Yoga instructor works with Men’s Resource Centre

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This article was published 23/05/2023 (1202 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A Brandon yoga instructor hopes to show that anyone can practise yoga by teaching barrier-free classes to men at the John Howard Society’s Men’s Resource Centre.

Chelsea McCrimmon, who also teaches yoga to the Brandon Wheat Kings, has spent numerous evenings at the resource centre over the past two years running drop-in yoga classes as part of the centre’s schedule of programs designed to offer support to men living in downtown Brandon, and particularly formerly incarcerated men in the community.

“I believe that yoga is for everyone, and everyone should have an opportunity to practise,” McCrimmon told the Sun.

The Men’s Resource Centre, which opened in 2020, was created to support people transitioning from incarceration back into society. Its goal is to provide a safe environment and positive space for men to access resources.

McCrimmon has been a certified yoga teacher since 2014 after training in Hawaii. She left her two past day jobs — one as a lawyer, and another working for the Wheat Kings — to become a full-time yoga instructor in 2020. She now teaches classes and private lessons out of her own studio called Luna Muna Yoga, which she opened in 2022.

McCrimmon was told by a client in one of her yoga in the park classes that the John Howard Society was looking for a yoga instructor, so she reached out to the society and has been coming back ever since.

“The whole idea of including yoga is part of our desire to provide a holistic approach to men’s health,” Brandon’s John Howard Society executive director Ross Robinson told the Sun, adding that the yoga classes promote physical and mental health.

Robinson said that the resource centre’s regular schedule of programs is working well and pointed to the fact that the centre has been oversubscribed for some activities it offers as an indicator of that success.

“When people are living downtown and are in that type of environment, it’s almost like a jail cell in which they don’t see that there’s a way out,” Robinson said. “And our goal is to show them that they can have a quality of life that they never imagined before and if they want to get out, it’s available to them.”

The yoga classes run Tuesday nights at the centre every few months and operate on a drop-in basis. McCrimmon says that class sizes vary each time, but she has seen as many as seven people participating in a given class. She said that the class isn’t run like a traditional yoga class after participants expressed discomfort with doing poses that made them feel self-conscious.

“I try to teach postures that can be done sitting anywhere, [where] you’d still be getting the benefit of a stretch or movement without necessarily drawing attention to yourself,” McCrimmon says.

Often, she asks participants if there are any body parts that they are looking to stretch, and will then tailor the class to incorporate movements that address those needs.

The Sun visited a class last week that only had one participant, but a counsellor who was there to provide sessions as part of another one of the centre’s offerings and an employee joined in.

McCrimmon took the small group through a series of movements, including a seated pigeon pose — a hip-opening stretch — and a downward dog pose, using the back of a chair. Racquetballs were used to massage the fascia of participants’ hands and feet. McCrimmon finished the class with a seated version of a shavasana — a resting pose. She encouraged participants to close their eyes and relax every part of their body.

Richard Ducharm, who visits the centre about four times a week, described the final pose of the class as a “quick getaway.”

Ducharm said that the centre offers him an outlet and a community where he can access resources like a computer, or try new classes like yoga.

“I feel energized,” he said at the end of his first yoga class that evening.

There were no mats, no matching water bottles, and no Lululemon clothing at the yoga class, but that’s part of McCrimmon’s approach to yoga — that it can be done by anyone, anywhere. She hopes that participants can take something from every class and incorporate it into their everyday routine and improve their life, even if it’s just one pose or breathing technique.

“It just makes my heart so happy for people to realize that anyone can have a yoga practice,” McCrimmon said.

» gmortfield@brandonsun.com

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