only to be left with meaningless credentials as the once overflowing rooms emptied. Some tried to pick up the name and run with it, but without its charismatic leader, it seemed vacant and lost. We all found ourselves in a sullied organization with no leader, no direction and no consolation.

Everything that Friend had taught now came into question. What was once considered a brilliant system of alignment principles was now being criticized as inflexible and resistant to growth. Once a vibrant, passionate, highly trained nexus of light workers, the emotional support system of the kula (the spiritual community) evaporated. Instead of networking and billeting, sides were taken, camps formed and suspicions mounted. The Tantric teachings of universal love and intrinsic goodness once again fell into public ridicule after all we had done to lend new credence and respectability to the ancient philosophy – one that we truly believed could change the world from the inside out.

Historically, the teacher has always been paramount in the practice of yoga. Hindu myths tell us that Shiva himself passed down the teachings of yoga to benefit mankind. The Vedas were brought in by rishis (seers) and the rituals performed by brahmin priests. The Upanishads, whose name refers to the self-realized teacher who expounds upon the truth, were sacred teachings reserved for those who showed loyalty, discipline and aptitude. They required years of study with a guru or mentor. In the Bhagavad Gita, considered the most important spiritual text in India, the conflicted Arjuna is instructed by no less than Krishna himself, an avatar, divinity in living flesh. The Yoga Sutras, the first codification of the philosophy and practice of yoga, was dictated in terse, compact aphorisms that required memorization, as well as context, elaboration and exposition through a mentor in order to glean any depth of meaning at all.

So like a parent, the teacher of yoga is put into a role of authority over the student in the instruction of life’s lessons, with the promise of true freedom or mokṣa at stake – a heavy responsibility. (The word guru means one who brings light into the darkness). When this accountability is broken it can leave deep, scarring wounds, especially for those who come to yoga for healing from past abuse. If a teacher does not adhere to a substantial and reliable code of ethics, he or she risks grave consequences for both themselves and for their students.

The yamas and niyamas, ethical guidelines laid out in the Yoga Sutras, are there to protect us all on the path whether we consider ourselves as students or teachers, as ultimately we are always playing both roles. They explain the dharma or the universal laws that one must follow if one is to tread this path to freedom. (See page 12.)

According to B.K.S. Iyengar, Sutra II.31 states that the “Yamas are the great, mighty, universal vows, unconditioned by place, time and class.” They apply to us all, in all circumstances, and there is no getting around them as they are enforced through karma, the law of cause and effect which follows us through and beyond this physical life. And they apply to us on all levels – not only to our deeds, but to our words and our thoughts as well. Sutra II.33 advises that “Principles which run contrary to yama and niyama are to be countered with the knowledge of discrimination.” As humans, we often have doubts, instincts, habits and needs that bring us into compromised positions in relation to these principles, but we are invited to always do our best to recognize their wisdom and to live them from the heart.

The yamas and niyamas are the first two of eight limbs of yoga. They are the foundation for all other limbs, including āsana (posture), prānāyāma (breath control), pratyāhāra (sense withdrawal), dhāranā (concentration), dhyāna (meditation) and samādhi (ecstatic merging).

As parents we need to give our children both roots and wings. Until they learn to make sound decisions for themselves, it is our responsibility to keep them safe and make good choices for them. In order to feel grounded and secure, children need to feel unconditional love and have reliable guidelines to follow until they learn to recognize their own inner wisdom. When they start to make their own choices in life, they then have a stable foundation upon which to build and boundaries in which they can safely explore their freedom.

As yoga teachers it is incumbent on us to lay out these same foundational roots and guidelines for our students – not only in āsana, but for emotional, psychic and spiritual support as well. The eight limbs of yoga provide us with both roots and wings. The yamas and niyamas keep us safe as we traverse the most difficult path, the dark inroads of our psyches. Without these tools, these understandings of who and what we truly are, we are bound to cause pain and suffering to ourselves and to others. They apply as much to teachers as students, allowing us all to deal with the inevitable difficulties that arise in life and with each other.

At her 85^th birthday celebration, long-time local yoga teacher and TV celebrity Gerda Krebs told me, “Yoga is to do good, and yoga is to be good”. Although it seems most of modern yoga is focused on the doing, its true power lies in the being. The yamas and niyamas teach us how to act with love until we discover, through samādhi, that love is who we are. As students, we are put into vulnerable positions that require surrender, trust and deep faith. But we are tasked to apply the teachings, following the path of yoga, to look inside for the truth, deep in our own hearts.

As a community, this challenge reminds us to engage our resources and strengthen our bonds. Unless we stand together as family, we cannot safeguard the integrity of tradition, protect the rights of the innocent or provide the comfort that lies in solidarity, in belonging. Herein lies our relevance, the importance of coming together as a whole.

I see two choices in this, as in any difficult matter. We can react in fear through hardening, become increasingly skeptical and resistant to change, or we can stay present with love, breathe life into the places that hurt and allow for an increase in freedom. This second choice requires an unshakeable foundation, alignment with our true nature and active engagement to support healing.

After the fall of Anusara, I felt betrayed and lost. But I was also comforted to have the soft cushioning of the members of the Yoga Association of Alberta (YAA). This fellowship left me knowing that I was not alone, but in a community where I always feel welcomed. This tribe has many wise elders to emulate, to turn to for guidance and advice. Always inclusive, with big hearts, and open arms, it is a place where I feel loved, even in our differences. And like a prodigal teenager, no matter how far I roam, with the existence of the YAA, I know I always have somewhere to return home. I have family. I have union. I have yoga.

The YAA Code of Ethics as adopted at the 1979 annual meeting of the Association is:

To treat others with dignity, respect and consideration of their circumstances.
To act in such a manner so as to maintain and honour the traditions of yoga.
To study, practice and expand the knowledge of yoga.
To improve the standards of yoga within the community.

The Guidelines for YAA Certified Teachers based on the above Code of Ethics is available here.

Donalee Campbell is now the Executive Director of the YAA, and a YAA Senior Teacher, teaching in Edmonton, Sherwood Park and Ardrossan.

For more articles relevant to teaching yoga in Alberta, please consider becoming a member of the Yoga Association of Alberta. With your membership you receive a subscription to the YAA newsletter Yoga Bridge: an informative publication containing yoga articles and upcoming events happening in the province-wide yoga community. There are three issues per year – spring, fall and winter.