om body
I
magine meditating in space with a view
of our earth or practicing yoga on the
beach without leaving your living room.
At EvolVR (evolvr.us), which calls
itself the world’s first virtual reality
(VR) based spiritual and personal growth
community, it’s entirely possible. And you
don’t even have to leave your living room.
EvolVR is a non-profit project of the Centre
for Progressive Renewal in the USA.
It now offers five weekly yoga and
meditation classes on the SocialVR platform
AltspaceVR, and will expand to other
platforms in the following months (AltspaceVR
is another California-based start-up that
provides ‘meeting spaces’ in virtual reality).
“We’ve only scratched the surface of
what’s possible for spiritual exploration
and personal growth in virtual reality,”
says EvolVR founder and CEO, Rev.
Jeremy D. Nickel.
“With new hardware and software
becoming available every week, and theprice of the necessary equipment dropping
steadily, the adventure is really ahead of us.”
The idea takes advantage of a new
generation of VR headsets such as the
Oculus Rift, Oculus Go, and HTC Vive.
These combine powerful technology with
greater affordability.
Participants or ‘students’ at some of
EvolVR’s previous events have brought
people ‘together’ (at least, digitally) from
around the world, including Japan, Korea,
Saudi Arabia, Germany, Sweden, South
Africa, Mexico, Canada and the US.
Attendees ranged in age from 14 to 65
and came from all walks of life, it says.
EvolVR offers 45 minute live events for
free, but soon will add smaller, more intimate
groups with more focused programming,
which will be available for a small fee.
And it’s recruited a bunch of cool yoga
teachers to lead you on your virtual mat –
but you may only ever see their avatar in the
class (check them out in the photo!).Evolve yourself
Don’t get left behind: virtual reality
yoga just got serious