New Yorkers come together to practice breathwork naked, hail experience

An event space in New York's hip neighbourhood saw a breathwork experience last week in which participants took part in guided breathing exercises and a vegan dinner, all while being naked. Men as well as women took part in the 'Füde Breathwork Experience' which reportedly had no sexual aspect but was aimed at connecting the participants with their "most pure authentic selves" as per the experience's founder Charlie Ann Max (29).

Max's love for cooking, nudity, and companionship inspired her to host her first naked group meals in 2020.

She now organizes four sister events in New York and Los Angeles, including The Füde Dinner Experience, The Füde Breathwork Experience, The Füde Clay Experience, and The Füde Photo Experience.

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The name pays homage to Max's German-Jewish heritage and is pronounced like "food."

The participants need to pay between USD 44 to USD 88 for entry.

It's "definitely worth it," said Niko Jane, who participated in Friday's event, her third Füde.

"It's stepping out of your comfort zone in such a safe way, even though it doesn't seem like that walking in the door," said Jane. "When you get here, you're... everyone's a little timid and a little, like, slow. But I mean, the more you're here, people are just hanging out, and we just happen to be naked. It's nice to be in a space that's not sexual. Naked."

A breathwork facilitator guided the participants through the breathing exercise after which they had a vegan dinner of herb salad, basmati rice, and chocolate-covered strawberries.

Many, like Mehow Podstawski, focused instead on the breakthroughs that came from the breathwork.

"Out of nowhere, I realised that I was working through a fear that I didn't know I had, and I just started crying," said Podstawski. "And all of a sudden, it was like this fear that you have is so irrational that it doesn't matter, and you are powerful enough and strong enough to, like, go through this, and take on the next opportunity that comes your way because you are, you have the strength, and the only reason why you're saying 'no' is because you're scared. And so that was really nice."

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Everyone who attended the event had to register through a website and then were screened so that participants would have safe experience.

"A lot of times people are nervous," said Max. "People are coming in for the first time to experience nudity in a group, and so it's important that we have different facilitators to come in to help people feel more comfortable."

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