I. Universal Wellbeing Skills in 10 Domains

1. HABIT & CHANGE

Wellbeing Skills

1. Patterns and shifts
   • yoga and ayurveda view
   • principle of adaptation—use it or lose it
2. The whole person
   • willpower, energy, resistance, effort
   • stress vs challenge, safety, resilience, coping, allostasis
   • curiosity, exploration, play, new vs familiar
3. The environment
   • supports for new patterns
   • triggers for old patterns
4. The journey
   • steps—small steps and large steps
   • less vs more in time and complexity
   • lapses, trying again vs trying differently, commitment
   • conviction, insight, growing vs changing
5. The goal
   • personal meaning of change, value system, intrinsic and extrinsic reward
   • acceptance, engagement and letting go

Traditional Frameworks

1. vṛtti, samskāra
2. hetu, phala, āśraya, ālambana
3. guṇa, doṣa, prakṛti
4. śraddhā, vīrya, prajñā, vrata
5. tapas, svādhyāya, īśvara-praṇidhāna

2. AWARENESS

Wellbeing Skills

1. Categories, practices, and stages of directed attention
   • mindfulness, absorption, contemplation
   • stages of progressive absorption
2. Awareness for holistic transformation
   • monitoring
   • focus
   • insight
   • goal-setting
3. Managing the quality of awareness
   • energy and dullness, effort and relaxation
   • steadiness, entrainment
   • focused vs. expansive
   • emotions, positive and negative
   • path over time
4. Objects or experiences of focus: body, breath, senses, emotions, abstractions, self
5. Awareness and the three guṇas of yoga
   • as the foundation of all experiences
   • as supports and barriers to attention
   • as variables in the quality of awareness
6. Practicing mindfulness
   • cautions, challenges, recommendations
   • mindfulness of breath, body, senses, thoughts and emotions
7. Practicing absorption
   • in sound, mantra, speech
   • in light, images
   • in breath and body sensation
   • in positive emotions
   • in peace, stillness

Traditional Frameworks

1. bhāva
2. dhāraṇā, dhyāna, samādhi
3. smṛti-sādhana
4. prajñā
5. vikalpa, vitarka, vicāra
6. grahītā, grahaṇā, grāhya

Modern Science

1. Neuroscience of the self, including
   • emergence and purpose of self-construct
   • nerve signaling, neural networks, artificial intelligence
   • theories of consciousness
   • top-down monitoring and feedback systems
2. Neurobiology of attention, including
   • mindfulness, absorption
   • flow states, DMN, TPN
   • mystic and alternative consciousness states

3. FEELING

Wellbeing Skills

1. Understanding emotion, valence, energy, guṇa-s, kleśa-s
2. Winding down from high energy: body, breath, senses
3. Activating from low energy: body, breath, senses
4. Deep rest and recovery
5. Desire, contentment, inner restfulness
6. Anger, letting go, peace
7. Fear, strength, support, transcendence
8. Ego, identity, self and other
9. Sadness, grief, navigating loss
10. Safety, control, choice
11. Gratitude, joy, compassion, friendliness, love
12. Exploring emotion, body-mind connection, and behavior
13. Physical sensation visualizations

Traditional Frameworks

1. 3 guṇa-s, bhāva
2. kleśa-s
3. prasupta, tanu, vicchinna, udāra
4. maitrī, karuṇā, mudita, upekṣā, santoṣa
5. pravṛtti, nivṛtti, nirveda, vairāgya
6. rasa theory of drama

Modern Science

1. Pathways of sensation, interoception
2. Stress response
   • sympathetic, activation, mobilization, responses
   • parasympathetic, relaxation, immobilization responses
   • polyvagal theory, heart rate variability
   • window of tolerance, resilience

4. WORDS & THOUGHTS

Wellbeing Skills

1. Cognition through words
   • concepts and abstractions
   • inner dialogue and life story
2. Watching over speech and thoughts
3. Managing thoughts
   • principles for managing negative thoughts
   • principles for positive thoughts, intentions, affirmations
4. Supportive words
   • identifying strengths and support
   • speaking to strengths and supports
5. Safe words
6. Positive words
7. Ethical words

Traditional Frameworks

1. pramāṇa, viparyaya, vikalpa, smṛti
2. parā, paśyantī, madhyamā, vaikarī
3. mantra as words

