In late November and early December 2023, Angie Jones completed a specialized yoga teacher training at Duke Integrative Medicine in Durham, North Carolina, the Integrative Yoga for Seniors Professional Training.  She spent this 8-day workshop with 14 fellow yoga teachers from across the U.S. and Canada studying with Kimberly Carson and Carol Krucoff, founders of the Yoga for Seniors program.  (Kimberly Carson also co-taught the Mindful Yoga for Cancer training that Angie completed at Duke in 2019.)  Angie is excited to become the tenth teacher in Kentucky to have completed the Integrative Yoga for Seniors program.  

This intensive training featured a mixture of practice, lecture, and discussion.  Before the trainees’ first yoga practice together, they were invited to “senior-ize” themselves to experience temporarily some of the experiences of practicing in an older body.  They could choose to dampen their hearing with cotton balls, wear a visor to reduce the clarity of their vision, breathe through a straw in their mouths to mimic breath challenges, tape their toes together to reduce foot flexibility and challenge balance, and strap one arm to their torsos to simulate a shoulder or an arm injury.

Lectures were delivered by Duke medical professionals with experience working with patients and clients to manage health conditions and recover from surgeries that are common as we age.  Each guest reviewed the medical aspects of the conditions they treat.  They then highlighted the benefits of yoga for folks with the conditions that they see, noted appropriate modifications and variations to those people’s practice, and directed participants to additional research to learn more.  Many guests emphasized the social benefit that we all gain from practicing with other people in a shared space and building community.

Dr. Mitchell Krucoff, a cardiologist and professor of cardiology, discussed cardiovascular concerns and reminded us of our students’ “remarkable resilience.”  Christine Baright, a physical therapist, addressed arthritis and joint replacements and charged participants with figuring out how to help their yoga students transfer lessons from the studio into their daily activities.  On the day devoted to palliative care and grief, Dr. Tony Galanos, a professor of medicine, spoke movingly on personal loss and his work to help fellow doctors with their own grief.  After his presentation, the group took a field trip to the Memorial Garden at Sarah P. Duke Gardens for a walking meditation.  After the private reflection, they discussed their own experiences of loss with partners.

Angie appreciates the other teachers at 4yoga who made it possible for her to travel to North Carolina for this experience—and she especially thanks Frances and Trudy, who taught extra Gentle classes while she was gone.

To learn more about how Angie is applying her Integrative Yoga for Seniors Professional Training to her teaching, please join her for one of her Gentle classes; she teaches on Tuesdays at 1:30 p.m. and on Thursdays at 9 a.m.  Or if you’re finding your way to yoga or back to yoga, one of her private Intro to Yoga sessions may be a good first step.  

Angie is also exploring options to share what she learned both with fellow teachers and with other students in February and beyond.