The Future of Yoga Therapy: Interview with Phoneix Rising Yoga Therapy Founder Michael Lee

Interview by Kelly McGonigal

Originally from Australia, Michael Lee moved to the U.S. in 1984, where he became a resident and teacher at the Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health. He directed several of Kripalu’s professional training programs, including the Yoga Teacher Training and Holistic Health Educator Training. Combining his Yoga experience with his background in education and psychology, he developed Phoenix Rising Yoga Therapy in 1986.

PRYT is based on inquiry and exploration. PRYT practitioners guide clients through a process, using a Yoga experience accompanied by dialogue. We don’t diagnose, give answers, or prescribe treatments.

We create a relationship with clients that gives them as much power as possible and as much responsibility as possible. We don’t give advice or presume to know the answers. When a client makes a major shift or change in their life that will enhance their experience of their life and bring them healing, we hope they say, "I did it," rather than say to the therapist, "You did it."

It is an empowering approach, based on the belief that we may not be able to change external circumstances, but we can choose how we are going to be present to them, and how we are going to respond to anything that is happening in our life.

PRYT helps the client experience a sense of themselves very much at one with everything – what the yogis call a place of equilibrium. At the same, they get a clearer sense of who they are, the sense of their uniqueness. The PRYT practitioner creates the opportunity for the client to experience this in two ways:

1) The practitioner models loving presence with the client, without agenda, which in turn encourages the client to be in loving presence with themselves. This creates for the client the permission to be who they really are and be comfortable with that.

2) The client is guided by the practitioner in focused awareness and being open to whatever is being experienced in the moment. This is done through the actual Yoga practice, engaging the body as the vehicle.

We’re very aware of and sensitive to the blurred distinction between what we do and what psychotherapists do. We want our practitioners to be clear about the distinction.

Yoga works with the whole person – body, mind and spirit – and we believe you can’t really separate them out. Psychotherapy works primarily with the mind. Many psychotherapists try to alter a client’s way of seeing reality, generally by using skilled verbal "interventions". Phoenix Rising Yoga Therapists don’t do this. They simply guide a process of inquiry using body and mind, and let the client notice what they become aware of, and what (if anything) is of any significance to their life. A key element in the Phoenix Rising process is what we call "loving presence". It’s basically a similar kind of focus that one might give to oneself in deep meditation, only in our approach, it is modeled by the therapist. If you just took this aspect alone you could probably see it also present in certain forms of psychotherapy. Carl Rogers, for example, referred to this as "unconditional positive regard".

So there is some overlap, but at the same time clear differences. We do not train Phoenix Rising practitioners to treat specific problems as a psychotherapist might. Many people who receive Phoenix Rising sessions report experiencing better self-esteem, more successful relationships, a clearer sense of purpose in life, a capacity to let go of past hurt and move forward, and so on. It’s just that the way we get there is different, and the way we set up the relationship with the client is different.

Many of our practitioners work with psychotherapists. About 20% of our practitioners have a background in social work or therapy, and we have a trained psychotherapist on our faculty as our Clinical Director to make sure our practitioners respect the boundaries between Yoga therapy and psychotherapy. Phoenix Rising is now also offering a new training designed specifically for psychotherapists who might want to bring a more yogic body-mind approach to their work.

Every year more and more people are turning to alternatives to traditional medicine. And I see something very healthy happening now that wasn’t happening a few years ago. Many people in mainstream healing professions are interested in those alternatives that work. Professionals in all areas want to learn from each other. They are also becoming more knowledgeable, and able to distinguish those practices that offer something worthwhile and those that don’t.

There’s been a shaking out of the scene, and people are starting to become educated. I think we are going to see a lot of what we might now call alternative healing practices simply becoming part of the mainstream. Physicians are willing to refer people to other practioners, including Yoga therapists.

My fear a few years ago was that because people in the Yoga profession were so eager to be involved with the medical community, they would be willing to sell out their integrity and try to be all things to all people. Because there is now a more widespread acceptance, people in the Yoga profession are more likely to stand by the integrity of what they do, and not make it try to fit the medical model.

I would hope that by becoming part of the mainstream, we don’t follow the path of other professions with over-regulation and stringent definition. I would like to see room for many different approaches.

I would prefer to see consumer education, so people can make informed choices about what might be good for them, rather than giving power to some organization, like the Yoga therapy version of the AMA, to regulate who gets to practice and who doesn’t.

Basically, I think we need to come together as a profession. There is too much "Mine’s better than yours" in our profession. There is also little real understanding of each other’s work. I think our strength is our diversity, and we need to be careful not to exclude anyone just because we want to more clearly define Yoga therapy or standardize practices.

We also need to not fall into the trap of letting outside publications or events define us. Yoga magazines, for example, have played a great part in the popularization of Yoga, and I thank them for it. At the same time, however, they have done much to put the spotlight on certain individual teachers they have chosen, rather than look more broadly at all the great work that is happening in Yoga and educate the public to the kinds of choices they have.

Some of the best work in our profession is being done in small, out of the way places by people no one has ever heard of. We need to find a way to include them and give them a voice too.

