Yoga Sin Ropas · 16 December 2007
I did not go to naked yoga today in San Francisco; and that is why this post is not password-protected.
The only reason for this was a full schedule, not fear of or distaste for the concept. I’m sort of interested, actually, in finding out whether the people at One Taste can pull it off with any grace. Whether they can keep the spirit of inquiry open, and a lid on the especially creepy intentions the whole prospect of naked yoga could attract.
Speaking of attracting creepy intentions. Google-searchers: I should tell you now that the rest of this post contains only some reflections. Not actual naked yoga. If that is the idea, keep googling and be rewarded. Though what you may find might actually be sweeter and less exploitative than it first appears.
I’m interested to know how the ashtanga set responds to the prospect of naked yoga, which seems so American in its all-or-nothing audacity, and (for all OneTaste’s efforts to be metro and cosmo and so very refined) inseparable from a tired 1960s vibe. Do you figure it is stupid or prurient or imbued with a moist, floppy ick factor? I caught some heat last week, like this:
Ed: Naked yoga? You have got to be joking.
(0v0): (Sheepish looking into my lap.)
Ed: You’re serious.
(0v0): (Swallowed grin, looking at ceiling.)
Ed: Hookaaaay. You do what you need to do…
(0v0): Oh come on! It’s just that it makes you uncomfortable!
Ed: You’re right! Why would you even want to hang out with these people? And hang out with them naked no less? Are these really the people you need to, uh, “connect” with?
(0v0): Ok check it out. These are not dirty hippies with sweaty pubes and they’re not new age flakes masking sex addiction with “tantra.” They’re Integralists: urban, supergroomed, interested in “consciousness” and all the ways to expand it in everyday life. They’re not even hairy because half of them are shaving to look like Ken Wilber!
Ed: Uh huh. Naked. Yoga.
(0v0): Yes! If I’m blogging to inquire what yoga means for contemporary spirituality, I have to check this out.
Ed: “Check out.”
(0v0): Uh! It’s not going to be sexual! Come on! Nothing could be less sexual! People don’t even know how to objectify other people in everyday life when they’re not wearing clothes! Besides, I’ll go to a women’s-only class. Just females. Nobody is going to be coming after me.
Ed: Sure. Because. There. Aren’t. Any. Lesbians. In. San. Francisco.
My guess is that for amateur nudist yogis, the naked factor is a source of discomfort and the practice is to explore and learn from its special weirdness. And maybe delight in it, if there is some luck in it all. Looking at the ethnographic research on American nudist colonies (Sociology is very important!) or friends’ experiences at naked parties in college, the activity centers on establishing “normalcy” in the absence of clothing. Nudes do this looking only in others’ eyes, limiting topics of conversation (and denying thoughts of sex), adding extra physical distance, and doing anything else to dial down the eros. Nudity threatens both social and personal order, and even for the few willing to play with that edge there are a million reasons that naked yoga would be a lot farther from an orgy than, say, a Saturday night at the club or a Sunday morning at charismatic worship service.
This discomfort that nudity creates for groups is the reason it could be a rich variation to throw into an asana class. Such as we practice it, yoga may at first be about getting comfortable in your body. But after that, yoga is about once again getting uncomfortable. The reflections and transformations that practice inspires involve intimacy with fear, with not-knowing, and with impermanence.
As people practice letting go, their physical bearing becomes refined. We go from colonizing space and moving in on it with all manner of bags and water bottles and accessories, and indulging our discomfort and wild fearful minds with fidgeting and pee breaks and conferences with the teacher… to less and less of this outwardness… to a narrowing right down toward stillness. It’s hard practice to let the accessories go: I’m so conditioned to peeing 20 minutes in to practice that my body gives me the promt even when my bladder is empty. It’s just my body toying with me now, asking for little vacations.
