The latest trend in meditation and stress relief - hooping?

JEEP

The Living Force
FOTCM Member
http://www.dispatch.com/live/content/life/stories/2010/06/01/hoopla.html said:
HOOPLA
Toy comes back around for fitness, meditation, even more

Tuesday, June 1, 2010 02:51 AM
By Amy Saunders
The Columbus Dispatch

It's called, simply, hooping. "Hula-Hoop" is a trademarked name for a 1958 Wham-O toy. And, besides, this isn't about standing in your driveway, counting rotations around your hips.

The new hooping is about performance art, dance, exercise, stress relief and the never-ending pursuit of cool tricks: hooping around knees, on shoulders and across backs, from one leg to the other - with fire, even.

It's a major hobby for members of the Columbus Hooping Collective, a "hoop troupe" of about 25 people that practices at Goodale and Whetstone parks, and travels to "hoop jams" throughout the country.

"It's like a whole underground city," said Kerry Rose Hartnett, 23, of Victorian Village. "Everyone knows what it is, but no one understands the intensity we put into it.

"It's an addiction; it's a total hoop addiction."

Like others in the group, Hartnett got her start not in childhood but at Bonnaroo and other music festivals, where some attendees hoop to the music instead of sitting or standing.

The hooping resurgence is often attributed to the jam band String Cheese Incident, known for tossing hoops into the crowd at its shows in the late 1990s, said Philo Hagen, founder of the informational website Hooping.org.

With its 40,000 weekly visitors, Hooping.org is a full-time job for Hagen, who started it as a blog in 2003.

Since then, he has received e-mail not just from big-city hoopers but also from people in smaller towns looking to hoop for childlike fun, exercise or a sense of community.

"The fact that I often know of a group near them tells me it's much more popular than it ever has been," said Hagen, 46, of Los Angeles. "And when you have something that's good for you physically and emotionally - that makes you feel more in touch with yourself - how could it not be growing?"

In the past few years, the activity has inspired many hoop-specific events, including Hoop Convergence, a five-day retreat in Carrboro, N.C., that ended last Tuesday.

Friends Elaine McGarvey and Steven Seaquist drove nine hours from Columbus to the festival, where, for $500 apiece, participants learned new techniques and theories for more than six hours daily in workshops taught by professional instructors and performers.

Afterward, they hooped casually as late as 3 a.m., admiring the style of each attendee. The 3-year-old event was sold out at 140; attendance could have been twice that, organizers said.

"I tried to take pictures of it, and it doesn't even translate; the energy was just insane," said McGarvey, 21, of the Short North. "I'm so excited to show everyone what I've learned."

A smaller but similar scene played out recently at Whetstone Park, where the Columbus Hooping Collective gathered to enjoy a sunny afternoon, share techniques and talk hoops.

Each hoop is unique, usually fashioned from about $5 of irrigation piping and decorated with colorful tape. (Hoops for glow-in-the-dark performances - featuring internal LED lights or Kevlar wicks that hold fire- can cost more than $100.)

An adult hoop is larger, heavier and, therefore, easier to rotate than the Hula-Hoops that Kristen Marra Marek could never seem to maneuver in her youth.

Inspired to try again after her children began hooping in their Grimaldi Circus classes, she still struggled to hoop for a week before realizing that the motion consisted mostly of rocking back and forth, leaning onto an extended front foot.

"It has nothing to do with moving your hips," said Marek, 43, of the Clintonville neighborhood. "This is, like, a huge accomplishment. If I can do it, anyone can do it."

Having mastered the basics, McGarvey demonstrated how to whip the hoop from one leg to the other, sending it up to her shoulder in one fluid motion - so fast that its path was almost untraceable.

As she swayed to the music and twisted her arms into the air, Laura Garcia's hoop slid up and down from her shoulders to her stomach and her knees. Balancing on one foot, she leaned forward at a 90-degree angle while the hoop swirled rapidly around her thigh.

"You just feel the music and the rhythm," said Garcia, a 22-year-old senior at Ohio State University. "At first, you can't do anything, but, the first time you do a trick, it feels so good."

Thrilled by the hoop tricks he began learning in October, Seaquist decided a month later to add fire to the mix.

With six burning wicks extending from his hoop, he shimmied it up and down his torso, raising his arms in and out of the hoop while managing to avoid the flames.

"It's exhilarating," said Seaquist, a 20-year-old student at Columbus State Community College. "I'm fearless with it - which is good and bad."

He has escaped injury, but McGarvey's arms are pocked with burns from fire-

hooping incidents. ("It happens all the time; they'll heal," she said nonchalantly. "It's worth it.")

Others hoop less for performance and more for exercise: Nintendo's Wii Fit has a hooping game; fitness company Gaiam and actress Marisa Tomei last week released a workout DVD called HoopBody.

Hooping has helped Kate Dech lose 70 pounds since she took up the hobby last year. The 23-year-old, who founded the Columbus Hooping Collective after a trip to San Francisco, also credits the activity with strengthening her arms and core, and improving her posture and attitude.

"It's boosted my confidence tremendously," said Dech, a Dublin resident. "It's just how I feel when I get up in the morning; I have a more positive view about things."

Seaquist finds the activity to be such a stress reliever that he hoops all winter in his bedroom (despite having broken a few valuables).

And, for McGarvey, a rhythm with the hoop is like meditation.

"There's a state you can achieve. ... It's almost spiritual," she said. "The hoop and your body are like one."

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Whoa - playing with fire literally! Interesting concept in regards to stress relief and meditation - does spinning a hoop actually allow the creation of a meditative state? How would it be if one recited the POTS in rhythm with the swaying hoop? A useful exercise?
 
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