The Gardens on Spring Creek is a botanical sanctuary offering classes in Eastern traditions such as tai chi, yoga and mindfulness. It’s a 12-acre garden home to butterflies and 2,680 species of plants, and it’s only a five-minute drive from Colorado State University’s campus.

“The Gardens provide the perfect opportunity to connect with nature, each other and oneself,” Senior Communication Specialist Mackenzie Merrill said. “It’s a place to gather with friends and family, find serenity and learn.”

On Saturday morning, amid the birds’ melodies, the monarch butterflies flapping about and leaves dancing in the wind, groups of all ages practiced tai chi and goat yoga, guided by practiced teachers.

“In this human structure, you have this instrument, whether you play the jazz way or whether you play the piano way. When it is working well, you can express yourself and be more in tune with your body.” – Min Fan, tai chi instructor

Tai chi is an ancient Chinese martial art that helps calm the emotions, focus the mind and strengthen the immune system. It is often referred to as meditation in motion.

The class at The Gardens was taught by Min Fan, who moved to the United States from China and got her bachelor’s degree at the University of North Carolina. Fan made her teachings accessible for every skill level, encompassing metaphors connected with nature to express movement in the body.

“I like the connection to the ‘I Ching’ and the dao,” Fan said. “To be one with nature, you rise from Earth; you return to Earth. When you practice outside, you think about the trees. Be rooted, relax and extend. Part of it is realizing that we are a product of nature.”

Fan demonstrated that tai chi is more than a martial art or an exercise; it is a way to connect with the body and flow with the Earth. Tai chi isn’t about using muscle or force but about intention and energy propagating through the body.

“In this human structure, you have this instrument, whether you play the jazz way or whether you play the piano way,” Fan said. “When it is working well, you can express yourself and be more in tune with your body.”

Tai chi works closely with yoga through physical expression to bring the mind, body and spirit into unison.

“Yoga is a heightened sensitivity and awareness of all life around us and within us and an outpour of love in reciprocation with life’s wonder and beauty,” the Bhagavad Gita reads.

Kendra Mayrose teaches yoga classes at The Gardens on Spring Creek, beginning in 2021 when COVID-19 restrictions pushed The Gardens to find a new way to bring the community together outdoors. Mayrose has been practicing yoga for over 10 years and finds it to be a great tool for self-reflection. She utilizes specific areas of focus to discover and heal aspects of herself that are out of balance.

“Yoga is a breath-centered practice,” Mayrose said. “When you’re focusing on your breath, that automatically slows down the sympathetic nervous system, and it engages the parasympathetic nervous system, so it takes you out of a fight or flight state (and) into more (of) a rest and digest state.”

When you add goats into the mix of these practices, the results are evident in the laughter and smiles of guests at The Gardens. While they moved through warrior one, downward dog and low lunges, the goats walked, hopped and waited for the participants to look up and greet them.

“It becomes less about the yoga and more about being outside and being around the animals,” Mayrose said. “And I think that’s actually really nice because I think we can get hyperfocused on our tasks and our goals. Having something to break that up is really beneficial.”

Reach Evan Borman at life@collegian.com or on Twitter @CSUCollegian.