I’ll let that flourish go eventually. And I don’t see how, under dedicated circumstances, letting go of clothing would not be just another exercise in stepping away from the accessories I use to keep from reflecting clearly and then transforming. So… why wouldn’t I research that?
This existential discomfort stuff—there is a possibility to do it playfully. And in a way that lightens your touch on the rest of your life. I bet there are some naked yogis who get this hilariously well.
Posted by (0v0)
Categories: arbitrage
, evolution
, having a body
, integration
, spirituality
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well, you know what i think, squitch squitch.
Posted by: cranky housefrau · Dec 17, 03:43 AM · #
Maybe if my jumpbacks/throughs were a little higher… LOL!
Seriously, though, I totally get what you’re saying. The catch, though, is it would take me a very long time to be able to let go of my self-consciousness in this setting. Less the “I’m naked!” singular self-consciousness than the “I’m without clothing!” socialization (which has more to do with Gap and Gucci ads and dreams of being at school or in public but oh gosh, I forgot my clothes what will everyone think group-consciousness).
Truth be told, I figure a co-ed class would be sketchy — surely at least one guy would be a letch — but a women-only class? I’d actually be curious to meet women who were interested in this kind of experience. Seems outside the norm, in terms of what we expect women to want.
Posted by: karen · Dec 17, 04:38 AM · #
Hi Owl…I clicked on the One Taste site and checked out the NY events, and from what I can see, it is all about sex. Sex. Sex. And sex. The OM meditation stands for Orgasmic Mindfulness or something like that, in which, get this someone gets two-on-oned and everyone watches and gets ideas and then joins in. I am not judging. If that is how someone wants to explore their sexuality, great. But you should be aware that One Taste is essentially a sex club. Not a way of being naked without being prurient.
Lauren
Posted by: lauren · Dec 17, 05:57 AM · #
Cough. The only public comment I would make is to observe the time of the class. 10:00pm and 11:00pm. On a Sunday. Why not hold the class at 6:00pm? Are they afraid dates would ensue?
Cheers, A
Posted by: arturo · Dec 17, 07:07 AM · #
Now, I’ve never done a OneTaste event, but I have hung out with people who do things similar to Orgasmic Mindfulness (see Human Awareness Institute, et. al., I think it’s called) and once upon a time I did hit an actual real live swing club and so forth, and there should be, if OT is anything like the rhetoric of HAI, a substantial difference between its “sexuality” and that of, say, the swing club. Assumptions are being made here and I’m trying to foreground as many of them as possible. Sure, OT could be using “ease your defenses” rhetoric to create a big sweaty hippie party, but I want it said for the record that there are many people in SF/Marin who are doing this very much in terms of Siva/consciousness/a non-privatized sexuality and body politics. If I’m able, I’m totally hitting the coed class the next time I’m in SF.
Posted by: patrick · Dec 17, 08:37 AM · #
i think i’ve finally met someone classically enlightened and she goes by the name of owl! thanks owl, how great this is! i think to see the inner machinations of one taste you have to sign in to read the blogs and chatboard; totally absolutely sociologically incredible.
wilberheads aside, OMing, orgasmic meditation, is there taken very seriously as an authentic vehicle to get you to samadhi.
Posted by: eor · Dec 17, 09:23 AM · #
i’m sorry not to at least have taken you there for a peek!
Posted by: eor · Dec 17, 09:35 AM · #
I’m pretty comfortable being naked. I mean it doesn’t bother me at all to be fully or half nude & chatting with people in the Ladies at my shala. But naked AND sweating AND bent over? It’s just too Pink Floyd for me. I have to admit it.
Posted by: Boodiba · Dec 17, 11:58 AM · #
But you should be aware that One Taste is essentially a sex club. Not a way of being naked without being prurient.
Gosh, these two sentences — especially the second one — are so very loaded that it’s hard to leave them alone. But maybe citing them and not commenting is plenty enough.
