How I Move Adriene Mishler

Youtube phenomenon omenon with millions of global bal followers opens up on lockdown, ckdown, politics and how w yoga can bring people together ogether in these tumultuous ous times

I challenged those who wanted to unfollow me and asked what if our yoga could unite us

I met my business s partner on the set of an independent dent horror film – not your typical yoga project origin.

Prior to meeting eeting him and setting up the Yoga a with Adriene Youtube channel in 2012, I was already committed d to being a full-time yoga teacher, her, despite doing other jobs. As a young twentysomething-year-old, year-old, working out didn’t t feel good to me but I liked being active. ctive. The more I started to practise yoga and guide others, the more I started to see that this feels really y good and connected, like something mething that could just save us all. So by the time my business partner er wrote to me to see if I was interested ted in doing a yoga Youtube channel, nnel, I was game for anything.

When the cost of yoga started to go up, as it grew in popularity, my mission crystallised.

n allised. I realised, wow, if I’m m scrubbing floors to get into a yoga class, and I’m a full-time teacher cher who’s devoted to this stuff, ff, what about all of the other factions ns of people who probably won’t ever er get access to it when it’s $18 per class? lass?

If you scroll back far enough on the channel, I actually said my mantra “find what feels good” in the very first Yoga with Adriene video.

ually at a I still stand by that mantra, even if the meaning g has evolved, as I still think “find what feels good” is awesome because se it puts the individual in the driver’s river’s seat.

I could never, in my wildest dreams, have imagined gined that I would be part of creating this incredible eight-million million subscriber global community.

That so many people would d hit the subscribe button is awesome, e, but what’s pretty remarkable is the way the community formed pretty early on and continues to grow. Travelling and touring made me realise just how real these friendships across oceans have become through the channel.

I genuinely was not planning on ever having my dog Benji in the videos.

Then I realised that it helps create a setting where whatever’s going on in your house is acceptable for practice today, just like whatever is going on in my house is acceptable today. Now, with the pandemic, it’s quite common to have at-home yoga practice through the screen. But when Benji first started making appearances, the wellness industry had kind of stolen yoga for a second and made it this “one thing”. So I was really trying to show up as a real person, rather than doing all this production. Benji was a good way of breaking that fourth wall.

It felt weird to be getting all this “good press” in the beginning of such a tumultuous, scary time Global influence: Adriene Mishler’s yoga channel, including her dog Benji, has eight million subscribers with lockdowns around the world.

Bu But I told myself I wasn wasn’t going to get distrac distracted by that. I would feel weir weird if we had just started, but w we’ve been at this for a while and the goal has always been the same: to p provide as much free yoga to as man many people as possible. I feel grateful I have something that could be of use during this time. I wish it wasn’t quarantine that brought m more at-home yoga to people’s lives lives, but I embraced it.

I appreciate p people high-fiving me for using my voice in politics, but I’ve alwa always done that – I just think I didn’t have a bigger following be before, so nobody noticed.

Whe When Donald Trump won the presidenc presidency in 2016 I’m pretty sure I posted about it and used colourful lang language and asterisks and had a bad word on that. But the engagement o on Instagram in the last few years has grown a lot. I launched “Be “Benji’s Get Out the Vote Campaign” on social media to encourage my followers to vote in the president presidential election.

As a yogi, I had to make the choice to take responsibility for the difficult conversations on my platform too, not just the yummy stretches.

We always were steadfast in challenging ch ourselves to say ‘yoga fo for all’ and continue to hold space for all. I think with just how polarised we’ve become, especially in m my country, when you cast that wide net you have to also be willing to p provide the safe space for everyone t to have their opinion, because your audience don’t all agree on the s same thing. I was born and live in Au Austin, Texas, so have practice in tha that when we go to the store or when we talk to family members. You You’re not necessarily chatting with someone that is voting the same sam way as you. I do feel proud for challenging members who wanted to unfollow me right away and lovingly asking them, what if you stayed? What if our yoga coul could be one thing that unites us and helps us understand our fundamental fundamen differences?