“This is a first of its kind offering that combines pain science with yogic principles and compassionate practices to give yoga teachers the confidence to help their students with pain move from fear and fragility to fearlessness!”
–Kristina
Dear Friend,
We rarely think about what we think about pain. Yet when we do, we realize that many beliefs do not match with our life experiences. On the other hand, contemplating pain science and yoga teachings exposes kindred views. With these views guiding our language and approach to yoga and pain care we remove barriers that have held our students/clients back from finding more ease and less pain during yoga practice and life.
Neil: When I started as a physiotherapist in the mid-80s, I quickly realized that what my patients were telling me about pain didn’t match with what I learned in school. There were no courses on pain during school or after, but the implicit message was loud and clear – the solution was finding ‘the tissue’ causing the pain. Such linear, mechanistic ideas rarely help when pain persists – pain is always multifaceted. So, for a long time, I relied more on the experiences of my patients to help me understand pain and pain care.
Now we know that yoga teachings about pain align very well with pain science. Just like patients and yogis taught us, the solutions come when we can unveil misconceptions. Or to state this in the language of pain science, solutions come when we reconceptualize pain.
Lisa: As I explored more deeply into yoga for therapy, it became obvious to me that pain is a whole human experience. It is affected by absolutely everything within us and around us. “As above, so below, as within, so without…”, This mystical axiom put the path of pain care into a perspective where my mystical nature was drawn to curiosity and wonder. How can we use self realization to manage and change pain?
Pain is a whole human experience. Everything affects pain. What we think, what we believe, what we see, hear, remember, wish for… Everything has an effect on our pain experience.
The teachings of yoga align with this; that we are multifaceted beings that are greatly impacted by everything around us and that we, with mindful action and awareness can become more perceiving, more peaceful and less sensitive to the influences surrounding us and within us. We have forgotten our true nature. Yoga teaches us that when we remember and wholly acknowledge our embodied experiences we can view them from an expanded, fuller, more complete perspective. Yoga and Pain Science go hand and hand they do not disagree nor compete with helpful service to knowing our true nature and overcoming fear, despair, pain and suffering.
There is no quick path to becoming pain care aware, and to changing your approach and language related to pain and pain care. This Foundations course is the place to start – to gain more knowledge, to experience change for yourself, and to prepare you for making your teaching, clinical or therapeutic work Pain Care Aware.
Join our community of like-minded care providers.
Be Curious about pain. Change is possible.
Take the first step to integrate yoga and pain science into your yoga teaching, yoga therapy or health professional clinical practice.
If you’ve ever experienced…
Then you’re ready to learn more about pain and pain care. The goods news is that Pain Care Aware Foundations will provide you with knowledge and skills to overcome these barriers and to effectively integrate yoga and pain science into your language and approach to helping people experiencing pain – whether the pain is acute or persistent.
Over the next weeks, this course will provide the tools you need to:
After you gain foundational knowledge about pain, people in pain and pain care, you will complete and contemplate the effects of pain care practices. This prepares you to change your language and approach to pain care, while offering you techniques to guide others when there is pain, and at the same time providing you with the conviction that pain is real, pain is changeable and we all have the ability to learn how to gain more influence over it.
The Pain Care Aware Foundations Course is a self-paced program with over 30 hours of continuing education offering a pain-informed approach to teaching yoga.
Within each module, choose options to learn with written, audio and video formats, listen to ‘the Swami and the Professor’ discuss key topics, then take the quiz to help consolidate key information.
This lesson provides an explanation of pain physiology. Reconceptualizing pain provides a new foundation from which to consider options beyond changing body position when there is pain in asana. You also explore the questions; “How much pain is okay in asana?” and, “Can I change the pain without changing my posture?” (Really change it, not suppress it or get good at tolerating it)
Discover that it makes sense to approach and to explore pain, and that Yoga is more inclusive, accessible, safer, and beneficial than is often understood.
Contemplate how “Pain is a complex human experience a whole lot like love.”
In this module we begin to break down theories of pain. From Rene Descartes, to Melzack and Wall, and Moseley and Butler. You will explore embedded misconceptions that don't align with current science or with yoga.
You will gain confidence to guide students to interoception and being 'aware in the moment' as options when there is pain, and how to regulate to decrease sensitivity of protective mechanisms and allow the body to regain health.
In this module we focus on developing and cultivating discernment and compassion in our approach to pain care. You will explore your role as a Pain Care Aware™ teacher to help students—and therefore society—seek wellness thru yoga and science. This path towards fearlessness is rooted in compassion, and arises through cultivation of courage and resiliency. Being Pain Care Aware includes teaching students and clients to be more discerning, when to observe, when to change, when to pause and how to find more ease and peace in asana.
This modules includes practices and techniques with downloadable scripts to deepen your practice and allow you access to personal insights about pain.
Language can inadvertently foster fear and limit potential. Negative words and expectations can decrease exploration and put an end to playfulness and curiosity.
In this module we offer specific recommendations: language to avoid, remove, or add. Language inspired by science and physiology, and inspired by yoga. Broadening concepts and perspectives, you become more flexible in your language, more inventive, more intentional, and far more realistically optimistic.
This modules includes practices and techniques with downloadable scripts to deepen your practice and allow you access to personal insights about pain.
Upon completion of the PCA Foundations Course, students receive a Certificate of Completion and are eligible to enroll in a Pain Care Aware™ YTT Certification Practicum in Teaching Groups or Teaching Individuals, or both!
For additional questions about this course, please reach out to us anytime at info@paincareaware.com
The Pain Care Aware Foundations Course is designed for Yoga Teachers, Yoga Therapists, Health Care Professionals, Movement Teachers and Movement Therapists.
Anyone who is working with people in movement groups of any size or 1:1, who would like to combine yoga and pain science education into a platform for changing the impact of pain on society.
Yes, this is important information. It is true that you will review what you have learned with Neil or Lisa at one point, but we strongly believe that multiple reviews are necessary and required when it comes to understanding pain. AND, the Pain Care Aware Online Foundations Course also adds an all new level of curriculum in changing our language in yoga cueing.
This is very difficult, especially if you have been cueing your classes a specific way for a long time.
New approaches in language and its application take time to digest, process, make your own and develop into action.
This course will give you a solid foundation to change how you cue yoga to include people who are in or experience pain in asana.
For this reason in order to develop new patterns in language which are rooted in yoga and in understanding pain science, the “why” becomes the important piece in changing pain in society through yoga.
Our mission cannot be met if this skill is not passed on, therefore, The Pain Care Aware Foundations Course is required of anyone seeking certification from Pain Care U., regardless of past student history. If you currently have a Certificate from Pain Care U it is completely valid and we are happy to have you on our team. We invite you to integrate this new information as you are able and hope that you join our Memberships to stay involved in your call to serve those with pain.
YES! This is why we created this program, so that we can be with all of you at once and on demand. Everyone can do the course at their own pace, so its’ easy to start anytime or join with a group and be guided through. However you chose to complete it, EVERYONE begins with the Pain Care Aware Foundations Course for ALL Pain Care U certification offerings.
You have as long as you wish, however we suggest that you finish it within 4 to 6 weeks to keep things fresh and to be able to help others by applying the knowledge into action more quickly. Often PCA Trainers, Lisa, or Neil will offer guided Full Certification Courses (Level 1 Foundations with a Level 2 certificate process), so you may chose to enrol in one of these to ensure you complete the work on a specified timeline if that is something that would serve your personality and learning style best.
Yes, once enrolled you will continue to have unlimited access.
We encourage graduates to return for any updates or to refresh their understanding, keeping knowledgable and relevant is important in our collaborative mission.