The social nudity thing is odd. One the one hand, nudists say they need an environment wherein they can be free of the constraints that are part of the clothed life. But as you point out, there is a deliberateness to the espoused non-sexuality, if it is espoused in the particular environment. In other words, sexual energy is further rationally dismissed from the social gathering. Any time people get together, that something that flows through us all resonates and it does have a sexual facet. It’s not dismissable by rationale. Nudists create a fine little inconsistency for themselves there.
But naked yoga is not a social event. I’m intrigued and would like to read more. There is something special about practicing yoga in the mixed room. I think it’d be that way regardless of the clothed state of one’s shala mates. I’d guess that practicing yoga naked would only mean there’d be many more interesting physical details one would be able to observe.
Posted by: Carl · Dec 17, 12:34 PM · #
yeah baby! (sorry)
Posted by: eor · Dec 17, 02:22 PM · #
There’s an easy fix to this dilemma…start with an “intro to naked yoga” class full of ugly participants. once you prove that you’re there for the tantra and not the naked hotties then you get to graduate to the regular class!
Posted by: cody · Dec 17, 03:54 PM · #
Cody, your teacher didn’t excuse you from working hard in the beginning merely because you were a beginner. Realization demands ardent practice. Hot naked yoga with hot naked yoginis is how it must be if you choose to follow the path.
Posted by: Carl · Dec 17, 04:35 PM · #
oh, god, it is just SOOOO unsanitary!!! ugh! i don’t give a crap about being naked in front of anyone! but for me to participate in this thing everyone and their mats would have to go through some sort of bleach bath. YIPES! GERMS! GERMS!
and yes Carl, YESYESYESYES!!!!!
Posted by: cranky housefrau · Dec 17, 05:17 PM · #
Just thought I’d offer up that NYTimes-reported parties held by sexually nervous, self-conscious Ivy-leaguers out to prove to everyone they don’t care does NOT gibe with my actual personal experience of naked parties, especially those that develop spontaneously among adults. Nor at, dear lordie, any number of group naked hot tubbings or skinnydips. Nor, Owl, does the crew from our particular alma mater win any prizes for having overcome 13-year-old sexual neurosis, however hard the aggressively nakedly homosocial Deltas tried to make that happen.
The last large-scale naked social gathering I accidentally attended in Portland was largely a free-for-all (post-Critical-Mass sweaty nude hippies), as especially was the previous in Chicago (musicians and scenesters), and the one in Portland even before that (mods/rockers), and the drugged/drunk one before that (Reedies).
Also, I had a dream last night Reed College moved to NY.
I don’t narrate my role in any of these bacchanals, but will attest that mass social nudity inspires chastity only when nudity scares you and you’re trying to show everybody it doesn’t matter. If not, not: especially when there’s a large dancefloor.
Organized group butts-up, heads-down naked activities I have less experience with, I’ll admit, but I did check out the One Taste site. I sincerely, sincerely doubt sex/swinger club scenarios (seriously, look at the tight scheduling right after the coed) nor would I expect direct lurid perviness without other back-up information, but seriously: the whole org’s somewhat self-congratulatorily nerve.com.
Sounds like their goals are more along the lines of sex therapy or creating sexual openness or being pleasantly risque together, with yoga being one facet of or venue facilitating which. Which could serve your functions, of course—in the working out of your bodily discomfort category—but non-pansexual sorts, or those who got a few curiosities out of our systems early, might end up having similar reactions to the Editor’s if there’s any personal stake involved.
Posted by: dailymiltonian · Dec 17, 06:31 PM · #
Does anybody know what OneTaste stands for? Do you only need to taste what they offer once? Do they only have one sense of taste/style?...
Posted by: Sally · Dec 17, 06:59 PM · #
Let’s see, where to begin…
Patrick: you’re going to “hit that”? Cool.
Samadhi through orgasm? Sure, but that is not along the eight-limbed path, just making sure your realize that, whomever said it.
