Denver – Good morning, everybody! I hope you had a good Friday night. I came across an interesting article about the DeafYoga Foundation and thought to share it with all ya’ll. As a long-time fitness freak, I have always wanted to learn yoga but seemed to have a basic problem: I am deaf and have trouble reading yoga instructors’ lips in classes, which made things awkward at times.

A few years ago, I signed-up for a yoga class at the gym I worked-out each day. The experience was interesting: I could understand and see how the principle exercises and stretches worked but I spent more time concentrating on understanding the instructor rather than my breathing. I stopped going after a couple classes and have since let my curiousness about yoga ebb and wane.

Word comes from New York that the deaf non-profit organization has partnered up with another non-profit entity, the International Sivananda Organization, to provide the first ever Yoga Teacher Training course for the deaf community. According to the press release, there is only one certified deaf yoga instructor in the United States, and in conjunction with raising awareness of yoga’s benefits within the deaf community, the partnership also aims to provide the community with an influx of deaf certified yoga instructors.

” .. deaf people haven’t really been able to freely explore the meaning of yoga prior to our organization. To date, we have served more than 1,000 deaf and signing people through our service projects, programs and the DeafYoga for Beginners DVD.” – Lila Lolling, DeafYoga Foundation

Lolling also stated that three deaf woman had applied for scholarships for the training but also added that sign language interpreter fees were a major funding issue, and requested donations to off-set interpreter expenses for the training. Click here to read more on this story

Okay .. so, we need more yoga instructors in the deaf community. And do you know what this means? This means that I need an iced chai!

HaHa!

Anyway, I have to go now – I need to mow the yards before the Squirrels that Run Up the Tree start slingshooting pine cones at me again. If you have time, check out the DeafYoga DVDs and let me know how they are, please?

Finally, and apparently, there is also a Wii game utilizing yoga, believe it or not. I guess that’s another reason to love the Wii?

Have a great Saturday!

Be good .. or be good at it.

Paotie