Yoga in the 90s: The Wild, Weird & Wonderful Early Days

If you practiced yoga in the 90s, you know… it was different.

Before it was in every gym, before online classes, before Lululemon — yoga in the U.S. was a quirky subculture you had to seek out. In this episode of Yoga-ish, we share our funniest, weirdest, and most heartfelt memories from our early years of practice:

• Renting rooms in funky parts of town with circus performers as neighbors
• The original paper-thin blue and green mats that never got cleaned
• Heavy wooden props that could double as furniture
• Our first teachers — from deeply traditional to delightfully eccentric
• How yoga felt before it became mainstream, and what’s changed (for better and worse)

Whether you started in the 70s, 90s, or just last week, this is a love letter to yoga’s evolution — and a celebration of its wonderfully weird past.

Chapters:

00:00 Intro & why we’re talking about 90s yoga

04:03 Andrea’s first yoga class (and the clown car moment)

11:54 Jason’s first yoga class in college

25:11 Quirky studios, circus neighbors & wild props

31:26 What’s changed for better and worse