Modern Science

1. Cognitive therapy
2. Motivational interviewing
3. Trauma sensitive language

5. MOVEMENT

Wellbeing Skills

1. Skills of moving well: learning path, application
   • pain-management as needed
   • awareness & exploration
   • relaxation, release
   • mobilization, easing movement
   • stability, control
   • strength, endurance
   • range of movement, stretching
   • alignment for safe and effective force transmission and loading
   • balance, gait
   • agility, speed and responsiveness
   • coordination, increasing complexity
   • positive emotion and supportive dialogue toward the body
   • breathing to support moving well
   • play, intrinsic reward
2. Exercises for each of these regions to develop important movement skills, with a holistic focus
   • low back
   • mid & upper back
   • neck
   • shoulders
   • elbow, wrist, hand
   • sacrum
   • hip
   • knee
   • ankle, foot
3. Practices combining multiple movement skills for a region and across regions
4. Guidelines for safety
5. Decision pathways for working with each body region by skill
6. Modifying common asanas for skill development

Traditional Frameworks

1. purpose of asana in classical yoga
2. sthira, sukha
3. prayatna, śaithilya
4. ananta-samāpatti
5. krama, vinyāsa, pratikriyā
6. asana names and Sanskrit
7. common traditional asanas

Modern Science

1. Tissues of the locomotor system: fascia, cartilage, bones, muscles, ligaments, joints, nerves
2. Global organization of movement
   • tension, compression, tensegrity and integration
   • prediction, feedback, neural control
   • development of movement
3. Science of key locomotor skills
   • basics of exercise physiology
   • strength training
   • stretching and range of movement
   • stabilization and tracking
   • alignment
   • balance and gait

6. BREATHING

Wellbeing Skills

1. Breath awareness
   1. observing the breath
   1. natural breath
   1. regulating the breath
2. Effort of breathing
   • decreasing effort—ease and relaxation
   • increasing effort—energy and arousal
   • deep and shallow breathing
3. Physical patterns of breathing and their uses
   • abdomen
   • lower ribs
   • upper chest
   • back
4. Breath and body movement
5. Slowing the breath
6. Fast breathing
7. Cultivating the inhalation: movement, position, touch, visualization, sound, sequencing
8. Cultivating the exhalation: movement, position, touch, visualization, sound, sequencing
9. Breath suspension, stepped breathing, breathing ratios
10. Ujjāyī breathing
11. Breath as a connector
    • subtle body or inner body experience with the breath
    • changing emotional content
    • changing sensation content
12. Breath and sound: working with breath using vocalization, mantra, chanting
13. Bandha-s: jalandhara, mula, uddīyāna
14. Pranayamas of hatha yoga
    • ujjāyī, anuloma-ujjāyī, viloma- ujjāyī, pratiloma- ujjāyī
    • laharī, naḍīśodhana
    • naḍīśodhana
    • bhastrikā, kaphālabhāti
    • bhrāmarī
    • sūryabhedana, candrabhedana
    • śītalī, śītkārī

Traditional Frameworks

1. Pranayama and ayurveda
   • doṣa, agni, vāyu
   • heating, cooling, drying, nourishing
2. prāṇa, 5 prāṇa-s
3. nāḍī, iḍā, piṅgalā, suṣumnā
4. cakra
5. deśa, kāla, saṁkhyā, dīrgha, sūkṣma
6. sama-vṛtti, viṣama-vṛtti, vaikarī, vairambha

Modern Science

1. Functional anatomy of the respiratory system
2. Functional anatomy of breathing cycle
3. Physiology of respiration, including:
   • control of breathing
   • gas exchange and transport
   • energy generation
   • metabolic impact, acid-base balance
   • hyperventilation and hypoventilation
4. Visceral regulation, stress response, and breathing
   • interoception, homeostasis, autonomic nervous system
   • vagal tone, heart rate variability, regulation through breath
   • connections based on polyvagal theory

7. SENSES & LIFESTYLE

Wellbeing Skills

1. Importance of personalizing lifestyle
2. Daily routine and rituals of lifestyle
3. Sleep management
4. Balancing work, play, rest
5. Stages of life
6. The environment and seasons
7. The eyes and vision
8. The ears, what we hear

Traditional Frameworks

1. dinacarya
2. ṛtucarya
3. hīna-, ati-, mithyā-yoga
4. prajñāparādha
5. pratyāhāra

Modern Science

1. Physiology of sleep
2. Anatomy, physiology, neurology of vision
3. Anatomy, physiology, neurology of hearing

8. NUTRITION

Wellbeing Skills

1. Understanding relationship to food and hunger (nourishment, craving, coping)
2. Charting diet and eating patterns
3. Cultivating beneficial relationships to food
4. Fasting, its relevance, safety

Modern Science

1. Anatomy and physiology of digestion, assimilation, metabolism
2. Importance of the gut, microbiome, and its connections to health
3. Overview of nutrients, theories of diet

