Free and donation-based yoga classes for vets during Veterans Week

Free and donation-based yoga classes for vets during Veterans Week

There's a whole lot more to yoga than what our culture often leads us to believe.

It's not about perfecting our tushes or finding yoga pants you can't see through.

It's about helping people heal.

That includes veterans, many of whom suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder.

During Veterans Week (Friday through Nov. 15) yoga teachers and studios across the country will hold free and donation-based mindful resilience classes for vets and their families and regular patrons. All donations will go toward the Veterans Yoga Project, a nonprofit educational and advocacy organization dedicated to improving the health and well-being of veterans.

Jason Smiley, a local vet and yoga teacher, will take up the gauntlet for Colorado Springs. He's taught mindful resilience classes locally for the past year and during the upcoming week he'll guide three sessions at Hot on Yoga, Cambio Yoga and Yoga Studio Satya. Vets and their families are free; other attendees are encouraged to make a $10 suggested donation. Donations can also be made at veteransyogaproject.org.

"They found in studies that these techniques, especially meditation and breath, are helpful with PTSD," Smiley said. "Yoga doesn't cure PTSD, but it's better than anything else."

A July story on Smithsonian.com reported that psychological surveys suggest 271,000 veterans of the Vietnam War may have full PTSD. About 11-20 percent of veterans in Operations Iraqi Freedom and Enduring Freedom have PTSD in a given year, according to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. Add in about 12 percent of Gulf War veterans in any given year.

The mindful resilience class Smiley teaches was designed by a clinical psychologist and a yoga teacher and based on hundreds of responses from vets with PTSD. The intention of each 60-minute class is to provide tools for self-regulation and to become present and grounded. There are typically five parts to each class: breathwork, asana (yoga postures), meditation techniques, guided relaxation and gratitude practice.

The all-level classes are physically accessible for beginners because of more emphasis on physical grounding than getting deeply into a posture.

Ryan Warner was an Air Force firefighter for four years and now works for the Colorado Springs Fire Department. Though he didn't see combat after he joined the military in 1996, he's witnessed many traumatic events during the course of his work.

The breathing and meditation techniques he's learned in Smiley's classes over the past six months have helped.

"One of the things I struggle with is not being able to control what happens or what we see or how things end up," Warner said. "The more you try to hold on to control the harder time I have. It's a way to take back a little bit of control and accept whatever happens and be OK with that."

If a vet has severe PTSD and doesn't feel comfortable coming to class, he can access a free online database of yoga classes and information through the Veterans Yoga Project website.

Smiley was in the army from 1989-1992 and was stationed in South Korea during the Gulf War. Though he didn't see combat or walk away with PTSD, military service did not help his bipolar disorder.

"PTSD and depression have the same physiological affect on the brain," he said. "These classes work for me, too."

It was more than a decade after leaving the army that Smiley discovered yoga. He eventually earned a yoga teaching certificate in hatha yoga from Sivananda Ashram Yoga Retreat in the Bahamas in 2013 and completed two mindful resilience trainings through the Veterans Yoga Project in 2014.

"I needed some peace of mind and wasn't having much luck with other things I was trying," he said. "The feeling I had after class keeps you going back. Your body feels good and your mind feels peaceful and clear."