NiM's 7 year Anniversary + FUTURE PLANS

Hi Patrons,

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY!!!

7 years ago today, Naked in Motion held its first Naked! Yoga class in NYC. A special shoutout to our clients who have been with us from day 1!

This message is going to our newsletters, but wanted to make sure it was on here, too.

A lot has changed since 2016, and I want to especially thank our Patrons who have continued to support the business through the low times. As many of you know, I took a sabbatical in May of last year due to crippling burnout after all we’d been through with the pandemic. That time gave me the space I needed to work on mental health, and also to figure out what I want to do with Naked in Motion next. I honestly wasn’t sure I’d even return; all the studios we used closed, our Instagram got shut down, and the content production for our online content didn’t feel sustainable. Basically, almost everything that made up the Naked in Motion experience was gone, and it was debilitatingly discouraging.

But it turns out I still have a lot of passion for my work, so I’m back in action and filled with ideas about what I want to do next. I feel excited about what we’re working on now, which is a feeling I completely lost last year. I wanted to send a detailed update about where we’re headed. I’m making a video to say the same thing, but I’ll write it here as well. There is a lot of info coming up, so please read on.

Naked in Motion

I’ve been working since November to do the boring paperwork part of the business, and that’s still in progress. Other than that, the first thing I knew for sure was that I wanted to finish my online Beginner’s Guide to Naked! Yoga Workshop. I had the script and many of the videos already filmed, but I’m a different person now and I’ve realized I can’t film large projects without help. I’ve hired a videographer with a small crew who will film and edit the video. I also hired local yoga teachers to join me on the movement parts of the video so you’ll see more demonstrations of different options. We’re set to shoot in the first week of February, 6 days in a row, 8 hours a day. Granted, we added a lot of fluff time for breaks, but I can already tell this is going to be one of the most intense things I’ve done so far. If you want to stay updated on the launch of the workshop, sign up here.

I honestly think the Workshop will be widely beneficial for lots of you. Even if you’re not new to nude yoga, you’ll likely still benefit from this deep dive into how to use yoga and meditation to deal with body shame and develop more self-compassion. In the workshop, I also talk about how “Naked!” can be interpreted more loosely since you’re doing the workshop alone at home. If the first step toward a naked yoga practice for you is wearing a tank top instead of a sweatshirt, that’s enough! Maybe your next step is to not avoid looking at your body. The point is, there are many ways to use it and a lot to get out of it, even if you’re not the target demographic (those who never thought they’d do naked yoga).

I know a lot of you have been emailing about future in-person classes. At this time, I’m not going to be able to re-create exactly what we had before with weekly sessions and different instructors in multiple cities. It’s financially and energetically draining, and after all we’ve been through, I’m not ready to jump in that far. However, in-person classes are my favorite part of the experience, so I will start getting back into in-person classes this year. I’ve found a new studio in Seattle to use, and I’ll likely do some more on the east coast, but for now, all classes will be pop-up classes, more like infrequent special events. In the future I’d love to offer more, but this is the best I can do for now. If you want to help us move farther in that direction, the best thing you can do is keep supporting us on Patreon.

Patreon

Speaking of Patreon, I unlocked the library of content and made it accessible to everyone for as little as $5. I hope y'all were able to make good use of the Table of Contents and find some helpful stuff. It’s likely that I may have to go back to a tiered plan in the future, but for now, nothing will change. Soon I’ll start adding back in my bi-weekly update videos for some behind-the-scenes insight, and I’m going to be looking into getting other instructors involved to take some work off my plate. We’re making shirts for our video shoot, so we’ll probably start selling merch to you soon, too. Stay tuned, and as always, I can’t thank you enough for your support.

Soma Locus/Instagram

Naked in Motion will now continue as a specific branch of another project called Soma Locus (website to come). Essentially I’m taking my mission out into the clothed world to try igniting more radical discussions of body-acceptance. “Soma” is Greek for “body”, and “locus” is Latin for a specific or abstract “place”. It’ll be a space for body compassion, and a place/space is often where people come together, and this can be in person or online. But also, my favorite way to describe me in a state of body compassion is when it feels like all parts of me are on the same side, cheering for each other. So, it’s a place for union within your mind and body, and yoga means “union.”

This will take a bit longer to get going, but the goal is the same: to help people develop more compassion for their bodies and have a friendlier relationship with themselves. Naked in Motion, then, will be a branch; a very specific and extreme way of doing this. It’ll start as a Youtube channel with a website and Instagram. There will be some yoga asana on the channel, but I also want to do more video blogging to explore these other ideas further. I’ll be interviewing people on how things besides body size can create body shame, everything from STI status to plastic surgery to skin conditions. I want to partner with other people to show ways other than yoga for developing body-acceptance. This stuff will be free, so it’ll eventually have its own Patreon to fund it.

Speaking of Instagram, we got shut down for “sexual content” which is bullshit, but I knew it’d happen eventually. Naked in Motion has consistently faced advertising challenges due to the nature of the business, sometimes even because of the name alone. So everything about Naked in Motion will be posted and tagged in the @somalocus account. It’ll be more of an all-encompassing landing page, and hopefully make it less tricky to dodge the bots. There’s nothing on the page now, but we’ll start posting little things soon, so please follow @somalocus on Instagram and stay tuned/spread the word!

Closing notes

One last thing, I won’t be teaching any private lessons in person or online for the time being. I’m going to focus on all these other things for awhile, and I’ll let you know if I start opening up my private practice again.

I’m really excited to move forward with all this, but as usual, I’m probably a little too excited about it. The biggest challenge for me getting back into work has been to move more slowly and not fall back into unsustainable habits that would cause another burnout. It’s remarkably challenging, but I have a lot of support. Knowing there’s so much I want to do, and so much y'all want in the future, makes me want to buckle down, but instead I’ll ask for your patience as I take the time needed to move forward in a healthier manner.

As usual, all of this costs money, and I still really rely on the support of our Patrons to keep us going. If you’re already on our Patreon please consider increasing your monthly pledge if available to you. 

I think that’s all I’ve got for now. Please be kind to yourselves, even for not always being kind to yourselves. I look forward to seeing what happens next!

Willow