What’s your military connection?
A Yogi’s Center offers free classes (one a week) to active duty, reserve and veterans of the U.S. Armed Forces. Regardless of when you served, for how long, or which branch of service you may attend any of the following classes: Tuesday at 6 p.m. or Saturdays. Free class is limited to one class per week.
You need to show proof of service when attending your first class. Acceptable forms include: ID card, DD214 or VA card. If you attend more than one class per week, class price will be discounted at the military family member rate of 25%.
Military Family Member Discount-”the MFMD”
Military family members receive a 25% discount off the regular class pricing. You will need to show proof of service of your family member when attending your first class to receive the discount. Discount excludes the Newcomers Introductory offer, Double Your Bliss package and private sessions.
Are you a military family member?
If your father, mother, brother, sister, spouse, or child is serving or has served then you are. You must show confirmation of family member service to receive your discount. Acceptable forms of confirmation include; ID card, DD214, VA card, or a photo in uniform. In addition to your acceptable form, please provide a photocopy of your service member in uniform that we can add to our military wall.
Barbara McCarthy, studio owner and yoga instructor is a former U.S. Marine and married to retired Marine Gunnery Sergeant, Mike McCarthy.
The following is taken from the December 27, 2011 Daily Courier
| Former Marine stays disciplined, focused with yoga studio | ||
|
Ken Hedler
The Daily Courier
PRESCOTT VALLEY – Former Marine Barbara McCarthy went from saying “Semper fi” (Latin for “always faithful”) to “Namaste” (a Hindu gesture of salutation) since she began dabbling in yoga in 2005.
McCarthy said yoga and the military have many things in common. She opened A Yogi’s Center at 8500 E. Highway 69 on the symbolic date of Nov. 10 – the 236th birthday of the Marine Corps.
“They are both disciplines, to begin with,” she said.
She recalled wake-up calls in the Marines at 5 a.m. for physical training, and running three miles. Yoga enthusiasts wake up at the same time to do their practices, such as meditation.
Members of the military sing cadence, McCarthy said.
“In yoga, we call it chanting,” she said.
McCarthy, who served eight and a half years in the Marines, including a stint in the first Gulf War, said members of the military stay focused by taking part in working parties.
“You pick up trash. You do what you are told to do,” she said. “In yoga, we call it ‘seva.’ Seva would be kind of the same thing. You are doing work that needs to be done. With a working party, you leave a place better than you found it.”
McCarthy, a registered yoga instructor with 200 hours of training, said she turned to yoga to seek relief from pain on the left side of her body. She added that yoga offers an alternative to prescription painkillers, which can have negative side effects.
McCarthy practices the Svaroopa ® style of yoga, which uses the angles of the body to release tension. She operates the only Svaroopa ® yoga studio in Arizona, according to Cheryl Davis of the Master Yoga Foundation in Exton, Pa.
“It is not the typical yoga,” McCarthy explained “It is not putting your foot behind your head.”
Instead, McCarthy said, “A lot of the work we do starts on the floor, lying down. We start with poses that release the tension of the tailbone and continues the full length of your spine. In releasing tension, your body opens up.”
She said it is more of a “work-in” than a workout, adding, “You are not going to work out a sweat. It is blissful. It is compassionate.”
McCarthy offers one-on-one and group classes. She offers free introductory classes for active-duty military, reserves and veterans – and 25 percent discounts to their family members.
She attended the Natural Healing Institute of Encinitas, Calif., north of San Diego, after leaving the Marine Corps in 1998. She managed a retail store in Fallbrook, Calif., from 1999 to 2003, and worked for a government contractor at Camp Pendleton, Calif., from 2004 to 2006.
That position led to civilian employment with the Department of the Navy, Naval Facilities Engineering Command Southwest in Fallbrook.
She moved with her husband, Michael, a 20-year Marine veteran, from Fallbrook to Prescott Valley a year ago in part to be closer to her mother, Barbara Polasky, who lives in Payson.
McCarthy said she had not intended at first to open her own studio but changed her mind after determining it would be too difficult to teach at somebody else’s studio.
McCarthy plans to host an open house and ribbon cutting with the Prescott Valley Chamber of Commerce at 1:30 p.m. Jan. 5.