Good news! President Donald Trump is making yoga great again!!!
This news comes to us by way of the May 29 USA Today in which Paul Singer reports that the election of Donald Trump has driven many liberals to take up yoga as a means of escape or to energize themselves for the "resistance" ahead. So perhaps those opposed to Trump will discard their basic black Antifa wannabe ninja outfits for yoga pants instead as we learn that Since election, yoga rises off the mat to take on Donald Trump:
President Trump’s election and the political cacophony that followed are driving waves of people to yoga and meditation, seeking a respite from the roller-coaster ride but also trying to recharge and build energy for a political pushback.
Yoga and mediation coaches say they are seeing increased enrollment and fewer dropouts from the annual "New Year's resolution" wave of signups. Part of this is stress relief — the American Psychological Association reports that stress nationwide is on the rise for the first time in 10 years.
But part of it is also meditation as resistance: Liberals see yoga as a place to reflect and recharge batteries for the political fights outside.
Have yoga instructors thanked President Trump for helping to increase their employment? Something to meditate upon.
“This last election especially felt so tumultuous and so dividing — like there was so much angst and anger on both sides,” said Kristin McGee, celebrity yoga instructor and author of a beginner's guide called Chair Yoga. “The whole idea of yoga is to unite or to come together and to create a community. ... people are trying to find a way to come together, to try to find what is it that makes them feel connected and centered.”
Since the election, McGee said, “more and more people are coming to classes, more people are emailing me and asking me about how they can get started or asking me for private sessions.”
...David Romanelli, a Los Angeles-based author and meditation teacher, said he began a program of daily meditations for a group of about 50 clients right around the time of Trump’s inauguration. “Usually you see a lot of attrition — that has not been the case this year. People have stuck to it.”
Julie Campistron, CEO of the meditation app Stop, Breathe & Think, saw the same phenomenon.
Campistron’s app asks users to begin their meditation by choosing words to describe their feelings, and the two days after the election “were the lowest emotional state we've had in the history of the app, over 30% lower than the year's average.” Users chose words like “disappointed,” “powerless” and “pessimistic” nearly three times more often than they had a week before the election.
One wonders if a Trump 2020 re-election victory would bring that emotional state of yoga liberals even lower.
For liberals, yoga has been part retreat, part organizing strategy. After the election, “yoga studios in Washington, D.C., turned into emotional trauma wards,” said Hari-kirtana das, a yoga instructor and author of a new book on the spiritual basis of yoga called In Search of the Highest Truth. Das says the shock to the mostly liberal yoga clientele is driving a change in the training studios offer. “There has been a big uptick in the demand for mediation and meditative yoga as opposed very active energizing yoga” which was more popular two years ago, he said. People “need to find a tranquil space within themselves in order to feel protected from a very antagonistic atmosphere that has been created by this administration.”
Yoga as a gateway to the alternate universe in which Hillary won the election?
The good news for liberal yoga practitioners is that even if they drastically change their political beliefs they can have Trump's Golf Yoga available to them. The following video demonstrates the Golf Yoga exercises one can use to improve their golf game when playing at the Trump National Doral Miami.
Exit question: Will President Trump also inspire Bowling Yoga?
