Faculty: Ivette Vargas-O’Bryan
Description: Have you ever wondered how meditation, yoga or the martial arts can enhance concentration, promote creativity, affect brain function, and improve health? How can a foot massage improve organ function in Chinese medicine? Did you know that yoga, meditation, and the martial arts originated in religious settings? What would it be like to do yoga in a religious context or medical setting, and not a studio? Since the 1980s in the West, Western medical practitioners and scientists have tested the impact of ancient Asian mind-body practices like mindfulness, yoga, and the martial arts on health conditions like stress, anxiety, depression, pain, substance abuse, and others. During the COVID pandemic, these practices have been critical to build resilience in a crisis. This multi-faceted course has a three-fold goal: 1) to expose students to major Asian religious teachings underlying mind-body practices, 2) to expose students to Western medical studies that test the outcomes of these practices in terms of Western science, and 3) to engage students in mind-body practices. Among the slated practices students will engage in include mindfulness meditation, Buddhist meditation, Indian Hindu yoga, medical Qigong, arts (painting and music) and meditation, Ayurvedic cooking, and if permitted, practices at local temples in the DFW metroplex. In addition to the main AC instructor, there will be guest instructors to teach martial arts, mindfulness and yoga techniques.
Meeting Information: 01/03/2022-01/25/2022; M-F 09:00AM – 12:00PM; Room to be Announced
Section Requisites: Instructor permission via e-mail required.
Course Fee: $400
Out of Pocket Expenses: $40