Inviting Masculinity to the Yoga Mat: A conversation with Jason Gant about gender bias & mindfulness
A native of San Francisco’s Bay View Hunters Point, Jason Gant is not your typical yogi. Towering at 6’3”, Jason is regal in his cocoa brown skin, dope fade and duck-tail (yes duck-tails are making a strong come-back). His silent presence is palpable as he stands on the beach adorned in his colorful African dashiki, XL basketball shorts, sage bundle, and iced-out gold chain. Just kidding — he is rocking a gold chain, but it’s not iced out. Enter Jason Gant…he is everything I described, and more.
Jason Gant is a far cry from the typically circulated image of a yogi. Though the layered yogic science of asanas (postures), pranayama (breath) and pratyahara (mindfulness) was created by melanated sages of the Indian Sub-continent, popular culture tends to almost exclusively market Yoga to thin young white women. As a matter of fact, when thinking of “mainstream” yoga, 5 things typically come to mind:
- Flexible
- White
- Thin
- Female
- Lululemon
Due to subliminal racial & gender bias campaigns marketing Yoga as a sexy health trend that will somehow make us all feel like flexible white women, yoga has trended for decades. But who has benefited from this profitable sales ploy? And who has been harmed? More importantly, who has been uninvited to the yoga mat? Jason contends that many men / masculine folks earnestly want to invite healing into their lives, but they don’t always feel safe or welcomed to do so within the parameters of yoga.
What may seem like a serene yoga studio to those of us who benefit from status-quo marketing, may feel unsafe and isolating for those who are excluded from the invite. Mainstream yoga marketing is harmful because it perpetuates rigid ideas of femininity, body types, and gender, causing the average American to feel unwelcome on the mat, and uncomfortable in their own body. Ironically, yoga’s unfettered boom is directly linked to it being marketed as ultra-feminine and sexy. Yet, this is precisely why yoga still registers as unwelcoming for most Americans — and especially men.
In the last 15 years, Yoga Magazine has donned 4 men on their cover and only 2 plus-size women. That’s almost 200 issues of marketing exclusively to one phenotype and gender-expression. This may come as a shock to the marketing moguls of the world, but believe it or not, not everyone wants to look like sexy white femmes in Lululemon pants. Some of us simply want to be sexier versions of our authentic selves, and the majority of us just want to be healthy and pain free.
At this point you may be wondering why the imagery of who and what a yogi practitioner looks like is so vital? It is vital because through my interviews with Jason Gant, he made it clear that gender bias is not a one way street relegated to women being excluded from predominantly male spaces. Furthermore, there are spectrums to masculinity and femininity, and Yoga culture (in the USA at least) is especially biased towards EXCLUDING a certain type of masculine archetype: Enter cis-gendered male or trans-gendered folks who lean more towards the masculine. Jason contends that this is problematic because if cis-gendered men and transgendered masculine folks are continually excluded from spaces of healing, our society cannot heal from the cyclic ravages of toxic masculinity — nor can it heal from the vestiges of toxic femininity which are byproducts of patriarchal cultures.
Jason is passionate about Yoga being more inclusive because it literally saved his life. Jason Gant played NCAA level basketball for UC Berkeley’s Golden Bears, a favorite in the Pac-12 Conference. He walked onto the team, due to sheer raw talent and drive. He hustled hard to maintain his athleticism and grades as a burgeoning Public Health major. Unfortunately, he worked himself literally to the bone, eventually causing himself a major injury. His injury progressed, and his hoop dreams were fleeting right before his eyes…he could barely walk, and nothing his physical-therapists or doctors prescribed improved his prognosis. He was a young burgeoning athlete, and yet his injury rendered him immobile and riddled with excruciating pain. Out of desperation, Jason tried Yoga. He admits being terribly intimidated to attend his first Yoga class because he was an adolescent masculine jock, and the only classes he found were 98% women. And contrary to popular belief, not every cis-gendered man wants to be in a space surrounded by women in tight pants. Just like a woman might naturally feel uncomfortable being the only female in a room packed with sweaty men. But because Jason was more focused on being healthy than being “cool”, he started taking every Yoga class he could limp into.
Jason has now been a vanguard in the yoga field for over a decade, and he embodies the practice into his work both on and off the mat. With a Masters of Science in Behavioral Health from University of San Francisco, Jason has used his mindfulness expertise to champion healthy masculinity, collaborating with top Title IV officials to transform downward trends of unhealthy binge drinking and high-risk sexual behavior prevalent within universities & competitive athletics. As a former Futures Without Violence Fellow, he understands the ramifications of toxic masculinity, and champions projects which are actively planting seeds of healthy masculinity. Because of this, Jason champions yoga being an inclusive healing modality where all body types, colors, and genders are welcomed. With his wellness firm My Village Tribe, he coaches clients in the art of designing your own life. My Village Tribe is based in principles of global entrepreneurial management, which focuses on an empathetic lens for the consumer, and this empathy is what drives Jason to design welcoming yoga spaces where men & masculine folks also feel welcomed.
When exploring the most important aspects of Yoga, Jason surprisingly does not mention stretching or flexibility at all; instead he emphasizes breath and mindfulness. Jason encourages his students to “tap in” to breath and mindfulness by using the simple act of S.T.O.P.
S: Stop
T: Take a breath
O: Observe
P: Proceed peacefully
But can it really be that simple? My programmed mind won’t allow it to be that simple, so I challenge Jason by asking how can marginalized communities use yoga to combat injustice and inequalities? Jason doesn’t budge, and he calmly responds,
“Through breath and mindfulness”.
“Mindfulness about oppression”? I impatiently retort.
“No…mindful that the breath is more powerful than any weapon of oppression. Mindfulness connected to breath allows us to design our days instead of being taken over by our days”.
Jason further explains that though mindfulness is linked to being aware of the underpinnings of one’s surroundings, it is also inextricably linked to being in the now, and this is where most Americans falter, and relinquish our power. Being “in the now” allows us to be one with our breath, facilitating a certain responsiveness to the bad and the good in our lives. Responsiveness in alignment with our breath, allows us to adapt, cope. and thrive. When we fail to be in the now, we become reactionary — our minds and bodies shut down. Hence, we become imprisoned by the depression of the past, the anxiety of the future, or the daze of dissociation. Jason stresses how Western medicine does not focus on the breath until breathing has gone awry, but Yoga deals with the breath as a daily anchor towards achieving optimal well being.
My Village Tribe is a big proponent of pushing Yoga where it has traditionally been denied, so you will see Jason and his team holding classes in Bay View Hunters Point, Oakland, etc. And becoming a new parent with his longtime college sweetheart has not slowed Jason’s mission of empowering men to “tap in” to the healing practice of Yoga. Convinced that yoga allowed him to be more present during his partner’s gestational journey, he contends that yoga can suture unspoken wounds of the masculine experience, creating healthier individuals, families, and communities. As a teacher and father raising a son under yogic principles, he stresses that yoga is a way of life transcending the confines of a yoga studio. He is adamant that yoga has helped him to be a better man, partner, and father, and he wants other men in need of healing to feel invited to the mat.
Jason can be reached for yoga & mindfulness classes and workshops through the following:
Instagram: @MyVillageTribe
LinkedIn: @My Village Tribe
Twitter: @MyVillageTribe
Email: MyVillageTribe@gmail.com
