Wednesday, August 29, 2001

Sweet release
Yoga offers participants a soothing break from reality
by Laura Mc Farland
skiff staff

Gemma DePrang laughs when she remembers one of her student’s reaction to her first yoga class. The woman, a stressed mother of three, finished the class and told DePrang that she felt “all tingly.”

She, like a growing number of TCU students, is one of the many stressed, frazzled or just plain burned out people who have discovered the benefits yoga can have on a stressful life.

“It’s kind of like taking a vacation,” said DePrang, a yoga instructor at the Health and Fitness Connection. “Workaholics don’t do it, but when they finally do it, they think, ‘Why didn’t I do that sooner? I’m getting so much more done.’”

When DePrang talks about yoga, she easily lists the many benefits she credits to the exercise, which she said will help TCU students deal with stress from the many responsibilities they take on.

“It benefits everything as far as your mental, physical and spiritual well-being,” DePrang said. “It gets all three. It helps you settle your mind, it helps you tone your body and it helps you gain flexibility, which releases some tightness. You just feel better, and when you feel better, you do better. You’ll think more clearly.”

Yoga, DePrang said, also has other excellent health advantages. She said the most important focus in yoga is correct breathing, where the breath is taken from the diaphragm rather than the chest.

Deprang said that many people stay away from yoga because they expect chanting will be taking place, but she describes what people will find Fort Worth as “Western yoga,” which emphasizes strength, balance, flexibility and then some stillness at the end.

“Fort Worth is pretty conservative so we don’t chant,” DePrang said.

In addition to the stigma of yoga being a strictly Eastern and mystical practice, DePrang said another reason people avoid classes is because they are worried they’re not in the right physical condition, DePrang said.

“People of all fitness levels can come here,” she said. “On a Monday morning I’ll have a 19-year-old in my class and an 85-year-old in my class and we’ll all sit there and go through it together.”

Laura McFarland - skiff staff Juanita Parish holds a position at her Monday morning yoga class at the Health and Fitness Connection.

Yoga continues to increase in popularity as people gain more knowledge about it and the healthy affects it can have.

Julie Pummill, a senior piano performance major, said she practices yoga to relax as well as to increase strength and tone her body.

“Yoga is a good way to start the morning because it refreshes the mind,” Pummill said. “It increases your consciousness of your body because you have to concentrate on positioning it. Yoga also helps me be aware of my breathing.”

A growing number of people with tense, driven natures are being attracted to yoga, DePrang said, but many of these people, who may have a hard time settling, choose not to try yoga because they think it doesn’t involve much movement.

“I can spout the benefits all day, but until they come visit the class, they don’t get it,” DePrang said. “Some people still feel like it’s too slow, and they’re the ones who need it the most.”

Those who want the stress-relieving benefits yoga offers without the stillness have an option in Pilates, a more rhythmic exercise that emphasizes breath, like yoga, but it emphasizes stronger, more powerful breaths.

Pilates, said Jacque Crossin, a yoga and pilates instructor at the Health and Fitness Connection, is a non-impact exercise system that uses a person’s own body for resistance. Like yoga, Pilates helps with posture, flexibility, balance and strength.

Crossin, who has been teaching Pilates for the past year, said there is not very much stress in pilates.

“I have heard people mention that it is hard, especially people who are not in connection with their bodies,” Crossin said. “People who come to the classes say that (the exercises) looks so simple, but they’re really hard.”

Both DePrang and Crossin agree that yoga and Pilates would be a beneficial addition to any students life, because it gives them the time to slow down and spend one hour focusing solely on their mind and body.

Laura McFarland
l.d.mcfarland@student.tcu.edu