What does creativity have to do with Yoga Therapy?

My father once asked me what connection there was between studying visual communication design and the work I do now.

For me, the connection felt obvious, although it was not always easy to explain.

Creativity has been part of my life for as long as I can remember. It was present when I danced classical ballet, when I studied and worked as a visual communication designer, and throughout more than two decades of working with children, families and educators. It shaped Enchanted Wonders™ and, perhaps less visibly, it is woven into the way I work as a yoga therapist.

Working with children made creativity very practical. Children often showed me quickly whether an invitation reaches them. A change in language, an image, a rhythm, a story or the freedom to make a choice can transform how they meet an experience. Learning to notice and respond to this has stayed with me.

Earlier this academic year, as my youngest son transitioned and became a university student, I returned to Out of Our Minds by Sir Ken Robinson. His thinking has influenced how I understand creativity, education and children for many years.

One sentence stayed with me:

“Creativity is a process more often than it is an event.”

We often notice creativity through its finished form: a piece of art, an idea, a performance or something new that has been made. Yet much of creativity happens before we know where we are going. It develops through attention, curiosity, experimentation and a willingness to change direction.

We do not always need to see the finished form before we begin.

This feels deeply relevant to yoga therapy.

Each person arrives with a different body, history, set of circumstances and relationship with practice. They may also arrive differently from one session to the next. The work has structure, therapeutic knowledge and a clear intention, while its form develops in response to the person.

When someone brings something they would like to explore, there may be several possible ways into the experience. Movement might feel accessible. At another time, breath, sound, rest, imagery, conversation or attention to sensation may offer a more appropriate place to begin.

Sometimes the smallest adjustment changes the person’s relationship with the practice: sitting rather than lying down, keeping the eyes open, introducing movement before stillness, shortening the practice or offering more choice.

We notice what happens and allow that experience to inform what comes next.

Within this process, I keep one question close:

What might create enough curiosity for this person to return to the practice?

A practice can be appropriate in theory and still have very little place in someone’s life.

To become useful, it needs to feel relevant enough to remember, accessible enough to use and meaningful enough to revisit.

Curiosity can help that relationship develop. It invites the person to notice rather than perform, and to explore without needing to achieve a particular result.

Over time, they may begin to recognise what they need and make more informed choices about what supports them.

This responsiveness is held within professional training, ethics, therapeutic knowledge and ongoing assessment.

In trauma-informed work, it also involves careful attention to pacing, choice, agency and the person’s sense of safety.

The process is collaborative. I bring therapeutic knowledge, many years of embodied experience, and the attentiveness and creativity to explore different possibilities with the person in front of me. The person brings their own lived experience and their response to what we explore. The practice develops between us through deep listening, trying, noticing and adjusting.

When I think about my father’s question now, the answer feels clearer than ever. My studies in design gave me a way of seeing that I still use every day. All the different chapters of my life have shaped how I listen, what I notice and how I respond to the person in front of me.

This is what I mean when I say:

I design creative ways back into the body.

By this, I mean creating the conditions in which something can be discovered.

My knowledge and experience guide the work, while the person’s responses help us understand where to go next.

The creativity lies in that exchange and in allowing the practice to develop without deciding its form too soon.

Is there something in your own life that you might approach with a little more curiosity?

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