Carl: No one, but NO ONE, said that this naked yoga is non-sexual in nature. Where did you get that from? I think it is pretty clear that it IS sexual in nature, at One Taste, for sure.
Miltonian: I don’t see anything “sex therapy” about One Taste. It’s a horniness thing, as far as I can tell. That’s what their marketing looks like to me.
Not a swingers club, not a rave, not a hippy party. Rather, a very modern way of getting sexual release in a socially condoned way. And by socially condoned, I mean condoned by the organization. Personally, I think be masturbated by two people in front of a group of “Orgasmic Meditators” is beyond creepy. I won’t be going to that party.
Posted by: lscyc425@gmail.co · Dec 17, 07:24 PM · #
Oh, that is definitely “sex therapy.” Ahem.
Anyway, if that is “where to begin,” my dear, that is also where to end. I like to leave questions open, so do ask you not come around to try to bat clean-up in this space.
I am not one to rush to repress inquiry sexual or otherwise (“just horniness” can lead to deeper places—this is the exact idea in play here); and insofar as I am quick to judge I hope to use this writing practice here to attenuate the tendency.
Carry on. I’m loving your comments, off-blog and on, and thank you all for coming around.
Posted by: (0v0) · Dec 17, 07:51 PM · #
Hi Owl! This is interesting… practicing yoga in a mixed room is usually nonsexual. My male teachers lie on me, stand on me, adjust me in ways and places that are usually hands-off except with a lover. And as a teacher, it’s a different dynamic for me to adjust or touch a male student than to do the exact same thing to someone I’m interested in. Would I feel differently if I found my own teachers attractive? I might.
I’m comfortable with nakedness, fairly experimental and a bit voyeuristic, but not necessarily always participatory. This doesn’t sound like the kind of scenario you can go watch from the sidelines.
It definitely seems like “sexual release in a socially condoned way.”
Posted by: Anna · Dec 18, 07:32 AM · #
Perhaps we can make a group expedition to either NYC or SF and (duck! I’m going to deploy this vocab again! Hah!) hit one of these places as a group; that sounds like it’d be a wide variety of enlightening for all involved.
Posted by: patrick · Dec 18, 08:04 AM · #
safety in numbers?
Posted by: eor · Dec 18, 11:16 AM · #
When we see a shoal of donkeys flitting about like reef fish, we’ll know that EOR decided he needs to seek his safety in numbers.
It’s funny how the undertones flowing through this discussion are predominately related to sex and acceptance of sexuality, though acceptance of one’s naked body is altogether a different issue. There are situations — like bathing — where nudity is not only natural but expected.
I used to visit certain hotsprings with my friends after skiing. The first few public disrobings take a little nerve but it becomes the ‘norm’ (a lexicographic nod to our sociology friends) and feels more natural. Of course, it’s much easier to appreciate a person’s form when they’re undressed. That’s natural too, though. It’s much less natural to admire someone’s Armani suit, I’d say.
“Sex” isn’t necessarily the sex commonly thought of. The species is divided into two sexes; each has its basic attributes that complement those of the other. Practicing yoga in a mixed studio really reveals the way the members of our species are “sexed” without involving erotic sexuality, though maybe some people feel that vibe too. When a female and a male share some kind of proximity, the complementing is plainly obvious. Nudity is irrelevant to that, though it might lead to some less-than-subtle arousal.
I don’t see why people can’t do their yoga naked, in mixed-gender and mixed-sex spaces, without having to explain themselves.
Posted by: Carl · Dec 18, 12:01 PM · #
But if you observe anything uniquely interesting in, say, sarvangasana, please feel free to explain that.
Posted by: Carl · Dec 18, 12:03 PM · #
who’s down for a post-OT trek out to Harbin?
Posted by: patrick · Dec 18, 12:46 PM · #
Maybe it’s kind of like being on a nude beach? That doesn’t seem like a big deal at all. How is it different? Other than closer proximity?
