Yoga for Health

In 2001, while living in Adelaide, Australia, Patty saw a poster for "Happy Yoga" with Louisa Blake. Being an avid runner, Patty had pooh-poohed yoga as being not much of a workout. She had a change of heart after her first class. As it turns out, Blake was a 70-year-old yogini (female yoga teacher) who had trained with a yogi in India, and with her incredible teaching skills and her strong accent, would call Patty out saying "American, put your left foot forward and to the right” while teaching to a packed class from the perch of a small rickety table at the front of the local community center. In addition to feeling some relief from extremely tight muscles, the deep rhythmic breathing resulted in a calming effect McGown had never felt before. She was hooked! That was over 20 years ago. When McGown returned to her home in Montana, she began Yoga Teacher Training and eventually earned a 200-hour Registered Yoga Teacher Certification. She has been teaching yoga since and find it manages her stress levels, anxiety, and depression. She is also a Licensed Professional Counselor, and as such has experience with talk therapy. In this lecture, part of the Thursdays at the U Lecture Series, you will learn how yoga helps with both physical and mental health. It will be held 12:30-1:30 on March 3rd. This and other sessions of Thursdays at the U are held in the Blue Hills Lecture Hall (Ritzinger 234) on the UWEC-Barron County campus, located at 1800 College Drive in Rice Lake. All are free and open to the public, thanks to financial support from the campus foundation. Neither seating reservations nor parking permits are required for campus guests.