Comments on: Pay By Donation: An Experiment In Affordable Yoga (Not for Yuppies)

By: Recession Yoga and the Community: Santosha in the City « Dancing Dogs Yoga | Balancing Earth, Mind & Body Dancing Dogs Yoga

Wed, 04 Apr 2012 14:02:29 +0000

[...] getting into the idea of giving, as seen in two of the most respected Yoga outlets on the web, YogaDork and Elephant [...]

By: Sarah

Sarah — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 13:19:00 +0000

There are also a lot of free classes in your neihborhood that people may not know about. Every lululemon in the country offers a FREE community class on Saturday or Sunday. They ask instructors from local studios to come and volunteer their time to teach. It is a great way to check out different instructors who inspire you and practice yoga at least once a week with no damage to your pocket.

By: Jill

Jill — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 17:02:28 +0000

The foundations of yoga including the Yoga Sutras, the Upanishads and the Bhagavad Gita, help us to understand that we are not to escape the responsibilites of this world, but to do our duties with joy and detachment from results. It is not “unyogic” to charge money for services. One does not pursue the teaching of yoga to get rich (good luck) but to make an honest living at something one lives and loves as a service to all our relations. If you are following the yamas as a teacher, there is no reason why you cannot charge a reasonable rate for your services. If you can afford to not charge than more power to you. What about going giving free classes to low income families or offering free classes in other contexts. The attitude that yoga should be by donation only and if you charge you are just a greedy soul is new age mumbo jumbo. Whether you have yoga by donation or charge a set fee, you are STILL IN THE BUSINESS OF TEAHCHING YOGA. Being a yoga educator is an honorable profession, one that I take seriously, devote my life to and dedicate my life to realizing God in all. If a student truly cannot pay for classes, how about taking responsibility for that and asking if there is work-study or some other arrangement to be made? Taking responsiblity for one’s financial well-being is also a practice that can lead to yoga.

By: Kelly

Kelly — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 02:17:54 +0000

Hi YD!
Adding to the roll call of donation based yoga studios-
LOVE Yoga Coop and Black Swan Yoga in Austin, TX. Both studios were founded by folks who wanted to provide a way to create a sense of community and support wellness at the same time.
Cheers,
Kelly

By: Yogini

Yogini — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 19:37:01 +0000

On the other hand, I think this yoga teacher is far from all bad (there is evidence of obsessiveness and hypomania in the approach, as in the business model that reflects the person). I also don’t have the best of karma myself, so who I meet on the path is a reflection of who and what I am, too. Someone with MAJOR problems. That said, I am more or less pay-as-you-go (not an overpriced walk-in, but regular use/pre-registered); in my current life space I have room for a strong home practice.

By: Yogini

Yogini — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 13:52:14 +0000

Depends on the deal. This is an opportunity for a studio to use lowballing bait and switch tactics, which I could smell a mile away when one such thing happened–”recession special” as mirage. So much for diversity in the membership.

By: Yogoer

Yogoer — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 02:23:02 +0000

PS — My favorite model is the membership model, a monthly fee for unlimited classes, since it encourages students to practice frequently and get “a good deal”, instead of feeling like each class they take is only encouraged for profit’s sake. And it’s more stable for the studio.

By: Yogoer

Yogoer — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 02:17:00 +0000

@yogini:
I know studios here in New York that pay $10,000 or $17,000 a month in rent. I empathize with owners who have little business training, just passion, and enter personal bankruptcy for their studio. We could all just practice at home — there are plenty of yoga DVDs and books — but if we enjoy the community space we have to support it. And if we’re really unable to pay, there are many many studios that have always offered work exchange programs.

By: roseanne

roseanne — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 02:02:45 +0000

The pay-what-you-can model is interesting, and I’m curious to see how it works out for these studios. But there’s a part of me that hopes that the current economic climate might mean the downfall of the yoga studio, so yoga can enter other spaces. It would also be interesting to see studios offer more than just yoga (and not yoga + pilates, or massages, or whatever) – to offer space for different ways of working, community resources, non-yoga workshops. While it’s nice to have spaces designed solely for yoga, we don’t *need* to practice, or teach, in studios.

In this conversation, I am reminded of the following quote by Michael Stone (who teaches out of his garage in a working class Toronto neighbourhood): “I think that these teachings belong in alleys, in the gaps… We develop a relationship with people over time. And they develop relationships with each other, so that we can drop into deep practice without the constructs of institutions, even the institutions of the commercial yoga studio.”

By: Linda

Linda — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 01:53:42 +0000

“It’s time yoga studios woke up to the fact that, like it or not, they are a community resource…”

“community resources” still have to pay the rent and keep the lights on or else there’s no more “community resource.