admin Everyone always says that yoga is for everybody and everybody, and these organizations, studios, and teachers are making it a reality!
Find out more about these inspiring teachers and organizations below.
Yoga for Special Children
Sonia Sumar developed Yoga for the Special Child, an international program in Evanston, Illinois. The program was originally designed to assist babies with disabilities. It has now spread to other countries.
Yoga for the Special child is gentle and therapeutic. It’s suitable for children and babies with Down Syndrome, Cerebral Palsy, and Microcephaly, as well as Autism, Attention Deficit Disorder, and ADHD.
Piedmont Yoga Community
Piedmont Yoga Community serves a variety of students. Some arrive in wheelchairs or with walkers, crutches, or canes. Others have invisible special needs. They have students who have paraplegia and many others with esoteric diseases.
Teachers and assistants mostly volunteer their time because no one is turned away due to lack of funds.
Yoga Circle
Yoga Circle opened its doors in 1993 and offers yoga classes, private sessions, workshops, retreats, and therapeutics. They are open daily and welcome people of all backgrounds to their studio.
Gabriel Halpern, the director, and Cathy Welfare, a teacher, work with different organizations to provide yoga for adults and children who have Down’s Syndrome or other disabilities. These services are also offered by other teachers who come to the studio.
Shakti Bell
Shakti Bell teaches yoga in classes that are designed for populations who may not have been able to access yoga. After living with disability and discovering the healing benefits that yoga offers, she became a teacher. She says: “I don’t usually move very quickly. I navigate in a wheel chair or crawl to reach my students.” Anyone who has practiced with me knows that no one is left behind or ignored.
All Ability Yoga
All Ability Yoga was created on the principle that yoga should always be accessible. They offer specialized classes and teacher training in adaptive yoga. However, they focus on yoga classes that are held in studios or gyms so that yogis with disabilities and wheelchairs can participate in the classes alongside non-disabled yoga practitioners.
All Ability Yoga’s founding members, quadriplegic Tami Riedley, Pinush Choubrn, and Sage Bova, are highly motivated to make their classes available to all!
Accessible Yoga
Accessible Yoga is committed to sharing the benefits and teachings of yoga to those who do not currently have access, as well as to communities that are excluded or underserved. This organization believes all people deserve equal access, no matter their background or ability.
They also organize Accessible Yoga teacher trainings and conferences to support those who want to increase access to yoga teachings for people with disabilities and chronic illnesses, seniors, and anyone who does not feel comfortable attending a regular class. The conference offers scholarships to ambassadors.
Accessible Yoga Teacher Training
Accessible Yoga Teacher (AYTT) certification is a two-part Integral Yoga program designed to train people with disabilities as yoga teachers. The only program that meets national standards in the U.S., it is aimed at people with disabilities, such as paralysis or chronic illnesses.
Both applicants with and without disabilities will be considered.
Mind Body Solutions
Mind Body Solutions, a nonprofit organization with 501(c), is known for its adaptation of yoga to people with disabilities. Yoga styles taught include Iyengar, Hatha, Viniyoga, Gentle, and Meditation/Breathwork.
Matthew Sandford founded the company after a car accident left him paralyzed. He used yoga to reconnect mind and body, and now he’s on a mission for others — both able-bodied and non-able-bodied — to do the same thing. He says yoga is “being able work with integrity in the body that you have without attachment to how you think the pose should appear.”
Adaptive Expeditions
This non-profit organization helps people with disabilities, both physical and visual, to experience the benefits of sports, such as yoga, surfing and sailing, kayaking and cycling, and swimming.
Adaptive Expeditions is funded by the city (of Charleston, South Carolina) where it is based, Gaiam, and Give Back Yoga. This sounds like a perfect program!
Sangha Yoga Institute is a school of higher learning founded by Karina Misky, a disabled massage therapist. Its mission is to teach yoga and meditation to everyone, no matter their age, race or gender, sexual orientation or gender identity, disability, or religion.
Those with physical disabilities can enjoy yoga if they focus on the Eight Limbs of Yoga.
You can find the Sangha Yoga Institute here.
Yoga for Amputees
Yoga for Amputees (YFA) is a yoga program and training for amputees as well as professionals who work with amputees. Its goal is to help amputees regain their wholeness and experience the healing powers of yoga on a mental, emotional, and spiritual level.
Marsha Therese Danzig is a below-knee amputee and founder of Yoga for Amputees (r) by Marsha T Danzig. This program helps amputees to move forward with their lives using the healing power of yoga.
Click here to see this awesome program.
Yoga for All
Many teacher training programs do not teach how to deal with large students, injured or disabled students. Yoga teacher Dianne Bondy created Yoga for All as an online teaching program to help.
You’ll learn how to make your classrooms more welcoming, positive, and accessible.
Ela Wojtowicz
Elizabeth Wojtowicz was born prematurely, three and a half months early. She weighed only one pound five ounces. She was born prematurely and has cerebral palsy – a neurological disorder that affects balance. Since she was a child, she has relied on crutches for help.
Her mission is to help those with physical challenges or limitations realize that their physical challenges do not define them.
Do you feel inspired by the future of yoga accessible to all? We are! Comment below to let us know who you think is changing yoga!
