Jivamukti and Integral Yoga Institute have taken on the challenge, and will present NYC Metro Area Global Mala Yoga for Peace Event (a mouthful–and a concert/kirtan) at Baruch College’s Mason Hall, Sunday, September 20th, 6 – 10pm.

Your $15 donation goes to Animal Mukti, a spay and neuter program established by Sharon Gannon at the New York Humane Society.  (This event is looking for volunteers, hint hint.)

Earlier in the day, Yoga for Peace will host an outdoor mala from noon til 3pm—that’s right, 108 sun salutations at Battery Park. You need to pre-register and send in your $20 (see the website).

The evening event is a concert and kirtan featuring some key Jiva figures such as Shyamdas (who appeared in the yoga movie, Enlighten Up!) and Sharon Gannon. Swami Ramananda, president of the Integral Yoga Institute, will speak and so will  Sri Dharma Mittra.

All big vegans and vegetarians.

So, there you go folks! Global Mala NYC is on.

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The white space was hung with long yellow scrims that caught the late afternoon light and brightened the windowless space. The black cushions on the floor were strewn with the petals of red roses, and garlands large and small framed sepia-toned pictures of Guruji at the front of the space. Food was served the back–delicious spicy popped rice with chutney, and samosas and chai.

Four hundred people had RSVPd. Those who came were a good-looking bunch, with a lean, clean, healthy glow. Many had young children with them.  It was a grown-up yoga community, one that has weathered their initial zeal for yoga and matured into seasoned practitioners.

Representing the yoga world were Alison West (Yoga Union), Leslie Kaminoff (Breathing Project), Michelle Demus (Pure Yoga), Hari Kaur (Golden Bridge), Rodney Yee and Colleen Saidman (Urban Zen), James Murphy (Iyengar Yoga NY), Carlos Menjiva (Jivamukti), and someone from Bikram yoga.

On the walls around the space, photos of Guruji, his family, his students, and his travels over the years played in a continuous loop. After Eddie Stern, Jois’ long-time student, director of Ashtanga Yoga New York, introduced the evening, three Hindu priests changed a part of the Upanishads, 18 minutes of piercing, passionate sound meant to disperse the elements back into the world, to help Guruji on his journey. In the background of this austere music, was the sound of children chirping and playing.

“When a great person is born into the world, he affects everyone,” said Stern. “Regardless of whether they follow his teachings or not.”

Other speakers mentioned Pattabhi Jois’ generosity as a teacher, the inclusiveness of his sangha, and his “sympathetic joy”—his availability to all who had even just a flicker of interest in trying yoga.

“He took complete delight that someone was growing through their yoga practice,” said John Campbell, long-time student.

Ruth Lauer-Manenti, a senior Jivamukti teacher, relayed the story of how she first went to Mysore to practice with Pattabhi Jois. “Sharon Gannon [director and co-founder of Jivamukti] had just come back from Mysore. She was thin, thin, thin. She looked kind of green and she had a dislocated shoulder. She said, Ruth, you gotta go. So I went the next day.”

” ‘Yes you can’ was his message—it’s what so many of us took from him,” said Lauer-Manenti whose practice helped her to heal from a near-fatal car accident.

“He always wanted you to do your best, including making it to his birthday every year.”

Jois believed—in fact, he lived the idea—that yoga is the science of transformation: 1% theory, 99% practice. Yoga is mind control: controlling your helter-skelter thoughts and practicing love (plus a 2hr, 6-days-a-week, demanding asana practice) instead.

As he famously said, “Do your practice and all is coming.”

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Judging from my texts and tweets from Thursday and Friday, I am super glad that I do not run a yoga studio. What a headache! I’m a writer not a marketer!

And yet, I do run yoga retreats, and I do want to write more about yoga and business (and the business of yoga).

What I learned: the (global) recession doesn’t stop people from opening yoga studios. When Bob Murphy of MindBodyOnline (the next inline to be a big stats provider to the yoga world) asked who was planning to open a studio, about half the people in a room of, oh, 50 -70, shot up their hands. Jeez.

Average annual profit at a yoga studio: 17%. Yes, ladies and gents, it’s still a labor of love.

And as Connie Chan, founder of Levitate Yoga (which, at 7 months pregnant, she just sold) outlined, owning a studio means dealing with: lawyers, accountants, landlords, NY State, and the Feds, and that’s even before you’ve auditioned teachers, painted your walls, and installed check-in software. Oy!

And then there are the licence centers that offer teacher training programs. (See Yoga Dork’s astute rundown of the complex—and exceedingly compromising (perhaps crippling)—issue.)

People have come from Russia, Poland, Germany, Canada, Brazil and other parts of South America to learn how to either run their existing business better or how to start on the right foot.

Charlie Barnett who left finance in America to open Yoga Flow in Sao Paulo said he couldn’t imagine doing some of the (very practical) things that the (very experienced) presenters were suggesting—such as drawing up a budget for his studio. In Brazil, he said, things are about 15 years behind. (Not to mention that you have to monitor the banks down there (money disappears from your accounts) and internet service (including networked servers) cut out at least once a day, leaving you, jack-of-all-trades to get systems up again).

As has been the case til recently in the US, in Brazil mingling money and yoga is very much frowned upon. But still a studio’s gotta survive.  Ganesh Das, managing director of Jivamukti Yoga School, suggests thinking of money as necessary energy, “At Jiva, money is a form of energy that the center needs so we can use the school as a platform for change in this world. Therefore, you have energy coming into our school through purchases that keep operations going, and it goes to teachers as energy that then goes through their teachings and then comes back to us in a circle.”

In fact in the US, says Brent Kessel, financial analyst, ashtangi and YJ columnist on money, says we’re moving away from an Innocent/Idealist/Caregiver dominated way of running studios. As more people make career changes midlife, they’re bringing more level-headed (Guardian), entrepreneurial skills (Empire Builder) attitudes to running yoga studios. (For example, see Yoga High and Mala Yoga in New York.)

Ana Forrest’s marketing manager Lynann Politte showed us how to brand: color! image! message! consistency! and Beverley Murphy (Bob’s wife) demoed guerilla marketing techniques—yes, those postcards *do* have an effect; yes your most dedicated students are worth your love and attention; yes, you do need to have specials if you want revenue.

All in all it was a pretty interesting couple of days, but as I drift towards bed I’ve got dollar signs in my eyes where there used to be meditating yogis. Guess that’s the bottom line talking, huh?

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