How Healing is Yoga? – Daniel Simpson

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Instead of an interview, this week I'm sharing a talk I gave on whether yoga is really a “path to holistic health”. It was part of a conference at the University of Wales, hosted jointly with the College of Medicine (whose chair is head of King Charles’ “Royal Medical Household”).

I went first and set the scene with a very brief history of medical yoga, which got quite lively in both the delivery and the Q&A afterwards (included in this episode). As a written introduction put it: "The body was originally an obstacle that had to be transcended for spiritual insight, so the therapeutic model was renouncing the world."

Thankfully, that gradually changed over the centuries, so the talk unpacks the evolution of yoga as therapy, highlighting themes that inspire it today. Let me know what you think in the comments here – all questions are welcome!

As I mention at the end of the talk, I’m hosting a retreat in the west of England at the end of August, where I’m going to be exploring these sorts of ideas in a practical way. You can find out more about that here.

And finally, Ancient Futures is free, but takes time to produce – so all donations are greatly appreciated, whether as a subscriber or by fuelling me with coffee.