How Yoga at Marist Exercises the Body and Mind

Nikki Vincenty-Haas is a certified yoga instructor who encourages students to find balance between the body and mind. Photo by Nikki Vincenty-Haas

For a college student, it can be incredibly difficult to find free time to exercise. If you are a student athlete, it might be built into your schedule, but for those who are not on a sports team, it is hard to maintain a consistent exercise regimen. Looking for a place to start? Yoga might be the best way.

When people think of yoga, an image of slow-moving, thoughtful practice might pop up in one's mind. At Marist College, Nikki Vincenty-Haas teaches more than just a calm downward dog.

“I teach everybody on day one, ‘I love plank,’” said the yoga instructor with a grin. 

Vincenty-Haas’ journey with yoga began in 2016, and since then, she has traveled across the world learning about and teaching yoga. She joined the Marist phys-ed team two years ago when she was asked to work with the women’s basketball team.

“I came on to teach the well-loved basketball team how to stretch, and I quickly realized that there was a lack of something as simple as stretching in such an athletic college,” she said. “It's really interesting to me, in all of the years that I've been teaching yoga, to see these athletes at their peak performance lack so much mobility.”

From there, Vincenty-Haas took on the hatha yoga course and began teaching larger portions of the student body. She now teaches three classes throughout the academic year, in addition to three days a week of intramural yoga. 

“The nectar of my job is the hatha yoga course, where I get to teach the student body self-care,” she said. “Within that course, I teach students a broad understanding of what yoga is, with the goal of showing them that there is so much more than the physical movements.”

“We start very physical, because that is what everybody just thinks yoga is,” she continued. “Then I start weaving in yoga philosophy and showing young adults that how we act as people in this world is a way to practice yoga.”

Hatha yoga can get quite intense, as Vincenty-Haas loves to teach her students handstands and headstands. If you are looking for something cooler, her restorative and meditative yoga course might be perfect for you.

“The meditation course is run only in the fall and is a deep dive into what I would call cooling styles of yoga. My intention in that course is for students to be able to practice probably the most difficult styles of yoga, which are breath work, meditation and inward connection,” she said. 

On the opposite end of the yoga spectrum, Vincenty-Haas teaches an intense strength and conditioning yoga course in the spring. 

“Within that course, we will deep dive into asanas, and for my students that love the drills, standing on their hands, deep backbends, we navigate all of those postures and break down the mechanics, the biomechanics, of what happens to the body when we're in these postures,” she said. “If you like to sweat, that's the class for you.” 

Outside of Marist, Vincenty-Haas teaches courses for the elderly in Poughkeepsie, New York, as well as other classes throughout her week. She feels that teaching college students is incredibly fulfilling. 

“What's really beautiful about teaching at Marist is I'm meeting people at the beginning of their adulthood and showing them that self-care is so important,” she said. 

By teaching college students how to move their bodies and how to take their mind off of the worries of their day, Vincenty-Haas is giving students an outlet to release stress in both physical and mental ways. She has her students journal in every class and encourages her students to ask questions about the philosophical principles of yoga. 

“I really hope through my course that I'm giving them tools to use for the rest of their time as an adult and hopefully find a better understanding of themselves. The goal is self realization and self development,” she said. 

A barrier for many students to starting yoga is the worry that they will not be good at it. Vincenty-Haas says that that doesn’t matter.

“Something I hear all the time is, ‘I can't do yoga because I'm not flexible.’ We are all inflexible in some way, whether it's our physical body or our mind, and yoga makes us flexible in so many different ways,” she said. 

“If you have any interest, just show up. Don't be embarrassed because you can't hold a plank. We all have to start somewhere, and I guarantee you, with consistency and dedication, within a couple of weeks, you'll be a very strong yogi.”