Sonita Abrahams Burrowes: Grounded in 50 years of yoga

As she lies on the mat, taking deep, intentional breaths during a 12-minute sound bath at the close of a session at Afya Yoga Studio, Sonita Abrahams Burrowes wears a familiar, satisfied smile. It is a feeling she has come to know well in her 50 years of practising yoga, a discipline that has done more than keep her body supple and her mind centred. It has shaped her approach to life, grounding her in the present and bringing her a sense of calm, purpose, and connection to a community that extends beyond the mat.

The 74-year-old, who will celebrate her 75th birthday on October 30, sat down with Sunday Lifestyle last weekend following a special joint session with instructors and students marking her five-decade journey.

“Yoga keeps me grounded, centred, happy, fulfilled, grateful, and healthy,” the Immaculate Conception High alumna says of what keeps drawing her back to the mat.

“Even after 50 years of practising yoga, I’m still able to get down on the mat and get into my postures. I love showing up at least four days a week, and I look forward to it. When I don’t, I really miss it,” she explains.

And though she owns the studio and is a yoga and Pilates teacher, Abrahams Burrowes says having a team of “awesome teachers” means that she can sometimes step away from teaching and simply enjoy attending classes herself.

She never imagined, when she discovered yoga in her 20s following a car accident that prompted a more deliberate approach to her well-being, that she would still find joy in it five decades later.

Back then, she was living in Miami with her first husband and their two young children and had returned to college while struggling with her physical and emotional health. She recalls overturning her car on campus during her second week of school and deciding, while in hospital, to “radically change my life”.

Start of her yoga journey

“The first thing I had to decide, and I realised it was a choice, was that I wanted to be healthy. I wanted to be healthy for my [family] and for myself,” she explains. “And so I started a path of taking care of mind, body, and spirit. So at the time, I became a vegetarian, I started doing meditation, and I started my yoga journey.”

That journey continued after her family moved to Jamaica, where she took classes in the annex of the Temple of Light Centre for Spiritual Living on Fairway Avenue. The centre, her long-time spiritual home, has also been Afya’s home for the past four years.

A firm believer that life is shaped by perspective and the choices we make daily, she says her commitment to nurturing her whole being has helped her manifest the life she envisioned, including the space that has become a haven for many since opening at her childhood home on Bamboo Avenue in 2002.

Two years before the studio opened, Abrahams Burrowes had already begun imagining what it would look like. Towards the end of her yoga teacher-training certification programme, she sat at a dining table in Massachusetts with her “yoga sister”, who asked what she wanted to do when she returned to Jamaica. Abrahams Burrowes simply told her that she wanted her own studio.

“‘Well, let’s draw it,’” her yoga sister suggested. Abrahams Burrowes still has the drawing tucked away somewhere today.

The idea eventually became a reality when her daughter, Natasha, and her then-partner returned to Jamaica from working in Tanzania, Africa, where he was a safari guide and she worked at a safari camp. After falling in love with yoga through Abrahams Burrowes’ classes, they helped bring the studio to life.

Strong community

Among the many stories that have passed through Afya’s doors, one remains particularly vivid for its founder.

“A lady’s daughter called me one day. Her mother had been coming to my classes, but she was not well. Her daughter said, ‘My mom wants to see you.’ So I went to her bedside, and she said to me, ‘Look, I’m dying of cancer, and I just want you to know that showing up at Afya twice a week and having a community of loving, caring people around me has helped me so much,’” she recounts, visibly moved.

When it comes to family, Abrahams Burrowes takes joy in seeing her children make space for wellness in their own lives. Her son Ryan, who lives and works in New York, meditates, while Natasha has followed more closely in her mother’s footsteps.

A dancer by profession, Natasha performed with the National Dance Theatre Company before becoming certified in Pilates alongside her mother. She later trained online as a Qigong (chee-gong) teacher while in Kenya, where she now owns a studio.

“It’s wonderful,” she says of witnessing them adopt similar habits. “It means that the good aspects of this journey have influenced my children, which is lovely. And hopefully, it will influence my grandchildren,” Abrahams Burrowes, who is chair of her non-governmental organisation, RISE Life Management Services, adds.

She was also conferred with an Order of Distinction in 2017 for her contributions to community development, youth empowerment, and services for people affected by addictive disorders.

Having spent much of her life teaching, leading, and supporting others, Abrahams Burrowes is now making room for another creative pursuit: painting.

“I want to learn to paint. I don’t want to be able to put my pictures up anywhere. I just want to be able to paint.”

In high school, she had to focus on the sciences rather than the arts, but she has already started taking painting classes, albeit casually. For now, she is enjoying the chance to explore something new simply for the pleasure of it.

As she prepares to turn 75 later this month, she hopes to mark the occasion with a quiet dinner alongside her husband of eight years, John Burrowes.

For those who think age is a barrier to starting yoga, she insists that it is never too late. At Afya, she has welcomed students of all ages: “I have a lady in her early 80s [who] started with us. As long as you can, even if you can’t get down on the floor, we can put you in a chair,” she says.

Reflecting on what five decades of yoga have brought her, she says: “I am at a place now where I am happy, I am healthy, I am centred, I am prosperous. And I look forward to the next 10, maybe 20 years, you know, but also to living in the present moment. That’s important.”

rollesha.laing@gleanerjm.com