Let’s be honest, most of us have probably spent more time lounging around the past few months due to the fact that COVID has kept us from getting out of the house. At this point, maybe you’re ready to kick things back into gear and start moving around again. But how are you going to go about doing so? Getting on the treadmill? Lifting some free weights? Maybe neither of those sound appeasing. Have you given yoga any consideration?
We chat with Anita Trent, co-founder and owner of West Lafayette’s Be-Moved Power Yoga, where she shares how anyone, and everyone can benefit from taking part in yoga.
Why is yoga so beneficial? What kind of classes do you have to offer?
Yoga can be gentle and accommodating to strenuous and challenging. In my looking, yoga is beneficial because it gives us a break from our very busy lives while allowing us to wrap our breath around our body in a way that is healing and restorative. Another reason why yoga is so beneficial is because every-BODY can do it!
There is a specific type of yoga for every person and that is both special and telling. It tells us that yoga is a desired practice, and the right modality is out there for each individual seeking body awareness, breath & movement, a physical practice, a restorative practice, deep tissue healing through patience and time in a pose (YIN), to name a few. At Be Moved Power Yoga, we use infrared heating panels and heat the room at 90-92 degrees. Hot Yoga has been medically reviewed and has proven benefits; improves flexibility, burns more calories, reduces stress, provides cardiovascular health, and reduces recovery time for muscles.
A growing number of studies have found yoga can aid in the treatment of depression and depression-like symptoms, although it should not take the place of a person’s regular treatment. We ask our students to come out of their talking heads and come into their physical body and their breath. This work is healing and calms the central nervous system.
Be Moved Power Yoga offers all level classes and can be practiced at a gentler pace with variations of the pose that provide ease in the heated environment or the student can alter his or her experience to be more challenging. We teach from a backbone of 11 sequences and 53 poses called Journey Into Power. The instructors bring in their own creative sequences in the space as a teacher and each trained teacher at BMPY has an individual way of teaching. I should also say we are a virtual studio and an in-person studio! Most of our classes are offered online at the same time as we are instructing in the space at BMPY. There is so much power in the two groups coming together, although one group is taking from home, we have them on a screen and faced in-studio yogis.
What drove you to want to teach yoga?
When I was in elementary school, my mother left for work very early in the morning. I would get up and get ready for school with her and have a lot of time to wait until it was time for me to leave to walk to school. PBS had an early morning yoga class that I would watch and practice. That was my first experience with yoga, and it was very positive. I took several yoga classes throughout my life. In 2009 I had a little more time after having left a big job in 2008. I began seeking out yoga classes and taking a variety of styles including meditation. In 2011 I took my first Baptiste style yoga class, and I was immediately engaged and curious about the practice. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say I was blown away by the class and instructor. In June of 2013 with absolutely no-good reason to spend that kind of money at that time in our lives, I signed up for Level One Baptiste Yoga Teacher Training and spent 8 days in Sedona, Arizona with Baron Baptiste, his team of leaders, and 203 other participants. My yoga teacher training journey started then and continued with various training over the years and I am currently enrolled in what is called Fit to Lead with the Baptiste Institute, along with my co-owner Susie Schul. Together, in early 2017 Susie and I founded Be Moved Power Yoga, A Baptiste Power Yoga Affiliate in West Lafayette. I teach yoga because I want students to feel that same “blown away” feeling I felt and still feel about this special physical practice and methodology. I want to empower and inspire others through the practice, and I am most happy in that space. I find myself most clear and confident as an instructor of Baptiste Yoga and I wish to share my energy with others and hope that they then take that energy with them to expand good energy in the world. It’s that simple and so important right now in the human condition we are experiencing.
How do you define wellness?
We define wellness to be ideal when what we say, do, and our way of being all lines up; meaning, when we are walking, breathing, acting, and interacting in our unique truth, living at cause for ourselves and others in an authentic way – not how others want us to be and not pretending, we have achieved true north alignment and in that state of wellness, we are unmissable with, we are empowered and confident and can therefore be ourselves and be up for others in all the places we stand! We can turn the looking from ME to WE, and that is Baptiste Yoga.
How do you strive to keep your clients coming back?
To be honest, COVID has been really tough on our yoga business. We have struggled to know if we can remain open, but every time Susie and I talk about the future of BMPY, we always come back to it’s what we WANT to do and it’s what we are MEANT to do therefore we will figure this out and remain open no matter what the COVID timeline proves to be. We have deep hope for our future and believe our yogis will join us again in the future.
What kind of special events do you have? Have you been able to host events during COVID?
It is Be Moved Power Yoga that brings Greater Lafayette FREE Yoga on the John T. Meyer Pedestrian Bridge! These annual classes on the bridge are a chance for us to take our yoga practice outside of the four walls of the studio and share yoga with any person who wishes to practice with us. It’s so much fun! We have had as many as 200 people join and as few as 12 and a mix in between. We have had children and families walking on the bridge stop and take a few poses with us for fun! We laugh and clap and enjoy the beautiful pedestrian bridge and give thanks for our community and the sameness we share as well as the diversity we honor!
We offer 200-hour Yoga Alliance Approved Yoga Teacher and Leadership Training each year beginning in September. This next year will be no different.
Beginning January 12, I will be facilitating our annual 40 days to Personal Revolution Program in the studio and there is a virtual option as well. This 40 Days program is transformative, and I would invite any person to join us!
How should someone pay you a visit?
We can be found online at www.bemovedpoweryoga.org. One can email us at info@bemovedpoweryoga.com. We also have interested people walk right into the studio for a tour and to ask questions. We use MindBody software on our website and on the MindBody app for class booking. Once new students set up an account with us on MindBody (search Be Moved Power Yoga) it’s an easy process for future booking. Interested yogis should follow us on Facebook and Instagram.
To wrap things up, wellness is going to Yoga in the Park with Be Moved Power Yoga and meeting at Brokerage Brewing Company afterwards for conversation and community. Wellness is working hard on the tasks in front of us, feeling accomplished, and sharing those accomplishments with a listening friend. Wellness is sitting on the porch at Brokerage Brewing Company waving to friends and neighbors passing by and being asked by Dan or Mike, “Hi Anita, how are you doing?” One thing Brokerage Brewing Company and Be Moved Power Yoga have in common is our desire to help create connection and community and I think that offers wellness and a sense of mental health you can’t buy or force or fake. We are up for people. Period.