Traditional Frameworks

1. Ayurvedic foundations of metabolism (doṣa, agni, dhātu, mala)
2. Ayurvedic approach to personalizing diet (prakṛti, time, environment)
3. Rituals of healthful eating (mantra-s, prāṇa, agni)

9. RELATIONSHIP

Wellbeing Skills

1. Role of connection in wellbeing
2. Navigating relationships with a holistic approach
3. Common archetypes: parent-child, spouse, friend, teacher-student, therapist-client etc.
4. Ethics and boundaries
5. Real-life case studies of relationships

Traditional Frameworks

1. types of sambandha
2. adhyāsa
3. yama-s

10. LIFE MEANING

Wellbeing Skills

1. Choice, acceptance, control, letting go
2. Life purpose, achievement, connection to that greater than ourselves
3. Spirituality, divine, devotion
4. End of life, transitions

Traditional Frameworks

1. dharma, jñāna, virāga, aiśvarya
2. dharma, artha, kāma, mokṣa
3. īśvara praṇidhāna
4. karma, jñāna, bhakti yoga
5. pravṛtti, nivṛtti
6. theory of karma

II. Traditional Frameworks (Common to all domains)

1. 3 guṇa-s (sattva, rajas, tamas)
2. 3 doṣa-s (vāta, pitta, kapha)
3. bhāva
4. prakṛti
5. theory of qualities and functions
6. theory of causation (kāraṇa—sākṣāt, paramparā, upādāna, nimitta)

III. Modern Science (Common to all domains)

1. Immune system
   • role and functioning of the immune system
   • inflammation, cell damage and repair
2. Endocrine system
   • important hormones and control of vital functions
3. Cardiovascular system
   • anatomy and physiology of the heart and blood vessels
   • blood pressure regulation
4. Autonomic nervous system

IV. Disorder-Based Guidelines

1. Common to all diagnoses
   • mapping presentations based on diagnoses to self-care and wellbeing domains and skills
   • taking a holistic approach
   • safety, scope of practice, and need for referral
   • connecting with traditional frameworks
2. Chronic pain
   • pain science: biology, pathways, etiology, classifications
   • risk and referral, pain measures, evaluation for self-care
3. Locomotor disorders
   • lumbar spine (chronic low back pain, disc herniation, sciatica, facet joint dysfunction, hyperlordosis, spondylolisthesis)
   • thoracic spine (hyperkyphosis, stiffness, facet joint dysfunction)
   • cervical spine (head forward alignment, disc herniation, nerve compression)
   • scoliosis
   • osteoporosis
   • shoulder (impingement, rotator cuff tears, instability)
   • elbow, hand (epicondylitis, carpal tunnel syndrome)
   • sacroiliac pain and dysfunction
   • hip (fracture, alignment, soft tissue imbalances)
   • knee (IT band, meniscal tears, ligament strains)
   • dropped arches, hallux valgus
4. Neurological disorders
   • stroke
   • Parkinson’s disease
   • dementia, Alzheimer’s disease
5. Sleep disorders
6. Autoimmune disorders
   • multiple sclerosis
   • autoimmune arthritis (rheumatoid, psoriatic)
   • Crohn’s disease, ulcerative colitis
7. Thyroid disorders
8. Chronic fatigue syndrome
9. Obesity
10. Diabetes mellitus and metabolic syndromes
11. Cancer (pathology, diagnosis, journey of the patient, treatments, common types)
12. Respiratory disorders
    • allergies
    • sinusitis
    • asthma
    • COPD
    • cystic fibrosis
13. Cardiovascular disease
    • atherosclerosis
    • ischemic heart disease
    • high blood pressure
    • heart failure
    • arrhythmias
    • deep vein thrombosis
14. Digestive disorders
    • irritable bowel syndrome
    • gastritis, ulcers
    • malabsorption
    • diaphragmatic hernia
    • constipation, loose stools, irregular digestion
15. Menstrual disorders, menopause
16. Pregnancy and women’s health in yoga
17. Aging
18. Eye disorders
19. Hearing loss, tinnitus
20. Chronic kidney disease, dialysis
21. Trauma, PTSD, anxiety spectrum
22. Depression spectrum
23. Addictions
24. Schizophrenia
25. ADHD
26. Autism

Guidance for Teachers & Therapists

1. Assessing the client.
2. Designing practices for different needs.
3. Delivering skills in multiple ways.
4. Language, communication, and therapeutic relationship.
5. Safety and contraindications.
6. Case studies and mentoring.