Relieve your pandemic-induced stress through Yoga With Jackie
Jackie Hooper has taken the concept of staying flexible during a global pandemic more literally than most.
Yoga enthusiasts at last month’s Midwinter Reset yoga retreat in Harmony got a front-row seat to just how flexible the 54-year-old Monroeville resident is. The class she was leading at the Opera Hall at the Center of Harmony witnessed her contort her legs into a “V” shape, do a full split and balance on her head, among other poses she made look easy.
Besides her physical prowess, Ms. Hooper, a Plum native, also has displayed remarkable professional flexibility in the face of unprecedented adversity. She spent the past seven years building upher talent booking agency, Sound Advice Entertainment LLC, but once COVID19 stalled live events, she needed to find another way to make money and release her creative juices.
She also needed a way to reduce the arthritis-induced pain in her hips, and that’s what led her to discover the joys of yoga, earn a yoga teaching certification from The Yoga Institute in Mumbai, India, and start her own practice, Yoga With Jackie, where she shares all that her new passion has given her with fellow enthusiasts from all over the country.
“I’m a big dreamer,” she said. “And I can see this taking me further in my quest for living life fully.”
Turning nothing into something is kind of her brand.
The University of Miami graduate spent two decades teaching music throughout Western Pennsylvania and playing clarinet in groups such as The Polkameisters and The Joe & Jackie Show. She parlayed all the local music-industry connections she picked up along the way into Sound Advice Entertainment.
Since launching her own business in 2014, she has amassed a Rolodex of 1,753 acts spanning multiple forms of entertainment and has booked 8,056 gigs and counting as of Feb. 10. She has plenty of corporate clients who hit her up for their functions and has worked with big local names such as Kennywood Park, UPMC, Concordia and Seven Springs Mountain Resort.
COVID-19 was “pretty devastating at first,” she said, as she wasn’t able to book a single event in April 2020. Pre-pandemic, she was setting up 200 to 300 gigs a month. Now, she’s happy if she can book 50.
The pandemic also coincided with her 20-year battle with hip pain taking a turn for the worse. Hoping to avoid hip-replacement surgery, she sought out an online yoga class and, when she realized it made her feel “like I was walking on clouds,” became hooked. Her teacher from that class told her about being part of The Yoga Institute, which inspired Ms. Hooper to give it a shot herself.
Earning her certification was grueling work that required weeks of early mornings, long days and learning Sanskrit, an entirely new language for her. But she got through it, started teaching classes herself and now has a thriving practice of her own in Yoga With Jackie.
“Just like I tried to expand my borders with Sound Advice Entertainment, I feel that excitement with Yoga With Jackie,” she said. “I feel like I can really help people with this yoga that’s really helped me. It’s a feeling like no other.”
She’s been teaching at least one virtual class a day since
June, and her burgeoning practice has already attracted a steady stream of students from places ranging from Western Pennsylvania to New Jersey, North Carolina andeven Cheyenne, Wyo.
One of her most loyal clients since the beginning has been Valerie Cannon, 54, and owner of Speckled Hen Chocolate Co. in Clinton Township, Butler County. She has become a “yoga junkie” thanks to Ms. Hooper’s classes and credits them with helping her get in the right mindsetto be a boss at work.
“I have to be calm, as stress-free as possible ...,” Ms. Cannon said. “Doing Yoga with Jackie helps me be more balanced and focused so I can be more creative in my business.”
Patty Ogden, 58, of Wake Forest, N.C., only checked out Yoga With Jackie because she happens to be Ms. Hooper’s cousin. But now the dance teacher and dance studio owner does a class with her almost every morning.
“It was really valuable to me in the last few weeks,” Ms. Ogden said. “There was a lot of stress in my personal life and business. We’re still in the middle of the pandemic, where things are not normal. It was a real stressreliever for me and one way to do something to take care of myself.”
Ms. Hooper said she believes this was the perfect time to start a yoga business from scratch because of the health benefits yoga provides.
She believes that yoga “absolutely creates miracles,” like the way it has gifted her with an entirely new community for which she is as grateful as it seems to be for her.
“It’s a really nice outlet for being connected to other people,” she said. “I hope that I am able to bless their lives as much as they’ve blessed me.”