Pop-Up Yoga

January 30, 2013, from Yoga Buzz

The trend of pop-up retail stores and restaurants is successful in part because of the exclusivity associated with relying on a customers who are in-the-know to find the pop-up locations before they disappear again.  It might seem like a stretch, then, that the trend is finding its way into the yoga community—a population that has grown quickly because it is all-inclusive. 

But pop-up yoga classes are using the idea to make yoga more accessible, not less. 

“We try to offer some unique yoga experiences for people who might be intimidated by the traditional yoga studio,” said Pop Up Yoga NYC founder Angelica Olstad, who has held events in art studios and coffee shops among other non-traditional places.  Pop Up Yoga NYC, which was founded last year, is turning its efforts toward contributing to nonprofit organizations in 2013.   

Pop Up Yoga NYC class at Dekalb Market in Brooklyn

New York isn’t the only city with pop-up yoga offerings.  Olstad said she’s been communicating with someone in Miami who is hoping to start a pop-up yoga scene there.  And Detroit recently got in on the trend with roving a pop-up yoga studio offering regular weekly classes.   

Yoga teachers Beth James and Corinne Rice founded Pop Up Yoga in Detroit  in an effort to bring the practice to people at a lower cost.  Since they don’t have the overhead of paying for a studio space, they can keep the class price down.  They suggest that students pay a donation of $10 a class.  Classes are offered throughout the city, in an art gallery, chiropractic office, church community room, and a restaurant and tea house, among other locations.  

Evidence Supports Health Benefits of 'Mindfulness-Based Practices'

Mind, Brain, Neurology

Specific types of "mindfulness practices" including Zen meditation have demonstrated benefits for patients with certain physical and mental health problems, according to a report in the July Journal of Psychiatric Practice.  

"An extensive review of therapies that include meditation as a key component -- referred to as mindfulness-based practices -- shows convincing evidence that such interventions are effective in the treatment of psychiatric symptoms and pain, when used in combination with more conventional therapies," according to Dr William R.  Marchand of the George E. Wahlen Veterans Affairs Medical Center and the University of Utah in Salt Lake City.  

Mindfulness Techniques Show Health Benefits 

Dr Marchand reviewed published studies evaluating the health benefits of mindfulness-based practices.  Mindfulness has been described as "the practice of learning to focus attention on moment-by-moment experience with an attitude of curiosity, openness, and acceptance."   Put another way, "Practicing mindfulness is simply experiencing the present moment, without trying to change anything."  

The review focused on three techniques:  

Mindfulness Meditation Training Changes Brain Structure in Eight Weeks

Mind, Brain, Neurology

Participating in an 8-week mindfulness meditation program appears to make measurable changes in brain regions associated with memory, sense of self, empathy and stress.  In a study that will appear in the January 30 issue of Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging, a team led by Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) researchers report the results of their study, the first to document meditation-produced changes over time in the brain's grey matter.  

"Although the practice of meditation is associated with a sense of peacefulness and physical relaxation, practitioners have long claimed that meditation also provides cognitive and psychological benefits that persist throughout the day," says Sara Lazar, PhD, of the MGH Psychiatric Neuroimaging Research Program, the study's senior author.  "This study demonstrates that changes in brain structure may underlie some of these reported improvements and that people are not just feeling better because they are spending time relaxing."  

Previous studies from Lazar's group and others found structural differences between the brains of experienced mediation practitioners and individuals with no history of meditation, observing thickening of the cerebral cortex in areas associated with attention and emotional integration.  But those investigations could not document that those differences were actually produced by meditation.