Jennifer Houghton

For more than seven years Jennifer Houghton has been a certified yoga instructor and for the last three, the director of Flowing Yogi Studio, located at 126-2nd Ave. West.

It’s no secret that the ancient mental, physical and spiritual Sanskrit practice has exploded in popularity in North America — especially over the last ten years; its many variations, including Ashtanga, Bikram, Hatha and Vinyasa Flow — can be practiced in hot or cool rooms and by all levels of practitioners.

Houghton’s clientele is diverse, but many of the students in her ‘gentle yoga’ classes include people who are post-injury or living with arthritis, fibromyalgia, multiple sclerosis (MS) or other types of chronic pain; Houghton added that her gentle yoga classes have become very popular among seniors, as well.

“What’s different about the yoga I’m teaching is that people who feel the need to keep up in other yoga classes don’t feel that way in my classes,” said Houghton.

“Instead of people having to adapt to yoga poses, we adapt the yoga poses for them.”

One of Houghton’s yoga students who has found yoga to be highly beneficial is Cochranite Sharon Boyce, who started taking Houghton’s classes several months before she was diagnosed with MS, when she first started waking up and not feeling well each day.

“I was diagnosed about a year-and-a-half ago,” said Boyce, who explained the red flags that were the onslaught of the disease. “My first episode was waking up with loss of vision in my right eye and the second episode was vertigo about a month later.”

Other MS-related symptoms, including chronic fatigue, muscle twitching, numbness, vision issues in both eyes, weakness, loss of balance and tingling sensations were quick to follow.

For Boyce, one of her only sources of temporary relief has become yoga.

“It relaxes me,” said Boyce. “It has taught me to breathe again. The meditation really helps me focus on the here and now.”

“It helps me stay positive — it gives me hope. The best way to explain it is that it gives me peace.”

Learn more at flowingyogi.com.

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