Stanchart treats women to yoga for peace of mind

Yoga is the study of balance; balance that most people wish for but find it difficult to find and keep. And balance is the aim of all living creatures. Yoga says that if you have a perfect breath, you will have perfect health. It allows you to experience different poses to gently put pressure on your organs and tissues to promote health within the body. It also allows you to practise mindfulness and to learn to breathe to disconnect the mind from stress and to rejuvenate yourself. 

On top of these benefits, according to yogi Instructor Claire Lane, yoga allows people to return to their centre, to ground them and bring them back to following their heart. It calms the mind, restores health and lifts the spirit, allowing restoration of inner balance, harmony and true nature. This sounds appealing, right? 

On Valentine’s Day recently, a select group of professional women were treated to a pampering and mentoring session that permitted them to learn how to balance their lives while staying true to what they really want at the same time. The event, dubbed Wellness Appreciation Morning, was organised by Standard Chartered Bank. It was clear from the invitation card that whoever had put the programme together knew about the stress that professional women who struggle with balancing their professional lives with family life on a daily basis.

The lucky women who were given the rare opportunity left the event with rejuvenated minds and looking forward to the future with open arms after a couple of hours away from their families and work to celebrate Valentine’s Day in a tranquil setting. The event also allowed them to reflect on what they desperately needed to tweak from their lives in order to have trouble-free days.  Held at the Grand Palm  last Saturday, the day was highlighted by Yoga and Zen meditation that were topped off with a mouth-watering, health inspired brunch.

Apart from the official programme, the women had a rare moment to exchange their life experiences and reflect on their lives in general. Although most were new to the experience, the hectic session that - in the words of instructor Lane - left them with a few sensations (referring to the muscle aches that some must have experienced) here and there after learning about how much their bodies can do when it comes to different poses, could still smile and laugh about the beautiful day. Most were 100 percent sure that yoga and meditation were something that they would like to do on a permanent basis in order to navigate through life and its many obstacles.

Giving the women a note of motivation, Pedzani Tafa, who is the Head of Retail Clients for Standard Chartered Bank, said they conceptualised the event because they wished to give women the perfect way to give attention to mind, body and soul before embarking on an intense programme of showering their loved ones with affection or receiving love from their partners. She said it was their wish that the day had set the tone for them going forward. “It has been said that the greatest form of wealth is one’s health,” said Tafa. She added that Stanchart was striving to be an all rounder banker, hence they were constantly quizzing themselves on what it was they could do to ensure that their clients had peace of mind at all times.

“In our effort to promote a healthy lifestyle over and above normal banking services that we provide, we recently have launched insurance plans that cover hospitalisation, life cover, education plans and so on, so that we rely on these to have peace of mind,” Tafa explained. Lane, who owns ‘Just Yoga’ studios, was tasked with the role of taking the women through their paces and breathing new life into their spirits.  She observes that every human being seeks health and vitality, adding that there are lots of mediums that people can use to work towards health and vitality. Tafa emphasises that it is important for one to find something that one liked as opposed to doing something that one didn’t like.

“It does not matter what you do. As long as you are elevating your heart rate, you will improve your health,” she says. Her classes go for as little as P500 a month twice in a week, P250 once a week and P100 for a single class.