I think we should all be able to fit under one umbrella, and I would like to see that happen. Having separate divisions within that might be a good idea.

I do think there is a lot of difference between what I call the Process Approach and the Treatment Approach. I don’t like the structural/spiritual distinction commonly used when discussing approaches to Yoga therapy, because the structural approaches are also spiritual.

First and foremost I would bring together a diverse group and encourage them to talk to each other and find common ground. How can we all help each other? That would be the question I would ask them. I think there needs to be more face to face conversations. Email is great, but it is no substitute for genuine person to person communication. We need to get to know each other, and find ways to work together.

I often wonder about this. I sometimes think of the question, "Do you need to know all about generators to be able to believe that when you flick the switch, the light will go on?" In the twenty years I’ve been teaching Phoenix Rising, I don’t have any doubts about its effectiveness. I know it works and I have a file drawer filled with testimonials. So that’s not an issue for me. I am, though, interested in knowing how it might work better.

I’m also curious about whether its effectiveness is increased or decreased with different methods of delivery. For many years, we only taught people how to deliver the work one-on-one. Recently, we introduced Group Yoga Therapy programs and a program for Yoga teachers. I would like to know how effective these methods are, compared to the one-on-one approach.

We have recently begun to conduct research on the effectiveness of group Yoga therapy. One study examined the benefits of group Phoenix Rising therapy for irritable bowel syndrome, and we found a 55% reduction in symptoms. We trained 20 practitioners to lead similar groups for general stress reduction. There was a big spread in those results, but again, we found on average a 50% reduction of stress-related symptoms.

The advantage of working in a group is that people get a lot of support from the group, if it is well facilitated. They can be inspired by others, which you don’t get in the individual session. What you miss out on is the individual focus, and the opportunity to go deeper. People who have done our group training have been better able to get into settings like hospitals, community centers – it’s an economic thing; these organizations (or the clients) cannot afford the one-on-one session.

I wouldn’t like an outside organization, particularly someone with a set idea of what Yoga therapy is, coming in to tell me what standards to use. We need to have conversations with each other to ensure that we don’t do that to each other. Who am I to say how you should be doing things?

I think it would help to have an organization that was far-sighted enough to be able to recognize what already exists, and how this could be used to create some more broadly recognized credentialing. It would need to accommodate the different approaches, so there might need to be at least two different kinds of qualifications for Yoga Therapists – one on a Treatment model and one using a Process model.

There could also be some overlap that promotes better understanding of each model. To some extent, PRYT does this already, and encourages our practitioners-in-training to experience different approaches.

Our training model came from my own experience with Vermont College, when I was able to do independent study for a graduate degree in Yoga therapy. The idea is to provide a certain amount of in-house training, and use a mentoring system for the student to gain practical experience under supervision.

In the eight-month third level of the PRYT training, standards include peer evaluation of a session, a session with a supervising mentor, and a number of practice sessions observed by a group of teachers.

Students in Level 3 attend two residential workshops during this eight-month period of training. They are assigned a mentor and work closely with their mentor by phone, email, mail, and in person, starting with a meeting at the program orientation. At this time, the mentor looks not only at the student from a professional perspective, but also what they bring from their life experience. Every Yoga therapist brings not only their training and skills to their Yoga therapy sessions, but also themselves. Part of their training is to become well-rounded in their personal Yoga practice, and what they bring to their clients. Being grounded, present to the world, is really important. Using Yoga as a tool for life, instead of as a way to escape from life, is really important.

One thing mentors do at orientation is help the student plan the daily spiritual practice that is required as part of the program. We don’t offer simply one standard Yoga practice. We try to look at the student and encourage them to commit to a practice that will give them the maximum opportunity for growth and development.

Whether you like it or not, if you are planning on making a business out of Yoga therapy, you also need to learn about business. Most Yoga therapists I know don’t know much about it. I sure didn’t when I started. And many of us don’t want to learn about it. We think if we put up some rag-tag flyer at the local health food store the phone will start ringing. We need to learn how to market ourselves effectively and how to network. I always tell our students, "If you don’t have people calling for sessions, go out and talk to people. And if that doesn’t do it, go out and talk to more people."

Networking is the most important thing, and finding the words to describe what you do. Tell some stories, give examples of people you’ve worked with. Try to find the alternative-friendly practitioners in the area, because they make referrals. Ask people who their general practitioner is, and whether they are open to alternative methods.

Be a learner. Go out very humbly and find out what other people are doing, and how you can fit into what is already happening, rather than trying to create something totally new.

I wouldn’t do this work if it didn’t fulfill me personally and spiritually. Even now, after over 20 years, my work with Phoenix Rising gives me fuel for my spiritual growth and helps me put what I learn back into the world in some way. That’s why I started this in the first place. Most people who come to Phoenix Rising are looking not only for professional satisfaction, but also for spiritual and personal growth. I would encourage all Yoga therapists to find a training program, find a teacher, find a way of doing it that gives you that. Don’t settle for less. Sometimes we think the "head" learning is most important, but just learning more stuff is not going to really satisfy your soul. What will is connecting with people at a really deep level. •IAYT•