If the goal of yoga is to find inner peace and distance yourself from the outer world, then doing yoga near a celebrity is probably not ideal. But if the goal of yoga is to find that inner peace no matter your surroundings, it’s actually perfect.
Hilaria Baldwin likes to introduce herself as a yoga teacher. She founded Yoga Vida, a New York studio with several locations, has four children with her husband Alec (Baldwin), and co-hosts the Mom Brain podcast. But she’s teaching three yoga classes at Saks Fifth Avenue over a few months, starting with this morning.
What is it like taking a yoga class from Hilaria Baldwin? For me, it did not start well, as she had us do what felt like ten minutes of jumping jacks. But I was charmed, and inspired, when Baldwin went into a headstand while wearing five-inch Prada suede stiletto boots. Help me, Hilaria. How can I be that good at yoga?
“People work so hard when they’re beginners and as you get better at it, you learn what muscles you don’t have to use,” she said. “You don’t scrunch your face during an ab workout because you know it has nothing to do with your belly.” In other words, know what muscles you need to use, and relax the ones that you don’t.
As for the headstand with stilettos, she says it’s really just a party trick (to be fair, she was a dancer and a gymnast before she was a yogi). “The feet have nothing to do with it, that’s all. Now if I’m balancing on one foot in heels, that’s more impressive. But with a handstand the feet are just in the air. It’s all a trick.”
In summation: You don’t have to do a headstand. But if you do, may as well do it in heels.