Australia, could you consider stretching nakey in a studio with your bae?
Nude couples yoga is currently touring the country and undressing a whole list of cities along the eastern seaboard, including Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Byron, Gold Coast, Rockhampton, and Mackay. It has the potential to take you and your mate (the sexy kind of mate, not a mate-mate) to second base real quick.
The ‘workshops’ are all done in dimly-lit, 30-degree-C heated space, and involve two hours of:
- stretching totally starkers,
- ~connecting emotionally~,
- breath-work,
- meditation,
- basic partnered-yoga poses suitable for beginners,
- and much, much more.
#MOOD. Here’s more about the movement, if you +1 are so inclined:
These nude yoga classes are the brainchild of Rosie Rees. The Perth-based yoga teacher and relationship counsellor started teaching nude yoga in May this year (after two and half years of teaching normal, clothed yoga), and says that her couples classes are about building non-sexual intimacy and normalising nudity:
The only time you see your partner in the nude is usually in the shower, bath or bedroom. So we wanted to created a really safe, honouring space for couples to come and be naked in front of each other in a respectful way. It builds trust, communication and really healthy boundaries with each other. It’s like extended foreplay without trying to be; it takes you on a journey where you’re going deeper with your partner – you’re looking into their eyes, massaging them; you’re doing partnered stretches and having contact with each other which is playful and brings you together.
She says she gets couples who’ve been together for 25 years coming along, as well as couples who’ve only just starting seeing each other coming in for their first date:
We had this guy recently in Melbourne, he sent me an email asking, ‘what do you think about this’ because he had a love interest, and he ended up booking the tickets and it turned out really great for them!
Nude couples yoga is less this…
And, more this…
While it may seem gratuitous to some, Rosie explains that there are some impactful benefits of doing yoga in the buff versus traditional clothed yoga:
The biggest is obviously vulnerability. Being able to come in and take your clothes off confronts a lot of people, but it also takes them out of their comfort zone. Being vulnerable takes a lot of strength, so when people come in they really transform themselves, especially their body image perception and their self-love and acceptance.You also develop more body awareness. It’s really freeing to be able to twist and turn and hold the postures without your clothes on – to not be squeezed in by tights and yoga bras. Nude yoga takes you to another level that yoga usually doesn’t. It’s great for clearing the mind and releasing stress, and generally just getting to see how you body works.
Rosie also runs private one-on-one classes as well as her hugely popular, sell-out classes for women:
I was surprised no one had done it sooner. For me, I always wanted to teach nude yoga, and I really felt, after the Free The Nipple Movement and there was recently a Bondi Nudie Dip, that now was the time to put it out there, and obviously the classes have been very popular and it’s been received so positively, which shows women are really ready to embrace their bodies and start accepting themselves.