Posted by: Anna · Dec 18, 02:11 PM · #
Great question, Anna!
Part of the difference might be the ways “groupness” is experienced at the beach. People are with who they are with—there’s not the possibility, really, of intimacy with strangers that you’d have with those in a class or, as DailyM points out, a dance party. But then, considering the interesting, always amusing “research” insights DailyM has gathered, perhaps he’s also been to Portland’s nude beach at Sauvie’s Island and can report back? Those of us who have gone nude in southern Europe had the luck to do so in a culture where the body is no big deal, relatively.
Patrick: You mean harbin? I hear it’s nice. I could hit that. Carl can join. (Carl, did you go to the naked hotsprings where Will Oldham goes in Old Joy?)
Sally, “One Taste” is a reference to a Ken Wilber book and beyond that to a kind of “nondualism of spirit” that he brings in from his following of Nagarjuna. At least I think. I haven’t read that book, although I highly recommend it all of us. And I haven’t read much Nagarjuna either. But I think that is the idea.
Got to run for the moment…
Posted by: (0v0) · Dec 18, 02:39 PM · #
Hmm, I have a gift certificate somewhere in Napa that I wanted to use late spring, maybe it would be fun to hit Harbin too?
Posted by: Anna · Dec 18, 04:53 PM · #
anna, where is your gift-thing sending you to?(i write like a donkey) harbin is freaky-fun. we could all get watsu there. one taste is my favorite wilber book because he reveals his true name-dropper self therein.
Posted by: eor · Dec 18, 05:02 PM · #
I am not sure – somewhere expensive, I believe. It was a prize at an auction thing and I think it also involves a hot air balloon and vineyards? It’s at work… I can let you know tomorrow.
and… MEOWETH!
Posted by: Anna · Dec 18, 05:21 PM · #
Owlful one, yes, as your clever readers have already picked up, that’s the Harbin I mean! I went during a CA trip in summer 2003, and it was brilliant. I’ve also met a guy who used to teach yoga there, and he’s fabulous. In fact, I have a standing invite to spend part of my next SF Bay trip in his house.
Posted by: patrick · Dec 18, 06:49 PM · #
balloons, vineyards, very awesome. meoweth, roar! grr hump!:)
Posted by: eor · Dec 18, 08:35 PM · #
Villagio Inn and Spa, it’s a Thursday-Sunday package that includes a tour of vineyards, a balloon ride and 2 massages. I think I need to bring someone that I want to do naked things with, including or not including yoga? Seems worth a roar, perhaps two?
Posted by: Anna · Dec 19, 07:16 AM · #
I am so definitely not cool. Naked yoga does not sound inviting to me. At. All. I’m picturing
Prasarita Padottanasana. We are just used to seeing each other with clothes on. Which, I suppose is the point, but I think I can live my life without experiencing naked yoga. Okay, I admit it—I did it once. It was really hot and I was BY MYSELF!
Posted by: gartenfische · Dec 19, 09:39 AM · #
Naked yoga isn’t something I really want to do, either. Yoga… Squatting down to play with a kitten… There are some things that are just better done clothed.
Posted by: Carl · Dec 19, 11:20 AM · #
ouch babe! yikes cats, no, had not thought of that, carl.
anna, villagio is really nice, and right there in yountville with all of thomas keller’s restaurants.
Posted by: eor · Dec 19, 03:51 PM · #
What a collection of comments.
I’ve done yoga sans vêtements on beaches in Western France, Marthas Vinyard, and St Martin, perhaps elsewhere. In Vendee, The Wife noticed a bunch of kids who were watching me and imitating the poses. I recall one time in August on MV, when I had finished, there were maybe 3 or 4 or so other people at various parts of the beach who also thought, by golly, it seems a good time to do yoga. In St Martin – I remember, doing ten sun salutations seemed like a lot – 1994, when Principessa was a baby – it ended up being a conversation starter with another person interested in yoga.
