by Nina

Night of Love by Rene Magritte

Many years ago, I did an interview with Bonnie Maeda, a hospice nurse and a yoga teacher about yoga for grief. I’ve always loved her honest, straightforward, and gentle approach to this topic. But in the intervening years since my original interview, I’ve come up with more questions I wanted to ask Bonnie because grief is a topic I want to write about for my new book. Also, I think grief is an important topic right now because not only is the pandemic causing an increase in death worldwide, but people are grieving about many other types of losses the pandemic has caused. The other day, for example, I was talking outside and socially distant with my sister-in-law and she started to cry. I wanted to hug her so badly, but we are being careful so I held back. Still, I could not help but sharply feel the loss of my ability to comfort her with my touch. 

Fortunately, though, Bonnie agreed to do another interview with me and, as always, she put her heart—and her wisdom—into all her answers to my questions. Thank you so much, Bonnie.


Nina: Could you tell our readers a bit about yourself and briefly describe how you came to teach yoga for moving through grief?

Bonnie: As a child, I was considered to be “very sensitive”, and it is part of my true nature. It took some time for me not to think of this as a negative part of my character. The loss of my grandfather at the age of 12 is when I first became familiar with the feeling of sadness related to loss. As I grew older and experienced more loss, I became aware of a host of feelings related to loss and significant change. I became a nurse at the age of 23 working in a hospital where I continued to experience losses—although work related, they were very much felt personally. I then went through a divorce after 18 years of marriage and five children. This significant loss and change in my entire way of life left me devastated, fearful, full of anxiety, and lost myself. Healing from my losses I grew as a person learning more about who I truly am and knowing that accepting my process of grief was the path to healing. I then became a hospice nurse in 1992. During my time working in hospice, I was practicing yoga. My yoga teacher and mentor, Katie Allen, encouraged me to train as a yoga teacher.

I was a student in The Advanced Studies Program at The Yoga Room in Berkeley, California when my youngest son was murdered. The hole I fell into was so deep and so dark I did not know if I would ever recover. The yoga community of The Yoga Room held me and supported me. I continued to practice even when I could barely move.

No one judged my practice. They were just there for me. I was in the midst of my grief when Katie died of metastatic breast cancer. I kept practicing.

I received so much support and love through this difficult time. Together with the love, with therapy, and the practice of yoga, I slowly climbed out of that dark hole. As part of my healing, I wanted to share what I had learned about the healing practice of yoga.

Nina: Grief is such a complicated emotion, I think. It seems to me that people can experience this emotion—or maybe this set of emotions—very differently from one another, and that grief may not always feel like sorrow. From your perspective, how do you understand grief?


Bonnie: You are absolutely right. The grief process varies from person to person as well as from one type of loss or another. I believe what is important is to be aware of what your individual reaction and process is to a given loss or significant change. There is no right or wrong. Each person’s response to loss is personal depending on many factors. Some of the factors may include a person’s age and experience with loss. It can also be influenced by whether feelings are encouraged to be felt and expressed. I also believe for some it becomes a choice to explore the response to loss or suppress the feelings. This may be a protective mechanism as well. Sometimes the pain is too overwhelming to feel. I have also heard comments like, ”I don’t have time to deal with that right now.”


Nina: Although people tend to think of grief as a feeling we have after the death of a loved one, is this an emotion we can have over other losses? And do people tend to feel more grief during times of change?


Bonnie: Yes, and this is when you might hear someone say, “I don’t know why I feel like this.” There are some losses that feel more obvious than others. We are always going through changes. Some are easier to accept than others, and we may not attach an emotion to the change. It may even surprise us when we become aware that we are in a state of grief with a change occurring in our life. A diagnosis of a chronic disease, for example, is more obvious, and can be quite challenging to accept. Questions arise like” How will this affect my life?” and “Is it life threatening?” Remember grief is an emotional response to loss or change, and there are degrees of reactions to these changes. I think of the class of 2020, and that during the pandemic they were not able to celebrate as a group. I hoped the teachers and parents of the students were acknowledging the feelings these students may be experiencing as grief. The loss of a significant time in their lives.


Nina: I’ve heard from various experts that grief needs to run its course. They say it needs to be felt completely and given as much time as it needs. What do you think about that?

