But 25 years later, Fisk — who a decade ago opened Center for Yoga, Movement & Massage, 1780 E. Grand River Ave. — uses the ancient practice of yoga in every part of her life.

Reaping the benefits, inside and out

While today yoga seems to be a hip trend among celebrities and average people alike, Fisk, 50, said it hasn’t always been this way.

“(Twenty-five years ago, yoga) was not popular,” she said. “You heard about yoga because someone said, ‘Hey, you ought to try this.’”

She said classes usually had only five or six people and were often held in someone’s living room, almost like a private lesson.

“Yoga used to be strictly a lifestyle,” Fisk said. “If you started studying yoga, you started studying because you wanted to understand the philosophy, you wanted to lead a different type of life. Now it’s used for fitness, plain and simple.”

Fisk said there are physical and health benefits to yoga, but it’s very difficult to generalize what they are because it can be different for each person.

“Overall, yoga can balance all the body systems, mentally and physically,” she said. “Practices can be designed to help heal injuries and build more strength.”

Chris Thompson, a staff physical therapist at Physical Therapy, 3315 E. Michigan Ave., in Lansing, part of Ingham Regional Medical Center, said a lot of stretches used in physical therapy overlap with poses used in yoga.

“Sometimes (physical therapy and yoga) go hand in hand,” Thompson said, noting that the physical therapy center often refers people to Center for Yoga.

Courtney Gallaher, a geography graduate student, said she started taking yoga classes as a sort of physical therapy because she had knee problems from dancing ballet.

“I thought the stretching might help my knees,” Gallaher said.

“(But) I started to notice that overall my whole body started to feel better.”

Gallaher, who has been taking classes at Center for Yoga for more than three years, said she practiced yoga informally with her father while growing up, and that it’s hard not to translate the practice to other aspects of life.

“I think that a lot of yoga is just learning to take care of yourself,” she said.

“I don’t necessarily follow yoga philosophy, but I do think some of the philosophy is true for any walk of life.”

On Monday evening, Gallaher took Fisk’s advanced yoga class, taught in a hot, dimly lit room with wood floors.

Outside of the room her class used is a library of books about yoga and an open area for students to wait before class.

Fisk said the practice definitely can reduce stress for college students, but it also can help keep their perspective on the world.

“College students have to get very involved, very wrapped up in what they’re doing,” she said.

“Yoga allows the whole system to let down for a few minutes (because it’s) a balance of activity and rest.”

This proved to be very true for 2007 MSU graduate Cheyney Dobson, who said yoga calmed her when she was in school.

“(Yoga) was one place I found I could go to detach from that and really have time to give to myself,” she said. “It helped me survive through college.”

Dobson, who is a part of Fisk’s teacher-training program, said it’s important to know yoga isn’t about competition or judgment.

“You do (yoga) to connect with all people,” she said. “It’s not a religion, but it’s a philosophy. It’s about being a compassionate person to all people and all things.”

Fisk said it makes her and the other teachers at the yoga center chuckle when people ask if her classes are a workout.

“Our response is, ‘No, it’s a work-in,’” she said. “Yoga is very physical, but it’s working inward toward the self, not toward the physical physique.”

A common misconception is yoga is a short-term practice, Fisk said.

“I think people think that they can come in, get fit, understand it and go, and then go on perhaps to the next trend,” she said.

“It’s a long-term investment.

You can expect physical and emotional (and) psychological spiritual results after a few months, but it takes years to understand the practice.”

Off the mat, into the home

For most practicing yogis (men) or yoginis (women), such as John and Ruth Fisk, the philosophy of yoga goes far beyond the physical movement used in a class.

She said part of living a yogic lifestyle includes following 10 principles — five “yamas” and five “niyamas” — that can be interpreted in different ways and applied to many aspects of daily life.

Among the yamas and niyamas are honesty, not being greedy, contentment and purity.

Ruth Fisk said purity has to do with a clean environment and “clearing the energy of the house,” which starts with removing your shoes upon entering the family’s Okemos home.

“It’s a symbol that I’m leaving the outside behind and entering the sacred space of my home,” she said.

Inside, Ruth, John and their two sons, Tyler, 15, and Liam, 12, work to be environmentally friendly by recycling and abstaining from the use of cleaning chemicals.

“We use vinegar and baking soda, things like that, so our environment is very clean,” Ruth Fisk said, noting the family also tries to eat locally, organically and sustainably.

John Fisk, 48, said his full-time job, working at an international nonprofit organization that focuses on sustainable food and farming systems, and alleviating poverty, also fits into the yoga lifestyle.

“It’s about saving the planet in a sense — about making the world a better place — and that’s very consistent with yoga,” he said.

“(I) try to draw consistency so that you’re living out the philosophy instead of just on the (yoga) mat.”

John Fisk said a big part of yoga is balancing the principles with the fast pace of today’s culture.

“I think originally yoga was designed as a technology or methodology for enlightenment as defined by the yogic scriptures,” he said. “But for somebody living with a job and a family in today’s society, it’s a pretty different thing, a different endeavor You have to live in the society you live in, but also hold these values.”

Tyler and Liam have been raised on these values, which Ruth Fisk said sometimes might make them feel like “the odd man out,” but they have gained a lot from it.

“They sure are not influenced by peer pressures, and they’re gonna make conscious choices,” she said.

“They make very conscious choices.”

As a result of these practices, Ruth Fisk said her family is very close-knit.

“We have a culture of respect that we’re trying to teach our kids and live,” she said.

“We don’t drink coffee, we don’t follow that speedy lifestyle kind of thing because then we don’t have time to think about what we’re feeling and what we’re experiencing and what’s coming in and what’s going out.”