Gail Parker has delivered a surprising, thoughtful, rigorous book about how yoga practice can exacerbate racial trauma, especially if it is done without awareness of the unique aspect of race based stress. Chock full of concise examples and concrete steps, Restorative Yoga for Ethnic and Race Based Stress and Trauma prepares instructors and practitioners alike for the spiritual work of healing racial wounds. This book should be required reading for yoga studio owners, yoga teachers, yoga therapists and for everyone practicing yoga while black.
Dr. Parker has gifted the world with this elegant, powerful book of insights, challenges, and hope. She masterfully weaves the worlds of yoga, healing, trauma and culture in clear, powerful prose. The practices offer you a new understanding of "yoga." You aren't addressing the cultural kleshas? Then get the book!
A timely, penetrating search for commonality in a racialized world. Dr. Parker expands the construct of trauma as an assault to the fundamental human need to belong, and examines the traumatic consequences of social exclusion. Healing requires embracing our inner connectedness, and questioning personal and social beliefs that divide us. The book asks more questions than it answers. Let the conversation begin!
This book shook me to my core as I had to not only confront my own trauma as an African-American woman, but the trauma of others. But then it brought me peace (in the form of yoga) as Dr. Gail provided concrete tools for collective healing. If you are committed to any level of social justice, this book is a must read to heal not only yourself but to help heal others.
Dr. Gail Parker's Restorative Yoga for Ethnic and Race-based Stress and Trauma is a unique read. Parker writes from the perspective of a woman who grew up during the Jim Crow era —- some of America's cruelest, harshest and unjust times.
Dr. Gail Parker's powerful new book is delivered with love, compassion and liberation. Dr. Parker reminds us, through personal story telling, the wounds and scars caused by racial and ethic trauma and the the need for radical healing. This is the book we have collectively been waiting for. This book is a love offering of straightforward life changing tools to foster healing in ourselves and transform our communities.
Dr. Gail Parker's skills as a psychologist, researcher, yoga educator and storyteller converge to share multiple ways a comprehensive and practical application of yoga can restore body, mind and spirit and neutralize the harmful impact of ethnic and race-based trauma. She empowers individuals to acknowledge their racial wounding while shining light on the need for deep healing among those who inflict race-based violence. This book is useful for everyone seeking pathways of peace and understanding to heal the human family.
We should all be thankful that Gail Parker, wounded by her own experience of racism, stumbled upon a yoga class. Later, as a psychologist, she came to recognize the healing possible in the stillness of Restorative Yoga. This book is Parker's gracious offering, a beautifully written survival guide for those who have experienced ethnic and race-based stress and trauma, but also for those who wound and re-wound others. It demands we be honest and no longer deny or repress our pain or the pain we inflict upon others. It brilliantly shows us that we have the ability to heal and accept with grace the commonness of our humanity.
Powerfully and compassionately written, this book remedies the silence our culture maintains around issues of race, ethnicity, and oppression. Dr. Gail Parker fluidly integrates science, psychology, yoga philosophy, and spiritual activism to illustrate the importance of racial unity in diversity and of doing the inner work that helps us achieve it. The book is peppered with captivating stories and opportunities for study through reflection sections, discussion points, and practice. It is a must-read, both for people with privilege and those who experience oppression. It will transform the work of yoga teachers, yoga therapists, psychotherapists, and anyone who wants to be more aware of ethnic and race-based stress and trauma and how to address it.
Gail Parker's important work is a welcome portal into a critical conversation in which we are all engaged. Uniquely, this book is also a thoughtful roadmap for furthering that conversation through the healing practices of yoga.
Dr. Parker has delivered a concise, frank, and yet non-confrontational look into a sensitive subject. She has opened the door for understanding with insightful and gentle provocations that, rather than telling you how to be, encourage beneficial self-reflection and supportive dialogue that can lead to healing. It is not just a book about how the tools of yoga can help heal race-based stress and trauma - it is an invitation to dive into our own psyche and heart, and into the shoes of others - to pierce through the veils of illusion and be able to see clearly. For anyone who has been affected by or contributed to racial prejudices, or perhaps isn't sure, I recommend this book. I also highly recommend this book for any yoga teacher, as it is important to understand where students could be coming from, and how to help support wholeness rather than knowingly or unknowingly contributing to separation and suffering.
Dr. Gail Parker has covered the important subject of race-based trauma with sensitivity, scientific precision and empathy. Yoga is presented with the principles of yoga, detailed practices, convincing case histories and anecdotes as a way to achieve deep healing.
A powerful read for people of all races.
Rane Bowen and Jo Stewart
Gail Parker has been a trusted colleague for over two decades. I've always admired her ability to keep her finger on the pulse of issues affecting our community. With this book, she combines decades of experience into a guide for yoga teachers and practitioners to transform yoga into an inclusive space for all.
A transformative book - not just for yoga practitioners. Through yoga philosophy, research and story Dr Gail Parker illuminates how we each add to and suffer from racial trauma. The wisdom and practices shared offer the opportunity to heal ourselves and our communities.
Simply put, Dr. Gail Parker 's book is an Awakening. Empowering. Inspiring hope. Life-changing! underpinnings and progression of racism, and ethnic and race-based trauma, to ground us in an awareness of the enduring visible and invisible "wounds" to mind, body, emotion and spirit. She then guides us through, onto a path of HOPE, anchored in the inner work of "self-study" and the "healing balm" of Restorative Yoga.all our intergenerational lives ... made me want to cry. I could identify with the pain, but I was also touched by her care, extraordinary insights, and the wisdom she gives away so generously.Life-changing!
Paula Christian Kliger PhD
