During the first week that Sara Ishaq began offering free yoga classes in Sana'a, the capital of Yemen, only four women showed up. By the end of the week the room overflowed with more than 25 women.

Yoga's popularity has increased in the United States in recent years. Indeed, a 2012 study from the magazine Yoga Journal showed that the number of Americans practicing yoga has soared from 15.8 million in 2008 to 30.4 million in 2012. This means that more than 8 percent of U.S. adults practice yoga and the largest two motivations are flexibility and general conditioning, the study showed.

But, it is clear that new interest in yoga is not just confined to the U.S.

Ishaq notes that she had never seen a yoga studio anywhere in Yemen. Furthermore, few gyms allow women and exercising outdoors is not socially accepted, she added.

"Women can't exactly put on their running shoes and go outside so yoga appeals to them because it is a full package, they just need a mat and comfortable clothing," Ishaq explained to CBS News.

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The Yemeni women in Ishaq's class range from 20 to 50 years old, and many of them came to yoga with weight loss aspirations. Yet, after class many said they felt calm and possessed a new sense of ownership over their bodies. Yoga provided an outlet for physical and mental restoration that these women could not find anywhere else.

Ishaq was 13 years old when she began suffering from severe migraines that left her bedridden for up to three days every week. She was living in Yemen and after high school, moved to Scotland where the migraines persisted with agonizing intensity.

"Doctors came to the house and gave me morphine and explained that the problem was genetic," Ishaq says. But the morphine and other medicines did not help.

She first discovered yoga after finding videos in her aunt's Washington D.C. home and began following their instruction. She also began running, and suddenly her physical and mental health turned a corner for the better. Her migraines largely subsided the more she did yoga.

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Yoga being used for social change in Yemen, Kenya