Download Psychologie aktuell: Yoga - successful in the treatment of drug

Psychologie aktuell: Yoga - successful in the treatment of drug addiction
27-07-11
Yoga - successful in the treatment of drug addiction
"Yoga might be helpful in the treatment of drug addiction. Drugs - their primary effects may be
sedative, stimulating, or dissociative - all can produce some kind of euphoria, which might
have a quality similar to that of altered states of consciousness arrived at through Yoga
techniques," Professor Dr. Peter Sedlmeier reports.
"How can these euphoric states be induced by drugs? Consciousness can be released from inhibition
by sedative drugs (e.g. alcohol), it can be directly expanded and enlarged by stimulating drugs (e.g.
cocaine), and a variety of ´religious feelings´ can be induced by dissociative drugs such as
ayahuasca, marijuana, peyote, or LSD. The similarity between the effects of Yoga and drugs might be
the basis for using Yoga as a potent therapeutic device in this field.
Some of the beneficial therapeutic effects of Yoga can be seen as (predicted) byproducts of Yoga
practice, which are attained on the way to higher stages of consciousness.
It seems that in therapeutic settings, Yoga practice is quite prevalent but there is still a scarcity of
empirical studies that measure its effectiveness in the treatment of different disorders and examine
differential effects of Yoga versus conventional therapeutic approaches ..."
Peter Sedlmeier: Ancient Indian Psychology - Can it Offer Anything to Academic Psychology?
in: Rapp, Sedlmeier, Zunker-Rapp (Eds.) Perspectives on Cognition. Pabst, Lengerich/Berlin, 540
pages, ISBN 978-3-89967-314-2
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