Luna created Naked Yoga Dallas in 2016 following a four-day weekend at the Austin Weekend Yoga Camp, where Luna’s weekend consisted of camping and yoga while becoming one with nature — quite literally.
“It was really amazing,” Luna says. "[The camps] would always sell out. They would pull in like 250 men from all over the world and that really inspired me.”
After his experience in Austin, Luna wanted to create something similar in Dallas: a place where men could be free of their clothes and in a safe, de-sexualized environment.
“I thought ‘They have naked yoga in Austin. Do they have something like this in Dallas?’” Luna recalls. “Whenever I would search stuff like ‘men’ and ‘naked’ and ‘yoga,’ I would find nothing but porn. I was kind of disappointed, so I figured I would get something like that started in Dallas.”
Thus, Naked Yoga Dallas was born. Each week, Luna encourages men over the age of 18 to come to class, remove their clothes and make new friends. He aims to de-sexualize the human form to help each student embrace their own body.
Naked Yoga Dallas offers different styles of yoga, including hatha, a “burn and balance” class, and a slow “vinyasa” flow class. Different instructors come to teach the classes each week, including Nick Weilbacher, who has been teaching naked yoga since last September after attending a class in Austin.
“The teacher who was supposed to teach this naked yoga class didn’t show up,” Weilbacher says. “He got stuck in traffic, and they asked if anyone could teach the class. I found a moment of courageousness and offered to teach. I felt it was something I needed to cultivate more in my life.”“Whenever I would search stuff like ‘men’ and ‘naked’ and ‘yoga,’ I would find nothing but porn. I was kind of disappointed, so I figured I would get something like that started in Dallas.” — Israel Luna
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Weilbacher later reached out to Luna and asked if he could use his class as an opportunity to fine-tune his yoga teaching skills. He believes that more people should find liberation and solace in their bodies, he says.
“I enjoy cultivating community and providing a place for people to feel unashamed,” Weilbacher says. “There’s so much shame around the male body and feelings that you need to cover yourself and follow these rules. I think that this is a great place for people to kind of shed their skin and have a good time.”
The instructors of Naked Yoga Dallas say that their students are finding that practicing yoga in the nude is beneficial, both mentally and physically. The practice is meant to be an equalizing experience, bringing together men of all races, classes, religions and backgrounds.
“When you do yoga, being naked really helps with the posture and with the poses,” Luna says. “It’s also a good way for the instructors to see if the students are doing the poses correctly. But the biggest thing for me, with doing it naked, is it's a mental thing. You immediately bond with other people because you're stripped of all materialistic stuff. So whether you make a ton of money or not very much money, none of that matters. It doesn't matter what car you drive or anything like that. Everyone is exactly equal.”
