A flexible inner peace: yoga helps gay men and lesbians stay fit and develop self-esteem. there are even classes for those who like to go naked.One of the hottest spots in West Hollywood West Hollywood A community of southern California northeast of Beverly Hills. It is mainly residential. Population: 36,600. , Calif., on Friday nights is not a trendy club but a loft building on Fairfax Avenue Fairfax Avenue is a street on north central Los Angeles, California. It runs from La Cienega Boulevard (which separates the Westside from the central part of the city) with Culver City at its southern end to Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood on its northern end. that houses City Yoga. At 6 P.M., Marc Holzman is teaching Anusara Yoga--a technique developed seven years ago that uses poses to align the body and mind while teaching self-acceptance and raising self-esteem. He must be doing something right. The number of students at City Yoga has rocketed to about 10,000 in just a few years. City Yoga makes it a point not to judge students who can't strike a perfect pose, and even the most basic beginners are welcome, especially gay men and lesbians, who "have issues with self-worth and seff-loathing," Holzman says. "This practice of yoga can be used as a reminder or a remembrance of the students' essential goodness." Yoga's popularity among gay men and lesbians is increasing, from San Francisco San Francisco (săn frănsĭs`kō), city (1990 pop. 723,959), coextensive with San Francisco co., W Calif., on the tip of a peninsula between the Pacific Ocean and San Francisco Bay, which are connected by the strait known as the Golden and Manhattan's Chelsea neighborhood to Salt Lake City. It is a great way to stay in shape, meet someone, and even improve performance in the sack. "People start interacting and talk about their lives, and they might match up," said City Yoga owner Anthony Benenati. "I think there is something innately attractive about people taking care of themselves." While yoga first appeared a couple thousand years ago, the modern versions emerged in the 1960s and 1970s in the West. Seeing a harmony between mind and body, various yoga forms focus on muscles, including those that strengthen key sexual areas not reached during a typical gym workout, "Yoga raises the prana, the life energy in the body," says Mark Donato, a yoga teacher at the New York New York, state, United States New York, Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of Sports Club A sports club, athletics club or sports association is an eclectic institution oriented to multiple sports, which fields many teams and has varied sports departments in several sports, working under the same umbrella organization. in Chelsea. "Yoga breathing distributes the prana throughout the body. It makes you stronger and enables you to last longer in your sex life." Not to be outdone out·do tr.v. out·did , out·done , out·do·ing, out·does To do more or better than in performance or action. See Synonyms at excel. , a few blocks away 32-year-old Aaron Star is teaching, yoga classes for people not afraid to bend and meditate med·i·tate v. med·i·tat·ed, med·i·tat·ing, med·i·tates v.tr. 1. To reflect on; contemplate. 2. To plan in the mind; intend: meditated a visit to her daughter. in the buff. Star's "Hot Nude Yoga" classes are a combination of power yogas, tantra Tantra (tŭn`trə), in both Hinduism and Buddhism, esoteric tradition of ritual and yoga known for elaborate use of mantra, or symbolic speech, and mandala, or symbolic diagrams; the importance of female deities, or Shakti; cremation-ground , partner yoga, and contact yoga. "I really believe that nude yoga is going to be the wave of the future and widely offered in many yoga studios," he said. "I think it will really start to change the way people look at yoga and the way they look at themselves and their body." Other nude yoga classes are being offered in Boston, Fort Lauderdale Fort Lauderdale (lô`dərdāl), residential, commercial, and resort city (1990 pop. 149,377), seat of Broward co., SE Fla., on the Atlantic coast; settled around a fort built (c.1837) in the Seminole War, inc. 1911. , Seattle, and other cities. Star stresses that his classes are not orgies. Some poses do involve physical contact, but kissing or touching of the genital areas is not allowed. Even when a student becomes aroused, the class stays focused. "I just encourage people to go back into the breathing," he says. Star's classes are so popular that he opened a larger space in February. Some students can't imagine practicing yoga any other way. Explains 30-year-old New York writer Joe Reid: "I love doing yoga, and I love being naked, and I love doing yoga naked, so it was like a perfect marriage." Hernandez is a Los Angeles journalist. |
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