I take classes at Karma Yoga studio in Cambridge, MA. Recently the studio allow infants to sit in the class while their parents practice yoga. The classes are adult-only classes and not “parent and child” kind of class. Kids are unpredictable and aside from it being unsafe for children it makes it uncomfortable for me hearing a screaming infant while I am in shavashna! I brought it up to the owner of the studio and was ignored. Myself and others asked the on facebook if they can have a non-infant policy and our comments were ignored and later deleted by the owner. Are we just over reacting? If bringing an infant to class a normal thing?
It’s not something that I would find acceptable. I’m not a child-hater - but they have their place and an adult yoga class is not the place.
Doesn’t sound like you are going to have a positive solution with the owner though so I’d suggest trying to find another class if you can’t accept the situation.
I found myself in a similar situation with chronically late and disruptive adults to yoga class. I either had to accept the situation or move on.
In agreeance with you. No way i could concentrate with kids in the room…plus bit hard on the kids “making” them keep quiet and still
Studio owners may do as they please with their business. We vote with our dollars. If you do not like their policies and you’ve attempted to redress them with ownership then cast your vote accordingly.
Change is certainly something a student of Yoga should be open to (not for the sake of it but only for growth in moving toward, rather than away from light) however infants in an adult class, a class that is not “Mommy and Me” seems pointless and without rationale.
As for your reaction, obviously this is two-fold. The first is the held level of equanimity that all students on the path of yoga are cultivating. Here the work is to not get one’s feathers ruffled, not create or attach to drama.
The second is the lesson we garner from the Gita which is that our actions are relative to our dharma and energy needs to be met with energy in that framework. Here the work is to connect with your spirit’s particular purpose in the world and act accordingly. However this is foreign matter to most students and they are not trained (well) to make such a connection. Ergo for some this is problematic.
An occasional interruption can be seen as part of the practice. But if my class was regularly interrupted by crying babies or disruptive kids, and the studio doesn’t see the problem, I would probably vote with my feet and dollars. Especially if they actually deleted reasonable comments or questions on Facebook rather than perhaps explaining their position - again their business and right, but IMO not especially cool. (In fact, I used to attend a class someplace to which someone started bringing their kid, who was an obnoxious brat uncontrolled by parent or teacher, and I stopped going to that class.) If enough people do it maybe the studio will catch on. You’d think if they were going to allow this they could set some rules and perhaps limit it to a subset of classes in an attempt to keep everyone happy.