Bonnie: I agree. The human response to grief is extremely complicated with many variables. Each person, each loss, each significant change has its own unique course. There is no simple recipe or one way to process grief. For me, my grief will be a part of who I am for the rest of my life. It is how I continue to hold my son close.

Nina: How can yoga support us while we are moving through grief?

Bonnie: What I believe is that our emotions, feelings, and thoughts have energy and that energy lives in the body. Through the practice of yoga, we are able to create space, and even acceptance, around these areas of energy that hold our feelings. When we allow ourselves to feel our feelings fully and bring compassion to our experiences, this process can lessen the intensity and return us to a sense of wellbeing. Yoga is about self-exploration, and if we are willing to be present for this process, there is an amazing possibility of freedom.


Nina: What are some of your favorite poses and practices for helping people who are moving through grief?

Bonnie: There is no one answer to this question. This requires the student to experiment, and to find which poses will be appropriate for them. In the initial stage of grief, it may be lying on the mat practicing some stretches. Supported Child’s pose may be worth trying. Further into the process, adding a few standing poses, and not holding them for long periods. Here experiment with a low Supported Bridge pose. Progress slowly and mindfully depending on the amount of energy and the ability to focus. It is important to remember that the grief process is not linear. There may be times when the student needs to do less than the practice before. As part of each practice ask, ”How am I feeling in this moment, and what does my body need?”

Nina: Can people get stuck in their grief? If so, how someone tell? And can yoga help with that?

Bonnie: I believe so because it was part of my experience. I actually remember the day I said to myself, “I don’t want to live with this pain for the rest of my life.” At the same time, I did not know how not to. I was stuck. I learned my pain was my connection to my son, and I did not want that to change. I needed to find a way to change my relationship with my grief. Again, each person’s experience is unique not to be judged in any way.

Nina: A few years ago, you told me that you believe that grief can get stuck in the body and that “releasing” it can help those who are grieving to move through their grief. Could you explain this for our readers and say something about how yoga can help with this?

Bonnie: I believe yoga is a practice that moves the energies of the body. It has been my experience over the years of practice that I feel lighter with a sense of vitality after practicing. As I understand this for myself, yoga is all about energetic movement. I can observe this as well in the way students look and feel after a practice. It can be quite remarkable.

I don’t know if I would use the word releasing now. I believe there can be a softening or spaciousness created with the practice around where grief is held in the body.


Nina: Are there any yoga practices and/or poses that people who are grieving should avoid?

Bonnie: This is an interesting question. I say this because I have had many students think that only restorative poses are appropriate after a major loss or death. What I have found is students need gentle movement, not stillness. Also, the deeper backbends may trigger “deeper” emotions. Another consideration is that the student experiencing grief needs to feel safe in the class. I return here to how variable each student is and how their experience of their grief is being felt at any given time.

Nina: My own experiences with grief felt a lot like stress, maybe stress mixed with sorrow. If you’re experiencing stress, anxiety, depression, or anger as a part of your grief, does it make sense to use the yoga tools that might help with those emotions?

Bonnie: Absolutely, especially if yoga has been part of your life for a period of time. It can serve as an anchor in a time of turmoil. I believe it is extremely important for the student to realize their practice may look and feel very different when coping with difficult emotions. It truly could be a five-minute practice lying on the mat doing leg stretches. And when “the mat” just doesn’t feel possible, to give yourself permission to take a walk or a nap.

Nina: Is there anything else you’d like to say to our readers about this topic?

Bonnie: Only to reiterate that each person experiences each loss in their own way, and in their own time. If the practice of yoga feels supportive, that is great. If it feels too challenging to get on the mat, that is okay as well. Bringing compassion and a tender heart to the experience of loss and change is what’s crucial.

Bonnie Maeda, RN, is a trained Iyengar-style yoga teacher. She graduated from The Advanced Studies Program of The Berkeley Yoga Room in 2001. Her approach is gentle yoga for health and healing as well as restorative yoga to promote relaxation and to manage stress. She believes in the benefits of yoga for every age, body type, and ability. See yogaroomberkeley.com for information about the classes Bonnie teaches at The Yoga Room in Berkeley, California.

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