There’s a lot to write about here. The range of comments. The shame. The disdain. The denial. The fascination. The rationalization of core instincts beyond reason.
We are big animate lumps of flesh, that will not last for long. Nothing we put on can change this fact.
And nothing we leave off.
Posted by: Tim · Dec 19, 05:47 PM · #
Yes Tim. There it is.
Posted by: (0v0) · Dec 19, 05:56 PM · #
Hi again, (0v0). This has become a hot topic, eh? It might be a digression, but I like wassu and other treatments. I was lucky to work on a project of a spa recently. So I investigated a lot of interesting treatments such as vichy shower scrub, wassu, hot stone massage and others. If you have to create spaces for these things, you have to understand them. I guess I should check out harbin springs. Cheers, Arturo
Posted by: arturo · Dec 19, 08:35 PM · #
The small-college-in-the-middle-of-nowhere where I did my undergrad studies had a tradition of all-day nakedness, every May Day. It started in the ’70s, of course, but when I was there in the early to mid ’90s there was still a little remnant of it.
What happened, at least among the ‘artsy’ group I hung out with, was that the more ‘normal’ the things you did, or the zone into which you put yourself in, while naked, the ballsier you were.
For instance, I played naked Frisbee on the college lawn, sat around a living room in the college literary house naked, did dishes naked, etc. The really cool people did things like walk into the library naked.
One of the rules that was pretty well followed (except in obvious places like the library) was that you couldn’t hang out with a group of naked people unless you were naked, too. I remember once I was at an off-campus party with about 8 or 10 friends. I left the room to go to the bathroom and when I came back, everyone was naked, so I had to take my clothes off. I’ll never forget that – it was so surreal to see everyone in the same position they had been when I left, only now without clothes.
Anyway, in general I really enjoyed all of that. And, weirdly enough, group nakedness always seemed to take sex out of that night’s equation – everyone just sat up all night naked together. I’m pretty sure that some nasty stuff happened at the frat parties, but that’d go over with or without clothes, no?
Anyway, I would do naked mysore yoga, but there couldn’t be any adjusters or teachers or observers. Not comfy.
Posted by: ASHTANGI · Dec 20, 11:29 AM · #
“If you have to create spaces for these things, you have to understand them.”
That is a good call, Arturo. I have learned so much about this topic here, just watching people respond. And especially in the off-blog email this post has generated. My thanks to those who have taken time and helped me learn very much about the nakedness.
Ash: this is great! Your college was better. My flaming friend R once attended a party at the dork-frat (the only one we’d visit, as mentioned above by DailyM) without his clothes. How I remember drinking with him outside in the chill, not not not looking at his sweet vulnerable body.
The next Monday, the Prez had caught wind of it. Announcements were made; prohibitions were issued. I sort of wanted to take after our neighbors at Reed and institute a full on nude waterslide. But there were no hills and I had already flouted the admin enough with a certain hot-boxing incident that was pardoned with great mercy and, because of that mercy, calmed me right down.
Posted by: (0v0) · Dec 20, 04:45 PM · #
Mmm, this owl is remiss. The what-for on naked yoga has been published, long since now, and it’s here.
Transformation of the bodymind in a sex-negative culture; the revulsion we direct at situations with ramped-up body politics when we don’t want to confront something about our own body politics; the possibility for doing self-possession of a shifting if not transforming self—knowing one’s own edge in order to open it without creating more samskaras. That kind of stuff.
Posted by: (0v0) · Dec 20, 05:55 PM · #
don’t forget, as long as we’re One-Tasting, that there is a ton of stuff under “One Taste” on your friend and mine, YouTube.
Posted by: patrick · Dec 21, 11:17 AM · #
god, i can’t believe i missed this. I’m just wondering if I would create a vacuum in maryichi a and be stuck for the rest of the class.
Posted by: laksmi · Dec 29, 08:25 PM · #