A 97-year-old yogi on why group exercise is a great move for oldies
Maureen Maclean says 16 years of regular yoga classes has strengthened her body and also boosted her social life.
After trying out a free yoga class at 81, Maureen Maclean now visits Hamilton’s Sun Salute yoga studio three times a week.
For elderly people, the benefits of joining a group exercise class like yoga are social as well as physical, she tells Jesse Mulligan.
“If you come to yoga, then after yoga you can have a cup of coffee and you meet a whole group of people that you have not met before.”
Maureen Maclean will turn 97 next week.
SUPPLIED/Katie Deare
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The yoga teachers at Sun Salute - who Maclean saw five times a week until just a couple of years ago - give instructions but don’t pass judgment if their students can't pull off a pose very well, she says.
“It's just a lovely, soft introduction, and you do what you feel you can do.”
Regular exercise classes are a great way for older people to get out of the house and connect with others, says the former school teacher.
“You can sit in your house and yes, you've done the dusting, the vacuuming is one, You haven't got a garden, so you don't have to worry about that. What the heck am I going to do?
“If you come to yoga, then after yoga you can have a cup of coffee and you meet a whole group of people that you have not met before.
“That's very good for you as an individual, finding out about the other people.”
Although her mother’s lifetime spanned three centuries, Maclean has only sampled two in her almost-97 years.
Of these, she much preferred the 20th century, particularly the 1970s, when she felt “much more comfortable” in the world.
“Most things relied on me, not on telephones and all the modern ways of communicating."
For Maclean, the practice of yoga has an “uplifting effect” that isn’t just related to mood.
“I walk uptown most days, and I hear the teacher saying, ‘Head up straight.’
“Yoga is good for the body, it's good for the mind and [it provides] the opportunity of meeting new people and getting a different group from what you have been used to is all very rewarding.”
Check out some of Maureen Maclean’s yoga moves here.
